Oh señora.

"I am so proud of you that you are travelling to all these Spanish speaking cities". This is what my señora told me after I told her I was going to Morocco tomorrow, and after we recapped what other countries I have visited. Apparently señora is just impressed with my Spanish improvement, and is attributing it to my travels. Though I have certainly learned to communicate sans English, I have learned far more than that on my journies. At least when I barely squeak by in my classes here I can say that I learned something...Because I´m walking away with a much larger, uh, suitcase, than I arrived with.

Procrastinating

I need a break from writing my paper. I am now no longer aiming for just passing with this paper, I want a darn good grade on it. Though the chances of that happening are nearly non-existant, simply due to my fantastic grammatical ability. At least I will get to compare this to what I would be learning at Richmond, because a few of my friends are taking our Modern Political Theory course, which this is being credited to.

As I have been endlessly working on this paper, I have inevitably been in the cafeteria, as it is really the only spot in school where I can sit and use my laptop. The cafeteria however, is much more like a European café than anything else, which I guess fits the name. Between classes swarms of people flood this confined space spilling thier caffé-lattés as they spill out into the hallways. Luckily for me, they are not allowed to smoke in there, otherwise you wouldn´t be able to see through the fog. My guess is if they don´t have time to take their smoke break, they figure that downing a shot of caffinee will do the trick. I am still baffeled by the amount of coffee and cigarettes that they consume--and you people think that I drink too much caffinee. Apparently you haven´t been to Bilbao. Apparently they are immune to caffinee though, as it takes quite a bit to extract an occassional facial expression. I make it a habit to try and crack a smile out of at least someone on the metro.

Oh and Dad, I was utterly embarrassed the other day in class because of you. When I was asked to read an excerpt aloud, it included the capital of País Vasco, Vitoria. Well guess how I pronounced it. VIT-OR-E-A. Thank you, really. After only hearing that for a few days, it quickly became engraved in my head as the pronunciation, and no one knew that I was refering to VI-TOR-IA. Maybe I´m not good at breaking now pronunciation, but there is a vast difference between those two words. Oh well. Another one bites the dust.

In almost 24 hours I´ll be departing for Morocco, bag´s already packed. Grabbing it and going tomorrow after class. Maybe this time I´ll get my passport stamped. I´m trying to figure out what I can pull this time, since apparently telling the people in Germany that I had weapons was unsuccessful. I still only have a Madrid stamp. This is GOING to change.

Home for the week

Alright, record this one in the books. I stayed in Bilbao for over 10 days without leaving--not even on a day trip. Where to start? Well, I hope that everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving, I know that I certainly missed it while I was in class. However, my American program did decide to surprise us and take us out to eat for pumpkin soup, turkey with blackberries, and a pumpkin pie. Honestly, it was a pretty good meal. Cannot top anything that I would have had at home, but it was still nice.

Friday, just like back home, is Black Friday--people were fanatically shopping. Unlike home however, it lasts all weekend. I went to the Christmas tree lighting ceremony, which was quite delightful. Though I am not surprised, I am still attempting to grasp the concept of why Spain decides that Christmas should start the day after "Thanksgiving" (which by the way is a concept that no one here understands). Most people view it as another excuse for the Americans to have a hearty meal and take off work. I guess that's the way it looks in movies, but luckily, I actually enjoy the holiday for other reasons.

I went to my first futbol game, which was very exciting. We were sitting in the 12th row, so we had clear visibility of all the players facial expressions and encounters. Spanish soccer is quite a theatrical production. I have never seen the players so involved in every call. Unfortunately, we tied. We were up on goal until the last 50 seconds of the game, when Deportivo (North-West Spain) scored. An interesting fact about Atletic, the Bilbao team: they ONLY have basque players. Recruiting doesn't exist outside the province, whereas other teams, will accept players from any region (or even country). Their pride is too high to allow others onto the team, as again, I am reminded that this is a region based on tradition and principles.

The reason this is rather short, is because I actually spent most of the weekend working on my wonderful political theory paper. Writing about the relationship between religion and democracy, which is interesting when I talk about it with my classmates, as they believe the US to be an extremely religious country. I guess my presentation will surprise them...

Thursday night I begin travelling so that I am in Morocco by Friday morning. I won't lie, I'm stoked. I'm home in less than a month, a concept that's still a bit unstable for me. That also means less than a month til Christmas, I cannot complain about that. Oh, and my senora loves my stocking that I have hanging in my room, which wouldn't be there without the wonderful craftswork of grammy--so again, thank you grammy for letting me have my Christmas decorations in Spain.

NO8DO = The city has not abandoned me, Sevilla´s motto

Another weekend has flown by. This time it was spent in Sevilla, the city that you probably envision when you think of Spain--flamenco, tapas, bull fights, the works. Friday morning, per usual, we got up at 4:30am to catch our flight to Sevilla. We met our fantastic tour guide (and best friend, Meredith Kamis) who saved us money by knowing everything that would be on the audio guides. Our first stop (post-hostel) was the Alcazar.

The Alcazar is a royal palace in Sevilla with an incredible mix of cultures put into its architecture. Construction began in the 14th Century and was heavily influenced by the Moorish style, yet still contained within Christian limitations. The palace is filled with running water and pools, as it was believed that still water birthed evil, and thus the waterways are all connected. The Roman baths in the basement of the palace were bigger than most swimming pools, pretty impressive. The palace has many courtyards, lined with hedge mazes, orange trees and goldfish filled ponds. Pretty much, it was a fantastic little place to spend the morning.

After that wore us out, we needed food. Off to the Roman Baths we went. I should remember the name of the restaurant, but its currently slipping from me, that we ate at. It is a preserved underground roman bath. It was quite fun to sit in the cave-style atmosphere while enjoying my lunch.

Rejuvenated from our food, we headed off to stroll along the Guadalquivir River. This river, I am convinced, is the only reason why Sevilla was able to survive in ancient times, because without that water way, Sevilla would have been a deserted desert. The river led us to Triana, where we proceeded to explore and shop.

Since we were tired, we only went out to Calle Beatiz, (the nightlife district) for a few hours, so that we were well rested for our day in Cordoba!

Cordoba allowed us to take our first train ride in Europe, as we headed two hours north of Sevilla. Once the largest city in the world, it boasts ancient architecture and small curvaceous roads that encourage you to get lost. Luckily for us, the Mosque was peaking out over every street, so reason for coming to Cordoba was quickly found. Cordoba was continually a site of invasion, and thus every culture that came in decided to add to the marvel that is the mosque. There are not many matching columns, as they were all stolen from other Roman buildings and remains, I did happen to notice quite a few granite ones though, which of course reminded me of home. In the 13th century, the mosque (like many others at this time) was converted to a cathedral. It now still holds services and Christian events, despite the embedded Muslim influence that is literally trapped in the walls.

We felt we were leaving out Judaism, so we ventured out to the Synagogue--one of the last three that remain in Spain (the remaining two are in Toledo, the city of religion as I am now referring to it as). The Hebrew inscription on the walls tells the story of the construction of the building. Sadly, only one room was open, which made sense since we only were charged .30 to enter.

Two hours later we were back at it in Sevilla. Get showered, get ready, and lets go. Flamenco dancing is on the agenda. After a delicious dinner, we headed out to a flamenco show. It was fantastic. Only one dancer, with four musical men behind her. Very relaxed tavern like atmosphere, yet silenced by the passion on the stage. Definitely glad that I was able to watch the performance. We then decided to practice our Spanish some more by heading out for the evening at a rather upscale club (we got in free instead of paying the 500€ entrance fee). I felt a bit under dressed.

Sunday was a day of rest, so we took advantage by sleeping in until 9am, just in time to catch the free breakfast our hostel offered. Off to the main events, Plaza de España here we come. Plaza de España has a bench from every main city in Spain, EXCEPT Bilbao. I don´t know if Sevilla is aware that Bilbao is the 5th largest city, but apparently that makes no difference. Instead, they had a bench of our region, which encompassed all of the cities that are tied to ETA. That of course had no effect, as ETA is only three decades old, while the Plaza has a few hundred years on it. We then strolled through Parque Maria Luisa on our way to find lunch before scurrying off to the Cathedral.

The Cathedral is the largest Roman Catholic church (I believe in the world). It is the burial ground of Christopher Columbus. The reason why the cathedral is so big, is they wanted to cover all of the land that once belonged to the mosque that once stood in its place. The best part was the tower top view that allowed us to see for miles, as there is nothing but flat land in the south of Spain.

We had a farewell dinner to top off the evening and caught our flight in the morning in time to make it to class on Monday. Perfect. Fantastic weekend.

Spur of the Moment--let´s pretend to be Heidi

Last weekend I decided to jump on a plane and head to Germany. My friend Ashton, who is in the American program, and I decided that we wanted to go to a central European country for the weekend, and booked our flights two days before we left. Actually, I booked the flights, which is why we ended up where we did. Being on a budget, we generally fly to the airports on the outskirts of cities, so I opted to fly into the Frankfurt-Hahn airport--big lie. This airport is over 2 hours away from Frankfurt, luckily we found this out the morning before we left, so we didn´t make any boarding reservations in Frankfurt.

Instead we headed out to Trier, the oldest city in Germany, founded in 16BC. We arrived in a soft snow fall, it was perfect. Finding a hostel however, was not. Though we had been practicing our best German accents, we were entirely unable to communicate in German, and sadly very few people spoke English. Thus, finding a hostel for the night was an endeavor. Luckily for us, there were only two hostels in the whole city, so people had heard of the one we were looking for. After we found it, we managed to hand motion enough that we wanted a place to sleep for two nights, sadly they only had space for one night. I say sadly, because this was the best hostel I´ve stayed in yet. They gave us a private room, double beds, and down comforters. Amazing. After we put our things down, we wanted to do a bit of exploring, so we ventured out, bundled in the winter attire. The only place that was open was the mall, so of course, we headed in. Spain is not known for big store, they prefer the style of buying your shoes in the shoe store, skirts in the boutiques and so on. Germany functions a bit more like America with BIG department stores. We even found the equivalent of Walmart--but much more entertaining.

Since the city was shut down for the night, and we could only explore so many stores in the mall, we headed in back for an early night, knowing that we´d get an early start in the morning.

8am we were on the road, or sidewalks rather. We boycotted all public transportation and decided to get our exercise by walking everywhere. Our first stop was the Palace of Trier which hosted fantastic gardens lined with statues and vine covered stone walls. The architecture looked a bit French, but we accepted it for what it was. We strolled over to the Roman forum which houses the Roman baths. If I had not titled my pictures on my computer, I easily could have slide these into my Rome photo album. Trier was one of the main cities during the Roman Empire, and the history is most certainly still visible.

Since it was a bit chilly, we wanted our next stop to be inside, so off to the Cathedral we went. It is the oldest Cathedral in Germany, built by Constantine, the first Christian Roman emperor, and now holds regular Catholic services. It was impossible to miss the Cathedral itself, as it looks like you are approaching a fortress. Constantine is the same man who started places for St. Peter´s Basilica in Rome, if that gives you any idea of how impressive this piece is.

Then main street was filled with street market vendors, selling mainly edibles and flowers; therefore no good gifts to pick up. This road led us to the Porta Nigra, which is the city gate built soon after the death of Jesus.

We found ourselves on a leave-crystallized sidewalk next to the river, which was one of the best landscapes that I have seen since my arrival a few months back. Germany´s mountains and trees easily could be labeled New England, all in all, I felt home. This road led us, after a few detours, to the birthplace of Karl Marx, who resided in Trier for the greater part of his life.

I hadn´t realized how bustling with history the city was, as before last week, the city had yet to reach my radar. Despite having slept in the airport all Saturday night, as there were no available hostels, the weekend was fantastic. I came back to Bilbao in time to read a book for class and write two papers--I´m finally getting the hang of this. Next stop: Sevilla on Friday.

Whirlwind of northern Spain, and a stop in France for lunch

I arrived back from Barcelona Monday morning, and then was whisked away by my parents, grandmother, and the Haskells (family friends) Tuesday night. I haven´t had much down time in the past week--exactly the way that I like it. Tuesday night was reserved for the Guggenheim, as it was decided only one night was necessary for Bilbao, which was a good call. After everyone was zombied by the silver missle mines in the Guggenheim we had a quick dinner before resting for a full day of travelling. At dinner, the only local thing I could think to recommend was Kalimutxo, which is a combination of red wine and coke. My mom was the only one brave enough to order it.

One the map, the green highways are the scenic ones. Makes sense. We opted to take as many of them as possible in order to accutally see Spain. Phenomenal idea, as there is no other way that I would get to see the little towns of the country in which I am living. All the buses take the main highways, and destinations are to cities, so this worked out quite well for me.

Our green highways led us first to a quick stop in Guernica, then to Biarritz, a coastal quaint town in France that is in one of the French Basque provinces. Our first stop in the village was lunch in an outdoor cafe on the ocean. Picturesque. We then took the train tour of the city. We opted to depart at the neighboring beach of our car, and walked past a surfing competition and casino on our way to the chocolate store. I ended up consuming my entire chocoalate bar before we arrived at the car. Shocking, I know.

After we decided we had enough of France, and our GPS system failed on us due to taking it across boarders, we headed towards San Sebastian, our place of rest for the evening. We did a quick drive through tour of the city on our way to the hotel, bypassing the historical and market districts. Our hotel was less than a five minute walk from the infamous shell-shaped beach, known through-out Spain. On our search for dinner that night we ended up finding many sports clubs and tennis courts, but no where to eat until 9 o´clock. This however, is quite usual in Spain for nothing to open until this late.

Thursday posed a bit of a problem however, as it was all Saint´s Day, a big holiday for Spain. Translate it to our Thanksgiving, they all see their family, have a big meal, and a four day weekend. Just add a religious component into the mix, and it´s Thanksgiving in Spain. Even breakfast was a search, as everything is closed. However, as usual, we were on the road early.

From here on off, I have to be careful of the order in which I tell the cities by, as I have five witnesses (or CINCO as they are all very proud to know) to keep me in line. The morning I was a bit fuzzy on to begin with however, because like clockwork, carsickness set in within the first hour of travelling. During this time however, I believe that we drove through Vitoria (VIT-OR-E-A if you ask my dad) which is the capital of the Basque country. Now we travelled through the entire Basque country at this point, which I read this morning, is similar in size to New Hampshire. After blowing through Vitoria, we entered quite a bit of plains and agriculture. We were haeding towards Logroño, when we took what we hoped to be our lunch break. Instead we encountered hundreds of people in a wall-city with an incredible view of both the plains and the mountains. Apparently there was a convention in the city for the long weekend, which would explain why we struggled to find a parking spot for our car, which I endearingly refer to as the bus. We ended up having lunch in Logroño at the Drunken Duck, the only place open, and surprisingly didn´t speak a word of English, which is rare for an Irish pub.

We then beelined it for our destination, the name is currently escaping me, though I believe it was near Elciego, as that was a road sign I was continually looking for. The whole drive to our hotel was through the wine region in Spain, called La Rioja. We therefore passed many grape trees (for Dad) as well as hoards of vines. We ended up pulling off on the side of the road to inspect a field of them. The grapes we saw were very dark and had pits. We wondered how easy it would be to make wine with pitted grapes, as this was the purpose of the grapes, but we gathered that these people knew what they were doing with their hundreds of hectors of grapes.

Friday was a day of travelling. Our first attraction was Burgos, which housed Catedral de Burgos and Monasterio de Santa María la Real de Las Huelgas. The highlight of this town for me was finding a homemade Christmas store, something I have been searching for since my arrival in Spain. We spent the greater part of the morning in the town, and left only to get back on the road, not because we were finished.

Madrid was the first city that everyone throughly enjoyed. The reason for the green roads, was because everyone preferred them to the cities. Regardless, Madrid had it´s own feel. It felt incredibly busy and flooded with people, something that no one had quite expected. Saturday was the touring of Madrid, which started with the Reigna Sofia, which homes Picasso´s Guernica, as well as an impressive wonderbread castle in the middle of the woods for a bird feast. After that modern art musuem we jumped on the tour bus which gave us a historical tour of the city, which we interrupted when we decided that Plaza Mayor would be a great place to have lunch. Plaza Mayor is an outdoor courtyard with cafes and restaurants covering the exterior walls. We were entertained by witches, Bopping Betty type characters, as well as a band. The Prado followed lunch, the classical, and most famous museum in Madrid. This museum guards many of Goya´s, El Greco´s, and Ruben´s most well-known pieces. Only have of the group was artistically exhausted at this point, so half us departed to explore the city while the other have made full use of our tri-museum pass and saw (post)impressionist art at the Thyssen-Bornemisza.

The highlight of the entire trip was Saturday night. We sadly had to rush through tapas, but the restaurant we choose we a great pick. Before the digestive process even begun we were already sitting in our seats at the Flamenco Ballet. It is exactly what it sounds like, a mix of Flamenoc and Ballet dances. It was my first experience of either, and apparently very authentic on both accounts. I thourghly enjoyed the show, and am now even more anxious to head down to Sevilla to see Flamenco at its home.

Sunday was the day of departure, five on a plane back home, one on a bus to her Spanish home. Luckily I don´t have class until late today, because after nearly ten days of travelling, I was quite tired and slept most of this morning. Next on my list of travels requiring a plane: Sevilla.