Yesterday I finished my last exam. Today, I am in Madrid. Life is good.
Alright, if you want to be technical, I arrived in Madrid last night. But anyway...
Today I let myself sleep in, and just wander around the city, taking a few breaks to rest at cafes, drink some coffee, and read my book*. In the evening, I let Maria take me around the city some more, giving me more ideas of where to go in the daytime. Life definitely is good, and will continue to be even better.
On a side note: Maria told me that Madrid was "freezing" and that I should bring my coat. I did bring my coat, but soon found that it most certainly is not "freezing", and I hardly even need my coat. It was in the upper 50s and sunny today, and at night it's slightly less than 40. Uh huh..."freezing", Maria.
In other (technical) news: I am uploading two albums to Flickr to share with you, the Madrid photos and the photos I took when I was in Edinburgh the day before my flight back home to Seattle for Christmas. I realised that I hadn't uploaded them earlier, and figured that now is as good a time as any to get that done. Edinburgh is a beautiful city anytime of year, but at Christmas it is truly wonderful.
Edinburgh photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/67703297@N03/sets/72157628959830543/
Madrid photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/67703297@N03/sets/72157628960391525/
Adios for now,
--Rachael
*I brought 3 books with me on this trip, all originally written in Spanish. The first book The Shadow of the Wind is by Spanish author Carlos Ruiz Zafon. It is set in Barcelona after World War II and focuses on a young man called Daniel Sempere as he finds the only copy of a rare and mysterious book called The Shadow of the Wind by Julian Carax. However, Daniel soon finds that there is a man out to destroy every one of Carax's books, and resolves to find out why. It's a really great book that I read last year, I think, and want to read again because I am in Spain, and just bought the prequel to The Shadow of the Wind, and need to refresh my memory. The second book, the prequel to The Shadow of the Wind is called The Angel's Game. I don't know exactly what the plot of this prequel entails, but I liked the The Shadow of the Wind and its author so much that I don't really care that I don't know. I eagerly await what it has to offer. The third book is One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. He is a Colombian author, so while his text was originally written in Spanish, it wasn't written in Spain Spanish...ok, whatever minor detail. I am letting that one go because I love One Hundred Years of Solitude and can't wait to read it again. I read it two years ago for English class at Annie Wright and it was one of the rare required school reading books that I actually liked. Both The Shadow of the Wind and One Hundred Years of Solitude are both rich, complex, stunning books that I highly recommend (more so The Shadow of the Wind than One Hundred Years of Solitude because One Hundred Years of Solitude is a bit harder to navigate on your own on the first read).
No comments:
Post a Comment