Friday, September 12, 2008

Hola todos! It is Friday, and I have the satisfaction of having accomplished one week of classes. My mind is swimming with thoughts about what I should tell you. It has only been one week, and it was so filled to the brim, that I don’t know where to begin.

I will begin with today. Today I had to turn in a 230 word description of my topic of choice. The past few days have been so hot that I decided to describe the autumn. It really must have been a love letter, because I think I lured autumn to Sevilla. The day started crisply, and during a 30 minute class break, I went to a café near my school for hot café con leche. Beautiful. The cafes on our cobble stone street have tables and chairs that spill out into the street, and the mopeds whiz by while I drink my coffee. My class is on the second story of our building. Our room has two French doors that open onto the two smallest balconies I have ever seen, only big enough to stand facing forward and peep out onto the street below or the buildings directly across. During class I hear horses pulling carriages clomp down the narrow cobblestone street.

The building itself had a big interior patio with a fountain. All of the hallways above wrap around so you can look down below. We also have an exterior patio, in which I have a dance class.

In this class we are learning the Sevillano, a traditional dance with hints of flamenco that the locals break out during Feria de Abril, a week long fair in the spring. Our teacher said that it can either be danced by two women, and is very elegant and beautiful, or else a man and woman can dance it together, and then it is very sensual.

And I have also found out that during the fall there is a flamenco festival here in Sevilla that only occurs every two years. I am excited for this since I won’t be able to enjoy the festivities that occur in the spring with Semana Santa and Feria de Abril.

As far as every day routines here in Sevilla, I am adjusting just dandily. I remember to throw my TP in the trash can (don’t flush it!!!), I am careful about not leaving lights on, and I am doing just fine without air conditioning, though it can be a little warm. (I’ll admit I have considered riding the tram back and forth through town just to cool off, but have yet to resort to this). I take my allotted 8 minute showers, exactly. (I time myself with a clock). I am used to eating lunch at 3 and dinner at 10. And I know my route and bus numbers by heart from home to school, gradually exploring more and more outside of my little route each day.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Today some friends and I traveled to the Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporaneo. It was an old Monastery that was converted into an Art museum, and after some exploring, we found rooms with old frescoes on the walls, and also rooms with white marble crypts in them. I’m not sure if tombs are the right word, but they were big marble boxes, and on top of each one there were three statues of people lying down with their arms crossed and eyes closed. I don’t know if mortal remains were enclosed inside. Anyhow, we went to see 2 international photography exhibits. One was called “On the Human Being” and was a collection of numerous artists. My favorite pictures were a set of 100 black and white photographs lined up side by side on the wall. Each one had a person in ascending order from the age of 0-100, and it was so neat to see the progression of life.

This morning classes were cut short for the first of a series of three trips. This morning my group visited Italica, which are ruins of a Roman colony in Spain. I had a hard time understanding all of the history that our teacher guided us through. However, there was an arena in which I gathered thousands of people could have been slaughtered in one day. (probably only that many on a real party day) That was my first time getting to experience ruins like this, and it was amazing to walk down a road which held so much history.