About a month ago... (I know, I have been horrible about updating this) our group took a day trip to Toledo, a city known for its swords, marzipan, and cathedral. Our first stop was the beautiful Cathedral of Toledo, famous because Toledo was once the capital of Spain, and the cathedral once an icon of the Christian's dominance in the country. Now I really love architecture and beautiful art, and I would like to think that I appreciate it more that your average person, but even my brain has started to mix all the cathedrals, churches, basillicas, and chapels together. So for most of us, this cathedral looked very similar to the past 50 we had seen, making it slightly difficult to pay attention. Needless to say, when the director of our program said this was the last cathedral we would visit, there was applause. It was however very interesting to see works by Valazquez and El Greco, which we had studied in art class. It makes learning much more fun when the classroom comes to life. After the cathedral we visited the Enterrimiento (grave) de Senor Orgaz, made famous by a painting by El Greco, which was also fascinating to see in person. Next we visited a beautiful synogogue after which we went just outside the city to overlook the beautiful river and views of Toldeo. The guys in our group however were more interested in the sport car caravan apparently making its way through Toldeo, so they spent a good 15 minutes of the ride running from one side of the bus to the other watching the porsches, ferraris, and lamborghinis race past. After lunch we had free time to walk around, shop, try the famous marzipan (gross if you ask me) and get a feel for the town of Toledo.
That night when we got back to Salamanca, I had my first date with a Spanish guy. No one get too excited... it was a one date situation. After about a week of getting everyones opinions and going back and forth on whether or not I should go, I decided to live a little and say yes. We went for a cup of coffee, where he proceeded to play with his phone, tell me he was unemployed, and accidently show me pictures of about 50 women he had on his cell phone. Oh did I mention I found out he was 34? Man do I know how to pick them. Needless to say I ended the evening after coffee with a previously organized emergency text message signaling my friend to call me. I also had a text message that meant come to the cafe and get me, but thankfully I didn't have to use that one.
My next adventure was off to Italy... details and stories to come!
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