After a short period back home in Belgium, it was about time to come back. Bilbao: the sequel.

After a while you take a number of the things for granted, but when it is no longer there, you start to miss it. It sounds so cliché, but unfortunately it’s the bitter truth. It’s really weird to notice how fast some other culture can grow on you.

Memories

Walking into a bar and see delicious food on the counter, cheap wine, enthusiastic and talkative people, and of course the landscape.  Large mountains, a beautiful seaside and stunning beaches. Hiking or surfing? Knock yourself out!

The famous Guggenheim © spanish-podcast.com

The landscape is one, but it’s sure not the only thing that the Basque Country has to offer. Does Bilbao with the famous Guggenheim ring any bell? And the authentic Casco Viejo that stands in a huge contrast with the more modern centre of the town.

And what about Donostia – San Sebastían with more Michelin stars per capita than any other city in the entire world.

What is there not to like about Euskal Herria. Okay, it might rain occasionally, but hey, there is an umbrella shop around every single corner.

Returning

But enough with all the positive adjectives. I’m really struggling to come up with some new and unused ones, so let’s continue.

As the loyal readers might know, as an Erasmus student I already spend the first trimester in a small town called Bergara (Guipúzcoa). But now, as I am a couple of months older and wiser, it was time to move up north to Bilbao (Indautxu) and discover the big city in all its facets. Updates of that will probably follow in the upcoming months.

‘But why coming back?’, I hear you all simultaneously think. I was hoping to entertain you with a nice, long and funny story but unfortunately the truth is less exciting.

As I am in my final year of university college, it is obligated to  do a three month long internship at a media company. During my Erasmus period I already worked on a weekly basis at EITB and all of a sudden the opportunity came up to do the real internship there too. One and one makes two and now, two months after date Michael and myself returned to the Basque Country.

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The best part of the week still stays the weekend. Reason one: a lot of free time. Reason two: football. My match of the week: Athletic Club versus Valencia CF.

Athletic - Valencia

Even there are more top teams in Spain then there are in Belgium, the opportunity to see Valencia CF play doesn’t come around every week. David Villa, Juan Mata, Joaquin, Pablo Hernandez, … not the ‘most average Joe’s’ is a term that immediately pops to my head if I hear the names of those players.

And there is the fact that every football fan had to pay San Mamés a visit. A stadium that breaths football, going old English style, not those fancy new hyper modern buildings that have to pass as a ‘football’ stadium.

Pre match experience

Three hours before kick-off and the bars were already full, the official shop was almost sold out and everybody was stoked. Positive nerves were floating around San Mamés, not only around the stadium, even in the centre of the city you could feel that there was a football match coming up.

First 45 minutes

After searching for the seats – not really an easy job – it was time to kick off. The Athletic supporters were trying to create a great atmosphere, but if the players on the field aren’t doing the best job ever, it’s hard to talk about a good game. Pablo Hernandez had a couple of nice moves though, but Mata couldn’t make the finish.

When Athletic’s top striker Fernando Llorente was substituted for De Marcos, my hopes for an Athletic win weren’t that high anymore.

Second half

David Villa after the equalizer

After the break, we finally noticed where San Mamés is famous for. The fans were starting to believe more and more in a good result against Valencia and after the 1-0 from Iker Muniain (impressing football player, and only 16 years old) the stadium exploded. The fact that David Villa equalized a few minutes later (with a beautiful volley) didn’t seem to bother them. ‘Athletic Athletic Athletic’ was rolling out of everyone’s mouth.

The game settled down, but then Koikili received his second yellow card after an unnecessary fault on Juan Mata. Valencia smelled the victory, but they had to wait until seven minutes before the final whistle to take the lead. After a bad clearance from Iraizoz, Mathieu smashed a volley home.

Less than five minutes on the clock, but Athletic didn’t give up. First an offside goal from Iraola was disallowed, but a couple of minutes later Athletic had to perfect opportunity to take one point against Valencia. Referee Antonio Rubinos Pérez was the only one who saw a fault from David Navarro on Martinez, but Lopez kicked the penalty against the post.

To describe Athletic as a club, that’s still a hard thing to do. I would say unique, great atmosphere and very passionate.

Movie: David Lopez misses the penalty

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On Wedsnesday we had a field trip with the other Erasmus students to the Sanctuary of Arantzazu, located in Oñati. The the Virgin of Arantzazu is the main worship figure and also the patron of the province Guipuzcoa.

According to Wikipedia the legend of the figure of the Virgin was found in a thorn-bush, and his exclamation “Arantzan zu?!” (Thou, among the thorns?!) gave rise to the name of the place. According to the linguistic explanation, the name stems from “arantza + zu”, ‘place abounding in hawthorn’.

The Sanctuary of Arantzazu. © Wikipedia

Because pictures are worth a thousand words, a smal impression.

The maquette of the sanctuary

Painting of the Sanctuary

Inside the church

The other side of the church

Jesus Christ

The Virgin

People took out their cameras

An art gallery where they show the history of the Sanctuary

Paintings

And more paintings

Another part of the complex where they show more modern paitings

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The previous update is already a couple of weeks behind us, so it was about time to update the Basque Country Live blog with a new post.

Already more than three months in the Basque Country, but for some vague reason Bilbao didn’t got much of my attention. Now, I know that I should be ashamed of myself, because Bilbao, it has a lot more positive points then it has disadvantages.

Music

To be really honest, I’m not the biggest music fan in the world. Radio, parties and from time to time a festival, but there it stops. I’m always up for trying new things and when Niké (and to a lesser extent Sanne) got whole excited over two bands that would be performing at the Heineken Greenspace V edición in Bilbao, I decided to give it a try as well. For one time, a more cultural event, nothing wrong with that.

After work we headed for Akalarre, the hostel were we would spend the – short – night. We were at a very tight schedule, but thanks to Bilbao’s good and fast subway system, we didn’t have to walk to whole way. Even though it is one of the tidiest subways I’ve ever seen, I still got a bit cramped, but that’s totally to blame to the feeling of being underground.

Concert

The Pains of Being Pure At Heart © SaJeh

The search for the Heineken music hall didn’t really went according to plan, but after walking in a circle for 15 minutes, we arrived at Santana 27 just in time.

The first band that preformed was Atlas Sound. Band? It was only one guy with his guitar. But he did an okay job. You have to like his indie / little bit of emo genre, because it’s not something you’ll hear on the radio every day. A typical example of the more you listen to it, the more you’ll start to appreciate it.

The next band is called The Pains of Being Pure At Heart. I would classify them as an ordinarily indie band. For me, it seemed that every song was the same and okay, if you play indie that’s probably normal, but it’s not normal anymore if the first song resembles to the second one, and the third one bears resemblance to song four, six and maybe eight as well.

Casco Viejo

Drinking in Casco Viejo © SaJeh

The famous night club Fever was just down the same street as the concert hall, but we decided to go to the old part of the town Casco Viejo. Everybody of who were planning to go to Fever, was drinking outside. At the time it seemed a bit trashy, young adults with Eroski bags filled with beers, bottles of wine and other liquors. That image combined with tuned cars and – bad – house music. No, I was glad that we decided to go downtown.

Of course by these temperatures, everybody in Casco Viejo was also drinking outside the bars, but it was a totally different atmosphere. Maybe a bit hypocrite to say it, but at Casco Viejo it is more natural to see it happen.

To make a long and tiring evening short: a lot of bars, ridiculous cheap drinks and good company. The classic example of a night well spend.

The day after

The morning after the night before – I’ve never used this phrase in a pleasant way – was a different story. Sharing a room with seven other people, it maybe was not the best idea ever. Plus the fact that the mattress felt like stone, lead to the fact that sleeping was not a genuine option.

But the clock ticks and life goes on as well, so no need to complain about it. After a quick lunch, it was time to explore the city. A lot of nice shops and they were actually open, beat that damn siesta! Next week my parents are coming over, hint hint mum and dad!

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Almost November 1th, and the weather is still amazing here. “The Basque Country? What the hell, that’s even more rain than in Belgium!”

I’m writing this post outside –using someone else his WIFI – but okay, doing a bad thing, but none the less, now I’m enjoying the sunset in Bergara, having a nice view on the town square where everybody is relishing the nice temperatures. The kids are playing football –and making a lot of noise – the parents talking to each other and sharing a couple of drinks. Southern mentality, I’ll never get tired of that.

Upcoming temperatures. Damn Sunday.

The end of October, but we can go to school in shorts, t-shirt and sunglasses. It feels like a big summer revival. Even at school that summer feelings sticks around for a while.

School building in Eskoriatza.

In the beginning of my Erasmus story, the four of us thought that we would have classes in Mondragon, our mistake it seemed, Eskoriatza it was. Instead of a fifteen minutes drive to school, we had to double that figure. Half an hour on a bus to go to class, it was something different that I was used to. Back home it was a five minute walk, so I wasn’t looking forward to that commuting thing.

Quarter of an hour more, but for those fifteen minutes we get a really nice authentic school building that definitely is worth that time. It radiates some sort of rare peace. When the sun shines on the inner, you would sometimes even forget that it’s actually a faculty.

Post-summer days, let them come. It makes everybody more happy and cheerful.

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Guipúzcoa, nothing wrong with that. But the Basque Country is more than only one province. Time for some change, time for Biscay!

Biscay, Guipúzcoa? Most of the ‘foreigners’ are already lost. Solution? Just a simple map of the Basque Country.

Alakrana

On Friday we’re already in Bilbao (Read: Biscay. Getting a bit bored on writing that name over and over again), so that’s already the perfect reason to stay there. One reason, but of course there is one more: Oihana lives in Bermeo and invited me over to spend some time at the coastal town.

From a journalist point of view that was just one day too late.

On Friday there was a rally to demand the release of Alakrana. Somali pirates overran the tuna boat Alakrana and took 36 crew members for hostage. The pirates are still in control of the boat from the Basque Country in northern Spain. Five members of the Alakrana crew have their residence in Bermeo.

A pity, but fortunately the coastal town has more to offer.

Bermeo is located nearby the sea. Okay on the first view that’s nothing special, plenty of places that borders with the sea over here, but Bermeo takes it to a whole other level. A couple of pictures say more than a thousand words, a small impression:

If you still aren’t convinced, pop in the car and find out for yourself. I can promise you, you won’t regret it. It’s a town –city – where I definitely would spend a nice holiday.

San Juan de Gaztelugatxe

One of the absolute must-sees is San Juan de Gaztelugatxe.

San Juan de Gaztelugatxe © Facebook

Among Bakio and Bermeo, there is an old chapel attached in a rock to the mainland with only a steep stone staircase of 231 steps. It was supposedly founded in the tenth century and originally must have been a Templar monastery. Due to its strategic location, it has been the focus of many legends of pirates, kings and shipwrecks.

For me it was a beautiful place with tons of natural beauty and magical stories.

Unfortunately times goes very quick when you are having a blast. Social and friendly people, agreeable weather and that typical holiday rhythm. The perfect definition of a weekend well spend. But Sunday evening arrived, and school was just around the corner.

Bummer. If there was some sort of subscription to Bermeo, I would seriously consider of getting one.

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An easy stay at home Friday night, so we had to make up for it the next day. Dutch Erasmus Education student Nathalie’s sisters were in town, so what comes before part B? Part-A!

Gathering at Nathalie's place © E. Schroyen

This weekend was apparently ‘invite your friends over’ – weekend. Niké had two visitors from Belgium, Tiina was reunited with her Finish fiancée and Nathalie invited her sisters to spend some quality time with her in the Basque Country.

We went to Eskoriatza to meet up with the others in the apartment of Dexter and Nathalie. It was a lot of fun to chit-chat with new people. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not tired of the other Erasmus students, but it’s always nice to see some new faces.

After a couple of beers the volume kept rising, so Nathalie thought it would be better for them, the neighbours and our own well-being to visit the local bar in Eskoriatza.  They still have to live there for two months, so no need to have upset neighbours.

Eskoriatza, not the biggest place in the world, but last Saturday night it certainly wasn’t just a ‘middle of the road’‘ town. Some say that Eskoriatza is a really boring place. Well, not everybody has to share the same opinion I suppose.

Local barbershop

Although so many things have changed in the last two months, there are always some points that will never change. We all need our beverages, we still have to buy clothes and our hair will keep growing.

You can delay it as long as you want, but in the end you just have to pay the hairdresser a visit.

I normally even have trouble explaining what he or she has to do with my hair in Dutch, so now that I have to talk Spanish – I don’t even bother to ask if they speak English – that promised to be a lot of fun.

In advance I translated some standard sentences; you never know that it might be helpful. Lost effort it seems, I clearly have to work on my pronunciation.

Back to the good old hand gestures; pointing at a picture of some kind of model/actor and she basically knew that she just had to cut it ‘corto’. So no Basque mullet for this guy, even if she asked it a couple of times.

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Hanging out in bars and mingle with the locals has its advantages. Last Saturday night two Basques from Bergara invited Michael and me to play some pelota with them. Pelota? What the hell? The game is rather difficult to explain, but Wiki jumps to the rescue!

“The basic principle in hand-pelota is that there are two teams of two players each. The team to serve bounces the ball, and then propels it towards the playing area of the narrow, front wall where it has to rebound between the low line demarcating the low off-area and the high line demarcating the high off-area.

The ball may either be played so it rebounds directly off the front wall onto the playing floor or onto the long side wall first. The opposing team may either play the ball immediately after rebounding from the front wall or side wall without rebounding from the playing floor or after having rebounded from the playing floor once.

A team scores by playing the ball in such a way that the opposing team is unable to play the ball before it has rebounded off the playing floor once or playing the ball in such a way that it rebounds off the front wall and rebounds off the floor outside the playing area.

A team may also score by the opposing team hitting the front wall but either below the low line or above the high line, or hitting the ball in time but failing to reach the front wall.”

Example of a pelota game. © stmarysmedia.

Pelota can be compared to a game that I used to play when I was younger. Just kicking the football against the wall, and the person who couldn’t hit the wall, was off. But instead of shooting with a normal ball, pelota is played with some sort of baseball and with your hands. Painful in the beginning, but after a while, you get used to the burning feeling.

So Thursday afternoon we met up with Mikel and Juanjo, the two friendly Basque people, in Bergara to play a match of the typical Basque game. I think that it’s not necessary to say that the far advanced Basques won very easily. Although it was our first time that we tried pelota, losing still provides a feeling that doesn’t suit me very well.

Afterwards Michael and I stayed a bit longer, just to improve our skills. No need to get our asses kicked again next time we play.

Apart from our defeat, we had a good time. Mikel and Juanjo enjoyed laughing with the poor pelota talent of the foreigners, and Michael and I were excited to have found a new sport that more or less fits us. Still, some extra training is recommended.

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After a pretty relaxing month, now it seems that school is starting for real. A post about papers, group assignments and presentations.

We don’t have many classes in a week, so you might think that everything will be done in advance, but that isn’t really the style that we are used to. Back in Belgium, our schedule is packed with thousand and one things and strictly deadlines.

A big difference here, were we can ignore the work for a couple days. Result, the deadlines stays a bit of an obstacle, still nothing irreconcilable. I suppose that pressure is needed toperform well.

Done: paper on new communication platforms,

Work in progress: blogging

To do: presentation about Belgium, a paper and an oral presentation on importing a new product to the Basque Country, reviewing Jeff Jarvis’ What Would Google Do?,  a couple of articles about the Basque Country and some sort of comic strip.

The deadlines are somewhere in December, so absolutely no need to panic and time enough to enjoy the Basque Country.

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Yesterday we’d gotten some good news from our teacher Digital Journalism. Today’s class was going to be cancelled. An extra free day, but what to do with it? Time is on our side.

Bilbao: no go

We’re on weekly basis in Bilbao, unfortunately that’s all work and almost no pleasure. So this was a perfect opportunity to explore the many faces of the San Mamés city.

But checking the bus schedule on pesa.net, problem number one occurred. A direct bus from our hometown to Bilbao already left at 8:30. To be honest, it’s not that of an inhuman hour, but we’re already fully adjusted to the HUHEZI classes in the afternoon, so we have a totally different biorhythm now.

Problem number 2: the next bus left around 4 o’clock, maybe a bit too late. We would have less than 4 hours left to visit the city and that’s not near enough to only see the highlights of Bilbao. Yes we know, we are difficult people, no need to point that out.

Vitoria it is

Buses to Vitoria and San Sebastian are more frequent, but having already been in San Sebastian last weekend, the week before and a couple of times earlier, I genuinely think that I already know that city by heart.

Only one option left: Vitoria – Gasteiz. To be honest, I can imagine worse third options.

The previous time in Vitoria I saw a couple of nice shops, so it was the perfect opportunity to buy some new clothes because most of my current t-shirts are all covered with stains. Not a very student-like solution, but so be it. Every reason to buy new clothes is a good one.

Now problem number three as number four comes in the picture. Searching for clothes while there are three other people watch every move, not very helpful. I can handle one people, but two extra people is a bit over the hill.

Truth be told, even when they would be helpful, I wouldn’t have bought much. Leaving your credit card at home if you go shopping, not the best plan ever.

Not a total disappointment

Hiding from the rain which was making Vitoria a bit less attractive, we went to the first shop we saw. As by wonder it was a supermarket, and as by wonder we discovered a whole section with Belgian beers. Delirium, Affligem, Duvel, …

I’m totally pro on trying the local delicacy, but when it comes to beer, there is no other place like good old Belgium.

Final result: almost ransacked the whole section (kidding, we left some beers for the Basques who want to try the delicious flavor).

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