I went to Madrid!

Palabra del día: altavoz
Translation: speaker
Frase: La semana pasada alguien instaló un altavoz en el techo del baño y escuché a la música pop cuando me duchaba.
Translation: Last week someone installed a speaker in the bathroom ceiling and I listened to pop music while I showered. (True story, though I haven't heard music in there since then).

Comida del día: Torta del virgen

 Last week there were a lot of religious processionals in honor of the virgen, and there is a special food to celebrate as well.  It's basically sweet bread with some sort o filling, and it comes in many flavors.  I got one from the delicious bakery next door, which sells giant pastries for very cheap and smells like freshly baked bread all day, every day.  The flavor I chose was called "cabello de angel," which means angel hair.  I thought this choice was a bit risky but thankfully it tasted like orange marmelade.  I'm wondering how angels have any hair left on their head if their hair tastes that good!

Foto del día: 

Here I am in front of the Palacio Real, which was our first stop in Madrid this weekend.  The palace was gigantic with ornate decorations in each of its 25 rooms.

 Traveling from Granada to Madrid last weekend reminded me in some ways of a trip from Boston to New York.  Madrid is huge, crowded, expensive, has a wide variety of diverse neighborhoods and restaurants, has tons of tourists, and is great for shopping.  Its modern buildings don't reach as high as New York's skyscrapers, but they were still a shock after living with Granada's small hillside houses for the past few weeks. And though Granada is smaller than Boston, they are both more livable and student-friendly compared to their larger counterparts.

I went on this trip with 5 friends from the program, which was convenient because we got a room in a hostel all to ourselves.  About an hour after arriving in Madrid, we agreed that we were glad we chose Granada as a place to study abroad.  It wasn't that we didn't like Madrid; it's just that Madrid seemed like a great city for visiting, rather than for living.  We were also upset that we had to pay so much money for food, instead of getting free tapas with our drinks like we are used to in Granada.  After making these comparisons, we decided to stop comparing and start enjoying everything the city had to offer, and we definitely made the most of our 2.5 days there.  Here are some highlights:

1. Food: Of course I have to talk about the food.  Madrid was great because it had more options.  I had been getting a bit sick of spanish food (there's only so much tortilla one can eat!) so I was happy that we got to eat at an Indian restaurant and a Mexican restaurant.  We also stopped at a Starbucks, where I got iced tea and a chocolate chip cookie - two foods that don't seem to exist in Spain!  We were shocked at the prices though.  If you thought Starbucks was overpriced in the US, don't try it in Spain.  In terms of real Spanish food, we ate at a delicious Tapas restaurant called Lateral that had plenty of vegetarian options.  Thanks for the recommendation, Amy!

2. Museums: On Saturday we went to the Prado, a giant museum with lots of traditional Spanish art.  It was very impressive, but after about an hour everything started to look the same to me...I really enjoyed the Reina Sofia modern art museum, which we went to the next day.  It had big glass elevators, lots of works by Picasso and Dali, and a really neat exhibit about a film artist that included a recreation of his studio and contained all of his old film equipment.

3. Retiro Park: This was a beautiful and very large city park near the museums, which was originally built for the kind and queen. We rented rowboats and had lots of fun paddling around.

4. Shopping: On Saturday, we went vintage shopping in an area called Malasaña.  This cute cafe, which we stopped at one morning for what I like to call "second breakfast," is also located there:

We also went to El Rastro flea market, which is the (only) thing to do on Sunday mornings in Madrid.  It was probably 20 blocks long, and full of great bargains!  I think bought a few more things than I should have, but I did get some good souveniers, including a scarf, earrings, a skirt, and a flamenco guitar CD.

5. Nightlife: on Friday night we decided to check out a giant discoteca called El Kapitan.  We got there around 1:30 am, and when I left at 3:30 there were still people pouring in.  It's pretty normal to stay at a discoteca until 6 am, and most don't close until 8.  The club had four different floors and was still jam packed, but it was definitely fun to experience Spanish nightlife in a big city.

I thoroughly enjoyed the sites and variety that Madrid had to offer, but by Sunday night I was  ready to go back to Granada, get some sleep, and return to the land of free tapas and beautiful landscapes.