Last Monday was the start of our two week intensive grammer class. It meets for 3 hours a day from 3 to 6 pm, and is pretty chill except for the fact that we have 3 essays, a project, 3 articles to summarize, and 2 exams in just those two weeks! Despite the unwanted homework, the class has been an awesome review for my Spanish, and it has helped me speak with more confidence now that I have reviewed some of the different tenses and its irregulars. For my class we had to visit El Museo del Baile Flamenco (very cool atmosphere with lots of interesting information about the culture of flamenco!), Museo de Bellas Artes (I still have yet to visit!), and Alcazar.
Alcazar
Alcazar is one of the biggest attractions in Seville. It started out as a Moorish building back under Moorish control of Seville, but then after the reconquest of Spain by Christians, King Pedro I started the building of a palace in 1364. Over the centuries, different monarchs continued the building of palaces and gardens, adding on to this beautiful, fortified paradise. It is the oldest palace still in use by the royal family in Europe, as the royal family still resides there while in Seville.
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| The palaces have Muslim and Christian influence, so it is very interesting to see the different styles of architecture. |
The first time I went to Alcazar with a group and thought it was cool, but didn't really appreciate it fully as we were rushed along on the tour. The second time I went by myself for class and it was one of the neatest experiences ever! It was so surreal to be in such an ancient, important place by myself. I was able to take my time and really notice the detail and beauty of the palaces and gardens.
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| Selfie in the palace! Fountains were important in the Muslim design. |
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| The beautiful, detailed ceilings were amazing! |
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| Found a friend! |
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| Beautiful Gardens |
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| I wanted to be Link and climb this! |
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| There were peacocks everywhere! I was 3 inches away! |
Cathedral of Seville
Also, I made the visit to my favorite places in Spain…the Catedral de Sevilla! It is the third largest Church in the world behind St. Peter’s in Rome and St. Paul’s in London. The cathedral used to be a Mosque, but in 1401 the Christians started to build this massive cathedral to celebrate their wealth and their conquest of
Spain from the Muslims. They wanted people to think that they were crazy for building such an elaborate cathedral!
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| The organs were my favorite! |
This Cathedral is also the resting place of Christopher Columbus's tomb. After some testing, they confirmed that at least some of his body is actually there inside!
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| There were lots of treasure rooms and of course old bones of past Saints. |
The
cathedral was absolutely breathtaking with its Gothic design. The detail in
every wall, ceiling, chapel, floor was unreal. The old minaret of the mosque
was turned into a bell tower and is the tallest building in Seville…until they
started building this ugly skyscraper some miles away L The Giralda, the name of the bell tower,
is 35 flights up, but the view was worth it!
I still can’t
believe my time here is real life and I am loving every minute of it. I love
and miss everyone!
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