A Weekend With Friends

      My friend Ethan came to Madrid from London for the weekend. On Friday, we met up at his hostel which was only like 3 blocks away (in a huge city like Madrid I didn't expect that at all), and after I showed him around a little bit. It was cool being able to tell him about some of the things I have learned and show him some of my favorite plazas, restaurants, and bars.
     First, we went to a little restaurant down the street from my apartment called Traigos Tapas. They have a deal where you get five beers for 3 euros. We split a huge Iberian ham sandwhich and drank some brews. The waiter could tell we were tourists and was trying to really talk up the restaraunt, but he didn't know I had already been there. It's great, but it definitely wasn't what he was talking it up to be.
     After that, we walked towards my favorite bar, Casa Camacho. I showed Ethan the "Times Square of Madrid" called Callao on our way.

    We bought ourselves a few Yayos at Casa Camacho and shared stories from our study abroad experiences. Next weekend, I am going to be in London and it's going to be cool to see some of the things he was telling me about. 

      On Saturday, Ethan, Sirena, Kaitlyn, and I went to Retiro Park and rented some bicycles. If you don't already know, biking is one of my favorite hobbies (also part of my occupation at Jimmy Johns) and I hadn't been on a bike since leaving home. I was so excited when we got our bikes and started riding around the park.

        Retiro Park has a number of gardens, statues, and spectacular views that we encountered during our exploration of the massive grounds. In one of the little gardens, there were a group of peacocks. This little kid kept chasing them around and it was pretty funny.

       The park was once owned by the Spanish monarchy, but was eventually given to the city and opened to the public. Basically, this huge park used to belong to just a few people.

     These picture are of the inside of the Palacio de Crystal. This building is so cool and we hung out for a little bit inside the tapestry tent.

      We hung out on a bench and ate some snacks as we took a break from riding. There were a bunch of birds hanging out and I tried to share this bread with the pidgeon. He bit at it a few times, but another smaller bird flew in and took off with the whole piece.

       We rented our bikes for like 4 hours, so we took a couple rests here and there. When our time was up, we turned in our bikes and went home for a nap.
       Later on, we all met up (including some other classmates) and headed to a Jazz bar. We listened to a band that went by the name of Calle Mora, according to the trumpet player that I talked to after the show, the band name is based on a street in Venezuela. He told me the band has players from Venezuela, Cuba, Columbia, and Spain. I used to play trumpet back in middle school, so I told him he played much better than I did. He complimented me on my Spanish and it was a little bit of a confidence boost.
       I had spotted this really beautiful girl standing alone against the wall looking in my direction a few times, and decided that I would go say something. I asked her, "porque estas aqui y no bailando?" (Why are you here and not dancing?).
      She smiled, but before she could say anything, her friend grabbed my shoulder and yelled, "Que quieres?" (What do you want?). I said I just wanted to talk, but I didn't want this crazy Spanish girl to attack me, so I left them alone.
      We went to a discoteca after and danced to some random electronic music until pretty late. I think this might have been one of the better nights out in Madrid this month. And thanks to Ethan and my friends from class, it was a pretty solid weekend as well.

Thanks for reading,

      RCE