Hola! Wow, I'm not very good at this updating the blog thing, am I? :)
Well, we survived Madrid! Hooray!!!
(P.S. The rest of last week was not too exciting, just had classes, it was fine.)
So, late night Thursday from packing, then up early for Madrid on Friday! ....OH boy.
Friday morning I headed out early for the Fund, where I was meeting everyone else not living in the neighborhood of Poligono (where the majority of people with families are staying--they got their own bus). I met up with some friends, including my bus buddy, Megumi! She's so sweet. :) So, we started off on the bus all excited, until I got a phone call after a little while. It was Erin, telling me Anna and Amy had missed the bus! Oh dear! I asked the coordinators what they could do but they all said the girls would have to find their way to Madrid themselves! Scary! But luckily, they were able to do it. Unfortunately, they missed our tour of the Royal Palace (they called me while inside, but I couldn't answer it) and the bus tour, but they had made it to Madrid and were going to meet us and the group for lunch after they hung out at the Plaza Mayor. After much confusion on the phone about the location of our restaurant, el Museo del Jamon (which by the way, is the exact one we ate at for the few days I was in Madrid with my group from high school!!---the hotel we stayed at was just down the road), the girls met up with us.
After lunch, we went to find our hostel, but failed big time. After trying to call both the numbers we had about the place, we started getting really worried that we had just been screwed. However, we tried calling once more and the guy answered, and we were actually right outside the hostel. The reason we couldn't see it was because it was above a bank, in an apartment building, with no sign. Sketchy? I think so!!!! Still, there were two more people trying to find it too so we didn't feel alone, and we went inside. So yes, our hostel was some guy's apartment, but the two people we had just met said they were frequent travelers and although this hostel was weird, it seemed like the owner had the right procedures and was organized and stuff, so we said O.K. However, we wanted just to stay Friday night (we were still kinda freaked out), and he was going to say that was O.K., but then because it was less than 24 notice we would have had to pay for Saturday night either way. Boo. Whatev. So, after checking out our interesting 12 person mixed gender room, we left for Retiro Park (kind of like their Central Park) and later, a wonderful dinner at an Italian restaurant, and then returned to our hostel for the night. The window was open and since Spaniards stay up so late it was very loud and I couldn't sleep, thus I got about 3 hours of sleep. Yes, Amy Sc., 3 hours!! lol
After getting up bring and early the next day, we headed out for some churros for breakfast at a sort of day bar. We then took the Metro (which Amy taught me about) and proceeded to the Prado museum (where we got a discount with our Carnet Joven card--take that Rick Steve!), and next met up with some other girls from the Fund for lunch. We bought sandwiches (or Burger King for Amy and Anna) and ate outside (which, by the way, it's kind of cold out! I mean it is "winter" here) and then went to a Botanical Garden. Afterwards, we went to the free museum of Reina Sofia where we split up with the other girls (who, actually, loved their hostel. It was very nice and clean they said. Another group from school also really liked theirs, so I think ours was just so sketch because we booked it so last minute. Next time, we know it will be MUCH better.).
So after the museum we went shopping for a while because restaurants don't open til later, and I bought my first souvenir for myself---a purse. :) It's plain gray, but has funky designs on the top and inside. I like it. But that's the end of my spending money for a while, seriously. Seriously. Anyway, next we headed out to dinner at a cheap place where the waiter was a jerk (though service here is much less friendly here in general...it's nothing to get upset over, it's just the way it is here), but later a different waiter came and he was awesome. He practiced his English with us and welcomed us to Spain, and even offered to take a picture of us. Then he asked to take a picture with Amy haha, oh it's O.K., it was all in good fun. However, we all hated our dinner so had our good waiter bring us a piece of chocolate cake for us to split...we felt better. :) Then we went back to brave our hostel again, and I actually slept all through the night.
Sunday morning brought us to Starbucks for breakfast (I had a wonderful chocolate chip muffin) and we headed home on the bus. I took a very nice (and needed) shower at home and the my host parents came home and we had a lovely lunch. I then proceeded to take a 2 1/2 hour siesta and of course now I'm groggy and my stomach hurts. Figures lol. Oh well. Still, I'm so proud of all of us girls for making it in the big city of Madrid, and although it was VERY stressful at times, I still had fun, we learned A LOT about traveling, and we had some pretty epic kodak moments. In all, definitely an experience!!!!
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