Seville

Hola de España! I am going to have the hardest time not typing in Spanish right now. I´ve been having the time of my life brushing up on the language, and automatically start thinking in Spanish now, after just a few days! I wish I knew so much more, I love conversing with the people here but I have to warn them that solo hablo poquito Español.

I´m traveling with my four good friends from the BU program, and we just met up with some of our guy friends in Madrid (we booked the same hostel, the same floor, and didn´t even know it!). It´s an absolute blast traveling with my friends. We´re having an awesome time just taking it all in, struggling through the language together. We left Dublin Thursday night and arrived in Alicante, Spain at around midnight. Our flight to Sevilla, the real destination, wasn´t until 6am, so we all experienced our first all-nighter in an airport. Totally safe, there were guards and everything, so no worries there. But nothing was open, as we had anticipated. We stepped outside to at least say we breathed some Alicante air and it was WARM. Warm. So amazing. There were palm trees. We were psyched. We also met some great people who pulled the same all-nighter, a girl from Brazil and a boy from Madrid. He was so helpful giving us a list of places to go and food to try.

We arrived in Sevilla at last at around 11am the next day and passed out until 5pm. Luckily, one of the girls I´m with had a bunch of friends studying in Sevilla, so we had great tour guides to show us around the city that night.

Sevilla is beautiful. Even beyond our obsession with the palm trees, the narrow stone streets and flora everywhere is awesome and architecture is so fascinating. My favorite part was La Catedral de Sevilla, the largest cathedral I have ever seen. There were paintings covering every surface, countless altars adorned in gold, statues everywhere, and the ceilings were phenomenally high. There is a 34 story tower that gives you the BEST view of the city, and yes, we climbed it. Instead of stairs, however, you climb ramps to get up, originally built that way so that they could ride horses up. Looking out over the city was amazing. Tiny dots of every color umbrella swarmed through the stone streets amongst yellow-beige buildings with brightly colored doorways. Even with the rainy weather it was so colorful.

My favorite thing about Sevilla is the trees. There are orange trees and an occasional lemon tree EVERYWHERE you go, just orchards of them. They are not edible, we were warned, but they were so pretty, adding more splashes of color to every street. We got a good amount of rain, but it held off when we really needed it to, like during the walking tour. We learned all about the history of Sevilla, learned funny legends that always ended in someone converting to Christianity. Sevilla is the most Catholic place I have ever been.

The hostel we stayed at, The Garden, was amazing. The employees were so interesting to talk to and very helpful, providing the walking tour and a tour of the city at night. They also had a paella (this amazing Spanish rice dish) and sangria night for just 6 euro, which was absolutely declicious. Most of the other food we had wasn´t very Spanish, but since we were on a different meal schedule than is customary in Spain, it was hard to find places open. Meals are much later here, approximately at 11, 3, and then 9pm. Nightlife doesn´t start until midnight and most places don´t close until at least 6am. Not that we stayed out that late! ;)

Yesterday we sadly left for the 6 hour busride to Madrid, in a surprisingly comfortable bus that provided more leg room than I´ve ever seen in a vehicle. Yeah, that was wonderful. We arrived in Madrid, met up with the guys I mentioned previously, and hit the town for dinner. This proved to be problematic. None of us know the area at all, and we wandered in the rain for a solid half hour before we found a place that was serving la cena, the dinner. We all had a good laugh there, because the man wouldn´t let us order from anything but the American food on the menu. I kid you not, we had fries, a hot dog without a bun, a hamburger without a bun, a fried egg, and a tomato. That was the dish. We figured he went into the back and scratched his head thinking what Americans eat. We just wanted paella!

It was fantastic to meet up with our friends. It really brightened up the trip for us, and we´re headed out in a bit to explore the city with them in the gorgeous sunshine outside. Finally, sunshine!

Mas de Madrid luego!