muchas cosas... london, extremadura, florencia, MADRID

Hello folks,
I am just starting this blog as I sit on my balcony enjoying the 85 degree weather.. finally!! I can hardly believe it is the end of April. Time is just flying by, and I realize I have a lot to update you all on! 


I just got back last night from a long weekend in London. I met Christina there, and we spent 4 days seeing as much of the city as possible. Luckily, everything ended up going just fine with both of our flights. All week, I was thinking that our flights would end up being canceled, so when I finally saw Christina on Thursday night it was a good feeling! London is so big... we were lucky to be able to spend 4 nights there, but I think I would need another 5 or 6 days there to feel like I had seen the things I wanted to. I really loved London - the atmosphere everywhere we went in the city was just great! It was nice to be in an English speaking country with some American comforts. I was really excited to find a number of foods... including VEGETARIAN STARBURSTS! Who knew that the ones they make in England don't have gelatin!?? I hadn't had Starbursts in probably 10 years, so I happily bought a pack-a-day for myself and brought some extras home with me. Maybe when I get back to the states they will be vegetarian there too? :D I also got a huge bag of dried basil, which I haven't been able to find anywhere here in Madrid. As far as eating food there, we had a lot of good stuff... including Indian! There were Indian restaurants all over the place, and although I'm not one to eat a lot of spicy foods, it was nice to get a bit of spice in my life. Word on the street was that a Chipotle was due to open April 2010, so naturally we had to go find it! We were SO excited... but it hasn't opened yet :( Just seeing the Chipotle sign hung up made me so excited to eat it first thing when I get to Chicago in just 2 months :D We did find a restaurant that is a Chipotle-wanna-be, and it was pretty good! It was great to get a burrito! 

Me on Millenium Bridge with St. Paul's Cathedral in the background

As for the touristy things in London, there is sooo much to do. I was amazed at how big the city was! We did two walking tours, which were both great. The weather was fabulous, about 65 and sunny, not the infamous London rain at all! We figured out that students can get awesome deals at shows, so we went to two! Friday night, we saw Avenue Q, a musical about a recent college graduate trying to figure out his life and living in NYC. The end of the story was him still not knowing what he was going to do... but at least he had made friends! I guess we'll just have to wait and see how my story compares to his a year from now. On Saturday night, we saw Wicked (a different version of the Wizard of Oz)! I've been wanting to see it for awhile, and it was just awesome to see in London! Both nights were a lot of fun. We went down to the walk along the Thames one night and saw Big Ben at night over the water - absolutely beautiful. Being there made me realize how much I really miss having a big lake or river nearby. Madrid has a river, but it is not that great, haha. As for museums, London has a ton! With everything else that we had to fit in, we were only able to make it to 4 museums - the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, Tate Modern Art Museum and the British Museum. The National Gallery was probably my favorite museum I've ever been in. They had really strong collections of art basically from 1300-1900, with a lot of paintings that I've studied. We were only able to spend about 4 hours there unfortunately; I could probably spend 2 days just in that museum. The British Museum is the home to all of the relics that the British have so kindly helped themselves to throughout the years.. including the Rosetta Stone and a dismantled Parthenon. Definitely another museum that we didn't have enough time to go through. The nice thing about London is that these museums are all free, and some even have free guided tours! 

Christina and me inside a guard's little house-thing

The bad thing about London is that every other touristy thing costs a lot - about 15 pounds (20 or 25 dollars). We decided that we didn't have enough time to spend in any of these - such as Buckingham Palace and The Tower of London - but hopefully I'll be back in London someday, because I would really like to be able to go to those. We also went to a couple of cool outdoor markets, where we got the best vegan ice-cream I've ever had (made with cashews for its base). As the weather was beautiful, we spent a bit of Saturday afternoon at Hyde Park. It is basically like Central Park, but it was really fun people watching. I don't think I will ever get enough of little kids with British accents. Christina and I tried to practice our British accents a bit, but I don't think I improved much, haha. We also went to Harrods, the craziest and biggest department store with everything you can imagine. It is such a destination that they even have a dress-code! My favorite department was "Pet Kingdom" where they had dogs painted all over the walls and they even had pets for sale... all of which seemed to be the most cared for (and expensive) dogs I have ever seen in a store. There was even a section of fossils and huge gems for sale. The fossils were so cool to look at; most of them were from Wyoming! The most expensive one I saw was this beautiful flower fossil that was at a going price of 30,000 POUNDS. The man working there kindly showed us where the more affordable fossils were, where I could have bought a small fish one for 500 pounds. Haha! Finally, no trip to London would be complete without a visit to Kings Cross station to see Platform 9 and 3/4! Christina and I tried to find Gryffindor scarves, but apparently nobody in London has Harry Potter pride because nobody sold them, not even the huge tourist shops! Either way, we had fun finding the platform. All in all, London was just great and it was so much fun to hang out with Christina for a few days!

Big Ben and the Thames

I'm exhausted from the weekend, but no time to rest! I got back around midnight last night, and had a full day of class today. It is my roommate's birthday, so we're celebrating that tonight! Tomorrow, my cartography class has a field trip to a map-making facility for the day, so that will be fun! Thursday and Friday are going to be filled with paper-writing and hopefully seeing my señora. This Saturday, I'm going hiking in a big park in the mountains about half hour outside Madrid with some friends. Then Sunday I'll have to find time to get more homework done and then I'm going to a Real Madrid game! I'm really excited to see the stadium and just be at a game. Although I haven't been following them all that much, I love watching soccer and it will be a lot of fun with all of the fans. Next Wednesday, I'm going to Mallorca with my roommate Vanessa. Then I have one more week to write 3 papers (egghh..) but then I turn them in and will have some visitors - Ruth and Will! It is just crazy how much I'm going to fit into these next couple months... I feel like I have just about every day planned out. It is going to be hard to get work done since the weather just keeps getting better and better, but it'll work out!


I have some telling to do for other travels this past month. Last weekend (the 18th), I went to Extremadura with my program. It is a region southwest of Madrid that borders Portugal. It was wonderful! It was full of Roman ruins and old castles. It was really non-touristy, which was a nice change. I still can't figure out why it isn't touristy, as some of the ruins I even found more interesting than some in Rome. On Saturday, we spent the day in Mérida, which has a really well preserved theater and amphitheater (for gladiator action). They also have the 2nd longest Roman bridge, so that was really neat! Late afternoon we headed to Cáceres, which is another cool city with a really nice atmosphere. We did a night tour, because the city is really neat lit up at night. On Sunday, we went in a museum there and then headed to Trujillo, a small beautiful city on the way home. Trujillo had really great views of rolling hills with mountains in the background. I really liked the weekend - it was nice to be somewhere where we were the only tourists. 

A bridge designed by Santiago Calatrava, who also designed the Milwaukee Art Museum

Ahh alas, I am going to post this and then update more to put up some more pictures from extramadura and FINALLY talk about Florence!

Love, Bonnie

italia, continuada... and an update on madrid

Alright, alright... I am horrible at updating my blog. I've been quite busy with my Spanish life!

My past week in Madrid has been absolutely wonderful! The weather was beautiful last weekend, so I spent most of my time outside. I've been hanging out with my roommates a lot and getting to know them better - it has been a lot of fun :) Last Friday, they threw a party to welcome me to the apartment and for my American friends to meet their Spanish friends... que divertido! It was Spanish themed, so we painted a big red and white polka-dotted background for photo shoots, made paper flowers to hang up everywhere and wear in our hair... and drank a whole lot of sangria.

My fabulous roommates!

Saturday night was the Real Madrid vs FC Barcelona football match, so I went to a bar with my roommates to watch it. Most of the game it seemed as if Barca was going to win, so the fans were pretty quiet. It was still fun to be out and see everybody really into the game. The rest of the weekend, like I said, I spent outside... like on my terrace :) I got quite burnt, but I went and bought sunscreen, so hopefully I'll be set for the next couple months. Some of my friends and I took the Teleférico, which are suspended cable-cars that go over a big park in Madrid, we rented rowboats on a lake, and played a bit of soccer. I also saw my señora a few times last week! She has two new students, who are both really nice and go to Stanford.

I had an exam yesterday for the Prado class, so I went to the museum a few times to study and prepare. The test itself went well - I am really liking art history a lot. My other classes are also going well - I am beginning to work a bit on papers that will be due in the middle of May. In my mapping class, we're talking about the first maps of the New World, and the professor seems to think that we (there are 4 Americans in the class) know about and have seen all these maps that the Library of Congress has. Apparently the US government paid some ridiculous amount of money to buy a map made in the sixteenth century that is the first time the new world was referred to as "Amerigo". He made us promise him that we would try to go to the Library of Congress when we go home next year and see it for him. :)

I've been trying to figure out my travel schedule for the upcoming months, specifically about this summer. I have decided that I am not going to go to Uganda - for a number of reasons, but mainly because everything would be too rushed. I am sad that I am not taking advantage of this amazing opportunity, but also a bit relieved. I think that come the end of June, it would have been difficult to start up a big energy-intensive project in a completely new place. Also, being here, I don't have the time to adequately prepare for the project. I'm hoping that I will be able to go next summer (after graduation) or fall 2011, and stay for a couple months. So, I am still trying to figure out when I'm coming home, but I'm thinking sometime around July 1. I may fly into Chicago and spend a few days with Sylvia when there, and then head back to Minnesota to spend July with family and friends - hopefully with a trip to the Boundary Waters in there!

In my remaining two and a half months, I am going to be vvvvery busy. Besides school - which is going to pick up a lot from now until the end of May - I have some wonderful travel plans. This weekend, our program is taking us to Extremadura, which is a remote region of Spain. I'm really excited for the trip because it is supposed to be much (MUCH) less touristy than everywhere else, and I am curious as to what we're going to see. I know that one of the best-preserved Roman amphitheaters is there, so that will be cool! Next weekend, I am meeting Christina (friend from high school and roommate from UW) in London.. I can't wait. I already have a playlist of Beatles and Mary Poppins music to listen to on the flight, and I am going to watch Notting Hill before going. I'm really looking forward to spending 4 days with Christina and getting to see London! I'm so lucky to be able to see so many of my friends from home. It is kind of surreal to have people from my life at home mixed with my life here. Ruth, my roommate at UW who is studying in Sevilla, is coming to Madrid tomorrow. I love having visitors so I can show off a bit of the Madrid that I've been enjoying for (more than) 3 months now!

As for May, I am going to Mallorca, an island off the Valencian coast, with my roommate Vanessa. She is from there, so I'll be spending a few days with her and her family. The island is supposed to be beautiful! During the summer, it is pretty touristy, but she said that during May it will be fine. I'm really looking forward to spending time near the water - and hopefully at the beach if it is warm enough! My high school friend Will is planning on coming around May 20 and staying here in Madrid with me for a bit, and then I think we're going to go to Sevilla and Lisbon for a long weekend. It is so exciting being able to do such a wide variety of things in a relatively small area. It still amazes me how much the culture and physical landscape of Europe differs. I'm so lucky to have been able to see what I've seen.. but am even luckier that I still have a couple months left here!

Speaking of what I've seen... I still haven't written about half of my trip to Italy! I got together with the girls I went with last night to reflect on the trip, and we all came to the same conclusion: everything was fabulous.

I think I left off in the middle of Rome. Our second day in Rome was spent at the Vatican. We had reserved ahead of time our entrance time for the museum, so luckily we got to bypass the hundreds of people waiting to get in. I felt kind of bad, but at the same time can't believe how many tourists go to places without doing what everybody recommends, which is simply reserving your entrance time. Anyways, we spent about 4 hours total in the museum. They have a very large collection of Egyptian relics. It is hard to think back to the museum and remember what was there because the Sistine Chapel and Raphael's works shine out so much. They have Raphael's School of Athens, which is one of my favorite paintings. It is so neat to see frescoes in their original place - where the painters meant them to be. Thats one reason I really like visiting churches with built-in altars or frescoed walls... just thinking of the painters themselves planning around the lighting of the specific building, or who the audience is. At the end of the museum is the Sistine Chapel, which was amazing and I hope that everybody who reads this can go see. I love Michelangelo. After that, we got our mid-day dessert: crepes with nutella. Pure goodness. Then, we headed to St. Peter's Square to get in line to go inside the Basilica. The Basilica was breathtaking, but in a very modest way. The hour or so we spent there really brought to mind the unpresuming aspects of Christianity for me. We tried to climb the dome, but because it was Easter week they had weird hours. Oh well, I suppose it is just another reason to return to Italia :)

Well, that's all I have time for now. More on Rome and Florence later! Love, Bonnie

(Side note... As I was writing this blog, I bought my ticket home! I'm flying into Chicago on Monday June 28, and hopefully I can spend a few days with Sylvia before heading back to Minnesota. Wowhoo!)

Chronicles of Italia

Hello all! I'm back safe and sound from Italy and getting settled back into my wonderful Spanish life: only one day of class this week and beautiful 70 degree weather. Not bad :)

Italy was an amazing 10 day trip. Looking back, I'm pretty impressed that we were able to fit so much in! The whole trip was filled with seeing artwork that I still am in disbelief that I actually saw in person, indulging myself with wonderful food, and just walking around the cities trying to soak up the atmosphere. All of the cities were pretty touristy - more so than Spain feels to me. We got pretty lucky with the weather and logistically everything worked out. I went with 3 other girls from my program who all go to school in Indiana. It was really nice to be able to spend an extended period of time with a smaller group to get to know them each individually - most of my time in Spain has been with bigger groups and for not as long. I ate so much good pizza and pasta, and was happy to see that every gelato place had sorbet (vegan) for me. I tried nutella - a chocolate hazelnut spread -  for the first time in Italy... and absolutely love it. People here say that they use nutella like Americans use peanut butter; I got over the non-veganness of it and am now in love. Most restaurants would have an inexpensive house wine that was usually from around the area, so that was great to be able to try that. I definitely noticed a difference when I returned to drinking my 1-euro box wine last night!

The first city we went to was Milan, which is often referred to as the business-capital of Italy. As a city that shows current Italian culture, it was a great way to start the trip! As Rick Steves said, people typically visit Italy for its rich history... but people go to Milan for today's Italy. In that way, it reminded me a lot of Madrid. It was less touristy than the other cities, but still had a lot of great things to see. da Vinci's Last Supper is there (which I didn't get to see because its booked-up months in advance), but I went to the church that it is housed in, which was a wonderfully humble-looking romanesque church. We saw so many churches when we were there, but I was happy to find myself continually amazed by each of them. The romanesque churches are so much simpler than the Gothic ones that Spain tends to have, and it is a nice change to have a church that is smaller, better lit and full of frescoes. That's not to say that Italy doesn't have any gothic churches - those had beautiful facades of white, green and pink marble. We got to climb on top of the roof of Milan's Duomo (cathedral), which was amazing to see. There were hundreds of little spires, and it made me wish you could go on the top of every gothic building.

Molly and I on top of the Duomo in Milan... me with Rick Steves in hand

Also in Milan, we saw one of Michelangelo's "Pietá" sculptures. A pieta is a work of Mary holding crucified Christ in her arms, and Michelangelo had many of them. We ended up seeing a few of his, which was really neat to compare. The one in Milan was his final work - he died while working on it. Because of this, it was really neat to see how he went about sculpting. As I learned after seeing his work in several museums, he generally worked front to back from a piece of marble/stone. He supposedly believed that god put the figure in the slab of stone, and Michelangelo was simply releasing the figure. As I later saw in Florence, he has a series called The Prisoners, who look like people who are trapped in the stone and trying to break out. It was really cool being able to see so many of his works, more on them below.

After Milan, we took a beautiful train ride to Venice. Venice was so great and relaxing. It really is a city built on over 100 islands that were fortified long ago to make them habitable, and they actually use the canals for their transportation - basically instead of roads. It was so peaceful to not have cars! We rode their public transport boats down the main canal a few times, which takes you through a lot of history of the city with all of the palaces and market places built for trading. The grand St. Mark's Basilica lies where the grand canal meets the open lagoon. It was a beautiful church that had marked Byzantine influence, so that was really neat to see and compare with the others in Italy. Venice was filled with a lot of gelato (sorbet for me), crepes with nutella and bananas, and exploring back areas of the city. We splurged and took a gondola ride, which was completely worth it and one of my favorite moments of the trip. Our gondolier, Giamba, took us down several smaller canals that you can't get to on public transportation. He finished by singing to us, and I'm pretty sure I teared up because I was so happy to be there on the water with this man singing romantic songs to us in Italian.. haha.

The canal outside our hostel

Meandering down canals in the gondola

Next was Rome. Rome was crazy and filled with so many wonderful things to see. We were there for two and a half days. We got there late Monday night, and as our hostel was at the end of one of the metro lines, decided to stay there for the night to rest of up for a long day of sight-seeing on Tuesday. Tuesday we did old-time Rome things: we toured the Coliseum, walked through the Roman Forum and saw the Pantheon. I still can't believe we saw all of those things in person. 

A dark picture, but me with the Roman Forum in the background

Alright I have to take a pause and post this now - I will finish up talking about Rome and Florence tomorrow! Love, Bonnie