Spinning

Whoever invented the concept of Spinning (intensive stationary cycling to music) obviously never tried it. Would it really be that difficult to make a seat that wasn't the size of remote control or stuffed with rocks?

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I'm a quiter. I can't take it anymore. Charles Dickens is killing me. I've tried and tried to get into his novel, Little Dorrit, but it's only lead to suffering on my part. It's going back up on the shelf and I'm moving on. Maybe in a few months I'll try and read the 500 pages that I have left, but not now. It's disappointing for me to leave a book unfinished, but my mental health is at stake right now. I need something a little less dense.

Farewell Little Dorrit.

Medieval Serfdom?

Ok, I know it's a stretch, but this came on the news the other day here in Galicia, and it blew me away. Things like this are part of the reason why youth in Spain reject the Catholic Church so much, making it hard for them to believe in anything. The article's in Spanish so I'll give a synopsis.

A humble elderly couple (89 years old, to be exact) in Portomouro, Galicia had to pay 8,000 kg of corn and 320 kg of beans to the church (that's right, not the government, but...the church) yesterday or they would be evicted from the land they've lived and worked on all their life.

It all dates back to a legal contract made between the family and an Ederly Home run by the church in 1926, stating that the family could live and work on the land but they would have to pay rent, either in the form of money or spices/crops. The family payed diligently each month until the Home closed 35 years ago. For thirty-five years no one has ever demanded the rent until last week when the priest came forward.

The couple chose to pay in the form of crops (abiding by the 80 year old contract), something that the priest thought was "ridiculous" (I'm sure he would have prefered the money). Of course they didn't have 8,000 kg of corn nor 320 kg of beans, so they had to buy it, costing them more than 3,000 Euros. The priest stated that the church was going to sell the crops and give the money to the poor. Ironic.

Many young people in Spain consider themselves either atheist or agnostic, precisely because of what they see in the Catholic Church. And if I didn't know what it means to have a personal relationship with and have freedom in Jesus, I might have been one too.

My intention isn't to bash the Catholic Church or praise the Protestant Church, because niether are perfect. But I think there is something terribly wrong when the Church seeks power over truth. In my opinion, the Catholic Church represents everything that Jesus is not. It's this hipocrisy and hunger for power that has disillusioned many of the Spanish youth. The church shouldn't be a man-made, powerful institution, but a God-made, humble family.

(Courtney jumps down off of her soap box.)

What I'd Give for Some AC

It's hot. Africa hot.

It's normally not hot in Santiago, so no one has ever needed AC in the apartment buildings. But with the hole in the ozone layer every year it gets hotter and hotter. Right now an African heatwave has blown our way and our fans just don't cut it. We live on the 8th floor so if it's 85 degrees outside it's 90 degrees inside.

I'm actually looking forward to going to work...there's AC there.