Bronze-tanned Spaniards with perfect skin and beach hair.
Kids screaming with excitement in the surf.
Loud Spaniards shouting to each other.
Loud Spaniards laughing like seagulls.
Sailboats moored in the middle of the bay.
The afterglow-heat of a hot day on stone walls.
Ladies with big backpacks and hiking poles, on their way to Santiago de la Compostela.
Rain clouds hanging heavily over the hills.
Sangría instead of Aperol Spritz. Good.
Straw hats. They must be in.
No selfie sticks. Really.
Today still benefits from yesterday’s heat. It will rain tonight, and it might begin any moment. Yesterday was blue sky, 30 degrees Celsius, and a beach day for the thousands. The La Concha beach was a sea of crawling brown bodies and a constant droning voice. This is where Spaniards (and some French) come to vacay. Perhaps to get out of the heat and drought of Southern Spain. Or from the coolness of the mountains. The climate in San Sebastián is a comfortable in-between.
I came here for two weeks of Spanish language classes. Really only ten days of school. I have been studying Spanish since last October, and while I think my efforts have been haphazard at best, the level test somehow put me in A2. Fortunately there will be no A2 group starting this week, so I will be put in A1+. Whatever that means. If it means understanding basic spoken Spanish and being able to produce more or less useful words and nearly no complete sentences, then they got me in the right group. In two days’ time I will find out how lucky I am, or if I am bound to be feeling ashamed and frustrated for ten days.
(San Sebastián, Spain; August 2019)
Busy. Warm. Crowded. Brightly lit. This is a Donostian pintxo bar on a Wednesday or Thursday night, the night of pintxopote. The waiters (all men sweat over the counter (although thankfully not onto the pintxos). Sangria and cider flow, and I am the only solo guest.
Hello San Sebastián. Last time I visited you the beach was empty. Now you have 1.5 kilometers filled with bronzed bodies. Semana Grande is quite the fiesta here, wrapping up the summer. I intend to leave swimming until the bronzed crowd has vacated back to working life, next week if I am lucky.
After 10 years, it was still there. In the vaults of an old building at Placa Reial. Of course it was, since it’s been there since the 60s. Still as fresh and interesting – and a little freshened up as well.
12 hours off in Barcelona on a Sunday. What a gift. Even with serious flight delay as the entire Schiphol airport was shut down because of one person getting ill in one plane on one runway.
(Barcelona, Spain; March 2017)
When I think of Spain I never think of mountains. But they are right there, if I would wander deep enough inland. 
When the rest of the world thinks of beaches and sangria and sun-kissed villages, there is surprisingly much snow up North. Now I understand why the Great Pyrenees dog breed is so white and fluffy. 
(Above the Pyrenees, Spain; March 2017)
Biarritz is Basque country. San Sebastian is Basque country, too – the heartland of it. Yet Biarritz is very French and San Sebastian very Spanish. The cast-iron balconies with red flowers, the music loud in cars and cafés, the chaotic lunch hour in a pintxo restaurant – it is all so quintessentially Spanish. Where the French are elegantly laid back, the Spanish are loudly casual. Where the French love white and light houses, the Spanish in San Sebastian use more heavy, dark colors to make a town lively, energetic, and a little chaotic, but equally beautiful as France.
Strolling down the streets of San Sebastian old town (or Donostia as it is called in Basque language), I found it hard to believe that we were still in the same ethnic and cultural country, as so much has changed after the border between France and Spain split the ancient Basque country in two. 
It is a strange thought how insensitively Spain and France divided the country, dividing at the same time an ethnic group in half. Perhaps a little similar to Ireland and Northern Ireland; or when Sweden and Russia tossed the Finnish borders around. Nobody asked the Basques, but they ended up in the middle, without a choice. Their language, food, culture, and way of life was suddenly divided. Families were divided (although EU now allows an open border). And in one way worst of all, the Spanish Basques have, with their sometimes unjustified actions through armed conflict, reached a level of autonomy that the French can only dream of. In France one must become French it seems. Nothing else is really acceptable in the long run. And so nobody seems to care about the Basques – except that they make nice cakes and goats cheese, and pretty colorful striped weaves. 
But we were simply ignorant day tourists who cared more for the lovely Belle Epoque time architecture, digging our toes into the sand of the La Concha beach, and the pintxos. Oh, the pintxos! I have no idea of what I ate half of the time, but goodness me it was delicious. Although, what can one expect when the San Sebastian night sky is bejeweled by Michelin stars, more than anywhere else on the globe compared to population count. It is weeks since we returned from San Sebastian now, but I can still taste every single pintxo I had that day. Oh what simple beings we humans are. 
(San Sebastian, Spain; July 2016)
This blue marble 