Flamenco and new friends

Tried the phone again but still not accepting the sim. It is exasperating. Took the bus again today to visit the famous Macarena Virgin statue.  The churches all over Seville are getting ready for their famous Easter processions. The Virgin Macarena is dressed in her finest clothes in readiness. She must stand as tall as me ( about 5ft) and is carried on a podium for about 14 hours on Good Friday all around  Seville.  Think Chinese dragon in little Burke street. They have teams of young men training for the day. We saw them tonight practising carrying the podium. They wear a sort of Egyptian type headdress and they hop under the podium and when the captain gives the word they all heave upwards at he same time and bounce on their tip toe and then all move forward in unison. It is a tradition that everyone seems to want to be part of. They were training at midnight!
The Macarena is exquisite.
I wandered around the town heading to Centro where they have this rather strange mushroom shaped, mechano style construction which you can go to the top off for 3€ and a free drink. It affords the best view over Seville and it's surrounds. It is a weird construction that stands over the museum of antiquity which houses Roman ruins. I am not sure of its actual purpose but they have in-line skating classes on the plaza directly underneath the structure and above the museum. Great use of space at least.
My next challenge was the Flamenco Museum in the Santa Cruz area which is a labyrinth of streets that housed the Jewish residents peacefully, then as a ghetto after thousands were slaughtered during a purge.
the Museum was very interesting with interactive displays that went some way to explaining the complexity of Flamenco. They also run a show which was riveting. The guitarist was fabulous and his guitar had such depth of tone. The music is somewhat improvised and so the dancers need to get into the 'pata' clapping rhythm before any dancing occurs. I think it is quite mournful singing full of emotion and the dancing is very dramatic.
I joined a walking tour through the old Jewish area and as there were only four of us we went on to dinner together.  By now I am into the swing of eating at 10 pm and we went off to a traditional and long established Tapas bar. Our guide Mia, a student of  Flamenco, told us that tapas comes from a law passed by the King to curb drunkenness. It became law that people had to eat something with their drinks. plates of food were served and because of the flies they put little plates (tapas) on top. It seems to have worked because while everyone is out having a drink there is no public drunkenness to be seen.
My companions Amanda, her friend Jemima and her son Jack were from Blackpool and great company. Jack is another young English student of languages who is on study leave to improve his fluency. It was my most companionable meal so far.  Both the women have had breast cancer last year.  They had come to celebrate Jacks birthday. Jack reminded me of Jonathan. I felt a bit self conscious telling people why I a here  because they always seem amazed and impressed with my ambition to walk the Camino. Jemima wanted to follow the blog. Amanda had been in Australia recently and was using a women's travel program where you pay a membership fee and then get hosted in people's homes. Must look into that. She said most people didn't want money just the opportunity to show visitors around.