Friends

Botellon at Plaza de Espana

Spanish friend Alberto (aka culo abierto), me and Nikki

Friends at the monestary in Lisbon

Lisbon pics

Being a poser on the walls of the castle

Beautiful view of the river side of the city

View from on top of the Santa Justa elevator

Lisbon, Portugal

so, this weekend we went to lisbon as a group and i must say that i am in love with this city. it was so beautiful and so amazing. lisbon is like a mini san francisco. it has the bridge, it has the hills, it has the cable cars. they were built similar because they both have earthquake threats frequently, so the bridge and building structures are built to last. but this town was amazing. there is a castle on a hill there that overlooks the entire city and the view was amazing. it was quite a hike to get there (wearing flip flops nonetheless) but it was beautiful there! i said several times this weekend that i could live there. i would have to learn some portugese though. haha. we also visited the monestary there and we saw a wedding taking place! it was pretty. and cool to see. i wonder how long they had to wait for it....
anyway, it was a great weekend and i am super glad i went! i would recommend it to everyone! :)

Senior portrait in Ronda :)

The Real Alcazar in Sevilla...its a palace....for the king.


A picture from the bullfighting arena....

Laughter

So....I am the new joke in the house! Haha. My madre and abuela like to jokingly make fun of me and mock me now-a-days. For example, after the bullfight I was talking to abuela the next morning and she asked me about it and I told her I thought it was incredibly sad and I didn't like it very much, and I was animated about it. So she told my madre and at dinner that night, my madre asked me if I liked the bullfight. I repeated my response and I was almost freaking out and my family was laughing at me for a little bit! It was funny. Another example, whenever my madre asks me if I would like anything else to eat, or if I would like any duck liver, I simply and courteously reply "no gracias." Naturally. So now, my madre likes to mock me and say in a funny voice back to me "no gracias." It makes me laugh and it makes her laugh too! So all is well :) I am glad I can provide the household with some form of entertainment :)

Anniversary Celebration

So, a while ago we had our one month anniversary of being in Spain! We took the opportunity to go see a movie, in english, and then go out to dinner at TGI Fridays. Haha. It was a good night, and if you haven't seen "No Reservations" I would suggest it. It was a good film! This was a good weekend and we plan on celebrating all of our monthly anniversaries in the same manner!

El bullfight

I know, I know, its been a long time since I have written....here are some stories:

I have now officially been to a bullfight. It was one of the most heartbreaking saddest things I have ever witnessed in my life. I will NOT go into details about the fight, but basically what happens is that there are 3 matadors (bullfighters) and they each have to kill 2 bulls. So the first bull comes out and they taunt it with these pink cloak type of things until it gets pretty upset, and then they bring out the horses. Now, horses and bulls aren't good friends so the bulls likes to charge the horses. (PS there is a guy riding the horse, and the horses are dressed in armor so it cannot be harmed) So when the bull charges the horse, the horse rider stabs the bull in the neck/back area to start the bull bleeding. Very sad. Then they taunt it some more, making it weaker while it is bleeding, then they have 3 guys stab small spear type of things into the same place as it was stabbed, making it even weaker. Then the matador comes out and taunts it some more, and by this time it has having trouble breathing and such. Then the matator does the deed of killing it. I had my eyes closed for most of this experience and I could only stand to sit through half of it. It was hard for me, but I am glad I got the cultural experience of going. Very interesting and I can't believe they have done this "sport" for centuries. And I have no idea how it attracts so many spectators....but I was told that most of them are tourists, so I guess everyone is in it for the cultural experience....