(Second half in
English)
Como dice mi
abuela, el tiemplo vuela. He estado en
Madrid por dos semanas ya y me faltan sólo 17 días más aquí. Mucho ha pasado durante la semana pasada y
voy a tratar de contarlo todo aquí, pero es probable que voy a olvidarme de
algo.
Voy a empezar
primero con mis clases. Cada semana
tenemos dos clases. Las clases empiezan
los miércoles y terminan los martes. Por
si acaso, siempre tenemos mucha tarea los lunes y he estado trabajando
muchísimo hoy. Esta semana estoy tomando
clases de la enseñanza del español como lengua extranjera y de la semántica
española. Mañana en la clase de
enseñanza todos tenemos que hacer una presentación y estoy muy emocionada
porque cada uno de los estudiantes va a tener 15 minutos para presentar una
actividad o un juego a la clase. Espero
aprender muchas actividades nuevas para enseñárselas a mis estudiantes el año
que viene.
Como ya saben,
siempre hay mucho que hacer después de las clases. A veces tenemos excursiones con un grupo de
la universidad y a veces exploramos la ciudad con nuestro propio grupo o
individualmente. La semana pasada
tuvimos dos excursiones a dos museos diferentes aquí en Madrid. El martes fui con un grupo a las tres de la
tarde al Museo del Prado. Este museo es
uno de los museos más famosos en toda España y allí vi muchas obras famosas de
Francisco de Goya y de El Greco. El
jueves fuimos a otro museo que se llama El Museo Reina Sofía. En este museo había muchas obras de Pablo
Picasso y Salvador Dalí, incluyendo el famoso “Guernica” de Picasso. “Guernica” es una obra muy grande y muy
interesante. En el mismo cuarto con la
obra hay una secuencia de más o menos seis fotos que muestra el desarrollo de
la obra a través del tiempo. Este
miércoles vamos al Museo Thyssen, que es otro museo del arte y el último que voy
a visitar con el grupo de la universidad.
El jueves pasado,
después de ir al museo, fui con mi hermano Richie al Parque de Retiro. ¡Es un parque grandísimo! Allí vimos un lago grande con barcos, mucha
gente tomando el sol, algunas personas jugando a damas, mucha gente tocando
instrumentos y cantando y algunos hombres haciendo ejercicio. También vimos un palacio de cristal que es
parte del Museo Reina Sofía. Caminamos
por casi dos horas. Después de caminar
por el parque caminábamos un rato más y un poco más luego tuvimos que
despedirnos. Yo estaba muy triste porque
no sé cuándo voy a ver a mi hermano otra vez.
Él ya ha ido a Granada y va a seguir viajando por toda Europa este
verano.
El viernes por la
mañana salí con un grupo de MSLA (el programa de estudio) para una excursión
más. Había aproximadamente 60 personas
en nuestro grupo y el autobús estaba lleno de gente. Viajamos primero a una ciudad que se llama
Burgos donde fuimos a una catedral grande.
Allí aprendí que antes era posible comprar una familia su propia capilla
dentro de una catedral. Por eso, la
catedral que visitamos tiene aproximadamente 20 capillas en adición a la parte
principal de la catedral, donde está enterrado el Cid. En Burgos también vimos algunos árboles muy
interesantes. Lo interesante es que sus
ramas han crecido juntas y son todos conectados. Después de salir de Burgos seguimos el camino
del Cid, es personaje principal del poema épico el Cid, a algunos lugares más y
leímos parte del poema. Finalmente,
después de hacer un picnic y usar los servicios (dos baños por sesenta
personas), salimos para el destino final: Pamplona.
I was especially excited to arrive in Pamplona as my lower
back has a tendency to hurt after four or five hours in a car or bus and we had
been traveling for at least that amount of time when we finally spotted the
city on the horizon. As the bus made its
way through the first part of the city I was amazed to already see many people
walking around town in the traditional red and white. Towards the outskirts of the town there were
very few people, but the closer we got to the center of town the more crowded
the streets became. We pulled up in
front of our new dorm and excitedly piled out of the bus and rushed to get
settled into our new rooms. In general
the rooms were much smaller than what we have become accustomed to at “home”
(Galdós in Madrid), but I actually lucked out and received a double room that
was just as big as the room I have been staying at in Madrid. After getting unpacked I grabbed a bit of
money and my chapstick and headed out to meet my friends in the lobby for our
walk into the great unknown.
Before coming to Pamplona we had been warned that we should
keep a close eye on our stuff, that we should never carry purses, that we
should always wear closed-toe shoes, and that we should never go out alone or
in groups of more than four or five.
Upon finally getting to the downtown portion of the city the reasoning
behind all of these pieces of advice became abundantly clear. While the population of Pamplona is typically
around 200,000 people, during the international festival San Fermín, more
commonly known as the running of the bulls, the city attracts anywhere from one
to one and a half million people. The
streets, bars, restaurants, parks and stadiums are constantly abuzz with music,
dancing, singing, talking and much more and pickpockets are out in full force,
thus the no-purse rule. With so many
people on the streets it is sometimes very difficult to move and with a large
group it is quite easy to lose people because one second they are there and the
next they are lost in the sea of red and white.
Though the no open-toed shoes rules didn’t seem to make sense at first,
I quickly came to understand its value as I sledged through an inch of paper
and plastic trash, glass bottles, liquor, vomit, and pee. Throughout our few days there it was not
uncommon to see children or full-grown men relieving themselves in the street…something
that I had witnessed previously in Ecuador but that I didn’t think to
experience in Spain.
On Saturday morning we got up at 5 a.m. after only about 4
hours of sleep in order to make it to the stadium for the running of the
bulls. We arrived at the stadium just
before seven and sat for an hour before the evetn began. It was quite an experience to see many people
with beers in hand at 7 a.m. The crowd
was in high spirits and there was a lot of singing, cheering, and, of course,
the wave. At 8 a.m. sharp the bulls were
released into the streets and people began flooding into the lower part of the
arena. From our seats we could watch
everything on the big screens and we eagerly awaited the arrival of the bulls
in the stadium. Many of the bulls
weighed between 550 and 600 kilograms.
It was incredible to watch them run and frightening as well. After the initial run four bulls were brought
one at a time into the arena and the true entertainment began. Thankfully we didn’t witness anyone getting
truly trampled or maimed, but we did witness one man getting knocked out and
another man getting his pants ripped right down the center by the bull. Overall it was an entertaining experience and
I am very glad to have been a witness to this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
While I could go on and on about my time in Pamplona, I
think I will sum it up by saying that we had a great time. We spent Saturday at the beach in France and
I was able to eat crepes with Nutella and bananas. On Sunday we stopped by Medinacelli, a 15th
century Spanish town, and then made our way back “home” to Madrid. Though our trip was a lot of fun it was
extremely nice to get back to my own dorm.
I was especially grateful to return to our more diverse and filling
breakfasts!
