Sleepless in España

Thursday night we decided to head back home after walking around Chueca after school. There were some really high-end stores in the area (you had to ring a bell to be let in, and let out). We also got some gelatos. Mine was mango and strawberry. The mangos reminded me of all the mangos we were getting for free at home before I left for Spain. I wonder if there will still be some when I get home...Anyway Thursday night was nothing special. It consisted of watching Pasapalabra at home while eating dinner and finishing off “Age of Innocence” before going to bed.

In class on Friday we watching this really silly, stupid, yet funny movie called “Otro lado de la cama” which was a “musical” dealing with relationships between four friends. It was pretty cute and pretty predictable, but the ending was open-ended. In the movie each character sang popular Spanish pop songs from the 80s and 90s; apparently most Spaniards, when they watch that movie, know every single song that they sing. The dancing and singing was horrible, but that just added to its silliness. The two most famous actors in the movie are Paz Vega and Guillermo Toro. Toro reminded me a Spanish version of Will Farrell (except not as annoying, just in looks I guess). Either way, it was cute.

Friday night was rolling around, and the girls had a night on the town. All 9 of us girls headed out to El Tigre for some tapas and drinks. Some of them had a little too much of their 6 euro sangria, but we all had a blast. Afterwards we wandered through the streets trying to find this club called Paradise. However, we discovered that it doesn’t exist. Well, it does exist but only on Thursday nights. Apparently this other club is converted into Paradise on Thursdays, offering free chupitos; chupitos is the word they use for shots, it’s awesome and we’re all going to bring that word to the States and see if it catches on. Anyway never finding it we headed over to Sol, where all the stuff happens on the weekends. Two of the girls went home because we had an excursion the next day and needed to be at school by 9 AM. I wanted to do that to, but Tema wanted to stay out and I couldn’t let her be alone, so I stayed and headed off to find a bar or club. We ended up at this Irish pub called Dubliners, where they met a guy who bought them all free drinks and shots. The guy had a thing for our resident Lesbian, so it was funny when they started making out; apparently, she has some straight tendencies when drunk. I must say I was confused but highly entertained. There wasn’t much going on in the pub, but my new CMU friend Cristian and I decided to get the party started and danced together. I will be frank and say that we were awesome (that’s what happens when you get to DS dancers together). After that we went outside and tried to decide where to go. There was lots of confusion and no consensus of what was going, so somehow we all got separated. Michelle, Lauren and I headed to the salsa club called El Son. It was packed with people and lively. We all had a great time, dancing meringue, salsa, bachata, and regaetton. There were many guys that danced with us, but one guy in particular took a liking to me. His name was Julio from Columbia. He kept asking me to dance, and since he was pretty good at it I said yes. At first he told “no estoy aqui para ligar como todos los otro hombres; estoy aqui para bailar, solamente para bailar” which made me happy because I knew he wouldn’t be hitting on me then. But as time went on he kept complimenting me and wanting to buy me a drink (which I refused). He also asked me 5 times what the heart bracelet I was wearing meant. Just so you know its silver bracelet locket that my lovely boyfriend gave me for our anniversary, which is what I told him, 5 times. The fourth time he said “I know that it’s a gift from your boyfriend but what does it mean….” And I was wondering “Well, it’s a heart locket, what do you think it means?” Anyway, after telling him it was from my boyfriend he kept saying that my boyfriend didn’t appreciate what he had. Once saying that, I realized that he said earlier was all that true, el estaba tratando de ligarse conmigo. Once it was about a bit past 5 AM Lauren and I decided it was time to go find our other girls. When I told me new friend I had to leave he asked me for a kiss, so I kissed him on the cheek. But he said he wanted a real kiss. I told him I couldn’t do that and he knew why. He then informed me that it doesn’t matter but he loves me more than my boyfriend does (you hear that Adam?). Yeah, right. I headed out of there like a bat out of hell.

Some other people that I met were from the DR, Ecuador and PR. They could all dance very well, it was amazing. There was also no groping which was fantastic, especially after my experience at Kapital the Saturday before.

The other girls were at a club called Joy, and we had to wait outside for them for about 40 minutes. And I must say, I have never experienced so many men coming up to me. By the end of the 40 minutes Lauren and I had our game faces on, our “I’m a bitch you better not come over here and bother me” faces. Once the other girls got out of the club, it was time for the metro to start up again. So Tema and I headed home. We got home a bit after 7 AM, so we had about 1.5 hours to get ready for out excursion. We each took showers, ate breakfast and got back on the metro at 8:30 to head over to school. That’s right, no sleep for us!

So by 9 AM we were on a bus on our way to El Escorial. For those who don’t know, El Escorial is a palace/monastery/church/museum/school built by Spain’s king Felipe II. It built very orderly, geometrically, very stoic. Some say it was a model for how Felipe II ran his government: in a very strict, orderly fashion where religion was at its center and all else around it. The monastery still has monks living in it so we couldn’t go into that part, and same goes for the school. The school is a co-ed elementary and middle school, but a bordering school only for boys. We saw the living quarters for the king and one of the princesses. The rooms weren’t any extravagant because apparently the king believed that they should be living like monks in this life, for in the afterlife they would be living like royalty. Thus, their tombs were something extremely spectacular. We saw were all the kings since Carlos I have been buried as well as the queens, princes/princesses, and all other kinds of royalty were buried. It was pretty awesome; some of those tombs as the most beautiful marble sculptures. The most detailed and beautiful one was the one of Carlos’s half brother known as Don Juan, who was very popular with the ladies and was a great leader; he’s famous for same battle that I can’t remember right now (yeah, its that’s famous….). His battle is so well known that it was recounted by Cervantes (yup, this guy was Cervantes’ inspiration for Don Quijote). After that we headed into the museum part where there were some Greco paintings. Apparently the king has originally hired el Greco to paint the ceiling of one part of El Escorial, however after seeing some of his works he decided it wasn’t good enough and hired some unknown and not very famous painters; sucks for him, right? We also saw part of the old monastery and the library where some books that date back to the 5th century are stored. We also saw the gardens which are right at the edge of a mountain. The views are pretty spectacular.

After lunch we got back on the bus and headed to El Valle de los Caidos, which is supposedly a memorial to the fallen soldiers of the Spanish Civil War (but I think most think that Franco used that as an excuse to build himself a really, really big mausoleum; after all he is buried there. This memorial is placed right at the center of a mountain range, and you can see Madrid far off in the distance from it too. It has one of the largest crosses I have ever seen. It’s the biggest in Europe and perhaps in the whole world. It’s also a church/basilica. It’s pretty impressive. Apparently not many people visit el Valle though. The Spanish apparently don’t care, especially since Franco built it and is buried there. Either way, it’s pretty sweet looking. Once done there we headed back to Madrid, and got home around 5:30ish.

Having not slept in over 24 hours, we decided to take a nap. So, we took two naps: each of about 2 hours, one before and one after dinner. We probably could have slept more, but it was a Saturday night in Madrid so naturally we had to go out. So Saturday at around 2 AM we went to a club called JOY. JOY is an old theater turned club, so it has all the balcony seats and stage still intact, but a dance floor and bars where there would be seating. It was pretty classy. The best part, we didn’t have to pay to get in. Two of the girls, while on their way to meet us, ran into one of those promoters that’s always handing out little cards and such (they are EVERYWHERE ALL THE TIME). She told them that if they told the guys at the door that they were on her list, we’d all get in for free. Not sure if it would work, the girls sent me to talk to the guys in front since apparently I’m the most fluent. And so, I sweet talked to guy into letting us in for free (actually, I just told them I was on the list and I got us all in for free. No sweet talking involved). So we go in and immediately hit the dance floor. The music was quite different from that of Kaptial the week before. First off, there was no groping involved what so ever, which was fantastic. Second, since it was only floor it felt much more packed than Kapital. Also there were a lot more older looking people (and I must say, when the old guys stand around you in a circle whispering to each other, you feel like a little deer surrounded by hunters planning their next move). Joy was much more techno/remix based. It was pretty good for a while since most songs were ones we recognized, then it turned into house music and most of us weren’t feeling it anymore. Plus, since I hadn’t actually slept any I was really tired. So we headed out at around 5ish and saw a very well know chocolateria open. So we went and got ourselves some chocolate con churros (and a water bottle of course) all for 4 euros. That’s not bad if I say so myself. We satisfied our churros cravings and waited for the metro to open. This time we made it home before our host mom was up. It was fabulous.

So we got home around 6:30 AM Sunday morning and went to sleep. I woke up at around 12:30 hungry and had myself some breakfast. I then began to wait for Tema to wake up so we could head out on another adventure. She slept until about 2, and around 3 we headed to El Prado. Our school had got to El Prado as a field trip the week before we arrived, so it was up to us to make it there on our own. We got there around 4, and waited outside on the benches until about 4:45 and got in line for the free admission that started at 5. Every Sunday El Prado is open from 5 til 8 for free. Fantastic, no? So we made it in and hit all the big master pieces. First up was Goya and his “pinturas negras” (my favorite) as well as “el 2 de mayo” and “el 3 de mayo”, which are the two famous paintings about the war of independence in Spain. Las pinturas negras were amazing and creepy and SWEET. I think I’ll go back and check them out again. Next up was the second floor where all the Velazquez and El Greco paintings were. We went through their rooms and roamed around some more until about 7:20 to hit up the gift shop. We didn’t finish seeing everything. There’s too much to see, so we decided to go back on another Sunday afternoon to finish our visit. El Prado is huge and amazing. And on Sunday afternoons, its packed. I have never seen a museum so full of people. It was impossible to see some of the paintings without pushing someone out of the way. But it was worth it, because I got to see things like las pinturas negras or las meninas. And I must say, all these famous paintings were waaaaaaaaaaay bigger than I thought. “Las Meninas” is huge, as well as “el 2 de mayo” and “el 3 de mayo;” usually people tell you that paintings are smaller than you think (for example the Mona Lisa) but in case of every single one I saw in El Prado, they were much larger than I had imagined.

So after about 2.5 hours roaming the museum we headed home for some dinner. And then, we did our homework and went to sleep. It had been a very long weekend with extremely little sleep, so a long well deserved sleep was waiting for us Sunday night.

That’s it for now.
Hasta luego chicos y chicas!