Sevilla y Córdoba

Alright, so last weekend I went to Sevilla and Córdoba with my group from UNH.  You are all pretty lucky that you even get to hear about it because I have all of a sudden become incredibly busy! (with stuff like homework...what is that? I don't even remember how to do it anymore!)  But anyway, since I never procrastinate doing my work or anything I have completed all of it so that I can tell you what I have been up to. (That is a complete lie...obviously I am doing this instead of writing papers and studying for tests)

Anyway, it was a really busy weekend because we did two cities in two days.  Our first stop was Sevilla.  The first place we visited was Plaza de España.  It was pretty much a public gathering place with a moat you could paddle boats in, a fountain in the center, horses, and some amazing architecture.  Many famous movies have actually been filmed there which is pretty cool.  All along the walls there are different mosaics dedicated to each province within Andalucía and each of the 4 bridges represent the first 4 kingdoms that united to form modern Spain: Aragon, Castille, León, y Navarra.

Next we moved on the Alcazar.  This is basically just a castle and military fortification.  It was AMAZING!  Everything had an Arab as well as Christian influence.  We got to tour the inside of it and the gardens.  It is still in use as a palace, and the upper rooms remain prepared for the arrival of the royal family at any moment!  We then took a break for lunch and sangria...yum! We got to eat outside by one of the main monuments and listen to Spanish guitar music...it really doesn't get any better than that, especially with the extremely good weather we have been having (but I hear you have great weather at home home too).  After lunch we went to the Cathedral of Sevilla.  This was a very cool experience because I learned about that exact cathedral in my art class, and I actually got to see it in person!  My favorite part was climbing the bell tower.  It is called the Giralda because in Spanish the verb girar means to turn and it has a weather vane on the top of it that turns...so hence the name Giralda.  It was a great view of Sevilla from the top!  Here are a few photos:

The inside of the Alcazar...the patio actually. I have more pictures of the inside, but this was one of my favorite parts.

Gardens of the Alcazar! Awesome to walk through

The pond in the Alcazar with Brenna, Sarah, and Melanie!

La Giralda...we climbed that tower in the Catedral de Sevilla :)

Oh right...did I mention that in the Cathedral we got to see the tomb of Christopher Columbus?  So cool.

We made it up the bell tower!!

Below: The view from the top!

Plaza de España!!!

 You can see some of the brides, the moat, and fountain.

Us on the Puente de León! (look at all the mosaic!)

That night we went to see a play called "El perro de hortelano"...it was a comedy and actually pretty funny!  Much easier to understand this time because we read the play in class before actually going to see it!



The next day we went to Córdoba, my favorite stop of the trip.  First up was the ruins of Medina al-Zahra.  Although that is in Arabic, it translates into The City of Sarah.  The legend of this city is that the Arab king of the time married a girl from Granada named Sarah, but she was always sad because she did not see the snow or landscape of the Sierra Nevadas.  In one night, in order to cheer her up the king built this new city to resemble Granada and planted thousands of cherry trees to blossom white and resemble the Sierra Nevadas...que romántico!  In reality however, it was the strongest and most strategic point in the kingdom of Córdoba.  Since I am a history major...it was one of the coolest things ever! I wish we had gotten more time to spend there, but we had much more to see!

When we actually arrived in Córdoba, we visited the old Jewish neighborhood.  There is a long history of Jewish/Arab/Christian conflict in Córdoba and it remains a big influence on the city today.  You can literally see the evidence of each culture.  We saw some of the old markets and the synagogue.  After that, we had free time until our tour of the catedal/mezquita.  During this time my wonderful and amazing friends told a random group of singers on the street that it was my birthday...thank you.  They then sang to me, made me dance with all of them, and wear a cape!  It was quite embarrassing, but at the same time so much fun! That is Spain for you I suppose...

After that we got to enter the cathedral/mosque.  It had to have been the single most breathtaking building I have ever seen.  I have photos, but they won't do it justice.  The blending of cultures and styles is mind blowing.  You can see the remnants of old Roman streets, the architecture of the Arabs, and then structures from both the Gothic and Renaissance periods according to Christians.  If any of you have a chance to go to Spain this is a MUST see.  Here are some pictures of this city:

Bev with the ruins of Medina al-Zahra behind her

Allie just climbing up the ruins...I am not quite sure if that was allowed.

Arcs in Medina al-Zahra...everything in Spain has arcs!

Jewish market place...live Spanish guitar music was playing while we were here.  The music is everywhere in the streets...I am going to miss it when I have to come home!

Inside the cathedral/mosque...this part is the mosque.  The arcs were endless and incredible to see in person.

This part of the building began the transformation into the cathedral...here is part of the Gothic stage.  The Christians actually elevated every single part that they rebuilt because they believed they were the better religion.

The lighting inside was very dim, but it only added to the experience.

I like this picture because you can see the transformation of the mosque into the cathedral.

The cathedral...Renaissance portion and main alter

This is the Guadalquivir River that runs through both Sevilla and Córdoba.  Fun Fact: it is supposed to be the river that Hercules moved during his labours to clean out the Stables of Augean in a single day!

Finally, here is me dancing with the street performers in Córdoba...two more joined in later.  So much fun!

Last fun fact: When we drove home we passed 3 more castles/churches...each of which was a fortilization of the Reyes Catolicos during the Reconquista.  I wish we could have stopped because on the building was a Catholic church built on a mosque,  built on a visigothic church, built on a Roman temple, built on an Iberian temple... HOW COOL IS THAT???  Just try to imagine how many people lived there, walked there, worshipped there, and it is still standing today!

La vida granadina

¡Hola todos!

So I have had a pretty busy week/weekend in Granada. I have had a few inquiries about daily life here in Spain, so I will start with that before talking about my adventures (but when I think about it, every single day is an adventure!)

First, THE FOOD! It is all delicious! I keep forgetting to take any pictures of it, but there is always meat of some kind, soup, lots of fish, bread, etc. Our host mom makes something different almost every single day! I have no idea how she has that many recipes. But here are the basic food groups in Spain (if you ever visit you will discover them very quickly)

1. Bread 2. Olive Oil 3. Fish 4. Wine 5. Ham 6. Cheese 7. Ham 8. Ham 9. Cheese 10. Ham 11. Ham 12. Cheese 13. Ham 14. Cheese 15. Ham & Cheese

(Not to mention they have an endless number of delicious pastries that I just can't stop eating)

Second, you may not think so, but I actually do go to classes! SURPRISE! I'm taking La historia de España, La historia de arte en España, Literatura española, Cultura de paz, and one other course with our professor from UNH (I don't really know what to call that one)  But so far they have all been pretty easy.  Interesting, but easy...I guess they don't really cover as much content when you are trying to learn everything in a different language.  I'm not complaining though because just living in Spain is enough of a learning experience.  I also have an intercambio partner named Cristina.  She is 25 and trying to learn English, so when we meet up she speaks only in English and I speak only in Spanish.  It is actually really fun and I learn a lot this way!

As for daily activities, we usually walk into the center of the city hang out, grab a coffee, or sometimes shop.  We also like to go lay in Federico García Lorca park because the weather is so nice.  Every Thursday we play fútbol, and most days between classes we go the the same cafe.  I love the walk into the city/to school.  It is beautiful and always makes be appreciate how lucky I am to have an opportunity like this!  Here are some photos of outside of my building to try and show you what my part of Granada is like:

This is outside of my apartment...note all of the clothes hanging out the window: that is exactly how half of my clean clothes ended up covered in bird poop -__-

This is right as you walk out the door of our apartment building.  Across the street is a cute little cafe that Victoria and I like to go to.  Where we live it is mostly apartments we have to walk a bit to get to the busy part of town.

Okay, so now that I have gotten all of that out of the way, let me tell you about the fabulous weekend I had in Granada!

On Saturday I went PARAGLIDING in the Sierra Nevadas...a once in a lifetime experience!  If I had to describe it, it was like we were just blowing away with the wind!  The only scary part: running off the side of a mountain with a man who didn't speak English and said "we just need to wait for the right amount of wind...oh wait..GO!"  So much fun however!  We did all kinds of tricks in the air which made it even better... here is a video of all of us who went...pretty cool.

So after that, we felt like we needed to relax a bit so we went to the Arab Baths in Granada. It was so relaxing and an amazing experience because they are just like they were thousands of years ago! They were the same thing as the Arab Baths in Ronda that we walked around as ruins! It was dimly light, Arab music was playing, and the sound of running water was everywhere. There was a cold pool, a hot pool, and a warm pool. When you were in the main pool (the warm one) there were literally columns surrounding you. There was a tea area and massage area as well. It was the first time in my life that I had ever been to anything like a spa and this was just 10 times more amazing because it was like I was living in history! I wish you all could have experienced it because I cannot possible do it justice by description and we were not allowed to take pictures. Later that day we went to a Granada fútbol game! It was so much fun because the crowd was so into it and cheered (or yelled) at every moment. I think I learned the majority of my Spanish swear words that day... unfortunately they lost to Valencia, but I am so glad I got to experience it! Here are a few photos of the stadium:

Yay Granada!

A great show of support to start off the game!

The field once it got dark!

So many people!

Oh! I almost forgot...the weekend before this one was Día de Andalucía (well Monday and Tuesday were) But for those days we didn't have class or anything so we spent it wandering around Granada.  Victoria and I went to the Parque de las ciencias, saw an anarchist demonstration in the centro, and walked to the Albaicín at night to see the Alhambra!  Más fotos para su entretenimiento:

The butterfly house in the science park!

lost in the labyrinth??

The cool water sculptures!

So many children everywhere since admission was free for Día de Andalucía.  It was really cool that the whole park was outside.

Protests in Granada...with drumming, singing, and dancing

Protests outside of the city hall

Center of the city at night!

Statue dedicated to Los Reyes Catolicos

This is my walk to school...there was a film festival in Granada so it was turned into a red carpet...So much fun!

The Alhambra at night...

So I think that pretty much covers everything!  This weekend I'm heading to Sevilla and Córdoba so I am sure I will have more to share with you all after that! Hasta luego.





Jerez de la frontera

So this weekend I traveled to Jerez de la frontera.  It is a small city about four and half hours away from Granada.  They are famous for the production of sherry, horse shows, and flamenco.  We happened to go the weekend that their Festival de Jerez began, which means it was a flamenco festival.  The trip went well from day one when we checked into out hostel/hotel.  Thanks to a mix up on their part we got upgraded to an apartment and didn't have to pay any extra.  We spent the next two days exploring the town.  We visited some of the old churches, the Alcazar (or castle), stummbled upon quite a few open air markets, and saw various street performances.  We also had the opportunity to tour a sherry bodega and go to a traditonal flamenco performance.

The flamenco show that we saw was called "El aire que me lleva" and the dancers were Andrés Peña and Pilar Ogalla.  They were amazing!  I have never seen anything like it.  There is so much passion put into the dance, guitar, and singing.  By far it was one of the best experiences I have had in Spain.  Below is a sample of what the dancers can do, but it doesn't even come close to the real thing!

Here are some photos to show you the town the sherry bodega:

This is where we saw the flamenco show!

In the center of the city.  We were completly lost this entire time.  In Jerez streets are not labeled, maps are inaccurate, and the locals don't even know where to send you...quite interesting, but we worked past it!

The center of the city where we saw all of the street preformers.  Some of it was improptu flamenco, but with elements of comedy.  For example, there was a group of men dressed as aztecs throwing fake heads around and singing that we better come back or die!  They were pretty funny and drew a huge crowd.  We also witnessed a group of men dressed as old women doing the same type of thing.

The best park in the city where we hung out for a while before the tour of the bodega.

Our apartment for the weekend.  We had a kitchen/living room, bedroom, and balcony!  Not bad for about $20 a night :)

Oh and we also had roof access from where we stayed!  It was pretty cool a night...I forgot to take pictures of that though.  The weather was in the high 70s so we could hang out outside all day and night.

This is the sherry bodega that we toured.  Tio Pepe is one of the most well know sherry companies in Spain and in many other parts of the world.  Jerez literally means sherry, and the word sherry in english comes from english speakers trying to pronounce the town's name.  We decided to take the tour in Spanish since that it what we are trying to learn...we got the general idea of it, but our tour guide was one fast talker.  He found out afterwards that we weren't from Spain and asked us how we had been able to understand anything because even he knew he was talking fast.  I guess it proves that we are all getting a bit better at Spanish!

The grapes...just not in season right now, but they will be growing by April and May.

So. Many. Barrels. Of. Wine.  The funniest thing is that here they put out a mouse trap, but it isn't a typical one.  They put a tiny ladder up to a glass of sherry.  We actually saw a mouse come out and drink from it!  They do this because when the bodega was first founded Tio Pepe found out that he could make extremely sweet sherries that even the mice liked to drink.

Victoria standing with even bigger barrels of wine!

Our 4 sherry samples.  The dark one and first light one were extremely sweet and are supposed to be had with desserts.  The middle two were dry for meat dishes.  Overall they were pretty delicious!

The open air market with every type of food and handmade good for sale that you could imagine.  Spanish music was playing, tents were set up as cafes and bars, and to top it all off, it was in the courtyard of the Alcazar!

Just one of the tents with all the kinds of things they were selling (ham, cheese, bread, olive oil, etc)

This is the Equestion School in Jerez.  Unfortunately they only do shows on Thursdays in the winter and we go there on Friday.  It was still a beautiful area though and very cool to see.  Normally they have processions and shows in which the horses are trained to dance to music under the direction of their riders.