On behalf on the national holiday commemorating the signing of the Spanish constitution (which, wildly enough, was only in 1983), the whole country ended up with another long weekend. I had nothing planned, but once I got out of my class on Wednesday morning, I received a call from Jake:

1. We were going to the first game of the Copa del Rey that night-the round of 32. I had no say in the matter.
2. There were tickets available for the Alhambra for the next day, and let’s go, please.

So the stage was set. By the time I finished my classes, I hopped off the metro and only had time to drop off my stuff before we made our way over to the stadium by bike-it’s only just a couple minutes away. We locked things up and met some other people from the program right outside.

Sevilla won 1-0, but the other team (Villanovense) put up quite the fight, especially for being as trash as they supposedly are. We went all together to the most well known Spanish fast food chain/cerveceria: 100 Montaditos. They’re really everywhere, at least in Andalucia-I just went to google maps, there are 3 within 1 mile of here.

I’m back from a 5 minute wikipedia binge-there’s actually 5 in the US, all in Florida.

But we had to head in on the earlier side-we had a BlaBlaCar booked for 9 AM the next morning, and we needed a little bit of time to get over to the bus station to meet him. After a little bit of tardiness, we met up with Luis, a really great dude from the area who now lives in Seville. His girlfriend, however, is a Granadina, so he spends a lot of the weekends over there-and because of this, was chock full of suggestions for Granada. After some discussion about politics, TV Series, and the our collective good fortune to live in the time of the two greatest futbolistas of all time (Messi and Ronaldo), he dropped us off near the university campus. Granada is a city full of students. It’s somewhere around 250,000 people and has a student population of 82,000.

From there, we started walking uphill-we had a time to keep at the Alhambra and were a bit behind schedule. We walked through the more urban area, then up through the older city center where we snagged the last 2 hostel beds (I feel like they always say that) immediately before heading up to the Alhambra. I had taken a little walk around the block as Jake was setting up, which resulted in me going up to the palace from a different direction that Jake-running into an Adelante Andalucía protest, which held me up even further.

But finally I summited the hill and me and Jake pulled out our tickets and walked inside. The Alhambra is a huge Muslim fortress that later turned into one of the most prominent royal courts of the Reyes Catolicos-it was here where Cristopher Columbus pitched his trip to Isabel and Fernando. The most beautiful and intricate part is called the Nasrid Palace-the place where the last Muslim rulers of Spain lived. Our tickets said 1:30 PM, but we had only showed up at 1:59-and there was a line. I went to the front to ask if we would still be able to get in, and to my surprise, the guard/curator/employee opened up the gate and told us to head through.

Up to this point, we were having a good time-but from this time forward, things were going practically too good to be true-but it wouldn’t stop. Me and Jake hypothesized why it feels like we get away with a lot of stuff while examining the 1000 year old intricate architecture and sculpture of the Palaces.

When we wrapped up the inner palace, we walked over to the Generalife, the gardens that wrap around the other side of the palace. We left for a little water/restaurant/tapas stop before realizing that the Alcazar was to close at 6:30-we only had an hour left to see the oldest and arguably most historically significant part, the fortress.

So we dipped back down and made our way through the fortress to the tip of the mountain. We climbed the tallest tower, took a picture with the fortress and the snow covered Sierra Nevada (active skiing resorts above 3000m-although last week in Seville it hit 70). And then it closed, so we left the fortress and walked down the other side, popping out in a plaza and headed back towards the campus.

We ended up at a cerveceria/tapas spot and had a light little dinner, and a pre-nightime cafecito before winding our way through the city again, back to the hostel. When we arrived, there were a couple spread out groups in the kitchen/dining room, and we were immediately offered a drink-I don’t know exactly how it happened, but we sat down with a group of vacationing girls who turned out to be from Seville as well. It was one of their birthdays but they were about to go to bed-until we showed up.

It was salsa night! Come out, kids! So as the rest of the hostel packed up to get their dance on, so did we, and so did the Sevillanas. We wound our way through the streets around the center, ending up with the 12ish who had come on the excursion-but being Spain, and being only 10PM, it was completely dead. It’s kind of like going to a Salsa bar at 6PM in the US-of course no one will be there.

Plan B was a clubish type bar nearby. There, we said goodbye to the group we had met earlier (lame), and the night continued. There were two hostel employees with us, Eric, and a polish girl who’s name I don’t remember. (I’ve learned here that I’m good with English names but not-so-good with not-in-English names(.

We hung out there for a little while with the group, having a slight run in with who I think was a nazi. From there, we went to a chiller bar and had a bit of a foosball tournament. I only played in one game. Loss.

 

Jake played a few rounds. All wins, I think. That kid.

But the night wasn’t to end yet. There’s a famous disco in Granada called Mae West-everyone, all the time, was telling us to go there. So we started hiking.

You know how, on a typical night, you sometimes run into people? Me and Jake ran into a two girls who told us, no, Mae West is not worth it, especially not this early, and that we should come with them to a couple spots to chat with them. They were named Ana and Carmen, as we came to know, and Jake really hit it off with Carmen.

We went to bed on the later side that night, to be honest, and woke up to our friend from the hostel Eric telling us that checkout time was 11, dammit, and get out. Actual time: 11:30.

I wish I could block my mom from reading this.

From there we went to get some breakfast and visit the cathedral. We payed our diligent 3 Euro, and spent a long while in there. The proximity to Christmas meant that it was nativity’d to the nines, and the long weekend had made the whole city filled with Spanish tourists-which was pretty cool, since it feels like tourist destinations are so often dominated by English.

After that we snaked our way down through the old city, heading roughly in the direction of where we were to meet our BlaBlaCar home (8 Euros compared to the 23 Euro bus!) We stopped for a lunch outside in the 70 degree weather, faced with the nicest waiter I’ve ever met in Spain, who also undercharged us. After that, we walked around a smallish indoor market. I took a picture of a group there. Actually, come to think of it, I took another picture of a couple overlooking the Alhambra. For some reason people trust their phones with me.

By the end of our 2 hour lunch, we were ready to meet the BlaBlaCar, which went off without a hitch. We hit Sevilla by 8pm, and walked through the center, which was filled with literally thousands of people. Hopping on the metro was like herding cats, which ended up with us standing in two lines (one for getting into the station, another for getting onto the train). But finally we made it home, where I nuked some pasta my family had left me-they had left for the beach.

Phase 2

But it was only Friday. We had done this whole trip, not even realizing that we had a whole weekend ahead of us. I was invited out to La Alameda by my friend Blanca, we met a group of her friends out there-including a Youtuber named Juanki who is the strangest combination of likable and unusual you’ll ever meet in your life.

I was pretty tired, so after a bit of chat, I packed it in for home and crashed immediately.

I woke up the next morning fully recuperated, went to my favorite cafe to pretend to do some work for a second (actually, I think I wrote the Barcelona post there, and then went for a run. I watched my current favorite Spanish language show, Bajo Sospecha, before yelling to Jake outside my window what his plans were for the night.

Jake and I live literally across the way from each other, close enough to have an ‘inside voices’ conversation across the 12 story chasm. We used to call each other to coordinate plans, but now I just open my window and yell across for him to open it up. He told me that we were gonna bike to an Airbnb where our friends Chris and Lauren were staying, hang out there for a bit, and see where the night would take us. Plans with Jake are often like this: versus ‘do you want to do this?’ it’s more of a ‘We’re doing this.’

We biked over there, only after a little bit of navigational trouble, then chilled for the next couple hours at their house. By 1ish, Granada was catching up with us, and a pizza stop later, we were biking back home.

The next day, I had some goals to accomplish. I had two papers to write, then I wanted to go to the gym, hit an area I had never hit during the daytime-Triana, then buy my sister a present (I don’t think she reads this, so I should be fine).

That went without a hitch until I found out that my gym membership had lapsed, so I biked home before doing my daily run. At 6 pm, we had a goodbye cruise with all of the kids from the program and all of the orientation guides I had come to know so well.

But that was not the fate that awaited me-I ended up showing up 1 minute late, due to some unforeseen circumstances, which caused me to arrive exactly as the boat was pulling away.

So I sat on the river of the great Guadalquivir, filled with self pity. 30 minutes later I got up and got myself some juice.

When the rest of literally everyone I know in Seville showed up, I was there to greet them.

I got pictures with my favorite ones, then went to 100 Montaditos (I’m starting to understand how they stay in business) with Jake and some friends for a quick merienda. From there, we went to the strip of student oriented outdoor bars by my house to hang out. We hung out there till dinner time, 9 pm.

So that was one of the best weekends of my life-filled with friends, productivity, beautiful sites, people, friends, new, medium, and old. This weekend I said goodbye to a few people, went to dance, did a thousand things that I pray I’ll be able to do again.

Last night my host mom told me that it’s the final countdown-but only the final countdown of this stage. I started to look for flights back this summer.

I’ve got a final this afternoon, then about 24 hours to pack, say my last goodbyes, write my people a few letters, and then get on a damn plane.

No matter how far it is away, you always arrive.

Jack