Toledo, Flamenco, y El Rastro

Toledo was in a word: breathtaking. This city, which used to be Spain's capital, is hilly and filled with streets so narrow I was shocked to see cars on them. We had to take about 6-7 outdoor escalators up and up until we finally reached the top of Toledo. Mind you it was an absolutely windy and freezing day! But well worth the trip.

View of Toledo

Streets of Toledo

In Toledo we went into the oldest cathedral in Spain. Unfortunately they didn't allow us to take photos, but trust me when I say it's breathtaking on the inside. El Greco was commissioned to paint for this church, and they had a mini-museum on the inside filled with his paintings. El Greco always was my favorite in art history class so this was a nice surprise! Next we had a 2.5 hour break during which we ate lunch and shopped around the beautiful city. Then we saw an old Jewish temple and took some last photos before it was time to head back to Madrid.

Overlooking the river

Following our trip to Toledo I went out to a tiny hole in the wall Cuban restaurant for dinner where we didn't eat until past midnight. I felt like a true madrilena. The food was kinda bad-my yellow rice that I was looking forward to was cold by the time it got to me, but at least the daiquiris were good!

The next day I met up with my friend Kristely for what turned out to be the best shopping day in my life. Here in Madrid they're having huge sales and I bought some really nice new Spanish clothes for very cheap. Talk about traveling on a budget! To top off that great day, we decided to see a Flamenco show. It was there that it finally hit me that I'M IN SPAIN! Where the hell else would I see this? Flamenco isn't really my scene but I'm glad I saw out because of the cultural significance here in Spain. And boy do they stomp their feet. After flamenco they had just a piano player and a singer and I said, "Hell no. I gotta get out of here." That was really not my taste. So it was off to the pub with some friends after that.

Flamenco!

 This morning I woke up before 9am to go to El Rastro! It's this market that happens on Sundays when pretty much all the other stores are closed and you can find anything there. It was a little overwhelming but I rested assured knowing that I can come back any Sunday.

This continues pretty much indefinitely. You can find anything at El Rastro

Now I wait for the short but somewhat dreaded school week to set in before heading to Prague on Thursday morning!

xoxo

P.S. I just realized I forgot to include my visit to Madrid's royal palace! I honestly don't know why this place doesn't get as much attention as Versailles, if not more. Napoleon was actually jealous of his brother who got to live in the Madrid palace-that's how awesome it is. Being in the same room where centuries of royalty used to sit just gave me goosebumps.

Gettin my education on...sorta

Every day seems to be packed with even more adventures!


So after my first day of classes I had my Tuesday free until 5:30 PM when I had my only class for that day. I had heard of a free tour in Madrid so my friend Kristely and I went to check it out. It was to start at 3pm, and I figured I should have plenty of time to arrive to my class on-time.


The tour was absolutely amazing! Anybody who visits me in Madrid, I will take you on this tour. I learned so many cool interesting facts about the city and went to places that I would not have otherwise known about. Our tour guide was so smart and entertaining and time flew by so fast!

A view of Plaza Mayor where our tour began

Fighting crime with Spider Man in Plaza Mayor

Oldest running restaurant on earth from the 1700s. There's a plaque from Guinness World Records in there.

Looking pretty happy for standing in front of that bridge which was Madrid's most popular suicide site!

Madrid's old city hall that was built when the Hapsburgs were in power-hence the Austrian architecture.

Me in front of this gorgeous cathedral in Madrid. Directly opposite it and to my right in the picture sits the royal palace. 

So the tour was so wonderful and I was learning so much that I figured it would be ok if I was late to my first Spanish Cinema class, which I was. Here's a photo of my school! (It's pink).

The next day I had another very long break between classes so instead of going home I had my senora pack me a lunch and Kristely and I went shopping in the area around my school. I figured since there were so many independently owned shops that it would be pricy but I was wrong! I got some really nice things for quite cheap, possibly cheaper than the big chain stores. It could be due to the rebajas (sales) that are going on right now, but I was a happy customer. That night I went out for a few drinks with friends since I didn't have class the next day. Nothing like a huge mug of sangria for a euro!

The next day (this afternoon) I met Kristely at Plaza Mayor to go on the Tapas Experience-and the guide was the same guide that we had on the free tour as it was in the same company. We had a great time trying sangria and tapas at 4 different bars. And yes-the sangria tastes different everywhere you go because everywhere adds their own special ingredients. I also tried some pretty interesting foods...

Churros with pure melted chocolate. DELICIOUS

I'm sure no one would guess what this is, so I'll just tell you. Bull's tail with chocolate! I actually tried it and it's super delicious!

That's about it! Tomorrow morning I'm headed to Toledo--can't wait.

Ciao! 

Vale!

Hola todos!


I last left off with me arriving safely to Madrid, and so much has happened since then it feels like it's been one really long day.


A few quirks about Madrid so far:

• in the hotel room that we were at for orientation, you have no idea how long it took us to simply figure out how to turn on the lights. Apparently you need to insert your hotel card into a slot, and then they work. It's supposed to save energy...But y'all know me, I turn off the lights when I leave the room regardless.
• I've heard of "tapas" forever, always assuming it was fancy hors d'oeuvres. So on my first night out naturally I was excited when I heard you could get a beer for 2 euro that comes with tapas. It's actually just a plate full of greasy food, like fried potatoes, breads with various types of meat on it. Some of it was pretty good but just not what I expected!
• They have Big Brother here! This is my favorite reality show in the US and it's called "Gran Hermano" and it's on 24 hours a day on one channel. I can't wait to watch!
• On our first Friday night, a group of us wanted to make a reservation for 9pm (extremely early-we were the only ones in the restaurant for a while) and they said "9pm isn't available. Only 9 o'clock on the DOT" because for Spaniards, I'm assuming a 9pm reservation means 9:30-10pm.

So we landed on Thursday morning and checked into our hotel which was beautiful and centrally located. As tired as I was, I was determined to do something on my first night in Madrid. So me and a group of girls went to a bar in the area. It looked like a dive bar to me, but yet again this was pretty much my first bar experience! There were boar and deer heads on the wall (that made feel at home) and meat hanging up everywhere behind the bar. There wasn't anywhere to sit, but just a cubby hole basically in the back where we all stood up. I ordered sangria, which was not exactly traditional, but it was a HUGE glass and it had about a half an inch of sugar just sitting on the bottom. This came with the free tapas that I mentioned above, and I liked some of it like pepperoni on bread.


The following day we just went to the Instituto where our classes are and had orientation for several hour on classes, host families, etc. Great thing about my program: they give us a travel stipend (I think 30 euro a month), 24 euros every weekend so we can get dinner on Friday and Saturday night, AND they have cultural reimbursement: if we go to a museum, Spanish movie, theater, opera, you name it-they give us up to 7 euros toward that--and there's no limit on how many times!


Foolishly I thought that 12 euro would be more than enough to cover one dinner in Madrid, but that wasn't the case at El Inca, where we ate Friday night. I got a dinner, a pina colada, and we all split some desert, but I walked out paying 21 euro, and others who got more expensive dishes paid closer to 30 euro for ONE NIGHT. To economize, me and some girls just split a bottle of wine back at the hotel and had a pretty relaxing evening because the next morning I moved into my casa! By the way, up until this point, I didn't take a single photo since my camera battery was dead.


I knew nothing about my host mom (senora), so I wasn't sure what to expect. Her name is actually Casi, not Luisa like it said online, and her oldest son is older than my parents, so she must be at least my grandparent's age. I am her 46th student! So she knows what she's doing. She kept saying "You're so tall, and beautiful and such beautiful blond hair and blue eyes! And how well you speak Spanish!" She was very kind and made me feel at home right away. She was telling me how awful some of her past students have been, and when we found out we're both Libras, I knew we'd get along great. She's also an excellent cook! And most families are strict as to the number of meals you get, etc. but she told me this is my house now and I'm free to make myself at home. She's a great cook as well! I just tried paella for the first time, and it is wonderful! Hopefully I'm not still allergic to shellfish, but I'll know in a couple hours...

My room

Paella!

I live right along a river in Spain, and I love sitting on the terrace and enjoying breakfast and seeing the river.

You can see the river on the right. This is a path where people walk, ride bikes, rollerblade-you name it. At night the green bridge is lit up with beautiful colors. 

Since dinner was so expensive on Friday, for Saturday night I consulted my guide books (thanks Alex and Debbie!) and found this awesome place Fresc Co that's an all you can eat buffet for 10.95 euros: great food, cappuccinos, dessert, wine. It was a great bargain. After taking our time there, me and a smaller group went to a bar which was pretty reasonably priced. 

Now, the metro in Madrid is great: it tells you when the next train is coming (usually 3 minutes) and is very clean. However, it stops running from 1:30-6 AM and during that time they have the Buho, which is a bus that runs instead of the subway. Upon leaving the bar, everyone took a cab to their different locations except me: I was prepared to take the Buho. I just had to ask where to get the bus, and as soon as I found it it was so easy and dropped me off even closer than the metro stop that I live at. This is great because it'll save me tons of money on cab rides I won't need! There are really old people riding the Buho at night, which is why I love Madrid: everyone here knows how to have a good time!

Sunday our whole group met up and went to Retiro park, which I suppose would be comparable to Central Park or the Public Gardens, but much more beautiful. They have boats you can rent out (I'll be doing that soon!) and it was packed with people as it was a gorgeous day out.

Retiro Park

Sunday we wanted to go exploring or shopping but pretty much everything is closed! So instead I took the time to book my flights to Prague, Barcelona, and London. (Stay tuned to hear about those adventures!)

Today I had my first day of class and I'm on my 4+ hour break where I come home for lunch. My second class the lady was talking so fast it was hurting my head! But I understood most everything. Classes I'm taking:

• Advanced Language and Composition: Mon/Wed 9:00-10:20
• Migrations and Cultural Diversity in Spain. Un analysis from the anthropological perspective: Mon/Wed 10:30-11:50
• Translation through film and theater: Mon/Wed 5:40-7:00
• Spanish Film: Tuesday 5:30-8:30

I only have class Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, which is amazing!

That's all for now! xoxoxo

Madrid! despite the snowstorm

So there was this huge snowstorm scheduled to hit the day my flight departed and things weren't looking too good. After I made it safely to the airport (quite an impressive feat given the conditions) I boarded my flight that miraculously was still on time. Iberia airlines was great-a nice dinner (including champagne!) and then breakfast in the morning. I was counting on sleeping on this flight so that i wouldn't feel TOO jetlagged upon my arrival, but it feels like I only slept for 20 minutes. After checking into the hotel that we're staying at during "orientation," we basically wandered around our area--quite touristy, complete with a  KFC--and we all got our cheap pay-as-you go mobile phones. We have the afternoon to explore before dinner but I'm exhausted and wanted to let people know that I'm alive and well here!