La Vida en Sevilla

Hola!

As you know from previous entries, I spent this past weekend in Sevilla in the region of Andalucia in the south of Spain. I absolutely fell in love with the city. It is so different from Barcelona that I could hardly believe I was in the same country. First of all, the people there are much warmer and more welcoming than here in Barcelona. I also got to practice my Spanish without having to worry about people speaking only Catalan or busting into English when I missed a word. The weather was also gorgeous, in the high 70s with sun and clear, blue skies all week.

About 25 students from my program went on the trip. We set out on Friday morning, only to have our flight delayed for almost two hours. When we finally arrived, we were late for our scheduled tour of the famous Cathedral (the third largest in the world) so instead our tour guide took us to Alzacares Reales de Sevilla, which is a beautiful palace/fort with amazing gardens. We also had a brief tour of the center of the city.

 

Some pictures of the palace gardens

Later, after some time to shower and change at the hotel, we went to a flamenco show. I don't know how the dancers move their feet that fast, it was amazing! Afterwards, I found a tapas restaurant with a few friends and we had a delicious dinner. That night, we went out to some local bars near the Cathedral. The nightlife in Sevilla is way different than in Barcelona! Everything closed much earlier, so we found ourselves wandering around looking for something to do (it was only 1am, way too early to go to bed on a weekend!).

Flamenco dresses!

Eventually, we decided to just head back to the hotel, but ended up getting very lost. We encountered a bachelor party in progress, and the 10 or so men absolutely INSISTED that they take multiple pictures with "the Americans." They were hilarious! I talked with the groom-to-be in Spanish and he told me that he was getting married in 20 days. Every time he said "viente dias" all of the other guys would yell out "VIENTE DIAS!" It was pretty funny. We eventually made our way back to the hotel and went to bed.

The next day we had a lot of free time, so we slept in, had breakfast at the hotel, and then ventured out to further explore Sevilla. A couple of friends and I wandered around the city center for a couple of hours, and then bought some bocadillos (sandwiches) and had a picnic in the gardens of the palace we had toured the previous day. 

During this picnic, my friend Maggie got pooped on by a pigeon TWICE. She even moved to the other side of the circle after the first time and she still got hit again! She was not very amused at the time, but it became a huge joke for the rest of the weekend.

After lunch we found the main shopping area in Sevilla and spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around there. We went back to the hotel to rest and change before the dinner that was provided by the program. It was a typical Spanish meal of three courses. I got a pasta dish, seafood paella, and ice cream cake for dessert. It was delicious!

Slightly bloated from dinner but happy nonetheless, we went back to the hotel for some wine and then decided to check out the main nightlife scene of Sevilla: the river. The river is lined with bars and clubs. We went to a couple bars before finding one that we liked. It was PACKED but had cheap drinks, and we met a lot of people. We met some guys who play American football for a team in Barcelona (I know, weird, right?) as well as a bunch of locals. It was a lot of fun, and I was exhausted when we made our way back to the hotel.

The next morning, we had breakfast at the hotel again and then sat outside in the sun at a cafe and chatted until it was time to go to our rescheduled tour of the Cathedral. What an amazing place! It is very famous--it is the third largest Cathedral in the world! Every time I see places like this I am awestruck...its hard to believe that places like this actually exist and were created in a world without much technology. 

We also climbed to the top of La Giralda tower and got an amazing view of the entire city!

View from the top of La Giralda tower

A bunch of us at the top of the tower

After the tour, we walked down to the river to take some group photos, then headed to the airport. After a very frightening plane ride home (there was one sudden drop that lasted about 10 seconds and scared the living daylights out of everyone, especially since the flight attendants were running up and down the aisle looking panicked), we arrived safe in sound in Barcelona around 10:45pm.

All I wanted to do was go to bed, but, being the procrastinator that I am, I had to do all of the homework I should have done before the trip. Thank goodness I don't have an early class on Mondays!

Next stop on my adventure: Paris! I am so excited! We have a long weekend this weekend, which makes it the perfect time for a trip! I hope to be feeling better for it, though, I have been having (yet again) some stomach issues for the past couple days. Hopefully I'll be good to go by Thursday night.

Hope everyone is well! I miss you all!