Day 3

This morning we had breakfast with our group and took a bus to Toledo. This is one of the oldest cities in Spain and is very important for the Catholic church. Toledo's bishop is Spain's representative for the Vatican and it's cathedral contains the gigantic monstrance used to hold the body and blood of Christ during the celebration of Corpus Christi. We particularly enjoyed getting to see and hear about the various influences on the architectural styles of the Cathedral, which included Baroque, Gothic, and Neo-Classical. There were many paintings by artists in whom we have developed a strong interest, particularly El Greco. There was even a painting by the grandfather of our former Spanish teacher, Señora Tristan. 

The Arabic influence is particularly obvious throughout the city. From the typical geometric ornamentation, which evokes notions of infinity, to the domed towers, one can see how, despite the centuries of violence, coexisting in harmony did indeed take place among the great monotheistic religions. This is particularly evident in the Sinagoga de Santa María la Blanca, which was built by Muslims around 1200, became a Jewish synagogue shortly thereafter, then converted into a  Christian church.

In a small church, Iglesia Santa Tomé, we saw one of the most famous paintings by El Greco, The Burial of the Count of Orgaz. It was interesting to study a painting that has remained in the exact location for which it was intended over 400 years ago. El Greco's style is, from our point of view, uncharacterizable. Many people say that he painted souls rather than bodies, because his depiction of human figures are always elongated, as if they were stretching towards heaven. There are also aspects of his style that resemble certain trends within 20th century art. He was undoubtedly one of the most unique artists of his day - of any day, really.

We returned to Madrid for the evening, and after dinner we went to a Sangria bar with our friend, MJ, located in the basement of a building near our hotel. The bar was run by three grumpy old men: one waited on customers, one stayed behind the bar, and the other played old show-tunes on the slightly out of tune, but nevertheless pleasant-to-listen-to, piano. The walls were covered with posters from the Prado and hand-painted proverbs and quotes. The air was filled with smoke; there's no doubt it was authentic and almost everybody there was a local (check out the video).  It was interesting to experience a part of Madrid's night life.

Day 2

Today we woke up renovated to a bustling, bouyant Madrid. We walked through several plazas, including Plaza Mayor, stopping for pastries and café along the way. We took a detour to buy Pastas de Almendra (soft cookies with an even softer almond-flavored filling) from a local convent. There is only a small sign on the convent door which reads, se vende dulces, which means, we sell sweets. The purchase was conducted entirely through a window with a lazy-susan-type door, allowing the nuns to sell their goods without being seen. We read about the place in our Rick Steves' travel guide and thought it would be fantastic to be the only tourists to know such a secret - to our dismay there were several other tourists holding their Rick Steves books, trying to find the concealed convent. After this we headed to the Palaceo Real, Spain's royal palace. This indubitably magnificent, though decadent, palace is considered to be one of the greatest in Europe. Each room is covered with frescos or elaborately-embroidered wallpaper, and filled with statues, clocks, and paintings of the royal family.

For lunch we ate like the locals, that is, standing up at a bar. We tried a bocadilla (a small ham sandwich) and gazpacho (a popular, cold, tomato soup). We then dropped off the rest of our Pastas at the hotel and headed to the Thyssen-Bornemisza museum. This art museum contains the collection of the Baron and Baronness Thyssen and includes works from early Christian artists all the way up to Picasso. We especially enjoyed the impressionist works, as well as becoming acquainted with a few new artists like Joaquín Sorolla y Batista and Ernst Ludwig Kirchner.
In the evening everyone from the group for the Spanish class met at the hotel and then we all went to dinner together. We were served multiple courses of Spanish classics, including olives, ham, and calamari.

Day 1

After a tedious, though somewhat pleasant day of traveling, we arrived in Madrid at 9:00 in the morning. Only speaking our hesitant, broken Spanish, we managed to get on the right bus to take us downtown. The weather was beautiful: cool and sunny with lush, white clouds, perfect for a long walk. We strolled through a significant portion of the city before finding our hotel, observing along the way not only the magnificent architecture, but the people as well. We found ourselves in the midst of a whole new culture, one which pronounces certain letters with a lisp; which takes a midday siesta; which eats a huge meal around 14:00 (2 p.m.) and small snacks and drinks around 21:00 (9 p.m.); and where men ride motorcycles in suits--we even saw two priests sharing a moped!
Nevertheless, we were not deterred from following suit. After our own revitalizing siesta, we ate a multiple course meal around 14:30 at a restaurante called La Taparía. We ordered in Spanish, throwing in the occasional ceceo (the lisp mentioned above) with words like gracias and cerveza (pronounced in Castilian GRAH-thee-ahs and thair-VAY-thuh). For only 23 euros, this delicious meal was una ganga, because we each had salad, bread, an entree, desert, beer and coffee. We then went to Madrid's modern art museum, el Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, where Picasso's masterpiece Guérnica is displayed. Although this work demands more thought and interpretation, we feel comfortable saying now that it undoubtedly captures the horror of war, but in a unique and deeply moving way. Accompanying this were dozens of sketches and drafts Picasso made in preparation for this work, as well as photographs of the havoc wreaked by the civil war.
We also saw paintings and sculptures by other Spanish artists with whom we were not familiar prior to our arrival. It was particularly interesting to see some of Dalí's earlier, pre-surrealist works. Finally, we were able to take a few breaks to contemplate the art we had just seen in a lovely garden circumscribed by the museum.
For "supper", around 9 pm, we had some ice cream, because we were so full from our afternoon meal. Not yet having yet recovered from our overnight flight, we decided to skip on the customary tapas and bar scene in order to get some rest for tomorrow.

¡Buenas Noches!