Cooking with Squatters in Sevilla
It's 6pm, and I'm at my hostel in Spain. Not without a bit of trouble tho, what with the flight from Egypt being delayed until 2am, missing my connecting flight by a matter of minutes, and then getting desperately lost in the streets of Sevilla (in all fairness though, the hostel didn't have any signage and their directions were pretty shocking!)
But despite the world being against me, I had arrived. And having spent the day checking out the sights with a fellow Aussie named Warwick, I was ready for some real authentic Spanish cuisine. And it was just at that time that a guy called Tom invited me to a free Spanish cooking class. Figuring that it was about time I learnt this whole "cooking" thing for myself, I decided to tag along.
And so we started on our walk through the streets. On and on we went, and as we did I started noticing that the streets were getting dodgier and dodgier. Then suddenly, the guy stops outside a graffiti covered wall, pulls back some Aluminum, and ushers us inside. That's right - my friend had kindly forgot to mention that this cooking class was being held in a Squat!
But after getting over the shock of that, it was actually a really awesome night. Of course, all the instructions were in Spanish, so it was a little tricky. We cooked organic Vegan food (no meat, milk, cheese - no products from an animal). Now cooking meat is easy - you just buy a steak, chuck it on the barbie, and you have one of the tastiest dishes known to man. But making veggies taste good - that's another story!
We made an onion soup, and an onion and potato bake, with onion and chickpeas as the sauce. (These guys really love their onions - apparently they have some special healing properties). And you know what, after a lot of salt, they actually tasted really good!
While we were waiting for the food to cook, we sat back to watch the freaky Diablo guy do his thing - and I tell you what, this guy was awesome. Gob-smakingly awesome. Then we did a tour of the squat. Every wall was covered in amazing art and graffiti. Here's one of the pieces I liked:
With softened hearts, we returned to our hostel via the "scenic route". Reflecting on the experience as we looked for landmarks, we were all really struck by the people we had met. Many of the squatters were homeless, jobless, and in our eyes, hopeless. And yet they had hope. And they had joy. Why? Because in their little rundown squat, they had each other.
Looking back, I think that God has answered my New Year's prayer already - or a least has given me a little more insight into the lives of the homeless. They are people just like you and me - only difference is, they look out for each other.
Please pray for the Sevillian squatters. The government is trying really hard to evict them - there is a court case in February. And pray to thank God for the experience, and the insight that he gave us all.