Day 3: (Madrid) Guess I'll Get That Beach Bod?

Ask me how tired I am, just ask me.  (You don’t really have to ask me, you’ll probably know after reading all my posts).  In Day 3 of this Spanish marathon, we had another walking tour with Javier where we explored Calle de Alcalá and Paseo del Prado – hitting up Madrid’s City Hall,  El Museo de la Reina Sofía, and a gorgeous rooftop terrace at el Círculo de Bellas Artes along the way. 

We started off our morning walking down Alcalá, the street where our hotel was located and is more or less in the heart of Madrid.  Today, we walked the opposite direction as we usually do – away from Puerta del Sol and towards a whole new part of town.  Soon enough we came across this huge, beautiful white building.  Yes, a lot of the buildings here are white and beautiful, (like the palace and cathedral) but I promise you this is a different one…  It was massive and literally looked like a palace – today it serves as Madrid’s City Hall where the mayor’s huge office is located (our tour guide told us how big it was, but I forget..) and where art exhibits and galleries fill the other floors; but, back in the day it served as Madrid’s Post Office.  Their freaking Post Office!?!  Seriously, just look at some pictures below – if our Post Office looked like this, I’d be sending snail mail left and right.  Walking out of the building we saw a small group of protestors, which wasn’t unusual to me since we were in the country’s capital and in front of city hall.  But, the group was only made up of about 12 or 15 people and they were protesting the move of bosses and managers of artisans to higher corporations, something that is already done far too much in America.  They were peacefully holding their signs, which were no doubt made by their own handmade materials with the Madrid police standing by.  Javier, our tour guide, told us that Madrid has an average of 7 different protests a day.  Wow.

We continued through a beautiful park, with statues of Cibeles, Apollo, and Neptune; which are representative of Spain’s consciousness in their planning, culture and architecture.  Cibeles is the Greek god of the earth, Apollo the air, and Neptune the sea - .  After the park we popped out by a Spanish government building where their Congress meets and where two huge lions guarded the door (which is the cool part..).  The cool thing about these lions (other than the fact that they’re huge iron lions) is that they were made from the melted down cannons of Spain’s enemies in the war in Africa.  Check it:

We then toured Lavapiés, the immigrant/emigrant part of Madrid.  The shops were quaint and most likely family owned, and there was tons and tons of street art, which is obviously obligatory to take a picture in front of.

After we finished our tour of Lavapiés and another adjacent called a Latina, we made our way to El Museo de la Reina Sofía, which is most famous for housing Picasso’s Guernica (link).   More importantly, in my opinion, the museum housed a lot of original Dali’s which I was very excited to see in person.  I’ve done reports on the surrealist painter before and have analyzed some of his works – so seeing them in the flesh was a very cool experience. 

After the museum, we went to Círculo de Bellas Artes, paid a cheap 4 euros and chilled on one of the most spectacular rooftop terraces I’ve ever seen.  (Admission: I haven’t seen a whole lot of roof top terraces, mostly just in movies – but this one definitely topped them).  We stayed there for only a short time before the professors said we had to go to our class session, but a few of us on the trip convinced them to move our class activity to the terrace.  They obliged, and we spent the afternoon basking in the Spanish sun on a swanky rooftop over the entire city.  Not bad, huh?

After our bodies had more than enough Vitamin D, we walked a short couple blocks back to the hotel to get dressed and ready for dinner and a Flamenco show!  As some of you may know, Flamenco is a Spanish dance that is very important in their culture – it is done by both women and men and the dance is a very passionate portrayal of different emotions, much of which is done through stomping, clapping, or the movement of the hands.

We went to dinner at a lovely place called Prada a Tope, where we were again served tapas.  I just realized I don’t ever think I explained what tapas were – but for those of you who don’t know (and who have made it this far into the post) tapas are small dishes of different types of foods that can be shared with a bunch of people.  So it forces you to go out, connect with, interact with, and talk to people.  (WEIRD – right America??)  But honestly, it’s very nice – it makes for a very communal and familial feel while at the table.  Today, we had the most amazing salad I’ve ever eaten (and I hate salad), roasted vegetables (asparagus, zucchini, eggplant, tomatoes, and onions), Tortilla Espanola – which is kind of like an omelet – it’s eggs with potatoes and onions baked in a tomato sauce, and Pork Ribs and Fries.  YUM!  I know you’re thinking, ‘What the hell, she’s in Spain and eating French fries and ribs??’ but let me tell you, these fries were almost to die for – hand cut and cooked in olive oil and sea salt.  Just imagine it; so crispy, so good.

Finally made our way to Flamenco and got lost in an alley along the way, which sounds scary but a Spanish alley in Madrid is literally like walking down a residential street in Lincoln Park – it’s clean, painted bright and fresh colors and isn’t creepy.. 

Flamenco was intense – the dancers are very passionate and intense, but are very encouraging of one another while they’re dancing.  I wish I could explain it better, but you’ll really just have to see it for yourself to understand.