Guernica, Ladies Night, Tapas

This week was not the world's most eventful week, but I took a few pictures that I thought I would post.

First off, thank GOODNESS we are almost done with this intensive month of language...I'm so tired of all these ridiculous exercises one of our teachers has us do, like we were talking about women's rights in Spain, and she wanted us to respond to different quotes from men in Spain about how women should stay in the house, etc, but we had to do it in the subjunctive, and while we all understood why she wanted us to do this, she still wanted our actual opinions, but none of us could really say exactly what she wanted us to say while putting it into subjunctive. Just frustrating.

But yesterday, we spent her class talking about Spanish film, which was actually interesting, and I'm going to ask my family if they have any dvd's I can borrow (I still haven't seen Volver, but I was the only person in the class that had seen Mar Adentro, which if you've never seen, I HIGHLY recommend it, beautiful film with Javier Bardem) that I can put at least Spanish subtitles on...my comprehension is still not fantastic when it comes to listening. And we spent the other teacher's class talking about Spanish history...I think they're getting bored as well lol.

But here's a great story: Apparently, it is very normal for kids to live with their parents up until their 30's. Partially because it's so expensive, but also because parents like their kids staying close to home. Our teacher Ruben gave us some really interesting statistics:
Minimum salary in Madrid (maybe Spain?) is 587 Euros a month.
Average working day is 9-2, lunch, 4-8.
My teacher works 8am-7:30pm, 4 different teaching jobs, to pay for his living expenses.
I can't imagine working that much at a job that in the US to pay for living expenses; I mean, teaching at a University in a big city, I feel like the pay would be enough to make it on, maaaaaybe needing a second job? Maybe I'm wrong. But either way, I was just like WHAT.
And his 33 year old brother, who's been with his girlfriend for 11 years, is still living with their mom and dad because neither he nor is girlfriend makes enough at their jobs to be able to afford to move out. No thank you.

Went to the Reina Sofia museum on Wednesday with my school...saw some Dali and Picasso; they were the only two artists who's names I recognized, but we did see some others as well.

Here's a picture of a Dali:


And a picture of some Picassos:


In some places we were allowed to take pictures, and in others we weren't, so I only took a couple pictures because I didn't want to get in trouble anywhere.

But here's a picture of the Guernica...very cool. A lot bigger than I expected. If you don't know the story, click here for the Wikipedia article. It's really interesting.


And of course I bought a postcard copy to put in my scrapbook.

Here are some pictures of the outside of the museum:




Thursday night I went out with some of the girls to get some drinks and maybe do some dancing...we started at this Irish pub with free shots, where we ended up running into a couple of guys that my roommate knew from school. They were starting their study abroad programs out with a tour of Madrid before heading to other parts of Spain, and it was really random, but pretty cool. They were with a bunch of guys from their program, so we decided to head out and find another place that would give us free drinks. Upon leaving this pub, we realized one of the guys was HAMMERED...didn't speak a word of Spanish, and would loudly tell anyone that tried to talk to him in Spanish...was also hanging on all of us, just really awkward. We found a club that was having a Ladies Night: free entrances and free drinks every 15 minutes for girls, 5 Euro entrance with two free drinks for the guys, which was a pretty good deal. It was fun, but since I had an 8:30 class, I got home at about 1:30am. Wasted guy ended up getting thrown out of the club by security, which was really embarrassing for those of us that were technically there with him; I have yet to see a Spaniard THAT drunk, so it's easy to see why Americans have such a bad reputation unfortunately.

Last night, I went out for tapas with a new friend from class, which was a lot of fun. I had a great glass of red wine from Rioja (although it was chilled, which I thought was odd...), and we split some croquettas (ham, cheese, deep fried, deliciousness) and some calamari (yes, another thing I never thought I'd be too fond off). Definitely going to figure out how to make both of these for the family when I get home. At least the croquettas. :-)


Then we headed out to find drinks elsewhere, and came across a bar that was a free plate of tapas with any drink purchases, and the special of the night was mojitos, so we wandered in there and ended up getting potatoes chips with jamon...very interesting:


Not sure if I'm doing anything super exciting tonight yet, but today I took a long walk (google maps told me it was about 5-6km) around the Palace and through town. The palace and the gardens are gorgeous and I will definitely be going back to take some pictures. It's nice to get out and just explore on my own without a map, just kind of know the general direction of where I need to get back to, and if I get lost, I can always ask.

Other than that, not much more to report. I love that kids are the same anywhere...I watched a little boy plunk himself down and cry in the middle of the sidewalk, refusing to move. Our host dad is working on his English and was trying to figure out how to pronounce the differences between fail, fall and fell, which was really interesting; not something I'd ever thought of before, I guess. But I know I have similar problems in Spanish with things like that.

Here's a picture of a traffic jam on our street. It gets really loud outside our window, and I can't wait for it to cool down so we can sleep with the window closed. It's amazing how busy our tiny street gets.



1/4 of the way done as of today. I'm looking forward to October when I'll actually get to start going places and taking excursions with my program, and I know that time will start to just fly. I am loving my time here, but I miss so many random things from home! Like grocery shopping. And hanging out at peoples houses (THAT'S one thing that is really weird...personally, I prefer a night in at someone's with a few friends and splitting a couple bottles of wine...but teens here don't have friends over, they always go out...I do not care for this on a regular basis, I am too much of a homebody).

I also cannot wait to get home and do some cooking. I miss cooking!!!!

Love you all lots, only three more months!! CRAZY.

Trips have been booked!!!

Today I spent a bunch of time (and money) on plane tickets to get out into Europe, and I couldn't be more excited!!!!!!

I added them all to my calendar, so hopefully you can see them, but I still wanted to be excited and write a quick blog post about it:

Oct 8-10, I'm heading North to Bilbao to visit a friend from school. So excited to see Northern Spain!!

Nov 4-8, on a whim decided to buy plane tickets to London, but I think I needed to do that or I really would have regretted it. Was prepared to go by myself, but a friend from the program decided to join! Possibly more, we'll see.

Dec 2-7, I'm off to Southern Italy to hang out at a (cold but freaking beautiful) beach with a family friend who's celebrating her birthday there! Don't have to worry about housing or transportation to and from the airport, all I have to worry about is airfare and food!

Dec 21, I leave Spain. Now that I've filled up my schedule, and only have like 2 or 3 free weekends, I'm realizing how fast this is going to go by. But I'm glad! I will be totally ready to go home when the time comes. Although I wish the US would get their act together and make flying cheaper between large cities. Really, $300+ Spokane to San Fran? Boo.

Dec 26, I fly to Boise to tackle my boy at the airport!!! Then we will drive six+ hours to Moscow. A little silly, but at the same time, it'll be nice for him to have company, and it's cheaper than flying into Pullman.

And March 16, I fly to Phoenix to see my best friend get married!!!

(Plus all the various excursions that my school and program are doing, which will be fantastic...and my friend from Bilbao is hopefully coming down Thanksgiving weekend!)

So many airplanes...I'm gonna be a pro by the end of this semester. :-) A tomato eatting, spontaneous trip taking, airplane flying pro.

Dancing, More Parque del Retiro, and Shopping!

A week and a half left in the intensive month. And I am READY to go into my real classes (we have one really fantastic teacher, and one nice but boring teacher right now...just want to do something that's NOT grammar, please!). I am signed up for a comp & conversation class, a grammar class, a cinema class, a theatre class, and a contemporary Spanish society class...and I emailed my Spanish advisor, and everything should go through smoothly! It equals out to 15 credits, so I'm really glad it worked out and I should still be getting my major provided I pass everything. I only have to take 6 credits of Flen or 400-level Spanish when I get back, although either of those would be a decent amount of work (and two will be quite a bit, so I'm in talks with my theatre professors about just focusing on my recital and maybe doing a smaller, student directed one act instead of the mainstage shows. Plus, it would be nice to be able to actually work decent hours again...)

An update on what I've been up to:
My brand new jeans I bought the weekend before getting here do not fit anymore. I have quite easily dropped 5-7 pounds walking everywhere, eating better, and drinking less. It's funny cuz we have massive amounts of carbs at every meal (lots of pasta, pizza, rice, bread, potatoes) but lots of salads as well...they put olive oil on everything, and lots of veggies and fish. Not so much fruit, so I bought some orange juice to get some vitamin C in...the fruit here just looks not so great, we get amazing quality fruit in the US.

I bought my tickets to Italy!!!!! Cost me more than I initially anticipated (dang it me and my fear of committing financially to things! All in all, after conversion, cost about $230...but since I don't have to pay for housing or transportation to and from the airport, TOTALLY worth it. And look at these pictures!!! Google Image Search: Porto Cesareo) Figured since it was the weekend before my 23rd birthday, I could also justify it by calling it my birthday present to myself. And I'm glad I'll get to hang out with a friendly face!

On October 8, I plan on heading up to Bilbao to check out Northern Spain. My theatre friend Austin is living up there for the year, so he'll meet me at the bus station and we will explore together. The Guggenheim is up there, plus it looks like a lot of cool modern and old buildings. Should be a lot of fun, and another friendly face I'm looking forward to seeing!!!

So let's see...on Friday, I did a little shopping. Got two new pairs of flats, a skirt, and some rings (remembered why I don't wear rings...the cheap ones turn my fingers green!! Boooo.)

I like my new flower shoes:


Then that night we went out to a club called Kapital:

(I didn't bring my camera that night, so I got a picture of it yesterday in the daytime)
And I got these free glasses that say "Schweppes"...yes, as in the tonic water...they are up for grabs, anyone that would like them when I get back. I mean, I know I look awesome in them, but I thought someone else might appreciate them more, you know... ;-)


Now, about my club experience...let me tell you, it was an interesting one.
First off, it was expensive. But everyone said, you have to go to Kapital at least once to experience it. It's 7 floors (?) of dancing, drinking, karaoke, smoking, all that...too many people for me by the time we left at 3:30am, but that's when the night was just getting started for the Spaniards. Paid 18E to get in, which included a drink (a gin & tonic, made with schweppes, of course...also had a rose petal in it, which I thought was really weird, but whatev), about $24 US. I know that's about what clubs cost in NYC, but still a little shocking for someone from a small town. But glad I went and had the experience.
Now, I must talk about the male Spaniards. Really, I've only heard cat calls a couple times when I've been out with friends, and I've never really been approached by anyone looking to buy me a drink or whatever, which has been nice considering what I'd been prepared for. And what's really interesting, compared to the US: PDA is AWFUL here! Everyone is constantly making out in public, even in like the daytime! It's so weird to me, and a little uncomfortable when you have to stand right next to these people lol (but a lot more hand-holding couples of all ages, which I think is really sweet). BUT, I also think the men here are a lot more gentlemenly. They open doors, they go shopping with their girlfriends and hold their bags, they carry their books...just interesting, and kind of nice I think. Just something you don't expect from guys in the US, which is fine, it's a different culture.
But going to the club...HOLINESS. First off, I went with a group of prolly 10-15 Americans...some from my program, and then a bunch of the Denver kids had some friends in town that came to visit this weekend, which was the reason we went to Kapital. And the guys were extremely friendly. They were striking up conversations, whether it was asking me how I was doing, where I was from, just to tell me I looked nice...generally they would talk to me in English and I would talk back in Spanish, which was funny, but it was easier to understand. But Spanish guys are very touchy...it was never inappropriate, I never had to get mean (although I know a few other girls that had issues with butt-grabbing), but they would just grab our hands and get us to dance, or like a couple guys tried to get my attention by tugging on my hair or petting my arm, and I was annoyed by that so I refused to turn around. And I didn't have a problem talking with these guys or dancing, but I always kept at least a foot between me and the them. There were girls I was with that were grinding up on these Spanish guys, and then they didn't understand why the guy was being creepy after. All I had to do was say no or back away, and the guy would back off. But it still made me a little uncomfortable...I swear, in big crowds, my personal bubble gets bigger. And I also did not want to give any of these guys the idea that I was interested, and I was very upfront about the fact that I had a boyfriend, which actually they were all pretty respectful of (they'd ask me where he was, and I'd say in the States, and they would say, oh that's pretty far, and I would say I know, but I love him, and they'd leave me alone...another thing that was nice considering what I'd been expecting).
So an interesting club experience in Madrid...won't go back there unless there's a special occasion or something, but glad I did it.

The next day, I took a walk to Parque del Retiro just to get out of the house, be by myself, and journal, and remembered my camera this time. It was a lot of fun to people watch and just be in a green area for three hours.

This was on my way there...it's a building with a garden growing on the side:


Paseo del Prado in the daytime...it's like a 6 lane street with a green walkway down the middle, very pretty.


Entrance to Retiro:




A couple pictures of the lake:



This is a man, not a statue...these people statues are ALL over madrid, it's crazy!






Palacio de Velazquez...now a museum in the middle of the park run by Museo Reina Sofia:



This is the Crystal Palace, also running an exhibit from Museo Reina Sofia:





There are a lot of cats in Parque del Retiro...I tried to figure out why, but I could not. It was hilarious watching them stalk birds, but they don't let people approach them, they're not friendly.


Cat in a bush.


This is where I sat for an hour and journaled and people (and cat) watched. I got asked three times for directions in Spanish, and got into a couple of conversations, one with a guy from Columbia, and another with a guy who wanted to learn English and asked if I would meet up with him later and talk (I lied and said I needed to study...he was very nice, but I didn't want to put myself in a bad situation just in case). It was really entertaining though, and good for me to practice my Spanish. Pretty sure I gave wrong directions to all three people though. Whoops.
Here's what I saw from where I was sitting...I think it's called the Bosque de Recuerdo, but i am not 100% sure...



Leaving the park:


And then I went to El Rastro this morning to look for cool things, and I bought this scarf for 1 Euro. w00t!!!!


This week, I'm going to the Museo Reina Sofia with my school on Wednesday, but other than that, no plans. We'll just see what all happens!

If you want a postcard...

If you want a postcard, I'm going to need your address.

I have the house address. I have the condo address. I have Grandma's address.

Everyone else? I do not have your addresses. Seriously. Not even Nick's.

I bought stamps today, and I'd love to use them. Comment your address, or you can email me at heathermcquarrie@vandals.uidaho.edu if you don't want to just post it. I will send you a postcard.

Love you all,
Heather

Sushi and our attempt to see Palacio Real. Oh, and grocery shopping.

So last night we went out for sushi...ended up being overpriced, very meh, but it was a lot of fun. And as far as we know, no one's gotten sick, which is a big plus. :-)



Then today, sad story. Our university does free excursions for the students to go to tourist-y places while we're here in Spain (like last week was the Museo del Prado). Today was the Palacio Real, which I was actually really looking forward to. We could not find the group, and ended up missing them. Not sure if we came out the wrong metro entrance, or if we misunderstood where exactly we were supposed to meet. BUT we think they're going to repeat all of these excursions through the semester, so we'll just catch it next time around. Still, bummer. But I took a couple pictures of the outside.



We found Sarah. She missed the group, too, so we didn't feel as lame. And we went to ice cream to console ourselves.



And on the way home, we stopped at the grocery store so Emily could buy some cheese, and so I could be really weird and creepy and take pictures.

They sell hard a in the store. Weird. And you can buy a decent sized box of red wine for 0.55 Euro. Kelly Q would be so proud. ;-)


The eggs. Not in a refrigerator.


The milk. In boxes. Also not in a refrigerator. (Although the boxes are handy...I like that.)


Laughing Cow Cheese. Those who know me know how obsessed I am with this stuff. LOVE. IT. Love that they have it in Spanish. Lol.

Exploring on my own and La Noche en Blanco

So Saturday I went out in search of a cardigan and brown flats (succeeded in finding one of the two (cardigan, in case you were wondering)). It was kind of nice to just be on my own and go where I wanted to go and look like a silly tourist and take pictures of everything. And to get lost and find my way again.

Also went in search of a Starbucks...was craving something familiar (let me tell you...it was not familiar. Their milk here is not refrigerated so my iced beverage was kind of room temperature...I'm looking forward to colder weather and hot drinks) and looking for some instant coffee since our host mom is out of town for a few days. Ended up wandering between Puerta del Sol, Paseo del Prado, and Gran Via. Here are lots of pictures I took:


Mousetrap by Agatha Christie is playing.


Spain has a church of Scientology as well.




Their Starbucks' have WAY better pastries than ours do! THEY HAVE QUICHE!!!!


This is a bank. Say WHAT?







And Arthur Miller's All My Sons is also playing in Spain.



Haagen Daaz theatre. It is a THEATRE showing a MUSICAL and they serve ice cream in cones made out of crepes. And waffles. We will definitely be making a stop here at some point. Unfortunately, tickets to the show are 40 Euros at the cheapest. :-\

Then I went out that night with some of the girls and Julian (the German exchange student) for La Noche en Blanco, a night where all the streets of Madrid stay open, lots of dancing, music, theatre performances, museums...it's silly to stand in line for anything when it's all outside too! So we went dancing for a little bit, then just wandered until we got too tired. The pictures kind of stink cuz my camera doesn't do night very well, but I posted some of the better ones.

Puerta del Sol


I'm pretty sure this is Gran Via, kind of like Madrid's equivalent to Broadway in NYC, I think?


This is where they had dancing.


Emily, Kait, Kristen


Emily and I with Kristen's fan


Our good roomie going out picture




Paseo del Prado...HOLINESS. All these streets were literally wall to wall bodies.



If you look closely at the girl playing with the bubbles...why yes, that is a penis shaped bubble maker. They were extremely political bubble makers, actually. And then the random penis one.



We saw some music.


We saw some dancing.


And I bet you can't guess what restaurant this is that we ended our Noche en Blanco in. Yup. McDonalds. Another thing that Europe does 10x better than us. It was a PLUSH McDonalds. And the only reason we went here was because everywhere else was ridiculously busy.

We ended the night officially at the Museo del Vino with some sangria, and then Emily and I made it home at about 3:30am. Good night. Slept a lot the next day though.