Bienvenidos a Espana!

Hola! I'm in Madrid!!!!!! Just got here today, and I love it so far!! My senora, Sol, is SO sweet and a great cook. Also, we are already pretty spoiled it seems...Both my roommate, Laura, and I (so I'm Laura 2, she's Laura 1) have our own rooms which is awesome! Also, Sol provided hair dryers and STRAIGHTENERS for us because ours would burn up (she's under the impression that the special one i brought would burn up too, so I guess I'll just use hers...even though I'm pretty sure it would work here). But how adorable is that? And we both have desks all set up and there are Spanish reference books and travel books all around! So I'm pretty excited :)

It was sad to leave Turkey though :( Here's a quick (ha, I'll try my best to be brief) run-down of what we did...

SUNDAY

I'm pretty sure we slept in really, really late...Then we went out to dinner on this amazing island thingy on the Bosphorus. It was completely open to the air, and there was a nice swimming pool and everything. And cool little music playing. Ege's family and me and Sarp all went. To give you an idea, a famous retired soccer player was there, and when we were leaving a model had just arrived. Ballinnnn!

Then we went to an outdoor club (with Ege's parents too, b/c her dad knows the manager! aka freeeee) that faced the Bosphorus and was SO beautiful! Barely anyone was there, but the view of the bridge lit up and just the club itself were AMAZING.

MONDAY

Ege, Sarp and I went to Sultan Ahtmed, an area where all of the historic stuff is. But some (a lot) is closed on Mondays, so we went to Topkapi Palace. I can't really remember all of the info about it...but I'm sure there's a great Wikipedia website if you're interested...But it's old. And very pretty! And we saw a HUGE diamond, I think the largest cut diamond ? maybe? And lots of jewelry, etc from the sultans. Them sultans had it made. seriously.
Then we ate these meatball things that are famous in that area. They were good actually! But it was a lot of meat...I dunno how it made me feel...but I was hungry at the time so I ate it...ahh so much meat!

Then we went to the Grand Bazaar which was awesome but overwhelming. There was too much stuff, too many people...lots of things being sold. But it is really old, which is cool! and HUGE, I think it covers a kilometer at least.

I can't really remember what we did Monday night...I think we just went to sleep or something. I was really tired that day.

TUESDAY

We went back to Sultan Ahmet to finish the old stuff. We went to Hagia Sofia, a now museumesque mosque that used to be a church. It's so interesting, there are little paintings of Mary and Jesus and of Gabriel, but then there is a little door that points to Mecca and a place for the imam to go up and a lot of other very islamic things. Yay Ottoman conquerings!

Then we went to the Blue Mosque, which is SO beautiful, built after Hagia Sofia, and intentionally beautiful and massive, but it was prayer time and so we couldn't enter. I recorded the imam singing to let people know it was prayer time, which is pretty cool, I'll see if I can post it. All of the mosques had that guy singing, it sounded like they were responding to one another. So then we headed to the Basilica Cistern - SO COOL. Literally and just awesome. It's underground and still has water in it. And lots of fish, some of them were HUGE. And since it's underground it was a very cool temperature, which was nice. It has a great history too - once the Ottomans conquered Istanbul (I think it was then, anywyas) the cistern stopped being used and was literally forgotten. Then a man had come to Istanbul to research and learned from the locals that they could get water from their basements sometimes, and even fish! He did some investigations and was able to get into the cistern through some one's basement! But between then, it had been used for a trash dump basically, even for corpses, which is really gross. Also there are 2 Medusa head columns. One is upside down and the other is side ways, and no one knows why they are different, other than the fact that they are. They were pretty cool.

Then we had lunch (I think this lunch made me feel sick because it's the only thing that Ege and I didn't eat the same food and I still am not feeling too great....blechh) and these little cats were so adorable but begging for food...as in paws on my chair.

Back to the Blue Mosque. Ege and I brough scarves to cover our heads, but Ege had forgotten that you need to cover your shoulders too (well, women anyway). Before we went in, there were an old man and woman making sure everyone was dressed appropriately. When the woman fixed Ege's scarf and mine, the man asked where we were from. Ege told him America. He then told her she looked French! But it was funny because she was too embarrassed to tell him she was Turkish because she didn't know to cover her shoulders and she is Muslim herself!! Pretty funny. Anyway, the inside isn't as pretty as the outside, but still very gorgeous. And people were really praying and stuff inside. But some women had taken off their head scarves and everything, which I thought was pretty disrespectful. I mean, it doesn't have to be your religion, but respect it.

Then we met up with Sarp and his friend (and roommate to be) Omer. I said his name like Omar, which is apparently wrong, and no Americans can really say his name right (the O has a little dot dot thingy over it..like a sideways : but i forget what it's called) (ALTHOUGH I have picked up on a lot of Turkish words and can say them quite well...Ege's mom said I have a gift for languages! so take that!). We went to some famous little place where you go and drink Raki, this gross gross alcohol that tastes like black licorice. But it's cool, it's clear, and then you mix it with water and it turns cloudy. But I didn't drink any because it is just gross. But the place is well known, you sit and drink Raki (prounounced like...ruh-kuh) and there are gypsies with violins and stuff and come to your table and sing (for a few Lira, of course). An accordian guy sang to us! but he wasn't a gypsy so it wasn't as cool. But he was funny. He sang a song about how Istanbul welcomes Charlotte, but he said it SO hilariously...And he also sang a song about some girl and we had to sing the little chorus. It was cute. Also, their friend Omer was really nice, so I had a good time!

WEDNESDAY

We did nothing. literally. Sat on the couch. Watched TV, like Tyra Banks. Yep. Great last day in Istanbul. ;) actually I did have fun! But I was feeling SO SICK so I am glad we didn't leave. We had wanted to go to the Turksih baths but Ege's mom basically was like, no, they are too dirty. Oh well...I will defintitely go to one when I come back (?!) to Turkey - athlete's foot or not!

Then my lovely flight left at 6:40, so we left Ege's house at 4:45. IN THE MORNING. Cool. Oh, and when I was in the airport in Turkey I was able to use my few Turkish words (meaning thank you and hello). I told the immigration guy thank you in Turkish and it seriously made his day I think, although that may sound a bit cocky, seeing as it was only 5:30 in the morning...But he knows that no one actually learns Turkish...it's just not as useful as a different language to have as your 2nd language for example, so I'm sure he was super excited! It was funny.

But I really had such a good time! I think (hope) Ege and Sarp are giong to visit me here in Madrid!!! So it's not really goodbye yet :)

ok so now I'm here, all unpacked and moved in. Using my INTERNET! wireless baby! Very exciting.

Tomorrow we're off to see the Duke part of our Madrid stay, and a tour of the city!! yay!

love/miss you all!!

buenas noches!