So today I decided to take a siesta for the first time in a long time because I was struck with a horrible thought: Today is just about the last day that I will be able to do so. Without it being weird, that is. I suppose this is arguable, being that the standard American college student's sleep schedule is much like that of all of Spain: go to bed after midnight, wake up at 7, go to class/be productive, then take a nap in the afternoon. It's brilliant, I think. College students have the right idea. Let's impose this on the rest of the country.
So yes, this weekend was satisfying, which is the best I can hope for, as it is my last one. I got to see most, if not all, of my ERASMUS friends, which were the ones I was most concerned about seeing. It's the most uncomfortable goodbye, because that's exactly what it is: a goodbye. There's almost absolute certainty that you won't ever see the person again. There's no "see you later" about it. The Portuguese guys, as they've been come to be known, threw all us Americans a going away party at their house uptown, which was really sweet. And if you're confused about why we're having a going away party right now, while we still have a couple weeks left in Europe (actually 2 as of tomorrow), it's because tomorrow will be our last night. We've had several of these "last nights" here in Santander (for example, last weekend, we never hesitated to tell everyone who would listen that it was our last weekend. And tomorrow night, there is talk of going out for our "last night," but then most of us will still be here on Friday the 29th, which is our real last night, because we leave for Madrid the next day, and from Madrid, it's home), and I think it's because we all just want an excuse to party harder than we've ever partied before.
Anyway, it was a successful weekend. After losing my camera on Thursday night, I succeeded in losing nothing else. Oh, Spain. All I've ever done is love you unconditionally and you just take, take, take. I've lost two sets of keys, two cell phones, an iPod, a camera, and probably some dignity as well. Okay just kidding about that last one.
So one more thing before I go home and start to pack and give up halfway through and instead cry myself to sleep...I was walking here to the library to study for my last exam tomorrow when I heard some really obnoxious drumming. I walked a little further on and I saw my first Semana Santa procession! Now, for those of you who don't know, Semana Santa means "holy week," and a Semana Santa procession is kind of like a parade, only creepy. Men cloaked in large white cloths with their faces covered in the cone-shaped hoods walked to the slow, ominous drumming of teenage boys walking behind them. Then came some pre-teen looking girls carrying banners and looking like they hated their lives. After the girls with banners, there was a giant "float," if you will. It was a giant wooden table covered in red flowers on the top with a symbolic Jesus standing on top, complete with crown of thorns and look of misery on his face, he was carrying a proportionally sized crucifix on his shoulder. The statue was even made to look like he was being weighed down under the burden of this giant cross; a detail I think few would think to include. Bringing up the rear were 4 or 5 young boys, also cloaked in white, but the terrified looks on their faces were on display, as they were not forced to wear the creepy cone-shaped hoods with the tiny eye slits. Why make a religious procession so unsettling? I'll never know. I can only imagine what would happen if the Catholic Church tried to pull something like this in North Carolina.
Speaking of North Carolina! I hope you all are doing well and my heart goes out to everyone who lost homes or even family. You guys made international news. I watched it on the Spanish news with my host family. That was just about the most frightening thing, let me tell you; hearing about natural disasters in your home state and not knowing whether your family and friends are okay. Glad to hear you all are, though. I count myself lucky.
Until next time, everyone!
"El mundo es un libro y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página."
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Monday, April 18, 2011
Last word, Kodak digital camera gifted to me for Christmas by Brian Stewart, dies at the age of 4 months.
Today we mourn the loss of the digital camera belonging to a Sherri Christine Dill, 19.
The camera, a Kodak 8 megapixel Easy-Share with 5x optical aspheric lens, died this past Thursday night, April 14th, 2011, in its temporary home of Santander, Spain.
The cause is believed to be theft, but is as of yet, unknown.
In its four month career, this accomplished and celebrated Kodak documented several amazing places and many a night out on the town, reccounting many stories that none would believe actually occured had there not been photos. This camera's lens had seen the likes of Santander, Bilbao, Salamanca, Santillana del Mar, Las Cuevas de Altamira (kind of), Barcelona, Dublin, and Paris. It also had plans to travel to Los Picos, El Soplao, San Vicente, Rome, Pisa, Florence, Venice, and Madrid, and even was going to return to its original home of North Carolina. However, due to Thursday's tragedy, these dreams will, unfortunately, not be realized.
This particular Kodak will be remembered fondly, for its ability to capture the moment at the most spontaneous beck and call, and for its unique attention to the most minute detail.
"My Kodak did any beautiful scene justice," Said previous owner, Sherri Dill last Friday morning. "All my friends were really jealous when they looked at my pictures on FaceBook."
Kodak Easy-Share was manufactured in Japan and made its way to a Staples store in North Carolina, USA in the year 2010. It was purchased by Brian Stewart and then made its way to the intended owner, Sherri Dill, on Christmas Day, December 25th, 2010. The camera earned its own 5 albums on Dill's FaceBook, including over 750 photos. Dill admits to missing the camera dearly, saying that none will be able to fully replace it.
Memorial arrangements have not yet been released.
The camera, a Kodak 8 megapixel Easy-Share with 5x optical aspheric lens, died this past Thursday night, April 14th, 2011, in its temporary home of Santander, Spain.
The cause is believed to be theft, but is as of yet, unknown.
In its four month career, this accomplished and celebrated Kodak documented several amazing places and many a night out on the town, reccounting many stories that none would believe actually occured had there not been photos. This camera's lens had seen the likes of Santander, Bilbao, Salamanca, Santillana del Mar, Las Cuevas de Altamira (kind of), Barcelona, Dublin, and Paris. It also had plans to travel to Los Picos, El Soplao, San Vicente, Rome, Pisa, Florence, Venice, and Madrid, and even was going to return to its original home of North Carolina. However, due to Thursday's tragedy, these dreams will, unfortunately, not be realized.
This particular Kodak will be remembered fondly, for its ability to capture the moment at the most spontaneous beck and call, and for its unique attention to the most minute detail.
"My Kodak did any beautiful scene justice," Said previous owner, Sherri Dill last Friday morning. "All my friends were really jealous when they looked at my pictures on FaceBook."
Kodak Easy-Share was manufactured in Japan and made its way to a Staples store in North Carolina, USA in the year 2010. It was purchased by Brian Stewart and then made its way to the intended owner, Sherri Dill, on Christmas Day, December 25th, 2010. The camera earned its own 5 albums on Dill's FaceBook, including over 750 photos. Dill admits to missing the camera dearly, saying that none will be able to fully replace it.
Memorial arrangements have not yet been released.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Just because I haven't been in Santander in a month, I'm going to dedicate a whole entry to this weekend.
This past weekend was the 2nd to last one that I will spend in Santander. Because of this, I rationalized going out on Thursday night, in spite of having class at 9am on Friday morning.
I met up with a friend at the Chupiteria to start the night. We drank tequila to pass the time, and I couldn't help but feel that roles were reversed, as we drank tequila while waiting for the men to get ready and meet us there. We took 3 shots each and then left to go find the guys because they were taking too long. When we met up with them, we all headed over to a place called Rio De La Pila, which is a street that I walk everyday to go to school. It's really close to my apartment, and I had been there once before to hang out with a friend, but had never been there late at night or on the weekend. By the way, Thursday night counts as the weekend here. Anyway, it was a shock because the place was PACKED. Just about every young Spanish person and ERASMUS student was there. Usually people get their drinks and go outside to socialize. I learned this fairly late in the game (as it was my second to last weekend, as I mentioned before), but all the kids go to Rio De La Pila to hang out early in the night (and I use "early" as a relative term, because early here is anywhere from midnight to 2am) and then move toward my side of town, where all the heavy drinking and/or dancing goes on. That's just a coincidence, by the way...Anyway, that was fun because I got to see a lot of my ERASMUS friends as well as some of my American friends. We bar hopped the night away, and I got home around 5am, and even made it to class the next day.
One thing that was particularly striking to me, and what originally inspired me to write a blog about this weekend was something a friend said to me. As my friends and I were walking the street heading to Rio De La Pila, we ran into another friend of ours who is from Mexico. We stopped to talk to him and he asked me, "¿Adónde van?" Now, this deserves both a bit of context and a tiny grammar lesson. If you speak Spanish or at least know how to conjugate verbs, you can skip the grammar lesson. I took 7 classes over the course of about 5 and a half years in the states learning Spanish. Because Mexico is the closest Spanish speaking country, the American public schools teach you what's called Latin American Spanish, which makes sense. If you're to run into a Spanish speaker, they probably come from a Latin American country. It's really not all that different from Spanish Spanish, but there are notable differences, as I've come to realize. In Spanish (in general), they maintain the difference between a friend and a person of seniority or respect, and conjugate the verbs differently. I'm sure you all know this, especially knowing that "¿Cómo estás?" means "how are you?" when talking to a friend, and "¿Cómo está?" means "how are you?" when talking to an elder. You is "tú" and the formal you is "usted." Now, more to my point, if you're talking to a group of friends, it would be multiple tús, right? That's what we call vosotros. If you're talking to more than one person of respect, you call that "ustedes," because it's just more than one "usted," make sense? But in Latin America, they don't make this distinction. When they're talking to multiple people, no matter if they're friends or professors or what-have-you, they refer to them as "ustedes." However, it must be noted that the conjugation for "ustedes" also functions as "ellos," which means "they." This may sound confusing, but it's easy to understand within context. If you say "Van a Rio De La Pila," this can mean "you all go to Rio De La Pila," OR it can mean "They go to Rio De La Rila," depending on what you want to say. I learned for five years to use ustedes. I never ever EVER used "vosotros." It just isn't done in Latin America. Even my professor for Advanced Spanish Grammar said that he was unable to use vosotros without taking a second to think about it first. And yet, when my Mexican friend looked at me with a group of friends and asked, "¿Adónde van?" I actually looked around and said, "Who?" What's striking is how quickly I fell into Spanish Spanish, and I didn't even realize it. After five years of studying Latin American Spanish, I forgot it in two months. I had expected to hear "¿Adónde váis?" which is the "vosotros" form.
Okay, sorry if that was boring. Just had to get that out.
Side note- The last bar we went to, a place called "Indian," gave me a heart shaped lollipop with my rum and coke!! I love Spain.
Friday night was a little crazier. Actually, I'm pretty sure it was just like every other night. Pre-gaming with the Americans, then separating and bar hopping with our respective ERASMUS friends. Nothing particularly memorable. And if there was and I'm not exactly remembering it at the moment, I will edit this later on.
A lot of my wilder stories came from Saturday, which is truely saying something. I chose not to drink, which was SUCH a good idea. I'm glad I was fully there for all of the insanity. (Side note-I found out the cheapest and easiest way to get hammered, if you're interested. Simply tell all your friends that you're not drinking. I did this and I think about 7 of my friends offered to buy me drinks) We started out at the Chupiteria, doing the usual, which, if you haven't gathered by now, is drinking obscene amounts, because they're 1€ per shot, which is the cheapest you'll find just about anywhere in the world. Qué mala idea, ¿no?
There is another group of Americans from Oregon studying here for a "term." I assume this is kind of like a tri-mester or something, because I didn't care enough to ask when I was actually talking to an Oregonian. Anyway, put all of us Americans in a room together (a room that happens to sell cheap liquor) and what should we do? Take body shots, of course. The Spaniards acted as though they'd seen nothing like it. After terrorizing the poor place, we walked over to Tempo, where the ERASMUS used to hang out. None of us had been there for a long time, and it felt like kinda like home. No, that's a lie. It felt like the beginning of my time in Spain when we all used to go there. I got to see a lot of ERASMUS students that I hadn't seen in weeks while I've been busy jet-setting all around Europe.
A group of us decided to do some bar hopping like always. I had a wonderful time and the night ended at about 4:45. One of my more tamer nights, but let me tell you about the rest of us. Without naming names, of course. By the end of the night, one girl had lost her keys, several had had horrible falls, two guys had gotten in two different fights, and one guy had had the policía called on him. Oh, and I hear that about 3 or 4 never actually made it home. Americans. Can't live with them, can't live...well, let's just leave it at that.
So I can't really ask what I thought about Santander, like I usually ask myself at the end of my entries. I'm sure I've bored you all with my talk about how much I love this city anyway, because every time I go somewhere else, I compare it to Santander. I really only wrote this blog so I could put into writing my thoughts on all of a sudden knowing vosotros.
This is going to end now due to poor planning. Until next time, vosotros :)
"El mundo es un libro y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página."
I met up with a friend at the Chupiteria to start the night. We drank tequila to pass the time, and I couldn't help but feel that roles were reversed, as we drank tequila while waiting for the men to get ready and meet us there. We took 3 shots each and then left to go find the guys because they were taking too long. When we met up with them, we all headed over to a place called Rio De La Pila, which is a street that I walk everyday to go to school. It's really close to my apartment, and I had been there once before to hang out with a friend, but had never been there late at night or on the weekend. By the way, Thursday night counts as the weekend here. Anyway, it was a shock because the place was PACKED. Just about every young Spanish person and ERASMUS student was there. Usually people get their drinks and go outside to socialize. I learned this fairly late in the game (as it was my second to last weekend, as I mentioned before), but all the kids go to Rio De La Pila to hang out early in the night (and I use "early" as a relative term, because early here is anywhere from midnight to 2am) and then move toward my side of town, where all the heavy drinking and/or dancing goes on. That's just a coincidence, by the way...Anyway, that was fun because I got to see a lot of my ERASMUS friends as well as some of my American friends. We bar hopped the night away, and I got home around 5am, and even made it to class the next day.
One thing that was particularly striking to me, and what originally inspired me to write a blog about this weekend was something a friend said to me. As my friends and I were walking the street heading to Rio De La Pila, we ran into another friend of ours who is from Mexico. We stopped to talk to him and he asked me, "¿Adónde van?" Now, this deserves both a bit of context and a tiny grammar lesson. If you speak Spanish or at least know how to conjugate verbs, you can skip the grammar lesson. I took 7 classes over the course of about 5 and a half years in the states learning Spanish. Because Mexico is the closest Spanish speaking country, the American public schools teach you what's called Latin American Spanish, which makes sense. If you're to run into a Spanish speaker, they probably come from a Latin American country. It's really not all that different from Spanish Spanish, but there are notable differences, as I've come to realize. In Spanish (in general), they maintain the difference between a friend and a person of seniority or respect, and conjugate the verbs differently. I'm sure you all know this, especially knowing that "¿Cómo estás?" means "how are you?" when talking to a friend, and "¿Cómo está?" means "how are you?" when talking to an elder. You is "tú" and the formal you is "usted." Now, more to my point, if you're talking to a group of friends, it would be multiple tús, right? That's what we call vosotros. If you're talking to more than one person of respect, you call that "ustedes," because it's just more than one "usted," make sense? But in Latin America, they don't make this distinction. When they're talking to multiple people, no matter if they're friends or professors or what-have-you, they refer to them as "ustedes." However, it must be noted that the conjugation for "ustedes" also functions as "ellos," which means "they." This may sound confusing, but it's easy to understand within context. If you say "Van a Rio De La Pila," this can mean "you all go to Rio De La Pila," OR it can mean "They go to Rio De La Rila," depending on what you want to say. I learned for five years to use ustedes. I never ever EVER used "vosotros." It just isn't done in Latin America. Even my professor for Advanced Spanish Grammar said that he was unable to use vosotros without taking a second to think about it first. And yet, when my Mexican friend looked at me with a group of friends and asked, "¿Adónde van?" I actually looked around and said, "Who?" What's striking is how quickly I fell into Spanish Spanish, and I didn't even realize it. After five years of studying Latin American Spanish, I forgot it in two months. I had expected to hear "¿Adónde váis?" which is the "vosotros" form.
Okay, sorry if that was boring. Just had to get that out.
Side note- The last bar we went to, a place called "Indian," gave me a heart shaped lollipop with my rum and coke!! I love Spain.
Friday night was a little crazier. Actually, I'm pretty sure it was just like every other night. Pre-gaming with the Americans, then separating and bar hopping with our respective ERASMUS friends. Nothing particularly memorable. And if there was and I'm not exactly remembering it at the moment, I will edit this later on.
A lot of my wilder stories came from Saturday, which is truely saying something. I chose not to drink, which was SUCH a good idea. I'm glad I was fully there for all of the insanity. (Side note-I found out the cheapest and easiest way to get hammered, if you're interested. Simply tell all your friends that you're not drinking. I did this and I think about 7 of my friends offered to buy me drinks) We started out at the Chupiteria, doing the usual, which, if you haven't gathered by now, is drinking obscene amounts, because they're 1€ per shot, which is the cheapest you'll find just about anywhere in the world. Qué mala idea, ¿no?
There is another group of Americans from Oregon studying here for a "term." I assume this is kind of like a tri-mester or something, because I didn't care enough to ask when I was actually talking to an Oregonian. Anyway, put all of us Americans in a room together (a room that happens to sell cheap liquor) and what should we do? Take body shots, of course. The Spaniards acted as though they'd seen nothing like it. After terrorizing the poor place, we walked over to Tempo, where the ERASMUS used to hang out. None of us had been there for a long time, and it felt like kinda like home. No, that's a lie. It felt like the beginning of my time in Spain when we all used to go there. I got to see a lot of ERASMUS students that I hadn't seen in weeks while I've been busy jet-setting all around Europe.
A group of us decided to do some bar hopping like always. I had a wonderful time and the night ended at about 4:45. One of my more tamer nights, but let me tell you about the rest of us. Without naming names, of course. By the end of the night, one girl had lost her keys, several had had horrible falls, two guys had gotten in two different fights, and one guy had had the policía called on him. Oh, and I hear that about 3 or 4 never actually made it home. Americans. Can't live with them, can't live...well, let's just leave it at that.
So I can't really ask what I thought about Santander, like I usually ask myself at the end of my entries. I'm sure I've bored you all with my talk about how much I love this city anyway, because every time I go somewhere else, I compare it to Santander. I really only wrote this blog so I could put into writing my thoughts on all of a sudden knowing vosotros.
This is going to end now due to poor planning. Until next time, vosotros :)
"El mundo es un libro y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página."
Friday, April 8, 2011
Viaje a París
Paris was amazing. I really wasn't that excited to go, because I'd already been. I'm not entirely opposed to revisiting beautiful cities, so I went with my friends to Paris, because I think that would be more fun than going to a new place by myself. We had a wildly successful weekend. It was just five of us girls, and we got to see everything we wanted to see. I like traveling with just five or less people, because any more than that and you start to get pulled in a lot of different directions. It's easier to agree and get things done with fewer people.
The first night we got there was Thursday, and we didn't actually get to the hostel until after 10pm, so we just went to bed. But not before getting lost about 100 times. (Travel Tip #15: Before you visit another city, make sure you know where it is you're staying, or at the very least, make sure you have the stupid address.) We only knew the street name where our hostel was located, which happens to have a name that's very similar to another street that's on the other side of the city. Guess which one our taxi driver took us to?
I'll wait.
If you guessed, "the wrong one," you're correct! We walked around, really confused, until we came upon a metro station and stopped to look at a map. I can only imagine what a mess we looked like, because a really nice man with an english accent came up and asked us if we needed help. We told him where we needed to go and he gave us really clear instructions on which train to take, what stop to get off at, and where to go once we did. It was something of a god send, really. We thanked him and he laughed a laugh that says, "crazy americans..."
We got off the metro at the spot he told us to get off at and started walking. He told us to go to the end of the street, and there will be a graveyard on the left, and we turn right at that street and our hostel will be on the left. We walked and walked but began to doubt ourselves when the road kept going and never ended. We stopped to ask an asian girl smoking a cigarette outside a restaurant if she might know where we needed to go. Her directions were crass; she was telling us to go back the way we came and take the metro to some other place. We instead decided to go to a place with internet one street over. We looked up the address and asked the guy working there for directions. He helped us out, but was a little vague. We continued up the street and realized that somehow, we still didn't know where we needed to go. We stopped a couple that was walking along the same street, and luckily they spoke a little bit of english. When the woman realized we wanted directions, she pulled, wouldn't you know it? a GPS out of her purse. Another god send, for sure. She typed in the address and told us to continue the way we'd been going the whole time. Because, you know, the 4th time is the charm.
Finally we made it to the end of the street (which really wasn't that far down; I don't know why we were questioning ouselves) and instead of turning right as we'd been told, we turned left. I don't know why, please don't ask. We continued left and started to get excited to check into the hostel and go to sleep after a long day of traveling and confusion. The address was 2 Square Coulaincourt. We walked and watched the numbers above the doors start in the teens and go down as our anticipation went up. 8, 6, 4; ours was next. Then 2. A big black 2 above a big black door that looked nothing like a hostel. Feeling frustrated, we frantically searched for a street sign (which are extremely elusive here in Europe). Turns out we were on Rue Coulaincourt, not Square Coulaincourt. Why does anyone ever think it's a good idea to recycle street names within the same vicinity? Anyway, an Italian man came up to us (again because we must have looked very sad and lost), and asked us if we spoke Italian, because he wanted to help us. We said no, but he did speak some Spanish, and I was never so relieved to be able to speak Spanish. He told us basically that we should have turned right instead of left. We learned quickly that if there is a choice of ways to go, we will definitely pick the wrong one. Anyway, we finally found our "Square Coulaincourt," which turned out to be the tiniest square I've ever seen. We checked into our hostel and went to bed immediately.
I hope you all learn from my mistakes.
Friday, we went to see the Museum of Orsay, which is an art museum. I liked the photography exhibits, but I'm not all that into impressionism. To each his own . Then we went to see Notre Dame, which was wayyy more crowded than is comfortable, but I am big on cathedrals so I'm always willing to see them. Even ones that I've already seen before. After that we ate lunch and headed toward Champs Elysses, which is pronounced not at all the way it's spelled. In French there are so many crazy pronunciation rules that I can't remember. Basically the French just throw in a bunch of Qs and Xs and Zs and Js and then just arbitrarily choose not to pronounce some Ss and Ns and Ys and vowels, so in the end, nothing is pronounced the way it's spelled. But yeah, Champs Elysses is kind of like the Rodeo drive of Paris. I found a Starbucks and couldn't resist. I know it's kind of American, but I'm addicted to caffeine, okay? And drinking coffee and walking down Champs Elysses in France on a cloudy day? Okay, I thought it was cool. So at the end of the road is the Arc de Triomphe (Which literally means, as I understand it, "Arch of Triumph." Look at me, speaking french and what not), and it's in the middle of a GIANT round about. They do that so you'd have to play some serious Frogger in order to get across and realistically, it's impossible to do so without dying. This way, you have to take the underground tunnel, where they can charge you for a ticket. It wasn't worth it to us because we can always admire it from afar.
On the street corner, there was a small crowd gathered around 4 hot frenchmen dancing, which I suppose is a popular passtime for the young and poor. They find an open place in a high traffic area, set up a speaker, and just dance. Something you don't see everyday.
Then we made our way to the Eiffel Tower (Tour Eiffel in French). The girls were thinking about not going up because there was a long line, but the sun had poked its little head out from behind the clouds, and there really wouldn't be a better time to go up. AND it's really surprisingly cheaper than you'd think. It was 8€ (with the student discount) to go all the way to the top and 5.50€ to go to the second floor. We went all the way to the top and it was amazing, just as I remembered it. It kind of felt like deja vu, because even though I remembered being there before, it still felt kind of unreal.
After coming back down, we made our way back to the hostel, stopping at a small convenience store along the way to buy champagne. I'm not exactly sure why; it just felt right. We spent the night in the hostel and gossiped.
Saturday, we started our day off going to Versailles. The line was forever long, but it was worth it. It was really strange to be in all these monumental places AGAIN. It's like reading a really good book for a second time, because you catch a bunch of new things that you didn't see before. My favorite part was the Hall of Mirrors, as is everyone's I think. Actually, I loved the whole place. Louis XIV was such an arrogant douche. Who demands a bust of himself above EVERY fireplace? Who thinks that EVERY room requires a larger-than-life-size portrait of himself? Who lines his halls with statues of important people, and not only includes himself, but makes his statue the biggest one?? Louis XIV, that's who.
After Versaille, which took the better part of the afternoon, we were starving, but poor. We went to get Kebabs, which I'm sure I've mentioned before, but I really don't remember. The cookout of the European world? Maybe? America is missing out. Add that to the list of things I need to bring back to the states. Kebabs are heaven in pita bread. Anyway, after that, we went to Sacre Coeur, another really famous church in Paris. It's on top of this GIANT hill, which I climbed all the way up last time. But our hostel was located about 3/4 of the way up the hill already, so I didn't have to do much climbing this time around. I got all the joys of the amazing view without any of the panting and sweating and burning thigh muscles. There's also this really busy square outside where artists come to paint the scenery. It's really cool to watch them at work. How poetic is that? Painting in the square outside Sacre Couer.
Though it was beautiful, it was a little bit more touristy than Notre Dame. I mean, don't they think that maybe, just maybe, a GIFT SHOP in a CHURCH kind of robs it of its original beauty, or is that just my opinion? We did get to see the procession of the nuns to the sanctuary. And then they sung! It was really cool. How many people do you know who have heard the nuns sing in the Sacre Coeur? Then we went outside, and wouldn't you know it? More shirtless sexy French men dancing! I couldn't really see, because I am short and there was a large crowd, but I could hear them. And what do you know, hearing dancing is not as exciting as seeing it. Some people shifted and I snuck into the gap before anyone else could and watched them/appreciated their physical perfection before asking myself, "What do the nuns think about this?"
After that, we slowly made our way away from the crowded area of town, meandering through the streets and looking for the Moulin Rouge. Finally, we found it (lucky our hostel was close to a lot of cool stuff). It was cool to see it in person, but disappointing that a show cost 92€, or about $130. I just did not have that kind of money, as I'd only brought 275€ with me, and the hostel alone cost 120€. So yeah, we stood in the street and fantasized about all the scantily clad french sex goddesses inside, took pictures with the windmill, and left. We went back to the store we'd gone to the previous night, and bought more cheap wine. The funny thing is, we're all so used to buying boxed (shameful...) wine at 98 céntimos, that buying a 3.50€ bottle felt downright classy. All the while, the store owner was shaking his head and laughing, probably thinking, "crazy americans." If I had a nickel...
Then we went back to the hostel and had girl talk. The wine ran out remarkably fast, and we decided to go out for more, because, what else can you do? On our way back to the hostel, bottles in hand, we decided on an impulse to stop and get sushi at a place down the street. Candace and I went back to the hostel to get money and put the wine down while the others went in to order. We came back and ordered a metric shit ton of sushi, paid for it, and left.
When we got back to the hostel, the food lasted about five or six minutes. Then we drank more wine, talked more girl talk, and listened to old school 90s/early 2000s pop music. No better way to spend the night.
Sunday I woke up with a horrible wine headache. But I popped a couple advil, ate a croissant and I was golden. The only thing left on our To Do list was to go see the Louvre. (Travel Tip#16: If you go to Paris, make sure you leave at the very least a whole day for the Louvre. You'll need it. The line is insanely long, and the museum is insanely big.) (Aside...When did the United States decide that the "Louvre" was a monosyllabic name? Did we just forget about that R or something?) We were reserving it for Sunday because it's free on Sundays, but that also means gigantic-est line of my entire life. It wound all the way around the pyramid, along the front building, through the following square, and out and down the street behind the entire museum. It took us nearly 2 hours to finally get inside, but it was, of course, worth it ("worth it" in spanish="vale la pena"). Since there were five of us, we knew that we were going to get separated, so we set aside a time and a place to meet up. Info desk at 3. I looked at Victory and Aphrodite and Mona lisa, and I was making my way to the Egyptian exhibit when I realized it was 2:45. I made it to the information desk just in time. I met with my friends; two of us had already eaten, so the other three of us went to eat lunch. I know that a 3 o'clock lunch sounds really late, but that's actually right on time for us Españolas. After that we dispersed for more art appreciation. I went to see more of the Egyptian stuff, because I didn't get through it all before meeting the rest of the group. It was definitely my favorite part, mostly because it's really unlike anything I've ever seen before. I mean, I've seen it in a lot of shit movies like The Mummy, but to see the real thing was infinitely cooler. Their paintings were shit, but their sculptures were increíble. I'm amazed at the things they were able to do, and on such a wide range of scales. How did they sculpt such detailed artwork on such a small piece of material? Also, I would walk around and admire the bah relief works and the hyrogliphs, but then I thought about something I'd never really thought about before. I thought about the person who made it. I know it sounds like something you would intuitively consider, but when seeing a work in a temperature controlled glass box, it's easy to separate it from its creator. I wonder what he would think if he knew that what he was making would someday, thousands of years later, make it it into a museum where thousands of people would look at it every day, and probably never think a second thought about it.
I've been thinking about this a lot recently. I'm no artist, but I have drawn and painted and sculpted before. I mean, my pieces were absolute garbage, but I still know the time and effort and even emotion that you put into your artwork. In the end, you've put a little bit of yourself into it. So I can't imagine what it's like to make a giant life size sculpture of someone out of marble, like those that line the halls of Versailles and the outside walls of the Louvre. Who were these people? What did they do to deserve a statue of themselves in such a place of respect? How much of himself did the artist put into a particular work? And we just walk right past them. Food for thought.
The museum was closed at six, so I went to meet everyone out front. After we left, we found a random bakery because we felt like the French thing to do was to eat macaroons. Even though they're just about everywhere in the world. Anyway, they were delicious, and after that we went to wander around the city. We'd eaten fairly cheaply over the course of our french weekend, and a few of the girls really wanted an authentic French dinner, at an actual restaurant. An "authentic" French dinner usually consists of 4 or 5 courses. You have a starter and a wine, then your main course, then some kind of cheese and bread, then a dessert or liquor. I've heard that they're not big into entertainment, so what do they do for fun? you might be asking yourself. They go out to eat. For hours. And hours. And I loved every second of it. AND I ate snail!! It tasted good, but I just couldn't get over the fact that I had...a SNAIL in my mouth. At first, I was totally opposed to trying it, but I asked myself how often I'm able to try escargot in Paris. Yes, I liked the taste, but I just couldn't help but be reminded of the snails I've seen sticking to the inside walls of the tunel puerto chico, which is dirtier than a truckstop restroom, and think "one of those is in my mouth right now." But I ate it, and that's the important thing. I also tried foie gras, or duck liver. It was a little funky, but again, I tried it. It was somehow a little easier to stomach because it wasn't as recognizable as the escargot, which still had their shells. That felt so wrong. Pulling a little innocent snail right out of his home just so I can eat him. Poor little guy never had a chance.
So yes, we arrived at the restaurant at about 7:30 and left close to 10:30, like true Parisians. Then we made our way over to the Eiffel Tower, because the only thing I really wanted to do on the whole trip was to go up in the Eiffel Tower at night to see the whole city lit up from above. And we got there at 11:18. Guess what time they stopped selling tickets. If you guessed 11, you're right. Oh well. Disappointing, but I'm trying to be a good sport about everything. If there's anything I don't get to do, I just tell myself that it's a reason to come back. I still got to see the Eiffel Tower itself lit up at night, which is something I hadn't seen before. I also got some good pictures, which can be seen on facebook.
We went to the hostel and took a shot of Sake, which we had left over from the night before when we got sushi, and went to bed.
Monday was a really, really long day. We checked out of the hostel at about 9:30, walked to the metro, took the metro to the bus station, took the (hour long) bus to the airport, then hopped on a plane to Madrid, waited in Madrid, then took a (30 minute-talk about "hopper flight"-) flight back to Santander, took another bus from the airport to the bus station, then walked home. I got home and talked to my señora for about 5 minutes about my trip and told her I was going to take a late siesta before eating dinner, but I ended up never waking up. I woke up at 1:30ish, and just set my alarm for the morning and went back to sleep. She laughed at me this morning because she knew I had grand plans of showering and unpacking and studying, when I really just fell asleep. But I think I had reason enough to be tired.
Definitely a good weekend. Probably my favorite viaje out of all of them.
Time for my final thought. What did I think of Paris (this time around)? I was pleasantly surprised. I didn't try to keep it a secret that I wasn't all that excited about going, but I had a really good time. The city is absolutely gorgeous. It's very romantic somehow. Everything is infinitely more poetic in Paris. Even though the touristy aspects would annoy me, I think that if I had chosen to persue French instead of Spanish, I would have loved to study for three months in Paris. I'm glad Paris didn't turn out like I thought it would. I'm sorry, Paris; I don't know why I doubted you. I'll see you soon hopefully.
Over and out.
"El mundo es un libro y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página."
The first night we got there was Thursday, and we didn't actually get to the hostel until after 10pm, so we just went to bed. But not before getting lost about 100 times. (Travel Tip #15: Before you visit another city, make sure you know where it is you're staying, or at the very least, make sure you have the stupid address.) We only knew the street name where our hostel was located, which happens to have a name that's very similar to another street that's on the other side of the city. Guess which one our taxi driver took us to?
I'll wait.
If you guessed, "the wrong one," you're correct! We walked around, really confused, until we came upon a metro station and stopped to look at a map. I can only imagine what a mess we looked like, because a really nice man with an english accent came up and asked us if we needed help. We told him where we needed to go and he gave us really clear instructions on which train to take, what stop to get off at, and where to go once we did. It was something of a god send, really. We thanked him and he laughed a laugh that says, "crazy americans..."
We got off the metro at the spot he told us to get off at and started walking. He told us to go to the end of the street, and there will be a graveyard on the left, and we turn right at that street and our hostel will be on the left. We walked and walked but began to doubt ourselves when the road kept going and never ended. We stopped to ask an asian girl smoking a cigarette outside a restaurant if she might know where we needed to go. Her directions were crass; she was telling us to go back the way we came and take the metro to some other place. We instead decided to go to a place with internet one street over. We looked up the address and asked the guy working there for directions. He helped us out, but was a little vague. We continued up the street and realized that somehow, we still didn't know where we needed to go. We stopped a couple that was walking along the same street, and luckily they spoke a little bit of english. When the woman realized we wanted directions, she pulled, wouldn't you know it? a GPS out of her purse. Another god send, for sure. She typed in the address and told us to continue the way we'd been going the whole time. Because, you know, the 4th time is the charm.
Finally we made it to the end of the street (which really wasn't that far down; I don't know why we were questioning ouselves) and instead of turning right as we'd been told, we turned left. I don't know why, please don't ask. We continued left and started to get excited to check into the hostel and go to sleep after a long day of traveling and confusion. The address was 2 Square Coulaincourt. We walked and watched the numbers above the doors start in the teens and go down as our anticipation went up. 8, 6, 4; ours was next. Then 2. A big black 2 above a big black door that looked nothing like a hostel. Feeling frustrated, we frantically searched for a street sign (which are extremely elusive here in Europe). Turns out we were on Rue Coulaincourt, not Square Coulaincourt. Why does anyone ever think it's a good idea to recycle street names within the same vicinity? Anyway, an Italian man came up to us (again because we must have looked very sad and lost), and asked us if we spoke Italian, because he wanted to help us. We said no, but he did speak some Spanish, and I was never so relieved to be able to speak Spanish. He told us basically that we should have turned right instead of left. We learned quickly that if there is a choice of ways to go, we will definitely pick the wrong one. Anyway, we finally found our "Square Coulaincourt," which turned out to be the tiniest square I've ever seen. We checked into our hostel and went to bed immediately.
I hope you all learn from my mistakes.
Friday, we went to see the Museum of Orsay, which is an art museum. I liked the photography exhibits, but I'm not all that into impressionism. To each his own . Then we went to see Notre Dame, which was wayyy more crowded than is comfortable, but I am big on cathedrals so I'm always willing to see them. Even ones that I've already seen before. After that we ate lunch and headed toward Champs Elysses, which is pronounced not at all the way it's spelled. In French there are so many crazy pronunciation rules that I can't remember. Basically the French just throw in a bunch of Qs and Xs and Zs and Js and then just arbitrarily choose not to pronounce some Ss and Ns and Ys and vowels, so in the end, nothing is pronounced the way it's spelled. But yeah, Champs Elysses is kind of like the Rodeo drive of Paris. I found a Starbucks and couldn't resist. I know it's kind of American, but I'm addicted to caffeine, okay? And drinking coffee and walking down Champs Elysses in France on a cloudy day? Okay, I thought it was cool. So at the end of the road is the Arc de Triomphe (Which literally means, as I understand it, "Arch of Triumph." Look at me, speaking french and what not), and it's in the middle of a GIANT round about. They do that so you'd have to play some serious Frogger in order to get across and realistically, it's impossible to do so without dying. This way, you have to take the underground tunnel, where they can charge you for a ticket. It wasn't worth it to us because we can always admire it from afar.
On the street corner, there was a small crowd gathered around 4 hot frenchmen dancing, which I suppose is a popular passtime for the young and poor. They find an open place in a high traffic area, set up a speaker, and just dance. Something you don't see everyday.
Then we made our way to the Eiffel Tower (Tour Eiffel in French). The girls were thinking about not going up because there was a long line, but the sun had poked its little head out from behind the clouds, and there really wouldn't be a better time to go up. AND it's really surprisingly cheaper than you'd think. It was 8€ (with the student discount) to go all the way to the top and 5.50€ to go to the second floor. We went all the way to the top and it was amazing, just as I remembered it. It kind of felt like deja vu, because even though I remembered being there before, it still felt kind of unreal.
After coming back down, we made our way back to the hostel, stopping at a small convenience store along the way to buy champagne. I'm not exactly sure why; it just felt right. We spent the night in the hostel and gossiped.
Saturday, we started our day off going to Versailles. The line was forever long, but it was worth it. It was really strange to be in all these monumental places AGAIN. It's like reading a really good book for a second time, because you catch a bunch of new things that you didn't see before. My favorite part was the Hall of Mirrors, as is everyone's I think. Actually, I loved the whole place. Louis XIV was such an arrogant douche. Who demands a bust of himself above EVERY fireplace? Who thinks that EVERY room requires a larger-than-life-size portrait of himself? Who lines his halls with statues of important people, and not only includes himself, but makes his statue the biggest one?? Louis XIV, that's who.
After Versaille, which took the better part of the afternoon, we were starving, but poor. We went to get Kebabs, which I'm sure I've mentioned before, but I really don't remember. The cookout of the European world? Maybe? America is missing out. Add that to the list of things I need to bring back to the states. Kebabs are heaven in pita bread. Anyway, after that, we went to Sacre Coeur, another really famous church in Paris. It's on top of this GIANT hill, which I climbed all the way up last time. But our hostel was located about 3/4 of the way up the hill already, so I didn't have to do much climbing this time around. I got all the joys of the amazing view without any of the panting and sweating and burning thigh muscles. There's also this really busy square outside where artists come to paint the scenery. It's really cool to watch them at work. How poetic is that? Painting in the square outside Sacre Couer.
Though it was beautiful, it was a little bit more touristy than Notre Dame. I mean, don't they think that maybe, just maybe, a GIFT SHOP in a CHURCH kind of robs it of its original beauty, or is that just my opinion? We did get to see the procession of the nuns to the sanctuary. And then they sung! It was really cool. How many people do you know who have heard the nuns sing in the Sacre Coeur? Then we went outside, and wouldn't you know it? More shirtless sexy French men dancing! I couldn't really see, because I am short and there was a large crowd, but I could hear them. And what do you know, hearing dancing is not as exciting as seeing it. Some people shifted and I snuck into the gap before anyone else could and watched them/appreciated their physical perfection before asking myself, "What do the nuns think about this?"
After that, we slowly made our way away from the crowded area of town, meandering through the streets and looking for the Moulin Rouge. Finally, we found it (lucky our hostel was close to a lot of cool stuff). It was cool to see it in person, but disappointing that a show cost 92€, or about $130. I just did not have that kind of money, as I'd only brought 275€ with me, and the hostel alone cost 120€. So yeah, we stood in the street and fantasized about all the scantily clad french sex goddesses inside, took pictures with the windmill, and left. We went back to the store we'd gone to the previous night, and bought more cheap wine. The funny thing is, we're all so used to buying boxed (shameful...) wine at 98 céntimos, that buying a 3.50€ bottle felt downright classy. All the while, the store owner was shaking his head and laughing, probably thinking, "crazy americans." If I had a nickel...
Then we went back to the hostel and had girl talk. The wine ran out remarkably fast, and we decided to go out for more, because, what else can you do? On our way back to the hostel, bottles in hand, we decided on an impulse to stop and get sushi at a place down the street. Candace and I went back to the hostel to get money and put the wine down while the others went in to order. We came back and ordered a metric shit ton of sushi, paid for it, and left.
When we got back to the hostel, the food lasted about five or six minutes. Then we drank more wine, talked more girl talk, and listened to old school 90s/early 2000s pop music. No better way to spend the night.
Sunday I woke up with a horrible wine headache. But I popped a couple advil, ate a croissant and I was golden. The only thing left on our To Do list was to go see the Louvre. (Travel Tip#16: If you go to Paris, make sure you leave at the very least a whole day for the Louvre. You'll need it. The line is insanely long, and the museum is insanely big.) (Aside...When did the United States decide that the "Louvre" was a monosyllabic name? Did we just forget about that R or something?) We were reserving it for Sunday because it's free on Sundays, but that also means gigantic-est line of my entire life. It wound all the way around the pyramid, along the front building, through the following square, and out and down the street behind the entire museum. It took us nearly 2 hours to finally get inside, but it was, of course, worth it ("worth it" in spanish="vale la pena"). Since there were five of us, we knew that we were going to get separated, so we set aside a time and a place to meet up. Info desk at 3. I looked at Victory and Aphrodite and Mona lisa, and I was making my way to the Egyptian exhibit when I realized it was 2:45. I made it to the information desk just in time. I met with my friends; two of us had already eaten, so the other three of us went to eat lunch. I know that a 3 o'clock lunch sounds really late, but that's actually right on time for us Españolas. After that we dispersed for more art appreciation. I went to see more of the Egyptian stuff, because I didn't get through it all before meeting the rest of the group. It was definitely my favorite part, mostly because it's really unlike anything I've ever seen before. I mean, I've seen it in a lot of shit movies like The Mummy, but to see the real thing was infinitely cooler. Their paintings were shit, but their sculptures were increíble. I'm amazed at the things they were able to do, and on such a wide range of scales. How did they sculpt such detailed artwork on such a small piece of material? Also, I would walk around and admire the bah relief works and the hyrogliphs, but then I thought about something I'd never really thought about before. I thought about the person who made it. I know it sounds like something you would intuitively consider, but when seeing a work in a temperature controlled glass box, it's easy to separate it from its creator. I wonder what he would think if he knew that what he was making would someday, thousands of years later, make it it into a museum where thousands of people would look at it every day, and probably never think a second thought about it.
I've been thinking about this a lot recently. I'm no artist, but I have drawn and painted and sculpted before. I mean, my pieces were absolute garbage, but I still know the time and effort and even emotion that you put into your artwork. In the end, you've put a little bit of yourself into it. So I can't imagine what it's like to make a giant life size sculpture of someone out of marble, like those that line the halls of Versailles and the outside walls of the Louvre. Who were these people? What did they do to deserve a statue of themselves in such a place of respect? How much of himself did the artist put into a particular work? And we just walk right past them. Food for thought.
The museum was closed at six, so I went to meet everyone out front. After we left, we found a random bakery because we felt like the French thing to do was to eat macaroons. Even though they're just about everywhere in the world. Anyway, they were delicious, and after that we went to wander around the city. We'd eaten fairly cheaply over the course of our french weekend, and a few of the girls really wanted an authentic French dinner, at an actual restaurant. An "authentic" French dinner usually consists of 4 or 5 courses. You have a starter and a wine, then your main course, then some kind of cheese and bread, then a dessert or liquor. I've heard that they're not big into entertainment, so what do they do for fun? you might be asking yourself. They go out to eat. For hours. And hours. And I loved every second of it. AND I ate snail!! It tasted good, but I just couldn't get over the fact that I had...a SNAIL in my mouth. At first, I was totally opposed to trying it, but I asked myself how often I'm able to try escargot in Paris. Yes, I liked the taste, but I just couldn't help but be reminded of the snails I've seen sticking to the inside walls of the tunel puerto chico, which is dirtier than a truckstop restroom, and think "one of those is in my mouth right now." But I ate it, and that's the important thing. I also tried foie gras, or duck liver. It was a little funky, but again, I tried it. It was somehow a little easier to stomach because it wasn't as recognizable as the escargot, which still had their shells. That felt so wrong. Pulling a little innocent snail right out of his home just so I can eat him. Poor little guy never had a chance.
So yes, we arrived at the restaurant at about 7:30 and left close to 10:30, like true Parisians. Then we made our way over to the Eiffel Tower, because the only thing I really wanted to do on the whole trip was to go up in the Eiffel Tower at night to see the whole city lit up from above. And we got there at 11:18. Guess what time they stopped selling tickets. If you guessed 11, you're right. Oh well. Disappointing, but I'm trying to be a good sport about everything. If there's anything I don't get to do, I just tell myself that it's a reason to come back. I still got to see the Eiffel Tower itself lit up at night, which is something I hadn't seen before. I also got some good pictures, which can be seen on facebook.
We went to the hostel and took a shot of Sake, which we had left over from the night before when we got sushi, and went to bed.
Monday was a really, really long day. We checked out of the hostel at about 9:30, walked to the metro, took the metro to the bus station, took the (hour long) bus to the airport, then hopped on a plane to Madrid, waited in Madrid, then took a (30 minute-talk about "hopper flight"-) flight back to Santander, took another bus from the airport to the bus station, then walked home. I got home and talked to my señora for about 5 minutes about my trip and told her I was going to take a late siesta before eating dinner, but I ended up never waking up. I woke up at 1:30ish, and just set my alarm for the morning and went back to sleep. She laughed at me this morning because she knew I had grand plans of showering and unpacking and studying, when I really just fell asleep. But I think I had reason enough to be tired.
Definitely a good weekend. Probably my favorite viaje out of all of them.
Time for my final thought. What did I think of Paris (this time around)? I was pleasantly surprised. I didn't try to keep it a secret that I wasn't all that excited about going, but I had a really good time. The city is absolutely gorgeous. It's very romantic somehow. Everything is infinitely more poetic in Paris. Even though the touristy aspects would annoy me, I think that if I had chosen to persue French instead of Spanish, I would have loved to study for three months in Paris. I'm glad Paris didn't turn out like I thought it would. I'm sorry, Paris; I don't know why I doubted you. I'll see you soon hopefully.
Over and out.
"El mundo es un libro y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página."
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
SALAMANCA
The weekend after Dublin was our class trip to Salamanca. We left on Thursday morning, met in Palacio de Festivales and took a five hour bus ride to the city. We had lunch in the hotel, then had a short walking tour of the vicinity. We were staying right in the center of the city, and really the purpose of the tour was just to get our barings for when we went off on our own. We saw the Plaza Mayor, which was built at the end of the Gothic movement and at the beginning of whatever movement came next. We took some pictures, then headed back to the hotel.
After we met for dinner, the group of us Americans all got ready to go out, which meant all the Spaniards ran and hid. And just so you know;
Travel Tip #14
In Spain, and most parts of Europe, you can and will get kicked out for noise. If you're pregaming (or pre-drinking as the Europeans call it) in the hotel, don't get loud, becuase you could find yourself on the streets.
I usually don't like to explain my travel tips, because I think the mystery of it caters to the humor, but I will explain this one: I speak not from experience; this is just what I heard. No one got kicked out, which is lucky, because I'm pretty sure we were damn close.
We did some bar hopping even though night life is a tad more expensive in Salamanca than it is in Santander. I think this is because it's more of a university town than Santander. The streets were crowded like you wouldn't believe with Spanish college students.
The night ended a bit early because one of my friends got sick and I took care of her, but let me say this:
Travel Tip #15
KNOW THE NAME OF THE HOTEL OR HOSTEL YOU ARE STAYING IN. OR AT THE VERY LEAST, KNOW THE NAME OF THE STREET. And if you aren't going to memorize neither the name of your hotel nor the name of the street it is on, at least make sure you have some credit on your phone so that you can call someone who does know this information. Seriously. Your worst nightmares will be realized. Bad things will happen to good people; I beg you, learn the name of your hotel.
Friday we woke up fairly early and ate breakfast in the hotel. We took tours of Catedrals Nueva y Vieja (The old and new cathedrals of Salamanca), which were much different than Catedral de Barcelona. I like that, because I'm always afraid they're going to get a bit monotonous. The facade of the New Cathedral broke or burned down or something back in the 1970s, and when they fixed it, they added 2 things; an astronaut and an ice cream cone. I was able to find the atronaut, which you can see a picture of on my facebook, but not the ice cream cone. Then we got to go on the roof, where the two cathedrals connect, which I'm told is the best view of the whole city. I got some great pictures of this as well. (Side note-this is where I discovered my fear of spiral staircases. And raise your hands, who is surprised? No one? Okay. I suppose it's no shock when I'm scared of tight spaces and heights; why would I be perfectly okay when you put them together in a twisting vortex of doom?)
We also got to see La Casa de las Conchas, which was my personal favorite because it's a house covered in shells just like the one on my foot. Which is a bit strange, because Salamanca is in the middle of Spain and no where near the coast. Then we saw a church, which I can't remember the name of, something like "La Iglesia del Puente Romano" or something like that. But anyway, the city was settled by the Romans, and they built this bridge (english for "puente") in the first century. The first century!! I wish I were capable of building something that would last for 2000 years.
Then we went to see El Jardín de Calisto y Melibea. This was coolest, I think, for my compañera Emily and me, because we were most familiar with the story of Calisto and Melibea after having done a project on it together for our literature class. It's basically the Spanish version of Romeo and Juliet. It's a tiny garden, but the main attraction is the well that stands in the middle. Couples from all over come to attach a padlock some part of the well. If I were a romantic, I would so want to come back and attach one myself with a boyfriend. As it is, I am not a romantic, but I still fancy it a cool idea.
After the garden, we had some free time to walk around to get coffee or explore the city or what have you. I bought an "I <3 a="" and="" back="" balance="" br="" espa="" going.="" have="" hostel="" i="" like="" nice="" ola.="" salamanca="" shirt="" siesta-ed="" tee="" the="" then="" think="" to="" true="" turista.="" went="">
Actually, I didn't siesta per se. I really just laid around and watched hours of spanish disney channel. That was probably the best part of the whole trip. I watched Hannah Montana Forever, Suite Life On Deck, and Phineas and Ferb ALL in Spanish. Phineas and Ferb was my favorite, not only because that show is brilliant in English already, but also because they always have at least one song per episode, and it was really cool to listen to them translated into Spanish. Of course, some of the meaning is compromised, but still interesting. Or is that just really lame of me?
Whatever.
That night we went out again. We went to a bar that, if you paid the 3€ entrance fee, you would get complementary beers for 2 hours. And if you paid 6€, you would get complementary mixed drinks. Qué mala idea. Yeah, I'm glad I have good friends that I can trust.
Saturday we went to see la Universidad de Salamanca, which is the oldest functioning university in Spain. The oldest university is actually in Valencia, but it shut down in the 16th century (I think?). According to a legend made up by the students, if you can find the tiny frog within the facade of the main school (the school was divided into the main school and the lesser schools. the main school is where people studied philosophy and religion, which were considered much more important at the time the school was built. so, if you were a math or political science major, you would attend the "lesser" school. Qué interesante) without help, then that meant that you would have good luck on your final exams. If you weren't a student at the time but were still able to find the frog, that meant that you get a wish. So, if you'd like a wish and are bad at finding shooting stars, then there's still Salamanca.
We also got to see La Iglesia de San Esteban, which I think was my favorite. The space is just so grand and overwhelming. By the way, pictures of all this can be found on my facebook.
That night, I borrowed one of my friend's computers and got to skype with my sister and my two little cousins, who are slowly but surely becoming not so little anymore. Then, on a whim, because my boyfriend wasn't answering his phone, I skyped with my dad because 1. I saw that he was online and 2. I hadn't heard his voice in just about 2 months. That was a well appreciated digital family reunion. Then I went down into the lobby to talk to one of my friends and ended up being kidnapped by two of my friends and taken out on the town, even though I had no plans to go out that evening. It was close to 1am, which is about the time the city comes alive. The streets were crowded yet again with Spanish college students. Even though I made good on my promise to myself not to drink, we didn't get back to the hotel until around after 5am. I blame the time change. Here in Spain, they don't "spring forward" until the 27th of March. So after a breif 4 hours of sleep, I was downstairs at 9, ready to hop on the bus back to Santander.
So here's the question you knew I would ask: What did I think of Salamanca? (This is becoming something of a Jerry Springer's final thought, I think) I thought it was really beautiful as well. It was really different looking than Santander. Santander is your typical ugly city. Out of all my trips up to this point, Salamanca was for sure my favorite. I think that if I hadn't chosen Santander, I would have studied in Salamanca. It's about twice the size of Santander, which intimidates me, but it's infinitely more interesting than Santander because it's something like 700 years older than anything in the States. Its only vice is that it's extremely touristy. I could never imagine living there. It would feel like an extended vacation rather than life. So, Santander is still number one in my book. It feels much more real, which I like. I only have 3 months, and I want them to feel as real as they possibly can. My señora told me that this entire weekend was sunny perfect weather the whole time, but as soon as we drove the bus into the city, it began to rain. My friend Keelan said, "Welcome home to hell."
Holy shit, I love this ugly little city.
Until next time,
"El mundo es un libro y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página"
After we met for dinner, the group of us Americans all got ready to go out, which meant all the Spaniards ran and hid. And just so you know;
Travel Tip #14
In Spain, and most parts of Europe, you can and will get kicked out for noise. If you're pregaming (or pre-drinking as the Europeans call it) in the hotel, don't get loud, becuase you could find yourself on the streets.
I usually don't like to explain my travel tips, because I think the mystery of it caters to the humor, but I will explain this one: I speak not from experience; this is just what I heard. No one got kicked out, which is lucky, because I'm pretty sure we were damn close.
We did some bar hopping even though night life is a tad more expensive in Salamanca than it is in Santander. I think this is because it's more of a university town than Santander. The streets were crowded like you wouldn't believe with Spanish college students.
The night ended a bit early because one of my friends got sick and I took care of her, but let me say this:
Travel Tip #15
KNOW THE NAME OF THE HOTEL OR HOSTEL YOU ARE STAYING IN. OR AT THE VERY LEAST, KNOW THE NAME OF THE STREET. And if you aren't going to memorize neither the name of your hotel nor the name of the street it is on, at least make sure you have some credit on your phone so that you can call someone who does know this information. Seriously. Your worst nightmares will be realized. Bad things will happen to good people; I beg you, learn the name of your hotel.
Friday we woke up fairly early and ate breakfast in the hotel. We took tours of Catedrals Nueva y Vieja (The old and new cathedrals of Salamanca), which were much different than Catedral de Barcelona. I like that, because I'm always afraid they're going to get a bit monotonous. The facade of the New Cathedral broke or burned down or something back in the 1970s, and when they fixed it, they added 2 things; an astronaut and an ice cream cone. I was able to find the atronaut, which you can see a picture of on my facebook, but not the ice cream cone. Then we got to go on the roof, where the two cathedrals connect, which I'm told is the best view of the whole city. I got some great pictures of this as well. (Side note-this is where I discovered my fear of spiral staircases. And raise your hands, who is surprised? No one? Okay. I suppose it's no shock when I'm scared of tight spaces and heights; why would I be perfectly okay when you put them together in a twisting vortex of doom?)
We also got to see La Casa de las Conchas, which was my personal favorite because it's a house covered in shells just like the one on my foot. Which is a bit strange, because Salamanca is in the middle of Spain and no where near the coast. Then we saw a church, which I can't remember the name of, something like "La Iglesia del Puente Romano" or something like that. But anyway, the city was settled by the Romans, and they built this bridge (english for "puente") in the first century. The first century!! I wish I were capable of building something that would last for 2000 years.
Then we went to see El Jardín de Calisto y Melibea. This was coolest, I think, for my compañera Emily and me, because we were most familiar with the story of Calisto and Melibea after having done a project on it together for our literature class. It's basically the Spanish version of Romeo and Juliet. It's a tiny garden, but the main attraction is the well that stands in the middle. Couples from all over come to attach a padlock some part of the well. If I were a romantic, I would so want to come back and attach one myself with a boyfriend. As it is, I am not a romantic, but I still fancy it a cool idea.
After the garden, we had some free time to walk around to get coffee or explore the city or what have you. I bought an "I <3 a="" and="" back="" balance="" br="" espa="" going.="" have="" hostel="" i="" like="" nice="" ola.="" salamanca="" shirt="" siesta-ed="" tee="" the="" then="" think="" to="" true="" turista.="" went="">
Actually, I didn't siesta per se. I really just laid around and watched hours of spanish disney channel. That was probably the best part of the whole trip. I watched Hannah Montana Forever, Suite Life On Deck, and Phineas and Ferb ALL in Spanish. Phineas and Ferb was my favorite, not only because that show is brilliant in English already, but also because they always have at least one song per episode, and it was really cool to listen to them translated into Spanish. Of course, some of the meaning is compromised, but still interesting. Or is that just really lame of me?
Whatever.
That night we went out again. We went to a bar that, if you paid the 3€ entrance fee, you would get complementary beers for 2 hours. And if you paid 6€, you would get complementary mixed drinks. Qué mala idea. Yeah, I'm glad I have good friends that I can trust.
Saturday we went to see la Universidad de Salamanca, which is the oldest functioning university in Spain. The oldest university is actually in Valencia, but it shut down in the 16th century (I think?). According to a legend made up by the students, if you can find the tiny frog within the facade of the main school (the school was divided into the main school and the lesser schools. the main school is where people studied philosophy and religion, which were considered much more important at the time the school was built. so, if you were a math or political science major, you would attend the "lesser" school. Qué interesante) without help, then that meant that you would have good luck on your final exams. If you weren't a student at the time but were still able to find the frog, that meant that you get a wish. So, if you'd like a wish and are bad at finding shooting stars, then there's still Salamanca.
We also got to see La Iglesia de San Esteban, which I think was my favorite. The space is just so grand and overwhelming. By the way, pictures of all this can be found on my facebook.
That night, I borrowed one of my friend's computers and got to skype with my sister and my two little cousins, who are slowly but surely becoming not so little anymore. Then, on a whim, because my boyfriend wasn't answering his phone, I skyped with my dad because 1. I saw that he was online and 2. I hadn't heard his voice in just about 2 months. That was a well appreciated digital family reunion. Then I went down into the lobby to talk to one of my friends and ended up being kidnapped by two of my friends and taken out on the town, even though I had no plans to go out that evening. It was close to 1am, which is about the time the city comes alive. The streets were crowded yet again with Spanish college students. Even though I made good on my promise to myself not to drink, we didn't get back to the hotel until around after 5am. I blame the time change. Here in Spain, they don't "spring forward" until the 27th of March. So after a breif 4 hours of sleep, I was downstairs at 9, ready to hop on the bus back to Santander.
So here's the question you knew I would ask: What did I think of Salamanca? (This is becoming something of a Jerry Springer's final thought, I think) I thought it was really beautiful as well. It was really different looking than Santander. Santander is your typical ugly city. Out of all my trips up to this point, Salamanca was for sure my favorite. I think that if I hadn't chosen Santander, I would have studied in Salamanca. It's about twice the size of Santander, which intimidates me, but it's infinitely more interesting than Santander because it's something like 700 years older than anything in the States. Its only vice is that it's extremely touristy. I could never imagine living there. It would feel like an extended vacation rather than life. So, Santander is still number one in my book. It feels much more real, which I like. I only have 3 months, and I want them to feel as real as they possibly can. My señora told me that this entire weekend was sunny perfect weather the whole time, but as soon as we drove the bus into the city, it began to rain. My friend Keelan said, "Welcome home to hell."
Holy shit, I love this ugly little city.
Until next time,
"El mundo es un libro y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página"
Nothing Like St. Patrick´s Day in Dublin
Since it's been over three weeks since my last update, and since so much has happened, I've decided to divide my next update into three entries. It only seems fitting, because I have three trips that I still need to write about. This is for both of our conveniences, you see, because it'll be easier for me to write it in three different entries and hopefully will be easier to keep your interest in three different entries instead of one really super duper long one. So first is Dublin, which was from March 17th to the 20th. Here we go:
If someone ever tells you that they don´t really celebrate St. Patrick´s Day in Ireland, he or she is lying to you. A group of 8 of us skipped class on Thursday (sorry dad) to catch our flight out of Santander at 11am. Ireland is an hour behind, so we gained an hour, and arrived at the Dublin airport at 1pm ish. We made our way to the hotel, paid, and settled into the room. After that our first stop was to a novelty Irish gift shop, so we could find ridiculous green wastes of money to adorn ourselves with. Then we walked along the O´connell street, which I gather is the main street of central Dublin. All of us were immediately having the time of our lives. The streets were insanely crowded (tough break to be a car) with tons and tons of people. We made our way to Temple Bar, which was an area surrounding an actual bar called, you guessed it-Temble Bar. It was the craziest party I´ve ever seen, which really isn´t saying much, because I´ve only seen a handful of parties in my day, and they were all fairly tame. But I assure you, this was probably the biggest party going on in the world on Thursday. And also probably EVER. We met up with one of my sorority sisters, who is studying in Wales this year. Another one of our sisters was visiting her, and she also brought along her Welsh friend. When we retrieved them, we heard somewhere that the drinking age in Ireland was 20, and me and my sister´s Welsh friend began to panic slightly, as we´re both 19. Our friend Shelby walked to the bouncer of our first bar and said "Hi, I´m with that group of people over there, and we all forgot our IDs, can we come in anyway?" And he said, "Yeah, you look old enough." And in we walked. We started the night off early at about 2:30pm with a Guinness, which was the cheapest available pint (I shopped around. By asking the barman, "What is your cheapest pint? I'll have that." I´m so resourceful...) at 5€. Just so you know, the drinking age is actually 18 in Ireland. Good thing I did some research before I left, right?
So I won't bore you with the details, but basically we walked around the insane crowded green party that is Temple Bar and went from bar to bar and drank. I'll try to paint a picture for you. All you can see is green. You can't hear yourself think. You can barely walk for how many people there are. While making our way to another bar, I looked over and saw an early 20s looking man laying on the sidewalk, just vomiting into the street. I had two reactions:
1. Gross.
2. I'm so glad I don't have to clean that up.
St. Patrick's Day.
So yes, our day was much more successful and vomit-free than this stranger I saw on the streets of Dublin. Our night did end extraordinarily early, though. We went for Irish fast food at about 10, and took a cab home at 11. We got back to the hotel before midnight. All I could think was, wow, if we were back home in Santander, I wouldn't have even have left my apartment yet. I suppose when you begin drinking at 2am, midnight is a good time to throw in the towel.
Friday was a long day. It started out promising, as we'd all bought tickets to a 2 day hop-on, hop-off bus tour of Dublin. It's a line of buses that run constantly from early in the morning to about 6, and they stop at 24 popular tourist spots. You can get off at any point, and go to any bus stop and get back on. It's a pretty good deal, too. I recommend it if you're ever in the Dublin area. http://www.dublinsightseeing.ie/ It's only 11€ if you're a student and you buy tickets online (if you're wondering, that's my Travel Tip #14). Anyway, we started out at stop #1, and our tour guide was really funny, so we decided to stay on the bus for the entire circle of the city, just to get acquainted and decide where it was we wanted to go. After one full go around, which took about an hour and a half, we made our way back around to stop number 3, or 4, I can't remember because it was like 2 weeks ago and I need to stop procrastinating writing these blogs. This stop was Trinity College, which is the oldest college in Ireland. It's consistently rated as Ireland's number 1 college, and is rated 40somethingth worldwide. Also, it was founded by Queen Elizabeth I. It's really beautiful, and I admit that it would be cool to go there and all but, I get annoyed when I see high schoolers touring UNCW. There's no way I'd be able to handle the hundreds of tourists coming to see my school just for the novelty of it. How do you focus with all those people clouding up your mind?
After the college, we all went to get something to eat and to sit down and plan the rest of our day. We did some shopping and then made our way to the Guinness Storehouse. I'm really not a huge fan of Guinness, but when in Ireland, drink like the Irish do. We got our student discount (kinda ironic to get a student discount to enter a brewery, but then again, maybe not that ironic) and went in. Everyone gets a complimentary pint of Guinness. You have three options: go to the fifth floor bar and get your pint, go to the seventh floor gravity bar, from which you can see the entirety of Dublin, or go to the fourth floor, where they teach you the "right" way to pour a pint of Guinness. And then you get feel the pride of a job well done by drinking the very pint that you labored over and poured yourself. Guess which one I picked? The fourth floor, of course! I'm an american, I want to work for my pint. I don't want it just handed to me. That was a cool experience, though. They even gave me a certificate to prove that I am, in fact, a certified pourer. After that, we walked aimlessly through the other 6 floors of the storehouse. Actually, let me amend that statement: the other 5 floors. There actually isn't a sixth floor. The seventh floor is made up of only the gravity bar, which gets its name from the fact that it's floating rather than resting on the sixth floor, make sense? Kinda cool, no?
Also, when you first walk in, the central structure of the building is made of glass and is shaped like a pint glass. They seriously love their Guinness, don't they? They told us how many pints it would take to fill, and I think it was somewhere around 28 million. Then our tour guide said that that's how many pints are sold in Ireland per week. Then he added, "But this week, that's how many pints are sold per day."
St. Patrick's day.
The rest of the day was uneventful. We ate dinner and made our way back to the hotel, in hopes of getting up early the next day to get some more sight seeing done.
We did succeed in getting an early start on Saturday, though as soon as the cab dropped us off in the center, one of our number realized she didn't have her bus pass. This weekend was one mishap after another. Luckily we all like each other. The group I was with was the poor group, so while 3 of our group went to see stuff you had to pay for, we went to see all the free stuff, which happened to also be all the stuff that was shit. The first was Pheonix park, which was, admittedly, beautiful. Despite the winter months that preceeded, it was a vibrant green. There we met with our sister Jordan and her Welsh friend Jack.
Next was the National Museum of Ireland. It was kind of boring, admittedly, but I tried to be a good sport about it all. I mean, jeez, Ireland, we get it. That whole "luck of the Irish" thing was just a facade. It was like they wanted to avoid telling about all the misfortune in their past, so they just filled the museum with random things that you'd never go to a museum to see. For example, fashion on the 19th and 20th centuries. Then later, examples of the way a typical Irish bedroom or living room might look in the 1900s, 1910s, 1920s, and so forth. And then they exagerrated their involvement in the American Civil War, especially in the north (probably to win points, no?). Why do you need an entire floor of a museum dedicated to this? Even I could tell you about the Irish involvement in our Civil War. In fact, I can sum it up for you in one sentence: There were some legalized Irish aliens and some naturalized Irish immigrants living in the states at the time and they were drafted to fight. Some of them felt passionately enough about it to enlist themselves. Oh, wait. That was two sentences. You win this time, National Museum of Ireland.
After that, we went to the Irish Museum of Modern Art. I hate modern art; I think it's a waste of materials, money, time, capital, and energy to take a large canvas and paint it entirely black, save a 2cm by 2cm square in the bottom left corner (yes this was an actual piece that I saw). I value much more a person's ability to recreate actual, recognizable images, but that's just me. I won't be judgemental. Anyway, I found myself a nice room and read a book until one of my friends came to get me. When we were done at the Modern Art museum, we went to a crowded bar called Flannigan's or something Irish like that to watch the Rugby game.
The game was Ireland versus England, so it was really exciting to get to watch it in Ireland. And, as an added bonus, we got to watch Ireland win. This was especially exciting because this meant Ireland prevented England from winning some kind of title (forgive me; I'm new to this rugby thing). So after watching my first game of rugby, I have another thing to add to my list of things to bring back to the states. Where did we deviate from rugby and create American football, which is really just a shit version of rugby? Seriously, United States, get it together.
Sabrina, Abi, and I really wanted to get over to St. Patrick's cathedral and Christ Church Cathedral to take pictures before we lost the sun (it was about 5pm at this point) and before the buses stopped running. So we left during the game and made our way over to the churchs. They were really stunning and I got a couple pictures, but it was really just because I felt like it was important to at least make it to St. Patrick's Cathedral while you're in Dublin. That's not something you can see anywhere you go. After my few photos, we went to a place down the street that the cab driver had suggested. Apparently it's super famous. They have a list of the celebrities that have eaten there outside on the wall. It was a lot of food, but hey, I ate fish and chips in Dublin next to Saint Patrick's Cathedral. It wasn't on my bucket list exactly, but still cool all the same.
We got back to the bar to watch Ireland win, which was just about the most insanity I've seen in a single room in my whole life. After the game, Sabrina and I were getting tired and didn't feel like staying at the bar for the next game, which was between Wales and some other country I don't remember, so we met up with Shelby, Danielle, and Kelsie, who had all gone an another tour the rest of us couldn't afford. We met them in the center and caught a taxi back to the hotel. We spent a couple hours in the room having girl talk, and then went down to the bar for a night cap. I had an Irish coffee, which was suggested to me by my boss (Thanks, Mark!) a while back. It wasn't as good as I was expecting. I like whiskey, and I like coffee, but it's kind of like how I enjoy the taste of lasagna and the taste of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, but I certainly don't like them together. Then we called it an early night.
The next morning we had to wake up at 4am in order to catch the bus in order to make it to the airport in order to get our plane in time. It makes me feel so adult to do things like this by myself.
So what did I think of Dublin? It was beautiful. I didn't miss Santander as much, but I think that was just because I had already gone to Barcelona and learned what it was like to be away from your home away from home. It's kind of like when you go to school for the first time. It's really scary and you don't know what to expect and all you really want to do is go home, but then you get used to it and it's not so bad. (Until you get to college and you have to drag your ass out of bed at 7 in the morning to make it to quantitative methods and statistical analysis for business and economics, but that's a different story). So yes, Dublin was beautiful. There was a lot to see. I had a lot of fun Thursday, but I didn't particularly enjoy the rest of the weekend. Understand, I think this was mostly circumstantial. I don't blame the city for my bad time. I wish I could have somehow teleported to Santander during the night on Thursday and woken up in my bed on Friday morning. I missed class Thursday, and two day trips over the weekend, one of which I had to write a paper for in order to make it up. I feel a lot of what I did was purely for the novelty of having said that I did it. Yes, I drank a Guinness in Dublin on St. Patrick's day, but was that an even trade? I suppose I'll never know. It's best not to dwell on what could have been, especially one single weekend of my life. The important thing is that I had fun in Dublin. Don't misunderstand me; it's not that I regret my decision to go to Dublin (which, ask anyone of my friends, was a difficult one), it's just that it was this weekend that I began to realize how little time I have left here. Maybe I should be thinking the opposite way, that I should be taking advantage of all my time here and using it to travel around Europe?
Anyway, next entry will be about my trip to Salamanca! Adios, todos!
"El mundo es un libro, y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página."
If someone ever tells you that they don´t really celebrate St. Patrick´s Day in Ireland, he or she is lying to you. A group of 8 of us skipped class on Thursday (sorry dad) to catch our flight out of Santander at 11am. Ireland is an hour behind, so we gained an hour, and arrived at the Dublin airport at 1pm ish. We made our way to the hotel, paid, and settled into the room. After that our first stop was to a novelty Irish gift shop, so we could find ridiculous green wastes of money to adorn ourselves with. Then we walked along the O´connell street, which I gather is the main street of central Dublin. All of us were immediately having the time of our lives. The streets were insanely crowded (tough break to be a car) with tons and tons of people. We made our way to Temple Bar, which was an area surrounding an actual bar called, you guessed it-Temble Bar. It was the craziest party I´ve ever seen, which really isn´t saying much, because I´ve only seen a handful of parties in my day, and they were all fairly tame. But I assure you, this was probably the biggest party going on in the world on Thursday. And also probably EVER. We met up with one of my sorority sisters, who is studying in Wales this year. Another one of our sisters was visiting her, and she also brought along her Welsh friend. When we retrieved them, we heard somewhere that the drinking age in Ireland was 20, and me and my sister´s Welsh friend began to panic slightly, as we´re both 19. Our friend Shelby walked to the bouncer of our first bar and said "Hi, I´m with that group of people over there, and we all forgot our IDs, can we come in anyway?" And he said, "Yeah, you look old enough." And in we walked. We started the night off early at about 2:30pm with a Guinness, which was the cheapest available pint (I shopped around. By asking the barman, "What is your cheapest pint? I'll have that." I´m so resourceful...) at 5€. Just so you know, the drinking age is actually 18 in Ireland. Good thing I did some research before I left, right?
So I won't bore you with the details, but basically we walked around the insane crowded green party that is Temple Bar and went from bar to bar and drank. I'll try to paint a picture for you. All you can see is green. You can't hear yourself think. You can barely walk for how many people there are. While making our way to another bar, I looked over and saw an early 20s looking man laying on the sidewalk, just vomiting into the street. I had two reactions:
1. Gross.
2. I'm so glad I don't have to clean that up.
St. Patrick's Day.
So yes, our day was much more successful and vomit-free than this stranger I saw on the streets of Dublin. Our night did end extraordinarily early, though. We went for Irish fast food at about 10, and took a cab home at 11. We got back to the hotel before midnight. All I could think was, wow, if we were back home in Santander, I wouldn't have even have left my apartment yet. I suppose when you begin drinking at 2am, midnight is a good time to throw in the towel.
Friday was a long day. It started out promising, as we'd all bought tickets to a 2 day hop-on, hop-off bus tour of Dublin. It's a line of buses that run constantly from early in the morning to about 6, and they stop at 24 popular tourist spots. You can get off at any point, and go to any bus stop and get back on. It's a pretty good deal, too. I recommend it if you're ever in the Dublin area. http://www.dublinsightseeing.ie/ It's only 11€ if you're a student and you buy tickets online (if you're wondering, that's my Travel Tip #14). Anyway, we started out at stop #1, and our tour guide was really funny, so we decided to stay on the bus for the entire circle of the city, just to get acquainted and decide where it was we wanted to go. After one full go around, which took about an hour and a half, we made our way back around to stop number 3, or 4, I can't remember because it was like 2 weeks ago and I need to stop procrastinating writing these blogs. This stop was Trinity College, which is the oldest college in Ireland. It's consistently rated as Ireland's number 1 college, and is rated 40somethingth worldwide. Also, it was founded by Queen Elizabeth I. It's really beautiful, and I admit that it would be cool to go there and all but, I get annoyed when I see high schoolers touring UNCW. There's no way I'd be able to handle the hundreds of tourists coming to see my school just for the novelty of it. How do you focus with all those people clouding up your mind?
After the college, we all went to get something to eat and to sit down and plan the rest of our day. We did some shopping and then made our way to the Guinness Storehouse. I'm really not a huge fan of Guinness, but when in Ireland, drink like the Irish do. We got our student discount (kinda ironic to get a student discount to enter a brewery, but then again, maybe not that ironic) and went in. Everyone gets a complimentary pint of Guinness. You have three options: go to the fifth floor bar and get your pint, go to the seventh floor gravity bar, from which you can see the entirety of Dublin, or go to the fourth floor, where they teach you the "right" way to pour a pint of Guinness. And then you get feel the pride of a job well done by drinking the very pint that you labored over and poured yourself. Guess which one I picked? The fourth floor, of course! I'm an american, I want to work for my pint. I don't want it just handed to me. That was a cool experience, though. They even gave me a certificate to prove that I am, in fact, a certified pourer. After that, we walked aimlessly through the other 6 floors of the storehouse. Actually, let me amend that statement: the other 5 floors. There actually isn't a sixth floor. The seventh floor is made up of only the gravity bar, which gets its name from the fact that it's floating rather than resting on the sixth floor, make sense? Kinda cool, no?
Also, when you first walk in, the central structure of the building is made of glass and is shaped like a pint glass. They seriously love their Guinness, don't they? They told us how many pints it would take to fill, and I think it was somewhere around 28 million. Then our tour guide said that that's how many pints are sold in Ireland per week. Then he added, "But this week, that's how many pints are sold per day."
St. Patrick's day.
The rest of the day was uneventful. We ate dinner and made our way back to the hotel, in hopes of getting up early the next day to get some more sight seeing done.
We did succeed in getting an early start on Saturday, though as soon as the cab dropped us off in the center, one of our number realized she didn't have her bus pass. This weekend was one mishap after another. Luckily we all like each other. The group I was with was the poor group, so while 3 of our group went to see stuff you had to pay for, we went to see all the free stuff, which happened to also be all the stuff that was shit. The first was Pheonix park, which was, admittedly, beautiful. Despite the winter months that preceeded, it was a vibrant green. There we met with our sister Jordan and her Welsh friend Jack.
Next was the National Museum of Ireland. It was kind of boring, admittedly, but I tried to be a good sport about it all. I mean, jeez, Ireland, we get it. That whole "luck of the Irish" thing was just a facade. It was like they wanted to avoid telling about all the misfortune in their past, so they just filled the museum with random things that you'd never go to a museum to see. For example, fashion on the 19th and 20th centuries. Then later, examples of the way a typical Irish bedroom or living room might look in the 1900s, 1910s, 1920s, and so forth. And then they exagerrated their involvement in the American Civil War, especially in the north (probably to win points, no?). Why do you need an entire floor of a museum dedicated to this? Even I could tell you about the Irish involvement in our Civil War. In fact, I can sum it up for you in one sentence: There were some legalized Irish aliens and some naturalized Irish immigrants living in the states at the time and they were drafted to fight. Some of them felt passionately enough about it to enlist themselves. Oh, wait. That was two sentences. You win this time, National Museum of Ireland.
After that, we went to the Irish Museum of Modern Art. I hate modern art; I think it's a waste of materials, money, time, capital, and energy to take a large canvas and paint it entirely black, save a 2cm by 2cm square in the bottom left corner (yes this was an actual piece that I saw). I value much more a person's ability to recreate actual, recognizable images, but that's just me. I won't be judgemental. Anyway, I found myself a nice room and read a book until one of my friends came to get me. When we were done at the Modern Art museum, we went to a crowded bar called Flannigan's or something Irish like that to watch the Rugby game.
The game was Ireland versus England, so it was really exciting to get to watch it in Ireland. And, as an added bonus, we got to watch Ireland win. This was especially exciting because this meant Ireland prevented England from winning some kind of title (forgive me; I'm new to this rugby thing). So after watching my first game of rugby, I have another thing to add to my list of things to bring back to the states. Where did we deviate from rugby and create American football, which is really just a shit version of rugby? Seriously, United States, get it together.
Sabrina, Abi, and I really wanted to get over to St. Patrick's cathedral and Christ Church Cathedral to take pictures before we lost the sun (it was about 5pm at this point) and before the buses stopped running. So we left during the game and made our way over to the churchs. They were really stunning and I got a couple pictures, but it was really just because I felt like it was important to at least make it to St. Patrick's Cathedral while you're in Dublin. That's not something you can see anywhere you go. After my few photos, we went to a place down the street that the cab driver had suggested. Apparently it's super famous. They have a list of the celebrities that have eaten there outside on the wall. It was a lot of food, but hey, I ate fish and chips in Dublin next to Saint Patrick's Cathedral. It wasn't on my bucket list exactly, but still cool all the same.
We got back to the bar to watch Ireland win, which was just about the most insanity I've seen in a single room in my whole life. After the game, Sabrina and I were getting tired and didn't feel like staying at the bar for the next game, which was between Wales and some other country I don't remember, so we met up with Shelby, Danielle, and Kelsie, who had all gone an another tour the rest of us couldn't afford. We met them in the center and caught a taxi back to the hotel. We spent a couple hours in the room having girl talk, and then went down to the bar for a night cap. I had an Irish coffee, which was suggested to me by my boss (Thanks, Mark!) a while back. It wasn't as good as I was expecting. I like whiskey, and I like coffee, but it's kind of like how I enjoy the taste of lasagna and the taste of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, but I certainly don't like them together. Then we called it an early night.
The next morning we had to wake up at 4am in order to catch the bus in order to make it to the airport in order to get our plane in time. It makes me feel so adult to do things like this by myself.
So what did I think of Dublin? It was beautiful. I didn't miss Santander as much, but I think that was just because I had already gone to Barcelona and learned what it was like to be away from your home away from home. It's kind of like when you go to school for the first time. It's really scary and you don't know what to expect and all you really want to do is go home, but then you get used to it and it's not so bad. (Until you get to college and you have to drag your ass out of bed at 7 in the morning to make it to quantitative methods and statistical analysis for business and economics, but that's a different story). So yes, Dublin was beautiful. There was a lot to see. I had a lot of fun Thursday, but I didn't particularly enjoy the rest of the weekend. Understand, I think this was mostly circumstantial. I don't blame the city for my bad time. I wish I could have somehow teleported to Santander during the night on Thursday and woken up in my bed on Friday morning. I missed class Thursday, and two day trips over the weekend, one of which I had to write a paper for in order to make it up. I feel a lot of what I did was purely for the novelty of having said that I did it. Yes, I drank a Guinness in Dublin on St. Patrick's day, but was that an even trade? I suppose I'll never know. It's best not to dwell on what could have been, especially one single weekend of my life. The important thing is that I had fun in Dublin. Don't misunderstand me; it's not that I regret my decision to go to Dublin (which, ask anyone of my friends, was a difficult one), it's just that it was this weekend that I began to realize how little time I have left here. Maybe I should be thinking the opposite way, that I should be taking advantage of all my time here and using it to travel around Europe?
Anyway, next entry will be about my trip to Salamanca! Adios, todos!
"El mundo es un libro, y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página."
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