A couple of months already! (Burela, Spain)

My two-month anniversary with Spain! Still no serious relationship problems; we continue to discover new things about each other, and the butterflies haven't gone away.

I did end up going to a fish farm near the town of San Ciprian on Friday, but discovered that they are no less paranoid here than in Camarinhas. My brief conversation with the Head Honcho revealed why: industry secrets! (Not, as I had thought, worries that I would contaminate one of the tanks or end up being an undercover Greenpeace activist.) The type of fish at the farm, rodaballo, has only started being raised intensively in the past five years, and nobody has quite perfected the process yet. Different companies use different kinds of pools (I've now seen both an array of small circular pools and a line of long tanks accessible only from the sides) and distribute the fish differently (some fish hatch in the same farm they will mature in; others are shipped to the farm after reaching a certain size at a separate hatchery). Surely the feed and countless other aspects of the process are still being developed, too -- the experimental phase of what will probably become a freakishly efficient industry in the next few years. Head Honcho did let me see one of the pools full of fish before escorting me off the grounds, and, though I smiled and said "thanks" afterwards, I was an unhappy camper. The fish looked like a pile of pancakes that had been tossed in the water -- overlapping, hardly moving, pale (I think that they are pale anyway, but at the time I thought, "Sickly pale! Fish farm pale!"). I had rodaballo for my birthday dinner -- going to this fish farm was like somebody snatching back that birthday present.

I also walked to the toxic waste dump of a nearby aluminum plant (which dominates the San Ciprian landscape and skyscape both -- it's huge and smoky) after asking the fish farm security guard about an artificial-looking cliff at the top of a big hill. That cliff ended up being part of a wall that goes around the perimeter of a multicolored (but not like a rainbow is multicolored) lake of who-knows-what-deadly-chemicals. It was enormous and had obviously once been forest, because there was a single black trunk sticking out of the water near one of the edges, and there were piles of rock and dead dirt at the shores that made it look like even the hill had suffered (suffered as in "ouch," not just the obvious damage) (don't worry, I know that hills don't go "ouch"). I was angry when I took photos here -- wished I were a Greenpeace activist! -- and became sad when I talked to a man who lived nearby. He told me that the dump site had been there for thirty years, and that the adverse effects on the surrounding environment were noticeable. Fruit didn't stay on the trees anymore; the soil was bad. I wondered about all of the people who lived in the area, and especially the children; what happens when you grow up on toxic land, drinking (possibly) toxic water? Ugh! Industry!

I decided to walk back to Viveiro, which took me six hours and was good for the soul. So many trees! Such green fields! The vast blue ocean, yonder between those hills! Not so good for the soul was the Swedish thriller I had invited myself to, which has a different title in Spanish and English. In Spanish it's "Los hombres que no amaban a las mujeres" (which means "Men who didn't love women" -- I think gay) and in English it's "Men who hate women" (I think misogynist). It's the English title for sure! I walked out of the theater in shock -- so much sadism, rape, violence, cruelty. I hope it's only the Swedes, and I'm safe in Norway. (I hope it's not because they didn't get enough sunlight!)

Now I'm in Burela, a town which people in Viveiro had assured me I wouldn't like. I can see why they said so -- there is no historic center, and the city is lacking in architectural charm, museums, cultural activities, sculptures and monuments (the woman at the tourist office circled exactly one thing in Burela on the map and then about five others in nearby towns) (ha ha) -- but I certainly don't dislike it yet. The port is impressive, and some people have smiled at me. That's good. And the surrounding landscape is beautiful! I went on a long hike to a mirador on a mountain this morning (this is becoming the Year of Solitary Hikes) -- pine forests on cloudy days are an excellent idea. Ten points to Mother Nature! Tomorrow I will hang out at the docks, as is my wont, and boldly start a conversation with anyone who wanders within a ten-foot radius. "Bold" is my adjective of the month. Irene the Bold. Maybe bold will get me on a ship.