Last Day with Mum - Part 2

Evening in the City Centre

After I had packed the small suitcase with 7.5 kilos and was happy to have some of my things already almost on their way to Germany, I took a shower and got ready for dinner and my last time in the city centre with Mum and her boyfriend. I left my hotel room and went one floor down to my Mum's room in order to bring her the luggage. After everybody was ready (they were still stressed with all the luggage and the departure the next morning) we went to the restaurant to have dinner one last time. We weren't too enthusiastic about that as the food hadn't improved during our stay at the hotel and it was still the same thing - boring pizza, pasta without sauces and other dishes we weren't able to define. We had some plates from the buffet, some wine and it didn't take too long until we left the restaurant again. My Mum told me to ask at the reception wether there was the possibility to have breakfast the next morning before the restaurant opened, as the bus to pick them up and bring them to the airport would already come at 7 am! The woman there told me that it was no problem and that they could come whenever they wanted. After I had told her to call a taxi for us we left the lobby and went a bit outside in order to enjoy the warm and fresh air. Furthermore, there were some birds in a cage that were making incredibly much noise. 

Some Last-Minute Shopping

The taxi arrived and brought us to the city centre where we started to walk a bit at the promenade with all the more or less touristic shops and the restaurants with their "marketing" personnel waiting in front of them, trying to convince everybody to come in and eat or drink something. I still hated them, but I tried to enjoy my last evening with my Mum at that place - the rest of the days it would be Carnaval with the girls and quite exhausting. Carnaval had just started, but I didn't want to go to each event as the people in Tenerife are taking that time of the year incredibly serious and it was simply too much. We went into some shops and my Mum thought about buying last souvenirs or perfumes (perfumes were so cheap in Tenerife, amazing!) while her boyfriend was still in his bad mood and went slowly behind us. I didn't care and had a lot of fun with my Mum talking about weird tourists and watching cute little dogs. I couldn't believe that I would return to Germany in not even one week and still didn't know if I should be sad or happy about that. This place was so beautiful and like paradise, but I missed my family and friends and also some challenges - the internship had become boring and I wanted to have something important (at least to me) to do in order not to feel that useless anymore. 

So after we had passed by some of the shops and my Mum had finally bought another perfume, we wanted to have one last drink at a bar right next to the sea where one could sit at the terrace and enjoy the sound of the waves. My Mum's boyfriend was still behaving in an embarrassing way and talked to the waiter in German and everything, and for one second I was happy that they would return to Germany the next day. I wanted to have some more time with my Mum alone, but that wasn't possible, so I had to live with him, at least for a while. We stayed in that bar for a while and enjoyed the nice atmosphere until it became a bit cold with the wind next to the sea, so we paid and decided to walk on a bit. There was something going on at the large square where all the bigger events took place, so we went down there to see what was going on. It was a Carnaval event - the "Election of the Queen". 

The Election of the Carnaval Queen - Elección de la Reina

While we were walking down the street a bit further we could see that the area at the square was closed by a fence and you had to pay an entrance fee in order to see it, but there was also a paper telling everyone outside that it was already full. So we went up the street a little bit again because it was a small hill and one could see the stage from outside, too. There wasn't a lot going on at the moment but we waited a bit and soon there was a dancing group in beautiful costumes performing and dancing. It was nice, but I wanted to see the really large costumes of the queens - the election of the carnaval queen was kind of a competition for the best costume and the most beautiful queen. They were building costumes the whole year, sponsored by larger and smaller companies and private persons in order to win that election and be the famous queen of Carnaval one time. The costumes were huge and looked wonderful (as I had seen on pictures so far) and I was quite excited to see them. Unfortunately, the Gala had just started and as Spanish love to talk a lot the person moderating everything didn't seem to stop soon. I didn't care, I had no problem with standing there, listening to the jokes and enjoying the show until the main part would start. But I was a bit afraid that my Mum's boyfriend (and some time later also my Mum) wouldn't want to do that - something I could kind of understand, as they had to get up very early the next morning and additionally they didn't understand any Spanish, so it was just boring for them when the person was talking. 

But to my surprise they said that we could stay a while and wait for the interesting costumes - especially after I had shown them some pictures from the internet. So we stayed there at the large sidewalk with a lot of other tourists and watched the show. The subject of Carnaval was Cinema this year and therefore, the stage was decorated with large movie posters and famous actors. It looked great and one could really see how important Carnaval was for the people at Tenerife. After a long while of talking and making more or less funny jokes there was another show starting - a dancing group with spectacular costumes. My Mum was fascinated by their skills and the show and I was happy that she liked it. Right after the first show the moderation only talked some minutes before an even more spectacular show started: a woman in a huge malefiz costume coming in while very dramatic music was played and she was even singing! It was a wonderful show and we were all like hypnotised by her. That was the moment when my Mum usually would have said that she wants to go home, but when she had seen that she wanted to see the rest of the show, too. Her boyfriend started to be a bit crumpy because he wasn't interested in any other cultures at all (as one could already see in relation to the food) and he felt sick the whole day already - even if I wasn't sure if that was reality or just show in order to ruin the good mood of my Mum and me. Fact was that we stayed and waited for the "real show", the presentation of the queens. 

The problem was, that after that great show with malefiz and everything, the moderator started to talk again and he didn't stop. He made jokes, they made small sketches and everything, but there was no presentation of any queen. After 15 or 20 more minutes my Mum told me that they would leave now, as they had to get up early in the morning and her boyfriend's handicapped foot was hurting. I couldn't say anything against that, but I realized that we would have to say goodbye in that moment as I didn't want to get up at 5 in the morning just to say goodbye to them. So I hugged my Mum, thanked her for everything and wished her a good flight home. Her boyfriend gave me his hand and said goodbye - I hoped he couldn't see in my face how happy I was that he was leaving. Honestly, the goodbye wasn't a large problem as I would return to Germany only 4 days later and would see her again over there, so it was more a goodbye like the ones at home when I come to visit her and drive back home to my appartment for a while. I continued watching the show and after some more minutes, finally he announced the first queen. There was dramatic music again and the first candidate entered with her huge and shiny costume. They are really huge, they have wheels in order to be easier to transport and most of the time there is somebody helping the person in the costume to move because I guess it might be too heavy to walk normally. Furthermore, the women are wearing incredibly high high heels and I couldn't even walk in them without such a costume! 

I was fascinated by the first costume because it was the fist time I was seeing something like this in reality and I was looking forward to the other five ladies. My feet were already hurting because I had already been stanting there for more than one hour, but I was just too curious to give up and return to the hotel. I had been waiting such a long time, so now I wanted to see the most important and most interesting part, too. And now everything happened a bit faster, as the queen candidates couldn't move a lot in their costumes. They just came in, walked to the middle of the stage, turned around one or two times (with the help of somebody) and left the platform at the other side. Then, the moderator explained the theme of the costume and showed the logos of its sponsors and that was it. Afterwards, he already announced the next candidate with her name and age and the same procedure started again. The only thing that changed was the enormous costume. One could really see how much work they had put into that and that they were really loving Carnaval more than anything else. I loved each of the four costumes and was happy that I wasn't the jury that would have to decide the winner of that contest. When the last queen candidate had presented her costume, I finally decided to go - I would get to know the winner in the internet the next day and my feet were really hurting now! So I left the sidewalk and walked to the square where one could find taxis most of the time, took one and returned to the hotel. It was a bit weird to know that I was now totally alone in that hotel, but I tried to think optimistic and focus on the next evening when I would finally see my former Vietnamese colleague again. 

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