Athens, Greece

We got up early in Rome on Monday morning and made it to Athens with little problems. From the Athens airport, which is surprisingly small, we took a 30-minute metro ride to our stop called Monastiraki. When we exited the metro station, it was instant beauty. We entered into a beautiful, lively square, and the Acropolis was in plain sight on top of the hill. Our hostel was about 2 blocks away from the square, and about 99 times better than our Rome hostel. We immediately took showers since I had only taken (literally) a 2 minute shower during the three days we were in Rome because the water in the hostel was FREEZING. It was really nice to feel clean again. After our showers, we walked around the square for a bit. The first thing I noticed was the large number of stray dogs on the streets. The majority of them were sleeping, I'm assuming because it was so hot outside. Anyways, eventually our noses led us to a wonderful Greek restaurant that served gyros (surprise surprise)! I obviously ordered a lamb gyro (and couldn't believe I was the only one who did!). It was realllly good, but also different than what I'm used to because it wasn't shaved meat like we have in the US, but instead consisted of several long pieces of lamb in the shape of a hotdog... Nevertheless, still amazing gyros. After dinner we walked around the streets and got pulled into the touristy stores, which took up a good 3 hours of our time. It was really awesome though because going store to store actually allowed us to see a lot of the city. It's pretty neat because Greek ruins sites were randomly mixed into the city. The sites are fenced off, and the original ground is about 5 yards beneath the streets. After wandering in and out of stores, we stopped at a restaurant that specialized in crepes (I got one filled with chocolate and fresh strawberries... yum!). We ate our crepes outside sitting below the lit-up Parthenon, that is until the mime (who was actually talking quite a bit...) that was sitting near us started getting creepy. At this point we decided it would be best to head back to our hostel so we could get some much needed sleep (traveling wears you out!).

The next morning we woke up, got our free breakfast, and went to the reception desk to ask what was the best route to take to get to the Acropolis, which was actually super close to our hostel and really easy to get to. Much to our surprise, she told us it was "Museum Day" and that we wouldn't have to pay for any museums we went to that day. THANK GOD for Museum Day, which apparently only happens once a year... how lucky are we? We left the hostel and spent some time walking through the Athens Flea Market, got hit on by creepy salesmen, and eventually made it to the Acropolis entrance. The whole park took about 3, maybe 4 hours to walk (uphill) through, ending at the top of the hill with the Parthenon. The Parthenon has work getting done on it, but it was still really awesome to see. From the Parthenon, you can basically see all of Athens, which is soooo unbelievably beautiful. We sat on the top of the hill for about an hour and soaked it all in (I was also able to steal my dad a rock for his super non-loser-ish rock collection at this point). In the Acropolis we also saw a couple of old theatres (one which is still being used today), temples, old churches, etc. It blows my mind that any of it is still standing after all this time. After sitting at the Parthenon for a while, we headed down the hill to grab something to eat and to see the Temple of Zeus, which is almost completely destroyed compared to what it used to be. There used to be a gigantic statue of Zeus in the temple but it is no longer there; similarly, the majority of the columns from the temple are also missing. The statue of Zeus is one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, so that would have been really cool to see. We entered the temple (without charge) and immediately starting singing "I Can Go The Distance" from Hercules... it only seemed appropriate. From the Temple of Zeus, we hiked to the Parliament building, where there were thankfully no protests going on. Not a very impressive building compared to all the Greek ruins... it was very plain looking. After getting almost attacked by about 12 million birds in front of Parliament, we (frantically, in my case) headed for the market in Athens to buy something for dinner. The market is split in two sections: the meat market and the vegetable market. We thankfully only caught the end of the meat market. The first thing I saw was a whole pig, completely skinned with its eyeballs still on its head... that was enough for me. We headed for the vegetable market, where you can buy fruit as well. We bought tomatoes, basil (what we THOUGHT was basil... it actually was mint... oops), garlic, and strawberries at the market. We stopped at a "grocery store" nearby and bought pasta and olive oil (I call it a "grocery store" because that's all that was sold there besides cereal). Anyways, we made pasta with tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, and NOT BASIL in the hostel kitchen, which was quite an experience since none of us have cooked or even been in a kitchen in the past four months. Nevertheless, it didn't turn out to be too horrible.

The next day we got up early to go to the beach! However, by the time we actually found the correct tram to take to the beach it wasn't so early anymore. After about 30 minutes of tram-riding, we were finally at the beach (which is actually not sandy like your average beach, but pebbly). We all laid down, took short naps, and were ready for lunch by the time we woke up. The beach restaurant served amazing Greek chicken shishkabobs that Natalia and I devoured. After eating we played a little bit of Rummy with my newly purchased Greek playing cards before heading back out by the water. We took turns swimming in the beautifully clear water since we didn't want to leave our belongings on the beach unattended. After we were all swimmed out, we laid on the beach for a little bit more. Lots of interesting people watching to do here. There was even a popular TV show that was asking people questions and filming them on the beach. We got asked a question, but we didn't speak Greek so we were rejected. After a while it started getting cold so we decided to take the next tram back. When we were about 15 minutes into our ride, the tram stopped and everyone was ordered to get off because the strike was beginning and the trams weren't going to run for the rest of the day. How convenient... luckily there was a nearby metro station that we were able to get on before that closed down too. We got off near the Temple of Zeus because the previous day we saw that a nearby museum had an Andy Warhol exhibit. (Now my nerdy side comes out...). I looooove Andy Warhol and was looking forward to seeing him in the art museums in Madrid, but never got to. Needless to say, I was really excited that the exhibit was in Athens (and free!). I got to see all of the original Marilyn Monroe and Campbell's soup prints, along with a lot of other popular works by him and other pop artists. I really enjoyed it, but I was surprised to see that they were selling his smaller prints for 300 euro. I probably would have bought one if I wasn't a poor college kid, and if I had ANY room on my walls to put it. After the museum we headed past Parliament, where there was a small protest going on, to return to our hostel to shower and relax for a bit before going out to dinner. In the hostel we met a nice girl from Sweden who actually ended up going out to dinner with us. We returned to a restaurant that we had passed by earlier. The waiters were chatting it up with us and said that they would throw themselves off of the Acropolis if we didn't come back for dinner. The food looked good, so why not? I got another gyro and split a bottle of wine with the rest of the girls... a very delicious last meal in Athens. After dinner we went on the rooftop of our hostel, where there is a bar and an amazing view of the Parthenon at night. We sat around and talked for a while before going to bed.

The next morning we had to catch our flight back to Sevilla... so of course this had to be the day that there was a full-out transportation strike in Athens. The only available transportation to the airport was through taxi services, so we got one of those and only had to pay 15 euro each even though the taxi driver unsuccessfully tried royally ripping us off.

By the time we got back into Sevilla and at our house, it was about 5:30pm. We repacked all of our stuff into our suitcases, and while I was planning on walking down by the river one last time before leaving, I was sadly way too tired to do that. My roommate Natalia and I went to my favorite Chinese restaurant on Esperanza de Triana for our last "authentic" dinner in Spain. We crashed immediately when we got back to the house, and it's a good thing we were so tired because we had to share a twin bed! Ridiculous, I know... especially when there were two free beds and two free couches we could have been using, butttt I won't bore you with the details about that little issue. We woke up to catch our taxi to the airport at 4am. Pepi was very nice to help us carry down all of our luggage and wait for the taxi with us. It was very sad leaving Sevilla and I know I'm only going to miss it more and more! It's alright though, I know I will return someday... :)




Picture #1: Me and my gyro!
Picture #2: Greek ruins randomly thrown about the city
Picture #3: The Parthenon at night
Picture #4: Acropolis: Me in front of an ancient temple
Picture #5: Me with the Acropolis in the background and the Parthenon on the top of the hill
Picture #6: Top of the Acropolis: a temple next to the Parthenon, that was once attached to it
Picture #7: View from the top
Picture #8: Me with a view from the top. In the background you can see an old theatre, the one that is still being used today
Picture #9: The Parthenon
Picture #10: The temple of Zeus
Picture #11: Parliament building with a small protest going on
Picture #12: Parliament square
Picture #13: Me in Moniastirski square, with the Parthenon in the background
Picture #14: At the beach!
Picture #15: Natalia and I at our last dinner in Greece

When in Rome...

Friday we embarked on our week-long journey to Rome and Athens. With the flight to Rome leaving at 5pm and the busride from the Rome airport to the city taking an hour longer than expected, we didn't arrive at our hostel until about 9:30pm. Once we settled in and found our long lost friend Caitlin (who was on a different flight than the rest of us), we decided to get some dinner and go to bed so we could get up early and see as much of the city as we could. We went to a restaurant that was about 2 blocks away from our hostel, called "La Cavernella," which is a small little Italian restaurant run by an Italian family. It was reallllly good, and we ended up going there every night we were in Rome. After dinner we headed for bed and woke up early the next morning to get in line for the Vatican.

We arrived at the Vatican around 8am, and the line was already extremely extremely long. To make matters worse it was pouring rain. After standing in line for about a half hour, a man came up to us and asked if we would like to skip the line for 10 euro; we were cold, wet, and desperate, so we took him up on the offer, which saved us about 2 hours of standing in the rain. Inside the Vatican there are rooms filled with sculptures, paintings, and most importantly the Sistene Chapel. All the walls and ceilings are beautifully painted with religious images. After walking around inside for a good chunk of time, we next wandered over to St. Peter's Basilica, which has the largest interior of any Christian church in the world. We waited in line for this as well, but this line moved along much faster than the line at the Vatican (lucky for us, since there weren't any chances to skip the line here!). The inside is beautiful and it's no wonder why the church is considered one of the holiest Christian sites. There is a huge altar at the front of the church and it is said that Saint Peter is buried underneath it. Saint Peter was one of the twelve apostles of Jesus and is regarded as the first Pope by the Catholic Church. After admiring the inside of the church for quite some time, we left and took the metro to the Fountain of Trevi. There were a million tourists there, so we only stayed long enough to take a couple pictures and throw our coins in the fountain (doing this means that you will return to Rome some day). By this time it was late, so we took the metro back to our hostel, went out for dinner again at our restaurant, and went to bed so we could get up early the next day.

Sunday was the day to see Roman ruins. When we got off of the metro, the Coliseum was right there! Although I wanted to go inside right away, we first went to the Roman Forum right next door because entrance to the Coliseum was free with the Forum ticket. The Roman Forum is basically a huge area filled with Roman ruins. It was amazing to see. It took us about 3 hours to walk through, and afterwards we went inside the Coliseum, which I loved. The Coliseum is well preserved despite the fact that the top part of it is broken off on one side. Here is a small description of the events that took place inside the Coliseum (which I read from an information pole at the Coliseum): "The games would begin in the morning, following a parade of all the participants, with hunts of exotic animals (lions, panthers, leopards, bears, rhinos, giraffes and gazelles, imported by the Romans from their conquered territories)... The animal's death had to be preceded by a search for cover, skirmishes and combat in which more than a few of the hunters were killed; they were allowed to defend themselves only with a lance and a shield. During the lunch interval, it became common to throw criminals in the pit. Naked and unarmed, they would inevitably end up in pieces. Other kinds of shows would also be put on during the intervals; these used to range from jugglers, acrobats and magicians to entertaining parodies and the re-evocation of ancient fables which would often finish with the tearing apart of the actors, to general acclaim. The afternoons were reserved for the eagerly awaited gladiatorial combats. The protagonists of these combats were usually prisoners of war or slaves, but there were also free men fighting for wealth and fame; they were distinguished by their armor and combat techniques. Individuals defeated in the duel met a certain death unless the emperor or public were prepared to show mercy, in which case the loser could be made free." Let's just say I'm glad I didn't live during this era...

After viewing all of the Roman ruins, we went to a nice restaurant nearby and had the most wonderful bruschetta and pizza ever!!! (I love Italian food if you haven't noticed). We walked past Rome's city hall and other beautiful areas on our way to see the Parthenon in Rome, which was located in a really neat area with fountains, live music, and people everywhere. We sat around the square for a while soaking it all in. Afterwards we walked to the Spanish steps which were lit-up and really beautiful at night. The Spanish steps are the widest and longest staircase in Europe with its 138 steps (all of which we climbed!). We then headed back to the hostel, ate again at our restaurant, and headed to bed because we needed to fly out early to Athens the next morning! I really enjoyed Rome, and I think it was actually one of my favorite places I visited in Europe.



Picture #1: My friends and I inside of the Vatican
Picture #2: Inside the Sistene Chapel... you can see the famous image of God's hand reaching for man's hand in the center of the picture
Picture #3: Eating Italian food... nom nom nom
Picture #4: Outside of Saint Peter's Basilica
Picture #5: Roman ruins in the Roman Forum
Picture #6: An aerial view of the Roman ruins with the Coliseum in the background
Picture #7: Me in front of the Coliseum
Picutre #8: Inside of the Coliseum
Picture #9: Jumping pictures standing in the Roman Parthenon
Picture #10: Spanish steps!

Last days in Sevilla

My last week in Sevilla wasn't too eventful, as it was filled with studying for and taking finals. The last day of finals for everyone in my program was last Thursday, and on Thursday night CIEE threw a big party for everyone (all 200 of us) at a restaurant called Rio Grande, which is located right on the river across from the Torre del Oro. There we were able to say goodbye to all of our friends and teachers, and the staff of CIEE, while getting fancy horderves and drinks. It was a really great event for them to throw for us. After the party we headed across the street to our favorite bar, Long Island, to get some drinks and say goodbye to the bartender Pedro that we'd come to be friends with over the semester. After a while of hanging out there, we walked to the Triana bridge to get churros and chocolate one last time at the churro stand, which I am definitely going to miss. We sat on the bridge and enjoyed the view for a while before heading to Buddha (a discotecha) for the last time. Although we had a flight the next day to Rome, it wasn't until 5pm so we were able to stay out really late just like old times. It was a really great last night in Sevilla, although it was sad to say goodbye to everyone, especially the Spaniards who I made friends with and the Americans who don't live in Wisconsin. The next morning we woke up, packed for our week-long journey to Rome and Athens, and headed to the airport!




Picture #1: A view of San Jacinto, the street I walk on to get home everyday
Picture #2: The Triana bridge
Picture #3: Some friends with our teacher Angel at the going away party, with the Torre del Oro in the background
Picture #4: Friends at the going away party

Goodbye Sevilla

This is my last week in Sevilla. Unfortunately I can't really enjoy it too much because we have finals and I will be studying/ writing papers. There are a lot of things that I'm really going to miss from here, but there are also a lot of things I've really been missing from home that I'm excited to get back to! Here's a short list (I was bored, ok?):

THINGS I MISS FROM HOME:
-friends and family, of course!
-rice krispies with skim milk (or just skim milk in general, I can't remember the last time I had a glass)
-my favorite TV shows, especially The Office
-pancakes! waffles!
-frozen pizza
-crunch wrap supremes from Taco Bell
-pandora radio station (on the internet)
-brats
-my bed
-the terrace in Madison
-Madison
-showers!!!!!! that have a nozzle attached to the wall

THINGS I’M GOING TO MISS FROM SEVILLA:
-all the friends I've made (who don't go to Madison), Spaniards and Americans included
-the river
-the torre del oro
-churros con chocolate
-talking in Spanish
-hearing Spanish
-having meals prepared for me everyday
-botelloning by the river
-agua de fuego
-buddha/ discotequas
-flamenco dancing/singing
-Feria de Abril
-traveling everywhere by bus, for cheap
-cheap bottles of champagne/wine/beer
-warm weather all the time
-learning something new everyday
-one euro chupitos at Long Island
-the Triana bridge


I'm supposed to go to Rome and Athens on Friday, and return to Sevilla the following Thursday to catch my flight back to the United States on May 21st. However, there may be a slight change in plans due to the volcanic eruption in Iceland that continues to be a huge downer for all of us study abroad students. If our traveling plans through, it looks like I'll be staying in Sevilla and enjoying the city a week longer than expected. Either way, I'm sure I'll enjoy it.

See you all soon!
Emily

Enamorada de la vida... Huelva, Barcelona, Sevilla!

This past week my good friend Evan visited me in Sevilla! His program in London just finished and he's now traveling around Europe for the next couple of weeks. It was great to hang out with an old friend and being able to show him a little bit of the city! On Thursday, he convinced me to skip class and take a day trip to a beach in Huelva... which was TOTALLY worth it! We took an hour busride to Huelva, then talked to a local and eventually figured out how to get to the beach. It was about 90 degrees and the water was perfect for swimming! Me and Evan both swam in the massive waves for about an hour while our friend Melissa watched our stuff on the beach. It was my first time swimming in the Atlantic Ocean (or any ocean for that matter), and I loooved it even though I swallowed about a gallon of salt water and my swimming suit top didn't want to cooperate (eek!). It was a great day. I wish Lake Michigan had that big of waves to play in!

On Friday I took an airplane to Barcelona and met Evan there (he took a train), and we then waited in the hostel for a couple of hours until our other friend Jack arrived from Madrid. It was just me and the boys for the weekend (Pepi said I needed one for each arm). We walked around the city for a little bit and went to see the Cathedral, which was cool (but it's nothing compared to Sevilla's Cathedral). We actually spent most of our time sitting in front of the Cathedral watching a little boy zoom down a hill on his bike through a big crowd of people, which was pretty funny and kept us entertained for a good half hour.

We woke up early the next morning and saw all of the popular destinations in Barcelona: the Sagrada Familia, Guill Park, and other Gaudi buildings. We went to the Sagrada Familia first and decided not to go inside because we heard it wasn't worth it. It was so beautiful from the outside though even though it is still unfinished and there is construction still being done on it. Next we took the metro to the stop near Guill Park; unlucky for us, there are ZERO signs telling you where to go once you get off the metro. We walked around for a good 2 hours asking directions and looking at maps. Once we figured out where it was, we each had a beer before going in. The park was my favorite part of Barcelona. You can see the whole city from it and it is surrounded with Gaudi structures which make it a very artsy and beautiful area. After the park, we walked into the city again to see another Gaudi building called Casa Mila, which is an apartment building that looks like its melting. It was really neat, definitely a place I would live in if I was rich. We then headed back to our hostel to relax before our big night out. We took the metro to a couple of clubs on the beach. Barcelona has a really awesome night scene, but everything is SUPER expensive. It was about 12 euro for drinks! More specifically it was 12 euro for a white russian, which Evan was very fond of purchasing for himself and everyone else in the bar (haha). We took the metro home at 7am and while trying to find our way back to the hostel, we decided to go out for breakfast instead, therefore not returning to the hostel until 8:30am. With checkout being at noon, we slept verrrry little, but took naps at the beach after leaving the hostel.

On Sunday night it was finally time to head back to Sevilla. After some slight complications and miscommunication with the bus company about departure times, we ended up having to take a taxi to the airport, which was about an hour away from Barcelona in a town called Girona. The ride cost 130 euro total! However, divided between four people it was only about 30 each, but still an annoying extra cost since we had already purchased our bus tickets! Anyways, I made it back to Sevilla!

Sunday was "El Dia de la Madre," Mother's Day in Spain. Since I was still in Barcelona on Sunday, Natalia and I bought Pepi flowers today since she is our Spanish mama! She was very excited that we thought of her. Tonight she took us out for tapas and icecream (I'm not sure if this is related to the flower purchase or just because she loooves us so much), which was nice since we usually don't get to go out on the town with her.

Less than a month left! Nooooooooooo...



Picture #1: Melissa and I at the beach in Huelva
Picture #2: Evan and I at the beach in Huelva
Picture #3: The Sagrada Familia in Barcelona
Picture #4: A street in Barcelona
Picture #5: View of Barcelona from Guill Park
Picture #6: Gaudi buildings in Guill Park
Picture #7: Evan, Jack and I in front of Casa Mila... even though you can't see it, just trust me... it's behind us
Picture #8: Me in front of Casa Mila

Morocco, Africa!

I am sooo happy that I was able to convince a couple of friends to come to Morocco with me this past weekend. This is something that I had been planning on doing even before I got to Spain, so I'm glad everything worked out.

Last Friday we loaded a bus and drove down to La Linea to board a ferry to Africa. I was even able to see the rock of Gibraltar again (mi amor!). Anyways, once we got off of the ferry we were all really excited because we were finally in Africa!!!! Psych... little did we know we were still in Spain. The ferry drops you off in a city called Ceuta which is Spanish territory; from there we drove about 15 minutes to get to the Spain/Africa border, where we had to wait about an hour and a half to get all of our passports stamped and approved. By the time we got to our hotel, it was late (we left Sevilla at 2:30pm), so we ate dinner and went to bed.

The next morning we first visited the Moroccan city called Tetuan. Tetuan was a very poor city and it was sad to see how little people had. We walked through the main market, which was pretty interesting to see. I was really grossed out because in Tetuan, as well as all the Moroccan cities that we visited, people buy their chickens alive and then have to kill them and stuff at home (no doubt I would be a vegetarian if I lived there)... so there were chickens running around everywhere, which freaked me out even more due to my minor hatred of birds. The markets sold every kind of vegetable imaginable and fruit and bakery items. It was really nauseating, however, to see people buying pastries and baked goods that had 20 flies sitting on them. Most of the people were very friendly and smiled at me. The official language there is Arabic, so I wasn't sure whether to speak Spanish or English (since arabic was clearly out of the question). To my surprise, a lot of the people knew both languages. After the market we walked through an area that had shops exclusively for making Moroccan dresses. The dresses are expensive to make, as the designs are hand embroidered and made of silk. It takes about a month to make a dress and costs about a month's earnings to pay for one (plus you have to provide the dressmaker with fabric). If the dress is for a bride, it is worn for 3 days (weddings last 3 days in Morocco), and then after the wedding she can wear it again for any special occasion. We also went to a spice shop that had spices (obviously), and different types of herbs/teas. We also went to a rug store and got to see a bunch of really beautiful Moroccan rugs and blankets. My friend Jack bought one for 110 euros, although he definitely could have bartered and probably paid half of what he did for it. We had lunch in a very touristy restaurant that had Moroccan dancers and entertainers, which was cool; we had a "Moroccan meal" which consisted of soup, salad (rice, salsa, carrots, lettuce, other vegetables), and cous cous with beef and vegetables.

The next city we visited was Tangier, a port city that was much more modern and developed than Tetuan was. We drove outside of the busy city area to the Atlantic/Mediterranean coast, where we went on the beach to ride camels! It cost one euro for a 2 minute ride... it was fun, but it would have been a lot better if we had been able to go on a longer ride to an actual destination, instead of going in circles. We then drove back to the city center and got a bus tour, which included going up to see the outside of the king's house (well, his house for about a week each year). After the bus tour we checked into the hotel and had dinner, which was fish... if you know how I feel about fish, you could've probably predicted that we ended up at Mc'Donalds shortly after dinner ended. I got a kid's meal for 20 dirhams (less than 2 euros), which even included a dragon light-up toy (every 21 year old's dream)! After the Mc'Donalds adventure we headed back to the hotel because we had to get up at 7 the next morning to go to ChefChaoen. However, it didn't even pay to go back to the hotel early because I literally did not sleep a wink. There was a wedding going on in the streets so literally every 10 minutes there was honking and screaming.

The bus ride to ChefChaoen the next morning was very unpleasant, as the combination of being tired, having a horrible bus driver, and driving on narrow roads through the mountains is not a good one. When we finally made it there, we had a 15 minute break to go to the bathroom (which was a hole in the ground) and breathe in some fresh mountain air. There is nothing really historically significant about ChefChaoen to my knowledge, but it is an awesome city because it is in the mountains and the whole city is painted blue/indigo! It was really beautiful. We spent most of the morning walking around the city and afterwards went to a market where we were able to barter for scarfs, rugs, blankets, jewelry, etc. Before leaving, we had another Moroccan lunch (soup, a salad thinger, and a beef stew dish).

I think visiting Morocco was a great experience. It was amazing to see how different everyday life is there compared to the United States (and even Spain), and it made me appreciate all that I have a lot more.

PS. Dad, you have another rock to add to your collection.





Picture #1: Tetuan, Morocco
Pictures #2-3: Market in Tetuan, Morocco
Picture #4: Riding a camel in Tetuan, Morocco
Picture #5: African scenery
Pictures #6-8: Chefchaoen, Morocco

Feria de Abril!

This past week, Sevilla celebrated its festival called "Feria de Abril." Basically what this consists of is a week-long party filled with drinking, singing, dancing, music, and lots of decorations and lights. On Monday night, the festival started with the "alumbrado de la portado," the lighting of the main entrance to feria. The lights were turned on at midnight and the party began! In the feria grounds, there are thousands of "casetas" (tents) that line the streets. There are public tents and also private ones which you need to be invited into (there are literally body guards standing outside the tent to make sure you are allowed in); the public and private tents have a totally different atmosphere. The public tents usually consist of big groups of Spanish teenagers (usually because all of their friends can't fit into one private tent), Americans, and creepy old men who are trying to hit on the Spanish teenagers and/or Americans. The private tents, on the other hand, are much more intimate and allow you to experience a more "authentic" feria. The private tents usually belong to families, so you need to be a friend of the family (or a friend of a friend of the family in my case) in order to get inside. My roommate and I were very fortunate to have made Spanish friends this semester, because we got to experience feria in the private tents instead of the public ones. We went to our friend Antonio's tent a couple of nights (a guy we met on a bus trip to Madrid) and got to meet a lot of his friends which was neat. One of them was a really good flamenco dancer, and it was fun to watch him dance with all the ladies. Throughout the week we also went to our friend Fernando and our friend Nacho's tents which was really fun. Fernando is the son of a fashion designer that Natalia works with, and we met Nacho through CIEE.

The streets in feria are lined with really pretty lights, and there are flamenco dancing and singing break-outs everywhere (in the streets and in public/private tents, so literally EVERYWHERE). It's really awesome because people of all ages dance and sing; nobody is shy. The official drinks of feria are manzanilla (a white wine that is REALLY strong), and rebujito (a mixture of manzanilla and Sprite). We got free drinks (and food!) in the private tents which was pretty convenient considering I am a poor college student.

Feria probably has been my favorite week in Sevilla thus far. It is like a carefree fantasy world, and I hope everyone gets the chance to experience it someday!

VIVA LA FERIA!!! :)






Picture #1: La portada de feria (the main entrance to feria)... there is an airplane on the top of the structure because it is celebrating the 100th year anniversary of aviation in Spain
Picture #2: Me in front of the portada
Picture #3: Me and Natalia with Antonio and a couple of his friends (Antonio is the one next to me)
Picture #4: Lights in the streets of feria
Picture #5: Me in front of the portada again
Picture #6: Some of the pretty flamenco dresses
Picture #7: Me in a caseta