Chorizo n' Oreos

No, this is not the post where we tell of our fabulous new apartment.... that post has yet to materialize.

However, we had a pretty interesting day. After three nights in the apartment-hotel where we were staying on Atocha (one of the main streets in Madrid), loud, dirty, and busy, we were relocated to another apartment-hotel in another area called "La Latina" until Wednesday. We are on a tucked-away street, in a working class area which apparently gets quite a bit of night life (we're waiting for the ruckus to begin!). This apartment has three bedrooms, and is typical of an older-style European home (ie: no open spaces, very compartmentalized).

This afternoon we went to see an apartment in Ciudad Lineal -- northwest part of the city. It is somewhat far away but the realtor told us that it was very large and very cheap (well below our budget) so we decided it was worth a look. Lo and behold, we were escorted to an old, ugly flat --big, yes....but depressingly ugly. Again of the old style -- little rooms connected by halls (true, it had four bedrooms, and a fifth that served as a tiny living room), small "hallway style" kitchen. The guy sat in the living room on one of the old green couches and said "Yes, it's a bit old but VERY comfortable" and as he said this he patted the couch lifting a cloud of dust! hahah... I won't go on. Needless to say that the rule holds: 'You get what your pay for' and frankly, we're willing to pay a little more to maintain some semblance of our old USA lifestyle!

It humors me immensely to recall Fede's effort to maintain a neutral expression while talking to the realtor in regards to this potential home that was so grossly below our standards :) If you all know Fede, and you all do, it is easy to see why this is so funny....

Speaking of the good ol' US of A. I went yesterday to a mini supermarket to buy toothpaste. Now, as all of you will note, when you walk into any Walmart, or Walgreens in the U.S. you have a seemingly endless variety of toothpastes, brands, some with mint, others with whitening agents, scope, "clinically proven" formulas, etc...well, at our local mini-mart (run by Spanish-speaking Chinese women I may add), we had two choices: 1) something that I suppose was toothpaste although from the looks of it, I'm not sure if it was caulking glue 2) and colgate. yes, I mean bottom-of-the-line "anti-cavity", 1960-esque Colgate -(See pic below). Wow. Welcome to Socialism!! Man, given the choices I immediately grabbed the colgate although I could hardly believe I was buying such a miserable little tube of paste!! (And, the product met my low expectations, although it gets the job done). No more Mrs. Picky right?

We had a bit of a scare in the new apartment-hotel this afternoon. Being that it is old, it has sliding locks on the inside of all the bedrooms and these locks are below the door handle. Well, Francisco went into a bedroom, shut the door and slid the lock shut!!! I freaked! We would say, "Frankie, open the door" and he would just laugh from the other side. Of course, we had no way of picking the lock since it can only be opened from the inside. Finally after a few dreadful minutes, I told him we were going to watch a movie and he promptly slid the lock open and we opened the door. Wheeeeeeew. What a scare. Seriously, what brainless constructor would put such a lock within a child's reach?

After that experience, I put a generous amount of masking tape all over the locks so that they won't budge.

Finally, we come to the title of the post "Chorizo n' Oreos". That pretty much sums up our dinner. No, that's not completely true, because I did try to make a simple pasta to deviate a bit from the sandwich menu, but still we are subsisting off of random non-perishable items for the moment.

We know this is all part of the adventure and are trying to take it in stride. Still, we will be happy and relieved when this bohemian lifestyle ends :)

Til tomorrow!
-The Martinez Gypsies