Fallas!

I put up a bunch of pictures of Fallas!
Make sure to check out my link.

Granada and Cordoba

This week was an exciting week for all of us. We are almost halfway through our trip and the time is really starting to fly. We spent four days this past week in Andalusia, the most southern region of Spain. We spent our time in two major cities, Cordoba and Granada. Granada is about a 6 hour drive from Denia, a fairly normal amount for traveling in the United States, but a very long time for a Spaniard. For all of our trips so far, we have had awful weather. This time we had rain and wind. We tried to protect ourselves with umbrellas, but with the wind, most of the time our umbrellas would turn inside out, completely defeating their purpose.
Our first night in Granada we spent our time walking around the city to get the lay of the land. The first major site that we visited was the Capilla Real. This mausoleum, attached to a chapel, was built by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella. The mausoleum has the remains of Ferdinand, Isabella, their daughter, Juana, and her husband Felipe. The chapel and the Capilla Real are both amazing structures. The cathedral is huge with large pillars and an incredibly tall ceiling. The cathedral as an amazing organ decorated with gold and ornate trimmings.
After visiting the Capilla real, we spent our first night in Granada exploring the city and heading to bed early to be prepared for our early day at the Alhambra. We had to leave our hotel at around 7 AM to make sure that we could get into the Alhambra. We waited for a long time in the rain, but we eventually made it inside. There are many reasons why the Alhambra is the most visited site in Spain. It is situated on the top of a hill and was originally an entire city. Within the walls there were enough supplies to maintain an entire city. The walls of the Alhambra are covered with carvings in stucco of flowers, birds, and of course, writing from the Koran. The intricateness of the carvings and the details in the ceilings and arches is incredible. We were also able to visit the Generalife, which was the summer house for the king and queen when they wanted to spend some time away from the court. Despite the rain, the gardens, architecture, and carvings of the Alhambra are amazing.
In the afternoon we had some free time to spend in the city. Some students visited the arabic baths, while others visited a monastery and an old hospital.
The final day, we drove about 2 hours to a city called Cordoba to visit the Mezquita. For me, although I've seen pictures of the Mezquita in art history text books, it is incomparable to the real thing. I know I've over emphasized this point already, but it's an incredible monument. The red and white arches do look as if they go on for miles. There are so many things to look at at once, the arches, the columns, the ceilings, and the inscriptions on the wall. My eyes were continually jumping from one thing to another while my brain was registering the amazing things I was seeing. It is another worthwhile site to see.
Although we had very poor weather on our trip, overall we were able to see some fantastic things that made it all worth it.

Exciting things

1. We had a surprise birthday for my Yaya, she turned 70, it was exciting. It was all seafood, lobster, shrimp, calamari, salmon, etc. And they were all worried about me since Yaya announced to EVERYONE that I didn't like seafood. So every other minute someone was asking me if I liked the food or not. I did, and I ate enough.

2. I dyed my hair back to blonde, well kind of, it didn't go so well. It's kind of an odd color right now.

3. I had my first test this week, I think it went well.

4. I bought my ticket to go see my sister in York for spring break. AWESOME.

5. I am going to the opera in Valencia this weekend to see "Peter and the wolf", I am excited.

Whoopsie... dropped the ball.

Alright, so I totally have been dropping with this whole blog thing. It's been a crazy week starting classes and after a visit to Barcelona, it's been hard to find time to update. But, I will update now! 

Back up a week and a half, to Wednesday, January 28. We left after classes to go to Barcelona, it was a long, long bus ride with a bunch of high schoolers... they were students from a local high school and it definitely enforced my not wanting to teach high school, or go back to high school myself. They played dance music for the entire 6 hours and it was so annoying. But anyways, we got to Barcelona and at night we explored downtown Barcelona. I really like Barcelona by day, but at night, it's a little scary. I got offered drugs a couple times, and cat called, but I definitely did not like it.

On Thursday we went to many, many tourist sites. First we went to Gaudi's Casa Mila. It's a great building. The roof is definitely the best part of the structure. We spent more time than needed at the house, since there is only so much you can see in the one apartment. The roof gave you a great view of Barcelona and some of the other sites. With the extra time that we had, my friend and I visited some of the swanky boutiques that we could never afford. Stores like Chanel, Lois Vuitton, Hermes, etc., etc. It was fun just to look at the things that we couldn't afford.

Next we went to the Sagrada Familia and let me tell you... wow... it is awesome. The inside is really not visible since it's under such construction. But again, the roof is really the coolest part. You could pay to go up into the towers by elevator (they don't let you walk anymore because it's too dangerous to your health). They view is even better than the one of Casa Mila. It's an amazing structure that will be even cooler when it's done. But one side is very old and almost drippy looking, and the other is very square and block like. The contrast between the two sides is really cool, and they make for a really interesting structure.

The next thing that we did was go to Gaudi's park. If you like mosaic, this is the place the be. I took tons of pictures of the mosaics that are in the park. There are benches covered in mosaic and lizards covered in mosaic. And also tons of really cool rock structures and tunnels and what not. It was a cloudy day so it wasn't the best day for spending a day in the park. 

Finally, at night, we went to the National Museum of Catalonia. It was a huge museum and unfortunately we didn't get to see much of it. We only saw the parts that we were going to study in class. Which is kinda lame.... but anyways, we spend awhile there and then continued on.

The night activity was probably the best. We went to a soccer game between FC Barcelona, a huge team, and a smaller Barcelona team. The sports arena is amazing! I think it's the biggest in the world... or at least one. Even thought it was a smaller game, it was filled. It was kinda scary because there are so many people. But we kept together as a group and kept mostly safe. One of the guys in our group did get his wallet stolen...  but he was kinda stupid about where he put it. He lost a lot of money though, which isn't good.

The next day we had another day full of stuff. We first visited an old cathedral and then after that we went to the Palau de Musica. It was by far one of my favorite things that I've seen so far. It is a music hall that has like the most fantastic interior. It's full of mosaics and really interesting sculptures. With amazing acoustics, I would love to go to a concert there.

In the afternoon we went to Picasso's museum and just walked around the city. The Picasso museum is another thing that is on the must see list. It's full of his work from the beginning, more formal paintings, to his work in cubism, to the work that he did on stage sets. It was awesome.

Saturday was a day of wine tasting, at 11 in the morning and paid for by Calvin College. :D We spent another 6 hours in the bus and then home again. It was definitely good to be home. 

Finally! This past week was the first week of classes. It's been weird adjusting to classes. Yes, they are all in Spanish. The cool thing about this semester is that I really don't have classes on Friday. Which gives me many free weekends to do whatever I like! Good! Well that is enough for now, I will update more later!

Off I go, again

Sorry I haven't updated in awhile, this weekend has been crazy. Presentation, paper and test plus homework on top. Today we are leaving to go to Barcelona for 3 days, and I will be in Tarragona for a day. I am really excited, we are going to see some awesome museums and I am going to a soccer game! I will update when I get back.

Love you!

Skype

It's rare that I get a chance to go on Skype, but I will work on that. Let me know your Skype names by commenting on this post. That would be great. 

My name: Katie DeVos (obviously)

Skype name: kathrynrosedevos

I think I'll be able to be on tonight for awhile, probably from about 10 PM my time, till later.

If you are going to be around you should go on Skype so we can chat!

To make up for the last one, this one is short.

I almost walked out the door without pants on this morning. 

Good times.