Alcalá and Alcázar? Alca-awesome!

After just one week in Spain, I feel like I have lived here for months! I have my host family and program director to thank for the easy transition. I’ll try to limit the number of exclamation points I’ll use because I’m so excited.

All of my classes take place at the Instituto Benjamin Franklin, which is one of the many schools within the University of Alcalá. Only international students are allowed to take classes at the Instituto. Both of my courses are interesting and the two and a half hour period does not seem too long since there is a 10-15 minute break during the class. There are only eight students in the literature class, which is much smaller than the classes with 300 people at UW-Madison. On Wednesday we watched the movie adaptation of the novel La Celestina and Penelope Cruz played one of the main protagonists (it was nice to see a familiar face!).  Since this is a Spanish literature through film class we will be watching six movie adaptations of the main literary works of Spain.   Also, all of the classrooms in Trinitarios are organized by name. Yes, that’s what I said – name. It isn’t like in the US where the rooms are labeled with a number and the first number means the floor and the next two mean the classroom. They are organized by names such as Miguel de Cervantes, Rafael Alberti, or Gerardo Diego. For class, instead of buying a book that costs an arm and a leg, we buy a manual from the school for between 5 and 7 euros (about $6.5-$9.1) that is a compilation of the class syllabus and photocopies of the book that we would have had to buy.

After class and lunch for the first two days, we had three hour tours of Alcalá. We walked along la Calle Mayor (similar to State Street), visited the grand cathedral, the convent, and the University of Alcalá building. The University is where the King and Queen of Spain give out the prestigious Premio Cervantes literary award every year. It is also one of the oldest universities in Europe and was founded by Cardinal Cisneros who played an influential role in the Spanish monarchy during his lifetime. The convent is famous for selling candied almonds (almendras) and since the nuns that are at the convent are all cloistered, in order to buy the goodies, you have to jump through a few hoops. Press the button, and the nun will say “ave María purísima” and you can say “sin pecado, concebida”, like a password. It means that Mary conceived Jesus without sin. You could also say “hola, buenos días” or something along those lines, but I think it’s more fun to say the password. Then the nun will rotate the turnstile, you order your almendras and put the money in the turnstile, rotate it, and the nun will give you the sweets and your change. If you look close enough through the turnstile, you can try to see the nun!

Beautiful gazebo in the Plaza de Cervantes.
Beautiful gazebo in the Plaza de Cervantes.
020 (2)
The building of the Universidad of Alcalá
By the beautiful pink roses in the Plaza de Cervantes.
By the beautiful pink roses in the Plaza de Cervantes.

They say that Alcalá is famous for its four “c’s”: cigüenas (storks), conventos (convents), Cervantes, and colegios (schools, like the University of Alcalá). That’s definitely true. The storks are everywhere with their nests on top of all the old buildings. The convents, hello almendras! It’s pretty obvious that Cervantes is the big cheese in Alcalá. He was born here, the main plaza is named after him, and his original home is here too. The University of Alcalá is one of the oldest colegios and is older than the one in Madrid!

On Thursday, I finally got my first taste of tapas (they are like appetizers served with a drink)! Up until then, I had been busy with class, homework for class, and Alcalá excursions. My mom Pili recommended that I try a restaurant called Indalo, saying it has a great atmosphere with even better food that is inexpensive. I ordered the sangria which includes tapas. Sangria is normally red wine with chopped fruit, sugar, and fruit juice. The sangria I had was very similar to a fruity soda drink. I think I’ll be returning to Indalo for more tapas soon!

TAPAS. And sangria. That is all.
TAPAS. And sangria. That is all.

On Friday, we went on a field trip to Segovia and La Granja for my Spanish Civilization and Culture class. Mi madre española told me that my second top city to visit in Spain (behind Toledo) is Segovia and she was right! Our first stop: El Palacio de la Granja de San Ildefonso! (what a mouthful!) It was used by the Bourbon King Felipe V as his official residence and modeled after Versailles. Felipe and his wife Isabel de Farnesio are the only Spanish monarchs who aren’t buried at El Escorial as they are buried here. Unfortunately, we weren’t allowed to take photos inside, so I only have pictures of the beautiful outside landscape! The Palacio is also well known for its baroque gardens which have many fountains depicting ancient myths. We saw at least a dozen tapestries (one square meter of tapestry takes one person an entire year to create!), three different styles of chandeliers, and countless paintings and sculptures. The King and Queen’s bedroom is unique for royalty as they actually both shared the same room. Also, their room is in the exact center of the building. So, if you look out the window, you see the middle of the beautiful palace gardens.

At el Palacio de La Granja with my friend Sammi
At el Palacio de La Granja with my friend Sammi

After La Granja, we drove to Segovia and before we even got off the bus, we could see the magnificent aqueduct of Segovia, built by the Romans in the 1st century AD. It was HUGE! After eating our lunches prepared lovingly by our families (just like middle school: sandwich, juicebox, and some albaricoques which are apricots), we then had some free time to wander in the city. I went to a cute little café and ate my first churros con chocolate! The “hot chocolate” was basically like drinking melted chocolate, and who wouldn’t want to drink that? We walked by and took some photos at the Gothic cathedral of Segovia, complete with flying buttresses! We then visited the Alcázar of Segovia (it’s a castle/fortress combo) which they say was the inspiration for the castle in the Disney movie Cinderella. I could always move to Segovia and live out the rest of my days in the Alcázar as a Disney princess. It is also where Isabel I (“the Catholic”) and her husband Ferdinand lived; they are known as the reyes católicos (the Catholic Kings). They are also known to be the monarchs that supported Christopher Colombus’ trip to the Americas. The Alcázar that we visited was actually a reconstruction of the original which burned down in the mid-1800s.

First time having my churros con chocolate. They were AWESOME.
First time having my churros con chocolate. They were AWESOME.
At the Roman aqueduct of Segovia!
At the Roman aqueduct of Segovia!
At the Segovia cathedral. Grandísimo!
At the Segovia cathedral. Grandísimo!
 At the Disney princess castle (Alcázar) of Segovia, claro!
At the Disney princess castle (Alcázar) of Segovia, claro!

I know I already said this, but amo a mi familia! (I love my family!). I play ping pong with Nacho in the buhardilla (another fun Spanish word that means attic or loft). Since Nacho has school at the same time I do, my mom drives both of us by car in the morning, and I take the bus back in the afternoon. By doing this and having breakfast everyday with my mom, I get even more practice with speaking Spanish. For school since it’s such a long period between breakfast and lunch, my mom packs me a sandwich, juicebox, and bollo de chocolate (similar to chocolate bread). I met Raquel’s boyfriend, Ivan, when he was over for dinner this past week. He is very tall and talks even faster than my family does, and that’s saying something! He’s taking English classes and every now and then he would say a word in English (with a very heavy Spanish accent) mixed in with the Spanish, so much that Raquel (who will study English in college this fall) bursts out laughing because of the way he pronounces the words. (An interesting fact: since the Spanish language does not have the combination of “s + consonant” at the beginning of a word, Spaniards add a vowel before the “s” when speaking English. Instead of saying “school”, they would say “e-school”. Interesting, ?)

To finish up this blog post, since I’ve been here a week, I’ve compiled a list of interesting facts/differences that I’ve noticed about Alcalá so far.

1. Public transportation is much more common than in the US. We learned during orientation that about 90% of people in Spain use public transportation whereas in the US, 90% of people drive themselves. (On that note most cars in Spain are manual transmission).

2. To flush a toilet, there isn’t a lever – there’s a button on top of the toilet.

3. In general, most people are more environmentally conscious with respect to cars, houses, water use, etc. Most manual cars get better gas mileage than automatic ones. The cars are smaller and more compact; I haven’t seen a single Suburban or Ford F150! Most houses are built taller instead of wider and have three floors, the main floor, second floor, and attic/loft. Most do not have backyards as they take up too much space; I asked my host dad how to say backyard in Spanish, and he didn’t even know because having backyards is more an “American thing”. Especially in the summer, many places in Spain can go through a severe drought period, so everyone is very water conscious which means shorter daily showers.

4. People are very affectionate with each other, even in public. To greet people, you give them kisses on the cheek. Sometimes couples are a bit too affectionate to show their feelings for each other and can lead to some awkward situations on the RENFE train.

5. The eating schedule is very different. Breakfast is a very small meal and around 8-9am. Lunch is 2-3 pm and is the biggest meal of the day. It consists of a first course, second course, and dessert. But, dessert is normally fresh fruit which is pretty refreshing (but can be something sweet and sugary too). Dinner is 9-10pm and is similar to lunch, but with smaller portions.

6. There are roundabouts everywhere and I’m not kidding. Instead of having a lot of traffic lights, they have roundabouts instead. So if you really like roundabouts (like my friend Eric), you should move to Spain. My favorite roundabout is close to my house and has a giant fountain in the middle of it. Beautiful!