VIVE ESPANA

"Was that your first American?" "You can be my exotic American travel partner!"
"And then I left my key in the mens bathroom" "Ailie, itll be okay if you just brush your hair!" "But dont you want to practice your Spanish?"
"Just did." "God, I hope our sandwiches make it through security" "Hotdogging through Europe" "You dont get a ticket, you were rude!" "Sorry, I just speak French," "Moi aussi!"

Sorry for that. Needless to say, Spain was a good time. After an irritatingly long 8 hours of travel, we arrived at our hostel that was conveniently located to downtown and various historic locations. Although we arrived after 11, we decided to take a tour of Madrid and look for a retaurant or something.

What we found were three American girls, walking around looking for a place to get a drink. We tagged along with them and ended up getting a drink at a bar in Sol (I wont say what nationality, because its kind of embarassing). Anyway, came back home relatively early and fell asleep in our room which, at that point was empty.

On Wednesday, we woke up at a reasonable time and breakfasted on coffee (and croissant for Ailie). Feeling motivated, we walked out to El Paseo del Prado, in hopes of entering for free. We realized that we had to wait until 6 PM, so we wandered off towards Reina Sofia. We went in and it was pretty exciting, I got to see all of these Spanish paintings that Ive been studying since I was 14, including Guernica.

Im not sure how much of an "art" person I am. I feel like there are people out there that can just stare at something, and really appreciate it. I can only truly appreciate it if I understand at least some part of background. In other words, Art has to have context for me to consider it worth seeing. The propaganda, etc from the Spanish Civil war was really interesting to see. All that history I learned however long ago started stirring, and I was able to remember and fill in the gaps.

After the Reina Sofia, we traveled back to the hostel and went up to the terrace to enjoy the sun. We met some Americans, two 19 year olds from California who were doing 3 months traveling, and a guy from New Orleans who was taking just a few weeks. They were good people, and we went out with them that night. (There was some key issues, and possible sexual abuse, but thats not really important-just should note that no one got hurt....)

Thursday was a little more questionable. But we did still walk Madrid and the weather was absoultely perfect. We got groceries and made dinner. Somewhere in this mix, we met a couple Argentines that were studying in Barcelona, and ended up going out with them that night. In the process, we ran into some Erasmus kids we had met a few days before, and tagged along with them to some bar.

Friday we walked around and bought post cards, doing the tourist thing. We found Eli, Gabe, and Chris in the common room and made our sandwiches for our trip home. It sucks to say good bye to these amazing people, but c'est la vie.

Food-
Didnt actually eat at any Spanish restaurants, due to lack of fundage. We did however buy some chorizo and rice for about 3 euros, and made that last for FOUR MEALS. Yeah, we kicked Spains comida ass!

I did though come home to find the grandparents having a little fete with a tiny slice left of some sort of gateau. I had french cake, french cheese, french baguette, and a glass of french milk. I was disgusted with myself.