February 24

Today is February 24. That means I´ve been in Spain for a month! It´s kind of hard to believe. In some respects, it feels like it´s been longer than that, especially the first couple weeks. (Although when I look back at that, it seems like it´s been much longer than just a month.) But in most ways it´s gone by really fast. This is a good thing and a bad thing, I suppose. I am just as glad now to have the time go by fast, so that I can come home and see all my family and friends sooner. But I´m sure once the time comes, I won´t want to leave. I also feel a little guilty because I had intended to start speaking Spanish with my friends after the first week, and it hasn´t happened yet. And now all of the sudden it´s been a month! We to speak in Spanish every once in a while, and I´m finding that even when I´m speaking in English I sometimes incorporate a little Spanish, either in a phrase or sentence construction or something, but I had far better intentions. So that´s going to be my goal for the next month. Hopefully less than a month. It´s also weird to think that I´ve known the people I met here for only a month. Since we´ve done so much together it seems like I´ve known them for much longer. I still don´t know them all well, but it seems like it´s been more than a month.
Barcelona plans are well underway. We´re taking the bus Friday night, and we decided this morning to for sure take a flight back on Monday morning. Our hostel has a 2 night stay minimum, so we figured we´d take advantage of that and then catch an 7:30am flight back and get back around 8:30 or 9. Then I can have some time to sleep before classes start at 4. That´s the wonderful thing about having Monday mornings off! Janny gave me some recommendations of Gaudi sites to see there, so I think we´re going to take advantage of most of those. I´m getting really excited, I´ve heard Barcelona is one of the best cities in Spain.
I´ve hit a snag on my spring break planning. I can´t remember how much of this I´ve told before, so I´m going to briefly sum it up. Jen and I were going to fly to Budapest, then take the train to Vienna and Salzburg, and then fly home from Salzburg. Later that night (after we bought the tickets), she decided that would be too much money, so we decided to cancel those tickets and do a round trip from Budapest, and from there a round trip bus to Vienna. We would scrap Salzburg entirely. I found out last night that my ticket home from Salzburg is nonrefundable. So I either have to absorb the 164 euro ticket and buy a new one, or find a way to get to Salzburg, probably on my own. I´m not really sure what I´m going to do yet. I messaged Jen but haven´t heard anything back yet. This whole planning thing is so complicated!! It´s so much easier when someone else plans and I just tag along! But I guess it´s a good learning experience. And if I do have to travel alone, it´ll be practice for June when I think I´m going to end up going from Athens to Madrid to Chicago on my own. So I´m trying to think positively.
I can´t think of anything more of interest that´s happened lately, so I´m going to go catch the bus home now. Bye!
Bethany

February 22

Hi all
This morning we went to the Rastro, which is this flea market type thing in the streets. There were about 3 or 4 streets with stalls on both sides filled with all kinds of things, most for really cheap. It was fun to see, but we only spent about 30-45 minutes there because Jen had to leave to go to mass with her senora, and so we all left. Katie and I walked back to Sol via the Plaza Mayor, where there was supposed to be some kind of celebration for Carnaval. All there was was a man who was doing something with a backhoe. I think it was supposed to be some kind of dance with the man and the backhoe. He was in the scoop and it raised up, and then he hung from it and then curled up, and it was weird. It was kind of boring so we just walked by and didn´t stay. Katie and I went to Corte Ingles to get shower shoes for our hostel next weekend in Barcelona, but the cheapest flip flops we could find were 15.50 euros! I wasn´t about to pay that much. Maybe once it gets closer to summer I can find something cheaper. I´ll figure something else out in the mean time.
I came to the internet cafe today to post pictures on Facebook. I got my email for the first time since Thursday, and there were two from my aunt. For those of you who don´t know, which I assume is most of you, my aunt Janny has been at the Mayo clinic for the past week and a half or so. They found out that she has amyloidosis, which is a blood disease that involves the heart, nervous system, and skin. Without treatment, she could die within 3 years. With treatment, which involves a lot of chemotherapy or bone marrow transplant, the time of survival is 5-10 years and growing with each passing year. But there´s a 1 in 3 chance of not surviving the first year of treatment. Her disease is still in the early stages, even though the symptoms have been going on for 5 years. The doctors said she probably wouldn´t have problems with the transplant, and that it could happen as early as April. The danger would be that the treatments wouldn´t work and it would continue to spread. (If I´ve mistaken anything here, please correct me.) So that was a blow. I started crying in the middle of the internet cafe. Fortuanately, I don´t think anyone noticed. It´s a scary thing to find out someone you love may not have as long to live as everyone expected. She´s got an amazing attitude about everything; far better than I would have. She said she knows God is looking out for her, and that whatever happens He will be there. (Great, now I´m starting to cry again.) All of this really makes me wish I weren´t halfway across the world. I would like nothing more than to be with my family now. But obviously that can´t happen. So there´s really nothing for me to do other than pray. Any good wishes you would be willing to will toward Jan, whether it´s in prayer format or not, would be appreciated.
I don´t have any more plans today other than homework. It´s not due till Tuesday, though, so maybe I´ll just do a little and then curl up with a book and try to forget about the world for a while.
I´ll write again soon,
Bethany

February 21

2-21
We went to Segovia today! It was a beautiful city! I think it might be my favorite of the cities we’ve visited so far. Either Segovia or Toledo. We took the train, which took about 2 hours and 15 minutes because it stopped at every single station on the way. But to take a direct train we would have had to use the Ave high speed train, which costs a lot more. So we got into Segovia around 12:15. We took a bus into the city center where the Roman aqueduct is. It was amazing; there’s a huge section of an aqueduct from the Roman Empire still standing and in almost perfect condition. It was enormous, and all put together without mortar and at a time without modern engineering. I don’t know how they got the stones that high up in the air. The wonders of slave labor, I guess. There was a place where you could go up near the top and get a view of the whole city and the surrounding countryside, bordered by mountains. Beautiful! After that we went to the Alcázar, which is the palace/fortress thingy where a lot of the old kings and queens lived or stayed. It was built around the 12^th century; at least, that’s when the earliest documentation of it is. But it could have been around a lot longer since the city obviously existed during the Roman Empire. It has nine rooms that visitors can see, where the royalty lived. There’s the throne room, the royal bedroom, the chapel, and various other places. In one, called the Room of the Monarchs, there are little busts of all the kings of Asturias, Leon, and Castilla lining the walls just below the ceiling. I’m not when it was built, but there are tons of them so it had to be a little later. The brochure says it was commissioned by Felipe II, and if I knew my Spanish history a little better I might be able to tell you when he ruled (I just looked it up, and I actually did know! I just had a brain-fart. We studied him in class last semester. He was the king of Emperor Carlos V and he ruled in the late 1500s). The rooms were all really lavishly decorated, of course, with lots of red velvet and tapestries and paintings. We were actually allowed to take pictures here! I need to get to the internet café to post a bunch of pictures. (Stupid school won’t let me download ActiveX to upload them. Hrm.) In addition to the courtly rooms there was an armory, which was exciting. It was a lot smaller than the one at the royal palace in Madrid, but it had some cool stuff. And, again, I could take pictures! There was also a museum of the Royal Artillery School, which had a bunch of information about artillery and science from 1764-1862. There were lots of little models of cannons and guns and stuff, and actual examples too. They had some antique ammunition, too. I took lots of pictures of the guns and stuff for Dad, but they were all in glass cases, so I’m not sure how much of what you can see is the display and how much is a reflection of me taking the picture. The last thing we did there was climb the tower of Juan II, which had 152 steps to the top, most of which in a Judson Tower-like spiral (except the stairs were a lot taller here). It was a breathtaking view, though. You could see the whole city, plus the empty plains and hills beyond, and then the snow-covered mountains in the distance. My favorite was the view of the cathedral and it’s domed steeple, with the mountains in the background. Beautiful!
We found a kebop (sp?) restaurant to eat at that had a great view of the aqueduct. It’s funny: I’m in Spain and I’m eating Turkish food! They’re delicious, though. We discovered them in Granada. And they’re cheap, which is a big plus. They’re only 3.50 or 4 euros, as opposed to 8-10ish at most restaurants.
After lunch we went to the Catedral de Segovia. I love these cathedrals! They’re so delightfully European! This one is technically the last Gothic cathedral, but it has a lot of the Renaissance aesthetics, with it’s concept of space and luminosity. I’m looking at the brochure as I type this, in case you couldn’t tell. J This cathedral wasn’t nearly as opulent as the one in Toledo, having been built at the beginning of the Renaissance rather than later in the Baroque era. But it was still beautiful. There was a simplicity in the walls and ceilings that contrasted the ornate sculptures and artworks. There wasn’t that feeling of being draped in gold when you walked in. The stone walls were plain, and the columns not carved or painted or anything. It’s so cool to walk into a huge building that’s hundreds of years old, with the ceiling towering over your head and gold statues and paintings everywhere. It makes me wish I had brought Pillars of the Earth with me so I could have finished it. It’s all about building a cathedral in the Renaissance. I’ve actually seen it here in Spanish and contemplated buying it. But it’s not worth it. I do which, however, that they would turn on the heat a little in these cathedrals. Ancient stone buildings are cold! I think it was colder inside than it was outside. Of course, it was very sunny today.
After the cathedral it was getting late-ish, so we checked the bus schedule to get back to the train station. We had about a half hour before the bus came, so we wandered around some of the streets, going in tourist shops and stuff like that. We took the bus back at 5:30, because we thought the train left at 5:57. But it turns out we were looking at the arrival schedule, not the departure schedule. The train didn’t leave until 6:55. So for 45 minutes we wandered around near the train station, which is on the outskirts, and only has these little cheapo stores that have a bunch of crap that no one would actually buy. Then we went back to the station and sat in the warm until the train came. It was a quicker trip on the way home than the way there. I think it took less than two hours to get back into Madrid, and then a little longer to get to my stop. But I got home earlier than I had expected, which was nice, because I’m tired!
Tomorrow we’re going to the Rastro, which is a big flea market in Madrid. It’s also Carnaval until Wednesday, so we might go to Plaza Mayor to see some of the celebrations. Rosaura said there’s a parade in the afternoon that goes to Plaza de la Cibeles, so maybe we’ll catch that. It’s cool being here during the fiestas! Carnaval is a lot like Halloween; all the kids dress up in costumes and walk around. Adults dress up too, and have parties. Apparently in a lot of the smaller towns everyone dresses up and parties in the streets, but it’s less of a big deal in Madrid since it’s such a big city. But it should still be fun. All I can think of is the Simpsons when they’re in Brazil and Bart gets swallowed by the python and you can see his body shape inside the snake, and he says “Don’t be sad; it’s Carnaval” and starts to dance. Ok, it sounds weird when I describe it, but I know Danny at least is cracking up right now, and maybe Brent too. It’s sad: I don’t have anyone here to share in my Simpsons quotes. That’s one show that Katie doesn’t watch. So I have to contain myself and laugh in my head.
Well, I don’t have anything more to write about now, and I’m really tired, so I’m going to bed. I’ll write tomorrow about the Rastro and Carnaval.
¡Hasta mañana!
Bethany

February 20

2-20

Today I met with Jeannette to plan our trip to Austria and Hungary over spring break. We had originally planned to go to Budapest, Vienna, and Salzburg, but now it’s looking like we’re going to skip Salzburg. *tear* It was too much money to do all three. So maybe I can still go to Salzburg in May/June. But anyway, we’ve got at least part of the trip planned out.
I also had my first choir rehearsal today. Patricia met me at the train station and drove me the rest of the way. We were a little late because I had to come all the way from Jen’s house (almost an hour away) and then we got lost driving there, but we got there around 6:30. I had a mini voice test so the director could see my range, and then I jumped into the choir. I would guess there are about 50 people in it, both students and community members. We’re doing all Handel music for this concert in honor of the 200 or something-th anniversary of his death. I was happy to find that out; I wasn’t sure what kind of music to expect. And I just did a concert with all Handel, so I’m nice and practiced up. Even though it’s been over two months since I’ve sung seriously. The music is all in Latin or English, which is kinda funny. I go to Spain and sing German music in English. Go figure. It’s cute to listen to the choir singing English in their Spanish accents! There’s a concert at the end of March that’s held in a cathedral in Leganés, which is the town where the rehearsals are. It’s just south of Madrid. I’m not sure if I’m going to be in the concert or not, since I’m jumping in in the middle of the rehearsal process, but I’d absolutely love to sing in a cathedral! I think I will be able to do it, though, as long as I’m not traveling. Apparently a lot of the people in the choir don’t read music, so one of the directors was talking constantly about how important it is to learn your parts and listen to the music and stuff. So I’ve already got a leg up on them, being able to read. I didn’t sing perfectly, but I was probably almost as good as some of the people who’ve been singing this music for a while. So I don’t think there’ll be a problem with learning it. There’s a part in each reahearsal where groups of 2 or 3 go up into a little room for a vocal technique session with another teacher (who’s from England, so she speaks English!). Basically, it’s just to go over any problem sections. I went with the girl sitting next to me and her friend. They are the kind of singers that will sing when someone else is singing with them, but not on their own. After a 10 minute session, the teacher was telling them to sit by me and listen so they can learn their parts better. That made me feel pretty good about myself! J I got to talking with the two girls that sat on either side of me. Both of them told me that I could speak English with them if I wanted, and they were both talking to me in English the whole time. One of them was translating a lot of what the director said, which wasn’t really necessary most of the time, but it was nice of her to do. She made sure I knew where we were and everything, too, which was good because sometimes when they say where we’re starting it’s all a blur and hard to catch. The rehearsal is four hours long, which I thought was going to be atrocious, but it wasn’t too bad. There’s a long warm up time, then sectionals, during which we go out to our vocal technique things. Then we take a break and come back with the whole choir. So it’s pretty well broken up. It went faster than I expected.
The director arranged for someone who lives near me to show me how to get back home, since I had come in a rather circuitous route. She was a very nice woman who talked to me about lots of different things and gave me her phone number in case I had any questions. We took the train home, but the director drove us to the train station, so I’m still not sure how exactly to get there. Next week we’re going to take the metro and compare travel times. I think the train would be faster, but it’s kind of far from the campus.
When I got home at a little after 11, I found that Patricia and Jen had been calling and calling, worried about where I was. I realized that Rosaura and Manuel had forgotten I was going to choir. I had told Rosaura I would be back in the afternoon, but the planning session with Jen took a lot longer than I expected, so I went directly to choir. Yesterday Rosaura asked me if I was going to choir and I told her I was going today, but I guess I didn’t tell her what time. They were apparently waiting for me to eat, and Manuel called Patricia, which made her worried, so she called a couple times, then she called Jen, who then got worried and called me several times, and it was a big mess. Plus I got another scolding from Rosaura for not calling and letting them know I wasn’t going to be there for supper. Another one of those ‘you need to use your head and have some sense’ talks. I apologized profusely, but she kept going on, and there’s only so many times I can say I’m sorry. Especially when she did know I was going to choir. Yes, I should have made sure she remembered, but we did talk about it yesterday. Of course, when I told her I thought she knew because we had talked last night, she said she didn’t remember. I sometimes remember if her memory is all there, because she tends to ask me things several times. So I should have taken that into account and made sure she knew. But I didn’t. And I got scolded. Whatever. I’m not taking this one to heart.
So yeah, that was my night. I have to get up early tomorrow so I can meet the girls at 9:15 to go to Segovia. I’m excited; it’s supposed to be a beautiful city. I’m sure I’ll have lots to talk about tomorrow!
Good night,
Bethany

February 19

Hola
It´s been a few since I wrote a blog, so I thought I´d catch you up on my life. Not much exciting has happened since the Granada trip. Just school as normal. It´s the end of the second week of classes, and things are settling into a nice little routine. I suddenly got loaded with homework on Tuesday, but most of it isn´t due till next week, so I´ve gotten it all done already. Which is good, because I don´t want to have to worry about it this weekend. I think my favorite class so far is Spanish. We´re learning phrases and expressions that are actually useful in everyday life. How to invite someone somewhere, how to ask for things at stores and restaurants, that sort of thing. The professor is really nice, too. She´s the one who teaches Colloquial Spanish, which I wanted to take but couldn´t, so she knows all the modern phrases and stuff. I also like cultural studies. We watched La lengua de las mariposas yesterday, which means The Tongue of the Butterflies or something like that. It´s a movie about a boy going to school during the second republic in Spain, right before Franco. It was really good, but had a sad ending. The professor in that class is really cool too. In literature we started reading a book called Sonata de Otoño (Fall Sonata) that´s from the beginning of the 1900s. It´s really flowery and romantic and hard to follow. Luckily, it´s pretty short. We had to read half of it for next tuesday, and i finished that yesterday. Not sure I understood all of it, but hey, that´s what class discussion is for. History, the class I was most excited for, has turned out to be kind of boring. I like learning about the history of Spain, but it´s nothing but lecture for 3 hours a week. We just got into the middle ages, after the fall of the Roman Empire. Maybe once we´ve gotten into material I know more about it´ll become more interesting. My last class is film, and we´re studying surrealism now. We´ll be watching Un perro andalúz (An Andalusian Dog) today. He gave us a sheet with a synopsis, and it makes absolutely no sense. I don´t think I really like surrealism. Maybe I should hold back judgement until I see the movie, but I don´t have high hopes.
Tomorrow I´m getting together with Katie and Jen to plan a trip to Segovia this Saturday. It´s about an hour and a half bus ride away, so we´re going to do a day trip. Jen´s host mom is going with us. Apparently she knows a lot about the city and where we should go. I´m looking forward to it. We´re also going to plan to go to Austria for the beginning of spring break. I´m really excited for that! I´m glad I´ll be able to go then instead of in May because it didn´t sound like Brent and Danny were that interested in it, and then we can spend more time in places where they really want to go. I really want to see Vienna, Salzburg, and the Alps. I think we´ll go for 3 or 4 days, depending on when Jen´s other plans start. Katie will be in London, so she won´t go with. I don´t know yet what I´m going to do for the rest of spring break. I have yet to figure that out. I´m thinking about spending a day or two at the end of Holy Week in Toledo or Segovia or somewhere close by so that I won´t have to pay for a hostel. All the hostels are probably sold out already anyway. Holy week is a huge deal here. They have processions all day where they take the statues out from all the little churches and march them down the streets of the city to the cathedral and back again. It´ll be interesting to see, but I don´t necessarily want to spend two days looking at processions.
This weekend is Carnaval. Patricia´s sending us a link to the website that has all the activities. I want to check out some of the parades and stuff. A lot of the bars and stuff have free drinks, and I´m not really sure what other things there are going on. I think it´s not like Brazil where everyone dresses up everywhere. Some people dress up, but not as many.
Next weekend I´m going to Barcelona with Katie and her friend! I´m very excited!! Her friend is studing in Germany, I think, and he wants to see Madrid. So they´re going to hit the Madrid hotspots on Friday, then we´re taking the midnight bus to Barcelona and staying there till Sunday night. It´s about a 7-8 hour bus trip. Katie´s dad knows someone whose sister or something has a hostel in Barcelona, so we´re hoping to stay there for cheap or free (cross fingers).
Well, I´ve got to go to class. Ta ta!
Bethany

February 16

2-16
Warning: this is a long blog. Very long.
We just got back from Granada last night. Wow, what an experience that was! It was a student-led trip from the university, and it had to be one of the worst-planned and organized trips I’ve been on. I enjoyed the city and what we saw, but it was just so disorganized that it would have almost been worth it to go on our own instead.
We left Madrid on a huge double decker coach bus at 8:30 Friday morning. It was a 5 and a half hour bus ride, and we drove south through all of Castilla La Mancha into Andalusia. Those are two of the autonomous communities, in case you didn’t know. Granada is in Andalusia, which is the southernmost of the communities. It’s close-ish to the sea, but doesn’t have any coastline. It’s warmer there than Madrid, too; it was about 65 or 70 in the sun every day, but much colder in the shade. The scenery was beautiful; lots of rolling hills and fields. In some of the fields there were the ruins of little buildings with half a wall or no roof or something. I don’t know if they were ancient or not, but they looked like it, and in Spain you never know when something is 500 years old! When we were driving through Castilla La Mancha, there were a couple of times I saw Don Quixote-like windmills on a hill in the distance. They weren’t the windmills from the story (I think there’s a place where the supposed real ones are that you can go see), but it reminded me of it. And it was in La Mancha, so it was very cool. On the bus, we met three Italians that we hung out with for a lot of the weekend. There were two girls, Alessandra and I think Maria, and a boy, Riccardo. It was Riccardo that we hung out with most. He spoke English, but the girls only spoke Italian and Spanish. It was cool; they spoke Italian with us and we spoke Spanish with them, and we all understood each other! I knew that the languages were very similar, and I had heard that you could communicate using different languages, but it was a lot easier than I expected, and it was cool to experience!
When we got to Granada, they dropped us off at our two hostels. In the email they sent, they had told us we would be staying in hotels. I wasn’t sure if that meant a real hotel or a hostel, so I brought shampoo and soap and a towel just in case. But most of the other people in AYA who went were expecting a real hotel with all the accommodations included. Ryan (one of the guys in AYA) even said he expected there to be an iron and everything, which I thought was a bit much to expect even from a hotel. So they were all really upset about that miscommunication. The hostel we stayed at was down a narrow alley and it was a little dingy. It was pretty clean, but we were still wary. It was weird; when you walked in the front door it led into a kind of courtyard with an open roof and little balconies on the windows of the rooms above. It was pretty cool, except that the main area was then cold because it didn’t get much sun.
When we got there, they gave us a few hours to eat and do whatever we wanted before we took a walking tour of the city center. We didn’t know where we were or where to go, so we found somewhere close to eat and then met up for the tour. It was led by a student who seemed to know quite a bit about the various places, and I took lots of pictures. Granada was where the Muslims lived before they were kicked out in 1492, so there’s a lot of Muslim architecture and influence, with mosaic tiles and intricately worked plaster-ish stuff on the walls. A lot of the tourist shops had Arabic stuff in them. Granada also was the place where Christopher Columbus got permission from Ferdinand and Isabel to voyage to America. There’s a big statue of Columbus and Isabel in the Plaza de Isabel la Católica, which we used for a meeting place all weekend.
After the tour they dropped us off in the city center and gave us some more free time. We didn’t really know where we were or where the hostel was. This whole weekend, if we asked how to get somewhere the leaders told us to just ask someone on the street. They didn’t know how to get anywhere. So we just wandered around for a while and then eventually found the meeting place. We took a bus to this flamenco thing that was on our itinerary, which I assumed was at a theatre, but it wasn’t. Well, first the bus took us to the Almaycin, which is the ancient Muslim neighborhood with all white buildings were there’s a famous view by the church of St. Nicholas where it drops into a valley and you can see the Alhambra on the next hill, all illuminated at night (it was about 10:30). It was pretty, but it was freezing and we didn’t need to stay there long. Then the bus took us to the flamenco. Ryan described as an underground speakeasy, which is kind of what it seemed like. It wasn’t covert or anything, but it was in a small, low-ceilinged, long, narrow room where we sat around the perimeter so there was a kind of runway in the middle of the room. There were people that danced flamenco individually or in pairs, really close to us. It was kind of cool; we could see all the fancy footwork. It was like a kind of tap dancing; they would stamp out intricate and very fast rhythms with their feet, using their toes and their heels alternately, sometimes with guitar and singing, and sometimes with just people clapping. It was very loud in that little room, what with the stomping and at least two people clapping all the time.
We left the flamenco a little after midnight. On our itinerary, it said there was going to be a party at a club called L’Scandalo starting at midnight. Instead, we went to another club first, until about 1, and then moved on to L’Scandalo. I have no idea why they changed plans, but no one told us about it. We stayed at the other club until about 1:30, and then we wanted to go home, because we didn’t know where to go and we had a full weekend ahead of us. So all the AYA people and quite a few other people told the leaders that we wanted to go back to the hostel, and they sent one of the leaders with us. Only, he didn’t know where to go. We were wandering around the streets with a map, asking random people on the street how to get to our hostel. I think that if you’re going to be organizing a trip for students, you need to at least know how to get back to where you’re staying. That’s a must. It was ridiculous. It took us about a half hour to get home, and at one point when we were getting close, we got to a point that Ryan recognized and knew how to get home, but the other people thought it was the other way, so we split up. They ended up getting there a few minutes after we did. By this time it was 2 in the morning and we just went to bed.
The next morning we got up and went to the breakfast provided by the hostel: toast and jam. Really gourmet, but whatever. At 11:30 we got on a bus to go up to the Alhambra. I don’t think our bus driver knew where he was going, because we turned around at least 3 times, and it took us like a half hour to drive there (it only took about 20 minutes to walk back to the city center afterwards. Granted, there are a lot of one way streets and stuff, so that’s probably why it took so long). I don’t know how much everyone knows about the Alhambra, so I’m going to give a brief description. It’s an ancient city where the Muslim sultans lived in the 1100s. It was a city, but it’s really quite small, and all encompassed by the city of Granada today. It took only 20 years to build, which is amazing, because it’s several large buildings, and it’s very intricate. There were about 2000 people living there when it was used for that purpose. It’s got a main palace complex and then extensive gardens called the Generalife. When the Muslims were expelled from Spain in 1492, Ferdinand and Isabel were in Granada, but they didn’t live there. Their nephew, Emperor Charles (Carlos) V was going to make it the basis of his Spanish empire, and he lived there for about 6 months. During that time he had it added on to, making a round, Romanesque plaza sort of thing with columns where today they hold concerts and parties. It was only because Carlos V built onto it that the Alhambra wasn’t destroyed. All the other mosques and Arabic buildings were demolished in an attempt to wipe out all “heathenism.” After 6 months, though, Carlos decided that it was too far away from the hub of things to make it his home, so he moved somewhere else and abandoned the Alhambra. So, the Alhambra is one of the best and most famous examples of Muslim architecture in Spain.
It was beautiful. There were tiled mosaics on the walls and ceilings, and intricately carved plaster or something, I’m not really sure what it was made of. There were even some original carved wood shutters that were preserved by rubbing oil and dust into them. The ceilings were tall and pointed so that the middle was taller than the sides, and there were arches everywhere. The Muslims had tapped into a water source somewhere at the top of the hill and brought water into the complex where it had previously been all dry. They had some fountains, but also a lot of courtyards with pools of water that run so slowly that it looks like the water isn’t moving at all, so there’s a perfect reflection of the building. It was really cool. After the palace part of it, we went into the Generalife, which are the gardens. It’s on a hill, so there are different levels, and it has tall hedgerows that you can walk through and pathways with fountains and flowers (cheerily blooming in the middle of February!) There was even one huge bush I saw that had the middle carved out of it so you could walk inside! The Generalife was filled with all sorts of things that look like a stereotypical palace garden. It was beautiful. At the end of the tour, we walked down a street, I think it was called the Paseo de los Tristes or something like that, that is one of the oldest streets in Granada. It was downhill on cobblestones with small steps every few feet, and loose stones and very treacherous, so we couldn’t really look around at the buildings, but it was still cool.
When we got back to the city center (at about 3:30), our student leader was like: now’s free time, go do whatever you want. But again, we didn’t know where we were or how to get back, so we wandered until we found something familiar. The next thing on our itinerary was a party at a bar called Mae West, which said time to be determined. We realized after we separated from everyone else that they hadn’t told us what time we were supposed to meet. Of course. We assumed that it probably wasn’t until midnight or so, since that’s when the party the night before was, so we didn’t worry yet. We looked around some of the tourist shops, but once you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all, so we decided to go back to the hostel to shower and rest for a while. We managed to find it on our own this time (yay!) and so we were there for about an hour when the rest of the people from AYA came back. We hung out in the hostel for the rest of the afternoon. We found out from our Italian friends that the party was going to be at 12ish, so we had a few hours. The club we were going to was supposedly a dress up one, so we put on our nice clothes and Ryan did everyone’s hair and Jillian did everyone’s make up and it was a fun little makeover session. We found out at about 11 that there had been a pre-party party at 10:30 that no one had told us about, but I’m not sure if that was for everyone or just a smaller group. But it didn’t matter. We were having fun in our hostel.
We didn’t even all meet to go to the club together. They had given us the name of it, but no directions or address, so some of the people in our group went on the computer downstairs in the hostel to MapQuest it and find out where the heck we were going. Right before we left, the Italians told us that they heard we were going to a different club first, that was close to Mae West. We all went together, which was good, because none of the AYA people knew where we were going. The first club was small and crowded, and I kept getting bumped and jostled, and it was annoying. They played some American music, but there was also some Spanish music, which is different from the other clubs I’ve been to. I actually tried to dance and have fun, and it was pretty ok for the first hour or so. But then I just got bored. Around 2:00, all the Erasmus students were herded out of that club, counted, and then taken over to Mae West. It looked like it was in a shopping mall. It was weird. But there was a huge flight of stairs that people were climbing and waiting in line to get in, and there was also an elevator. I don’t know why, but we all got in line for the elevator. Which took about a half hour longer than it would have if we had just climbed the stairs. That’s when we also got our coupons for two free drinks. There were basically two rooms to the club, off of a mall-like hallway. The bar part was absolutely packed; you had to wade through people, shoving them out of the way to get anywhere. It was ridiculous. We got our first drinks in there (I got a lemonade and vodka, which pretty much just tasted like lemonade even though there was a lot of vodka in there) and then went over to the pub. That was less crowded. Relatively. You could stand up on your own with a little bit of personal space. They played American music in there, but it wasn’t the normal bad club music. They played some Bon Jovi, and a Spanish version of “I Wanna Be Like You” from the Jungle Book, and Greased Lightning, and some other fun music. I decided that I might as well use my other drink ticket, because it was free and I couldn’t imagine two drinks would kill me. So I got vodka with orange soda. Again, a lot of vodka in that little glass. I’ve never had two drinks before in my life. I was a little dizzy, but I’m not sure how much of that was the alcohol and how much was the fact that it was going on 4 in the morning and I was about to fall asleep on my feet. I was feeling completely lucid, though, and perfectly fine other than that. When it was almost 4, the AYA people started talking about leaving. We all met in the hallway to make sure we had everyone. There were two people who had decided to go back into the bar, so we were trying to call them to let them know we were leaving. One of them didn’t have her phone on her, and the other one picked up, but we weren’t sure how much she could hear. Finally we got through and said we’re leaving, and she said ok, but we didn’t know if it was an ok you can leave or ok we’re coming. So Ryan went around the bar like 4 times looking for them, and finally we decided just to leave. We walked home with no incidents or getting lost (which was a huge relief) and got back to the hostel about quarter to 5 in the morning. I was so tired. Apparently the other girls got back about 15 minutes after we did, but I was asleep by that time. It was way past Bethany’s bed time.
The next morning we had to be out of the room by 10:30; a cruelly early time for us. Five hours of sleep just isn’t sufficient. But we did it, and then found out that there was no breakfast waiting for us. No idea why. So Katie and Jen and I went out into the city and found a little bakery/café where we bought breakfast. We were going to go to the Corte Ingles to buy some supper for the bus ride home, but it was Sunday, so it was closed. The Corte in Madrid is open on Sundays, so we weren’t expecting it to be closed, but I guess Madrid’s is just open because it’s a bigger city. Almost everything in Granada was closed except tourist shops and restaurants. In Spain, everything is closed on Sundays and often Mondays. What is open those days is generally closed from 2-5 for siesta. So the reason we were staying in Granada until the afternoon with nothing to do? I have no idea. We wandered around for a while, then got lunch and sat there at the tables outside in the sun for 3 hours (it took almost that long from the time we got there to the time we got our check; we only sat out for about a half hour after we paid). After that we found another bakery, bought food for the bus, and then sat on a bench along the street for another couple hours. We went back to the hostel to pick up our bags and found the rest of AYA there, so we chatted with them for about a half hour before it was time to meet up to go home.
The original email we had gotten said that we were going to get back to Madrid in the afternoon, so I told my señora I would be home for supper. But when we got there we found out that we weren’t leaving until 4. The bus was supposed to pick up the people from the other hostel at 3:45 and then come get us at 4. Of course it didn’t arrive until 4:30. But then we got on and drove home. I tried to sleep for the first part, and I think I almost succeeded, but not quite. I just listened to my iPod for the rest of the trip. We got back to Madrid at 10:15, and by the time I got home it was about 10:40. I talked to my parents for a while and then went to bed, glad to have a real bed again. I don’t have classes till 4 on Mondays, so I was able to sleep in this morning. I slept until 11:30, and by 2:00 I was ready for a nap! But I forced myself to stay awake and finish some homework. Now it’s 10:30 and I think I’m going to go to bed soon. 5:00 in the morning really is too much for me!
Oh, one more thing about how disorganized the trip was. Two girls from our group had a class on Friday morning, so they bought their own bus tickets to come after class. They arrived around 5:30 or 6. The Erasmus people had put them on a list of the hostel rooms so they would for sure have a room. I know they did that, because when we were all signing up for rooms, we switched one of them out so they would be in the same room (they had been in separate rooms) and I would take her place with my friends. Then the Erasmus people put up a big stink because they said we couldn’t switch it like that, so we put it back the way it was. When the girls got to Granada, they called the leader and were told to just ask people how to get to the hostel. Luckily they had picked up a map from the bus station. They found the hostel and then were told that there was no room for them there. So they went to the other hostel and were split up. One of them was told that she was going to have to room with 5 boys she didn’t know. I’m not sure how she got out of that, but I wouldn’t have done it either! Somehow they ended up together in a room full of strangers, but I have no idea how their hostel got changed. They said there were people there sleeping on the floor on mattresses, so I guess there weren’t enough beds for everyone. Then they didn’t know where we were or where we were meeting when, so they wandered around the city for a couple hours. They just happened across us when we were all gathering to go to the flamenco, and we left 5 minutes after they found us, so if they hadn’t been walking by at that exact time we would have left them. I couldn’t believe that the leaders were that irresponsible with two of their group. It was inexcusable that they weren’t given a place to meet or a time, and that their housing accommodations were changed without telling them, or that they weren’t given directions, or anything. The girls were almost in tears when they found us because they had no idea what they were going to do. It was unbelievable.
Anyway, that’s my rant/story about the weekend. All in all it was a good trip, just badly planned and organized. I’m glad I got to see Granada, but I wish we could have gone with Patricia instead. She would have made it a great trip. But whatever. It’s over now. And I’m going to bed.
G’night!
Bethany

February 11

I. Hate. The. Internet.
I tried for 45 minutes today to connect to the wifi on campus so I could Skype mom. I went to 4 different places with varying degrees of connectivity. Even when it said I had excellent connectivity, it wouldn´t connect. I got the internet to come up a couple of times, but only for a minute. Skype never connected. I have no idea why. I thought since there´s wifi on campus, surely I would be able to tap into it and use Skype. But no. I have no idea what´s going on, and frankly, I´m very angry. I don´t know if it´s my computer or the connection here, but somethign isn´t working. I´m inclined to think it´s my computer, because as far as I know other people are able to connect on their laptops just fine. I ran a diagnostic thingy on Internet Explorer and it said I couldn´t connect with HTTP or HTTPS or something else, and it may be related to my firewall settings. I tried turning the firewalls off, I tried turning them back on again, nothing worked. I don´t know what to change and I don´t want to screw anything up. Does anyone have any idea how to fix this?
Bethany