Capítulo Uno: New Beginnings

"It's the world, dear. Did you expect it to be small?"
- Mrs. Beaver, The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Here's the edited post; I didn't feel like leaving whatever it was I wrote yesterday, which was nothing.

So, what have I been up to the last day in a half?

After Robby woke up from his nap, we took a walk up and down the street to see if we could find some food as well as just take a look around. Our location doesn't have anything too memorable, to be honest, but it did give us a very rough idea of the life in city of Madrid. We ended up not finding anything on the street, so we just ate in the hotel's restaurante instead. We had this sandwich tropical, which was basically some toasted bread with mayo, a small piece of ham, and pineapple. It was edible, but, and this is fortunate, it was the most disappointing meal I've had so far.

The next day comes, and people from the program start getting in. There were actually a couple of people who had came in early as well, but one of them was sleeping the entire time (that person happens to be my temporary roommate in the hotel, sleeping for a whopping 22 hours!) and others stayed elsewhere. Anyway, I meet my hotel roommate, Trinity, and then I take her down to meet Robby. Do people remember my freshman year of college when everyone would just naturally gather in Kristina's and mine's room? Yeah, that's what happened with Robby's room this time. His roommate, David, came in, and nearly half the CIEE-Madrid program participants slowly did the same. It was actually a really nice get together, so we could properly introduce ourselves and have small bonding time. We all seemed to get along pretty well. Around noon, we migrated from Robby and Dave's room to the courtyard of the hotel, where we met the rest of the participants and began Orientation.

Most of the things we did for the first half were the basic introduction activities: introduce yourself (name, school, major, something interesting about yourself), explained the layout of the orientation, some rules to follow, distribution of packets, etc. After that, it was already time for lunch.

Entonces, we headed back to the hotel for a two-hour 'siesta (nap -- there is a period during the day called 'siesta', usually from 1-3 where lots of shops close and the city is fairly quiet)'. Most of the people that had come in that day were suffering from jetlag, understandably, and needed a rest. Afterwards, we continued Orientation stuff, going over safety measures, information about the huge metro that runs underneath the city (very similar to Washington DCs), and social laws. Then, dinner time. After that, we got the choice of exploring the city at night (with one of the CIEE Advisers) or going back to the hotel. I'd say the majority of us went around the city. We explored one of the busier parts, where there were lots of bars and the seven story discoteca...

Today was about the same. Got up for breakfast, went through some orientation stuff, and headed out for lunch. Actually, the orientation activities were pretty entertaining -- we had to make skits which compared Spanish social life with American. Ours was about dating and asking someone out for a drink or a meal, and it shows how forward the Spanish are. And Robby was Tom Cruise in his skit (hurray, Scientology!).

Okay, some things I've noticed about this city:

First of all, it's definitely a city, and what I mean by that is that, in comparison to US cities, it's very similar in the sense that there are lots of people, big buildings surrounding you everywhere, and there's even that wonderful city stench. You know, that sewage smell...yeah, it's unpleasant, no matter what city you're in (I've noticed it in Chicago particularly). That being said, there are lots of differences. This city is BIG! I mean REALLY big. Most of the roads are stone and brick, as opposed to concrete. The architecture of the buildings are completely different. Lots of them seem to be connected together, stretching down alleys. But the structure of these buildings, plus some of the statues we passed, is absolutely beautiful. You can really tell the time and effort put into the making of these buildings and statues. Not that the skyscrapers in lots of the US cities aren't gorgeous in their own way, but I feel as if I appreciate these buildings moreso because they're not only efficient, but they're also very artistic. Another thing that I noticed that's different about Madrid is that there are lots of dogs in this city, as in people that own dogs (and multiple, might I add), which seems strange to me, because I've always felt that it's difficult to raise a dog in the city.

Here's a big thing: the night in Madrid is significantly different than the day. Madrid during the day isn't dead by any means (even during 'siesta' there are still people out and about), but the city literally comes alive once the sun's down and dinnertime rolls around. Hundreds among hundreds of people are out socializing, getting drinks or something. Even children probably not even in their double-digit years are out playing on the playgrounds, or skateboarding.

Oh yeah, we tend to draw a lot of attention. Both when Robby and I went walking as well as when the group was walking around anywhere, we clearly got a lot of stares. Personally, I found it amusing -- do we really look that much like tourists? Oh wait, we had to wear nametags during all of Orientation...hola, David! Ha.

Finally, the food. Oh my God, the food! Meals are done a bit differently here: they have a fairly small breakfast in the morning (9-10:30ish), a huge lunch (usually around 1 or 2), and a decent sized dinner (9 and beyond). The bigger meals are set up as three parts: Primeros (a small, opening meal, kind of like a salad or something), Segundos (the main course), and Postres (Desserts). The first place we went to was Ene Restaurante, where I had a salad for Primeros (they don't use dressings there, so it was mainly just greens, some oil, and some really interesting cheese), escoloton (which is some sort of beef, with a small line of chocolate sauce, which was surprisingly scrumptious), and mousse chocolate for dessert. I also tried 'tinto de verano', which is a red wine mixed with sugar water. I usually don't like wine at all, but this stuff was pretty good actually, though it's probably because it watered down the wine taste. For dinner, we went to Kubic, where I had tostado con chorizo (toast with sausage -- the sausage had a sweet taste to it, though, and mixed with nicely toasted bread made it amazing), pollo con BBQ (it wasn't the typical BBQ sauce, though, and holy cow, that chicken was cooked perfectly, so moist and yet had plenty of meat on it), and sorbette (con vodka...not very much, but I could taste it, and yeah, it was really damn good) for dessert. Today, we went Nina, where I had another ensalada, scalopines (which I thought were scallops, but was very mistaken and instead ordered a fried-steak like food, which was really good, though, so I lucked out for my mistake), and really rich helado vanilla for dessert.

So as you can see, I'm liking the food over here thus far. =] I must say, though, it's hard to find Coca Cola here. I've been living off of water (which is really good here, actually) and tinto de vino thus far, so who knows? Maybe this is where I'll break my Coke addiction...

Yeah, who am I kidding?

I did take a few pictures, but I only like to upload pictures where I have an abundance to upload. Right now, I don't have too many, but give me a few more days, and I'm sure I can come up with more than enough!

We meet our hosts tomorrow, which I'm kind of nervous about, though I'm sure all will be well.

I've talked too much now...I'm thinking a quick siesta in my downtime might be a good idea.

Adios, amigos!

~ LSquared