Pintxos!

I took a break from apartment hunting yesteday to meet up with Hannah, an American from New York who's been here for over a year. She did the program I'm doing last year, and she found me on Facebook, where I've been asking her all the questions the officials from the Basque government don't seem to want to answer for me.

Though learning the do's and don'ts of any new place by trial and error is half the fun, it is sometime nice to have someone who shares the same cultural background as you fast-track you through the process.

Hannah (and Leslie and Lewis, two Californians also living here), took me out for my first pintxos. Pintxos are particular to the Basque country, and they go something like this: You go into a bar, go up to the bar and order a small glass of wine, or beer, or clara ( a drink I discovered yesterday which is beer mixed with lemonade..mmm!). The whole bar is covered with plates of different hors d'oeuvre-type snacks. Anything to simple ham on bread, to an artichoke covered in cheese and deep-fried and toothpicked to a piece of bread, a dollop of a mayonnaise-y vegetable salad with a shrimp on top, small sandwiches, or Spanish tortilla (kind of like a potato omelette), and the list goes on. Different bars have different pintxos. Because half of the things no one really knows what they are, including people from here, you just go and point and the bartender will put whatever you choose on a little plate for you. There are also bigger portions of dishes that you can order to share amongst a couple of people.

These were my first pintxos, but will not be my last, I guarantee. It's kind of a huge part of the culture here.