Granada

CIEE hosted a trip to Granada this past weekend, and I went with Lori who is another Beloit girl on my program. We met at the University and boarded the buses at 8:30 Saturday morning and slept for most of the 3-hour ride. When we arrived in Granada we checked into our very nice hotel, ate lunch, and then headed out for our first tour of the trip: La Alhambra La Alhambra is a palace built by the Moors in Granada during the 14th century. It was taken over by Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile, Los Reyes Católicos, and their descendents during the 16th century, and today is a prime example of the mixing of Islamic and Christian art and architecture. The Alhambra is set on a hill above the city of Granada. It is one of the most intricately decorated buildings I have ever seen. In my Cultural Approaches to Math class from last year we studied the Alhambra because it is one of the only places where all 13 mathematical ‘strip patterns’ are found in one place. Almost every surface is covered with azulejos, stucco printing or carved designs. Even the ceilings are beautifully decorated with tiles or wood. Each window we passed offered a new but equally breathtaking view of Granada and the surrounding countryside. The Alhambra is so big and has so much history, our tour lasted about 3 hours and we barely scratched the surface.

After the Alhambra we all walked down the huge hill into the city para tomar un té at a ‘traditional’ tetería. Granada has a long history of Arab influence (it was the last city to be ‘re-conquered’ from the Arabs by the Los Reyes Católicos of Spain in 1492) and for this reason it still has an Arabic flavor and feel. I loved walking down the crowded side streets where many of the shopkeepers speak Arabic and sell scarves, jewelry, wall hangings, and simple leather bags that are unlike anything I see here in Sevilla. Everything is wonderfully colorful, crowded and noisy. The people who visited Morocco last weekend said that shopping in Granada was very similar to shopping in Morocco – the same language being spoken and similar products being sold. My friend Elley spent the last semester studying Arabic in Egypt, so she was really excited to be able to communicate with the Granada shop owners in three languages – Spanish, English and Arabic.

The tetería (tea shop) that we stopped at was very cool; each table was tucked into a niche surrounded by benches with comfy pillows, small poufs and stools. The lighting was very dim and lots of the tables had ordered hookahs so the whole place was kind of hazy but not in a gross way. Our mint tea was served in beautiful silver teapots, and we drank out of traditional Arab tea glasses – essentially very tall, decorated shot glasses. The sticky, nut-covered pastries we were served were a new, delicious experience for me. We tried five different types, all of which were good.

After the tetería we walked around the streets for a while, then took a taxi to the hotel to take naps and shower before dinner. The hotel provided us with a buffet at each meal for the entire trip, and the food was incredible. I had my very first Spanish paella experience (complete with shrimp and mussels), ate way too much bread and plates full of pasta.

After dinner we waited until the appropriate time to go out (11pm) and headed to a café to get some coffee to start the night off and keep us awake. We ended up at a very Spanish bar/café with a bunch of guys watching the fútbol game on TV. Sevilla was playing Real Madrid, was up 2-0 but managed to lose the game 2-3. Everyone else in the café was a hardcore Real Madrid fan so needless to say there was an excessive amount of noise, celebrating, and beer drinking going on. We were approached by a very, very drunk Spaniard who tried to explain to us that they were all out celebrating his cousin’s bachelor party, but he didn’t believe that we spoke Spanish so tried to say all of this in sub-par, slurred English. All of his friends knew that we spoke Spanish and kept making jokes about him in Spanish that we could understand. We talked to them for a while until the café closed and we moved on to another bar.

One thing that I haven’t quite gotten used to in Spain is that in every traditional tapas bar, they hang cured legs of meat, hooves included, from the ceiling with little plastic dishes at the bottom to catch the drippings. The next bar we went to had rows and rows of these pig legs hanging from the ceiling. Here we split a jug of wine complete with free tapa (as is the tradition in Granada). The next place we went, recommended by our taxi driver, was a club-type bar with a DJ and disco ball. Here we tried pomegranate liquor (Granada means Pomegranate in Spanish, and there are pomegranates everywhere in the city painted on buildings, street signs, in sculptures, etc), which was really good but super expensive. We had originally planned to go to a discoteca afterwards but nobody wanted to pay the cover to get in so instead we just stayed for the rest of the night and danced to a surprisingly good mix of Spanish and American music. All in all, it was a successful night.

The next morning we headed out on a walking tour of the old Muslim and Jewish neighborhoods of Granada looking at architecture of old mosques and synagogues that have been converted into current-day Christian churches among other things. We stopped at El mirador de la Alhambra, which is a lookout point that gives the best view of the Alhambra in the city. Unfortunately it was raining so the view was very hazy but beautiful nonetheless. There was an extremely talented guy playing his guitar and singing flamenco at the lookout so that was really fun to listen to. After the lookout we visited the tomb of the Catholic Kings of Spain, kind of creepy but beautiful and impressive.

Walking back to the hotel we were stopped by a massive protest in the streets. On Sunday the leaders of the European Union, Spain, and Morocco held a summit at the Alhambra to discuss their economic states and plans for the future of their international relations. Many groups of people used this meeting as a forum to bring their issues to the table and make their voices heard. A giant parade full of peaceful protestors holding signs and chanting slogans supporting different causes flooded the streets of Granada. Everything was in Spanish of different dialects and it was difficult for me to understand, but a few of the groups I could understand were Andalucíans against Capitalism, supporting a Socialist state to deal with the 25% unemployment rate that has plagued the region in the last few years, and a group of people supporting the Saharan Liberation, breaking away from Morocco and forming their own independent state to escape human rights violations occurring in the countries of northern Africa. It was awesome to see all of these people getting up and speaking out for the causes they are passionate about, and the Granada police force (although equipped with riot gear and frighteningly large assault rifles in case things got out of hand) stood by and let the protest go on.

After we hiked back up the hill to the hotel we boarded our bus and slept the entire ride home, arriving in a wonderfully cloudless Sevilla just in time to catch the first sunset I’ve seen in over a month.



Coming soon… a flashback to my weekend in Portugal. I really need to get better at updating this thing!