un chien andaluz

greetings from sevilla! i have not yet blogged from one of my weekend trips outside of barcelona, so i figured i´d take advantage of our sweet free hostel internet to do so. i´m here now in sevilla with my friend jenny from my program. sevilla is in the south of spain, in andalucia. we spent all of friday here, spent saturday in cordoba (a very small city about an hour and a half away), and are back here for our last day before flying out tomorrow.

andalucia is beautiful. i really like sevilla and i liked our day trip to cordoba, but i cannot imagine studying here, just because they are SUCH small and provincial cities. it has only just become apparent to me how ¨unspain¨ barcelona is, compared to here. people go to church on sundays. people we don´t know have struck up conversations with us in restaurants, on public transportation, on the streets- interested in where we are from and praising our spanish skills (haaa). this has been a really nice change from the impersonality of barcelona, but at the end of the day, i´m a northeasterner at heart, and hey, that´s what i´m used to and prefer. also, we´ve basically done everything that was recommended in sevilla in about 36 hours. boredom would set in quickly.

highlights from the trip have included sevilla´s cathedral, plaza del toros (where bullfights are held and have been since the 1700s), alzacar (palace of the christian kings from the 1550s), archive of the indias (museum that traces the development and exploration of the americas by spanish explorers), a few very nice parks, and some really excellent food, at far less expensive prices than one can find in barcelona. our trip yesterday to cordoba was also really fun, but tiring. the main focus of the day was the mezquita, mosque built from the 8th to 10th centuries. you can´t imagine just how big a mosque could be- but there is a cathedral built INSIDE of it, that takes up a fraction of its area (the christians decided to make their own mark on the place when they took over). it was incredible. we also visited the synagogue in the old jewish quarter, and the alcazar there as well. even the train ride from sevilla to cordoba through the andalucian countryside was gorgeous.

i spent last weekend in lisbon with another of my program friends. i won´t go into detail about it here so as not to make this entry ridiculously long. lisbon was my least favorite trip so far, although i´m definitely glad i went. the city just seemed lacking in personality (not to mention people- at 2 PM on a gorgeous saturday afternoon, the streets in the city center were empty. weird). this past week was nothing too exciting, mostly just classes and projects in preparation for this trip. we did, however, have a program thanksgiving dinner on thursday. the food left a little something to be desired (good, but not american thanksgiving), but it was a really nice thing to do, and great to eat at a nice restaurant with the other CIEE kids.

now, i´m getting into the final stretch with only two weeks of classes left. i am going home in exactly three weeks, and leaving barcelona in less than that (london first)! after three months here, it´s a little weird to think about. most people here have the same thoughts- ready to go home, but we will miss barcelona, our friends, and the overall experience a LOT. however, it´ll be nice to have next weekend in barcelona after a month straight of traveling; i´ll have to do the last things that i want to do in the city before it´s time to go. but luckily, my lovely sister will be arriving in barcelona in 12 days (!!!), and then i´ll get to show her the sights before we hit up london.

note to the british pound: i´m watching you. just keep on falling in value.