A night out...

Well, I had my day off on Tuesday, which was nice and relaxing. I slept in until about 11:30 am and then got up and showered and met Lourdes, (one of the girls that works the reception desk) at 1pm to go into the city for a bit.

We met up with Marta´s au pair, Allison, who is from South Carolina but goes to school in DC. We had lunch, walked and shopped a bit. I made it back to campus at around 6ish(?)

We had a staff pizza party. The pizza was delayed due to the fact that we didn´t tell the vigilante at the gate that we had ordered it and he refused to let him enter the campus. Quite comical that the press can make it on to campus to harass us but the pizza guy can´t.

Yesterday, was probably my favorite day here so far. The majority of the staff had off and went to Toledo. Due to the fact that my day off was Tuesday, I had to work the morning (8-2) shift in the office. By work I mean, appear to be busy so that the other people in the office won´t ask me to do stuff. Facebook is a wonderful tool for this type of avoidance of work.

Between 2 and 3 pm, Maureen finished up what she was working on in the office and began cleaning up a bit. When she was done, we got ready and grabbed Shiva, and went into the city. We took the longer bus ride and the short metro ride into Sol.

We called the Toledo group and made plans to meet up at about 7:30 for a night of fun. Shiva, Maureen and I began with our first jarra of sangria. LOVE IT! We sat at a little cafe just outside of plaza mayor and just enjoyed the breeze and people watching. There was the cutest little girl at the table beside us, whose name was Maria. She entertained us for quite a while.

At 7:30 we headed over to the Tio Pepe sign to meet up with the Toledo group. From there the night got fun. We went to Plaza de Santa Ana and shared some jarras of sangria, where we were treated to the incessant honking. Shiva volunteered to direct traffic and the funniest part was that the cars actually listened to him!!!

After our first round we picked up and headed to get some food. Kevin, Alex and Joel had gone to a restaurant called En busca del tiempo on a previous trip to the city and raved about the food, so that´s where we ended up. They were right the food was great. We shared steak and fries.

After dinner we were all feeling really good and went to an Irish pub for some irish car bombs. They were delicious...Afterwards, Joel has a strange, unexplainable fascination with the Museo de Jamon. It is probably because the beer is extremely cheap. After a round and a half there we went on a hike to the older part of town, the entire walk I had to pee. We finally stopped at a random bar with a really cool bathroom. Jenn, Maureen and I were the only girls and we all used the bathroom. The funniest part of that experience was that all of the men were being so loud in the bathroom next to us, we could hear everything that they were talking about and it was HILARIOUS.

After a few more bars, losing Shiva, finding Shiva and then Joel getting into an argument with me and Kevin about what the problem is with the american educational system. We ended the night at San Gines, the oldest and most famous churreria. The churros were amazing after a night of drinking.

We made it back to campus via taxi at about 2:30 am. I slept like a rock and was up and ready to go at 8am. Which is very impressive considering I felt less than great. But overall it was well worth it.

Also Maureen and I decided to share a hotel room on Saturday and Sunday night. The hotel is the Vincci Capitol and its a great deal for the price and location. We will be right on the corner of Gran Via and Callao. Which is practically in the center of it all.

I am looking forward to ending the trip on a good note by staying there.

Today, more packing and wrapping up the last minute things here.