Puerta del Sol

Today we went for a walk in Puerta del Sol, which I guess translates as Door of the Sun...anyway, it was very nice. This is another really good place to shop and eat. There are a lot of bands playing on the street and stree performers too, as you will see in the following pictures.

This resturant that we went to serves Churros con chocolate, which is very very good. This is me, Jenny and Jana; all girls from my program. Jenny lives in my apartment and Jana lives close by.

There are the churros con chocolate...mmmmm

These are Churros, and I don't really know how to explain them but they are kind of like doughnut sticks. They are dense inside and deep fried with a sweet taste.

The hot chocolate is not like what we have in the states. It is much thicker, almost like a chocolate bar melted, literally. Its very strong, but good.

I got dared to do this....so think what you want....

This is on an escalator in the biggest department store in Spain, Corte Ingles. If you ask a Spaniard where to get something, they will tell you Corte Ingles. Its a cool store, but most things are over priced. Its strange because you can't really compare it to anything we have because they have cheap off brand names right next to the most expensive brand name there is...its a true department store.

Here is a street band....The first time I saw them I thought they belong in Mexico...but I guess that is just the traditional outfits. :)

This is another band and I have a video of them in the following post. They played for like an hour in the same spot.

This is NOT a statue. This is a real guy; a street performer...you can see his little can for donations. :) It reminds me of Goldfinger.

P.S. By the way...we went to Corte Ingles (ha ha) and bought some cables to connect to the internet so I have inernet now. (unless the power goes out again, which seems to happen a lot) The important thing is that I should be set with this cable and it is a fast connection. Yay!

When the Saints go Marching in

This is a band that was playing on the street where we were shopping today and they were so good that I decided to take a video of them.. There are lots of bands like this one around, especially on beautiful, warm days like today.

El Parque de Gran Retiro and more

This building is one of my favorites on Grand Via (near where we live). I'm not sure what it is, but I really like the dome on it. This picture is kind of dark so I am going to try to get a better one, but we don't usually walk past it. This will be good enough for now.

This is a huge monument in the park. You might be able to see all the people sitting on the steps in front of it too. This park is where a lot of peole come and just hang out. My friends told me that last week they saw Minnie Mouse and Piglet there. :) In the day during siesta there is usually activities and entertainment, but as you can see, we went at dusk so we didn't see any of that.

This is the entrance to the park. I am sure it is much more beautiful in the spring when all the flowers are out.

This big...thing...is in the middle of a roundabout (they don't have regular intersections) and I don't know if you can read it or not, but it says King Carlos the fifth, I think, in latin and then there is a year under it that I can't read cause its roman numerals. I just thought it was cool.

This building is the post office, so I am told. When we were there I kept seeing signs for the Bank of Spain, so I think it might be that too. I'm not sure :)

Oh No!!!

Well, my worst nightmare came true. I came home sunday night from Alexandra's house and turned on my computer to find that our internet connection has been disabled. The way things work in Spain is that the telephone company will come when they have time, but there are so few people who know how to repair wireless routers and this is a huge city, so there is not much hope of them coming soon. This means that I won't be able to write as much but I will do my best. I hope it gets fixed soon!!!

Jamon Iberico

Here is a picture of some pig legs for sale at the local supermarket in Quintanar. Actually this is very common in spain, and these particular legs are nicer than the ones I have seen in Madrid. Usually they still have the skin on them on one side and are kind of greenish white...ewww. Apparently Iberian Ham (jamos iberico) is famous, so they think they have to display it everywhere...or something. I´m not quite sure what you would do with one of those once you have bought it...but like I said, this is very common here and people think nothing of it when they walk past the meat markets that have legs hanging in the window.

Video

Here is a video that I took at Alexandra´s house. Her brother had this little singing dog that he got from the lady that their mom cleans house for. Its so wierd, I just had to post it. :)

More Pictures

Here are the rest of the pictures from this weekend. They are net very exciting so sorry about that. I hope to go somewhere exciting soon but I'm waiting for my friends to catch up to my excitement, instead of sleeping and being on their computers all the time. I know they want to go places too, they just talk and don't act. Anyways... :) These are pictures from Segovia (the mountains ones) and a mall just outside of Madrid. If you are thinking that Europe doesn't have malls, you are definately wrong. They have malls for sure and they are huge! This one that I went to had a skiing hill, a go cart track, two levels of food courts, and lots and lots of stores.

This weekend

Here is a picture of me and Alexandra at the Nevadacerrada skiing area. I hesitate to say resort because its not. The story behind this is that her friends were planning a ski trip to what she thought was the Seirra Nevadas in Granada, but what they really meant was Nevadacerrada, which is just outside Madrid near Seovia. We were both really desappointed that we weren't going to Granada to ski and when we got to Nevadcerrada, the others didn't want to ski because there were too many people. They then proceeded to take us to a mall with an indoor skiing hill that cost 60 dollars for 4 hours. I told Alexandra that I didn't want to pay that much for fake skiing and she agreed, so we went shopping at the mall while the others skiied. So basically my weekend was spent in a shopping mall and in a car; a little disappointing compared to what I was looking forward to. We still had fun shopping though, and it was nice to spend sunday with her family and learn some more about cooking here :)

My Address

For those of you who have been asking, here is my address:
c/San Bernardino 8
2nd Izquierda
28015 Madrid, Spain

This goes to my landlord and he delivers the mail to everyone in the builiding. Its easier that way and safer.

Downtown Madrid

Today we walked home from school indstead of taking the subway, and so we got to see a lot more of the city. I took some pictures of buildings that are normal for downtown Madrid. It is unusually cold here right now so it was a very brisk walk, but it was really cool to see all the buildings and people around downtown. It took us about 30 minutes to walk back to the apartment, which isn't that bad. I think it is better to walk and save my money indstead of buying a metro ticket. The view is beautiful, so why not? Oh, and speaking of the city: Steve, just so you know, not all of the sirens in Madrid sound like the ones in the Bourne movies. Most of them are normal like what we have in the states. Although I have heard the "european" ones a couple of times. :) Thought you might like to know that.

Something Funny

Here is my dog Simon trying to find me. I was talking to my parents on voice chat and we had my webcam on and Simon heard my voice but couldn't fiind me. My mom said that he keeps going in my room to look for me. He would cock his head every time I talked and it was really funny. Isn't he cute?

Food

I thought you all might be interested in the food I am eating here. We first I have to say that I haven't found anything that I don't like yet. Everything is pretty good. For those of you who don't know, Spaniards eat a lot of seafood and cook everything in olive oil. The food is very healthy here, much more healthy than the US. The only thing that is strange is that milk is bought in one liter cartons like orange juice and it doesn't have to be refrigerated. It is displayed out on the shelves of the store with the cereal and chips. Very strange, but its still milk. The first weekend I was here, I went to Burger King with my friend Alexandra. They have Burger King and McDonald's everywhere here, as well as starbucks. I think there is a starbucks on every corner. But its a lot more expensive than in the US.
These are gambas, or shrimp boiling in the pot below. You can see that they are the whole shrimp, eyes and all. It is better to cook them this way and then you break the head off and the shell and just eat the inside. It has a better flavor than just the inside that is sold in packages. To buy this kind, you have to go to the supermarket and order it at the seafood counter like we would order meat and stuff at the deli. I have a picture of the fish counter below.

This is where you can buy fresh fish. I'm sure you can imagine how it smelled when I took that picture. I'm not sure if people buy the whole fish, but I wouldn't be surprised if they did. :)

This is a a resturant on Gran Via, near where I live. It is the street where all the shopping and activities are. This restaurant is called the Nebraska, which I thought was kind of odd. I had Tortellini, as you can see.

These are empanadas and croquetes (i'm not sure on the spelling) The bigger ones are the empanadas and they are cooked in olive oil and they have a mixture of tuna and tomato sauce inside. The croquetes are also cooked in oil and have puree chicken and some sauce. They are both really good. It kind of sounds gross when it's described, but really its good.

School

Here are some pictures of my first day of classes. I am in the higher level class and my professora is very nice. We discovered the library and also a small bakery nearby that has some very good pastries. I have class from 9 in the morning to 1:30 with a 30 minute break at 11.

Plaza Mayor

Today I went to the Plaza Mayor, which is a 10 minute walk from my apartment. I went at night and it was beautiful. Chloe, I hope you are looking at these!!

This weekend I went to a friend´s house. Her name is Alexandra and she is Romanian but she lives in Quintanar, Spain which is like an hour from Madrid. She met me on saturday night and we went ice skating with some of her friends. It was a lot of fun. Then we drove to her house and on sunday I went to her church. It is a Romanian church so my spanish didn´t help me but it was nice. Its a pentacostal church, so things are done a little differently. Tomorrow is a holiday here so I will stay with Ale until monday night. Here are some pics from her house and ice skating. Her family was soooo nice and it helped me to not be so sad about missing my family. She has two younger brothers. Enjoy :)

In Spain

Well, I finally made it to Spain! So far I have just talked to my parents but I hope that I will be able to talk to some of you all as well. It has been a crazy few days. There has been a lot of things that I didn't expect, but so far everything is going pretty well. I am in an apartment with 2 girls from my program on the same floor. There are some other people on our floor too but I haven't really met them. They are all students like me though. The students in my program are....well let's just say..interesting to be nice. The girls are picky eaters and all brought like twice as much luggage as I did. The two girls on my floor are nice though. One is from New Jersey and the other is from Oregon. They are a little more down to earth i think.

Madrid is a beautiful city from what I have seen so far. It is very clean, which is something I didn't really expect. The weather is nice. Its like in the 50's and mostly sunny. This weekend is a holiday (El Dia de los Reyes). Its to celebrate when the wise men came to visit Jesus when he was born. They actually give their gifts on this day instead of Christmas. The streets are so busy because of this and there is a huge parade tonight.

I haven't really done any shopping, but I will have to soon because I have to do something with my room. Its not very appealing right now. We live near la Gran Via, which is a huge street that is full of stores and hotels and anything you would want to find. (Andrea-- I found an H&M :) Things are pretty expensive here though so I am definately going to be careful about how much I am spending.

Spanish is coming pretty easily for me. I haven't really had any communication problems. I think Spaniards are a lot easier to understand than other hispanics that I have talked to.

Well I think that is all for now. I have one picture that I took so far, and it has been so crazy that I haven't thought to take more. Don't worry, I will. I want to thank everyone for praying for me and please don't stop. I think I need it more now than ever. This is going to be a huge adjustment.
Talk to you all soon!!!

So my mom just realized that my brother is graduating the same day that I get back from Spain! The graduation is at 7 and my flight comes in at 3:25 as of now. So I need to find someone that can pick me up from the airport. If anyone can help me out, please le me know!