Holy Toledo! February 4, 2009

Ok, so I realize I’m horrible at updating, but it’s really really not my fault. After I left my hostel on Sunday morning, I didn’t have internet until last night, and even then (and now), it’s stolen. So.. here goes the story of my weekend/week thus far..

Sunday- Woke up wanting to go to the Rastro, the biggest market in Spain and possibly Europe that’s only on Sundays.. so I get showered and packed and check out and I’m ready to go, only to walk outside into pouring rain/snow mix, which turns into the biggest snowballs I’ve ever seen falling at a very rapid pace. Needless to say, I was soaked and returned to the hostel immediately, then decided to take a taxi to the hotel Husa Moncloa where I’d meet up with the rest of the group later that day. I watched the Australian Open (stinking Rafa had to go beat my precious Federer… again.. ugh), grabbed some lunch, and laid around until everyone else showed up. By around 6 everyone was in the hotel, all 81 of us. I met tons of great girls and we went out to grab some food, and by the convo we had I knew we’d get along really well. One of my roomies, Jeanette, and I get along really well, we have easy conversation even though we’re nothing alike really. She’s Mexican, so her Spanish is obviously amazing, even though the only thing I’ve got on her is my new knowledge of Spanish vocab (as in, peninsular Spanish, which apparently is completely separate from the rest of the world’s Spanish). The other roomie Florencia (she goes by Flo..) hasn’t talked to us much but seems really nice, they just put her in a different hotel room with a girl who’s alone for now, so we haven’t had the chance to get to know her as well. I’ve met alot of other great girls, and guys. Our ratio is about 3:1, so not as bad as expected, and the guys are pretty vocal so it makes up for the small number. We had a little meeting, an hour bus tour of Madrid (even though I’d already seen the sights, I went along to be social), then were set free for the night. We walked for an hour to find a dinner place, apparently our hotel is not in a very good place for eating out, and ended up getting deliciously cheap Chinese food. 

Monday morning we woke up early and headed off for the Palacio Real. Our tour guide was THE biggest bi-atch ever, since she refused to smile or even act amused. Apparently she hates Americans, so she should definitely be working in the biggest tourist trap in Madrid. She kept bitching to our director Mario about how we obviously didn’t understand her at all, and he reassured her that we did, indeed, understand her perfectly. She couldn’t understand why we weren’t asking questions, not realizing that we didn’t really care to since she talked enough to make us all want to sleep as it is, and the one time someone ventured to ask something intelligent she pretended she couldn’t understand what he was asking. What a miserable old woman! Oh well, we all got a good laugh about it.

After the Palacio we walked through Plaza Mayor, in the rain, yet again, to the Reina Sofia museum of contemporary art. We saw Picasso’s Guernica (the really famous painting about the war in Spain that we studied a ton in high school and college Spanish classes), as well as some Salvador Dali and a bunch of sculptures and strange paintings with no obvious meaning or reason for being in such a famous museum. Oh well, I’m not exactly an art expert, but our tour guide here was precious, the polar opposite of the Palacio bruja. She was tiny and adorable and made art  really interesting, which is a feat for a group of jet-lagged college students. We got Italian food for lunch, returned to the museum (8 of us) to finish the other floors, where Jeanette and I got separated and couldn’t find the group, so we took the metro back to the hotel. Then we relaxed and just hung around the hotel all afternoon. After a grocery run for bottled sangria and bread and jelly (I already had the PB of course), Jeanette and I hung out with Nick and Dave, and I learned a new game called “Ride the Bus.”  I really enjoy getting to know everyone in our program, they’re from all over and are very diverse in backgrounds and everything else. There is a College of Charleston guy from Clemson (Anderson, actually), a VA Tech guy from Raleigh, a William and Lee girl from Charleston (Ashley Hall for h.s.), another Clemson girl (she was in my Core class last semester), a USC boy, a Michigan boy from San Diego (he’s transferring back to Cali, like a smart person would), a bunch of Cali, Arizona (ASU), Nebraska, Colorado, NJ (C of NJ), Texas, VA (Old Dominion, VMI..) and PA people, and everything in between people. There are more sophomores than expected, mostly boys but that’s fine, and I’m not the youngest by alot, so that’s nice. My roommates and I seem to be the most fluent, and I’m missing speaking Spanish alot, so I’m excited to get to Sevilla tomorrow and back into the Spanish lifestyle. Plus, I’m pumped to meet my family.

Yesterday (Tuesday) we left Madrid after my first good hour-long workout since I got to Spain (I miss my daily Fike visits, ALOT), and headed to Valle de los Caidos, a famous war monument. However, thanks to snow, the bane of my existence, it was closed, so we didn’t get to see one of the “most beautiful, momentous places in Spain.” We continued on to the Escorial, a monestary/church/tomb where all the famous kings and queens and family members are buried, and our tour guide was a wonderful old man who loved to tell jokes in his broken English. The place  was not only beautiful, but very interesting, and I felt like I was in Hogwarts/Gringotts at multiple points throughout the tour, which is always a good thing for me! (I’ve found atleast 5 other HP-obsessed people here, so that’s wonderful). Then we got some paella, yum, before our 2 hour drive to Toledo. Our hotel here is gorgeous, Hotel  Beatriz, even though you have to pay for the gym and spa and pool and stuff, I might give in and get a massage or use the baths tonight. We went into the city for dinner, and it was pretty dead, but I can tell it’s going to be beautiful for our tour.

Today is our all-day walk of Toledo, so I’m not sure what we’re seeing today, but I’m excited as always. Then we have one more night in the hotel and then leave for Sevilla tomorrow! So I’ll let you know how my family is once I get there…  Hasta luego =)

MuchoMadrid January 31, 2009

So, it´s still hard to believe I´m not going back to Granada..

Thursday night was fun but short, Kaeli and I went out with José and Carlos and met up with a few others for tapas, but went home around midnight so I could prepare for my big day on Friday =)  I´m uber jealous because she´s staying in José´s house for a few days since she wants to stay in Granada this weekend, and she´s going to cook his fam pancakes! Oh well, I already had my flight and I wasn´t going to waste more money to switch it..

Yet another long trip on Friday, I haven´t had the best luck with travel in 2009. I was planning to take a 3€ bus to the airport at 7:30, and like a genius decided to walk to the bus stop, which should have been about 20 minutes from my house. I forgot to take into account that my luggage ways approximately 100 pounds, and the streets are not roller-luggage friendly. After receiving 4 different sets of directions as to where exactly my bus was, I missed it by 7 minutes. Then, I continued to walk around, in the wrong area of town, looking for a free cab… 30 minutes later, exhausted and sweaty and grumpy.. I found one.  22€ cab ride, and I was finally there, way early for my flight, but atleast there… the flight left around half an hour late, so I was starving by the time we landed. Then I hauled my bags to the subway (2€ instead of 30? heck yes), only to discover I had to switch lines 3 times! And of course, none of the down/up escalators work, and there are NO elevators… Thank goodness the people of Madrid are more kind-hearted than I´ve heard and 3 people offered to help me throughout my trip. I finally climbed up from the depths of the subway station (or hell.. as I like to think of it) after an hour on the slowest subway system ever.. and had to walk an additional 15 minutes to my hostel, since I got off at the wrong station apparently (I just followed directions.. ugh). But after everything, I arrived, and have all my luggage and the hostel was nice and clean and friendly.

After showering and getting ready, I headed out for lunch on my own, and sat in a little  café close to the hostel reading and eating… not my f avorite way to have a meal, but not terrible either. Then I went walking, and guess who I should find… this boy Brian from my class in Granada! SOO random… Madrid is massive, absolutely huge, and I happened to run into the one person I know in the whole city. Anyway, I got his number in case we wanted to go to dinner, and kept walking around the Palacio Real and the Catedral and other cool buildings. I love this city! All the architecture of Spain is just so beautiful, and the cities are very tourist-friendly since I easily found my way around. I´ll never think NYC is the coolest city, ever again. After walking another hour or so, who should I run into in Puerta del Sol? Oh yes, Brian again. So I just gave up and joined his tour group and followed them around all afternoon. We went to a Mexican restaurant for dinner (you know how I feel about Mexican food outside of Mexico… not my fav.. but I was trying to just go with the flow), and it was the most expensive, least appetizing meal I´ve had thus far in Spain. Oh well, atleast now I know I´m going to stick to Italian and sushi and Spanish food… I´ve been craving Asian like crazy, so today is definitely a sushi-lunch day!

After dinner, I headed back to the hostel to see if anyone was around that wanted to hang out/ go out, since I was too tired to walk much more. I ran into a group of girls studying in Barcelona, just in Madrid for the weekend, from NJ (Ramapo, Tiff.. how weird is that?) and some other schools, and they invited me out to dinner.. Since I already ate I just went to talk and ended up playing translator since none of them speak Spanish… I could NEVER.. E VER.. come to Spain without understanding/speaking some Spanish, it would be SO much more overwhelming than it already is, and I would just hate to be the ignorant Americans refusing to speak the language… Anyway, it wasn´t terrible playing translator for one night, but I can´t WAIT to go back to Spanish tomorrow (I´m hoping my ISA group will cooperate with that.. they´re pretty strict on the Spanish-only policy.. which I love of course).

Not the best night´s sleep, with a middle-aged Italian in my room that was asleep at like 10, a middle-aged Asian woman who slept without making her bed at all, and 2 boys (1 Australian, 1 from Cali) who came in around 4? reeking of smoke and speaking English… I´m interested to see what they´re like during the day since I couldn´t see a thing when they came into the room… oh, and of course both of them snore.. not too loudly, but snoring nonetheless… So here I am, slightly tired, incredibly sore, and ready for another day..

Today I hope to get to the Prado museum, walk through all the parks, and who knows what else.. I think I may have to spoil myself with a massage due to the huge knots in my neck and shoulders from hauling my body weight in luggage for hours yesterday… we´ll see how it goes =)