Seville

So I took a cheap regional train from Cordoba to Seville. Was extremely bumpy!!. Seville looks very nice. The first thing I noticed were the really modern looking trams..

So I went straight to the Cathedral which is supposed to be the main attraction in Seville. Apparently the largest Gothic Cathedral in the World. Very impressive I must say. Massive pillars.. Some pictures of the Cathedral.

Sorry for the dark pictures. I did my best.. and I am not the best at photography

Really intricate stuff in Gold.

A view of the bell tower of the Cathedral.

So I walked to the hostel where I was supposed to be staying. Am finding it really difficult even with maps... But managing. So they had nice dinner on the terrace... Some speciality Spanish dish.

After that headed to the bar in the ground floor. Thats where everyone who stays in the hostel hangs out in the evening. Met some interesting ppl. Had a long chat.. .lots of fun pulling each others leg..

For those of you who want to know how a youth hostel dorm is here ya go.. Only 4 ppl tho. In london will be staying in a 12 person dorm..

Woke up quite late... Had some breafkast.. free breakfast at the hostel. Nothign much to speak of tho..
Another view of the Cathedral.

So went to see the Alcazar Palace. Was the palace from which a large kingdom was ruled about 1000 years ago. Was rather impressive.. The intricacy of detail impressed me... Saw a few unfriendly Indian Toursits there!!!

Some more Random pics of the place..

Anyway after that I went to the bus station where I had a ticket for the 2 30 bus. Guess what!!. There is no 2 30 bus!!. The internet site reflects a bus that does not exist. Anyway they put me on the night 23 30 bus.I though I was going to the first world. Oh well!!. :-). So got back to the hostel and am writing this. Going to lisbon tom. Will keep ya posted..

Cordoba

When I signed off last time I was talking about a early night! Guess it was not meant to be. So Pierre said we were to this brazilian bar to meet his neighbours whom he really wanted to meet for a long time. The atmosphere there was just so nice.The decor and live music.So there were 3 ppl who were roommates. And guess what. There was a Indian!!...So she was from New delhi. And was a design post grad student here. She was rather critical of the fact that I did not know Hindi . We had a very interesting chat about that. Thats a pic of me and Sonal. So as usual we got back only by about 12 or so. And after that had some admin work to do regarding tickets and the like. So slept later than planned.

And yes . That showed next morn. I was to wake by 8 for my 9 05pm train. As usual yours truly happily turned off the alarm and went back to sleep like how I do at coll(Now you know y I never make it to the morning classes). Anyway luckily Andres woke me by 8 30 . I rushed to the station and just made it on time. Heres a pic of the station. Really well organized all the stations are I thought. You have a single hall. From there you descend into the various platforms and so on. But I guess they charge for it. I paid 3.5 k INR for a short 400 km journey.

So yes by 11 pm I was at Cordoba. Went to Tourist info office. I was at Cordoba for a single reason. To see the Mezquita. So got directions and set off. On the way the usual beautiful gardens and the like. I just had to put a few pics of them , bear with me :).

I walked for about 30 mins. Some pain finding the place. Really small streets . and I dont know spanish. So somehow managed to get there. But i guess thats part of the fun in going to the place without knowing the language. So some pictures of the Mezquita follow. Basically its a mosque built about 1200 years ago. Which was conquered by Christians and converted to a Church . It was truly SPECTACULAR. And the pictures dont do justice. Some pictures follow.

Really spectacular it was...

This was the original islamic construction you can see in the background.

Then my favourite topic. On the way back to the station I went to a really cheap all you can eat Buffet. The only small issue was that there were so many varities of food. But there was no names/ labels/ nothing. So had a go at quite a few things without any clue as to what I was eating. I ate well. I hope tom goes well ;-)!!..

Am posting this as I sit in the Seville Hostel . Too lazy to post about what i did in Seville today. Will finish the parts tom in Seville and will post... tata... Am having a blast

More Madrid

So yes. I'm back!. The interview went very well. Have posted some pics of it. So they tell me it should be up in a week or so. They will post a video online also . So will post that once I get it. So Nadia interviewed me about how I met Pierre and the like. After that we went to a Traditional Spanish Bar . So basically they asked me what I thought about it and the like.

At the bar there a bull fight was happening on the TV. I was really keen on going to a bull fight as that was something I strongly associated with Spain. Well this was the first time I was seeing one. And believe me it was rather gory . They just keep stabbing the bull multiple times till it bleeds to death!!. So I though maybe not about going to the Bull fight. The pic below is the crew who interviewed me.

Thats me and Nadia.

So once the interview got done Pierre said we were going for his friends birthday party. Laura(the birthday girl wearing green, and I hope I got the name right) was really nice and welcoming. So we basically started out at this small bar with a few friends. That went on till about 12. We then moved on to the next bar.

So this next bar was like a dancing place. They had a Dj and quite a large crowd. This pic is a really interesting one of Andres(Pierres roommate and a super guy) who was demonstrating the two Vices in an interesting photo.

So everyone was having fun. The atmosphere was such a party one. We were at the bar till 3 30 when they have to close. So they make ppl leave by turning on the lights and turning off the music!!.. The pic was taken once the lights came on. Till then it was really really dark.

So then we went to the streets at about 3 45. Was it alive or what . They were soooo many ppl on the street who had just left the Bars. Madrid never sleeps I guess. This pic was taken at about 4 Am!.

So anyway we went back home and crashed!!!. So woke up reasonable late. So Pierre was telling me about this breakfast thing I had to try. We had this hot chocolate. which believe me had to be eaten with a spoon. It was so so thick .App its a Madrid Speciality. We had that with some friend donut like thing called Churrious. Was yum..

So once we got done with breakfast we headed out to the sunday Flea market. Was quite busy. Lots and lots of random stuff available.

We met up with Andres sis at the flea market. And then yes. no prizes for guessing. We went to a bar to meet up with some of Pierres other friends. Pierre is the man!!. He knows half of Madrid I guess!.So Andres sister Anna lived in Lisbon for a year or so. So she basically gave me a detailed plan on what to do in Lisbon with maps and directions and the like. So nice of her!!So follow the blog to see how that goes!!.

We then headed out to the main city square. Plaza de Mayor. We had a really really traditional squid sandwich.The really nice thing about the square was ppl were just sitting randomly all over the place relaxing. So yes thats us eating!!. And I had a second squid sandwich . It was really good I should say!.

After that the others left. Believe it or not they were having this festival called BollyMadrid. With indian cultural stuff and the like. So we went to this area where most of the indians in Madrid are. Believe it or not a Bharathanatyam performance was goign on .Lots of ppl were there seeing it also. Lots of indian stalls selling stuff like samosa, chat and the like!!..

We were there for a short while. We then walked to the Museo Del Prado which is probably one of the most significant art museums in the world. On the way we saw this really interesting building which was another art gallery .It had a vertical garden and a semi detached construction . Really interesting.

So the Museo del Prado was just next to the Park we went to yesterday(The Retiro).Some pics near the museum. As I mentioned earlier. I really love the green spaces in Madrid.

The museum had a lot of Masterpieces by really Big names like Rembrandt, Ruebens, Goya, El Greco and so on. As most of you must know I have no hope at art . But hey it was worth visiting. Quite nice I should say .Very large museum .When we were leaving we met some of Pierre's Friends. The pic is taken with the museum in the background.

So yes .After that we got back home. Today I need to sleep well. Have a train early tom to Cordoba. Chao....

Madrid!!

So I finally made it!. After all the confusion regarding the visas and other stuff I am here finally. So anyway the flights were all good. Believe it or not I liked the food on emirates! I watched pink panther 2 and some episodes of Friends . The Madrid airport was nice. Nothing spectacular.The image is a sign at the airport

From the airport i took the metro to my friend/ host Pierres Place. I was super impressed by the Metro. Its rather cheap also. So I got myself a 10 trip metro ticket and found my way to the place very easily.

So Pierre was there at the metro station to receive me. He lives right in downtown. The metro station was just a five min walk to his place.Thats Pierre in the picture

His flat is great. He lives right in downtown .The pics that follow are the view from his balcony.

Thats the room where I am staying. super couch!!. it opens out into a bed. you will see in the following pics..

I got in by about 2 pm. Hung around for a while. Then by about 5 I took off on my own . I walked about 5 kms(I know diff to believe for those who know me) !! . So basically hit the main tourist attractions. I guess some plazas. Statues and the like. Every square somehow seemed to have a horseman.For those keenly interested. I visited the plaza of Spain , the Real Palace, The plaza Mayor , the Gran via and the Puerta del Sol. This is the plaza of Spain.

Something that really struck me about Madrid were the large amount of green open spaces in the center of the City. The egyptian temple donated a 2200 year old temple to the Spanish (!!) in 1968 . So they have placed it in the Center of the City and some pics follow.

The National palace is also called the Real Palace. It is the official residence of the Spanish king. Looks very impressive!!

This pic was taken in front of the Royal palace from another side.And ya as I said horsemen everywhere!!. I wonder why.

This pic is of Plaza Mayor. Apparently the most important square in the city. Lots of ppl around. I guess you cant see it in the pic.

Something that I though was very interesting was this thing you could lean on in most of the Metro stations!!. Quite comfortable I must say.

So I headed back home by about 8 . Pierre's friend Mark was over for dinner. Pierre cooked a great seafood Pasta and a nutella desert which was yum!!.. Dinner was great.

You could hear so much noise from the balcony at night!The view was also very pretty.

So after that we decided to go out. We went to ths place close by where you apparently get super gin and tonic. Pierre told me something interesting . Apparently gin and tonic originated in India. The British ppl who were here really liked it and it spread around . Anyway we were having a great time. We went out in a group of 5(Pierre + 2 Roommates, Mark and I). But the group got bigger and bigger. So many of Pierre and his roommates friends joined us. I guess at some point there were 15 of us!!. Anyway it was a super atmosphere. I had a great time. The pic below is with some of Pierres Roommate's friends. They had a nice grafitti board where you can scribble stuff. I guess you can see that in the background.

We finally got home by about 3. Believe me the streets were busier at 3 am than at 3 pm. So many ppl were out. All having a great time. Rather noisy tho. Pierre did up the couch and this was the end result. And yes it was as comfortable as it looks!!.

We woke rather late by about 10 .We had a quick bite for breakfast and went out to this super big park called retiro. The following are some pics taken there. That was one thing I really like about Madrid. The large green spaces.

After the park we headed back home. We met one of Pierre's friend Nerea for a drink . I had some peach juice which is apparently typical Spanish . Was decent. We had a great chat.

After this did not take many pictures in the day!. I guess I was rather busy!. Pierre took me to this Birthday bash of his friend. It was bout 40 kms from the city . In a sorta vacation home. Super music . Super DJ. LOTS of Alcohol. The food was greattttttttt. We had lots of traditional Spanish dishes. As I am signing off now we are waiting for the TV crew to get here. They are from the Spanish national TV. They are interviewing Pierre and me about how we got to know each other and stuff. Through couchsurfing. Oh ya do look it up. Just google couchsurfing. Something really good. Thats how I met Pierre. He first surfed back at Salem. And then here I am . Will keep ya posted.