12 Grapes

Happy 2017! Here's to the new year and the new me, I guess everybody is saying it. I came home for the holidays, it's been a while. I miss Spain. I need to get back. 

I have a story I want to tell the world. I thought, no better place to write it. Three weeks ago I was in Madrid, in Valdebernardo, teaching my super cool high schoolers. I just finished a presentation on my holiday traditions. Their task was to write a paragraph discussing similar topics. I walked around, reading over shoulders, editing, correcting grammar. It took me a good half a period to realize Diego, Jesus, Maria, Alba, Manuel, Jorge, Gemma, and every other thirteen year old in the classroom were attempting to form sentences around the same noun: grapes. Uvas. 

Grapes are good, delicious if it's hot outside, but I'm not crazy about having grapes as a winter holiday dessert. I didn't understand the obsession. Apple cobbler, hot chocolate, and peppermint bark por favor. It was eventually explained that Spain has a New Years Eve tradition, which involved grapes. 

Supposedly Spaniards count down the new year with the last twelve seconds instead of the last ten. In those twelve seconds, you eat twelve grapes. The goal is to eat one grape per second. I believe it's meant to bring you luck, wealth, love, and all that fun stuff. 

I was in Boston for the new year. I told all my friends about the grapes so we went to the seven-eleven down the road and picked out a bunch of grapes. Grapes from seven-eleven sound a little sketchy now that I'm reflecting back on the memory. 

12-11-10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1... I couldn't do it. It's not easy to chew that fast. My older brother once peeled and ate a clementine in ten seconds, he was going for the world record. 

I should have got my grape-eating countdown on video, as proof. Just believe me, I guess. Mostly it was me giggling, screaming, and shoveling grapes in my friends' mouths as well as my own. My friends and I made a pact to practice our grape-eating on the last Sunday of every month until new years eve came around again. Surely twelve days should be enough. Surely...

Keep life trill. Live Large and Sparkle.

XO,

Flo