Sorry I haven't been updating my blog, I had mid-terms this week, ewww. I think they call all their tests mid-terms here, because for some of my classes I have more than one mid-term, which doesn't make any sense. But I had my Global Change and Art History mid-term, and I think they went ok.
Last weekend was another weekend spent in Madrid. On Friday we went to Aranjuez, a little town about 45 minutes outside of Madrid. It was a cute little town, and also another palace, the Royal Palace of Aranjuez. It was a nice sunny day, and we enjoyed touring the palace, and the large gardens they had. I don't think we even saw half of them! The town is between two rivers, and they pass by the palace. The palace itself was somewhere between the Royal Palace of Madrid and El Escorial in decoration...so not too decorated, but not almost bare like El Escorial! It was really pretty, and had lots of chandeliers, paintings, and tapestries. It was smaller than the palace in Madrid, but still pretty cool! On of the best parts was at the end, where they had the wedding dresses of the current queen, her daughters, and her daughter-in-law. They were absolutely gorgeous, even though they were fairly simple, with really long trains! They also had their coronation outfits. We ate lunch in Aranjuez, walked around a little bit, and then went back on the train, or Renfe, to Madrid.
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| Outside of Royal Palace of Aranjuez |
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| Fountain in the garden of the palace |
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| Another fountain, with flowers! |
On Saturday, we went walking around Sol, got some lunch at Aguacate, similar to Chipotle's but not really, and then went to the costume museum, or Museo de Traje, so really it was a clothes museum. We were lucky, because we got there after 2:30 on a Saturday, and it was free! It had all sorts of clothes from different eras and time periods, and showed the evolution of clothes. My favorite was probably the 1920s and flapper type dresses, they were really sparkly! They also had traditional Spanish clothes. At the end we walked through this giant indoor dome, that was supposed to be a kind of cat walk, and had modern clothes lining it...and runway music. It was really interesting, and fascinating to see how short small people (especially Spanish people) were only 100 or 200 years ago, and to see the different trends in clothes.
On Sunday we went to El Rastro and looked around some. It was crowded as always, and we found a street that everyone was just laying out there stuff, some of which looked like things you want to get rid of. Usually people have tents set out, and have a license to sell things. Spain must have a problem with counterfeit goods and pirating, because fake purses, fake name brand clothes, and cheap CDs and DVDs are everywhere. Sometimes I wonder how the people get the stuff they are selling and if it is legal! I really like the handcrafted or handmade stuff better, because it is most likely made in Spain, and is new. Unlike the random things that you see in piles or hanging from tents everywhere. We ate lunch at McDonald's (I need something American every once in a while), and then walked around some more. I found a souvenir shop that I encountered before, and I got this cute guy! I hope you don't think I'm weird, I just couldn't get over the cuteness. We went into H&M and some other stores, and made our way to mass.
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| A Spanish bull that is not scary looking! And really colorful. |
Things I have learned in Spain:
- It is hard to find books for class when all the libraries and bookstores have books in Spanish, and SLU-Madrid has a really tiny library
- It feels so great to get a package from home! With chocolate, yay!
- Pancakes here are not the same as American pancakes, they are more like crepes. But they are still pretty good!
- They have some weird fruit here that I have never seen before...like something that was yellow and oddly shaped, and apparently like an apple but more acidic
- Buying strawberries for 1 euro is awesome!
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