Actual Pictures of Madrid!

Meet Meryl. She's a friend of Brittany's from school. Today was the third consecutive weekend that the three of us have hung out. Either I tag along with the two of them, or she tags along with the two of us. But anyway, she's really funny and a lot of fun. This photo was taken two weeks ago, right after we went to the Museo Reina Sofia (the modern art museum, with, among others, Picasso and Dalí) Yes, we went to MickyD's. It was kinda fun! We rounded off the day with a trip to the cine to see a pretty bad movie. Good times!

This photo is of last week, when we all went shopping in Sol. I was looking for shoes, so naturally, I'm the only one who didn't buy a pair. We finished off the day with a trip to an incredible chocolatería and some terrible self-photography.

This is pretty much unrelated. Conchi, last (Sunday?) made us a huge brunch. This kind of thing is unheardof in Spain, but that didn't make it any less delicious!

There! Two photo posts!

But I'm not done yet! I'm going to Segovia tomorrow, and I still have last week's Ávila pictures. So look forward to more fun blogging excitement hitting your feed-readers everywhere soon!

Alcalá

Two weeks ago, I went to Alcalá with Brittany.

This small town, located only 30 minutes from Madrid, is the birthplace of Miguel de Cervantes and the deathplace of San Diego. We took the Cercanías train, which is covered by my B3 abono, so I didn't have to pay. 

We had a lot of fun hanging out, checking out a few histori

cal sites, and generally soaking in the atmosphere.

Here are a few pictures of our day...

This is an old arabic-style building we passed on the way through the city. I don't remember what it is now, but it's absolutely gorgeous!

This is some museum that was closed when we got to Alcalá and which we were having too much fun to go back to see. But it's beautiful from the outside, no?

There was some sort of Cervantes festival going on. It seems it was a few weeks long. Not sure of all the particulars, but there was a huge rennaicance fair-type event spanning the whole historical area. This is the crêpe I got - chocolate y almendras! It was as delicious as it looks all over my face.

Have you met Brittany? Cervantes is pretty much her heroe because she loves novels so much. Here she is (leaning against the hand of) Don Quijote.

And I got a photo op with Sancho Panza!

As per norm, photos were not allowed inside the tourist sites, etc. But we visited the Casa Natal de Cervantes, the archeological museum, and the Corral de Comedias (an historical theater).

A grand time was had by all, though I'll never wear those boots on an excursion again!

I'm sorry!

First off - I just signed up for NaNoWriMo. I'm not exactly sure why. I have been thinking about it for a few weeks. Not sure yet what I'll write about. But hey, it should be fun.

But don't worry! Even though I may not blog much of anything substantial next month, I will do my very best to get you all absolutely caught up within the next 7 days.

Right now, I have to lend Brittany my laptop for a little bit. I know you're all upset, but I promise, PROMISE to post 2 photo-posts before I go to bed tonight! (and hey, a lot of you might not even notice the gap, being asleep and all.)

OK, stay right there and I'll be back before you know it!

Noticias y Pensamientos

First, I'm now on Twitter. You may follow me if you like, but I mostly just did it so I could put whitty comments at the top of my blog page. So check back here from time to time to see what I'm up to, minute by minute.

In my Spanish societry class today, we went over the last century of Spanish history in 1:20. But what really struck me was our discussion of Franco's dictatorship. I hadn't realized the Church's role in those 40 years of Spanish history.

So, Franco allied himself with the Vatican, with the result that, in exchange for being officially recognized by the Church, Spain would be a completely catholic country.

This puts me in an awkward situation when trying to study this period of history. As we discussed in class the opressions of the dictatorial period, a good number of them were moral rules imposed by the Church. I found it very hard to view these restrictions (for example, on abortion, contraception, and homosexuality) as bad things. All my life, I've lived with the Church's worldview - These aren't restrictions, so much as a way to live God's law. Yes, I realize that free will is important, and I'm trying to wrap my mind around the view of freedom of religion from the other side. It's just sad to realize that Spain is a catholic country only in the way that Russia is an atheist country.

And the other thing that seems so wrong is the way the world views these libreral movements. Everything I've been fighting against on moral grounds my whole life seems, in the world's eyes, so simply be the natural progression of things. The legalization of gay marriage, by this reasoning, is as just and inevitable as women's sufferage. So many people apparently have no sense of the moral differences between different movements. All they want it change. But I'm not ready to blog about Obama right now. It's just something to think about.