I've been in Spain for about three and a half days now, and I can't decide if it has felt like eternity or just a moment. Thus far I have been to visit El Centro (the center of Madrid), El Parque de Retiro (a park), and today three friends and I drove to Toledo, an old beautiful town about an hour from Madrid. Everything here is beautiful and I love it.
I think I will try to use this blog to write about the things I see and learn so that I don't forget them. In the past four days I have noticed quite a bit about the people and culture of Madrid, so I will just list what I can think of:
-Meals: Spaniards eat breakfast when they wake up (whatever time that may be, depending on the person), and lunch around 2 or 3 pm. Dinner is usually around 9-10. This is not just college students or young people, this is everyone. For example, today I ate lunch at 5:30 pm... it is 9:40 and we have yet to eat dinner. (Today was an exception because we did not have "breakfast" until about 1:30 pm). People also eat with knifes and forks ALWAYS, unless they are eating a sandwich. This is hard to get used to. We Americans are not classy eaters at all.
-Radio: The pop radio station plays a lot of American music. I find that interesting and slightly comforting because I know the songs.
-Ignacio has a friend that when speaking in English, has a complete British accent. It blows my mind. If I never knew he was Spanish, he would fool me.
-Night life: Everyone stays up late! Even parents and grandparents may decide to go out to dinner at 10pm and not go to be until midnight. Young people stay up all night sometimes... not just the "crazy ones" but all of them. One of the girls that lives in the house that I'm staying at is 24 years old... the other day she did not get home from being out all night until 9:30 a.m. That's insane. A lot of people don't even leave to go out until 3 a.m.
-Food: food is so much more fresh and healthy here. I had fresh shrimp for the first time ever, and I had to rip its head, skin, legs, and tail off myself to eat it. Bread is eaten with everything, and processed food is not common. Fruit and yogurt are considered dessert. I was eating a yogurt and was asked "Why are you eating that before dinner? That is dessert!"
-McDonalds: Amy, I went to McDonald's and they don't have double cheeseburgers :( The menu has a few similar things, but it also has other weird things like some burger called the CBO (chicken, bacon, onion), the New York Crispy, and the McRoyal Deluxe. Plus its more expensive.... like 5.80 euros a meal. That is like $7-8! Boooo.
-Diet Coke: Here is is called Coca Cola Light, and it tastes like weird regular coke. Non-diet Coke tastes different as well. I noticed that neither one contains any sodium. Strange!
-Kisses: Anytime you meet new people or are reunited with people, you give a kiss on each cheek to greet. This is nice, but also somewhat annoying to me because anytime a new person comes I have to stand up and go greet them.
That is all I can think of right now.
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