Caitlyn SlivinskiWAKING up, I blindly reach over to my nightstand and grab my glasses. Putting them on my face, they fog up; the heat from my body reacts with the sub-temperature glasses that have been chilling in my room all night. It’s cold in here.
Okay, sub-temperature might not be accurate, but clearly it’s cold enough to create a vapor film on my lenses. I feel like I could see my breath; exhaling from under a pile of blankets in bed.
Since Sevilla is known for its scorching summers, centralized heat isn’t very popular here. It’s not that winters are freezing in Southern Spain. They don’t get snow. I would like to report that on January 2nd, 2011, in the year of our Lord, my roommate and I soaked in sun and mild temperatures on our roof terrace. One of us was even wearing a bikini.
So again, I can’t say there is anything to complain about, except at night I need to sleep with a winter hat on.
I think most Sevillians have wised up and invested in a space heater. Every time I go to purchase one for myself, it turns out to be a 70 degree day and I can’t convince myself that a space heater is necessary.
Each night though, I am wearing my slippers in bed with my blanket pulled up under my chin. Now it’s the end of January; less than a week until February which is when the warm weather starts crawling back. At this point it seems counter-productive to burn a hole in my pocket in the name of a heater. Even now as I write with a wool blanket over my legs and the hood of my sweatshirt pulled over my head, my nose and fingertips are icy cold.
I guess this is me channeling my Polish stubbornness genes. Comfort is well within my reach, but I refuse to give in. Like they kept saying in the terrible movie on TV last night, guess we just need to “soldier on.”
Ironic because the movie characters were also dealing with chilled temperatures, granted, compared to my situation, theirs – an approaching ice age – was a bit more extreme.
But only slightly.
My mujer told me about the cold of Spanish homes before our arrival two years ago…and I didn’t believe her. Coming from Colorado, living at an elevation of 1600 m, I said “nah, I’m tough.”
Guess who got the last laugh.
We’ve been scraping ice off our windscreen every morning for the last week down here in Andalucía! Whenever I speak to folks back in the UK they seem to think I’m lazing in the sun even in winter. When I tell them how cold it is I get the impression they think I’m fibbing!
It is very different in our part of the province of Almería. So far we have had a fantastic winter. Lots of sun and not much rain and wind. So much better than last year.
It doesn´t stop me feeling cold though. For most of the winter I have been wearing a fleece on the golf course when visitors who stay here for only a week or two have been going around in shorts and short sleeved polo shirts.
Ice on the windscreen? Sounds just like the UK. Another reason not to live in Ronda if it’s that cold! No problems in my part of Andalucia; December very was wet but beautiful days since January. 17 degrees here now, and only 11:30am. Not an icicle in sight…
P.S. Paul surely you are you wearing two pairs of socks now lol.
In Seville in January. Nah, wouldn’t be cold. I wish I had brought boots and wool socks. Ended up buying a hat and gloves. However,the people continue to hang in the streets and have a wonderful time.