what a whirlwind of a week!
last weekend we went to madrid. it was AMAZING! we flew from santiago to madrid on friday night and arrived in madrid last that night. we took the metro to our hostel - that was exciting (we were on there for an hour and watched some girl almost get pick-pocketed. thank goodness she was a boss and grabbed her wallet that a well-dressed man had tucked into his pocket before he could slip off the train). friday night we went on a bar crawl with the strangest character. the first bar he took us to was a literally united states discoteca from the 70s playing songs like "its in his kiss". we told him we needed to leave asap. we made it to about 3 or 4 bars and a discoteca. it was fun and it was nice to know places to go, not have to pay cover, etc.
saturday we went to pans & co. (aka spanish subway. but better than subway will ever be.) for lunch, followed by some shopping, and STARBUCKS. i've never been so happy to drink a frappucino in my life. saturday night we had tickets to a REAL MADRID soccer game. i don't really dig soccer in the states but here its SO much more fun to watch. it was unbelievable to see how many people were there (who had paid GOOD money for tickets) to sit in the rain and watch a soccer game. Madrid played Levante and there were quite a few fans there. they cheered until the very end of the game, and even though their team lost, they were still cheering at the end of the game like their team had just won the world cup.
sunday was our touristy day and it was a GORGEOUS day for it. our first stop was a HUGE market in madrid. there was a little bit of everything - food, sunglasses, art, clothes. then, we went to the palace and took a tour. the palace has over 2800 rooms but only 50 are open to the public. everything was so intricate and gorgeous. unfortunately, we couldn't take pictures inside, so you'll have to take my word for it. we also went to the prado to see some fabulous artwork. one painting, "las meninas" is in the prado and i wrote a paper about it for a class at loras so it was cool to see it in person.
monday we went to toledo, a city about 30min away from madrid by train. toledo has a lot of historical significance because it is a former capital of the spanish empire. the city was influenced by christian, jewish, and muslim cultures. we wandered around the city and found the cathedral and the house where El Greco lived. unfortunately, many of the main places (like the alcazar) were closed because it was monday. we got back to santiago late monday night. overall it was a wonderful weekend and we had SO much fun!
since we missed class on monday the week FLEW by! we finally (fingers crossed) got our volunteering figured out. olivia, tonya, and i will be helping in an english class at a place called Os Tilos. Os Tilos is kind of like an after-school type program outside of the city. some of the programs people have to pay for but others are free. the lady in charge was SUPER nice and we felt really comfortable there. she said the kids really like having volunteers from other countries there and think its really neat when they can help us learn something instead of someone older always helping them.
this week is our last week of classes before carnavales. olivia, celina, and i are actually leaving thursday for our continental adventure. we will be flying to brussels, belgium on thursday and taking a train to london, england for 3 days. then we're flying to paris, france for 3 days. from paris, we'll take a train to prague, czech republic for 2 days. the last part of our trip is visiting the concentration camps near krakow, poland before returning to santiago de compostela. it should be an AMAZING trip and i'm so excited. when we get back we only have EIGHT WEEKS left in spain! i cannot believe how fast time has gone here. i still have so much i want to do but i know it won't all be able to be done and still enjoy my time in santiago. miss you all!! xoxo!
picture tiiiiiiiiiiime (in no particular order...)!:
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| toledo from outside the city walls |
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| El Greco's house in toledo |
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| playing in the park! |
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| toledo! |
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| in our nosebleed seats at the soccer game |
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| my boyfriend (he just doesn't know it yet...) cristiano ronaldo |
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| outside the palace! thats a real person! |
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| el palacio real |
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| love locks on the fence in plaza mayor |
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| bubble man in plaza mayor |
