Pastries and Sea Urchins

This weekend, the people of Cádiz and I celebrated pastries and sea urchins. As near as I can gather. If it seems like a bizarre combination, that's because it is, but don't worry, each thing got its own, separate day of celebration.

Saturday was Pestiñada and at around ten in La Plaza de San Francisco, they started giving out free pestiños, tasty pastries that are made with honey and are popular in Andalucia, especially around Christmas and Easter. I got three, because I'm all about free pastries.

un pestiño, courtesy Google image search

They were also giving out free shots of anís, a liqueur that's made through the distillation of anise seeds. It burns a little going down but it's also very sweet and tastes a bit like licorice. All in all, it's pretty pleasant.

Meanwhile, people gathered in the plaza to hear the chorus sing. A lot of people. You may not be able to hear the music very well over the crowd, but anyway, here's my amateurish attempt at multimedia blogging (ignore the less-than-inspirational camerawork):

On Sunday, Erizada, the festivities began at around noon. Erizos are sea urchins and apparently people in Cádiz eat them. At least during Erizada. I myself was not brave enough to try one, but I am told that they are fishy and salty.

¡Qué asco! (Photo credit Megan Paolone)

I actually spent most of the morning getting lost in the city, so I missed out on all of the free beer being served in La Plaza de San Antonio. By the time my friends and I showed up after lunch, la cerveza gratis was all gone. This irked my friends and I, because we wanted to join the natives in taking advantage of the nonexistent open container laws, so we found a nearby store and bought, for 2 euros each, liter bottles of Cruzcampo.

Mmmm, I can taste the cheap. (Photo credit Megan Paolone)

After this eminently sensible purchase, we spent the afternoon wandering the city, people watching and taking photos. We also ran into a cool drum performance and I managed to capture some of it on camera:

The weather here in Cádiz has been inconsistent since I arrived, but we really lucked out this weekend and enjoyed a dry Pestiñada and a sunny Erizada. Speaking of weather, it's a beautiful day and I don't want to spend all of it inside, blogging.

But before I go: I've been thinking about maybe ending some of these longer posts with mini Spanish lessons or something. It'll be like a prize at the bottom of the cereal box, except less exciting. I probably won't do this all the time, just when I learn something interesting or useful. So without further ado, I present to you the first (and possibly last) installment of...

SPANISH FOR VIDLINGS:

• guay: cool, sweet (¡Tu cámara nueva es tan guay!)
• friki (also friqui): geeky, dorky (¿Vid mantiene un blog? ¡Qué friki!)