Moroccan Me Crazay! (Oct. 9-12)

(Rabat: by far the prettiest, coolest part of the city)

Mexico, Peru, Ecuador, New Zealand, England, Spain…. These places, though obviously different from Colorado, don’t constitute culture shock. If I thought that before, I changed my mind precisely 4 days ago. Morocco, a Muslim nation, is about 35 minutes via ferry from the Southern most tip of Spain – Gibraltar (a place with a wealth of history that my Dad could tell you much more about than I can). Despite this short distance, Morocco is as stark a contrast to Spain as you will find. You leave the beaches of Gibraltar (where it is common to see women but not their bathing suit tops – not that I ever look or anything, it’s just what people tell me…) and arrive in Morocco (in a city called Tanger) where it is almost a rarity to see the full face of a woman, and never any other skin aside from her hands. I mean you see this on TV all the time, but actually being there, right in the middle of it, is a completely different experience.  In Spain, as you all know by now, the nights really don’t get going until 11 or 12 pm and alcohol is almost a way of life. In Morocco everybody is in bed, or at least in their house, by, at the latest, 9 pm and alcohol is forbidden according to Islamic law. The streets are cleared out, aside from the vast amounts of trash that litter the ground as though the use of trash cans is looked down upon, the house is quiet and everybody is in bed or headed in that direction (I guess that this shouldn’t be too big of a culture shock to me, being that it is what happens at my home – where 9 o’clock is pushing it - but for some reason it seemed to me a very odd concept). To sum things up, I guess that it is easiest to say that Spain is by far the most liberal country that I have ever been to and Morocco is by far the most conservative.

(above: ridin' some llamas! 

right: the house, apparently a typical muslim house)

The first two nights we stayed in a home stay with a Moroccan family in the capital city of Rabat. This experience was one of the most revealing and mind opening  of my life. Sure, there are the little things, like a literal whole in the ground that serves as a toilet, which is in the middle of the shower, which makes up just about all of the bathroom. There is the food – a big bowl of kuskus or chicken or spaghetti – that is placed in the center of the table from which everybody eats using their right hand only (its very bad manners to use the left). Lunch and dinner are also strictly for eating, not for socializing – the only conversation we engaged in focused on how to get the coke from one end of the table to the other. Then there is the house itself, which was actually very beautiful. From the outside it looks like nothing, but the moment you step in it opens up to a big courtyard type structure with four pillars shooting up towards the ceiling. From this room there are five other rooms that branch off: the kitchen, two living rooms (which have built in sofas lining each of the walls) and two bedrooms - our room was the only one with actual beds – the others just had the sofas that doubled as beds. (There was a second level to our house, which another family lived in.)

The thing that impressed me the most about this new culture, however, was how open everybody seems to be. We had many discussions with Moroccan students and each time they made a point of saying how they never judge people based on race, color or religion. Who knows how true this is actually is, but based on the actions of the people around us it seemed to be the case. We went to some small, rural cities where we had to be the first Americans that the people had seen in a long time, if ever, yet they treated us as if we were as normal as the calls for prayer that you hear five times a day (the first one is at 4 in the morning). They never stared, never seemed to be talking behind our backs, and if they spoke to us it was to welcome us to their country and ask how we liked the tea (which was delicious, and full of sugar!). Another thing that impressed me about the Moroccans was that, at the minimum, they know at least 2 languages fluently (Arabic and French) though the majority that we met knew either Arabic, French and English; Arabic, French and Spanish; or all of the above. In our host family the two brothers (whom were 26 and 32) spoke all 4 languages more or less, but the mother only spoke Arabic; either meaning that multilingualism seems to be a rather new concept or that it is something that more men learn than woman.

(old roman ruin: Chellah)

By far the most local, authentic experience we had was the hammam – a Muslim bath house.  The hammam is comparable to a sauna in the United States; comparable in the sense that it makes you sweat, everything else is a little bit more strange. There are three rooms going from coldest to hottest and the idea is to sit in the hot room (something like 51 Celsius, which I would say the equivalent of in Farenheight but it just sounds too hot) for 15 minutes then move to the medium room where you can either chose to wash yourself or hire somebody else to do it. Three of my friends and I, thinking that it was probably one of those rare, once in a life time “opportunities” decided to hire somebody else to do it. Communicating this proved to be very difficult and eventually a worker arrived who was able to translate the following sentence to us in his broken English: “Who here wants the old man to rub them down?”  I don’t know if anything has ever sounded more awkward in all my life, or actually was more awkward, but we went ahead and did it anyways. The old man was indeed old; he had at most 4 teeth, was wearing underwear and nothing else, was incredibly hairy, but could scrub the body like nobody’s business. He had us lie down and then took a coarse rag – comparable to sand paper – to our skin and went to work. By the time it was over I had rolls and rolls of dead skin pilled up at the edges of my limbs – on my hands, my ankles, my feet. I think, that with the loss of dead skin and sweat combined, I lost a minimum of 5 pounds that night, and I’ve definitely never felt so clean in all my life.

                                                                    (Mausoleum of King Mohammad V: side note; not like by many, his son, the current king, is far more popular - helping the poor, a big problem in Morocco)

Another very interesting part of this weekend was a conversation we had with a couple of Moroccan Peace Corp volunteers. They have both been in Morocco for about a year and you could tell how excited they were to be talking in English to Americans in what probably was the first time in as long as they could remember.  It sounds like it can be some lonely work at times, imagine landing in a completely foreign country such as Morocco, then driving for 2 days to about as remote a village as one will find where you will be spending the next two years of your life. It makes me reconsider how “hard” I think it is being in Sevilla, Spain for a year. I have a tremendous amount of respect for those guys. I’ve considered the Peace Corp before and though I don’t want to rule it out I don’t think that I could do what they’re doing, maybe a village in South America, but a middle of nowhere place in Morocco is just a little too “middle of nowhere” place for me.

On the third day we went to a one of these middle of nowhere towns and had lunch with a local family. It was like one of those places that you can find in South America where the chickens out number the dogs, which outnumber the cats, which outnumber the people. Lets just say that an afternoon there was sufficient for me. After that we drove to a village called Chefchaouen, which was by far my favorite place in Morocco and probably one of the most beautiful places I have been. It is way high up in the mountains and a river flows right through the town where you can find kids jumping off rocks, ladies doing laundry and people simply enjoying life. The town itself is a maze of narrow streets, barely wide enough to walk in, much less fit a car, and the buildings are all some shade or another of blue or white. It really was an incredible place and I would love, if the opportunity ever presents itself, to go back there someday. Soccer jerseys were also 6 euros there (or 60 duran) as compared to 60 euros in Spain, so lets just say I put my newfound purchasing power to some good use.

The one thing that Spain and Morocco both have in common: Neither have the DENVER BRONCOS!!! The best team that this universe has ever known. My goal here is to, by the time I leave, have this city, or at least my house, decorated in the Orange and Blue (or should I say brown and, like, a very odd yellow) that represents the everything that this world should be.

¡Aqui Estoy! (Oct. 2-4)

¡Hola Todos!

Man, I got off to such a hot start there on those blog updates! I think I was somewhere along the lines of 5 for 5; 5 weeks, 5 blogs. Thats 100%! Rather than look at these past couple of weeks as losses, however, which would put a dent in that rather pretty percentage, I think I'm going to take them as though they were by weeks. And really its only been one by week. Or maybe one and a half. But anyways, here I am! And I have stories! The more time off the more stories generated! Jajajajaja

This past weekend I made plans to go to Granada. And this time I actually made it! (I don't know if I ever mentioned it in the Almuñeca blog, but I was under the impression that we were actually going to Granada then, which never exactly happened.) My friend Marco and I took the train there on Friday afternoon and came back Sunday morning. The train, if it were the same one I took to Madrid, would have taken about an hour, but being that they reserve those old fashioned, cargo looking trains that Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid once plundered for the shorter excursions, the trip was about 3 and a half hours. Bus and car are about the same length of time though, and trains allow for reading and writing so I would chose them any day. We arrived in Granada at about 7 friday night and fortunately, or so I thought, I had written down the directions/bus numbers that we would take to our hostel. When I pulled them out and started walking towards the bus, however, mi amigo Marco looked at me as if I were crazy. I mean, who uses directions to get to a desired location in a city in which they have never been to? I guess I liked his spirit though so i put them in my pocket and we proceeded to walk. Not only did we not know where we were going, but we didn't even bother to look at street signs; I guess we just assumed that some force was guiding us or something. But, as we would find out, such a force did not exist. We walked in what we later discovered was the completely opposite direction for about 30 minutes, but it was a fun way of seeing the other part of the city and we were in no hurry. When we knew we were close we decided to use the directions and this is what they consisted of (the final part, at least): "Big wooden door on the right". Maybe if we were in New York or something such a description would have worked, but its a little bit less helpful when all the doors are relatively big, and most definitely wooden. We started off at the biggest of the wood doors, which turned out to be somebody's house, then we attempted to decipher which of the four wooden doors on the street was the most wooden, if that is at all possible - for one wood to be more wooden than a corresponding piece of wood. (Wooden/wood is looking like a very odd word now, after writing it so many times. Test it, after the 6th time it starts to look really funny.) Anyways, that attempt failed as well - it was some sort of meat factory or something - so we turned to the smallest and least wooden of the four doors and, obviously - I mean it probably should have occurred to us sooner, that was the hostel.

The next day we had tickets to the Alhambra - one of the seven man made wonders of the world, also, as we would soon find out, one of the seven most complicated and confusing things of the world. We had tickets to the 8:30 entrance (each ticket gives you half an hour to enter the Alhambra, so we had from 8:30 to 9:00) that I had printed off of the internet. When our turn came up, feeling relatively proud of ourselves for making it on time, we were turned away because we were supposed to have exchanged the internet ticket for one that they give at the front. Ok, a little bit frustrating, but not too big of a deal, I mean, how hard can exchanging tickets be? Well, I guess it depends on if your a distance runner or not, because it was like running a marathon. At a full out sprint. In sandals. Ducking and weaving through people the entire time. Which reminded me of football. Which I miss a lot. We had to run up one hill, only for them to tell us that we were at the ticket office for purchases, not internet exchanges, so we had to run back down the hill and up the one on the opposite side, were we discovered that, although this was the actual entrance, the exchange office was back down, then up and around behind where we were. So we ran again. By the time we got to that office it was 8:51. Fortunately, they took us to the front of the line to exchange our tickets and we somehow made it just as the second hand on my watch was about to force that big hand to change the hour. (A fancy way of saying it was almost 9:00).

The Alhambra was well worth the run. It was originally built by the Muslims and later conquered by the Christians, so it retains aspects of both religions. Although its technically a castle, its much different than one would imagine a castle to be. Each room is beautifully and uniquely decorated witch Islamic scripture covering the walls. It is a very open structure with many courtyards and outdoor walkways leading from one room to the next. In what I thought was the prettiest and most unique room it is said that a Christian leader hosted an extravagant dinner party in which he killed all his guests. Right before dessert none the less. Probably not quite what the guests had in mind when they received the invitation. There is a winter part to the Alhambra and a summer part, or "vacationing spot" in which there are gardens are everywhere - probably similar to the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, though I have never been there. In my opinion what makes the Alhambra so beautiful, so majestic, is its location. Granada itself is impressive to take in. Its reminds me a little bit of Aspen, only its an actual city. Mountains rise up on all sides and then unexpectedly drop down into far reaching valleys which the highways shoot over, painting a sort of futuristic looking scene amidst an old, muslim founded community. The Alhambra looks over all of this and gives one an amazing view from all angles.

Wow, this has been an excessively long post. I guess that I felt as though I had to redeem myself a bit but I'm sure everybody is getting a little bit tired of reading this. Or maybe I'm just using that as an excuse due to the fact that I'm getting a little bit tired of typing, but to sum things up, we wrapped up our tour of Granada by visiting the Catedral of Granada and the Arabic community that is on a hill side close to the Alhambra.

I'm going to try to get back to this again this week to put up pictures and give a brief update on life at school. ¡Hasta luego!

Almuñeca (Sept. 19-20)

So I have been in Spain for over a month now, but in many ways I feel like I still haven't gotten away from America. I'm sure the Internet has something to do with that, but I love being able to stay connected to everything and everyone that has been such a big part of my life for so long (Plus, life without Internet is like the even more modern day equivalent of Cast Away, i.e. you can be in the most beautiful, modern, civilized, populous part of the world, but without Internet, without that connection to your home, you still feel as isolated and alone as ever.)  Rather, I think that this feeling of still being in America has more to do with always being around Americans. I was under the impression that from the moment we arrived here in Spain we would be with Spaniards. Granted, we see them all around us, but rare is the occasion in which we actually socialize with them (hopefully part of this will change when they start school on the 28th). Anyways, in an attempt to get even more away, I went to a little beach town called Almuñeca with a Spaniard I had met on my first night in Sevilla and two of his friends. They are crazy. Loco. I don't think I've ever been so confused or turned around in my entire life, but I loved it! Listening to them talk to each other was an experience in itself. I closed my eyes at one point during their conversation and literally thought that I was on another planet amongst 300 or so shouting Martians. I've always wanted thought it would be cool to be abducted by aliens! I'm sure it can't be much different than that experience lol. One of the amigos of my amigo Eduardo (or Principe Naranja as his friends call him because he is always wearing orange) owns a beautiful, very spanish apartment over looking the beach. (I was relieved upon pulling into the parking lot because I thought we would be sleeping in the car or something.... I literally understood nothing about what was going on lol).

We arrived at the apartment at 1:00 am (really 9:00 pm by their standards as I would soon find out) and sat out on the patio for a couple of hours. We went to bed around 3 am upon which the Spaniards all commented on how early it was, especially for a Friday night, but, obviously embarrassed with themselves, they went to sleep. (I, on the other hand, was ecstatic - almost to the point where I couldn't fall asleep - for this was the moment that I had been waiting for since 11 that night lol). The next day we got up at around 9:30 and went down to the beach. The water was cold but we rented a paddle boat and made our way into the open seas. The 3 spaniards and the american. Bound together by what would deem to be about an hour of solid pedaling and sufficient burning in the legs before we would make it back to shore.

That evening would prove to be another late one (or should I say early) as we got to bed around 6 am. The night consisted of tapa bar after tapa bar after tapa bar leading to, when it was all said and done, about 40 euros worth of food and drinks. I, unfortunately, had no say in what I wanted as my new amigos consistently brought new plates to me begging me try the food and then laughing as they saw my often not-to-pleasant reactions.


When it was all said and done the weekend passed by in the blink of an eye, or the sentence of a Spaniard, and I had heard more spanish than ever before in all my years of life combined - which is precisely what I came to Spain for. They want to do it again next weekend, but I need at least another month of recuperation and, apparently, more adjustment to the Spanish lifestyle. I need to catch up on sleep now! And how about them Broncos! All the way baby!

Mi casa, mi cuarto, mi habitación

(El Baño... I still haven't figured out what the toilet type structure between the sink and the actual toilet is used for. One of the many mysteries of this foreign country)

(my room, I know I should have cleaned it a little bit more before I took these pictures, but for some reason I have the hardest time cleaning this room so I decided to show it in its natural state)

(The House itself: (Alonso Cano, Casa 12)

La Universidad: UPO

(First impression of my new University.... ¿¡Dónde está el césped?!)

School..... Escuela.... It is here. Ha empezado. The language might be different, but those two words, school and escuela, they don't differ in any other way. For some people it is those overwhelming thoughts of the long hours of work that lie ahead, the end of the fun, worry free days of summer that they have grown so accustomed to. For me, it is the dreaded opening week. See, I seem to have this uncanny nack for always finding myself with a class schedule that represents as stark a contrast as you will find to those classes that I thought I had signed up for. Something as different as, say, Santa Clara University to my new Pablo De Olavide University (which we will get to later). This makes those first 4 days of school a stress filled, lets take as many classes as I can because the world is going to end (and obviously thats what I would want to do if the world were going to end) week. And this one proved no different. The first three days of school I sat in on about every class offered and some more than once. I was consistently running from one building to another and I don't think I've ever walked into so many doors in such a short period of time in my entire life (as I always seemed to be looking down at a map of the school when a building suddenly sprung up before me). Aaaanyways, I'm good now. I just called my university to make sure all my classes fulfill requirements there and, gracias a dios, they do. I also had my school send me an email saying that same thing just in case they try to hold onto me for another quarter when I return by saying that these classes actually don't count - which, I've heard, has happened before.

I am enrolled in 5 classes at Pablo de Olavide Universidad: Spanish (por supuesto), The European Union, International Marketing, History/Religion of Spain and The European Economy. It seems like a pretty solid course load and the final two classes are taught in Spanish so either I will learn a lot more Spanish as well as history/economy, or nothing at all. When we first saw the campus I'm pretty sure that we all had the same thought: "we are going to jail... or at least to a mental institute... I knew that this whole Spain thing was too good to be true".

(Left: The "watchtower"

Right: The hallways - reminds me of those California highschools I                                               used to see in the movies/disney channel)

It was made even funnier that on the first day of class two of my teachers made a point of reassuring us that we are not in jail, we did not do anything wrong in coming to Spain, and that we will be allowed to go home at the end of everyday. The school consists of an outdoor hallway running for the length of about 3 football fields with buildings springing off to the sides every now and then. The buildings are all yellow and orange with bars on the windows, but the classrooms themselves are just like any classroom you would see at a university back in the states. The thing that I miss most about Santa Clara as compared to this school is the grass. In Santa Clara everything feels so inviting. The freshly cut grass calls your name - whether it is for sports, a nap or just some good, clear thinking. The flowers create an aura of warmth and acceptance and the beautiful architecture makes you want to pull out your camera everywhere you go. Not to say that you don't feel a desire to take some pictures at my new university, its just for the complete opposite reasons; like, hey, look where I go to school, its worse than yours haha not really though; its just going to take some getting used to but I know that I'll love it, im not worried. (I don't have pictures right now, but I'm planning on putting some up in the next couple of days so be sure to check back!)

(This is definitely the kind of picture that you would find in a brochure... a solid use of the only green grass found on campus... though it does look more along the lines of an all-girls boarding school with those pink buildings..)

Over the weekend about 30 of us went to the beach town Huelva. There isn't a whole lot to report from there other than we found a football and got in a good three hours of playing time. Man did I ever need that. Ok time for some tarea! I hope that the United States is still united and very states-like. I read that Obama's latest health care speech was his best since president but I wasn't able to see it. Also everybody from Spain enjoys bragging about how there economy is worse than ours.

Madrid

(One of the first things we saw in Madrid... though we never figured out what the name/purpose of that building...)

¡Caramba! It is absolutely amazing to me that I have already been in Spain for 3 weeks. I feel like I should be fluent in Spanish! I'm not, but the past two weeks sure have bumped me up a couple of notches. On the Friday following our final exam I took a train to Madrid to meet up with my girlfriend and one of her friends. It wasn't until I was on the train (I guess because I had been so focused on the final) that I realized three things: 1) LoLo doesn't have a cellphone 2) I don't know the name of her hotel - I had somehow misplaced that information in route to the train - and 3) Madrid is the biggest city in Spain. These thoughts, combined with the anxiousness that I was already feeling, obviously caused me a bit of worry; but "Marley and Me" was playing on the tv in spanish and that substantially distracted me for a couple of hours. Just as the train was nearing its approach I received the phone call that I had been resting all of my hopes upon - LoLo was able to use the hotel phone and from there we took advantage of Madrid's highly effective metro system to meet up with each other relatively painlessly. We walked around the city a bit - me the experienced foreigner as they were still overcome by the jet lag a day and a half of traveling can give (not to mention the 8 hour time difference).

The next day we went to the Palacio Real - the official residence of the royal family of Spain. It really instils a new idea of what "big house" means. With 3000 rooms, a dining table for 180 people and an armory the size of a football field, the massive structure structure makes those so called mansions in Aspen look like little ant hills.

(Above: In front of the Palacio Real. The Statue is a representation of King Felipe IV)

We toured the Palacio with a handy little microphone type thing as our guide - you press the numbers corresponding to the room you are in and then the microphone gives you the history of that particular room. Unfortunately, I had misread the order of the numbers and therefore was intently  listening to the descriptions of the room completely  opposite of where I was. Everything looked too similar for me to distinguish via the audio description however, and, acting as the tour guide, I relayed all of the information to LoLo and Kandace under the impression that it was factual. We would oo and ahh and it wasn't until one of them took over audio duties that we found out that we should go ahead and forget everything we had just "learned". Needless to say, I was no longer allowed to be the official tour guide and we had to go back to number 1 on the map. (Towards the end of the tour, just to put the icing on the cake regarding my relationship with that microphone, I was swinging it around on the cord when it went flying off, hit the ground and ceased functioning all together).

(Plaza de Mayor - one of the most famous plazas in Madrid, famous for its tapa bars and street performers)



That evening we waited in a line with the hope of receiving discount tickets to a ballet that night. Maybe the fact that we were the last ones in the line, the fact that we were the only Americans or the fact that it seemed as though we were being laughed at for an abnormally long amount of time should have warned us, but by the time we got up to the front they were fresh out of tickets. So much for the hour and a half wait I guess...

(Left: A picture of some of the food served at tapa bars in Spain, though this was the nicest one I have been too.  Upon pushing and shoving your way to the bar to order they heat up the food and then bring it to you.)

The following morning, Sunday, we went to the Prado - one of the three biggest art museums in the world. There we saw drawings by Vazquez (the most famous Spanish artist - born in Sevilla, my new hometown - thats my claim to fame) Goya and about 400 other artists. It was entertaining for about 15 minutes, but I did my best to feign interest for the remaining hour and a half lol. Eventually they all start to look the same to me. Its not that I'm not interested in the paintings or the history behind them, its just that I know absolutely nothing about them. If anybody has any recommendations on books I should read regarding the incredibly broad topic of "History" (particularly that of the Romans, Greeks or Christianity) I would love to hear some suggestions.

(Somewhat random picture of a church outside of the Prado... seems as though scooters are just catching on in Spain... they've been out of style for about 10 years now in the U.S.)

I don't know how I'm supposed to end a blog. If it were an email I would say "I hope Colorado isn't too cold yet!", or, "I look forward to reading any responses!", or something along those lines, but I feel like blogs don't require little sign off messages like that. Rather, I think that they just kind of end. Like I talk for a while, write everything that is on my mind, and then just kind of dwindle off. "Until next time." Maybe thats a good one. I really don't know. If anyone has any words of advice regarding my new predicament that would be greatly appreciated. Also if anybody knows how I can watch American football in Spain I will grant them with the grandest of all honors - dedicating this blog to them..... Adios! (I had to say it haha)

Update Numero Dos

Wow, if last week was spent getting to now the basics of the city, this one was all about immersing ourselves in the language and in the culture. When we weren’t at our home speaking with our families, we were in class for 3-4 hours a day studying\learning\and taking tests. We were also thrown into the city a couple of times on so called scavenger hunts where the aim was to find Sevilla students, talk to them about their school, and try to understand at least a word or two here and there to write our reports off of. Learning Spanish where the language is actually spoken by everybody around you is completely different from Spanish in the United States: you go to class for a couple of hours every week, but the second you leave you don’t think about the new grammar or vocabulary until you have the class again or until a test somehow creeps up on you that you requires a bit of studying. Here, however, you can take what you learned in class and immediately put it into action. At home, in the streets, wherever. It gives a new incentive to concentrate and really try to learn the material. More than just getting a good grade, you want to improve for the sake of your life outside of the classroom. Sometimes, when I’m walking through the city by myself, I do my best to look like a native Sevillan. The other day I was sitting down eating a sandwich, or a bocadillo, and a couple of tourists asked me in English where they were. I looked at them in confusion, replied that I only speak Spanish and they were then forced to use body language to ask the question. I explained to them in Spanish where they were, but when they asked me how to get to a point on the complete opposite side of the city I was forced to give up my cover and revert to English. The look on their faces was pretty funny when i suddenly became fluent in English, but I think I had them going for a couple minutes!

Adapting to the Spanish lifestyle has been quite the adjustment. At home I was an early bird - one who ate ALOT of worms for breakfast - active all day long, small lunch, and ready to go to bed by 11 at the latest. The best way to describe the Spanish and their daily routines is to take my old routine and then do the exact opposite. If I didn’t have class in the morning, like today, things really wouldn’t ever get going until around 12; they have incredibly small breakfasts (sometimes just a glass of milk and tiny muffin), absolutely massive lunches, siesta time after lunch (which can last anywhere from 2-4 hours; when i wander the streets in this time I get the feeling that I am the only person left in the world, which is pretty weird to have in such a big city), dinner at 10 or 11 and bed at, on most nights, 1 or 2. When we go out at night I’ve discovered that the bestroutine for me is go to bed at the same time i would at home, sleep for 4 hours, then wake up at 3 or 4 in the morning and get my evening started.

Earlier this week we went on a little field trip to the Catedral. Its a gothic cathedral (the 3rd largest of its kind, when it was first constructed it was the first largest) built upon Muslim foundations – the Muslims had a presence there until they were forced out of the country in 1248). This gives it a very unique look in which the courtyard and the outside design are Muslim, but the cathedral itself is Christian. The king who had it built loved the original Muslim construction so much that he ordered the church to be built upon and within the original Muslim design as opposed to tearing the whole thing down and starting over. Walking around the church from the outside takes a good 10-15 minutes to get back to your starting point. The inside is absolutely massive, the walls just shoot skyward – very fitting as it resembles the streets of Sevilla. 

(Looking down on the Catedral from the Giralda)

When it was first built it was the tallest standing building in the world. It also claims to be the burial place of Christopher Columbus, though there is a fair amount of controversy regarding this claim - they won’t know for sure until 2041 when a DNA test with Christopher’s brother (who is also buried at the catedral) and the “other” Christopher Columbus (who, I believe, is in the Dominican Republic) is completed. My favorite part of the church is the 36 story tower (Giralda) from which you can see all of Sevilla.

(Man, did those pools ever look enticing)

Anyways if you ever get tired of American politics and talk about Heath Care then i hate to inform you that espana is not the place to come to escape it. They love talking about it, or at least my family/their friends, and about all of the things that we do wrong and they do better.