Nochevieja (New Year's Eve)

 31 December 2020

This year I was invited to spend New Year's Eve with the family of my flatmates, just a few blocks away. I didn't take many photos as it was a family gathering. I have spent all of the holidays with them due to quarantine here in Madrid; gatherings are limited to 6 people and the holiday curfew is at 1:30AM. It was really kind of them to invite me; back in the US, I would probably spend New Year's Eve in bed, wake up for a few minutes at midnight, then go back to sleep when the noise died down.

People usually dress up for New Year's Eve here, so I dressed up too. It was the first time I've worn a dress since summer; this is actually a summer dress to which I added a black jacket and wool stockings, as I only brought two dresses with me.

At all of the holidays, at least in this particular family, there is a huge amount of eating and drinking. We had typical Spanish appetizers of charcuterie, cheese, and pate. Once those were mostly eaten, out came prawns, cooked in a savory broth and then served cold, peel-and-eat style. Following that was another course of prawns, this time "a la plancha" (grilled), almejas (clams) cooked in the shells in garlic and butter, and "tigres" (Spanish style stuffed mussels). We finish eating all that, and there is yet another course, the "pulpo" or grilled octopus, plated in bite sized morsels on top of bits of potato. By this time I'm so stuffed I can hardly eat. But there is more! A seafood soup with fideo noodles, which included mussels, clams, and fish. This woman is an amazing cook - I am not accustomed to eating seafood and am not usually very fond of it, but everything was absolutely delicious.

Here in Spain, there is a tradition of eating 12 grapes at midnight, one with each stroke of the clock. By the stroke of midnight, you end up with all 12 grapes stuffed in your mouth while frantically trying to chew. (If I am still in Spain next year, I have GOT to videorecord this.)

All the main TV channels have pre-midnight shows the hour prior with celebs in elegant clothing chatting and musical acts. The TV shows helpfully show a "grape counter" at midnight, counting off the grapes with each chime.

 Last year, the grapes I was given were enormous and had seeds. This year, the grapes were smaller (what I would consider normal sized in the US), and we all cheated and took the seeds out while we were waiting for midnight to arrive. It made it much easier to keep up with the chimes, but still ended up with quite a mouth full. 🍇

After midnight, the location of the apartment was such that we could see various fireworks displays happening around Madrid, some of them were really spectacular. One of the 3 doggies present was terribly scared, which was sad. Even an hour and a half later heading home, there were still fireworks happening in the neighborhood.

It was a lovely evening and I was happy to be in bed (even though I had to sit up for a while due to my overly full stomach).

Feliz Año Nuevo!