So I just wanted to post this video for you. I was sitting in my house on Sunday and all of a sudden I heard this American music blasting from all over the place. One neighbor inside the apartment building and the other neighbor across the street were both blasting music. It was almost comical at that point because they listen to music that we would listen to. So here's the video I took to show you guys. Maybe tomorrow I'll actually take a video of my piso while everyone's gone so you can see where I'm living! Took me long enough, but ya know...
So as you all know, it was my birthday yesterday!! Yup, I turned 21, which is only slightly underwhelming when you're in a country in which it's legal to drink already. :( But I made the best of the it with my friend Bree, and Jessy and Abby as well later that night.
Me with Mr. Einstein!
I started off with heading over to the Parque de Las Ciencias (Science Park/Museum) in Granada. Me and Bree knew we needed a whole day there to see everything we wanted to see. So we met up at 11 and walked over to the park. After a few minutes of confusion we finally found the building and purchased our tickets for the Museum and for the Planetarium. I haven't been to a Planetarium in about 10 years, so why not? We were also reminded by the lady at the desk that it's in Spanish, and we were like "ummmm, we know!" After we bought our tickets we headed to the outside section of the park and had fun discovering all there was!! They had all sorts of cool things, a labyrinth of plants and veggies, plastic giraffes, sun dials, and logic puzzles all over the place!! So here's a snippet of what we did for about 2 hours outside.
First we found a butterfly house!! But it wasn't nearly as cool as the one in DC. There were hardly any butterflies and they didn't have fruit sitting out for them to eat. But we saw a bunch of cocoons! And we saw cute turtles and a giant koi fish. He was the only one and he was monstrous.
I killed the King with his Queen
Then we around the bend and some cool mind problem solving puzzles and a giant chess set!! Although it's not as giant as the one I saw in another city, I can't remember which one though. But that was fun, we didn't play because neither of us are good at that game. But it was cool to see one. Bree even felt like she was in Harry Potter. :) We're closet Harry Potter freaks together.
Hello Mr. Giraffe!
Then we found some cool plastic animals, a giraffe and a deer. They also had other fake animals set up in the bushes, so we learned some new words! We walked around the garden area some more and looked at the pretty trees, and the things they had set up about different types of soils, and what you can do with wood!
View of Granada and the Sierra Nevada
Finally, we climbed up the observatory tower and got a gorgeous view of Granada. It was so pretty, only I forgot my sunglasses so it was a bit painful to look out into the sun. But we could see the Sierra Nevada Mountains and the Alhambra and the whole city. I love the view of Granada.
From there we sat down and ate our lunch together and waited for our time slot for our Planetarium show. The Planetarium show was actually a lot of fun. I haven't been to one of those in years, and it was fun to be back. It was a really small room, but it was calm and I really liked the rest in the middle of the day. I even fell asleep a little bit...ooops...but at least I wasn't snoring like one guy!! I also understood the majority of what they were talking about. So that made me feel good.
Birds!
After that me and Bree found a birds of prey show!! But we were dumb and didn't just join the show when we heard it, we figured they'd do another one in an hour or so. But nope, there wasn't another show until 5:45 and sadly I needed to return home by then. :( So instead we settled for looking at all the birds and seeing them up close. It was really cool!! That over there is a real life Vulture, and it was huuuge!! And scary. (Side note: While walking around today running miscellaneous errands I totally got side swiped by a bird. It totally ran into my shoulder/hair and freaked me out!)
We finally decided to head inside and look at the cool exhibits they had inside. They've had a T-Rex Exhibit for a while, since January so we wanted to check it out before it left. Unfortunately we missed the really cool Escher exhibit (the guy that does all the really cool illusion drawings). :( But the T-Rex Exhibit was cool to see. They had most mechanical moving animals because they're kind of lame and don't have enough fossils. Most fossils have been found in North America so we have them all :)
I also have a video for you of me inside the T-Rex Exhibit!
Whale Heart
After we did the T-Rex exhibit Bree wanted to do the "Viaje entre el cuerpo" (Travel through the body). I consented, since I've grown a little bit more comfortable with it. I still stand my ground with the whole, the body is gross thing. But we did see some cool things, like how much blood your heart pumps in a minute, and put together a x-rays and see a giant heart! We rounded off our trip inside the Parque de Las Ciencias with a nice video of a birth thanks to Bree wanting to watch it ( J.K not really :P) which left a wonderful scar and left me saying "Yea...I'm not doing that for another 10 years).
Me by the river, with water in it!
Bree took me to Los Italianos finally and got me an amazing ice cream. It was a cake flavored ice cream and Lost Italianos is an excellent gelato ice cream place in Granada. It's famous all over, and when we arrived it was packed, but luckily we got in and out quickly. It was also some of the best ice cream I've ever had, not gonna lie. I went home from there and got home by 6:15 and was surprised with cake from Julia and Julia (senora and roommate). Julia (senora) was so excited and they were both singing Happy Birthday in different languages, it was really comical actually. My senora was so excited and gave me a cute blue scarf earlier that morning. I screwed up their plans by not being home for lunch, but I still got cake! And it was delicious! I also got to talk to pretty much my entire family after I got cake. It was excellent, I haven't seen my Aunt at all on skype since I've been gone and missed her and my grandma. So my afternoon and morning was excellent, I only had to prepare for the nighttime activities!
Me and Bree at Amsterdam
So at around 10:30 my friends Abby, Jessy and Bree met with me and took me too a bar like 1 block away from my house and we got yummy drinks. The place was called Amsterdam and I discovered that I like peanuts while I was there. They gave us little cups of nuts and gummies and I ate all the peanuts, yummm.. Then at around 12:30 me and Bree decided to head over to El Camborio, a fun club where a lot of Eramus (European Students) and Americans go to at night. El Camborio also over looks the Alhambra with it all lit up at night so it has a gorgeous view. We were ready for some dancing and good old fashion fun!! We ended up staying out till around 4:30, but it was so worth it. my feet were killing me by the end of the night, but my 21st birthday in Granada, Spain was an absolute success thanks to my awesome friends here in Granada!!
Me and Bree at El Camborio with the Alhambra in the back
So my birthday was awesome and this weekend I'm off to Vienna to meet up with Sophie!! So excited for that. More fun adventures to come, until next time. Love you all!!
So since I've been back I've actually already been on another trip!! haha I know, I travel too much. AIFS took us on a day trip to Ronda, a cute little town outside Granada. Well, it was supposed to be an excellent trip but we ended up getting rained on...hardcore. When I say it rained, it poured and I almost felt like I was in a hurricane at some points. Our trip to Sacromonte got rained out the day before so we were expecting the rain, which is a shame because Ronda is supposed to be really pretty when it's nice out.
Either way Ronda was fun to visit. I didn't know this, because I didn't read Ferdinand and the Bull, but apparently the bridge from that book is located in Ronda. It's also a really old bridge, well new compared to the older ones. That bridge was built twice, because the first one collapsed very shortly after it was built, so they rebuilt a better sturdier one. The views in Ronda are really pretty, but the rain was very hindering. Our poor tour guide felt so bad because he loves Ronda but you just can't appreciate it when you're cold and wet. Some girls succumbed to buying those stupid ponchos because nothing was keeping the rain away from us. Some went without umbrellas and one girl had bought one on the streets in Granada but that thing kicked the bucket by the end of the day. The wind was crazy and all of our umbrellas got turned inside out. One our AIFS directors had hers turn inside out and it was very comical watching her struggle with it.
Plaza de Torros
We also got to the see the bullring that's in Ronda. It's one of the oldest and is really cool. It made me really excited for my bullfight that I'm going to in May. Granted I'm kind of scared, but I'm it'll be fun to experience something like that. It finally stopped raining when we got to the bullring and our guide explained the bullfights to us and showed us parts of the ring. He showed us where they keep the bulls and how they actually have to have 6 bulls when they do fights. Each torero fights 2 bulls but they need to have two extra bulls in case one of the bulls don't feel like fighting and just stand there and stare at the wall.
Where they keep the bulls
The bulls also aren't allowed to see people before they go out into the ring because they learn very quickly what a person looks like versus the flag that the torero waves around. The bulls also live very full lives before they fight. They live to be like 6 years old and then get ready for the fights. Fights don't last longer than 20 min (that's actually considered too long) because the goal is to kill the bull quickly and painlessly. Bullfights (una corrida de torros) are also very expensive so it's impressive if a town has more than one. Each bull is about 4000 euro, times that by 6 for each of the bulls and then the three toreros that fight each make close to 100.000 euro. So put that all together and that's a lot of money. But honestly, if I was a bullfighter I'd want to make a ton of money for putting my life in danger too!!
We also got to visit a cathedral in Ronda, shocking! But this one was just as pretty as the rest. It also has a really cool history. Half of the cathedral is Gothic style and the other half is Renaissance style. When the cathedral was built the Gothic style was in, but then part of it fell down from I think an earthquake. So when they went to rebuild it the Gothic style was out and Renaissance was in. So you have a mixture where the two meet. Also, the choir is right in the middle of the church, which severely hinders being able to celebrate and see mass. Because of this anomaly they say that they are "going to hear mass" instead of going to mass. They also speculate that it was built this way for the privileged to sit up close and the poor had to sit behind the choir.
That was pretty much it for our trip though. We wanted to get out there as quickly as possible because we were tired, wet and cold. So we got back to Granada earlier than expected, around 5 and all went home to clean up. I met with a friend from school that night. Kim is studying in Sevilla and was here for the weekend so I took her and her friends out the a local tapas bar and bar here. We had a lot of fun and it was great to see a familiar face when I've been feeling so homesick.
I also just needed to share that we had one of my favorite soups today for lunch! I took a picture of it because I wanted to share with you. I'm going to try to get the recipe for it because I want to make it at home. :) It's got some potatos, beef and some other stuff in it. We had that and friend fish, it was such a good lunch.
I also saw some interesting things today. Today has been an all around interesting day. On my walk home I saw a man dressed in a very interesting outfit. It was all black and he had like a zorro cape on his shoulder and his outfit was full of badges. I was so confused and ask my senora. She said that he's part of some group of singers here that are known for that kind of thing. They wear that outfit when they perform or when it's a special day for one of it's members. Either way I was very thrown off and found myself staring. I wish I had my camera. haha. I also was reminded that I live in a city today. On my walk home someone dropped his wallet out of his pants pocket. I and three other people went to tell him that he dropped it and the guy in front of me leaned over to pick up. I assumed the guy was going to give it back to the guy but instead he took off running. The guy who dropped the wallet turned around when we called to him and saw the guy take off so he took off running after him and yelling. I felt really bad for him and was reminded once again that I live in a city where people will steal your things instead of be nice and tell you you dropped something. :(
That's pretty much been my day. I spent most of it updating my blog for you guys and for myself. This weekend I'm meeting with Manolo and Maria again, my intercambio Spainard friends and it's my 21st birthday on Saturday. So scary! I can't believe I'm turning 21, and away from everyone.
One more installment left!! I know I'm pretty detailed with my life, so to any of you who are complaining about my long winded posts (Beth) oh well. :P But Venice was actually a pretty uneventful day as was coming home to Granada, so you're all lucky. I also realized that my picture taking significantly dwindled once I got out of Rome. There just wasn't as much historical crazy stuff for me to take pictures of so I calmed down a bit. haha Plus in Florence I could take pictures in the museums.
Just hanging out in Venice...ya know...
So Venice....we woke up at around 10 the next day after our crazy night feeling well rested. Although Abby's foot was still killing her. We took our time getting ready and finally headed off to the island of Venice by I think about 11:30. It was interesting getting in there because we had to take a city bus into Venice and the desk clerk who told us what buses to take failed to tell us to buy tickets at the desk (stupid Italians). So we got on the bus and were once again told that we don't pay there. haha. So we were like ummm whatever, we'll pay afterwords, but when the bus arrived in Venice we were shoved off the bus. So another free bus ride? Okay, we'll take it, hahaha. So finally arrived on the islands of Venice and walked over the cool bridge thingy that took you onto the water filled islands. We quickly went over to the tourists booth (which I'm ashamed to say I used, but that for the first time through our entire trip) and bought tickets for a full day of unlimited passes on the boat ferry thing and a map since the hotels was really crappy. Abby's foot was killing and since this was our only day in Venice she came and hobbled around Venice with us. But the ferry transportation was very easy.
Venice is also shaped like a fish!! When we went to look at their ferry routes we realized that it looked like a fish! I don't have a picture of our map, but I seriously needed to show you guys that. We had a blast all day that it is shaped like a fish. So we looked at our map and headed for San Marco, because that's the most popular island/section of venice and has the most stuff to do. We took the ferry and got to see some beautiful views on the ferry ride. We realized how good of an idea if was to get the day pass on that ride. Seeing as one ride is 6 euro it's worth it, and you get to see Venice in a whole new way. You can see a lot of it just being on a boat.
So seriously, people say that Venice is just full of canals, and instead of streets they're canals. It's true!! No one has cars, I don't know where they're put them anyways. So we arrived in San Marco and walked down to San Marco square, which you can't really miss anyways. There's actually a huge gorgeous church in San Marco which we stood in line to get into. Unfortunately it was closed, we think because it was Holy Friday. But it was absolutely gorgeous and I was very disappointed that I couldn't see more. The front was even more impressing. We were only able to enter the vestibule. :( So we just walked around the Piazza and got some gelato, surprise, surprise! We actually went to sit down in the middle of the plaza like everyone else when we were told we can't just sit there :( So we ended up just standing around the plaza and chatting and bought our small souvenirs for the day.
Then we decided to follow the crowd and walk down a little street that everyone else was headed for and found this! Yup!! Gondolas!! There was a whole section full of them all just waiting for vulnerable tourists like us to hop in. Before heading over to Venice we looked up about getting Gondola rides and found high prices. A gondola ride costs about 80 euro for a 40 min ride, and if you want singing or anything else than you have to pay even more. We decided that we'd consider it if we found people that wanted to share a boat with us. But then we got there and were so broke that we decided it really wasn't worth it to sit in a boat awkwardly for 40 min with someone who most likely wasn't going to speak with us. So we settled for watching all the other people get in the boats, awwing at the boyfriends who forked over the 80 euro for him and his gf and laughing at the people that sprung for the singer and accordion. As we were standing there one of the guys pulled his gondola around to turn around and he looked at us and went "wow, hello!" haha It was really comical. We also found out some gondoliers wear different colors, but we don't know why. There were a few wearing all black, some wearing red and white strips, and then the usual black and white strips. We almost regretted not going on a ride because we had so many questions all of a sudden. But the guy that brought his little boy was so cute! Some of the gondolas were tricked out too!! They had all sorts of fancy chairs and statue thingys on them.
After watching the gondoliers for a while we meandered around the shops and just followed the crowds. We found another good pizza place for cheap and grabbed some lunch. So we spent our lunch on a small little bridge watching the people in the gondolas go by. We even got to catch some people that had the singers. I also thought it was funny because the gondolas are all pretty close to each other. So I decided that I wanted to be the person behind the people with the singer. I can enjoy the music and not pay for it!! haha, those people got gypped! :P Then we just walked around the little alleys and got ourselves good and lost in their small streets without signs or any real direction. But it was fine, our handy dandy map helped us find the next ferry port. We walked around San Marco for almost 2 hours though. We spent probably 3 hours on that island.
My sentiments exactly...
By that time Abby's food was hurting so we hopped on the ferry and rode it around for probably an hour while trying to decide where we wanted to go next. We were going to try for another island but we actually got off in the wrong place. We got off at a creepy industrial stop and quickly caught the next ferry out. This picture pretty much explains how we felt most of the week. haha. We just wandered around looking confused at our maps, yup, we were typical tourists.... So we ended up going to a port that had more than one connection so we could get to another pretty island. This island had cars!! We were shocked and just talking about how they don't have cars there. It was odd actually. But we quickly realized that we didn't have any more time to go to our last island and we headed to a different part of San Marco to catch dinner at a place in my handy dandy book! We got to the place a bit early so we found a nice plaza down the street and sat by the nasty canal river. The water is actually kind of gross, but it was relaxing nonetheless. We grabbed our last Italian dinner and headed back to catch the last bus back to mainland Venice. We still didn't understand how the stupid buses worked so we just hopped on and hoped to figure it out. We met a group of American guys that were backpacking across Europe for 2 1/2 months. They were just traveling via Eurorail with the Europass and telling us about their adventures. We were all sharing stories and laughing at our mistakes and ridiculous things that happened when we realized that we were at our stop. Abby looked out and was like "is this us?" and we realized almost too late! The bus doors closed which resulted in us pushing all the buttons shoting "wait!" and "espera!" to get him to open the doors again. Needless to say it was an excellent exit...haha Oh well. We really did meet some incredible people on this trip.
Afterwords we just went back to our hotel and settled our bill with the receptionist. When we told her everything we went through she seemed very shaken and was nice enough to give us a small discount at our request and free internet. It wasn't much of a discount but we appreciated it nonetheless. Then we went back to our room and packed to get ready for our day full of traveling on Saturday. Saturday morning we woke up nice and early and finally figured out the bus system!! We had free breakfast and we saw a sign that said you buy bus tickets at the desk. So we bought one ticket and when we got on the bus to the train station they wouldn't even work/they didn't matter! How stupid. Also, getting on the bus is stupid. You literally have to flag the bus down. We realized that when one the bus numbers we needed literally just zoomed past the bus stop...we were so confused! So we flagged down the one we needed and hopped on. After 20 min and a rousing game of what does the stupid buzzer mean!? we arrived at the station. Literally, people were pressing the stupid bell and we didn't know what it meant because the same thing didn't always happen! We decided they just do it to screw with tourists like ourselves (apparently Italians just like to do that). But our train left on time and after one train ride, a plane and 5 buses we finally arrived safely in Granada at around 11 P.M that night. I was exhausted, unpacked, ate dinner and passed out ready to face Easter.
That's all!! That's my whole trip to Italy. Hope you enjoyed reading about it. Pictures are on FB
