Anyways, on the all-afternoon bus ride to Granada from Madrid, I took tons of pictures. For lunch, we stopped at a really touristy rest stop that served Spanish cuisine. Alex, Kimia and I split a huge plate of paella, and I can't wait until I can have another plate-- it was that scrumptious!!
We got back on the bus and rode another two hours until we finally reached Granada. We passed scores of olive trees (a major export of Spain) and rode up and down through the winding mountain paths of the Sierra Nevadas. Upon entering Granada, we saw the gardens of Generalife, which we will visit in the morning along with the Alhambra. Tonight we're going to attend a flamenco show and learn how to dance.. hope I don't trip over anything!
Alex's paella Anyways, after learning that to turn on the lights in the hotel room, one must insert the room key into a holder thing, we only had time to change clothes before leaving for our 8 pm dinner. My hair straightener doesn't work with my converter, to my utter dismay. (But more importantly, the camera charger DOES!!) Allison (my freshman roommate) and I made it downstairs with time to spare. Our Parrott Academy group is one of three groups on this trip through Acis this week; the other two groups are from California. We had a short say hi, but tomorrow we should have a little more time to intermingle.
Thankfully, it seems like pat and charley will be our main form of transportation this week, for which I am eternally thankful. I brought a running outfit, but as of now I'm not quite sure I'll get to use it for a few days. I heard there's a good park in Seville that I could run through, but I need a chaperone. The restaurant was a short walk from our hotel anyways. Walking down the streets, it's hard to believe that I'm actually, FINALLY, in SPAIN!!!! I've been anticipating this trip for months!!
Dinner was simply amazing. It was traditional Spanish fare; our appetizer was chopped potatoes, orange, tomato, fish, and onions covered in olive oil with a crusty roll to mop up the excess olive oil. For the main course, everybody else had fried chicken, french fries (in olive oil) and steamed veggies. When I filled out the dietary form weeks ago, I checked vegetarian; as a result, I was served fish and veggies covered in olive oil. I'm looking forward to other yummy, healthy meals like this one! And dessert was cut apples, oranges and kiwi in a bowl; honestly wish that bowl was just a bit bigger since it didn't take me long to eat it!
my dinner After dinner, we had the option to either go back to the hotel or explore the streets of Granada-- of course I chose to walk around some more! This week, the week before Easter, is called Semana Santa in Spain. One tradition is watching street processions filled with anonymous repenters, which we had the opportunity to see tonight! I've seen plenty of pictures of "parades" like this, filled with clergy members wearing colored versions of a KKK uniform, with a group bearing a float of a cross. This time, I was on the front row! We got there at just the perfect time, because at that moment, the square was empty. By the time I decided to turn around from my front row spot, the square was jam-packed! One thing I hadn't seen before was the pouring of the molten wax from parade members' candles onto a child's wax ball. Apparently they try to see who has the biggest wax ball. We saw some street vendors too, but we didn't buy anything. One guy was selling coconut (coco), while another was selling baked potatoes (papas).
group photo in front of the fountain
parada de Semana Santa We walked around a little more, and stopped at a heladera (ice cream shop). It was probably a good 40 degrees F, but a bunch of people were eating ice cream anyways. I didn't have one since I was still stuffed from dinner, but I enjoyed ordering in Spanish for some of the others!
Now that I've taken a shower and cleaned up for good, I've put my SD card in my laptop and have been trying for the last hour and a half to upload pictures to Facebook. Right now, it says 23/107 have uploaded. I honestly don't know what the problem is, but the wi-fi "va y viene" (goes and comes). I really hope it uploads while I sleep, because these words can't do the scenery here justice. This time change is awful-- this morning I woke up at what felt like 5am to it being 10am, and now it's 8 pm back home and 2 am here. (Curiously enough, the Spring-Forward time change in Spain is tonight, instead of two weeks ago like it was at home.) Hopefully my excitement for the beautiful pictures I'll take tomorrow will make my sleep deprivation manageable (but actually, if I go to sleep shortly I'd be getting about as much sleep as I would at home).
Happy Easter!!!
(oh, and my 40 acts of random kindness = complete!)
No comments:
Post a Comment