Seville!

Hola todos,

It has been a couple days since I've written a blog, so I'm going to give it my best shot to catch you all up.

Yesterday we left Madrid and went to Toledo. Toledo is known as the Imperial City or the City of Three Cultures. Toledo was made the first capital of Spain under the Visigoths in the mid-6th century. Toledo served as an important hub for Jews, Moors, and Christians, and remained a city of religious toleration for hundreds of years despite political conflict and many changes. Toledo has 80 churches, and this is where the "Holy Toledo" originated (get it?). In the 1560s, Madrid became the capital of Spain, and the prosperity of Toledo ended.

La ciudad de Toledo (The city of Toledo)

In Toledo, we visited a Cathedral, the Church of Santo Tome, and the Barrio Judio.

The Cathedral in Toledo is the 2nd largest Cathedral in Spain (the biggest Cathedral in Spain is actually in Seville, and I will get to see it on Monday--this Cathedral is the 3rd largest in the world). The Cathedral was built from 1226-1493 and was inspired by the Gothic Cathedrals of France. The beauty of this Cathedral cannot even be put into words. Here is a link with pictures of the inside, as I could not take any pictures inside the Cathedral.

Toledo Cathedral

Front of Toledo Cathedral

The Church of Santo Tome housed the famous painting entitled "El entierro del Senor de Orgaz" or "The Burial of Count Orgaz" by El Greco. I bought a post card at the Church, and took a picture of it so you can see what the painting looks like, but the picture doesn't do it much justice!

El entierro del Senor de Orgaz

Once done with our tour in Toledo, we had a 7 hour bus ride ahead of us. It actually went by pretty quickly, and they stopped a few times--so that was nice. When we arrived in Seville it was around 8PM and  we were all waiting to what looked like we were being adopted. The families would come along and our directors would call out our names, and then we had a family! Very exciting! My host mom's name is Juani and is married to Manolo. They have two daughters Laura and Susana. Laura lives across the street in another apartment building with her husband, and Susana lives in the room next to mine. My family is very nice and so welcoming. They have a lot of patience and are willing to explain things that I don't understand. It has been a challenge communicating, but I believe I'm catching on quickly--I have to, because no one speaks english in this house! The apartment that I'm living in is more than I ever expected. I have my own room and bathroom and also have internet access and air-conditioning--so I am very content. When I arrived to their apartment I unpacked all my things, and we didn't eat dinner until about 10:15PM--I'm sure Dad is in shock! After dinner I went to bed because I had to get some rest for our bike tour in the morning around Seville.

Luckily, the bike tour was early in the morning, as Seville is known as the frying pan of Spain. Today the temperature reached about 99 degrees. Our bike tour lasted about 3 hours and it was great to see some of the sights! Seville is such a beautiful city, and just the right size for me. A couple of guys on my bike tour had flat tires--I was glad it wasn't me, I had my fair share of that on my bike tour around China in January :) After the bike tour I had to rise to one of my biggest challenges so far--getting on the bus to go back to my apartment. I knew what bus I had to catch, but wasn't sure what stop it was, but I was able to communicate with a couple ladies on the bus and they told me that my stop was after theirs, so that was convenient. When I arrived home, we had lunch at about 3PM and then I took a siesta (I'm already getting used to siestas, which isn't too shocking). When I woke up I went to "Al campo," which is basically the Target or Walmart of Spain--one stop shopping!

Tonight I think I am going to just lay-low, as I am very tired from this weeks events. I believe tomorrow I will be exploring Seville with a couple of girls in my program, and I just found out that my friend Dana from Miss Hall's has arrived in Seville, so hopefully I will be able to see her this weekend also.

I hope everyone is enjoying my blog so far. It's very nice to have a reflection about what I'm doing each and every day just so I can realize how blessed I am to be here and have this opportunity. I'm also keeping a journal of my own that my brother, Sam, gave to me!

That's all for today! I hope all is well en los Estados Unidos (in the United States). Hasta luego!

Besos,
Lindsay