Saturday: Hung out all day, went and got chocolate con churros with my roommate Gillian, but I think I already told you that.
Sunday (yesterday): Woke up around 10 and went to El Rastro with Gillian and Sari. El Rastro is this HUUUUUGE (and I mean HUUUUGE. Up and down several streets) open market, kind of like a giant flea market/yard sale that takes place every Sunday in Madrid.
You can get all kinds of things for real cheap. Gillian and I both took advantage of the 1 euro scarf sale. I also saw these really neat photographs of the different Metro stops around the city and I plan on trying to find one of the stop right outside my building (Moncloa). There were also all of these cool old cameras and coins and antique-y looking things.
Ah. All so neat. Definitely wanna try to make that a weekly venture. After we poked around there for a while, we got lunch at a nearby bar. I had a bocadillo de chorizo, which is basically a baguette with yummy yummy sausage in between. Then we might've stopped for chocolate con churros again. Maybe. Just sayin.
Today, I had my God-awful 9AM class, which requires me to wake up at 7 and be ready by 8 so I can take the Metro. And it's my only class of the day, so I'm back in the apartment by 11:30. I'm feeling a little under the weather, so I decided to take a nap. When I got up, I went out to find some second-hand clothing stores that I looked up online. I'm a sucker for thrifting, in case you didn't know. The place I chose to go to today was called Humana. It's basically like Spain's version of the Salvation Army stores. And lucky me, I decided to come on the day where everything was just 3 euros each! "Todos las prendas cuestan solamente tres euros cada uno??", I asked the clerk. SI. So I ended up getting a button down man-shirt to layer stuff with and a nice little jacket for when the weather warms up (optimism!).
Much love to all! Can't believe I've already been here two weeks :)
And if anyone can tell me where that quote is from, I will give you a dollar. If I have any left upon my return. Heh.
The night before last, my roommates all went out to Kapital (this HUUUGE discoteque - 7 floors!) with the goal of staying out til 6AM (when the Metro opens again) and getting chocolate con churros. Of course, I had class at 9AM the next morning, so I just stayed in.
Welllll LAST night, they embarked on this grand adventure again and this time I tagged along. Yes, ladies and gents. I was out until 5:15AM this morning. We were close to getting chocolate con churros, but my one friend needed to leave and we wanted to go with her. SO CLOSE. But anyway, I slept until about 1PM today and then went to get chocolate con churros with Gillian. So all was not lost. We also did some exploring and found some cool Indian restaurants and a librería café (a bookstore café) and the Museo Reina Sofía. All in all - a great afternoon. And now, nap time!
Yup. Everything's going swimmingly. I've been to each one of my classes by now. I'm taking Strength of Materials, Fluid Mechanics, and Intro to Engineering Management at UC3M, which are all pretty neat. I've made some Spanish friends! I'm also taking an intermediate Spanish course (thank God) and Spanish Art and Architecture at the IES Center. I'm especially excited about the art and architecture course because we'll be visiting some of the most prominent museums in Madrid at least a few times. The Prado, the Reina Sofía...fantastic.
Last night I went out with my roommates and had tons of fun at the expense of only getting about 5 hours of sleep.
Going to a flamenco show in about an hour. Probably gonna figure out how to do my laundry after that. An adventure in itself, I'm sure. Oh and a shout-out to the Alpha Nu new member class of Gamma Phi Beta @UR!!! Can't wait to meet you all :)
I leave you with this, a picture of the Palacio Real, or the royal palace, from our visit this past weekend. Huge. Gorgeous. Pretty much a recurring theme ha :)
Buenos días, amigos. I am currently updating this from the library at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. I had my first official Spanish engineering class this morning (taught in English though, thank goodness). But of course, as the first day of classes tends to go, we were only there for a half an hour. So I decided to stop by to check out what will be my Spanish equivalent to Carlson Library. I made pretty good timing with the commute here this morning. It takes about an hour to get here by Metro, but I really don't mind because taking the Metro makes me feel really cool. Strength of Materials was my only class of the day, so I'll be heading back to my apartment soon for a Skype date with a certain disappointed Jets fan.
Pretty low-key weekend. Went out with friends until very late Friday night. Saturday our group went on a tour of the Palacio Real (the royal palace) and then went and had chocolate con churros for the very first time! Muy delicioso! For those of you who don't know, when you think of hot chocolate here (chocolate caliente), it's not the powdered Nesquik stuff. Oh no. This is straight-up hot, melted, thick, gooey, yummy, CHOCOLATE which is usually served with friend dough sticks (churros). And it is oh so good. Then later that evening we went out for tapas and drinks. After that, I came back to my apartment to, oh I dunno, BOOK MY FLIGHT FOR SPRING BREAK. The destination: San Vito Lo Capo, Italy. Google it. B-E-A-Utiful.
Didn't do much yesterday. Slept in 'til noon haha and then just kinda bummed around the apartment. Made some tortellini for lunch. I'm getting pretty adventurous with this whole cooking-for-myself deal. Except not really. Today I just might sauteé some veggies for lunch. LOOK OUT! Last night, I went with some friends to a bar called O'Connell St. where they were broadcasting los partidos de fútbol americano (aka the NFL championship games). We were able to watch the Packers/Bears game, but I had to leave before the REALLY important one since, mind you, the games started at 9:30PM and 12:30AM our time. But it was really fun to watch. Almost felt like home. Except home doesn't have drunken Scottish men that start singing Jay-Z's "Empire State of Mind" when you tell them you're from New York.
I saw on the news last night that some provinces in Spain are experiencing record low temps. Looks like the Buffalo/Rochester weather followed me here! No snow though, thankfully. But it's fun to see the Madrileños run around in their hats, gloves, and scarves while I brave the elements with just my jacket and scarf. THIS IS NOTHING.
Muchos besos a todos :)
PS. As promised, a vid tour of mi apartamento! I kinda went a little fast cuz I'm a spaz. Lo siento. But you get the idea ;)
Look at me go, updating this almost daily. You all know that this won't be happening once classes start on Monday, right? Haha :)
Today was our day-trip to Segovia. And it was COLDDDD. Like, well, cold for here. It was about 35 degrees Farenheit. Probably just another day in Rochester, eh? Well it was about an hour bus ride to Segovia from Madrid. I slept, of course. Was up last night scheming with my dearest Big about our spring break plans ;) BUT ANYWAY. We arrived and were assigned to have Mario as a tour guide again. That guy is the best.
The first sight was saw was the ancient Roman aqueduct that Segovia is famous for (along with its food, but we'll get to that). Only gravity if holding this thing together, my friends. No concrete or anything else. Engineering at it's finest, yo. Then we walked down the streets further and grabbed some cafe con leche in the Plaza Mayor where the Segovia Cathedral stands towering over everything.
So beautiful. Can you tell I'm really enjoying the panoramic shot option on my new camera? Just click on the pics to make them bigger since this page format really doesn't do them justice. So then after our much-needed coffee break, we continued our tour to Alcázar de Segovia, which was built as a fortress but was then used as a royal palace. We were taken through the building, which had a great view from atop a cliff.
It was really interesting how the building's architecture was influenced by the many religions present in Segovia at the time. Then we got to walk down that really steep hill that the Alcázar was located on to get to our next stop, which was La Iglesia de la Vera Cruz. Inside this church was a small temple and the whole structure was designed around it in a way that wasn't typical of other churches. It's hard to describe haha But yet another really interesting stop on our tour. THENNNNNNN we hopped on the bus again to go to lunch. And boy did we eat. They served us three kinds of dishes of appetizers before the main course even came out. Peppers, tortilla de patata (a big omelette with potatoes), croquetas (kind of like a mozzarella stick but with creamier cheese and bits of meat). And then they served us the most tender chicken I have ever tasted. And of course a really sweet dessert that was probably 123145169384 calories a serving. I am gonna be muy gordo by the time I leave this place haha. All in all, a great day. And let the Friday-nighting commence!
The last two days have been really super busy. But, lots of fun. Yesterday our engineering group had yet another language and culture session (basically a crash course in Spanish vocab, grammar, and culture). Afterward, my friend Steven and I took the Metro for the first time to the meeting spot for our historical tour of Madrid. We wandered around la Plaza de Opera and found a pizza place to have lunch. We had pizza with bacon and ciruelas(which, as it turns out, are plums!). Then our group toured around some of the most historic sites in the entire city with our tour guide, Mario. He was funny and really knowledgeable of Madrid and the surrounding areas. The places we visited were SO beautiful that I vowed to come back again another day when my camera battery was fully charged (fail). After touring for about two hours, our group decided to go out on our own. We ran into some girls from Germany who were headed to TGIFriday’s happy hour, so we tagged along. And ladies and gentlemen, this is where I had my first (and second) legal drink (strawberry daiquiri and a raspberry rose mojito). We engineers are pretty boss.
Today was great. More language and culture class, of course. But then we were able to visit the school where we’d be studying, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, for the first time. We took the Metro from Moncloa, which is the stop right outside my apartment. By the way, my professor/instructor for the language and culture course is SO helpful and SO darn cute. Her name is Beatríz and she’s just the greatest. She helps us with our Spanish and gives us helpful tips for becoming real Madrileños. So she showed us how to get to Leganés, which is the suburb just south of Madrid where Carlos III is (about a 40-45 minute commute). When we got there, we were given a tour of the school by some students of the Universidad. We saw the library (aka. where I’ll be spending most of my time), cafeteria, sports center, and some classrooms. It’s a really nice campus and everything seems pretty easy to find. Afterwards, the students took us to their favorite bar and treated us to drinks and tapas. I had REAL sangria for the first time and una bocadillo, which is a “little” sandwich that actually served as a meal for me. I talked with one of the students who was actually going to spend the coming semester in Milan (like SOMEONE I know!) and he gave me travel tips for my future European travels.
Some of my roommates are headed out tonight but I think I need some time to cool my jets. We’re taking a day trip to Segovia tomorrow and I PROMISE I will bring my charged camera. Tomorrow night I’ll probably venture out to get groceries and some notebooks and school supplies. Who knows? My schedule these days is really up in the air. I was out from 8AM ’til 10:30PM yesterday and wasn’t even planning on doing so. Alright enough rambling. Hope everyone’s having a great day!
I've been CRAAAAAaaaaAAAzy busy the past few days. Ever since I landed yesterday morning it's been go go go! Which is good for me, I guess. The flight from DC to Madrid was long, but the plane was huge! The girl sitting next to me must've thought I was nuts because of how in awe I was of everything (pillows? blankets?! in-flight meals?!? ON DEMAND MOVIES AND TV SHOWS?!). We landed in Barajas airport very early yesterday morning around 6:30AM Madrid time. The IES staff were there to greet us and let's just say that I haven't wiped off the dumbfounded, "omg you're speaking Spanish to me" look since. But I can also say that my Spanish and my ability to comprehend have improved vastly even in the last 24 hours.
Here is the view from my hotel room in the Hotel Husa Princesa! This just made me that much more excited. After we were all settled in the hotel, we had lunch with the other IES students and staff. The people here are great! I'm one of eight engineering students (Four of which are from UR. HOLLA.) and we are eight out of about 160 IES Madrid students. One might say that we're kind of a big deal.
After lunch and meetings, I was able to get my cell phone and minutes straightened out (using my basic and broken Spanish) and afterward, a few friends and I went to get something to eat. We found a place called Lizarran. Here, you could go up to the bar and pick out different tapas for yourself, each with a different colored toothpick in them. When you were finished, you brought your plate and the toothpicks to the cashier and they charged you according to the number and type of toothpicks you had on your plate.
I tried some yummy things, some of which I had no idea what they were. For instance, my friend let me try his dish, which listed the ingredients as elvers, fried egg, and garlic. What are elvers, you ask? Google it. We did. Yep. BABY. EELS. Not pasta, like I'd assumed. Then back to the hotel to sleeeeeeep.
TODAY I had some more meetings and then finally moved into mi apartamento. I'm living with five other girls and our RA Lucia. It's SO CUTE and conveniently located just a ten minute walk from the IES Center and the nearest Metro stop is right outside our door. Tomorrow, (you guessed it) more meetings and crash-course Spanish classes. Plus a historical tour of this lovely city. Later this week, we are taking a day trip to Segovia, which should be awesome. More pictures to come, plus a video tour of my apartment! So high tech.
T minus 6 days until I depart for Spain and I get word from the computer tech place that my laptop has been deemed RIP. SIGHHHH. Off to Best Buy I go and I am now the proud owner of a new Dell laptop. Great timing? Not so much. But just a minor setback.
Went to the Buffalo airport yesterday to see my dear friend Susanna off to MILAN, ITALY! I am happy to report that she has arrived safely and lovin' life in Italia.
