We
have another holiday. It’s a long
weekend for God only knows what, I think maybe All Saint’s day. So essentially I don’t have work until
Thursday of this week. I should’ve had
class on Wednesday but the teacher doesn’t need me. So I bought a ticket to Seville and have been
spending a few days chilling out with Natalie, my friend from Uni, and her
mates here in Seville whilst exploring the beautiful city that I have dreamed
of being in for years now.
I
took the bus from Baeza at just after half four on Friday afternoon and got to
Seville at half past 9. Uhh. Long bus journeys are not my style but they
seem to be the norm here. And at least
my town is well connected with buses to all the major cities I’d want to visit,
although I’m not sure I’d be willing to spend over 12 hours to get to
Barcelona, might fly there. I met a
lovely old lady on the bus and had a small conversation with her. Turns out she has a great niece who is
currently on her year abroad in Ireland.
She wished me luck and then got off the bus in Andujar.
The
bus continued its journey to Seville without much incidence, although in
Cordoba we had to wait for ages so the driver could double check some
stuff. Cordoba is another place on my
list and I can’t wait to head there for a visit. I spent the whole journey listening to podcasts
to keep myself sane, and luckily my seat was right at the front of the bus so I
didn’t get queasy. When I eventually got
to Seville I was so happy to both be off that bus and to see and speak to
another Scottish person in Glaswegian, no need to clear up my accent or to phrase
things in different ways. We walked to
her flat which is in the Triana part of Seville and then we headed out to meet
some of her friends for tapas (which is paid for here, not like in the more
generous Jaen) and to see part of the city.
Walking over the bridge at night reminds me so much of the Clyde and
heading to the cinema at quayside. Also
the Cathedral with La Girlada is so beautiful, both in the sunlight as well as
when it is light up with lamps. Seville
is definitely somewhere where I’d want to spend a lot more time. Might even look for a job here after Uni, I
hope I’m lucky enough.
Yesterday,
Saturday, we headed out for a walk and headed to the Plaza de Espana. This has to be one of my favourite places in
the whole of Spain so far. It is so
beautiful and wonderful. It was designed
and built for the 1929 for the Ibero-American world expo fair. It is a huge half-circle with buildings
continually running around the edge accessible over the moat by numerous
beautiful bridges. By the walls of the Plaza are tiled alcoves, each representing a
different province of Spain, where people go to take pictures in their own region’s
space. It is currently used for
government offices. Imagine that was your
view everyday going to work. We spent a
while here taking pictures and just people watching. Afterwards we walked through the Parque de
Maria Luisa and headed towards the tapas place where we were meeting some more
of Natalie’s friends. Nicola and Rachel
from the first night were there along with Barry and Joe. We spent about three hours just eating and
chatting and calculating change…and then complaining when the Spanish people
tried to rip us off.
Last night Natalie invited them all
round for a lovely vegetable paella that she made from scratch. It was so yummy. I’m going to need to get her recipe and try
to make some for myself. Especially
since I know that I wouldn’t have an anaphylactic reaction since there
definitely wouldn’t be any seafood in it.
We all sat and watched Aguila Roja, a very strange Spanish show which is
apparently really popular. It is very
dramatic and has the same level of violence, sex and gore that a HBO series
has. The main character is the Red Eagle
and is a semi-ninja type. He dons his
mask and then protects the peoples. We
had the subtitles on but we really couldn’t follow the plot, as we kept joking
and laughing the whole way through.
Today, Sunday, we headed to the
Cathedral that houses La Giralda. Last
year we did a project at Uni about Moorish influence in the architecture of
Andalucia and Natalie’s building was La Giralda. With our student cards we got in for 2 Euros
which gave us access to the Cathedral, the treasure room, the art gallery
(which we didn’t go to) and to La Giralda bell tower. The inside of the cathedral was elaborately
decorated and contains many expensive altars and tombs. The tomb of Christopher Columbus is here and
inside the treasure room is all the evidence of Seville being a very important
trade route with the Americas. All the
gold is from South America and must be worth an enormous sum. I just hope Father Tom doesn’t develop a
taste for solid gold communion sets. 
One of the things we remembered
about La Giralda was that it didn’t have steps going up it, rather it had ramps
because horses used to go up there. The
ramps made it a lot easier to climb the 100m and 35 floors than if it had been
steps. The views from the top were well
worth the climb and we had to battle with the other tourists to get to one of
the many windows to look out over the city and to take photos. It is amazing to experience all the history
that these places have and to then go back out into the modern world.
My bus ticket is supposed to be for
tomorrow afternoon but I am going to go to the bus station to see if I can
change it for the bus leaving on Tuesday since I really don’t want to leave
here yet and would like to walk around a bit more and get lost in the
city.
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