Hey! So Ryan just left a few hours ago =( But let me give you a little rundown of our week.
Madrid (Sat - Mon)
Even though Ryan was not thrilled about the 6 hour bus ride after his lonnngg flight, the Jason Mraz concert was awesome!! The venue was very similar to the House of Blues, and he was a great performer. We got there a little late because the guy at the door needed to see my ID (to confirm that I was 18!!!!!!!!) before letting me in. But we met up with my friends afterwards and ate at a pretty nice restaurant before heading to the hostel to get some sleep! This hostel was ok - the building was kinda old, but we had our own bathroom and the owner was really nice. Sunday we walked around the city and ate outside in Plaza Mayor (beautiful!!) before heading to the bull fight. The Plaza de Toros was really big and the entire experience was very cool. We really had no idea what was going on most of the time, but we cheered when everyone else did. haha I think the killing of the bull would have bothered me a little more if I would have worn my glasses, but for the most part, the atmosphere was very similar to a baseball game. The last bullfighter got knocked over by the bull a few times, and a different bull knocked over a guy on a horse, but other than that it was pretty routine. After the bullfight, it was already getting dark and we walked around the city a little more. We went to Parque Retiro and there was a huge celebration going on inside. It would have been cool to see but Ryan got nervous when he heard the music and saw people peeing in the bushes! haha like I said before - very different environment than what we are used to. On Monday, we left early to get to Granada.
Granada (Mon - Fri)
We got to Granada around 12:30 on Monday, and the hostel owner was not there! So I dropped off Ryan's suitcase at my apartment and we went for lunch. Ryan tried Paella at this restaurant for the first time (traditional Spanish rice dish) and I thought it was really good. We sat outside, and 5 minutes after talking about TJ and Christina (Katie's brother and girlfriend), we see them walking down the street towards us! haha their hostel was on the same street we were having lunch. Then we headed back to the hostel which ended up being very cute! The owner was really nice and there was a gorgeous terrace on the roof that I wish we spent more time on. The only down side was that we didnt have our own bathroom and we had to go up a few flights of stairs...so I brought all of my shower stuff home and got ready at my house every day since it was so close. After showering and unpacking and everything, we went to the Hammam (arabian baths) in the Albaicin. Oh my gosh this was amazing! It was one of the highlights of the trip for me. We went in kind of nervous, changed into our bathing suits in the locker rooms and then walked out to the cold room that had a small pool of cold water. Then we went into the hot room which was like a shallow hot tub and a cute sitting area with heated floors! And then the warm room was the biggest and had fountains and stairs and it was really like a pool we could swim in. We went back and forth throughout the rooms before our numbers were called for our massages. The whole environment was just so calm and awesome. There was music playing and signs in the rooms saying to speak in low voices. It was really cool. After the massages we drank arabian tea (which I really liked haha) and went through the rooms a few more times. We also spent a few minutes in the sauna which was really hot! It was just a cool experience. Afterwards, we went to Plaza Nueva to meet Katie, TJ, and Christina. We went for tapas at some of my favorite places, went to a shot bar, and then to a discoteca which was virtually empty because it was Monday night! Before going home, me and Ryan got kebabs for the first time of many throughout the week!
Tuesday
We went to the Alhambra with Katie, TJ, and Christina. It was my first time there and it was really amazing!! Before going into the palaces, we ate lunch in a restaurant up there which was interesting. I got chicken gizzards when I ordered chicken =( but the sangria was great! We saw so many amazing things - you will have to look at the pictures to check it out. We met up with Pilar around 8 for tapas and went out with Katie, TJ, and Christina later on that night. We tried going to a tapper bar, but by the time we got there it was closed! We went to a few bars and played this awesome arcade memory game before heading home.
Wednesday
I showed Ryan more of the city. We saw my school and ate lunch in Plaza Nueva (this crazy pizza that was really good haha) and then met Pilar at El Parque de las Ciencias which is a science museum that Granada is famous for. (If I have sent you a postcard, it is probably on the stamp) It was really really cool. I wish we had more time to spend there, but we did not know it closed at 7:00. We saw an owl show, a butterfly garden, a robot that talked on command! haha and a lot more science stuff. It was very hands on and I really liked it. They also have a huge tower where you can go to the top and get a good view of the city. After the museum, we went with Pilar for tapas and went to a Granada futbol (soccer) game. It was really cool and there were a lot of people there, but the game ended with a 0 -0 tie...haha - It was still really fun. After the futbol game, we went home and changed and went to a discoteca with Katie, TJ, and Christina. It was ladies night and there were male gogo dancers - haha hilarious!! There were a lot of people there and it was really fun. Ryan and I and TJ and Christina even danced on little stages! haha (Ryan also danced on the stage by himself for a while =))
Thursday
We ate lunch on El Paseo de los Tristes (a really pretty terrace with a great view of the Alhambra) and ended up seeing my friend Dorothy there. I got a Spanish tortilla and Ryan ordered "salmonettes" which we thought would be salmon and ended up being full fried fish - haha they were really good though. Afterwards, we went with Dorothy and her two friends who were visiting to the Albaicin. It is the hill facing the Alhambra and it has a lot of Arabian influence. There is also a famous plaza with an amazing view of the Alhambra and the city there where we got some pretty pictures. After the Albaicin, we headed to Sacromonte (yet another hill) which ended up being a hike to the caves. A lot of people live in caves built into this hill and there is a museum right below giving information about the lifestyle and everything else. It was my first time and it was very interesting, but I definitely did not wear my hiking shoes! and afterwards, we were exhausted. But we made it to the Capilla Real to see the tombs of Los Reyes Catolicos (and I got some pics this time!) Then we headed to the famous Frederico Garcia Lorca Park and walked around and Ryan played on the trampolines for a while in the kids section haha. That night, we went to a flamenco show in a cave which was awesome!!! It was much different from my first experience because it was such a small area and the music was so close and loud. Afterwards, we went to Hannigans with Katie, TJ, and Christina and got kebabs at the end of the night one last time. Granada was my favorite of course ;)
Malaga (Fri - Sun)
Although Malaga was really fun, I cannot say that I like the city itself very much. Right now there is TONS of construction going on and it just doesn't compare to Granada where everything is lit up and the main streets are very wide and populated. Being there at night was not nearly as fun as it was in Granada. We also stayed in an actual hostel in Malaga which was not fun either since there were 12 English guys staying in the room next to us and it was very hard to sleep (and the bathroom was gross lol) but on Friday, we went to the Picasso Museum which was AWESOME! I could not take any pictures but it was seriously so cool to see his real works and read about them and learn about his life. Then we walked around the main strip of stores, and there were a bunch of statues along the entire strip (which was not a street for cars) and I really liked that. The weather was pretty nice and we ended up eating dinner at this AMAZING restaurant called Vino Mio. I loved it so much that we went back the next night too! haha - On Saturday, we took an early bus to Nerja (a town in Malaga that makes up part of the Costa del Sol) There were a TON of old people on the bus - it kind of reminds me of Florida only 20 times better, and I think a lot of people retire and vacation there when they are older. We ended up accidentally missing the beach stop and taking the bus up to Las Cuevas de Nerja (The caves of Nerja) and I am so glad because they were awesome!!! We walked through the caves, which were discovered accidentally by 5 teenage boys and are now a historical monument, until around 12:30. After they discovered it, a lot of prehistoric information was found (tools, human remains, paintings, etc.) and it was seriously really cool to see and read about - but we were not supposed to use flash on our camera so there are not that many great pics. There is a column in one of the main rooms of the cave, and it is in the Guinness Book of World Records for being the largest in the world!! Afterwards, we took the bus back to the center of town and went to the beach which was absolutely gorgeous!! The water was too cold to swim in, but we ate lunch at this cool place that Katie went to a few days before and ended up staying on the beach until about 5 when we went to catch the bus back to Malaga. When we got back, it was raining! So good thing we went to Nerja =) and then we had to pack everything up and prepare for the next morning which turned out to be a disaster!
Apparently Ryan's booking from Malaga to Madrid was cancelled because of some mistake the travel agency made with his ticket number which left him ticketless. We got to the airport at 4 AM and the check in desk did not open until 5! haha so then we get up there and find out it is cancelled and we are sent to the ticket office which did not open until 6! Then we were with the wrong carrier and we had to go back and forth talking to people and he was supposed to be on the plane by 6:50! We were really stressed out and they could not figure out what to do so he was put on a waiting list for his ORIGINAL flight that he was supposed to be on which he did not make because the plane was full....so then we went back to the ticket office and he was put on another waiting list for the 9:30 flight to Madrid...they told us that there was a small chance and that he had priority but that the flight was already overbooked. So we sat around until around 9 when they told him he could go on and I THINK he is flying first class right now =) so everything worked out fine in the end. I got home around 12 - I know - rough morning - and now I have to cram for my midterms tomorrow and read an entire novel!!!!!! But it was so worth it. It was a great week!!
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Alhama with Pilar!
Hey! Ok so I know I have been majorly slacking so lo siento mucho, but I just got home from Alhama today and oh my gosh it was amazing!! But first let me catch up with you guys ;) Ryan is coming in 5 days, and I have to get a lottt of work done before hand so that I will be prepared for midterms! :/ Me and the girls have been spending a lot of time at the park and just walking around Granada because the weather has been amazing!! Last weekend, I went to the beach in Malaga and it was absolutely gorgeous. Unfortunately, I don't have any pics because my camera was dead, but I will work on getting some from Heather. This weekend I went with Pilar to Alhama which is her pueblo 1 hour from the center of Granada. Five of us stayed in her cottage last night which was absolutely gorgeous! She grew up in Alhama and her parents have land 5 minutes from her house in the center of town where they go on the weekends and during the summer. They have tons of olive trees and chickens!!! (which means really really fresh eggs!) And the house is absolutely gorgeous. Outside is all hills and olive and almond trees. The drive there is down a dirt path with little stone walls surrounding the masses of beautiful almond trees. (I felt like I was dreaming) They have gardens with EVERYTHING growing literally - every fruit and vegetable ever. When we got there, we walked around the town a little, met her parents (SOOO NICE!! =)), toured the cottage, and played Party - haha thats a Spanish board game that mixes pictionary, sharades, and trivia. Then we watched some Friends in Spanish and they made this salad with oranges, tuna, green olives, onion, eggs and olive oil which was really really good and Pilar's dad made us a Spanish tortilla with asparagus. We started watching Babel (the movie with Brad Pitt) in Spanish, but stopped half way through to go swimming in the banos. OK people this was absolutely amazing! The river in Alhama passes through a volcano or something like that so the water in the river is hot! So we went to this 100% natural river at 1:30 in the morning and chilled in a natural hottub for 2 hours! There were TONS of people all along the river - it was so cool. Then we came home and finished the movie. In the morning (or afternoon I should say haha) we went for a little hike through the valley of Alhama. It was absolutely beautiful. You have to check out the pics even though they could not capture how beautiful it was. Then we got some tapas in town and went back to the cottage to eat paella which was super good! =) I feel so lucky that I met Pilar because she is sooo sweet and her friends are all great and this was such an amazing experience!
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Morocco!
Hey everyone! Let me just start by saying that my trip to Africa was the best trip I have ever taken in my entire life!! It has truly changed my outlook on life and what I want to do with mine. Ok - now we will start the story telling and get to the life altering parts ;)
Thursday, Feb. 26
We stayed in a hostel in Algeciras, Spain (southern coast) on Wednesday night so we could catch the ferry to Morocco at 8 AM on Thursday. The wind ended up being so bad that day that all of the ferrys were cancelled and we ended up taking a slow boat which we were on for about 3 hours!! We got to Tangier very late, but when we arrived at the DARNA women's center, they were very excited to talk to us and show us around! DARNA in arabic means "our home" and it is a place where girls and women can go to learn different trades. It was a beautiful place with plenty of classrooms and sewing equipment and we ended up eating an amazing lunch there of chicken tagine and really good Moroccan desserts! At lunch we talked to a few Moroccan students who spoke very good English (which is not common in Morocco because the language of business is French). We talked about the U.S. and also about daily life in Morocco. It was very interesting to hear about their views on the U.S. They continued to stress that the American people are not viewed in the same way as our government, and that they had met so many nice Americans. After leaving the center, we drove to Asilah along the Atlantic Coast, and we stopped along the way to ride camels on a beach at sunset!! It was sooo fun and the workers were so nice to us! We then walked through the Medina (old town) of Asilah and learned about the different colors on the buildings. Blue is the color of Judiasm, and the town at one point had a large Jewish population so you will see a lot of blue in my pictures. Green is the color of Islam, so whenever we saw a Mosque, it would have a green door and a minaret (tower) that could be seen from a distance. We also went to the coast and took beautiful pictures, but we didn't stay for long because of our very late start. We then drove 3 hours to Rabat to meet our home stay families! 3 of us stayed with each family, and the minute we walked in the door we were being hugged and kissed and welcomed. We could not communicate at all because no one in our family spoke English except for the 14 year old daughter who spoke very little. We were offered tea and cookies, and met about 15 people that were in the family or just staying as visitors. Our 23 year old brother came home with a girl from Egypt and a guy from France that he had just met and were invited to stay at his house. They all spoke English, so it was easier to communicate with the family. The bathroom in the house had a turkish toilet (which is a hole in the ground) and the house had no hot water so we could not shower (I will tell you more about that later). Even though we were exhausted, we went for a walk with our brother and his guests to the river and saw a beautiful view of the city lit up at night. Dinner was served in one large round bowl and everyone sat around it and ate the portion nearest to them. Most of them ate with their hands, but we were given spoons. We had lamb and potatoes. Historically the left hand was used in the bathroom because they do not use toilet paper at all, so it is very rude to put your left hand anywhere near the table and it was really hard to remember that! It was such an interesting experience!
Friday, Feb. 27
We woke up early to eat breakfast which was big pita-like bread with jam and more tea. (We drank the traditional Moroccan hot tea for every meal.) Then we met at the Agricultural building of the university with a Moroccan professor to talk about "West and Islamic worlds - Images about each other." It was sooo interesting to hear from her about life in Morocco and again her views on the U.S. I think for the most part she tried to be politically correct, but I certainly learned a lot about Moroccan culture and how progressive it is! She talked to us about women wearing the veil and women's rights and about culture. None of the daughters in the family I was staying with wore the veil, and they were much less conservative than I was expecting. There was a wide variety of degrees of conservatism in the people I met, and I was not expecting that. After the visit with the professor, we went to Chellah or the Roman Ruins and they were absolutely gorgeous!! There were hundreds of storks nesting there which I thought was so cool for some reason! haha and along with the storks there was a fertility pool there where women were feeding hard boiled eggs to the eel in the pool to bring fertility and easy childbirth. A few of us threw eggs in so we can have babies some day ;) There were also TONS AND TONS of stray cats there along with everywhere in Morocco. It was very strange because they were not scared of people at all and they were just everywhere. After the ruins we went to see the most famous Mosque in Rabat and the Mausoleum of King Mohammed V where he and his two sons' tombs reside. I have a million pictures from there because it was so huge and cool. Then we went back to our homestays and ate lunch which was couscous! I really liked it, but I guess it expands in your stomach and I ate a lot! haha After lunch we met with some students in Rabat who studied English and we talked to them about their views about the U.S. Almost all of them were males and we asked one of them about stereotypes they had witnessed in Americans. He said he didn't like to listen to stereotypes and most of the Americans he had met were really nice...then he went on to tell us about how Americans are "closed" and how it is not a stereotype, it is a fact. At first, I was really offended, but as we talked about education systems and culture, I stepped back and looked our similarities and differences on a larger scale and compared our perspectives. I thought about that conversation a lot afterwards, and I think I am still going to continue to think about it as I meet new people and learn new things about them. The cultural exchange that I experienced on this trip seriously changed my outlook on life. I think it is so important to learn about other people and experience new things in their environment. The first-hand experience taught me so much. We went to a pool hall with the students and drank more tea and talked more about culture and language and interests we had. It was truly a learning experience. After we said goodbye to the students, we met in someone's homestay to talk to a peace corps volunteer and a fullbright scholar who was studying in Morocco. After everything that had happened so far, and the cultural awareness I was feeling, I was really able to connect with the peace corps volunteer, and I am now looking into joining the peace corps after I graduate. After the discussion and getting all of my questions answered about peace corps, we went to a public bath called a hammam, and on the way we stopped and saw a celebration for Mohammed's birthday. There was music and people dancing, and everyone looked genuinely moved and happy. =) They have hammams in Granada as well because of all of the moorish influence, and they are kind of like spas (Ryan and I are going to one when he visits!) but this was an actual bath for bathing purposes because most people do not have hot water in their houses in Morocco. This was also a very cultural experience! We had our skin exfoliated by a moroccan woman. (She literally exfoliated our entire bodies - I have never felt so clean! haha) We wore our bathing suits, but we were the only ones who did. At first, I felt really uncomfortable, but by the end I didn't even think about it. Thinking about our reactions to nudity showed an apparent cultural difference and how our perspectives are shaped and formed. After the hammam, I felt greatttt! And we went back to our homestays and ate dinner with our families. It was some kind of noodles with meatballs, but when we asked our mom what kind of meat it was, she started cooing like a pigeon and saying chicken, so I still don't know what kind of bird we were eating! haha After dinner, our sister gave us henna tatoos. She was soooo good at it, and she told us (the Egyptian girl was our translator) that she used to work at the royal palace as a henna artist! Our one year old sister or cousin or something was adorable, and of course she wanted henna too! So she drew a small design on her hands and 10 mintues later she was holding up her hands asking for more, and it was all over her face which will now be orange for a whole month! haha - This was another moment that I stepped back and saw that laughter and kids and art and family are all the same. We all have them and value them in our culture, and despite our differences, we have so many similarities.
Saturday, Feb. 28
We woke up early, had a quick breakfast, said goodbye to our families, and drove up to a village in the Rif Mountains. We were supposed to hike for 30 minutes to meet a family, but the rain made it almost impossible for us. It was so muddy! Little kids with no shoes or socks were running around with goats and chickens. Women were picking vegetables, men were bringing goods to the market to sell on donkeys, and groups of people were standing around talking. I felt like I was in another world. We were invited into another home which housed many families and 3 generations. We went inside and sat down in a kind of living room area where we were accompanied by three men. The translator that we had picked up on the way as well as our tour guide were outside, so we had no way of communicating with these people. All of a sudden one of the men (who was grinning at us the entire time) starts asking us if we speak French and saying any English words he knows, and before we know what is going on he is teaching us how to count to ten in Arabic. It was absolutley hilarious! We were all repeating him in unison, and then we taught him 1-10 in English. (There were 9 of us girls) It was a great icebreaker! haha Once the translator and tour guide came in, (The translator was a second cousin of the two brothers who owned the house and land and our tour guide was a 24 year old from Atlanta who is studying in Granada as well) we started talking about our time in Morocco and about their jobs and daily life in the village. They told us about farming and the funny guy told us about how his father was a musician and about being a soldier (he was retired). They all seemed genuinely happy with the simplicity of life and they all said they were happy to live in their village. We asked them about economic challenges and they told us that everyone helps everyone else out. We asked them about marriages and they talked about how a guy has to ask a girl's parents to talk to her, but parents will rarely force their daughter to see someone she does not want to date. We asked them about education and the translator told us about how hard it is to go to college even though it is free, it is almost impossible to pay for living expenses (because there is obviously no university in the mountains). He was the first person in the family to get his degree and he was extremely intelligent. We talked to him about his masters thesis which was on the U.S. war on terror and about peace corps and other organizations. He was not for peace corps or any organization that has someone telling you what to do, so it was good to hear both sides of the spectrum even though I still think it is an absolutley amazing organization. We ate couscous and sandwhiches for lunch which were delicious, and we ended up talking to the family for 3 hours! Our tour guide told us it was the longest and most successful talk he had ever had because they usually last 45 min to an hour before people run out of things to say. The family was soo nice and welcoming and they even asked us to stay with them. The hospitality that I experienced throughout the whole trip was like nothing else I have ever seen or experienced. After saying goodbye to the family, we drove to Chefchaouen which was absolutely GORGEOUS! It was a very touristy area and many people spoke Spanish and English as well as Arabic. We went to our hostel and then went souvenir shopping before going to a nice dinner where I had a chicken shishkebab which was awesome and very different from the kebabs we have in granada! After dinner, we went back to our hostel and had a reflection time where we shared our favorite experiences and talked about where to go from here and what we can do to make a difference. We talked about not getting offended by the things people say to us about the U.S. and looking at things from different perspectives. One of the girls said something that I really liked and kept with me. She said something along the lines of, "We can't expect to get answers right now, or today or even tomorrow. We have to just swallow it and think about it and come back to it as life hands us new experiences." I totally agree with her, and I now know how much more there is to do and see and experience before settling down in the U.S.
Sunday, Feb. 29
In the morning we were supposed to go on a hike to see a view of the city, but it was pouring when we woke up so we just walked to the van and started driving to Ceuta which is an autonomous city of Spain located on the African side of the Strait of Gibraltar which seperates it from Spain. It was really pretty and we had to cross the border on foot here in order to take the ferry back to Algeciras. We talked a little bit about immigration and compared it to the U.S. The disparity in income is the greatest in the world at the Spanish-Moroccan border. Many people die trying to get to Europe on rafts or boats. Every minute of this trip was eye-opening for me. I learned so much about another culture who already knew so much about mine. It truly amazes me how little I know about the rest of the world but how much the rest of the world knows about me. I feel like I have so much to learn, and there are so many ways that I can help people and make a difference, and this trip made that such a reality.
Thursday, Feb. 26
We stayed in a hostel in Algeciras, Spain (southern coast) on Wednesday night so we could catch the ferry to Morocco at 8 AM on Thursday. The wind ended up being so bad that day that all of the ferrys were cancelled and we ended up taking a slow boat which we were on for about 3 hours!! We got to Tangier very late, but when we arrived at the DARNA women's center, they were very excited to talk to us and show us around! DARNA in arabic means "our home" and it is a place where girls and women can go to learn different trades. It was a beautiful place with plenty of classrooms and sewing equipment and we ended up eating an amazing lunch there of chicken tagine and really good Moroccan desserts! At lunch we talked to a few Moroccan students who spoke very good English (which is not common in Morocco because the language of business is French). We talked about the U.S. and also about daily life in Morocco. It was very interesting to hear about their views on the U.S. They continued to stress that the American people are not viewed in the same way as our government, and that they had met so many nice Americans. After leaving the center, we drove to Asilah along the Atlantic Coast, and we stopped along the way to ride camels on a beach at sunset!! It was sooo fun and the workers were so nice to us! We then walked through the Medina (old town) of Asilah and learned about the different colors on the buildings. Blue is the color of Judiasm, and the town at one point had a large Jewish population so you will see a lot of blue in my pictures. Green is the color of Islam, so whenever we saw a Mosque, it would have a green door and a minaret (tower) that could be seen from a distance. We also went to the coast and took beautiful pictures, but we didn't stay for long because of our very late start. We then drove 3 hours to Rabat to meet our home stay families! 3 of us stayed with each family, and the minute we walked in the door we were being hugged and kissed and welcomed. We could not communicate at all because no one in our family spoke English except for the 14 year old daughter who spoke very little. We were offered tea and cookies, and met about 15 people that were in the family or just staying as visitors. Our 23 year old brother came home with a girl from Egypt and a guy from France that he had just met and were invited to stay at his house. They all spoke English, so it was easier to communicate with the family. The bathroom in the house had a turkish toilet (which is a hole in the ground) and the house had no hot water so we could not shower (I will tell you more about that later). Even though we were exhausted, we went for a walk with our brother and his guests to the river and saw a beautiful view of the city lit up at night. Dinner was served in one large round bowl and everyone sat around it and ate the portion nearest to them. Most of them ate with their hands, but we were given spoons. We had lamb and potatoes. Historically the left hand was used in the bathroom because they do not use toilet paper at all, so it is very rude to put your left hand anywhere near the table and it was really hard to remember that! It was such an interesting experience!
Friday, Feb. 27
We woke up early to eat breakfast which was big pita-like bread with jam and more tea. (We drank the traditional Moroccan hot tea for every meal.) Then we met at the Agricultural building of the university with a Moroccan professor to talk about "West and Islamic worlds - Images about each other." It was sooo interesting to hear from her about life in Morocco and again her views on the U.S. I think for the most part she tried to be politically correct, but I certainly learned a lot about Moroccan culture and how progressive it is! She talked to us about women wearing the veil and women's rights and about culture. None of the daughters in the family I was staying with wore the veil, and they were much less conservative than I was expecting. There was a wide variety of degrees of conservatism in the people I met, and I was not expecting that. After the visit with the professor, we went to Chellah or the Roman Ruins and they were absolutely gorgeous!! There were hundreds of storks nesting there which I thought was so cool for some reason! haha and along with the storks there was a fertility pool there where women were feeding hard boiled eggs to the eel in the pool to bring fertility and easy childbirth. A few of us threw eggs in so we can have babies some day ;) There were also TONS AND TONS of stray cats there along with everywhere in Morocco. It was very strange because they were not scared of people at all and they were just everywhere. After the ruins we went to see the most famous Mosque in Rabat and the Mausoleum of King Mohammed V where he and his two sons' tombs reside. I have a million pictures from there because it was so huge and cool. Then we went back to our homestays and ate lunch which was couscous! I really liked it, but I guess it expands in your stomach and I ate a lot! haha After lunch we met with some students in Rabat who studied English and we talked to them about their views about the U.S. Almost all of them were males and we asked one of them about stereotypes they had witnessed in Americans. He said he didn't like to listen to stereotypes and most of the Americans he had met were really nice...then he went on to tell us about how Americans are "closed" and how it is not a stereotype, it is a fact. At first, I was really offended, but as we talked about education systems and culture, I stepped back and looked our similarities and differences on a larger scale and compared our perspectives. I thought about that conversation a lot afterwards, and I think I am still going to continue to think about it as I meet new people and learn new things about them. The cultural exchange that I experienced on this trip seriously changed my outlook on life. I think it is so important to learn about other people and experience new things in their environment. The first-hand experience taught me so much. We went to a pool hall with the students and drank more tea and talked more about culture and language and interests we had. It was truly a learning experience. After we said goodbye to the students, we met in someone's homestay to talk to a peace corps volunteer and a fullbright scholar who was studying in Morocco. After everything that had happened so far, and the cultural awareness I was feeling, I was really able to connect with the peace corps volunteer, and I am now looking into joining the peace corps after I graduate. After the discussion and getting all of my questions answered about peace corps, we went to a public bath called a hammam, and on the way we stopped and saw a celebration for Mohammed's birthday. There was music and people dancing, and everyone looked genuinely moved and happy. =) They have hammams in Granada as well because of all of the moorish influence, and they are kind of like spas (Ryan and I are going to one when he visits!) but this was an actual bath for bathing purposes because most people do not have hot water in their houses in Morocco. This was also a very cultural experience! We had our skin exfoliated by a moroccan woman. (She literally exfoliated our entire bodies - I have never felt so clean! haha) We wore our bathing suits, but we were the only ones who did. At first, I felt really uncomfortable, but by the end I didn't even think about it. Thinking about our reactions to nudity showed an apparent cultural difference and how our perspectives are shaped and formed. After the hammam, I felt greatttt! And we went back to our homestays and ate dinner with our families. It was some kind of noodles with meatballs, but when we asked our mom what kind of meat it was, she started cooing like a pigeon and saying chicken, so I still don't know what kind of bird we were eating! haha After dinner, our sister gave us henna tatoos. She was soooo good at it, and she told us (the Egyptian girl was our translator) that she used to work at the royal palace as a henna artist! Our one year old sister or cousin or something was adorable, and of course she wanted henna too! So she drew a small design on her hands and 10 mintues later she was holding up her hands asking for more, and it was all over her face which will now be orange for a whole month! haha - This was another moment that I stepped back and saw that laughter and kids and art and family are all the same. We all have them and value them in our culture, and despite our differences, we have so many similarities.
Saturday, Feb. 28
We woke up early, had a quick breakfast, said goodbye to our families, and drove up to a village in the Rif Mountains. We were supposed to hike for 30 minutes to meet a family, but the rain made it almost impossible for us. It was so muddy! Little kids with no shoes or socks were running around with goats and chickens. Women were picking vegetables, men were bringing goods to the market to sell on donkeys, and groups of people were standing around talking. I felt like I was in another world. We were invited into another home which housed many families and 3 generations. We went inside and sat down in a kind of living room area where we were accompanied by three men. The translator that we had picked up on the way as well as our tour guide were outside, so we had no way of communicating with these people. All of a sudden one of the men (who was grinning at us the entire time) starts asking us if we speak French and saying any English words he knows, and before we know what is going on he is teaching us how to count to ten in Arabic. It was absolutley hilarious! We were all repeating him in unison, and then we taught him 1-10 in English. (There were 9 of us girls) It was a great icebreaker! haha Once the translator and tour guide came in, (The translator was a second cousin of the two brothers who owned the house and land and our tour guide was a 24 year old from Atlanta who is studying in Granada as well) we started talking about our time in Morocco and about their jobs and daily life in the village. They told us about farming and the funny guy told us about how his father was a musician and about being a soldier (he was retired). They all seemed genuinely happy with the simplicity of life and they all said they were happy to live in their village. We asked them about economic challenges and they told us that everyone helps everyone else out. We asked them about marriages and they talked about how a guy has to ask a girl's parents to talk to her, but parents will rarely force their daughter to see someone she does not want to date. We asked them about education and the translator told us about how hard it is to go to college even though it is free, it is almost impossible to pay for living expenses (because there is obviously no university in the mountains). He was the first person in the family to get his degree and he was extremely intelligent. We talked to him about his masters thesis which was on the U.S. war on terror and about peace corps and other organizations. He was not for peace corps or any organization that has someone telling you what to do, so it was good to hear both sides of the spectrum even though I still think it is an absolutley amazing organization. We ate couscous and sandwhiches for lunch which were delicious, and we ended up talking to the family for 3 hours! Our tour guide told us it was the longest and most successful talk he had ever had because they usually last 45 min to an hour before people run out of things to say. The family was soo nice and welcoming and they even asked us to stay with them. The hospitality that I experienced throughout the whole trip was like nothing else I have ever seen or experienced. After saying goodbye to the family, we drove to Chefchaouen which was absolutely GORGEOUS! It was a very touristy area and many people spoke Spanish and English as well as Arabic. We went to our hostel and then went souvenir shopping before going to a nice dinner where I had a chicken shishkebab which was awesome and very different from the kebabs we have in granada! After dinner, we went back to our hostel and had a reflection time where we shared our favorite experiences and talked about where to go from here and what we can do to make a difference. We talked about not getting offended by the things people say to us about the U.S. and looking at things from different perspectives. One of the girls said something that I really liked and kept with me. She said something along the lines of, "We can't expect to get answers right now, or today or even tomorrow. We have to just swallow it and think about it and come back to it as life hands us new experiences." I totally agree with her, and I now know how much more there is to do and see and experience before settling down in the U.S.
Sunday, Feb. 29
In the morning we were supposed to go on a hike to see a view of the city, but it was pouring when we woke up so we just walked to the van and started driving to Ceuta which is an autonomous city of Spain located on the African side of the Strait of Gibraltar which seperates it from Spain. It was really pretty and we had to cross the border on foot here in order to take the ferry back to Algeciras. We talked a little bit about immigration and compared it to the U.S. The disparity in income is the greatest in the world at the Spanish-Moroccan border. Many people die trying to get to Europe on rafts or boats. Every minute of this trip was eye-opening for me. I learned so much about another culture who already knew so much about mine. It truly amazes me how little I know about the rest of the world but how much the rest of the world knows about me. I feel like I have so much to learn, and there are so many ways that I can help people and make a difference, and this trip made that such a reality.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Cadiz
Hey!!! So yesterday about 11 of us went to Cadiz for Carnival. It was quite an experience!!! Carnival is a big celebration in Spain and other countries that is similar to our Halloween but for adults and like 12 million times bigger. There are people dressed up in extravangant costumes EVERYWHERE (literally) and people come from all over Spain to go to Cadiz. It lasts all week long, and there are parades and music contests and lots of fun!!! Cadiz is near Portugal on the southern coast of Spain, and we left Granada at noon yesterday and arrived in Cadiz around 7:00 PM. There were 500 people going with the program we were with (which included just the bus ride for 20 euros! lol) We were dropped off right by the Atlantic Ocean and we watched the sunset on the beach - absolutely BEAUTIFUL! Then the nightlong party began!! We basically just walked around the city watching live bands, eating baked potatoes, and having a good time :) Some people slept on the beach and others (like myself) enjoyed Cadiz for a full 12 hours before reboarding the bus at 7:00 AM. This festival was so unlike anything else I have ever experienced. People are just so laid back and there to have a good time. I didn't see one police officer until we were walking back to the bus, nor were they needed! It was really amazing to be a part of something so different than what I am used to. You guys should totally check out our sweet masks in the pictures! haha we were probably the most underdressed people there!! And today, Katie's parents arrived in Granada!! So even though I am exhausted, I went out to dinner with them and talked about their travel and our life here in Spain :) It is soooo nice to see people from home!! Mr. Szafranski tipped the waiter almost 6 euros and the guy was so happy that he shook all of our hands (which they dont do here haha) and gave us a round of shots! (Waiters/waitresses are paid salaries here and a 20 cent tip if anything is sufficient in Granada) Then they went back to their hotel to try and adjust to the time change so they can enjoy the city for a couple of days before heading to Poland. I myself am headed to Morocco on Wednesday night, so my next post will probably be next Sunday when I get home! Miss you guys!
Friday, February 20, 2009
La Alpujarra
Hey everyone!! Sorry the posts are coming slower now...School is taking a lot more energy than I expected because I ended up taking 5 classes so I will be coming home with 18 credit hours!! The overachiever in me couldn't resist taking advantage of the lower tuition and more liberal class settings :) I also am pleased to announce that I have an intercambio!!! (which means I meet with a Spanish speaker and we practice our Spanish and English with each other) And she is soo fun, and I have been spending quite a bit of time with her. Also, this week I have been fighting a nasty cold...Katie went to Ireland with only hoodies (and it was snowing!) and she got me sick :( but I am feeling better today. I ended up having my second pharmacy disaster this week - the cold medicine I bought is prescription strength and it makes me very drowsy and what not - and apparently I am allergic to something in it - so my face is itchy and red like it gets when I wear makeuppp!!! Haha i am seriously having no luck with European pharmacies. But on to happier things - I went to La Alpujarra last weekend and it was amazing!!! It is a district of granada in the mountains right next to the Sierra Nevada. We traveled through the three white villages Pampaneira, Bubion and Capileira, and we ate lunch at a traditional Alpujarran restaurant in the last village. I ordered a vegetarian plate because every dish had ham in it....apparently they are famous for their ham - whoo hoo! ;) It was really beautiful and interesting to learn about the history on the way there. I guess a lot of famous people have houses here because it is so private and secluded. (Like U2 and Steven Spielberg - P.S. some Indiana Jones scenes were filmed up there bc Steven loves it so much!) We did a little bit of hiking but nothing compared to the mountain hike I did in January. It was very fun and relaxing and beautiful. Take a look at the pictures and see for yourself!! Miss you all dearly! <3
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Roma, Italia
Hey!! This is the last blog from Italy!! If it's the first Italy blog you are reading, you should scroll down and read about Milan, Venice and Florence first!
Friday, Feb. 6 cont.
We had a very hard time finding this hostel because there was no sign anywhere in sight. When we finally did find it, boy were we in for a surprise!! Haha you just have to see the pictures - we walked through a huge wooden door and are welcomed by the smell of mold! - Yuck! Then we got into the hostel, and our "receptionist" was laying on a couch watching music videos. We were sooo confused when he asked us for 132 euros in cash!! After paying him, we put our stuff down and chose our bunks from the 8 beds available. We didn't have sheets - just a matress cover and a small blanket folded up. The paint or paper or whatever it was was falling from the ceiling...and the window was locked shut. We decided to try to relax by taking a shower in the three available bathrooms (one of which has a giant hole in the wall and another has its shower curtain ripped halfway off the pole) and we realized that we don't have towels. We asked him about it and he told us they were 2 euros each and if we wanted a tiny locker to lock up our valuables, he needed a 10 euros deposit....at this point we are HATING this hostel - especially compared to the other 3 cities!! But we finally got settled and met the Polish couple and the 50 year old man from Austrailia who were living in our room...Two beds were still vacant when we went to find something to eat for dinner. We ended up eating at Pizzeria Rocci where I had the absolute best pizza I have ever had in my entire life!!! (salami of course) The waiter did not speak English and ordering was absolutely hilarious - we made sure to leave him a good tip ;)
Sat. February 7
The two vacant beds were filled by two guys from Barcelona sometime during the middle of the night. We woke up early and headed to Piazza Venezia which holds Il Vittoriano, a monument dedicated to king Victor Emmanuel II. The view from the monument was amazing and we saw sooo many important things here (like the Palazzo (palace) Venezia which was used by Benito Mussolini as his headquarters, and he addressed the people from its balcony!) Then we went to the Pantheon! It was really amazing to see something sooo ancient! (125 AD) Until the 20th century, the Pantheon was the largest concrete structure in the world, and Michelangelo studied its dome before starting work on the dome of St. Peter's Basilica. It was used for so many things over time and now serves as an active church. A lot of famous people are buried here as well (including the artist Raphael and the first king of Italy, Victor Emmanuel II) After the Pantheon, we went to the Colosseum!! This was by far one of my favorite things we saw on our trip. We also went to the Foro Romano which holds the oldest and most important structures of the ancient city. It served as a city square and central hub where people gathered for justice and faith a reallllyy long time ago. We went to Palatino (Palatine Hill) as well and then headed to McDonalds for lunch. We were feeling pretty homesick for Spain as well as the US, and keep in mind that this was the very first time since January 3rd that I had eaten American fast food...We ended up wandering around some more and seeing the Teatro Marcello (ancient theatre built right before the Roman empire) before heading to the grocery store to buy food for dinner. We were allowed to use the kitchen in our hostel - so we cooked some box pasta and ate salad and pasta for dinner to save some money. Since McDonalds, I had not been feeling well at all, and the girls were planning on going on this famous barcrawl from the Spanish steps, so I went to the Pharmacy to find something to calm my stomach - BAD IDEA! haha They don't let you shop for your over the counter medication in Europe...when you go to a pharmacy, you have to talk to the pharmacists and they give you what you need. So here I am in an Italian pharmacy where very little English is spoken trying to tell them that I ate McDonalds for the first time in a month and my stomach was killing me. The guy who spoke the most english gave me a box of pink pills that said Ibuprofen on them....so I asked him if it was pain medication and he said yes...I told him I needed something for digestion to which he responded with a puzzled look....so I told him I ate too much McDonalds (haha) and he smiled and nodded and gave me a different box of pills which I paid for. He said I could take 3 a day (and of course I could not read the directions because they were only in Italian) - so I took one and laid down for an hour. It didn't help at all so I took another one and started to get ready to go out. By the time we were all leaving, I still didn't feel very good and we got about 10 minutes away from the hostel when I decided to turn around and come back. The pills ended up working as a LAXATIVE! and I had taken 2 - so you get the idea! I was stuck in this wierd hostel with the creepy owner and the old man from Australia because everyone else had gone to the barcrawl!! Haha when I think about it now it is pretty funny, but I was not happy then. I took a shower and laid down to read, and I fell asleep with the light on. I woke up to the old man standing a foot from my bed (I was on the top bunk so his head was level with mine) All I saw was his huge fluffy white beard and I screamed and jumped back haha - and he wanted to know if I wanted the light off?? I was so creeped out I couldn't go back to sleep until they all came home from the barcrawl...what a night!!
Sunday, Feb. 8
Dorothy went to meet her friend who was studying in Rome, so Heather and I went to the Piazza del Popolo, The Spanish Steps (The widest staircase in all of Europe - Beautiful!!!), the Villa Borghese (the largest public park in Rome), and the ZOO!!! The zoo was so cool because we were allowed to get so much closer to the animals than at home. They also had a lot of different animals than what we have at home. This was one of my favorite days because it was beautiful weather and we were so relaxed. We met Dorothy at the Fontana di Trevi (The largest Baroque fountain in Rome) The legend holds that if visitors throw a coin in the fountain, they are sure to return to Rome....and you better believe we threw a coin in that fountain! haha - About 3,000 euros are thrown into the fountain every day and are collected at night. The money goes to a supermarket for Rome's needy. Then we went to the grocery store and made chicken ceasar salad with penne pasta for lunch/dinner. Then we went for gelato (Yum!) and came back and had a long talk with the Barcelona guys about Spain and poetry and random things haha - We thought one of them didn't speak English very well - but he was just shy at first! When we asked them their ages, they told us they were 27 and 29 and then told us (in english) that men don't get old, they get interesting. I asked them what women get, and he said "No hablo ingles." (I don't speak English!) haha they were hilarious. It was realllly awkward for me and the old man since the previous night, but the girls loved him - he said we reminded him of his daughter - which I thought was creeepppyy! We went to bed early because of our busy day to come.
Monday, Feb. 9
We went to St. Peter's Basilica and the Vatican!!! It was absolutely amazing. The dome of St. Peter's was designed by Michelangelo. We saw soo much famous art by Boticelli, Bernini, Raphael and Michelangelo. The Gallery of Maps was one of my favorite parts, as well as the Raphael rooms covered in his frescoes and of course the Sistine Chapel. We were there for the entire morning, and it was this day that I discovered my coffee addiction that has developed over the past month. I was almost falling over when we finally went for lunch and had really good pizza and potato and cheese rolls...haha we thought they were mozzerella sticks! Then we stumbled across an outdoor market and got the best nuts ever!! I don't even know what kind they were, but they had shells. We walked around the Trastavere neighborhood for hours. It was one of Rome's great medieval working-class neighborhoods that spoke its own distinct dialect and had traditional street fairs and poetry, but it became very touristy in the 1990s. We also went to Piazza Mattei/Santa Maria de Trastavere which, according to legend, had a stream of pure oil flow from the earth on the site of the church on the day Christ was born, signifying the coming of grace and God. There is a column next to the altar marking the spot - check it out in the pics! We walked back towards the river when it started getting dark and took a lot of night pictures!! We sat by an ice skating rink and people-watched for a while before going to meet Dorothy's friends in the Piazza Navona (Really pretty fountains) to go eat dinner. Dorothy's friend Kate and 6 of her friends came to eat dinner with us and Dorothy, Heather and I ended up getting appetizers AND a 2 course meal. We were so hungry and exhausted and we knew that it was our last night in Italy, so we ate every bite of it! haha - Then we got MORE gelato and crashed the minute we got back to the hostel.
Tuesday, Feb. 10
We woke up early and set out to find a good view of the city. We walked up to Aventine Hill and attempted to find the "keyhole" view of Rome in Piazza di Cavlierei di Malta. We didn't realize it was an ACTUAL keyhole in a door! haha We walked around some military base for like an hour looking for it - it was realllllly amazing though when we finally asked some guards where it was. And then it was time to get to the airport for our flight. It was such an amazing trip!! I hope you liked reading about it :)
Friday, Feb. 6 cont.
We had a very hard time finding this hostel because there was no sign anywhere in sight. When we finally did find it, boy were we in for a surprise!! Haha you just have to see the pictures - we walked through a huge wooden door and are welcomed by the smell of mold! - Yuck! Then we got into the hostel, and our "receptionist" was laying on a couch watching music videos. We were sooo confused when he asked us for 132 euros in cash!! After paying him, we put our stuff down and chose our bunks from the 8 beds available. We didn't have sheets - just a matress cover and a small blanket folded up. The paint or paper or whatever it was was falling from the ceiling...and the window was locked shut. We decided to try to relax by taking a shower in the three available bathrooms (one of which has a giant hole in the wall and another has its shower curtain ripped halfway off the pole) and we realized that we don't have towels. We asked him about it and he told us they were 2 euros each and if we wanted a tiny locker to lock up our valuables, he needed a 10 euros deposit....at this point we are HATING this hostel - especially compared to the other 3 cities!! But we finally got settled and met the Polish couple and the 50 year old man from Austrailia who were living in our room...Two beds were still vacant when we went to find something to eat for dinner. We ended up eating at Pizzeria Rocci where I had the absolute best pizza I have ever had in my entire life!!! (salami of course) The waiter did not speak English and ordering was absolutely hilarious - we made sure to leave him a good tip ;)
Sat. February 7
The two vacant beds were filled by two guys from Barcelona sometime during the middle of the night. We woke up early and headed to Piazza Venezia which holds Il Vittoriano, a monument dedicated to king Victor Emmanuel II. The view from the monument was amazing and we saw sooo many important things here (like the Palazzo (palace) Venezia which was used by Benito Mussolini as his headquarters, and he addressed the people from its balcony!) Then we went to the Pantheon! It was really amazing to see something sooo ancient! (125 AD) Until the 20th century, the Pantheon was the largest concrete structure in the world, and Michelangelo studied its dome before starting work on the dome of St. Peter's Basilica. It was used for so many things over time and now serves as an active church. A lot of famous people are buried here as well (including the artist Raphael and the first king of Italy, Victor Emmanuel II) After the Pantheon, we went to the Colosseum!! This was by far one of my favorite things we saw on our trip. We also went to the Foro Romano which holds the oldest and most important structures of the ancient city. It served as a city square and central hub where people gathered for justice and faith a reallllyy long time ago. We went to Palatino (Palatine Hill) as well and then headed to McDonalds for lunch. We were feeling pretty homesick for Spain as well as the US, and keep in mind that this was the very first time since January 3rd that I had eaten American fast food...We ended up wandering around some more and seeing the Teatro Marcello (ancient theatre built right before the Roman empire) before heading to the grocery store to buy food for dinner. We were allowed to use the kitchen in our hostel - so we cooked some box pasta and ate salad and pasta for dinner to save some money. Since McDonalds, I had not been feeling well at all, and the girls were planning on going on this famous barcrawl from the Spanish steps, so I went to the Pharmacy to find something to calm my stomach - BAD IDEA! haha They don't let you shop for your over the counter medication in Europe...when you go to a pharmacy, you have to talk to the pharmacists and they give you what you need. So here I am in an Italian pharmacy where very little English is spoken trying to tell them that I ate McDonalds for the first time in a month and my stomach was killing me. The guy who spoke the most english gave me a box of pink pills that said Ibuprofen on them....so I asked him if it was pain medication and he said yes...I told him I needed something for digestion to which he responded with a puzzled look....so I told him I ate too much McDonalds (haha) and he smiled and nodded and gave me a different box of pills which I paid for. He said I could take 3 a day (and of course I could not read the directions because they were only in Italian) - so I took one and laid down for an hour. It didn't help at all so I took another one and started to get ready to go out. By the time we were all leaving, I still didn't feel very good and we got about 10 minutes away from the hostel when I decided to turn around and come back. The pills ended up working as a LAXATIVE! and I had taken 2 - so you get the idea! I was stuck in this wierd hostel with the creepy owner and the old man from Australia because everyone else had gone to the barcrawl!! Haha when I think about it now it is pretty funny, but I was not happy then. I took a shower and laid down to read, and I fell asleep with the light on. I woke up to the old man standing a foot from my bed (I was on the top bunk so his head was level with mine) All I saw was his huge fluffy white beard and I screamed and jumped back haha - and he wanted to know if I wanted the light off?? I was so creeped out I couldn't go back to sleep until they all came home from the barcrawl...what a night!!
Sunday, Feb. 8
Dorothy went to meet her friend who was studying in Rome, so Heather and I went to the Piazza del Popolo, The Spanish Steps (The widest staircase in all of Europe - Beautiful!!!), the Villa Borghese (the largest public park in Rome), and the ZOO!!! The zoo was so cool because we were allowed to get so much closer to the animals than at home. They also had a lot of different animals than what we have at home. This was one of my favorite days because it was beautiful weather and we were so relaxed. We met Dorothy at the Fontana di Trevi (The largest Baroque fountain in Rome) The legend holds that if visitors throw a coin in the fountain, they are sure to return to Rome....and you better believe we threw a coin in that fountain! haha - About 3,000 euros are thrown into the fountain every day and are collected at night. The money goes to a supermarket for Rome's needy. Then we went to the grocery store and made chicken ceasar salad with penne pasta for lunch/dinner. Then we went for gelato (Yum!) and came back and had a long talk with the Barcelona guys about Spain and poetry and random things haha - We thought one of them didn't speak English very well - but he was just shy at first! When we asked them their ages, they told us they were 27 and 29 and then told us (in english) that men don't get old, they get interesting. I asked them what women get, and he said "No hablo ingles." (I don't speak English!) haha they were hilarious. It was realllly awkward for me and the old man since the previous night, but the girls loved him - he said we reminded him of his daughter - which I thought was creeepppyy! We went to bed early because of our busy day to come.
Monday, Feb. 9
We went to St. Peter's Basilica and the Vatican!!! It was absolutely amazing. The dome of St. Peter's was designed by Michelangelo. We saw soo much famous art by Boticelli, Bernini, Raphael and Michelangelo. The Gallery of Maps was one of my favorite parts, as well as the Raphael rooms covered in his frescoes and of course the Sistine Chapel. We were there for the entire morning, and it was this day that I discovered my coffee addiction that has developed over the past month. I was almost falling over when we finally went for lunch and had really good pizza and potato and cheese rolls...haha we thought they were mozzerella sticks! Then we stumbled across an outdoor market and got the best nuts ever!! I don't even know what kind they were, but they had shells. We walked around the Trastavere neighborhood for hours. It was one of Rome's great medieval working-class neighborhoods that spoke its own distinct dialect and had traditional street fairs and poetry, but it became very touristy in the 1990s. We also went to Piazza Mattei/Santa Maria de Trastavere which, according to legend, had a stream of pure oil flow from the earth on the site of the church on the day Christ was born, signifying the coming of grace and God. There is a column next to the altar marking the spot - check it out in the pics! We walked back towards the river when it started getting dark and took a lot of night pictures!! We sat by an ice skating rink and people-watched for a while before going to meet Dorothy's friends in the Piazza Navona (Really pretty fountains) to go eat dinner. Dorothy's friend Kate and 6 of her friends came to eat dinner with us and Dorothy, Heather and I ended up getting appetizers AND a 2 course meal. We were so hungry and exhausted and we knew that it was our last night in Italy, so we ate every bite of it! haha - Then we got MORE gelato and crashed the minute we got back to the hostel.
Tuesday, Feb. 10
We woke up early and set out to find a good view of the city. We walked up to Aventine Hill and attempted to find the "keyhole" view of Rome in Piazza di Cavlierei di Malta. We didn't realize it was an ACTUAL keyhole in a door! haha We walked around some military base for like an hour looking for it - it was realllllly amazing though when we finally asked some guards where it was. And then it was time to get to the airport for our flight. It was such an amazing trip!! I hope you liked reading about it :)
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Firenze, Italia
Florence is the third city of our Italian adventure so if you have not read about Milan and Venice yet, you should scroll down. Also, if you are not able to leave me comments, you should scroll even farther down and read my entry titled, "Follow my blog" so you know what to do and we can keep in touch!!
Tuesday, Feb. 3 cont.
Once again, we had a good location very close to the train station and the Duomo in Florence, but it was certainly a very different scene than Venice. This was very city-like, but different than Granada. We arrived at the hostel to find a sign taped to the door saying "call this number when you arrive." We had to wait about a half hour to get in, but once we did it was very nice. Our room was HUGE!! Check out the pics. We were very hungry (like always haha) and we set out to look for a restaurant. We found a place that looked nice and when we tried reading the menu outside, we realized that it was all in Japanese!! We were so confused and about to walk away when we saw a man laughing at us and waving us inside. He said you are not Japanese are you? Then he showed us the menu in English (this was obviously a very touristy place!) and we decided to stay. It was very nice inside, and (like most of Italy during these 10 days) full of Japanese people. We found out that Florence has more tourists than residents living in the city...which just baffles me! The food was really good and our waiter "Dustin" was absolutley hilarious!! He spoke to us with a New Jersey accent and when we asked him where he was from, he said he was from there. Of course 10 minutes later he told us that he was really from Italy and he just liked the New Jersey accent. We asked him how he learned English and he said he just picked it up in this restuarant and through people he met - so you can obviously see how many tourists come there!! He gave us free pizza bread when we were done eating because I think we were entertaining him. haha We got gelato before going home and went to bed exhausted from travelling.
Wed. February 4
We had breakfast in an adorable little nook in the hostel, and then went to The Gallery of the Accademia di Belle Arti which houses DAVID!! Michelangelo's David (1504) was one of the best things I saw on the entire trip. He has been in the Gallery since 1873 when they took him from the Piazza della Signoria (Which we also saw) to protect him from the weather. We saw replicas of him around Florence but seeing the real thing was sooooo amazing. I honestly can barely remember the rest of the art gallery - I stared at David for at least an hour. (We totally took illegal pics of him too so check them out haha.) The gallery also has a really cool instrument museum that was begun by the Medici family! We also saw the Duomo which was really cool on the outside and unlike anything else we had seen. Later, we went to the Piazza San Lorenzo which was like a HUGE flea market and walked around for a long time and saw the Medici Chapels where a lot of the Medici family (really important family in Florence from the 13th to 17th century - 3 popes!) is buried. We also went to a large indoor market where I had the best sandwich of my entire life, and all it was was salami and cheese!! It was so fresh - they sliced it right in front of us and it was sooo good! We also got super good almonds here! :) We walked around and window shopped and found out that Italian boys are even more aggressive than Spanish boys! (Which I didn't think was possible) For dinner we went to this amazing restaurant called Il Pirata and we paid 7 euro for an all you could eat buffet! There were a lot of Italians there, and it was very authentic and delicious!! (I discovered I really like pesto sauce?) I took pictures of the food so check it out! ;)
Thursday, Feb. 5
We started at Piazza della Signoria which has a copy of David, a bunch of other famous statues, and a really cool fountain. We took a thousand pictures there and then went to the Piazza/Basilica di Santa Croce (I know, I know - all these stinkin piazzas! You have to look at the pictures and then it will make sense!) which is where Michelangelo and Galileo and a bunch of other famous people are buried. There is a statue of Dante outside in the Piazza, but he is buried somewhere else. Next we went to the Uffizi Gallery which holds the world's most important collection of Renaissance art - oh my goodness it was humongous! There is soooo much art there it was ridiculous and I honestly cannot even remember most of it. We got some illegal pics...but for the most part it was just wandering around looking at art for 4 hours. It was really cool, but afterwards I was all arted out dude - I had no idea what most of it even was I just knew it was famous. A lot of the Medici family art collections and works by Michelangelo, Giotto, Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, and Raphael are here so that was cool. Then we went to Ponte Vecchio which I absolutely loved!! It was Florence's first bridge built in 1345 and it is the only bridge that survived from the Medieval days (all others were destroyed in World War II). It is lined with all these cute shops and the view is just amazing. When we went to find lunch, we discovered that everything closed at like 2 or 3 (or really whenever store owners want to close)...but after an hour of looking, we finally ate at Gusta Pizza because they stayed open for us and closed after we ate :) Then we climbed and climbed until we got to Piazzale Michelangelo which had an AMAZING view of the city and a green bronze copy of David ;) and then we got gelato and climbed even higher to the Basilica di San Miniato al Monte which is a Monastery that sits at one of the highest points of Florence (and obviously has a great view)! There was a huge cemetary there and it was a gorgeous day, so we stayed up there for a couple of hours and enjoyed the scenery. Afterwards, we went to see some friends who are studying in Florence in their apartment. (A presidential scholar and one of my good friends from ESA are studying there and it was so nice to see them!) It was cool to see their living conditions and how different they are from ours!! Even though it was fun and interesting, it made me really appreciate living with a family and living in Granada because it was just so different.
Friday, Feb. 6
We went back to San Lorenzo Market and bought pashminas (scarf like things made in italy out of cashmere and silk -sooo nice) and then window shopped some more and ate lunch at Il Pirata (I got Lasagna and it was amazing!!!) Then we took a 4 hour ghetto train ride (The whole side of the train was full of grafitti and it totally should not have taken 4 hours but it was the cheapest one! haha) And we were off to our fourth and final city!
Tuesday, Feb. 3 cont.
Once again, we had a good location very close to the train station and the Duomo in Florence, but it was certainly a very different scene than Venice. This was very city-like, but different than Granada. We arrived at the hostel to find a sign taped to the door saying "call this number when you arrive." We had to wait about a half hour to get in, but once we did it was very nice. Our room was HUGE!! Check out the pics. We were very hungry (like always haha) and we set out to look for a restaurant. We found a place that looked nice and when we tried reading the menu outside, we realized that it was all in Japanese!! We were so confused and about to walk away when we saw a man laughing at us and waving us inside. He said you are not Japanese are you? Then he showed us the menu in English (this was obviously a very touristy place!) and we decided to stay. It was very nice inside, and (like most of Italy during these 10 days) full of Japanese people. We found out that Florence has more tourists than residents living in the city...which just baffles me! The food was really good and our waiter "Dustin" was absolutley hilarious!! He spoke to us with a New Jersey accent and when we asked him where he was from, he said he was from there. Of course 10 minutes later he told us that he was really from Italy and he just liked the New Jersey accent. We asked him how he learned English and he said he just picked it up in this restuarant and through people he met - so you can obviously see how many tourists come there!! He gave us free pizza bread when we were done eating because I think we were entertaining him. haha We got gelato before going home and went to bed exhausted from travelling.
Wed. February 4
We had breakfast in an adorable little nook in the hostel, and then went to The Gallery of the Accademia di Belle Arti which houses DAVID!! Michelangelo's David (1504) was one of the best things I saw on the entire trip. He has been in the Gallery since 1873 when they took him from the Piazza della Signoria (Which we also saw) to protect him from the weather. We saw replicas of him around Florence but seeing the real thing was sooooo amazing. I honestly can barely remember the rest of the art gallery - I stared at David for at least an hour. (We totally took illegal pics of him too so check them out haha.) The gallery also has a really cool instrument museum that was begun by the Medici family! We also saw the Duomo which was really cool on the outside and unlike anything else we had seen. Later, we went to the Piazza San Lorenzo which was like a HUGE flea market and walked around for a long time and saw the Medici Chapels where a lot of the Medici family (really important family in Florence from the 13th to 17th century - 3 popes!) is buried. We also went to a large indoor market where I had the best sandwich of my entire life, and all it was was salami and cheese!! It was so fresh - they sliced it right in front of us and it was sooo good! We also got super good almonds here! :) We walked around and window shopped and found out that Italian boys are even more aggressive than Spanish boys! (Which I didn't think was possible) For dinner we went to this amazing restaurant called Il Pirata and we paid 7 euro for an all you could eat buffet! There were a lot of Italians there, and it was very authentic and delicious!! (I discovered I really like pesto sauce?) I took pictures of the food so check it out! ;)
Thursday, Feb. 5
We started at Piazza della Signoria which has a copy of David, a bunch of other famous statues, and a really cool fountain. We took a thousand pictures there and then went to the Piazza/Basilica di Santa Croce (I know, I know - all these stinkin piazzas! You have to look at the pictures and then it will make sense!) which is where Michelangelo and Galileo and a bunch of other famous people are buried. There is a statue of Dante outside in the Piazza, but he is buried somewhere else. Next we went to the Uffizi Gallery which holds the world's most important collection of Renaissance art - oh my goodness it was humongous! There is soooo much art there it was ridiculous and I honestly cannot even remember most of it. We got some illegal pics...but for the most part it was just wandering around looking at art for 4 hours. It was really cool, but afterwards I was all arted out dude - I had no idea what most of it even was I just knew it was famous. A lot of the Medici family art collections and works by Michelangelo, Giotto, Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, and Raphael are here so that was cool. Then we went to Ponte Vecchio which I absolutely loved!! It was Florence's first bridge built in 1345 and it is the only bridge that survived from the Medieval days (all others were destroyed in World War II). It is lined with all these cute shops and the view is just amazing. When we went to find lunch, we discovered that everything closed at like 2 or 3 (or really whenever store owners want to close)...but after an hour of looking, we finally ate at Gusta Pizza because they stayed open for us and closed after we ate :) Then we climbed and climbed until we got to Piazzale Michelangelo which had an AMAZING view of the city and a green bronze copy of David ;) and then we got gelato and climbed even higher to the Basilica di San Miniato al Monte which is a Monastery that sits at one of the highest points of Florence (and obviously has a great view)! There was a huge cemetary there and it was a gorgeous day, so we stayed up there for a couple of hours and enjoyed the scenery. Afterwards, we went to see some friends who are studying in Florence in their apartment. (A presidential scholar and one of my good friends from ESA are studying there and it was so nice to see them!) It was cool to see their living conditions and how different they are from ours!! Even though it was fun and interesting, it made me really appreciate living with a family and living in Granada because it was just so different.
Friday, Feb. 6
We went back to San Lorenzo Market and bought pashminas (scarf like things made in italy out of cashmere and silk -sooo nice) and then window shopped some more and ate lunch at Il Pirata (I got Lasagna and it was amazing!!!) Then we took a 4 hour ghetto train ride (The whole side of the train was full of grafitti and it totally should not have taken 4 hours but it was the cheapest one! haha) And we were off to our fourth and final city!
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