El festival: Molina

     If your lucky enough to make native acquaintances while you study abroad, there is an alternative reality apart from the well traveled restaurants and cathedrals at your disposal. Our friend Pablo has lived and studied in Murcia his entire life- he's what you would call a murciano. His city, Molina de Segura is about 10km outside of the principal city of Murcia and only a two or three euro bus trip. Although the town was in close proximity to the city there were characteristics of Molina that made the city unique.


 


    By the bus stop the streets were narrow and the buildings seemed to form an impregnable wall everywhere you looked. There were fewer people meandering down the alleys and sidewalks than in the city, but some gathered outside of convenient stores and on benches. The stone rippled and curved with the undulations of the road. It was if the masons who first laid the brick considered leveling the ground and decided what people needed more was a subtle altitude change on every street corner as they walked to and fro amidst the town.

 


   
       We made it past the streets of hills to the center of the town where the festival was. It was almost like a medieval bazaar- small huts were cluttered with fragrant oils and blocks of brightly colored soaps. One vendor displayed an assortment of wooden toys to satisfy every knightly whim. The food was intoxicating. There was a stall dedicated only to cheese and if I hadn't been pulled away due to sheer embarrassment, I could've say there all day sampling the bits of gouda.

   After we visited every vendor and stuck our noses in every oil and soap we could find, we found an awesome photo opportunity holding a massive yellow python. After seeing an eight year old wrap the creature around her tiny shoulders and smile for a picture, there was no reason we couldn't handle it. I got lucky enough to hold the head and hold it I did. With a vice grip around his wriggly little neck. Evidence:

  The night waned after we watched the parade and danced to the music blasting from the floats as they passed by. There was a custom, that I greatly liked and wish would continue at every parade I go to, where the people on the floats threw free stuff to the crowds. Not just candy or small toys, but whatever seemed to be within arms length at the supermarket when they were shopping for freebies for the parade. I'm talking packets of salsa, tissues, a pillow and best of all, free beer and rum and coke!

   Now that's a parade I could get used to!

Be patient, be kind, be open.