First week of classes

So last week was the first week of classes and it went really well! I am taking 4 classes: Spanish culture and civilization, Spanish Post Civil War novela, Corporate Responsibility and Ethical Leadership (or something along those lines), and this week I am starting a Fundamentals of Marketing course. All of my courses have been very interesting so far and I like all of my professors. I just completed my first novel for the novela class. It was fairly short, but I'm not sure I completely understand what was going on in the book.

Last week, Fati, Ashley, and I also met up with Lorena and a bunch of her friends for dinner/drinks at this chain restaurant called Lateral. Lorena says that it's really good for a chain restaurant. We had so much fun meeting all of her friends! On Wednesday night, we went out to a club called Zombie with one of Regi's friends from Spain.

Thursday night we went out to a club called Kapital, which has 7 stories! Each floor has a different thing going on. It was a lot of fun! We slept in late on Friday (since we don't have school on Fridays!!) and Ashley and I decided we wanted to get out of the house and go to homework. So we ventured to this little park-like area near our house and sat on a bench to read. We didn't stay too long, though, because it was getting pretty hot. So we decided to go exploring around our neighborhood. We found a good bank for me to go to, some cool restaurants we want to try, a little park called Villa de Paris that has a dog area in it, and a Marc by Marc Jacobs store! Friday night, we decided to stay in since we were so tired from the past two nights. We felt so lame, though! Instead of going out on our first Friday night in Madrid, we did homework! Haha.

Then Saturday we woke up late and Brittani, Fati, Ashley, and I went to Retiro Park to do homework. It was our first time to go!! Retiro Park is basically like the Central Park of Madrid. We found a nice place to sit and read, and once we were done with our homework, we explored the park a little bit. There is a small "lake" where you can rent a rowboat! Once it cools down a little more, we are definitely renting one! Then we wandered some more and came across the Museo de Cristales (I think that's what it's called). It's this empty building that's all glass, in the middle of the park! It was really cool, but I'm not exactly sure what its purpose is...

Finally, we decided it was too hot and so we walked back home and stopped by the Marc Jacobs store just to check it out. Nothing good, so we left and went to get a refreshing smoothie/froyo at our fav place by our house: Juicy Avenue! Yum!

Saturday night, we booked a flight to Portugal for the end of September! Sooo exciting!! Then we went out to dinner with Carmen to Pizza Jardin (pizza garden)--one of Carmen's favorite restaurants. She knows everyone there! We ate dinner from 10pm-12:15am. Whoa. I don't eat that late. But it was fun and the food was good!

Sunday morning we woke up early to go to El Rastro--Fati, Ashley, Brittani, and I. El Rastro is Europe's biggest open-air market! It was kind of interesting but about 98% of the stuff there was junk. I did get some really cute sandals for 3 euros though! Once we were done at El Rastro, we went to shop at this other place called Opera and I got a cute top on sale for 10 euros! By the time we finished shopping and got home, it was about 3pm! Good thing we started early!

Once we got home, I decided to work on some homework for my novela class. Then Lorena asked if we wanted to go get tapas with her and her friend Claire. Fati was asleep and we didn't want to wake her, so Ashley and I met up with them at La Latina and had a blast! They are so much fun!

Anyways, that's about all for now.

Pics of Retiro Park: