¿como se dice "ghetto"?

This is going to be a long one, you might want to grab a refreshing drink and make sure your seat is comfortable...

Friday morning, we departed on our first long weekend trip that we planned all by ourselves. Almost everyone was going to Sevilla at some point, so we started out on the same train- a high speet bullet train called the AVE. We left from Atocha station here in Madrid, which was exciting to me because in Spanish classes in high school, Atocha was always referenced on listening exercises- ¿A que hora salió el tren desde Atocha? (Side note: America needs a bullet train system!)

The 4 traveling in our little group, Ashley, Audrey, Corinne, and myself, took the AVE all the way to Sevilla and saw another classmate by himself at the station, so we all decided to leave together. We couldn´t all fit into one taxi, so we rode the bus to the hostel. The only problem was that we got on the bus going in the wrong direction, so for 1€ we ended up getting an hour long scenic tour of Sevilla´s "hood". At one point, the driver even stopped the bus and got off... I was a little concerned for my life at that point. Hahaha. Finally, after that little adventure, we found our hostel, which was super clean and nice, filled with students and the occasional grungy backpacker--although we experienced some of that "customer service" that seems to be prominent in Spain-- aka "they'll get to you when they get to you and no sooner." I think I heard more English being spoken in Sevilla than Spanish, however.
Speaking of which, late Saturday night we were walking around the town to try and find a certain Flamenco place (Flamenco in itself, at that point, was seeming more like a running joke that native Sevillans kept up with the tourists- kind of like snipe hunting in the US) I suggested that we stop and ask this girl I had heard speaking in English about Flamenco outside a restaurant we had just passed. When we backtracked, I heard Audrey say ¨Hey, don´t I know you?¨to the guy outside the restaurant. As it turns out, this guy, apparently a former Appalachian student, has been living in Spain for about a year, and we just happened to encounter him in the street that night! How crazy is that? We took pictures to doccument the occasion.

Anyway, the cathedral in Sevilla is one of the largest in the world and even holds a Guiness record for largest cubic footage. We were able to climb the belltower to get some amazing views of the city, and the bells sounded while I was up there, which caused everyone to jump because of the sheer volume! There is a monument in this cathedral that supposedly contains the remains of Christopher Columbus, but there is quite a bit of controversy surrounding the facts.
Later Friday night we saw multitudes of well-dressed people flocking towards the cathedral for a wedding. I can´t even imagine what it would be like to be married in a church like that, or not to mention, how much it would cost!!
On our way back to the hostel that night, I was finally on the receiving end of civilian paranoia- when waiting to cross the street, a man in a car stopped at the same intersection locked his doors- and we heard it! I always worry when I´m driving around Winston that the newspaper salesmen/homeless people/pedestrians can hear me lock my car doors and will get sad about it, and wouldn´t you know, you CAN actually hear it. Hahaha.

The next morning (Saturday) the 4 of us took a bus the 3 hours through fields of sunflowers and mountains covered in modern windmills to Tarifa, the sourthernmost point of Spain, and more importantly, the beach! It was a pretty picturesque coastal town, and very old and full of history. The Atlantic glistened shades of blue and green on our right, and the Mediterranean on the other, connected by the Strait of Gibraltar. The most exciting part for me was the fact that we could see the Moroccan coastline fairly clearly!! The one thing I learned, however, is that SPF 30 just doesn´t cut it when you´re only 15 kilometers away from Africa- to say I´m a little burnt is an understatement- but it HAS improved since Saturday!
Leaving, we made it to the bus stop around 5, but the bus didn´t show up until almost 5:30 (it was supposed to leave at 5:10) and I tried not to worry, especially because Ashley was freaking out enough for all of us! There was a younger Spanish guy at the stop too, who told us he was waiting on the bus to Sevilla as well and tried to assure us that we hadn´t missed it.

Sunday we woke up early (again.. sigh) to catch the train to Córdoba, mainly to see the world-famous cathedral there, reconstructed by Christians centuries ago from what used to be a mosque. (Spain has a lot of these). We hadn´t thought about the fact that on Sunday, it would be closed for mass services! Ooooops. After that we went to this house/museum hybrid in the Jewish quarter, which I blame on the fact that we were bored and it smelled really good inside- like oranges and cloves! Instead of the advertised "guided tour", it ended up being 40 minutes of listening to this guy talk in Spanish about things that only other Jewish people could appreciate- it was pretty ridiculous. We recovered by leaving and hitting up a very traditionally Spanish eatery- Burger King. Sundaes here (like ice cream sundaes) are called "Sandys" (say it with a Spanglish accent and it sounds more like sundae), which we ordered in Spanish, which pretty much cracked me up.

After returning to Madrid, we were super tired but stayed up to watch the final fútbol match (I will never be able to call it "soccer" ever again after being here) of the season for Real Madrid, which was also the La Liga championship- and more significantly for Ashley and I, the final game for David Beckham. (que triste.)
Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes were at the game, accompanied by Beckham´s wifey- my favorite former Spice Girl, Victoria. I can´t even describe how deep the obsession with fútbol runs in Spain. After the game ended, almost immediately we could hear fireworks and people yelling and cheering in the streets, little kids singing, and drivers honking their horns all in time, late into the early morning hours. Colin (aka "El Chico" thanks to Esperanza the Crazy Maid) had gone out with some other people to watch the game and celebrate, and showed us some crazy pictures of people waving flags and jumping around and climbing on top of statues in plazas and the metro exit signs. Unfortunately, our poor little Chico got his wallet stolen out of his pocket while in the crowd (my favorite Spanish word ever is the word for crowd: muchedumbre). His pickpocket was not as dumb as mine had been, however, and by the time he got back to the apartment and called his dad to cancel his debit card, his bank account had been drained. I was so sad for him! Mavi couldn´t believe one of us had been robbed again- I thought she was going to faint.

Last night I went to Reina Sophia to see the Guernica, Picasso´s huge famous mural about the air raid on the small Spanish town with the same name. It was pretty exciting. Tonight is the big birthday party with all of Mavi´s family, her kids, and their significant others, and I´m so excited! Tomorrow is Mavi´s birthday, and the three of us are going to go buy her a present tonight. (at VIPs... holla. haha)

Okay, I think I´ve talked enough and the internet café man didn´t go on break just for my sake, so I ought to get going. Hope you are all doing really well! Thanks for the emails, and I apologize for not being able to respond individually!

Erin