City on a Hill

Continuing where Travis left off, this past weekend led us to an excursion out of the city. As we’ve said before, being that we live in the dead center of the historic core of Madrid, we haven’t had any need to even buy a metro ticket or take a bus up until this point because everything is within a walkable distance. Not that all of these walks have been short (I think we’ve walked up to 7 or 8 miles on some days when you add up all of our wonderings), but when each walk leads us to a new interesting neighborhood, we’re happy to be walking and seeing rather than sitting underground on a train. However, next week we’ll start using the metro, as our different work places are a few metro stops away.

Toledo is the former capital of Spain, declared a historic landmark, and a thriving cultural, artistic and historic center of Spain. As the pictures have shown, we were absolutely awed by our transportation on the AVE high-speed train into the city, which cut a 100+ mile trip into 30 minutes, traveling at over 200 miles per hour. We were amongst many tourists throughout the day, but it was kind of fun to be a “tourist” for the day, because in Madrid we feel more like “temporary residents.” (Thus, we work a little harder to “fit in” while in the city, but here we just enjoyed the novelty of hauling out the camera and looking a little bit silly like everyone else.) The train left us at the bottom of a hill, so we took a bus that crawled up the steep hillside into the large stone gates that let us into the city. Toledo is located on top of a hill surrounded by a stone wall, and is home to one of the most beautiful cathedrals in Europe.

We drank this city in by walking up and down the many narrow, balcony-lined streets. All the streets were hilly and cobblestone, leading to many unique views and wonderful opportunities of getting lost. We peaked our heads into the churches, mosques and the cathedral. At lunch time (2:30pm), we “ate like the Spaniards,” and ordered the menu de la dia (menu of the day). We were provided with two different menus- #1 & #2, with different course options listed. We both chose menu #1, with a first course of excellent gazpacho (I never knew gazpacho originated from Spain). Travis’s main course was a pork cutlet served with patatos (french fries). Mine was a white fish (“haca” – I’ve never heard of it) also served with fries. It’s funny that in all of the restaurants in Spain- ranging from basic to fancy, it is typical to serve french fries as a side for all nice cuts of meat (no veggies….to my dismay). Our menu also included a 3rd desert course, and here were the options: A green apple served as is (not cut up fancy or anything) on a plate, a slice of watermelon, or chocolate pudding served as is in it’s plastic container as well, just as you would buy at the grocery store! Random! We opted for the watermelon. The best deal of all is the fact that this comes with bread (made that day) and your choice of beverage- an entire half bottle of wine, a tall glass of beer, or bottled water- all the same price!

Overall, Toledo was a nice respite from the busyness of the city for a day. However, we were happy to be back home when our train returned as well. It is amazing how in just one week of living in a new city you can find your way around and already establish your favorite places. Parts of this city are grand, bright and vibrant (similar to the feel of Times Square, New York), whereas other parts of the city are quiet, tree-lined, and quaint (similar to the feel of South Pasadena or Sierra Madre). We’ve only just begun to discover the different “feels” of the many neighborhoods (or “barrios”) here.

To finish my post today, I’ll continue with my 3rd ODDITY of SPAIN:

WHEN DO THEY SLEEP?

We’ve already mentioned the odd hours the Spaniards keep as far as eating, working and partying. What we haven’t figured out is, “What hours they do their sleeping?” To explain, let me just outline one typical evening here and the sounds I heard during my night of sleep:

-11:00pm- Went to bed. Smells of the restaurants cooking dinner were wafting through our balcony window. Sounds of families and people of all ages walking to and from dinner on the street, or waiting at the bus stop in front of our building.

-1:00pm- Woke up to the sound of the recycle truck that comes EVERY night at this time. There are large storage bins located throughout the city to recycle your wine bottles, plastic and paper cartons (this is a VERY clean city and there are city workers cleaning everywhere, at all times!), and they are emptied every evening. As far as how loud this is, let’s just say that even Travis is wearing earplugs now to sleep (I always have).

-3:00pm- Woke up to loud voices and the sound of a party. Sure enough, I looked to the apartment across the street, and in one of the windows I could clearly see a small party just beginning. I double-checked the clock, “Could it really be 3:00am? Why are their guests just arriving?” They were serving wine and chatting it up. Bizarre.

-4:30am- Woke up again. This time I looked over to the party apartment to see if the guests were still there and noticed they were not. Instead, the lady in the apartment was starting a load of laundry! Hey, why not?

-7:30am- Woke up for the day. I noticed the apartment across the street finally had their shades drawn. I guess they do sleep sometime. Time to start my day!

Keep in mind this was just a weekday, the weekend nights are a whole different story!

So, tomorrow Travis and I have our interviews at our workplaces. Although our companies have already seen our resumes and agreed to have us, this is just a chance for them to meet us before we begin interning there next week. We are a little nervous and apprehensive because of our Spanish skills. The companies were told we were beginners before they agreed to this… but did they really anticipate us to be at this level? I guess we will see! We’re very curious about the people we’ll be working with and the different tasks we’ll be assigned to do. We’ll keep you posted… -Trish