virgenes, tostadas, hippies and reggaeton

Today was my third time accidently walking into some sort of religous festival in the past two weeks. I knew something was up because the street was covered in rosemary but I was still surprised when I walked into some sort of full blown parade, a group of men carrying an enormous decorated replica of the virgin mary on their heads (complete with burning candles, flowers and its own freaking marching band). They're really into the virgin mary here. Last week each neighborhood decorated their own replica of her and the whole city was up at 3 am making a pilgrimage from "virgen" to "virgen." Then they get crunk. (Including my host mom). Irony? The first parade that I stumbled upon though was much different - something like 50 covered wagons painted bright colors and towed by oxen, accompanied by millions of people and their children in full flamenco dress walking dangerously close to the enormous animals. I don't even know. I don't even know.

Also,

I have recently developed a sincere hatred for something called a "tostada."What is a tostada, you may ask? I will tell you. It is FAKE fucking toast. It's like... a toast cracker. It comes in a plastic wrapped column, is it about as filling as a piece of paper and is the only thing that has ever been served to me for breakfast. dear tostadas, I LOATHE thee. Twice I have made the mistake of ordering tapas that turned out to secretly be thinly dressed tostadas - I'm sure you can imagine my thorough, THOROUGH dissapointment.

The (majority of) the food continues to be delicious, clubs continue to be free, drinks continue to free, dinner comes in the perfectly sized portions (and prices). It gets a bit hot sometimes, but normaly it's quite beareable. I've explored a bit more and have fallen in love with the bohemian section of the city called Macarena.

Dear mother,
what would you do if I became a Spanish hippy?
what would you do if I grew out long dreadlocks,
stopped eating to pay my inflated rent,
and refused to wear anything besides geni pants (a much more elegant and whimsical form of crotch pants)?
What would you do if I owned a Spanish hippy shop (as all these spanish hippies do),
played very very strange games in the park (I watched this occur one day - two rows would stand opposite eachother, dance towards each other, and then everybody runs every which way. I don't even know)
and had a lip piercing?
Would you still love me?

Oh and funny story. So it turns out my birthday was today. I thought it was YESTERDAY. shhhhhh! I may or may not be a disaster, but it had been a long time since I had seen a calendar! I celebrated that shizzle on friday night. UNO, DOS, TRES, CUATRO, I know you want me.... You know I want you.... Did I mention that I love free drinks? It was a pretty intense adventure. I have a couple bruises.

Oh, and I never want to leave.