Wow this is an amazing thread.... I went to Barcelona as a Rotary exchange student wayyyy back in the 80s (From Ohio also) and it totally rocked my world. I had Spain on the brain but there was no internet, nothing around me to keep me in touch, and everyone around me thought I was nuts.

I married a Turk in the mid 90s, and we went back and forth between Turkey and the US but I never developed the same feeling for it, thinking it was some emotional block on my part, and I had convinced myself that i was being silly and immature with my love for all things Spanish.

We live full time in Istanbul now, but I have never met another expat here with the same addiction to Turkey that I had and you all seem to have for Spain. We have been coming to Madrid on holidays (during the Eids) for the last few years now and will be there again during the Sacrifice Holiday in November.

I am so glad to read what you all have written here, and glad to know after a couple decades that I wasn't as crazy as everyone else thought me to be. Thank you!