¡Feliz Finde!

Learned a great new word from my Spanish intercambio...


finde- (n) derived from the phrase "fin de semana" which means weekend.


Anyway, I had a good one in Madrid this finde.


It started off on Thursday with a much overdue and much needed run.  Ever since the shin splints and illness (which I'm still still still getting over) I have been kind of out of commission and lazy. NO MORE!


Thursday afternoon I met with my intercambio, Sergio, and some of the other kids who have intercambios.  But really no one came to the meeting, except 4 American kids and my intercambio and one other, who is friends with Sergio.  She is really nice, Blanca, and said that we should all hang out, so thats another Spanish friend to add to the list!


Anyway, Thursday night I did a bit of Tapas bar hopping with Jenna, which is always a delight.  We even botelloned at the end (drank a bottle of wine in the center of the plaza just people watching the Spaniards go by), which is actually illegal but everyone does it.  We made friends with some Portuguese guys sitting next to us and chatted a bit in Spanish.


Friday was off to Toledo with IES.  Its great to see these places again, because a) I don't remember much from my whirlwind week in Spain.  b) It looks different in winter.  c) I'm not seeing everything from just a Jewish perspective.


Toledo was nice. A small escape from the city, with narrow winding streets.  We saw a really cool cathedral (yeah this one actually was pretty cool and stands out more than the others) and church and a convent.  Oh wait, there was a synagogue (WHAT?!) thrown in there somewhere.  It was nice to see some Hebrew and the Spanish explanations of all the Jewish stuff, like the circumcision knife...

artsy fartsy picture in the cathedral

Cool painting on the wall (it was huge) of a Saint holding baby Jesus and carrying him over the river

Sun light in the cathedral to let the angels in 9or out?).  Reallllly cool. the ceiling was painted and there were sculptures of angels around the top. 

The bishops...the most recent ones

Hebrew! outside where the tombs were.

translation

convent patio. very pretty.

During free time I walked along the river with some friends, which was a great break from the museuming and church touring.  I got to eat my lunch with an awesome view over the Rio Tejo.

lunch vista

hoodlums at the river.

Really cool river graffiti

Toledo is also really big on marzipan, they have marzipan shops everywhere! I didn't get one, and was really regretting it on the bus, but then some girl offered me part of hers and it was delicious!


Friday night was pretty uneventful.  I did manage to speak to more random people in Spanish, after these guys asked me to take their picture.  They were a group of middle aged men from the south of Spain, all friends from high school and on their yearly excursion to Madrid.  They were very friendly (probably a little borracho) and then they invited us to join them for drinks, but the girls I was with declined, probably a good idea.


The highlight of Saturday was going to see La Casa de Bernarda Alba, a classic play by Federico García Lorca that I had to see for class.  I have read this play twice, seen the movie once, but still, the best way to experience a play is to actually see it on stage.  It was a really memorable experience, seeing this Spanish classic in a small intimate theater in Spain.  I had an awe moment when I realized I was actually seeing a García Lorca play in Spain.  The interpretation was interesting, and honestly a little strange at some parts, but it was still really exciting and fun to see.

Backdrop for the La Casa de Bernarda Alba

After the play and some other shenanigans, I went bar hopping with a few kids in the trendy alternative area of Madrid.  We ended up running into another girl on our program and her "really rich"36 year old dentist man she has been seeing for a week.  Anyway, they were there for a birthday party, so we kind of got to join in on that and next thing I knew I had made another Spanish friend!  There were two girls I was talking to, one whose name I don't remember, but the other one was Virginia, who is a pharmacist.  She was really really nice and really excited to talk to me, and wanted to make sure I didn't leave without exchanging numbers.  That being said, I am not too sure on the calling back policy or whatever for 30 year old female pharmacist friends...this is uncharted territory for me.  Anyway, one of the funniest parts of the night is that all these people we were with smoke.  I was dying at the hypocrisy of the situation, the dentists (a lot of them were dentists), pharmacist, and other professional people all going outside for their cigarettes.  


After the leaving the bar I made my way to the night bus.  The very nice bus driver offered me a carmello as I was coughing up my right lung.  Maybe he was just annoyed with all my coughing since I was sitting right near the drivers seat, but anyway I declined the carmello explaining that I have a deep chest cough and a carmello wouldn't do anything.  I then spent the rest of the bus ride trying to stifle my coughs, or at least limit them to 5 per minute.  Was in bed by 4 though, so it was an early night. 


Today I went to a really great museum, Museo de Sorolla.  Sorolla is a Spanish artist and the museum is in his old house.  Its a great museum because although it has his whole collection of paintings, it is also in his beautiful house, with gorgeous gardens styled after gardens or courtyards in south Spain, and personal items.  It also explains a lot about his career and technique.  One of the rooms was his studio, and it was set up in more or less the same way, with all of his art supplies still there as well.  Also, a lot of the rooms were designed to be very specific, like the studio, and he even commissioned a room to look like one of the rooms in El Escorial, that monastery I went to a few weeks ago.  It was a great museum because it was more than just paintings and titles, and you could really see into the life and style of this guy.

Garden modeled after the generalife at the Alhambra

Self portrait of Sorolla

room modeled after El Escorial (note the blue tiles on the wall)

My favorite cuadro chiquitito

Tiffany's lamp from New York circa 1911

Sorolla's art supplies

On the way there I also saw a plaque on a house where Severo Ochoa, a famous Spanish scientist from the Franco era, used to live.  That was unexpected and cool.

To finish off Sunday, I went on a run in Retiro and ended up making another Spanish friend, also over 30.  This guy Christian just started talking to me as I was stretching in the grass under the beautifully blooming almond trees.  I guess he likes to talk to strangers, but he is a translator and was great to talk to because he was really into talking and correcting me.  We chatted for a long time about a lot of stuff, but then I got cold since it was not a typical sunny Madrid day, and so I had to go.  We exchanged numbers, he invited me to hang out and maybe play tennis or volleyball with him and his friends in the park, since he's a big sports guy.  


Anyway, I'm 4/4 on making Spanish friends this finde!  Now I just need to figure out when to actually hang out with all these people...


I came home, did some homework (boo, I hate that reality has to exist here) and then had dinner with Pilar and Sergey.  I was so hungry I scarfed down the fried rice/fish freezer bag on top of fried potatoes/ham freezer bag, on top of fried pork filets.  Just as I was taking one of my last bites of filet, thinking it was the saltiest thing I had ever eaten, Pilar took a bite and said that the filets lacked some salt, did I want to add some?


WHAT?! But hey, thats Spain for ya...