I'm home!

After a long day of traveling, complete with lay-overs, talking to strangers on the airplane, and airline food, we made it back to Orlando at about 9:30 last night. The flight, which was 10 hours long, went by surprisingly quickly, thanks to having people to talk to, a movie to watch, etc. Today I'm starting to unpack, enjoying being home and getting used to this time zone again. I'm also going to start uploading pictures of the other places I visited in Spain, since I think I've only posted up to the 3rd trip.

Here are some from Madrid. In my environment and society class we had 3 excursions throughout the semester - one to Segovia, and two long walks through Madrid. These are from the first of our Madrid "excursions".

The Royal Palace

In front of the Palace looking toward the north of Madrid. Off to the left, where you see the trees, is the small, formal garden of the palace. Back behind the building is a larger garden with lots of paths through trees, park benches, flowers, a couple peacocks and other birds. It used to be exclusively for royalty, but now, especially since the palace is not lived in anymore, it is open to the public.

A street through the "casco antiguo" of Madrid. The casco antiguo is the part that was built during medieval times. Madrid was founded in the 9th century by Arabs, conquered by Christians in the 12th (I think), and remained about the same size until the capital was moved there in 1561. It wasn't until the 19th century, though, that a plan was developed to make the development of the city orderly. So in the original part of Madrid, the same characteristics as other medieval cities are seen. Its streets are narrow and lack organization; the buildings are relatively small and close to each other. There wasn't a lot of open space in the city then, and due to a lack of good hygienic practices, the casco antiguo was unsanitary, which led to health problems. And because of the poor medical treatments of the times, a lot of people died of simple colds or infections.

The Plaza Mayor

In medieval times, it was located on the outside of the city wall and served as a place for those who lived in the country to come to sell their products without having to pay to enter the city. Later as the city grew, it was incorporated into the city and served as a meeting and entertainment place for people. For example, there were bullfights and soccer games held inside, a market set up along the edges... It was used as a parking lot for a while, and now there are little restaurants along the sides, the city hall is located in the different colored area you can see in the picture, and there are appartments in the other higher-up rooms.

This is a more modern part of the city, but you can see that the buildings here are still pretty old - I think from the 19th century or so.

The same area from the roof of a nearby arts center. You can see how the architecture of the buildings in this area is generally pretty. This picture also gives you a feel for the size of Madrid, even though this is only looking in one direction.

My "Environment and Society" teachers loved to talk about this stuff. :0)

Sharin' the love. right now.

Well blog fans, it's that time again. Time for another update. It's actually so far past time that its time for me to come home. So... I plan to update this blog once I get home with pictures from other trips and details about how the rest of the semester went.

For now, here are a couple pictures from when my parents came to visit. They're from a day-trip we took to a closeby medieval city, Ávila. (There are a lot of them in Spain). :0)

It was pretty cold that day.

They are up on the wall that goes around the city. Man, was it hard to get up and down it.

In front of Avila's cathedral.

I have one more exam tomorrow and a paper to turn in on Friday and then the "cuatrimestre" (short semester) here will be over! Then I'll have some time to say goodbye to friends, our resident director, and Carmina, and see a little bit more of Madrid before my flight home. I should be back in Florida by Sunday night. :0)

I am really looking forward to seeing everyone and getting caught up.

<} Sarah <}