Toledo

Yesterday we took a day trip to Toledo, which is about an hour from Madrid. It's really a beautiful city, and completely full of history. Whereas Madrid has been subject to rapid expansion and thus a lot of old buildings have been torn down in the name of development, whoever is in charge of such things in Toledo was very careful to keep all the modern buildings outside of the main town center that dates back centuries. As a result, the streets twist and wind narrowly in every direction, and as you walk through you're surrounded by churches and buildings from as long ago as the 13th century (unfortunately I didn't take any pictures in the streets; I wish I had).

Here's me outside the city:



This is the ancient and beautiful Toledo cathedral:



From inside an old monastery built under Ferdinand and Isabela (15th century):



When people talk about Spain and its history, they often talk about the "three Spains" or the three cultures which have shaped the country in its past and present: Muslim culture, Jewish culture and Christian culture. Spain was a Muslim country during most of the dark ages, until the Moors were kicked out under Ferdinand and Isabela. The Jews never really had control of the country but have always been a strong influence. Toledo is one of the most potent examples of this. In most cities in Spain, when one culture triumphed over another, they would wipe out most remaining cultural relics that were left over -- mosques would be raised and cathedrals built in their place. But in Toledo, much of the older cultures was allowed to survive. As a result, you can find things like this synagogue: La sinagoga de Sta. Maria, or St. Mary's Sinagogue, which is filled with Muslim-style decorations and architecture.



So it was a really interesting visit. Here are a couple of views from inside the city looking out at the hills that surround it.

More pictures of Madrid

Here are a few more that I took the other day:

The Palacio Real (Royal palace):



The statue in front of the Palacio Real:



Gran Via (one of the major arteries of downtown Madrid) at night:



The Catedral de Nuestra Senora de la Almudena:



A statue of Pope John Paul II outside of the cathedral:

Pictures

I've had these for a couple days now but haven't been able to post them cause whatever Internet connection I've been able to find has been slow and unreliable, so it's been hard to get them uploaded. I promise these aren't the most interesting or beautiful pictures Madrid has to offer, but they were near where I was, so I took them. (Click them to make them bigger)

First, my room:



This is the apartment building:



Here's the massive construction project that's going on on the other side of the street from the apartment:



This is the Puerta de Toledo, about 5 blocks from me, which marks the road leading to Toledo, where we'll be going tomorrow:



These are pictures of the Puerta del Sol, which is considered the social and cultural center of Madrid:



This is the Plaza Mayor, one of the main meeting places and another vibrant social center.. it's basically a huge plaza in the middle of downtown surrounded by walls and spires like this:



Close-up of part of the plaza, I forget the story behind these paintings:



The Prado:



A random church that's in the middle of downtown, surrounded by stores and office buildings and such. There are a lot of these scattered throughout the city.



That's all I have at the moment -- but I should be taking more pictures of better stuff today.

Mas

Today we went to the Prado museum with the art history teacher. He seems awesome, and I think having an art history class that is taught by going over theory in the classroom and then spending 40% of class time in one of the world's greatest museums viewing actual masterworks sounds like a good way to do it. I also found out about the internship I'm going to have: I'm going to be working for this magazine www.mapmadrid.com , doing graphic design work. I'm kinda disappointed because it's written in English and I'm sure the woman who runs it is a native English speaker, but still... it's exactly the kind of thing I'd want to do in the states. But I also don't have an office to go to and learn Spanish customs and practice and that kind of thing -- it seems I'd be mostly working on my own time. Which has its advantages and disadvantages. We'll have to see. I have the option of switching out.

I took some photos today but the internet connection here is pretty uneven, so I think I'll upload them tomorrow from school.

Madrid

Well, I'm officially settled in and oriented. I met my Senora and her son yesterday and got moved in and she showed me around the neighborhood and helped me with the metro system and stuff (it's not that hard). Today I had orientation. Best idea is probably just to give an overview of developments and impressions. I'll break it down by category.

The city:

Madrid's wonderful. It's clean, bustling, very social, and historical. It seems like almost all the architecture comes from either the gothic period or the neo-classical. There are a few modern ones as well. But everything's really well integrated. The metro system works great and it's really clean. The whole city is, in fact. There are people everywhere (except when the city's two futbol [soccer] teams are playing, at which point it becomes eerily deserted, somebody told me).

The culture:

Definitely different. Madrilenos are really social (as are most Spaniards, I imagine). They don't really like to get together and socialize in private houses -- pretty much all meeting and gathering is done in public. So there are tons of bars on every block, as well as large parks and gardens. The biggest difference most Americans would probably notice are the hours and eating schedule they keep. Businesses are typically open from 9 am to 2 pm, and then from 5 pm to 8 pm, with siesta time in between. The Spanish also eat constantly: a small breakfast whenever you get up (today I had the Spanish version of cereal and milk: hot milk with cocoa powder added, then corn flakes or whatever cereal added with a spoon), then a mid morning snack between 11:30 and 12:30 (my senora made me a sandwich), then lunch at 2. Lunch tends to be a multi-course meal -- today after orientation we all went to a restaurant and started off with bread and soup with beans and beef, followed by a beef entree with rice and then a really good cake-sort-of-thing for dessert. Then a small snack at 5:30-6:00 to tide you over until dinner, which is light and eaten between 9 & 10 pm. They eat constantly, but the portions aren't anything like what we have in America. After dinner is when social life starts, and Madrilenos dance and drink and socialize until as late as 6 in the morning.

My familia:

My senora is really nice, although she talks fast and a lot of times I don't understand what she's saying. But I can already feel myself getting better at it. Very slowly though. They live in a fairly small apartment (like I'm sure most Madrilenos do, it's pretty crowded), but I have my own room and bathroom. Her name is Antonia Pinero (Peen-yare-oh) and her son is 19 and named Dario (Dar-EE-oh). He's studying carpentry and she's an artist. I believe she said her husband died a year and a half ago of cancer. Spain has a real public health crisis because of the number of people that smoke (directly and indirectly). They're passing more and more laws to cut down on it, but people seem to ignore them a lot.

The program:

I was somewhat worried and anxious about this whole thing up until orientation today, and am now really excited. They told us all about the classes (they seem awesome and so do the professors) and the trips we'll be taking. The trips are probably the part I look forward to the most. We'll be traveling and not in class a grand total of 26 days out of the semester, not including a 4-day weekend and 10-day spring break during which we can do whatever or go wherever we want. The trip schedule is like this:

Jan. 27 (this Friday): Toledo
Feb. 10-12: Barcelona
Feb. 17-20: Long weekend
Feb. 23-27: Andalucia (Granada, Sevilla and Cordoba)
March 10: Avila and Segovia
March 25-31: Morocco
April 7-16: Spring Break
April 28- May 2/3: Portugal and Northern Spain

Maria Carmen, the academic director (who is amazing and I can already tell does everything in her power to make this program as enjoyable and educational as possible and succeeds) told us that part of the trip to Morocco involves a night spent sleeping in the desert. We're going to have to sign a lot of disclaimers, though, cause last year some kids decided it would be a good idea to get up in the middle of the night while everybody was asleep and go for a walk. In the Sahara desert. At night. Alone.

Needless to say they got lost and were picked up by a group of native desert people and taken to their camp, terrified and crying.

Anyway, so it should be awesome. My classes are Spanish Cinema, Art History (a lot of which is taught in the Prado museum) and the 6-hour seminar on Spain. I'll also have an internship for credit.

That's all I've got for now. Tomorrow I have free time in the morning so I really will get up and take pictures of the city and all sorts of interesting stuff.

Hasta luego.

Arrival in Spain

(I just found out I have Internet access [which doesn't really belong to me but which is available to me] in my apartment. I'm on my way to school now so I can't update about all that happened yesterday, but here's an update I wrote up the night I got here. More later today.)

Jan. 22 – Madrid

Well, I got here. It took about a million hours but I got here. I literally traveled I think 24 hours straight from the time I left Wimberley. More than that, in fact. Anyway, I really like Madrid. After I got in and took a nap, I and the other 36 AU students who are here for this program went on a tour with one of the teachers of some of the buildings nearby. For some reason people and books had given me the impression that it was kind of droll and the architecture all came from Franco’s regime when everything built was cheap and functional and boring. But there’s quite a bit of history in the few things I’ve seen. There’s the gorgeous Plaza Mayor, built during the time of the Austrian kings, the Palacio Real, (Royal palace) built under the Bourbons (who are still in power), and a lot of other historic buildings. (Of course this will all be augmented with photos tomorrow when I should have a chance to get pictures while it’s light out. Also I might have gotten some of that history wrong. We’ll see).

After that tour we all went as a group to a nice tapas restaurant, where I had my first authentic Spanish meal. Tapas are small, appetizer-like things that you order several of for a meal, except they had this one pre-planned I suppose. So we went and sat down, there was bread waiting for all of us, and then they poured water and sangria and started bringing out platter after platter of different tapas – there were cheeses and breaded sausage and vegetables and calamari and all sorts of stuff. They just kept bringing it out and we kept eating it for about an hour. Then they brought out the main entrée – veal cutlets. It was pretty delicious. After that it was ice cream (or gelato, probably) and some kind of weird spongy pie and dessert shots – something syrupy and licoricey. Anyway, it was really interesting and made me look forward to a lot more Spanish cuisine. Also, smoking is fine inside restaurants here, even though I’m pretty sure they passed a ban on it.

We meet our host families tomorrow at eleven – I’m probably going to get up before that and try to find Internet access (which, if this is posted, I found) and also go around and take some pictures of Madrid (which, if such pictures appear, was a successful endeavor). I guess we’ll be staying with our families for most of tomorrow, Monday is orientation day, and classes start Tuesday. Then Friday we’re taking our first trip to Toledo.

That’s all for now. I’m tired and jet-lagged.

Russ

JFK

Well, I'm here at JFK airport at the beginning of my 5-hour layover. JetBlue has a free wireless hotspot set up in their terminal here, so I thought I'd check in before I go get my bags and hang out for a while before checking in to my flight through Heathrow.

The last meal I had before I left Texas was a chopped beef sandwich at the Salt Lick, world-famous barbeque establishment... or barbeque fortress or something... which had a stand at the airport. So I left in Texas style. I might not have another sandwich for months.

That's all to report.

My blog

So, what this is going to be, is my new blog covering my semester in Spain. I'll try and update it as often as I have Internet access... I'm still not sure exactly how often that's going to be. There will be pictures, updates, info, etc.

I still don't really know anything about where or how I'm going to live once I get there. I know I'll be living with a Spanish family, but not where in Madrid they live, how many of them there are, what their customs are, etc. Right now I'm in Wimberley starting to get everything in order... it might be a late night here making sure I've got all I need packed.

So, stay tuned.