Saturday, February 28, 2015

International Dinner III

Last night there was yet another successful international dinner at the same assistant's apartment as last time. Portuguese, American, Irish, Scottish, Mexican, Palestinian, German, and French people all squished in a room sharing good food and good conversation. Man I'm going to miss these kinds of get-togethers and these kinds of people when I get home. 

The photos I took on my phone suck, and the videos are sideways. So with that tempting introduction, enjoy! (Once some of the others post their much-better photos I'll steal them and add them). 






And then on the way back I was in a tram with a group of drunk French people. 


Welcome to Crolles

If you imagine a line drawn through Grenoble, extending south through Echirolles where I live and north through Crolles where I tutor on Wednesdays, and turn it on it's side, you'll create something of a spectrum. On one side, Echirolles: the lower socio-economic area with difficult schools and a really popular (and catchy) song dedicated to the victims of a shooting two years ago. On the other, Crolles: a suburb surrounded by beautiful mountains, full of houses where every parent is either a doctor or an engineer who eats organic, and every child seems to be signed up for two sports, an instrument, private tutoring sessions and yoga. At least, that's the impression I get from tutoring six kids up there. Sorry fir the crappy video quality, and that it's on it's side...I don't technology very well.



Monday, February 23, 2015

Spain part 7: Cordoba, Where We Saw a Heard of Sheep, Laughed Out of Sheer Exhaustion, and Got Lost More Than Usual

Day trip #2 from Sevilla was Cordoba. This was a day before we left and we were both tired. Generally I'm able to power through my exhaustion but even I would have been happy to spend a day in bed, and I think Ewelina felt the same. At one point I was pretty we both lost our minds; she kept bursting out laughing at absolutely nothing, and then I would join her, and then she would laugh harder, and I'm sure we looked completely crazy.

We started our day by almost missing the train to Cordoba. First we missed the bus, then we realized that we had been standing on the wrong side of the road the whole time. Thankfully we ended up getting there with a few minutes to spare.

And then we got there and got lost. Immediately. And we remained lost the whole time. The map we got from the tourism office was completely useless.

Ewelina looking at map trying to find where we were: "Oh I see"
Me: "Oh you figured out where we are?"
Ewe: "No, this map is shit."

At one point we had no clue where we were and ended up near some relatively busy intersection. We plopped down on a little plot of grass in the middle and I laid out the map to, once again, try to figure out where we were. Ewelina proceeded to lay down on said map and used my leg as a pillow, and I burst out laughing thinking about how incredibly pathetic we must have looked to all the people passing by. We were laughing so hard we were crying.

But enough about being lost. We basically stopped using the map and just wandered around, seeing all the pretty things. And then we saw the sheep! We had crossed the main bridge and were walking along the water when all of the sudden we saw a heard of sheep (and a few goats) being led by a herder and his sheepdog. I never thought I'd see something like that so close to a city. It was weird, but I liked it. We ended up sitting and staring at them for a long time.

Cordoba: overall the city has some gorgeous things in the historical center, but honestly, once you get out of the Jewish quarter it feels like a regular city, nothing special. I'd recommend it for half a day maybe. I'm still glad we went, but among all our day trips, I would say it was my least favorite (although the other ones did set the bar pretty high). The bridge was really pretty, and the cathedral was as well. We didn't go in, but even the outside walls were pretty amazing. So I give Cordoba a mild thumbs up.

















The Sheep! This was really awesome. 





GOAT!!

YES! Honestly my coffee addiction is reaching new heights. 
We found Jesus throwin' up some gang signs. 
Ewelina likes to pick walls. Remember when I said I think she broke in Cordoba? I was taking some pictures and she had kept going ahead of me. I turned the corner and I found her picking at a wall. It was odd. There were many such odd moments. 
Sleepy. We were both pretty dead. 

Old Roman things

More old Roman things. At this point we had left the pretty part of the city and we were barely trudging along, trying to find the cool things on the map we were supposed to see. 

Spain Part 6: Cadiz, Where We Went to the Beach, Saw Lots of Costumes, and Were Lied To About Parades

Ewelina and I took two day trips while in Sevilla: first to Cadiz, then to Cordoba.

Cadiz is a little port town located on a narrow peninsula in southwestern Spain and is (thanks Wikipedia) one of the oldest towns in Europe.

We were lucky enough to be there during the carnival festivities, which Cadiz is known for. The city itself is adorable but being there during carnival made it even better. Everyone was dressed up, the streets were totally packed, and there were stands full of singers every few blocks. I only wish I could have understood what they were saying, everyone else kept laughing. Overall the beach area was gorgeous and the streets were super lively and despite my stomach giving me trouble by refusing to digest whatever I had eaten the day before, it was one of my favorite trips.

We did, however, have one disappointment. We were told that the parade would start at 5:00 pm. So at 4:30 we started walking over to reserve a place, and then we waited. The crowd got bigger, adorable children in costumes kept walking by, vendors were everywhere, people throwing streamers and confetti and spraying silly string. It was great. And then an hour later it was less great. And then two hours later we were cold and had to go catch a train. We never did find out when the thing actually started. I was bummed, if you YouTube search "Cadiz Carnival Parade" you'll find ones from previous year, it looked really neat. Oh well, you win some you lose some.

The singers all over the city:



These terrifying things were the first things top greet us:









This guy would jump out and scare people. I swear I thought one lady was going to knock his head off when he did it to her. 
Cathedral


Even the trash bins get dressed up specifically for carnival
The coast. So, so beautiful:


Getting made-up for carnival








Apparently they say that these trees were brought back from the New World by Columbus. And when I say "they" I mean Wikipedia. I just thought they were really awesome. 


Off the beach there was this long walkway that led to the Castillo de San Sebastián. It was great, at one point I just laid out on the barrier, closed my eyes, and listened to the water. I could have fallen asleep. 

View from Castillo de San Sebastián
There was wind
The dragon has real fire, the boy is peeing real water. Classy classy. 

More singing people!





Had to do it


Waiting for the parade...


Okay, I' not going to lie, this little Olaf was really, really cute.