Portugal, La Mancha, and What Happens When I Don't Have Airborne

First thing's first. Two weekends ago I went to Portugal!! What a great time. We flounced around and saw things like....

Really pretty cathedrals!

Beautiful parks... (who can spot me in this picture? HAHA oops)

Some ducks in said parks... (This one goes out to my mom, obviously)

The Riverfront!!

A beautiful tower!

The view FROM the tower

Generally charming street scenes...

Our hostel! Only the coolest place ever, inside the train station!!

So then LAST weekend I went with my Don Quijote class, of course, to La Mancha:

THIS is in a little museum there. It is, in fact, a German copy of Don Quijote signed by Hitler. So scary.

"Speak with respect, Sancho" --Don Quijote

 ^The supposed house of Dulcinea del Toboso!

WINDMILL.

Fighting the windmill, duh.

The day after La Mancha was the Carnaval parade in Madrid:

Waiting in the crowd of people to see the floats!

So, basically, adventures all around. But now, as it turns out, I'm a little bit sick. A LITTLE bit. For my part, I'm quite convinced that loading my system with vitamins and slapping on some Vicks VapoRub cures all, but my host mom does not agree. "Estás FATAL," she tells me.

...I am not "fatal." I just have a bit of a cough.

But after enough prodding, I agreed to go see a doctor.

Dear everyone, I'm ALREADY a known hypochondriac, and this behavior should not be encouraged!!

So I head to the doctor, to whom I explain (in Spanish), what seems to be ailing me, and she definitely thinks I'm overreacting. Which is obviously true but for once not my fault.

Long story short, I have a bit of medicine and I will absolutely be fine--just in time to head to Paris in two weeks!! 

Búscame (C St. C)

Have you guys ever seen that movie "Charlie St. Cloud"? It's really creepy and involves the one and only Zefron falling in love with this girl's half dead ghost? My personal favorite scene is when ghost girl leaves Zefron a note that says "Come find me" and then they rendezvous in a cemetery?

My day today was nothing like C St. C.

INSTEAD, it involved going to my second art museum of the weekend: El Museo de las Bellas Artes. However, like Zefron, I had someone I needed to hunt down--Francisco de Goya. For my art history class, I need to find and write about a painting of my own choosing by Goya. Conveniently, like creepy ghost girl, the museum provided a large sign for me that pointed me in the right direction, and read "Búscame"--almost literally, "Come find me."

I picked a painting of this sassy looking actress, posing with one hand on her hip. (Do you think my professor will give me extra credit for taking a picture of myself doing the same pose?)

Anyways, what I want to talk about more is the museum I went to yesterday--El Museo Sorolla. The museum is actually Sorolla's house, which is beautiful and charming and has delightful gardens. Also, it is full of gorgeous paintings of the beach, with women dressed in flowing white gowns. And paintings of La Alhambra, which as I've already stated, is a marvel. In short, the museum was a huge win--probably my favorite so far.

Question of the day: Am I turning into an art snob?

Blah Blah So Much To Say!

This post is going to be a smorgasbord of miscellaneous things that I need to "put right out there on front street."

Like, for example,

1. Besides the phrase "Bueno, pues nada" which basically doesn't mean anything but is used as a conversation filler, my new favorite Spain-ism is "Vale." Which basically means EVERYTHING. It's actually the response to virtually any statement, because it functions like "Ok," or "Understood," or "Word."

2. As many of you are aware, I was really gung-ho about taking a flamenco class while in Spain. No one was more gung-ho than me. Butttttt as fate would have it, no flamenco for me. (In fact, not to sound BITTER, I ended up being the only student on the waitlist for flamenco who didn't make it into the class.) Hahahahahaha no but it's actually totally ok, because instead I'm taking a super cool art history class. Guess who's having wine at her professor's house next week? This kid. Needless to say, the professors are wonderful and we do cool things like watch tapestries being handmade (that was today, and in all seriousness, it was fascinating).

3. I'm doing an "aprendizaje," or, internship! I'm working at a preschool, and the kids are ADORABLE. Now I can officially say I have Madridian friends, even if they are 3 years old. 

4. DON QUIJOTE. Not only is this class taught by an odd elderly gentleman with an extraordinarily large mustache, but it also involves reading a book totaling 1,312 pages of semi-archaic Spanish. It is an adventure all day erry day, literally. 

5. Learned the term for "sassy"--a favorite English word of mine. To be sassy can be translated into Spanish as "Ser caradura." (Other options include "picante," which is literally "spicy.") I probably use these terms more frequently than is appropriate.

6. While this city is no Clinton, NY, it's COLD here this weekend. I guess we're getting the cold front from the Sierra Nevadas or something?? Plus side: Pilar made me a hot water bottle type thing to heat up my bed (for those of you who know my passion for my sack of "hot corn" which serves the same purpose, you will understand how thrilled I was).