Birthday Wishes

Hey everyone! Thanks to all the fabulous people who called me on my special day. It was fantastic to chat with everyone and I hope that those who celebrated with Kate enjoyed themselves. I had a GREAT birthday, even though I was not able to spend it with all my friends and family in the states.
To begin the weekend, I spent the afternoon on Friday with a girl from the program at Retiro Park and we went for a walk around. The park is soooo nice and you can spend the whole day there and not be tired. Following the park we hung out in her "shoe box" of an apt. The best part was that she drinks just as much coffee as I do, and she had a coffee pot! It was lovely to have a steaming hot cup of real coffee. Here they drink their coffee like espresso so it was nice to have a large cup. The little things count for a lot.
From there we met up with her roommate, Southie, as she is called since she is from South Carolina. Her real name is Stephanie, and has a drawl to boot. Much worse than Bethany, if she's even from South Carolina. The three of us headed towards Sol to meet a friend of Southie's. Meghan, the girl from my group, knew of a great tapas bar near Sol, which was AMAZING. Even though we had to wait for thirty minutes to sit down, it was packed to the brim with people.
We ordered some traditional tapas, like paella, tortilla espanola (A potato omelet), croquettes, and some shrimp. It was sooooo good. Plus the pitcher of Sangria made everything taste that much better. We learned quickly that if a client enjoys their food, that you throw your napkin or chicken bones on the floor. The floor was covered in napkins and trash. From there I went home and got some much needed rest from a busy week at school. But Meghan and I planned to go to the Riena Sofia museum, which houses the famous Picasso painting, Guernica, on Saturday.
The museum was nice but as I have told some of you, I am not the kind of museum goer that can stand in front of a picture for twenty minutes absorbing the intent of the artist. That being said Meghan and I walked around for a bit and then to appease our coffee habit, went to a cafeteria to have a cup and chat. Oh, and I forgot to say that three other girls from the group came down from the Escorial district to meet us at the museum. We met up with them after the museum, to discuss what to do next. Now it may be that they are still on American time, but they wanted to have dinner at 6pm! Which is unheard of in Spain.
Well I had commented earlier in the day that I would really like to have Thai food for my bday dinner, so we Had to ask a tourist guide for suggestions. We found a place that was close to a metro stop, since the three girls would have to catch a bus at 945 to go home. Since we had time to kill, we walked a short distance to Meghan's apt to rest and have a snack.
Upon walking up the 64 steps to her apt, we had to sit down to rest our tired legs. Much to my surprise as I sat down, Meghan comes out from the kitchen with a small cake and candles, to celebrate my day. I was sooo surprised that someone I had only met for a month would be so sweet to do that for me. All the girls sang to me, and we shared a piece with coffee of course. To see pics of the weekends events, I will be forwarding the shutterfly link in an email.
The Thai restaurant was a big tricky because we arrived at the place at 8:45, which is still early for Spaniards to eat. Being the six of us we walk in to find a table, but unfortunately they could not seat us because we didn't have a reservation. We were about to scrap the idea, when the hostess, said, well we have another location, would you like us to reserve a table at the other spot for you. I thought that was above an beyond a normal hostess, so we jumped at the opportunity.
We hopped back on the Metro to get there on time, which was luckily really close to where we had been. This place, I must say, is better than Brown Sugar, in Boston, which I never thought possible. Many of the girls had never been to Thai food before so we asked the waitress for some recommendations. Of course, she recommended Pad Thai, but then we also got a beef and chicken dish to share. Oh it was DELICIOUS!! It was sooo flavorful and yummy. I will totally bring anyone there for a meal if people can come and visit.
Moving On... we made a quick stop at my house to change my shoes...
Thankfully Gina was awake so my friends were able to meet her and see my place. We had a really nice time chatting but shortly had to run back to the Metro so the girls could catch their bus back.
We were able to convince one girl, Maia, to stay in Madrid with us for the night and crash at Meaghan's house so we could go out dancing. Yes, I did say dancing. I know many of you cant believe those words came from my Suzy Homemaker, Grandma, mouth.
We got a bit nervous that Joycelyn and Jen would not be able to catch their bus, but thank goodness they made it.
We made our way through Sol simply by following the crowd. We ultimately found ourselves at an Irish Pub, O'Connells for the first round of drinks. This was a shack of a place, but full of people. We actually saw American Football on the TV, plus Rugby, of course. After a couple drinks, we decided it was now to time to go dancing. You always need a drink in you before you go to a club, or at least, I do, being so rhythmically declined.
Again we followed the crowd to this long line of people at a club called, Sweet. It was funny cause I think this was the first time I actually had to wait in line for a club, so I enjoyed it. Of course, I asked some random person in front of us to take a picture for me, which he did. And it turned out pretty good, actually. I have had many a photo taken by a stranger and it turned out crummy, but this was a young guy, and thus knew how to take a good photo.
The Club:
The place was jammed to the brim, thus why we had to stand in line. But in a good way. With the price of admission we each got a pass for a free drink, which was used right away. There were tons of flashing lights and great music. None of that 80's junk they play in Boston, sorry Kimmee I had to say it. We danced to our hearts content, until, 5:45 in the MORNING!! It was awesome, and I didn't even feel tired. No, don't worry I was still functioning, even though, Meghan was not. But hey that's the fun of it. As we stumbled towards the Metro it occurred to us that this would be a great time to go for Churros and Chocolate, a famous late night/morning eat. No Little Steve's for us! Well being that it was sooooo early in the morning, on a Sunday, no less, we were saddened to find that no such establishment was open yet, and proceeded to catch the 6:30am train back home to sleep.
No sleep for me, as I planned with Santi to catch a 1:30 bus to his house for Sunday lunch. But hey it was totally worth it.
Santi's house is amazing, I knew they were well off, but I had NO idea how much so. His dad actually has a squash court, in his house, and a basketball court. Not to be so materialistic, I met his entire family, grandparents included, right when I got there. Ironically he had just had his birthday this past Thursday, so everyone was over to celebrate with him.
Lunch was lovely. Of course, tons of food, and drink, but that's how Spaniards spend an afternoon, with nothing to do. I was able to understand most of what was happening, but must admit some was just white noise. After lunch the "adults" went to have a chat on the porch and enjoy the conversation while the children rested, no, still no sleep for me....
I ended up leaving his house at 9pm after the Real Madrid match on TV. It was a pretty boring game, but at least we won.
Finally I got home at 10:30 and was now ready for bed.
Overall it was a fabulous birthday, more than I could have imagined, being that most of the group had run off to Granada for the weekend, but I'm actually glad that not everyone was there so I was able to enjoy myself that much more with the company I had. I feel like if there had been more people there I would have hung around in the back, but thankfully that was not the case.
Again I want to thank everyone for the well wishes and phone calls/texts I received, its nice to know that so many people care about you. And not just on your bday, so thanks for calling daily/weekly too.
Some may joke that it took me leaving the country to finally call people, but hey we're all glad for that. Love you and miss you all.
Look forward to the pics, plus captions to boot. :0)