Work begins but playtime isn't over

Well it’s almost been two weeks since the bullfight so I have a lot of catching up to do.  Some of the girls and I found an amazing restaurant by Plaza Mayor, one of the big squares in the center of Madrid.  They have a deal for a plate of chicken fingers and 2 beers for 5 euros, which is about $5.50 – that’s what is on the bottom plate.  So that was like a taste of home a little bit.  The one on the right is called patatas bravas which is potatoes in a spicy sauce which is absolutely amazing.  The top is a flatbread, and usually I don’t like tomatoes but they are much better here, with more flavor and sweeter.  The left is jamón ibérico, Iberian ham.  Ham is huge here! I know my sister would hate it but everything has ham on it, like I said earlier in my entries, eggs are big but ham is even bigger.  You can see in every restaurant there are just pig legs hanging everywhere in the windows and in the back.  

Goya's El dos de mayo

Where Cervantes lived and died

Lope de Vega's garden

 Classes started last Monday, about a week and a half ago and it’s been going really well.  Mondays and Wednesdays I’m in the office all day mainly working on our money book, which is more like a scrapbook of receipts with money conversions and withdrawal slips…good thing I paid attention in my online accounting class… But Tuesdays and Thursdays are field trip days so I get to choose where it is I want to go basically with 8 classes.  The first trip I went on was with the Spanish Composition class and we toured Lope de Vega’s house and saw where Cervantes lived.  I’m no history nerd or anything but the fact that I’m touring houses and seeing the burial areas of people I’ve done projects on and heard about for years is pretty crazy.  We also went to see a monastery, which was pretty interesting.  On our way there we passed the exact spot that the first battle with the execution by Napoleon’s troops took place in 1808, which is actually the focus of one of Goya's paintings – another artist that I have studied.

We got lunch the next day with one of the girls I met at the Colegio before all of the students arrived, Elena.  She is from the Canary Islands and is studying to be a heart doctor.  We went out to lunch and basically told her to order whatever she thought we should eat… one of those things being murcilla – blood sausage.  Honestly it tasted like burnt popcorn or burnt meat, how it has that similar harsh taste.  

The gorgeous valleys

Thursday, the following day, we went to Segóbriga, where the gladiators fought and there are still remains of the Roman ruins.  It was out in the middle of nowhere basically with valleys all over.  It was absolutely beautiful.  After the field trip, it was off to Valencia!  I’ll post about that on Sunday!

Where the gladiators fought

Amphitheatre