L'espana e la settimana scorsa

Oops. I've been totally neglecting all of my loyal readers. I'm so sorry for that!

Okay, last week, during the week itself, nothing noteworthy happened, except for me taking the pictures in the last post.  I probably ate some pizza and did some homework and slept.  Honestly, I have no idea what else I did, except for planning a spur of the moment trip to Spain.... yea.

Puerta del Sol

So my friend Katey is doing the DTW program, and she's in Salamanca, Spain right now.  I wanted to travel over the weekend, but had no plans to do so, and no one here to go anywhere with.  So, I asked Katey what her plans were and if she would be interested in going to Madrid with me! She said yes, and we booked it! I had a lot of hurdles to jump over before I could get my plane ticket all set though, and had to take full advantage of the study abroad staff here.  Thankfully, they helped me sort it all out and everything was fine.

Beautiful Spanish Sunset!

I left for Spain on Friday, in the afternoon.  My plane left at 2:30.  I woke up early and packed and got money (my atm card doesn't work in Spain... thats literally the only country in all of europe it doesn't work in... wtf?) and got ready.  I was planning on leaving around noon, but I ended up talking with my roommate about the fun night out we had had the night before, and ended up leaving late.  I took the metro to termini station to get on the Leonardo Express which takes you to the airport.  When I got to termini, I had no idea where the stupid train platform was, because it is literally hidden, and all the signs made me run in circles before I could find it.  When I did finally find it, the train was pulling out of the platform.  So I bought a ticket on the next one and waited a half an hour.  I got on the 1:30 train and it took a half an hour.... yes, that's right, I got to the airport at 2:00 for a 2:30 flight..... ooops. So I wandered around looking for where to check in.  The terminal I was in was 95% Alitalia, which was good, since I was flying Alitalia, but bad because they had different lines for different things, and I ended up getting yelled at for being in the wrong line... oops. When I found the right line, I actually had to wait, even though my flight was boarding, because no one would let me go up front.  When I got to the front, it was 2:15. I gave my itinerary to the guy, and told him that I understood that he probably wouldn't be able to check me in, and I asked if he could get me on the next flight.... he told me to wait, and was chatting with one of his co-workers.  Then, suddenly, he threw a boarding pass at me, told me how to cut the security line, and told me to run as fast as I could. So, I obviously did. I got to the special security point for VIPs that he told me to use, and the woman tried to tell me to go wait in line with everyone else.  I literally begged, and she let me through. Then I sprinted to the gate.  I made it just in time.

Top of a church

I got off the plane in Madrid, and was on my own. Katey wasn't arriving until the next day at noon, so I had some time to kill.  I took a taxi to my hostel, which was located pretty much downtown.  It's called Way Hostel, and it was really nice.  The people were nice, and the rooms were really nice.  The beds were even relatively comfortable, compared to most I've experienced.  So I got settled there, and then set out to explore on my own a little.  Armed with a miniature mapped provided by the hostel, I headed towards Puerta del Sol, the geographic center of Spain.  It was only like 10 minutes away by foot.  I brought my camera, and took pictures as I went.  The weather was nice, so I got some good shots. Madrid is a pretty photogenic place.  On my way, I found a Dunkin Donuts!! I had never been so excited to see one in my entire life.  I immediately ordered a large iced coffee and didn't specify milks or sugars or anything, and ended up with a perfectly regular iced coffee!! It was incredible.  Puerta del Sol is literally a big empty square, so it got old pretty quick. After that I headed for Plaza Mayor.  I stopped on the way to eat Burger King, because I wasn't quite courageous enough to order real Spanish food (its scary) and really really really wanted a burger.  As much as I'm not a fan of fast food, it was goooooood.  Plaza Mayor was much more interesting than Puerta del Sol, and so I spent more time there.  I visited some other Plazas near the hostel on the way back and took some great pictures.  I got back to the hostel around 8:30 or so and wanted nothing more than to pass out, but there was too much going on, so I just read and hung out for awhile.  I "went to bed" at 11ish, but didn't fall asleep until after 2, because of all the people coming in and out. 

Plaza Mayor

The next morning, I woke up around 9 and ate breakfast at the hostel.  Then I checked out and headed out for the day.  Katey wouldn't be in until around noon, so I just wandered for awhile.  I started by going back to Dunks for some much-needed coffee.  Then, I set out to explore some more.  I walked around the area surrounding the opera house, and ended up at the royal palace.  It was pouring rain, so not really picture-taking weather, so I just have mental snapshots of those places.  Finally, Katey called and said she had arrived and that she was going to check into our hotel and would meet me in Plaza Mayor after. So I headed towards Plaza Mayor to wait.  Little did I know, our hotel was a ways away, and I ended up standing in the rain at Plaza Mayor for hours.  The plus side is that I'm probably in about a thousand different tourists' pictures because of where I was standing. haha. Katey and three of her friends arrived, and we ate lunch.  I ignored the traditional spanish dishes and ate spaghetti. Still wasn't brave enough. But for desert, we had churros con chocolate, which is totally spanish and totally delicious! 

More Spanish Sunset

After lunch, we walked along Gran Via, the Broadway of Spain.  The weather was abysmal at that point, so there weren't many people around, and a lot of the shops at least looked closed because of the lack of people.  We got bored there pretty quickly, and headed over to the Prado Art Museum.  It was wonderful! We spent a couple of hours in there, and Katey knows a lot about art, so she shared her knowledge with me as we walked through the rooms looking at all sorts of different paintings.  We saw lots of Goya's and lots of Velasquez's.  A Caravaggio, some El Greco, a Rembrandt. It was very interesting.  When we were finished there, me and Katey went to check out a church while the other girls went to check out Puerta del Sol.  We met up and headed over to Plaza Mayor's tourist office to see if we could get to a Flamenco Show.  That didn't work out, so we went to dinner instead.  I had chicken and potatoes.  Nothing exciting. After dinner we returned to the hotel and slept.  We were so exhausted.  

Gran Via

The next morning me and Katey headed back downtown.  We got some brunch, and then headed over to the Reina Sofia museum of modern art.  Neither of us is really that into modern art, but the museum was pretty cool.  It had a lot of pretty famous pieces, like Picasso's Guernica, and some Dali's, etc.  We spent two hours there, and got to see just about everything we wanted to see.  When we were done there, we wanted to go souvenir shopping, so we walked around to some different shopping areas in Madrid.  I think we both ended up with everything we wanted, and I got some presents for my siblings.  

church behind the Prado

We ate dinner in one of the plazas whose name escapes me.  The first place we went was outside, and we wanted to do tapas, which we really knew nothing about.  The waiter thought we were crazy.  But we ordered a spanish omelet, patates bravas (which ended up being fried chunks of potato smothered in american hot sauce.... wtf) and peppers with some fancy name (which ended up being peppers with salt on them...). Needless to say, it sucked. The Spanish omelet was good, but the rest was completely anticlimactic. Not what we were looking for.  The waiter was also really rude to us, and pretended like he didn't speak english and then spoke english perfectly at the end when we were leaving. jerk. So we left there and ended up stopping at another restaurant.  We intended to get something for dessert, but instead, we ordered more dinner.  The service was worse at this place, and we didn't get a waiter at all for a half an hour.  We ordered another spanish omelet and croquettes.  When they were served, they were actually really good.  But then the waitress ignored us and we had to beg for the check.  It was ridiculously frustrating.   We left there and headed back to the hotel. 

Spanish street

We decided to check out Kapitol Night Club, which is a huge 7-story club in Madrid. Everyone I know that has gone has loved in and recommended going. So we got ready and left the hotel around midnight.  It was around 1 by the time we got there, and we got right inside.  It was big. It was definitely big.  When we first got there, there was hardly any people. Spaniards go out LATE. really late. But it filled up pretty quickly and it was okay.  It definitely wasn't as good as everyone said it was.  I didn't have a great time. But we stayed until 3:30, and then took a cab back to the hotel.  Once at the hotel, I got my stuff together, and headed to the lobby of the hotel to catch the free shuttle to the airport.  Yea, that's right. I didn't sleep. ouch. I got to the airport plenty early and didn't have any of the excitement of my first flight.  Got back to school a little before noon on Monday.  

The plaza in which we ate the first of our dinners

Monday I slept most of the day.  Tuesday I went to class.  In art, we went to Palazzo Farnese, and Gianicolo Hill.  It was boring. Theology was more boring than usual and I couldn't keep my eyes open.  Wednesday I did service at the nursery school, which was the same as always.  I spoke more French than Italian and the kids colored in pictures of houses.  They also had their english lesson, but all they really learned was "yes" and "no" and we danced to Bingo and some other songs in English.  Today I had midterms. My oral midterm in Italian didn't go so well, but the written part was fine.  I also turned in my takehome test for theology, which was okay. Not my best work, but I don't care about that class at all. 

Me and Katey before we went to the club

Now I'm absolutely exhausted, and have no plans for the weekend.  It's possible that I might be getting sick, because why else would I be so tired? So I think I'm going to take it easy this weekend and maybe do some exploring around Rome.  There's always more to see! Anyways, that's all for now. I'll probably fall asleep real soon. Buona Notte!