We had a great time at the AEDEI conference in Cáceres in Spain, which took 'Voice and Discourse in the Irish Context' as its theme: there were papers on language, literature, linguistics, music, etc. I gave a plenary on the second-person voice in my novel
YOU and in Edna O'Brien's
A Pagan Place.
The sun shone, wine and tapas were consumed, the old city of Cáceres was explored - a stunning, secret gem. We even went to Madrid for a couple of days and got to the Dalí exhibition at the Reina Sofia.
It's very hard to write a report after the fact but here are some pics to give a flavour of the trip. Big thanks to Carolina Amador of the Uni of Extramadura for inviting me over and for treating us so well. Now to get rid of the cheese/bread/wine belly accumulated over eight days. Sigh.
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| Juno & Finn chilling - Finn reading, as per |
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| €2.50 for a glass of superior wine on Plaza Mayor, Cáceres. Score :) |
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| What's in the bag, Sister? |
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| Statue wearing the nazareno (penitential robe) |
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| They sold and served cured meat everywhere |
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| Tripping down from the old town to the new |
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| Statue with wheat |
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| Finbar checking out the Picasso lithographs in the old town's gallery |
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| The old town was often deserted |
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| View from the old town over the plain at Cáceres |
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| Juno looking at Warhol ;) |
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| The gateway of the star |
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| Me and Marisol Morales Ladrón of AEDEI and Alcalá Uni |
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| Some of the academics with our old town tour guide, who was VG |
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| A stork on a rooftop (?) |
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| Finn, Juno, Nuala exploring Cáceres |
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| Clara-Maeve (Carolina Amador's daughter) and Juno hit it off |
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| Irish Ambassador Justin Harman joined us for a reception at the art gallery |
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Anne Fogarty of Mary Immaculate College entertained us with her Limerick
usages and, most of all, the Rubberbandits song 'Horse Outside' |
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| Some of the panel on the fascinating Voice of the Irish Immigrant: Kevin McCafferty, Carolina Amador and Persijn de Rijke |
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| Christine and Martin Dowling, musicians and lovely people from Chicago/Belfast |
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| Christine and Martin Dowling playing at Restaurante El Figón de Eustaqio |
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| Clara-Maeve and Juno listen to the music |
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| Carolina and myself yapping at a bar called El Corral de las Ciguinas - they had cocktails, mmmm. |
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| Madrid street sign |
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| Finn with a flattened coin |
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| Dalí! |
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| Wine bought in Cácares, supped in Madrid. |
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10 comments:
It looks heavenly. The kids seemed to love it too. Oh, Spain, we love you! That town looks divine and exactly where i would love to go for a few days chill out with books and wine. Congratulations on the paper.
Yum yum. I can still taste the wine...and the tortilla. F
Rozz - it was utterly lovely, a stunning place.
Insinbad - tortillas 'r' us :)
Looks great, Nuala, love the photos, esp the one of Juno and Warhol! I love the old towns and especially those interesting spaces where the old and new meet, how they construct them with sloping pavements. Congrats on your keynote :)
Looks just fab, you look great: Spain, wine, and super food obviously suit you :)
Thanks for all the photos. I'm looking forward to exploring Spain this summer. I hope my Spanish is up to it. Have been Learning since January!
http://hilarymcgrathraza.blogspot.fr/2013/01/habla-espagnol.html
Hi Shauna, the Warhol one is kind of a joke. I have a pic of Juno refusing to look at Warhol at the Tate and I wrote a poem about it. Here she is actually looking at him :)
Emily - the food was not so super for us veggies but we did find a couple of places to enjoy. It's one of the only drawbacks of travelling - weird eating. Hence the cheese/bread belly I now have...
Fair play to you, Hilary. We got along with a few words - we were lucky that we were with a lot of Spanish people so they helped out in restaurants etc. No English on menus in most places. Have fun!!
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