Palm Trees and Mountains

So, now that you all know I am alive and well I have a few minutes to fill you in on my life. This past weekend, my roommates Jesse, Zoe, Amanda and our friend from upstairs, Laura went to Granada with our program. Granada is a city in the south of Spain, in the Mountains. It is an important city because it was the last city that the Muslims occupied in Spain back in the day. So needless to say there is a lot of Muslim influence in the city as far as the feel and look of the city.

So, on Friday we had to get up at the crack of dawn to catch the free train to the airport. Of course our flight was delayed once we got there, but only like 45 minutes so it wasn't too bad. I had a window seat in the plane and the view out the window as we got close to Granada was gorgeous. I could see the mountains and some of them were topped with snow. We got to the hotel (A five star hotel! It was so nice, the nicest I've stayed in since I´ve been in Spain. Good thing it was on dad´s credit card. haha) and we had free time for lunch before we started our tour around the city. We walked and found a restaurant and I had the menu del dia, which is a set menu with a few options with a starter, main course, and dessert that restaurants here do for a set price. It is usually a really good deal. I had a delicious meal of a Spanish omelet (eggs and potatoes) this beef stuff with rice and then an orange for dessert. Delicious. Then we met back up with the group to start our walking tour of the city. We went to see the Cathedral. It was really pretty and a lot different than the others we have seen. It was all white and it was huge! We had the best tour guide too! He was so cool and nice so it made him cute. His name was Nacho. We made friends with him, I think he enjoyed us. Or at least we hope he did, but I mean who wouldn't? So after our tour we had the rest of the night to ourselves. We walked and found a tea shop, which is very Muslim. You drink tea and smoke hookah. It was so fun. Two of my favorite things. We were at the tea shop for a while and then went back to get ready for dinner. We found a nice tapas bar for dinner and stuffed ourselves with tapas and wine. We called it an early night because we had to get up the next morning to visit the Alhambra!

In the morning breakfast was included with our room. We were all soooo excited for this! It was an all you can eat buffet! SWEET! We completely stuffed our faces and then even shoved apples and oranges in our purses. We didn't want to have to buy lunch so we took full advantage of the fact that it was all you can eat (or take with you...) Anyways after being ready to about throw up because we were so full from our breakfast of pancakes covered in melted chocolate and eggs and toast we left for the Alhambra. The Alhambra is a gigantic Arabian palace - it took 200 years to complete it. Wikipedia it. Its gorgeous. We had to walk up the mountain to get there, I was sweating, shock. But it was a nice little walk. We toured the whole palace with Nacho, who taught us the appropriate greeting when meeting with a Muslim King back in the olden days. It was honestly one of the most gorgeous palaces I've seen and it is pretty well preserved. Its Muslim, so its not like the royal palaces many of us think of and it was on the mountain so it had gorgeous views. The detail that was used in the palace was unbelievable, the Muslims always use geometry in their designs and every piece used in the design was cut precisely to fit with the other pieces like a puzzle. After the Alhambra we had the rest of the day to ourselves. So, of course, we all chose a day of pampering. One thing that was big in ancient Muslim communities was baths and they still have a few around today. It is like a spa as we know it today, kind of. There were six hot baths that you just sit and relax in for like 10 or 15 minutes and then you go and sit in a cold bath too cool back down and then head back to the hot baths. It was fun! I didn't expect it to really be that relaxing or be able to tell a difference when I left but I did. Going from the hot to the cold was such a weird feeling, it heightened your senses and then you went back to the hot to relax again. We also got a fifteen minute massage, which was nothing too spectacular but hey it was still a massage! It was a really cool experience! We definitely enjoyed ourselves. We then went back to the hotel and got ready to go to dinner. For dinner we heard of this place that had a free flamenco show (the traditional dance here in Spain that we also saw in Seville). I wasn't that hungry so I just had a crepe with bananas and strawberries but it was so good. The Flamenco was absolutely amazing. It was just one lady dancing and then a guy with a guitar but the lady was so good and got really into it. And she danced basically right on top of us because it was a small restaurant. It was fun. We were all tired after our long day of walking around the Alhambra so we went back early and passed out.

On Sunday we had another walking tour, this time of the part of the city that is considered the old Muslim part. It was of course a walk up the mountain so we were all huffing and puffing and getting sweaty. Unfortunately, Nacho wasn't able to be our tour guide this day so we had a new lady, she wasn't as cool. haha She took us to this church and we went in to find nuns, dressed completely in white, from head to toe, literally, even their face was covered. These type of nuns are really dedicated, they only leave the church once a year to see their families and stuff and they spend all of their time worshiping and praying to God because they feel that they need to pray for everyone in the world who is not praying. That's intense. It was really cool to witness though. So we continued on our journey and the tour guide kept talking about this square we were walking to... all I knew is that I was tired, hot (because the weather was absolutely gorgeous! Not a cloud in the sky and around 70 degrees) and thirsty. So finally we are almost to the square, she stops us to talk a little about the square and a Mosque that was in the square before we actually walked into the square. When we finally got to the square we had to turn a corner and there was the most gorgeous view I have ever seen in my entire life - wow. It was out of this world. My breath literally caught in my chest. I can´t even begin to describe it with words. When you walked into the square you saw the Sierra Nevada mountains and all of Alhambra. A-mazing. We then made our way back down the mountain and then had the rest of the day to ourselves. Since it was so nice out we decided to find a little cafe, get some wine and just relax. It was nice. Then we decided we wanted ice cream so we found some of that and sat in a plaza for a while. I actually got a little sun! I was excited, I was looking a little pasty and gross. We still had a long time before we had to be back to the hotel to head to the airport... we were all getting a little bored and ready to leave but there was nothing we could do about it. So we decided to walk around and shop a little bit. We ended up back in another tea house for some tea and hookah and then about that time it was time to go to the hotel. We finally left for the airport to once again find our flight delayed.... of course. So we finally left around 11 p.m. When we finally got back to the apartment everyone was so tired and I literally fell asleep in like five minutes. It was a wonderful end to a wonderful weekend. The trip was so fun and I´m so glad that I got to experience it with tour guides because I don´t think that I would have gotten as much out of it if my friends and I would have gone on our own.

So anyways, that was my weekend and this week hasn't brought anything too exciting except for that there was a big futbol game between Barcelona and Celtics - there were a ton of Scottish people hanging around here the past few days. Barcelona won. But yea, other than a mid term and a presentation there really hasn't been anything going on. I´ll be around here this weekend which I´m excited about. We have a list of things we want to accomplish this weekend so I will be busy but I´ll find time to blog about my weekend I´m sure.