Monday, November 30, 2009

Paris, je t'aime.

5:26 PM | Posted by Dan Ruemenapp | Edit Post

Sorry if I've haven't updated lately, I just had my final exam for Spanish Culture and Civilization and have been very busy lately. But fear not, here is my update. Paris, je t'aime means "Paris, I love you." This weekend some friends and I took a trip to the city of love, Paris, France. We arrived around 10:30 p.m. on Thursday night and just enjoyed a Parisian meal before going to bed in our hostel, named "Oops! Hostel Paris." The name Oops! fit very well. My friend Jack was only booked for 1 night, where as the rest of us were booked for 2. Our room keys failed on us once, and it is one of the most disorganized systems of reservations I've ever seen; it was all in pencil written in a little notebook. Other than the few problems we had the majority of our stay went well. The next morning we woke up ready to get started exploring the city of love. We started off visiting the Palace of Versailles. The palace is absolutely massive. Not only is it a palace, but it has a gigantic set of gardens and is almost a small town in and of itself. The palace is not actually in Paris but some 20 kilometers southwest of the city. The court of Versaille was the center of political power in France from 1682, when Louis XIV moved from Paris, until the royal family was forced to return to the capital in October 1789 after the beginning of the French Revolution. Versailles is a long lasting symbol of the absolute monarchy of the Ancien Régime.

After the Palace of Versailles, we headed over to Père Lachaise Cemetery. Now you may be asking, why would we go visit a cemetery in Paris, France of all places. Père Lachaise is one of the most famous cemeteries in the world. It is said to be the world's most-visited cemetery and is home to the graves of those who were a large part of France's history or those who are extremely famous and would like to be buried there. It is also home to three World War I memorials. The graves we visited in particular are Oscar Wilde and Jim Morrison. The famous pianist composer Chopin is buried there but we didn't have time to find his grave. Oscar Wilde's grave is covered in lip-marks from lipstick of those who kiss the grave of one of the greatest writers of his day. Seeing Jim Morrison's sent chills down my spine as I was witness to the remains of one of the most influential and crazy musicians of all time. He died all too soon at the age of 27 back in 1971. After the Père Lachaise Cemetery, we headed over to the world famous Louvre Museum.

The Louvre is the largest national museum in France and the most visited museum of the world. There are almost 35,000 objects on display in the Louvre. It is absolutely massive. We seriously could have spent an entire day in the Louvre, and we almost got lost inside as well. The most famous painting possibly of all-time, the Mona Lisa by Leonardo Da Vinci, is on display at the Louvre and is behind a bullet-proof glass casing. In all reality, the Mona Lisa is a very small painting and it gets an entire wall to itself. I personally think there are more impressive works of art in the museum, but it was still great to see it live and in person. Another famous work of art we saw was the ancient Greek sculpture Venus de Milo. The Louvre was awesome and it definitely deserves an entire day to itself. I hope I can go back sometime and finish what I started there. After the Louvre we walked through a flee market, ate dinner, and headed back to the hostel for the night.

The next day we spent walking through the city and visiting the Eiffel Tower. I didn't go up to the top because it costs 11 € but it still is an amazing structure none-the-less. As you all probably know the Eiffel Tower is a global icon for France and one of the most recognizable structures in the world. It was the tallest structure in the entire world until the Empire State Building took over the top spot in 1931. The tower stands 324 m (1,063 ft.) tall and is the most visited paid monument in the world. We couldn't have visited France and not seen the Eiffel Tower. It practically embodies the spirit of France. After the Eiffel Tower we visited the old Basilica of the Scared heart and got a chance to see the famous night-club/cabaret the Moulin Rouge. After that we just walked through the streets visiting shops and things and experiencing one of the fashion capitals of the world. For dinner that night we went to this restaurant which is famous among visiting students and tourists. It is this tiny little restaurant where they make you climb over the table to reach some of the seating and they treat you poorly as a joke. The meal we purchased included appetizers and cheese fondue with bread. To drink, they served us wine in baby bottles. That's right baby bottles. After dinner we stopped in a bar to hang out and talk about life and our fabulous time in Paris.

Paris is a great city and probably one of the most visited in Europe. It is the home of fashion, wine, the Mona Lisa, and the Eiffel Tower. I wish I had more time in Paris because there is still so much I didn't get a chance to see, including the Cathedral of Notre Dame. I hope that one day I can return to the city of love, and relive it once again. If you want to see pictures of my trip to Paris just visit http://picasaweb.google.com/djruemenapp. Until next time, Paris, je t'aime.

"Hello I love you / Won't you tell me your name? / Hello, I love you / Let me jump in your game."
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Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Giving Thanks

5:40 PM | Posted by Dan Ruemenapp | Edit Post
So today is the 24th of November. I have really less than two months left in Madrid. I'd like to take the time now to reflect on my time so far and give some of my thoughts I have been having recently of the future. Today I finished my midterm exams for my classes at Universidad Complutense de Madrid. I got a B on one of them and await the results on the other. I also have a lot of reading to do for my Spanish Literature since 1975 class. I hope that not only will this semester abroad be a GPA booster back at BC, but I really hope that I leave Spain with a fairly high level of Spanish ready to make more moves towards fluency. I do feel that my Spanish has improved greatly since I arrived. Actually, since I started studying the language two and a half years ago, my freshman year at Boston College, I fell in love with everything about it: the language, culture, music, people. I swear to God at times I felt like I have some long lost Spanish blood in me. I really improved quite quickly. I knew I wanted to go abroad in a Spanish speaking country because the best way to learn something is to be completely immersed in it and to be completely immersed in something I love would be a great opportunity. So far, here I am, living in Madrid for 5 months, living a dream I never thought in a million years would happen 4 years ago. I have visited different parts of Spain, Portugal, Italy, Morocco (Africa), and am going to Paris this Thursday. It feels like I have done so much, yet there is so much left to be done. The world is a big place and I would like to get to know it well.

And I sit here also missing my life back in the United States. I love it here in Spain, don't get me wrong, but I really do miss my family, friends, and the culture I have left behind. I guess you realize how much you really love something when you are away from it. I am looking forward to coming back to BC and living off campus and all the new classes I am taking. Right now my schedule consists of: Perception, Personality Theories, Social and Emotional Development, The Fundamentals of Music Theory, and Contextos (Spanish literature class). I am jumping deeper into my psychology major which is very exciting, and I also get to take a music theory class to help me learn the construction of song writing rather than accidental improvisation which is what I currently do. Living off campus will be a great journey into my autonomy as I move into adulthood (I can't believe I'm saying this). I am also excited to start recording and working intensely on my record I plan on putting out. Like I said before, I have already done so much, but have barely done anything at the same time.

Thanksgiving is this Thursday, and I will be in Paris, France. It will be difficult missing such a great holiday, but I would like to take the time right now to extend a big THANK YOU to all of you reading this. You are the ones who give me motivation to wake up and do things everyday. I especially want to thank my family. If it weren't for you, I wouldn't be the person I am today and I wouldn't be spending my Thanksgiving in Paris of all places. This great opportunity I am experiencing right now is due to you, so thank you for being my family. I don't know what I'd do without you. You are the reason for my being and I really hope I am making you proud. I'd also like to thank my other friends and loved ones. You guys mean a lot to me as well and I can't wait to get back to my life with you that I put on hold for 5 months.

I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving and I hope you all think about the things you are thankful for. I know all too well what I am thankful for, and I just want to say you can never say "thank you" or "I love you" enough. Life is too short for bull shit. You got to just take it as it comes and run with it while remembering those who helped get you there in the first place. Keep on keepin' on everyone.

"I'm in the war of my life / I'm at the core of my life / Got no choice but to fight 'till its done / So fight on, fight on everyone, so fight on."
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Friday, November 20, 2009

Battle Studies

1:12 PM | Posted by Dan Ruemenapp | Edit Post
Alright folks, here comes the review for one of my most anticipated records in a long time, John Mayer's Battle Studies. I could write a huge review and complete breakdown of every song but I won't do that to you all; I'll just give you an objective and concise yet complete and semi-biased review of John Mayer's 4th studio album.

Battle Studies

With the title based off of a 19th Century war tactic book, John Mayer wanted to create a record based on the hardship in relationships and the everyday battles we face in life. In a rented out Los Angeles mansion/home studio far away from the paparazzi, John accomplished exactly what he set out to do. John wanted to step away from what made his previous record, Continuum, so successful and go in a completely different direction and show his audience there is more he needs to add to his musical repertoire.

Battle Studies starts off with a U2 style guitar effect and breaks in the "love is a battlefield" theme in "Heartbreak Warfare." It is interesting that John selected an acoustic ballad as the second track, but "All We Ever Do Is Say Goodbye" fits here perfectly and is one of the saddest songs on the record. The third track, "Half Of My Heart," is a Fleetwood Mac inspired song featuring Taylor Swift and has "Grammy/Big Time Radio Hit" written all over it. "Who Says," the record's first single, is a simple folk song about having control of the pleasures in your life. "Perfectly Lonely" is one of the best on the record, and brags of his great guitar skills. It's a break in the clouds from the heartbreak stating "I don't need anybody." The next track, "Assassin," is my favorite on the record. It is a dark yet sexy song filled with very deep lyrics about a player who has the tides turn on him. The guitar solo shows his Stevie Ray Vaughan influence and this song has great potential to grow live. His cover of "Crossroads," the Robert Johnson song made famous by Cream, is very different from the rest of the record. John plays this song great live, but the studio version just seems very dumbed down. The next song "War Of My Life" is a very chill and great "road trip" song about the battles we face in life. "Edge of Desire" is probably the most emotionally charged song on the record and is about the deep wanting of love from a lonely soul. "Do You Know Me" is a very simple and short song (2:30) which is very open-ended and can get repetitive, yet it has an philosophic feel to it lyrically. The final track, "Friends, Lovers Or Nothing," is an upbeat and great closing song which shows the final battle of love and proclaims that "friends with benefits" is a bad idea.

I could have gone into greater detail in my review but I didn't want to overload you all. Overall, I think this is a great record. I can't really compare it to any of his previous work because it is completely different. It seems to start the story of heartbreak with the sun out, then the record gets darker and deeper, and then the sun comes back out at the end. I do like Continuum better musically, but Battle Studies is much more mature lyrically and his vocals are much more improved. I would have to place Battle Studies somewhere between Continuum and Room For Squares/Heavier Things. Tickets to the Battle Studies World Tour go on sale for the general public tomorrow, November 21, and expect me to be one of the first to guarantee a spot to see him. John continues to influence me as a musician and I am glad to be along for the ride.

"Clouds of sulfur in the air / Bombs exploding everywhere / It's heartbreak warfare."
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Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Transition Period

5:54 PM | Posted by Dan Ruemenapp | Edit Post
Hello all. This past weekend was a fairly chill weekend, seeing as we only did a single day trip with our class and the rest of the weekend I just stayed and enjoyed Madrid. Thursday and Friday were just fun weekends out with friends enjoying the nightlife of Madrid. We went to an Irish bar one night where everyone spoke English and they even had ESPN on the television. I was very excited to see American sports on TV again. Saturday, all of the BC kids went to El Escorial and Valle de los Caídos (Valley of the Fallen), which are both about an hour away from the city, but still located in the province of Madrid.

El Escorial is a multi-purpose palace built by King Philip II of Spain. It has one of the oldest libraries in the world. The architecture is kind of dull and gray, but I'm sure it was rockin' back in the day. Here is some basic information about El Escorial. I don't feel like re-typing all the notes I took during our field trip so all the credit here goes to Wikipedia. El Escorial is a historical residence of the king of Spain. It is one of the Spanish royal sites and functions as a monastery, royal palace, museum, and school. It is located about 45 kilometers northwest of the city of Madrid in the town of San Lorenzo de El Escorial. Philip II of Spain, reacting to the Protest Reformation of Europe in the 16th century, devoted much of his lengthy reign and much of his supply of gold from the Americas to stopping the Protestants. Philip asked the famous Spanish architect Juan Bautista de Toledo to design his palace. Together they designed El Escorial as the focal point making Spain the capital of the Christian world in the Iberian Peninsula.

After El Escorial and a quick picnic we took a quick visit to Valle de los Caídos ten minutes away (Valley of the Fallen). The monument built there is massive. It is built right into a mountain and a gargantuan cross situated on top of the mountain of the monument can be seen from miles away. The following information is also from Wikipedia. The Valle de los Caídos is a monumental memorial mausoleum erected at Cuelgamuros Valley in the Sierra de Guadarrama mountains near Madrid built by the order of the former Spanish dictator Francisco Franco who ruled Spain from April 1939 until his death in November of 1975. The monument was built to honor those who died during the Spanish Civil War. Only the names of José Antonio Primo de Rivera (the first leader of the Spanish fascism party) and Franco himself are honored individually. The rest of the fallen in the war are honored anonymously. Franco claimed the monument to be a "national act of atonement." As a surviving artifact of Franco's rule, the monument and its Catholic basilica remain controversial, especially due to the manner and circumstances of its construction (built by political prisoners).

El Escorial and Valle de los Caídos represent two periods of transition in Spain. The transition from the Catholic Kings of Spain to the Austrian Kings and the transition from dictatorship to democracy, respectively. I am currently going through a transition period myself here during my studies in Madrid. First, my classes are starting to get into intense mode as midterms are coming up and I have a lot of reading and studying to do the next few weeks. Second, tomorrow I register for classes for Boston College in the Spring 2010 semester. I have all of them picked out, and now I need to get some back up plans ready just in case they close before my registration time. In a few days after I finish registering I'll share my course schedule with ya'll.

I didn't take many pictures of El Escorial or Valle de los Caídos because I was taking notes the whole time, but of the pictures I did take you can visit soon at http://picasaweb.google.com/djruemenapp.

"Because these things will change, can you feel it now? / These walls that they put up to hold us back will fall down / It's a revolution, the time will come for us to finally win."
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Tuesday, November 10, 2009

A Strange Arrangement

6:08 PM | Posted by Dan Ruemenapp | Edit Post
Hey everyone, I'm back. Sorry if I was M.I.A. for a little bit, but I have been pretty busy studying, running errands, and enjoying Madrid. Today I am going to give you some fresh new music and fresh it is.

A Strange Arrangement

Andrew Mayer Cohen, "Mayer Hawthorne," born in Ann Arbor, Michigan (I do have a thing for local artists don't I?), is a soul singer/producer who just released his debut record, A Strange Arrangement. A Strange Arrangement gives off the same classic soul and Motown sound that you can find on an Al Green or Temptations record with a pinch of the 21st century thrown in. Mayer Hawthorne is this odd looking white kid with nerdy glasses who just comes out of nowhere with his nostalgic and soulful voice. "Just Ain't Gonna Work Out" is a smooth soul tune with the backing of some modern hip-hop style drumming. "Your Easy Lovin' Ain't Pleasin' Nothin'" is a groovy Temptations inspired Motown tune which will make you want to just get up and dance. The fast-paced drum beat of "The Ills" matched with echoing horns makes for a memorable rhythm. The record ends on the whimsical and weird, yet soft and soulful "Green Eyed Love."

The official name for this record's genre is "neo-soul" and it is both neo and soul. Mayer Hawthorne brings back the Motown soul from back in the day and gives it a very new and fresh feel to it. It brings nostalgic thoughts of "Where have I heard this before?" but also makes you say "Soul is coming back." The production value of the record is very clean sounding and is almost like a modern, cool, and stripped-down production of the original Motown sound. The first time I saw the music video for "Just Ain't Gonna Work Out" I immediately thought, "Is that voice coming from THAT GUY?" All songs are sung and produced almost entirely by Hawthorne himself; he has brought soul back, and here to stay it is.

"And I guess I don't love you anymore / And I'm sorry, but it just ain't working out / Just ain't gonna work out."
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Tuesday, November 3, 2009

A Clash of Cultures

9:09 PM | Posted by Dan Ruemenapp | Edit Post
So this past weekend all of the BC students took a "school" trip to the cities of Córdoba and Granada in the Andalucía region of Spain. The reason the word school is in quotes is because it was more of an educational vacation than actual school. The Andalucían region of Spain was home to hundreds of years of a peaceful mixture of the Christian, Jewish, and Muslim cultures before the Catholic Kings reclaimed the Iberian Peninsula from the Muslims. After a fun 5 hour bus ride to Córdoba, we first ate lunch at a Spanish restaurant. Take a guess as to what we all ate. If you guessed Ham, then you are absolutely right. It seems like I eat ham almost everyday here in Spain. As I was saying, after lunch we took a walk through the city taking notes about its storied history. When the Muslims had control of the Iberian Peninsula, Córdoba was their captial. After walking through its streets and learning about the cities history, we came upon the Cathedral of Córdoba, better known as the Great Mosque of Córdoba. It was one of the largest Mosques in the world at the time and was the main place of worship for Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula. During the Spanish Reconquest, King Ferdinand III built a cathedral into the side of the Mosque, but keeping the Muslim architecture intact. It's kind of ironic when St. James, the slayer of hundreds of Muslims during the Reconquest is prayed to in the building which once was the center for Muslim prayer. After our visit to the Mosque we had free time to roam the city before hopping back on the bus to Granada.

Granada currently is the capital of the province of Granada in Andalucía and was the capital of the final Muslim kingdom before the final battle of the Spanish Reconquest. As soon as we arrived we took a quick introduction walk through the city and ate an Arabic meal very similar to the food I ate in Morocco. After dinner we all retired to bed in our very nice hotel rooms. It was a nice change sleeping in a legitimate hotel room after my previous travel accommodations in cheap hostels. The next morning we fist visited the Royal Chapel of Granada which is a mausoleum which houses the remains of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain Ferdinand and Isabella. Next we visited the Alhambra. The Alhambra is a palace and fortress complex of the Muslim rulers of Granada. This was one of the most impressive architectural complex I have ever seen. From the outside, it looks like just a normal castle, but on the inside, the complex unexpectedly opens up into a massive "mini-city" which houses numerous palaces, gardens, plazas, and prayer areas. The Alhambra was filled with beautiful Muslim architecture and little Christian additions from when the Christians took it over during the Reconquest. We walked the gardens for almost 15 minutes. It was one of the most impressive structures I have ever seen.

After our visit to the Alhambra and some kebabs for lunch, we had an appointment with an Arab style bathhouse (like the Hammam in Morocco) with a Spanish cultural twist. We spent two hours in a spa with different temperature pools and enjoyed a 15 minute oil massage. Sometimes its hard to believe that this is actually a "school" trip. After some splendid treatment at the spa, we were all treated to a traditional Spanish flamenco show. The flamenco guitar playing was awe-inspiring while the singing and dancing brought it all together to show off the rich culture that Spain carries. That night some of us enjoyed a hookah session with some stimulating conversation. It was Halloween in the United States as well as in Spain. Halloween is a still a fairly recent holiday in Spain, having been adopted by the Spaniards from American culture. Halloween isn't as popular here as it is in the U.S., but they are making progress.

This weekend was just a blend of so many different cultures. I got to experience Spanish, Muslim, and even a little American culture this weekend. It really is a global world now and every single one of us is connected to the global network. It is very interesting to see how each culture mixes with one another and adopts certain attributes they evolve over time. I can't wait to see what happens in the future. Photos of this weekend trip can be viewed at http://picasaweb.google.com/djruemenapp.

"Jai Ho!"


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