Adventures in the Albaycin

As my time here abroad is getting shorter and shorter, I have started to embrace a bit of a hurry up attitude, which is a good thing. This past week on Saturday, my program and I went to a Flamenco show at a locations called La Chumbera. The performance was an all female group, with a female guitarist and singer, as well as percussionist and others. During s a few of there songs a dancer came out and performed to the music, which was my first time watching the combination of both the authentic music and the actual dancing of Flamenco. On top of all of this was the fact that this location was in an area called the Albaycin which is the hill opposite of the Alhambra in Granada. As the performance began at La Chumbera, the curtains were raised behind the musical group and offered an unbelievable view of the Alhambra lit up at night.
Before La Chumbera, on Friday night, some friends and I went exploring around the Albaycin in search of some new tapas bars and anything interesting and new. We ended up walking near a popular discoteca, but instead of heading in we passed it up and kept walking donw the road. This was definitely the right move because we ended up finding a small local bar where an amazingly talented Flameco guitarist was playing and a few regulars would switch off singing to the music. The bar only had about 20 people in it and the room with the music was essentially a tiny cave with a few tables. This was truly an authentic experience that I really enjoyed, and the location of the bar was very beautiful with a great view and great music.
This weekend I head to Paris with a friend from Denison and his friend in Toledo. I've heard nothing but great things about the city, my only concern is that it is not very economically friendly for a frugal abroad college student! More to come...

Middle of the Road

So between having a few midterms this week and having just returned home from Barcelona, i've been a little hard pressed to write anything. Last weekend I ventured to Barcelona with my friend Richie who had already been there one time before. This ended up working out great because he was a free tour guide and new a lot of fun spots to go. Also, Richie traveled all over Europe, which is what most people in European hostels are doing, so that was an easy conversation starter. On Saturday in the afternoon, the 2 of us realized that the FC Barcelona game had gotten moved from Sunday to Saturday night. We ended up finding some pretty cheap tickets and going. My first European football experience was quite amazing, even though we were in the nose bleeds and it was pretty windy and cold. In the last 10 minutes Lionel Messi (they're Kobe) got a penalty kick on our side of the field and he scored which was pretty awesome considering I was sporting his jersey. Around Barcelona for the remainder of the weekend I did a little exploring and saw some amazing gothic architecture as well as some beatiful views of the city (standing inside of a giant tower with Christopher Columbus pointing out over the ocean on top of it).
Returning from Barcelona, I have a littel over a month left abroad (hence the middle of the road post title, not my best I know). Crazy. This semester has definitely gone by very fast, but I have been pretty fortunate to be able to do all the things that I have done in the last 2 months. Coming up on my docket are a weekend in Paris over Thanksgiving, and a cultural exchange program for 4 days in Morocco. But I can't lie, I will be excited to have Christmas in America with family and friends, (minus my brother Kyle who's teaching english to little misfits in Saigon). More stories to come, thanks for reading!