Primero de Marzo

Hollllaaa. Today is the first of March. I cannot believe I've been here for 2 months already. Sometimes it feels like I've been here forever, but other times I don't know where the time has gone. Let's see where did I leave off Feb. 15th. Lent started and I gave up french fries. Its not that I eat them at home all the time, but they are served at my residencia almost daily and that can't be healthy for me to eat a million french fries while I'm here so thank you Lent. I have received two packages since I've been here and they are the best things ever! So a big thank you...especially for the peanut butter! If anyone would like to send me a letter because that would be fun for me to read AND I tape them to my wall :) My address is ...

Morgan Bucciferro
63 Calle San Bernardo
28015 Madrid Spain

Also, big news we won our first soccer game of the season! It was a huge deal, we won 4-0 and the next day our coach brought us beer and gummy bears for winning...life doesn't get much better than cerveza and gummy bears. So that was fun and I actually scored a goal, which was exciting.

Feb 19-21 we went to Salamanca. It is a small town about 3 hours west of Madrid where the oldest university of Spain is located. It was actually really cool and had a nice college town feel because I think there are 55,000 students in a 175,000 person town..something like that. While we were there we saw the university, library, and two cathedrals which were absolutely beautiful, I took lots of pictures to share once I get back. The town was very Spanish, much prettier than Madrid in my opinion. At night we ended up going to a bar called Jacko's. It was a Micheal Jackson bar. The bar had his pictures everywhere and dolls of him and they only played songs by him and his music videos where being shown. It was hilarious. I don't know what it was doing in a small Spanish town. Anywho I took lots of pictures for you Rachel, because this place would have been heaven for you.

We also went to an Italian restaurant two nights in a row because it was so good calle

d Paladinis and I tried gnocchi (or something like that) its like a potato pasta and might be my new favorite food. Then on the way back we stopped at a vineyard and did some wine tasting...well more like trying one type of wine and then getting 10 different types of tapas...okay by me! Haha we also got a tour of the winery and it was really neat to see the whole place.

I just figured out how to put pictures on this dang blog...so here are two of Salamanca.

This weekend was great. I stayed in Madrid and did alot of different activities. Thursday night I went to a Jazz bar and it was great. It was a bit more upbeat with a stellar harmonica player..that was really enjoyable. Then we ran to another bar for some delicious sangria. After that my friend Lauren and I decided to meet up with some other friends at a discoteca called JOY. If you read about Madrid it is like a must do, but I don't think I will be going back. Not my cup of tea. Too many Americans and American music. Not what I'm here for...Anyway the next day I woke up and went for a walk again. I ended up going to Sol and just hopping on a bus that took me to the outskirts of Madrid to the Atletico Madrid stadium...then it took me back to Plaza Mayor where I read my book for a bit and then headed back to the resi. That night I ended up going out with my Spanish neighbor and she took me to this underground club called Independence and it was basically like a concert downstairs. Loud music and cram packed with people. It was really fun and something different, so that made me like it even more.

I also woke up early on Sunday and decided to go for a stroll because it was so nice outside and I was walking past Palacio Real and the cathedral, when I decided to see what time mass started. I only had a 15 minute wait, so I decided to drop in and it was really cool. The choir was behind me and in a loft. There were probably 35 people in the choir and there was a HUGE organ. It was so pretty. The mass was a little hard for me to understand, not only because it was in Spanish, but it was echoing which made it even harder for me to understand haha. After that I found a fish market called San Miguel Mercado and it was PACKED first of all and had all types of fish and octopus and lobster and all other types of sea creatures. Not just like the meat though, their whole bodies where intact and for sale. After that I went back for lunch and then right after that went to the Parque de Retiro with some friends. Had a cana (small beer) in the park, watched street performers and just relaxed. Overall great day.

My March is really busy. I leave for Amsterdam this Friday. Super excited about this trip. Anne Franks house (huge fan) really can't wait to go there. Van Gogh Museum and I can't wait to rent a bike and ride it around all day. Then next weekend I go to Rome with my API group, which should be amazing and I can't wait to go! The next weekend will be the only weekend in March Ill be in Madrid and then the last weekend Ill be on spring break so Italy, Vienna, Prague, and Copenhagen.

Should be interesting. I changed the color of my blog to a more springy color. Black and March just don't mix.

Ciao!
Morgan