Sunday
On Sunday, after staying out until 3am, I woke up at 8:30 to find a pay phone to call John. I found one fairly close to the house, and I finally got to talk to John. After our conversation, which cost me almost 5 euros, I went back to sleep, where I stayed until noon. I seriously can't remember the last time I slept until noon. When I finally woke up, I longed to sit on the couch with my cat and NFL. But, that was not in the cards on this Sunday. I also would not be able to cook that day because the markets are closed on Sundays. So, I worked for a bit, had lunch with the girls (if I have to eat rice and vegetables one more time, I might scream!), relaxed for a while, then decided to explore on my own. I knew that if I just kept hanging out with the girls I live with two things would happen, the first is that I would get sick of them and get even more homesick, the second is that I would not learn my way around Granada and therefore would be dependent on them even more. So, I decided to take a walk. I left the house around 6:oopm, my goal was to head down the Albaicin to "Mirador de San Cristobal", a view point of the Ahlambra. I was hoping to see the sunset and stay long enough to watch the Ahlambra light up.
The Albaicin is one of the most confusing areas. The streets criss-cross every witch way, but the view point is quite popular, and there were signs pointing the way. My first success was reaching the view point. Then, I got even more courage and decided to get an ice cream. I did this by pointing to the coin size I wanted and saying "limon". Luckily, the flavors were labeled. The ice cream, or helado, was quite good. I ate my ice cream and watched the sunset.
I decided not to stay long enough for it to get dark, because I knew I wanted to continue my walk down the hill to the town center, and wanted a little bit of light to navigate the windy streets. I wanted to take a walk down what is known as "the Tea Street" (but in Spanish, can't remember it right now). This narrow street is lined with vendors selling all sorts of gifts, mostly Arabic in nature.
After I successfully found my way to this street, and then the main street of town, "La Gran Via", I explored for a little while, stopped in at an internet cafe, then headed home on the bus. I take bus #7. It was my first time getting on the bus alone. I did OK, I gave the man my Euro (i love the 1 euro and 2 euro coins, I with dollar coins would catch on!), but didn't stop and wait for my receipt. Oh well, lesson learned. Once I got home, I did a little more work, then went to bed. Successful weekend, adventures in Granada.
Next weekend I already have tickets to see the Ahlhambra on the inside, and hopefully I'll find a bar that might play the World Series or American football.
My next series of installments (amoung daily observations) will be an explanation of why the heck I came to Granada in the first place. This seems to be a popular question, and its difficult for me to answer. I think there are 4 people that really know the whole story: me, Francisco (the professor in Spain), Geoff (my adviser in Davis) and John, my huband.
No comments:
Post a Comment