We took an entire staff excursion to Madrid to introduce them to the city so that they have some idea of the set up and places for when they take their students on field trips.
Even though we took the public transportation into the city, they will have shuttle buses. But a trial by fire to the public transportation is necessary. We picked up the 561 bus not far from the entrance to the university and took that to Aluche where we picked up the metro and rode that into Gran Via where we transferred to Atoche.
The metro here is really clean and convenient. The bus cost 1,65 euro while the metro is less than a euro a ride (only if you by the 10 ticket pass). The convience and cheapness takes presidence over time in my opinion. The entire trip took about an hour. Which is opposed to a taxi ride from the university to center city that only takes 25 minutes but costs about 20 euro.
Anyway, once we departed from Atoche we walked to La Reina Sofia, la Caixa forum (a museum), el Prado, la fuente de Cibeles, el Palacio Real, la Puerta del Sol and we ended in la Plaza Mayor. It was a pretty hefty walk in terms of distance, but it was a very pleasant day with a nice breeze.
Once we got to Plaza Mayor it was about 2:30ish so we all went our separate ways for lunch, I had a pleasant lunching experience with the engineering and architecture teacher and his TA. They had paella and I had a delicious bocadillo de jamon y queso and we all shared a jarra of SANGRIA, this one was much better than the kind I had on my arrival day.
After an hour and a half of chatting and eating and people watching, we made our way to the art supply store to purchase some supplies for thier class, only to find it closed. So we trekked over to Corte Ingles, (the Spanish child of Walmart and Macy's, weird I know, but it's the truth!). We were able to get the majority of what they needed.
At this point it was time for them to meet up with another teacher back in Plaza Mayor. I went with them and met up with Fernando to make our way back to Aluche, where he would continue by bus to the campus and I would go to Carrefour for more supplies.
I was 90% successful in picking up the majority of what was on my list, while a few things still eluded me. But I was pretty content with my purchasing for the day.
I came out of Carrefour with about 8 HEAVY bags of stuff to take back. I contemplated shortly of whether to do a taxi because of the easiness of the transfer or whether to do the bus, and I guess I was up for the challenge at the time because I chose the bus. (Or maybe it was the cheapness in me!)
Half way through the bus ride I was wishing I had taken the taxi, because the conductor was LOCO! Jumping curbs, nearly causing a head on collision, and taking the turns like a he was driving a motorcycle. Luckily, I made it back to campus in one piece and hauled all of my purchases to la residencia. Where I unpacked everything and went to dinner.
Dinner last night was awesome! LOVED IT! We had pork cutlets with french fries. Now I must tell you that nearly everything we have eaten thus far from lunch and dinner has been FRIED and french fries are a staple of the university menu. They are served with every meal, but they take on different styles, from the traditional cut, to the potato wedge (think KFC), to the thinly sliced and then finally the small discs that are crunchy to perfection.
Also served with every meal are rolls, (which have varying degrees of freshness), we always have a veggie choice (yum!), and dessert usually consists of yougurt, fruit, jello, or pudding.
The whole carbs and salt on everything is really throwing my body off, to the point where I have to sleep at night with my feet elevated to relieve the swelling in my ankles. Which has also caused me to drink more and more water every day. Yesterday they were fine because I walked around from 9:30 am -8:30 pm.
Here are some pictures from the day;
The majority of our staff in front of the Velaquez statue outside of El Prado.
A pretty Madrileno street.
The famous fuente de Cibeles, I have only ever driven past this in the bus on my previous trips and I have never gotten a great picture of it, now I have.
Side view of Cibeles. You can't see it in this picture but behind the fountain is the Castillo de Correos, which literally translates to the Castle of the Post Office, and a castle it is. It is GIANORMOUS, and it probably takes up half of the block, and it's all for the post office.
This is my office manager buddy Fernando. He is from LA, but he hates the sun, so he brought a cheap red umbrella with him to shade himself. And yes he had it up practically ALL day. It was funny.I spolied you guys today with 2 posts in one day! I hope you enjoy reading about my adventures. It will be even more crazy tomorrow because all of our campers arrive. And so it begins, the three weeks of camp. If they go as fast as this week has, I will be back in the US so soon.
More in the near future!
2 comments:
Did you explain to anyone how July 4th is suppose to be celebrated?
All of us are american so we all know how it is supposed to be celebrated! But we had other things to do so we didn't do the traditional thing.
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