Castillos y Vinos y Cadetes

I have now been here a week. I'm really used to marking time based on weeks passed, because that's how we count our terms in college. So week 1 is done, 13 to go. Oddly, I feel like I've been here forever. I'm already sick, too. My host mom had a little cold this week, and I think she might have passed it on to me. But no need to fret, it's nothing I can't deal with.

Tuesday wasn't too interesting, but on Wednesday, we met with our intercambio partners who we will be practicing speaking Spanish with outside of the classroom. And they happen to be a bunch of cadets at the local artillery academy (it's kind of like West Point). There's 29 of them, and only 13 of us, so they outnumber us quite a bit, but they're all incredibly kind and welcoming. We split up into groups and they gave us an amazing tour of their academy. It's a beautiful building, and they have so many cool rooms in there. 

Thursday, our program coordinator and one of our teachers, Marian, took us around the city during class to learn about the Jewish quarter in town, and the history of the Jews here. There's an interesting restaurant here that serves Sephardic food, and a lot of the students had tapas there recently that were delicious. Earlier this week, Marian took us around and told random legends and folk stories of the city. I expect that most of the class will be conducted outdoors. Afterward, we met once again with the cadets, except this time it was in the plaza with the aqueduct and they were in plain clothes and all of us were so thrown off. We also thought it was going to be like an hour thing, but we ended up going around town with them until midnight or so. 

Friday, we had our first excursion, which was pretty dang cool. We saw two castles, a convent, and a local winery. The first castle we saw is called El Castillo de Coca, and had never in its history been invaded. The view is amazing, and it's situated near the largest pine forest in Europe, which the Spaniards call the "Sea of Pines". 

Then we saw a castle I can't remember the name of. But the important point is that this castle is now a freaking high school. How crazy is that? I mean, I'm sure the students don't notice anymore, but I sure wish I had gone to high school in a castle... Europeans...

And the last part of our excursion was to a local winery/vineyard called Malaparte. I'm not a big fan of red wine, and the first of the two wines we tried was young and particularly acidic, but it was fun nonetheless, and we all felt very sophisticated. I think.

Alana, Katie, Garrett photobombing in his Indiana Jones hat, Andrew, me and Allison pretending we like red wine. Also, I bought fun pants. They're really trendy here. 

Yesterday, Saturday, I went to a town nearby called La Granja. The palace there, (Palacio Real de La Granja de San Ildefonso) is where the father of the current King of Spain (Juan Carlos de Barbon I) was born. It was just me and a few of the girls, and we didn't go inside because we have an excursion there later. But we did check out the beautiful gardens, which are entirely too huge to comprehend and must take up a lot of time to tend. Seriously, we were walking around for about half an hour and thinking "okay, this is pretty, but what else do we do?" until we saw a map of the place and realized we'd seen about an eighth of the entire grounds. There's a labyrinth and a thousand and one fountains, all with the original piping systems that work from the natural topography and gravity, using water from the mountains to operate.

It was also a really beautiful day, and these pictures don't do it justice.

Reppin my ducks everywhere I go. SCOOOO

A panorama of the artificial lake ("El Mar") that sits at the highest elevation of the naturally sloping gardens, and acts as a reservoir for the bajillion fountains there. It was a little underwhelming after a steep climb in sandals, but it is quite a nice view. 

Once we got back to Segovia around 8 o'clock, we realized there were entirely too many people out in the streets. And then we realized there was some kind of festival going on, but we were all too tired from walking the gardens, so we split up for our homes to change, eat, and rest.

Later that night, we went out again with some of our cadet friends who hadn't gone home for the weekend. Loose, cotton pants that resemble pajamas or sweats (typically in bold patterns) are really popular here, and one of the girls and I bought some earlier this week. We typically refer to them as "los pantalones" (THE pants) or "fun pants." One of the female cadets found great joy in the idea of "fun pants Friday," which was particularly funny. Also, back on Thursday night, I was told two separate times that I resembled someone else on the trip. One cadet actually thought I was the sister of one of the other exchange students. I don't see it, but feel free to make your own conjectures. 

Apparently, my long lost brothers: Andrew from Colorado, and Nacho from somewhere near Oviedo. 

On a related note, I still can't get over how late Spaniards stay up. Do these people ever sleep?! It's ridiculous. Anyway, we got home entirely too late, and I woke up with a sore throat and a bit of the sniffles. But all is well! This weekend I am heading to Barcelona, after a loooot of confusion and ridiculousness. We're all also planning what to do for our fall break, so I'll keep you all updated on how that goes.

Miss you all! Looking forward to a duck game I actually need to check the score for avidly ;)