more pictures

More Madrid pics!

Toledo pics...

Here's a few more adventures...seeing the royal palace and the medieval town of toledo.
Lessons learned:
1)It is so hard to take classes in Spain because of:
a)lots of homework
b)lack of sleep
c)so much to see

2)From now on, i'll travel to the southern hemisphere in the summer months.
a)cheaper
b)colder

3)My spanish is improving:
a)reading like a banshee all these darn novels
b)writing 2-3 papers of 3-5 pages each week
c)however, speaking still awkward
1-still processing from english to spanish
2-still figuring out how to speak like a spaniard
3-they look at me funny because the white girl is speaking spanish

4)I really do love Spain
a)madrid...art, restaurants, history, culture, cosmopolitan environment
b)country-serious hiking needs to be done here
c)muslim/jewish influence in history and architecture
d)chocolate and churros

Spain

i know the question you want to ask.
"how is spain?"
Well, it's an interesting place. It's easy to be a bit touristy here...lots of english is spoken, and they don't have a lot of patience for my spanish. They're famous for their food, but i can't find any (affordable) good food (and i'm losing weight!). It's really, really hot. But not too humid. It's expensive- in fact the euro is beating the dollar 2 to 1 right now (yikes! no wonder i'm not eating out!). There's so much to see...on top of taking 4 classes...i feel like i can't see very much. But what i have seen has been pretty amazing. (more pictures here!)
I highly recommend the Reina Sofia museum of modern art. Picasso's Guernica is amazing. I still have yet to go to the Prado, eat churros, and see a flamenco show. But there's 2 weeks left. We'll see if im not too tired to do it all.
Speaking of being tired...yeah, i'm off to bed now.