Andalucia

Granada

We left Salamanca at 7am on Friday morning to head South to Andalucia! After an eight hour bus trip, we were both sick of each other and sick from the bus driver, who likes to get two inches (not an exaggeration) away from cars before he swerves over to the other lane.  We checked into a really nice hotel and had a little break where I took my first long shower in Spain! Granada was absolutely gorgeous- there were orange trees everywhere and beautiful hand-painted ceramic plates on the outsides of all the houses. We visited two different cathedrals here, one in which Ferdinand and Isobel are buried- we saw their tombs! The area of Spain that Salamanca is in is called Castilla y Leon, and they used to be separate- Isobel of Castilla and Ferdinand of Leon. We learned that Ferdinand originally said no to Christopher Colombus’ request, and that Isobel had him called back and said that she would pay for him to go with money from Castilla. Even though Castilla y Leon were united, only Castillans were allowed to take the trip to the Americas. The cathedrals were of course breathtaking, as always.

We were then told that we would need two smaller buses to get us to dinner because the roads we would have to drive on were too small. I completely underestimated what this drive would be like. It was CRAZY- we pretty much went up a mountain on a little trail you see in movies that circle around and look over enormous cliffs that you are about two inches away from rolling down. We drove on sidewalks, almost over pedestrians and down one way streets, but didn’t scratch the bus one time. Probably the most impressive/scariest driving adventure I’ve ever been on. We finally made it to a ridge on the mountain which we were told was a gypsy village, and their houses were literally built into caves. We went to a restaurant that was in a cave (it was painted and had decorations and light and everything), and the dinner was really good. Right after dinner, the stage lit up and a huge man with a guitar sat down and started playing. Later a vocalist and a flute player came on, and they all started playing together. The singer was singing the typical flamenco songs that sound really Arabic, with the long drawn out notes. As they’re playing, three women walk through the dining room and onto the stage. They each take turns dancing, and it’s amazing. Flamenco is pretty much like really intense Spanish tap dancing. They were wearing the traditional frilly skirts, but their outfits weren’t as elaborate as I had seen in pictures, which was alright because their dancing made up for it. Their dances were very serious, and they would start out by making a beat with their feet and all of a sudden go into this like hardcore spinning/stomping thing. It looked incredibly hard, and you could see the intensity in their facial expressions when they danced- they looked like they were in pain. We talked with the professor in residence, Lucy, who comes to everything with us and decided that they were definitely not choreographed. They would look at each other, and the guitarist and singer would coordinate with whatever pace the dancer chose. It was an amazing experience, and I really liked going to such a culturally rich thing.

Afterward, we saw a view of the HUGE Alhambra from afar- it was so beautiful at night. We learned that there had been 27 mosques in Granada- 22 of those were destroyed by the Christians, and the remaining ones were turned into cathedrals. On the Andalucia trip as a whole, we learned that there was an insane amount of Arabic influence in Spain (the South especially), because Africa is so close. Almost everything we saw on the trip had something to do with the Arabic culture or influence, and we learned that almost everything was destroyed by the Catholics when they conquered them. That night we also saw a recently built mosque, which had a tower that is traditionally very tall. This one wasn’t all that tall though, and the reason is that no temple can stand higher than the church. I didn’t bring my computer on the trip, so I wrote down notes in a little notebook so I wouldn’t forget. I ended up going on a huge rant after that visit- let’s just say all of my beliefs (or lack thereof) have been thoroughly reinforced.

In the Alhambra- we learned that most Spanish buildings (even our host madre’s apartment) are based on the Arabic design. The door never opens to a room to preserve intimacy, but instead opens to a long hallway. It was really cool to picture things how they were when the building was in use, but it’s hard to believe it was ever any more beautiful than it was that day. 

Córdoba

Here we went to another beautiful mosque-turned-cathedral. After the mosque was conquered by the Catholics, they placed the main cathedral in the center and made it HUGE and much more regal to show their power.

We saw Gongora’s tomb here, who was a Gothic poet that I’ve studied in my other Spanish literature classes. Here I also learned that the grapes you always see on everythingg from the Baroque period are linked to the whole wine-blood of Christ thing, which was interesting.

A few of us went out to lunch at a really cute little restaurant which was kind of outside but not really. We were given stipends for our meals that we didn’t eat with the group, which is nice because if you don’t spend it all you just have extra money.

We were assigned roommates for the hotels, which was kind of cool because I roomed with a girl who I didn’t really think I would get along with, but I ended up hanging out with her and other girls I hadn’t really bonded with yet and now I really like them. The hotels were all really far away from the city centers, which I had a feeling they did on purpose so we wouldn’t go out, but it was a little frustrating because we didn’t even get to walk around the city after dinner or anything. But it was fine, we all hung out in each others hotel rooms and talked. It ended up being really fun anyway.

Sevilla

By far my favorite city that I’ve been to in Spain. It’s pretty much what I pictured Spain to be like. There were orange trees, palm trees, and cactus everywhere and the city was really inviting and gorgeous. It’s part of Spanish culture to always be out of the house- they call them people of the streets, but Sevilla took this to a whole new level. When had our lunch break and were walking around, there was a plaza just filled with people talking and drinking wine and beer in the middle of the day. The temperature wasn’t freezing like we were used to, I even got to take my jacket off- shocking. Here we went to the Sevilla Cathedral, which is apparently the third largest building in the world (the first is the Vatican). This was of course also built over a mosque. We saw the tomb of Fernando Colón, Christopher Columbus’ son, and we learned a lot about different styles of art and buildings. There were three huge paintings kind of near each other, and Jesus (program director) had us guess the order of when they were painted and I guessed right! I remembered a lot more from Caff’s art classes in high school than I thought I did. We also got to climb to the top of the cathedral- 35 levels to a breathtaking view of the city. AMAZING!

Mérida

This was a more of a stop on the way home than a visit to a city, and it was a lot smaller than the others we visited. We went to a Roman Teatro y Anfiteatro and saw some ruins of an old colisseum type thing. It was gorgeous, and we learned about the different passages used to get in and saw the little coves where the animals were kept. It still had some of the old statues and everything too. We learned that the ancient civilizations used to have running water, and then it was lost until the early 1900s, which is really weird to think about. Maybe something like that could happen again. We had less of a bus ride home since we went to the most Southern place first and worked our way up, and when we got home our neighbors were here to cook us dinner because Carmen was in the hospital for the birth of her first grandchild! So she’s been in a really good mood lately which is awesome.

 

I lovedd Andalucia and will definitely be taking my family back there during the Spring/Summer in the future. So gorgeous. Also sorry if this is a little overwhelming with the history, but literally all we did on the excursion was learn. 

Besitos a todos!