A Year in the World (5 page)

Where to shop in Triana? We ask a woman carrying two huge bags with red chard sticking out the top. She points to a modern building near the bridge. The clean, compact market at first glance appears uninteresting. Much of the food is standard world-market imports—leeks from Holland, plastic-wrapped endive, peppers and fruit with stickers. Then we see vats of brown-striped snails, handfuls of wild asparagus amid the vacuum-wrapped beets, and a tray of wild greens from the fields called
tagarninas del campo
. The conical, chartreuse broccoli that we eat in Italy, known there as
broccolo romano
, here is
rumanescu
.

We wish we could cook, but on this trip we choose an initiation rite in tapas, cheeses, and regional specialties. We pause for lunch at a café where bridge and river meet. The larger plate of tapas, called a
ración
, ration, looks perfect for a light meal. We share codfish with roast peppers and a selection of vegetable croquettes. The thoughtful waiter brings us a
ración
of potatoes with aioli because he thinks we should try his favorite.

Sevilla, a town for the senses, and the air of midday turns balmy and kind. At the Plaza del Altozano, with an old tiled pharmacy and decorative benches under garden walls, many of the houses have
miradores
, literally “viewpoints.” When I travelled to Peru, I sketched the mysterious carved wooden enclosures the size of balconies, small upstairs porches from whence you can see but not be seen. I knew they were architectural imports from Spain, but now I see the real Arab origin in the latticed horseshoe arches and the shapes of the wooden cutwork. A
mirador
is known in an Islamic house as a
mashrabiyya
. In Naguib Mahfouz’s
Palace Walk
, set in Cairo, a young Muslim girl willfully peers out, almost inviting herself to be seen. Her defiance becomes the crux of her fate. The role of the
mirador
in the lives of generations of Muslim women could occupy years of research. Some miradors are glassed in; some have curtains and plants. The design has survived, probably because the enclosures cut the fierce heat and glare, as well as providing a bit of privacy if you want to nod off over a book or lounge nude with a bowl of cherries. Tile everywhere—even the undersides of the balconies are tiled.

Crossing over the river into the neighborhood called El Arenal, we stop and watch T-shirted kayakers and crew teams zipping along the Guadalquiver. The extraordinary weather holds. I’d like to drop my coat into the water rather than lug it along. Serene as this view is, I’m disconcerted by such an everyday image. After all, the al-wad al-Kabir, the great river, Guadalquiver, are names breathed and repeated in the poems of Lorca: “The open Guadalquiver . . . Ay, Guadalquiver . . . starry Guadalquiver.” Ships laden with goods from Spanish exploits in the New World plied this fast-lane interstate highway, sailing up from Cádiz to the city of Sevilla laden with everything they could raid, from silver to sugar: “For the sailboats/Sevilla has a road.”

Here Christopher Columbus, né Cristoforo Colombo according to tradition, and later Cristóbal Colón, beseeched King Fernando and Queen Isabella time and again before they yielded and let him sail. When they allowed him to confer with astronomers and mapmakers about his proposed journey, those wise ones sagely concluded: “If the earth is round, you will be compelled to sail up a kind of mountain from Spain, which you cannot do even with the fairest wind, and you could never get back.” When Isabella insisted, Fernando finally relented. After all, they had just driven the Arabs out of Granada in that indelible year of 1492, leaving them free to spread the word of God and to rake in the goods. The journal of Christopher Columbus reveals a driven man, one with vision, who kept from his men the true distance the
Niña
, the
Pinta
, and the
Santa María
had sailed, who kept his own counsel, who did step off the edge of the known world.

After weeks at sea came days and days when the sailors smelled land; they spotted floating weeds, a crab, finally a carved stick and a branch with berries. Longing for land, his men on the verge of mutiny, he wrote in his log that the sea was sweet and as calm as the Guadalquiver. Finally, they spotted a coast at night and rode at anchor until morning—what a night! Did anyone sleep? At sunrise they saw naked people gathered on the shore, gazing at them. And the rest is controversy.

“I vividly remember staring at the picture of red-haired Isabella beside Fernando in the fifth-grade history book. Do you?” I ask Ed.

“Yes, the whole story of Columbus—that’s where I first heard of the idea of pushing off from home. Whatever the consequences, he was a seeker. He was after the exciting life, the possibility. I never thought he was motivated just by desire for gold. He was itching to
go
.”

“Nobody mentioned that Fernando and Isabella drove out the Jews and sponsored the Inquisition. They just seemed like gods in a fairy kingdom where Columbus built his toy ships and found
us
.”

The
El Arenal zone seems neighborly with an abundance of tapas bars and small shops. An elegant riding shop near the Plaza de Toros bullring (blessedly closed for the season) reminds us of the great tradition of breeding horses in Spain. Young girls have shopped here for their fine saddles since 1892, saddles upon which one
could
ride with cape flying across the plain of the Guadalquiver to the beat of
Bolero
.

To travel with Ed is to be forever on the quest for the perfect espresso. He rarely encounters the well-made cup, the strong elixir with just the proper layer of
crema
. Nonetheless hope springs at the sight of every machine. Inept packing of the coffee, the wrong grind, the wrong setting—so much to go wrong. Still, he has his nips three or four times a day. I’m annoyed when we must trek from street to street hoping to find the right café after long dinners when I am longing for some heavenly bed. If I bring up this subject, he says, “Well, my love, you have to look at every damn flower in bloom and ascertain the name of it.” At an open-air bar, we end our afternoon’s meandering with Ed scrutinizing the lack of
crema
, grimacing at the sour brew. Maybe next time.

Ed goes wild for the vibrant tapas scene in Sevilla. So much fish! He loves anything pulled from the waters and tastes the squid, fish, urchins, clams, every little swimmer marinated or grilled or pickled or broiled and served forth on a tapas plate. At a crowded bar with tables spilling out under the orange trees in a plaza, we sample garlic shrimp, grilled baby squid, little cheese toasts, fried salty almonds. Then we move on.

We are able to experience only half the fun. Why didn’t I go to Spanish class sophomore year? I recall that I never bought the textbook and even forgot to drop the course by the third week. Later, when I studied in San Miguel de Allende for a summer, I became friends with the teacher, whose taxi-driver friend took us off road to search for Chichimeca artifacts. We forgot Spanish grammar. He wore small cowboy boots, and he thought my white, white skin was unhealthy looking. He would press my arm with a forefinger like someone testing bread dough. “So too white,” he would marvel. “And cat eyes. Bad luck.” I have a few pottery shards and a baby skull I picked up in an abandoned cemetery, where boys kicked bones in lieu of a soccer ball. So much for the rigors of learning Spanish. I would love to be able to join in the scene here, even to the limited extent a foreigner might. The tapas ritual is above all about conviviality. Friends meet, share a bite, shift to other friends, then head to another crowded bar where other friends wait. A similar rite,
ombra
, the shadow rounds, takes place in Venice. In early evening neighbors gather at small bars with counters opening to the street for half glasses of wine and saucers of food, then move on, often in groups. The name may have come from the time when gondoliers stood in the shadow of San Marco for a drink. No one really knows, and no one knows the source of tapas either. The word probably comes from
tapar
, “to cover.” A plate or a slice of ham resting on top of the wineglass made it easy to carry or, according to some sources, kept the flies out. The name may have come from an official order to eighteenth-century innkeepers to “cover” the stomachs of carriage drivers when they stopped for refreshments. Driving under the influence caused too many tipped carriages. Whatever the source of the name, the custom charms us. Still, I long to ask someone,
How do you do it? All these tastes and then dinner?

Tonight we are determined to go on from tapas to dinner at eleven. We might have walked ten miles today, but we walk again in the interlude because Sevilla at night becomes
muy simpatica
—the streetlights among the orange trees, the glimpsed courtyards with splashing fountains, the forty horse-drawn carriages—so gallant, unlike the usual tourist conveyances drawn by sad nags—the massive volumes of the cathedral, and the Giralda towering over all. “Isn’t it easy to imagine the muezzin’s call to prayer falling from the tower over all of us?”

“The guidebook says he rode a donkey up to the top five times a day. The stairs switch back so he wouldn’t have to climb.”

After several turns, we find ourselves in the same plaza, and there’s the stranded English woman, talking to three tourists. We see the man reach for his wallet. What a scam, and she was so specific (Tunisia, two oranges), so unlikely. She looks like a librarian or teacher on holiday. As she turns from the threesome, she catches sight of us but does not register any recognition. Even after one hour of walking, we should have recognized the two oranges part. Orange trees are everywhere! Reach up and grab one.

La Giralda has become our beacon. At 319 feet high, it’s visible from most of Sevilla. A pure minaret, except for the Christian top, La Giralda perfectly encapsulates the harmonious blending of the styles of successive conquerors. When built by the Moorish Almohad rulers in the twelfth century, the minaret was crowned with four golden balls topped by a crescent moon. The spangle of the sun on these spheres was clear to anyone approaching the city. The Torre del Oro on the river once was covered in gold-glazed tiles, also sending a glittering message to boats sailing upstream from Cádiz. Drawings of the minaret from that era show a more delicate structure of graceful proportions. The Christians broadened the entire top third of the tower to incorporate a bell tower—the Christian call to prayer. A figure of Fides, Faith, who defies his name and turns whichever way the wind blows, ornaments the top. Though the earlier structure may be finer, the current one pleases the eye, too. The remodelers retained, in the lower two-thirds, the original decorations, and the horseshoe and multifoil arches on the facade. The horseshoe arch, which seems so quintessentially Moorish, actually came from the Visigoths and inspired the Arabs, becoming, with many variations, their signature arch. You see this kind of marriage of cultures all over the city. The Romans brought Greek principles, the Visigoths took over Roman designs, the Arabs absorbed elements from the Romans and Visigoths, as well as the Greeks, and the Christians venerated the Arab architecture. Vehement as they became about expelling the Arab rule from Spain, the Christians continued to retain, adopt, and adapt from Arab artisans, who had directly shaped the beauty of Andalucía from the eighth until the fifteenth century. The quotes from Arab design continue today. Layers and layers fused, and we have Andalucía.

The
small Plaza de Santa Cruz looks as though actors will emerge any second. Wrought-iron arches suround the plaza planted with orange trees, and vines run from arch to arch. The houses are all dream houses, quintessentially Spanish with their carved doors and iron balconies and proud facades. Through the damask-draped windows we glimpse lighted rooms with baronial furniture, sideboards laden with crystal decanters, and portraits in immense gilt frames. The smell inside must be the same as in my grandfather’s house—overripe fruit, wax, cigar smoke, and leather. In one of the mansions, now a restaurant, we dine on sea bass with almond vinaigrette, artichokes with black rice, and fig soufflé. This is grand. I’m turning Spanish. It’s late.
Olé!

At one
A.M.
we find a taxi and show the driver a Triana address the waiter has written on our bill. In a few minutes we’re getting out in front of an unassuming white building that looks like where the Moultrie, Georgia Elks, or Legionnaires hold their pancake breakfasts. Inside, a few people gathered around tables facing a stage chat and visit. I’m surprised to see five or six small children and several elderly people. We find chairs near the front. The flamenco is about to begin.

Afterward,
at three-thirty in the morning, no taxi waits outside. We are about to begin the long walk home when the taxi that brought us pulls up. “I thought you might want to drive now.” He smiles and opens the back door. “I am sure you have enjoyed your evening.” We wanted to kiss him because we are both falling-over tired and overstimulated. The flamenco wrung us out. I have a pounding headache, and Ed is immensely thirsty. We’re thrilled straight through by the power of sharp, rhythmic hand clapping, the ear-splitting wailing, and the pained, ecstatic faces of the dancers. At times I felt I should not see the human face in that deep expression of private emotions. I felt the fascination of the voyeur.
Duende
was a word we threw around in graduate school: the summoning of a life-force spirit and the expression of that spirit. I see that we had no idea what it meant. Flamenco lights a brushfire in the blood. All those brightly dressed women twirling and clicking heel-toe, heel-toe, the men in black, thin as whips and vibrantly sexual, the play between them, and the stepping forth for solo dancing. Through the staccato clapping, which times and builds and emphasizes, hands become a musical instrument, powerful punctuation, and raw drive.

“Can you dance flamenco?” I ask the driver.