My Trip to Madrid and Volunteering

News flash everyone: the longer you wait to buy plane tickets the more expensive they are! Learned this lesson the hard way. Needless to say Audrey and I took the train to Madrid, which quite honestly was much less stressful and way more comfortable, but we made it! The two of us left on a Thursday morning and were in Madrid by the afternoon! We stayed in a hostel, my first time, that was not amazing but definitely wasn't horrible. In an effort to save money we shared one large bed in a room with about 30 other people. Definitely was an experience I will remember. Our bed looked a little like a cupboard and we had a curtain for privacy. It made me feel a little like Harry Potter living under the stairs. We met up with one of my friends from high school and explored Retiro Park and some of the other sites in Madrid then we went to a Bastille concert. Akine and Lewis Capaldi were the opening bands and I think Lewis may be one of my new favorite artists. Bastille was incredible and sounded exactly like they do in their recordings. We spent Friday visiting El Prado and the Reina Sofia art museums where we saw works from Picasso, Goya, Velasquez, Salvador Dali, and more. I liked the Reina Sofia museum better because you could take pictures inside and it was less of a tourist attraction. We came home mid-day Saturday and I finally made it to a Discoteca. I am not a big drinker and clubs here don't even open til around 12:30 am which is when I like to be going to bed. It was really fun....until Sunday morning ;). 
I have also started volunteering at a local school helping kids with homework and teaching English. It is basically my dream job and I am loving it so far. The kids are so excited to learn and are appreciative of the opportunity to work with a native English speaker. Some of the girls even wrote me notes and drew me pictures to thank me. I am so excited to continue working with them and will be sad to leave in May.
This weekend we are going to Cordoba and on Saturday I am going to Cadiz so it will be a great weekend!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week One

Well, this was the first week of classes and I made it through! I am taking an intensive language course and my class is huuuge. There is me, the professor, and oh yeah that is it. It's just me and the teacher four days a week for three and a half hours a day. I actually am really enjoying my class so far. We talk only in Spanish so I am getting a lot of practice in and its one-on-one help all the time, which is good because I like to ask a lot of questions. My teacher's name is Loli and she is so sweet. Surprisingly classes go by pretty fast and I am only aware of the fact that time is almost up because my stomach starts to rumble. I haven't quite adjusted to having such a late lunch after basically eating sugar for breakfast ( sorry kids even though whole grain is the first ingredient sugar is the second). God, I think I'm funny. So far this week it has been really fun, we even took a field trip to a traditional market with all fresh. By fresh produce I mean the fish
Read more

Morocco and Semana Santa Prep

Well, these last few weeks have really flown by. I was sick after our trip to Prague, recovered, and joined the program for a trip to Morocco. We took a three-hour bus ride and then a ferry to get to Tanger where we stayed. The waters were a little rough on the way to Morocco and a lot of people got motion sick. We visited so many places in two and a half days it was insane. We saw Asilah, the Blue City, Tanger and went to a ton of different shops with hand-made products. It rained all day Saturday which was not awesome but we made the best of it and the beautiful views helped you to forget that you were wet and cold. Morocco is famous for its pure Argan oil and we went to a pharmacy to try it out. I bought some henna lipstick and this weird spice mix that you breathe in and it helps stop migraines, snoring, and allergies. We also went to a store where they made rugs and a store with handmade scarves and decorative blankets. Here I fell trap and bought a really gorgeous multi-color bla
Read more