Mi casa en España:

I can call it "my" house because it really was. 

Here's proof:

 

The view from the balcony off my room was a joy to behold each morning. Every day of my week in Spain produced a beautiful azure sky, full of promise and, dare I say, adventure(?). 

Seriously though, I think it's bluer there...

Madrid Museums

If there's one thing for sure, it's that Madrid has quite a handful of museums and galleries-- The Prado,  Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, and Museum Thyssen-Bornemisza are the "big three," but there are tons of others. During my stint in Spain's capital I ended up seeing the San Fernando Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Reina Sofía, Museo Sorolla, CaixaForum, and La Casa Encendida.

Here's my very simplistic rundown:

My last night in Spain

So as I mentioned, the home at which I stayed for the majority of my visit to Spain was too far from the airport for me to arrive there on time for my early flight. I have a good friend who has relatives in Madrid, however, so--connections, connections, connections--I had an excellent back-up.

Melanie, a first grade English teacher at a bilingual school, took me out for a genuine Spanish night on the town. We first headed to El Mercado de San Anton for tapas, and it was so great!

El Rastro, etc. (Madrid día..cinco?)

Yeesh, talk about backlog. I already gave my disclaimer/apology a while back, so we won't waste time with that. You know how it is. Anyway, let's get back to Spain, shall we?

On Sunday mornings in one particular section of Madrid, there is a large street market called El Rastro. Fernando and I ventured down there to check it out the giant flea market, and it reminded me so much of Thailand. We mostly just looked/walked around though, because unlike Thailand, there was no bargaining, and it wasn't dirt-cheap. Oh well, still an experience...

Let's see...where was I...?

If you don't follow me on twitter (or if you're not in my immediate family)-- I made it to Italy! For the sake of consistency, however, I'm just going to keep on posting pics in chronological order (not to mention I just arrived here a couple hours ago and don't plan to actually explore for a few days anyway).

After Toledo's whole adventure I was ready to head back to the streets of Madrid. Here are some pics from my wanderings on Saturday. I hope you're not getting bored of the zillion pictures of buildings, because that's pretty much all you're gonna get. I'm not much for posing for the camera...You'll just have to believe me; I promise I was actually there taking the picture :)

pictures from Toledo

Here are the pictures promised in my rambling Toledo post from yesterday. Maybe you can see how it's possible to get lost there...

A lovely park on the way to the walled old city.

Thar she blows...

one last picture of the less-interesting, non-walled city :)

Here marks the "main"entrance to the city.

Brace yourself for a ton of pictures of the uphill-then-downhill winding roads, the tiny alleys, and amidst this hectic design, the hidden gems that pop out in between...

on wandering (or, getting lost).

If not also "God," all souls should keep on their minds at all time the word--and directive--"Smile." Today I was reminded as such, and suffered the consequences of not having those words at the ready when my day began.

[So…If you couldn't tell, I'm currently reading David Copperfield. I'll veer away from Dickensonian writing now and go back to my own style of rambling. DO comment if you'd prefer the former, as it is, of occasion, an altogether entertaining test of one's abilities to ___[steer?] towards alternative syntactical arrangements.]

On to the story: Toledo…

:)

Me? A tourist? Why would you ever guess that??

Oh, is it the sunglasses/camera/backpack/sweater-tied-around-the-waist combo?

Darn. And I was feeling so local, too...

-M

Strike-day adventures (Madrid- día dos)

¡Hola otra vez!

[I have added in the pictures that I promised earlier]

In yesterday's post, I mentioned that a nation-wide strike took place on March 29. [My mom insists that I bring on strikes wherever I go-- in Honduras (summer 2009), I left the day that a military coup occurred; in Thailand (summer 2010), a huge political demonstration by the Red Shirts took place in Bangkok; now, this. Maybe she's right...]

In any case, the strike meant that it would be very difficult to utilize public transit, so a few of my host's friends took me on a little day trip. We first visited a nearby town, called San Lorenzo de El Escorial. It has a large monastery, with lovely gardens that we walked around for a while.

Madrid- día uno

I did a decent amount on my first day in Spain's capital city, so settle in and prepare for a lengthy (potentially verbose) retelling…

My walk to the bus stop. Not too shabby: 

Once I made it to central Madrid (35min bus ride + 5min metro), I started at... 

Let's talk food...

Originally, I wanted to do a neat little thing, similar to Kendall's photo-per-run endeavor, where I documented all of my dinners in Europe. I knew it might get tedious, but I didn't anticipate trashing the idea by day 2, haha. Needless to say, I have yet to take a picture of my meals in Spain, but oh well. I got the meals on the flight at least:

The journey

Well heyyyyy y'all! [How's that for sounding touristy?] My internet's been quite spotty, and my brain has been quite exhausted, so forgive me for the absence. I expect this is going to happen rather frequently, however, so…accept this as my apology in-advance for the next month or so. I'll post when I can, and I'm sorry if it's not as often as your curious little minds desire : )

Let's just start with the trip over. Here are the stats:

the view from up here...

I don't love flying, but I do love the view that it provides. On my flight over, I was able to witness a gorgeously starry night sky, an utterly breathtaking sunrise, and this staggering snapshot of the Alps (well, the Alps are staggering, not necessarily my photography of them).

{for you East-coasters, those little hills at the bottom of the shot are probably about the size of the Appalachians.}

Tomorrow I'm exploring downtown Madrid, so at some point you can look forward to pics of that...hopefully (my camera spontaneously deleted a picture of that sunrise I mentioned, so I hope I'm not working with faulty hardware here...).

-M

MM (#20?)

Woooooo Hooooo!

This week, I'm switching out "Mindful Monday" for "MILAN+MADRID"! I fly out in a little over 12 hours, so I think it's safe to say that this trip is pretttty much all that's on my mind. Oh, and the fact that I forgot to bu a pocket Spanish dictionary...arghh. [Remember when I was so determined to use this semester as a time to learn about simplicity and spontaneity?? Yeah...I don't recommend you take that path when it comes to taking a 6-week trip to Europe. Sometimes planning things out is smart. Woops!]

For those of you that don't already know, I'm heading to Europe tomorrow because...