Soy una madrilena

Madrid+Me=Love. I have officially decided that there are no ugly buildings in Madrid. You know how in any other city you will find large skyscrapers that dominate the overall look of the city and inevitably you will come upon some run-down building full of graffiti and broken windows and floors, not in Madrid. All of the older buildings are gorgeous with amazing details dating back to I don’t even know how many years ago. Even the graffiti just works to add to the whole atmosphere and adds to the colorful nature of Madrid buildings. And keep in mind these are just the normal business buildings, I have not even described the historical sites.



But let me first begin with our journey into this glorious city. Public transport is huge here (as can be expected in any large city, especially in Europe). Due to this fact we get to first take a train and then the subway to end up in the middle of the city. This is not so problematic at eleven AM, when not many people are going to work, but in the late afternoon that is another story. Can I just say that the fact that I get to take trains, subways and buses everywhere makes me feel very metropolitan. But now onward with my first Madrid adventure!


We first went to the Plaza Puerta del Sol, a big square that has a statue of a famous Spanish man (the travel book does not say who), and muchas muchas personas. Interesting fact of the day: statues of people on horses tell you about how the person died. Two legs of the horse up means that person died in battle, one leg up means they were wounded in battle and died later from those wounds and all legs down means they died of natural causes. Apparently our mystery man was wounded and died later from it. As you can see below this plaza is surrounded by fantastic buildings and here you see a wide variety of people. There was even one of those statue men that stand perfectly still and take strange pleasure out of scaring the living daylights out of tourists. I got a kick out of him.





After that we made our way to another quite famous plaza, the Plaza Mayor. This place was not as crowded as I would have thought (probably due to the fact that it was a little cold when we went and people can be quite wussy when it comes to the cold and the rain), but we did get the lovely pleasure of seeing four sights that will be forever engraved in my memory of this plaza: a bullfighter (Matador) with a fake bull, four foot tall Darth Vadar, a nice Easter bunny (in January) and my personal favorite, Spiderman with a slight weight problem. Megan and I had a particularly hilarious time with this superhero. Let’s just say he knows how to work it to get him some money! We had a full-on photoshoot-first Spidey pose, then we flew to Seattle and finally he asked us the question- “Do you know why Madrid is so great?”. Do you? I sure didn’t. “It’s because we have the SEXY POSE!” (Look below for an example). Needless to say this guy got a few coins from us. But other than an awesome variety of people in Plaza Mayor it was also breathtakingly beautiful. The entire façade of one building was even covered with a mural (you had to look close to see it, but it was fantastic). Que bonita!









So after the plazas we had the fantastic privilege of chowing down on the most delicious chocolate con churros. For all of you out there who have never experienced this particular thing before let me expound. This is a hot chocolate that is so thick and rich it’s between hot chocolate and pudding. (Some people say that they melt real chocolate bars for it, but I’m not sure if that’s just here-say.) Then you get to dip these fabulous fried dough confections (but don’t think like Taco Bell-these babies have no cinnamon-sugar on them and are actually quite thin) with a slightly salty taste to them. The harmony of the rich chocolate with the salt of the churro makes for a blissful experience. Needless to say but I have now eaten them twice and will be returning for more multiple times I believe.



So now we begin the venture home. You gotta love public transport is all I can say. As I said before, like you would expect in any large city (especially in Europe, energy-conscious individuals that they are) it feels like the majority of the working class in Madrid rides buses, trains and subways. And I guess that on Fridays it’s the cool thing to do to go home from work early in the late afternoon rather than evening (so if you think you’re being smart by leaving Madrid then and can beat the crowds think a little smarter). Thus I came to have a great story to tell on this great blog! Thank you public transportation! So let’s just say that the subway was full to capacity, so much so that five of us got caught in the door as it was closing and ended up getting left behind at the train station to catch the next subway while the rest of our group chugged onward towards Alcala. Blessing in disguise I tell you. This is due to that fact that a certain drunken man happened to be sitting on a bench in the platform opposite of us. His raspy smoker-voice could be heard on both platforms belting a sweet serenade to us five American ladies. However our entertainment did not stop there because we then got to see him bust some sweet moves and at one point I could have sworn he was going to jump on the tracks and come over and join us (incredibly glad he refrained). And to top it all off he looked us square on and stopped his song to make the best face at us (sorry no pictures-we didn’t need to egg this man on). After this small bit of entertainment we then properly perfected our elbowing skills and weaseled our way onto the next subway and then later on to a train. All sense of personal boundaries is lost on those babies let me tell you and apparently no Spaniards like to talk at all during their commute. So I guess they all are more the sufferers in silence types. Let’s just say we weren’t quite the same way.


And now we have come to the end of our journey to Madrid. I hope all of my ventures there are this thrilling! I hope you enjoyed our trip, tune in next week for more adventures of the Spain ladies in our new setting…TOLEDO! (Unless I decide to be really studious and talk about my first week in Spanish school). Hasta luego!