The Siberian Peninsula

Right now, the nickname for Spain is the Siberian Peninsula, a pun on the name "Iberian Peninsula" that Spain and Portugal share, and the cold front that has arrived in Europe from Siberia recently. Pretty much all of northern Spain* is frigid; roads are covered in ice, it's really windy, and I guess there's lots of snow. (I thought this was pretty typical of wintertime in northern Spain, but whatever.) The "ola de frío," or cold wave (is that even a phrase in English? like heat wave, but freezing cold instead for a long period of time?) was actually officially last week, but Madrid has been so cold even into this week that people are choosing to stay inside when they don't need to go anywhere. The past couple of days my preschoolers didn't even go outside for recess, which is wonderful for me when they're all crazy with pent-up energy by the time the afternoon comes.

Anyway, the best part about this, at least on a personal level for me, is that I have been particularly bitter about this cold (my apartment isn't particularly well insulated) and it's nowhere even near what we consider "freezing" in New England. The highs temperatures have been barely hitting the lower 40s. The low temperatures - very early in the morning, including when I leave for work - have been in the low 20s. Add in the windchill and you've got probably somewhere in the mid-teens. I'm starting to panic about ever going back home to Boston for good. I mean, if I can't deal with some 20-ish degree weather with a little wind on occasion, how will I ever survive another entire New England winter??



*Just an fyi, Madrid, at least in this case, is not considered "northern" Spain. The temperatures here aren't nearly as cold as the regions north of Madrid, nor have we gotten any snow.

El Gordo

If you've ever wondered what the Christmas season is like in Madrid (or anywhere in Spain, for that matter), one way to sum it up rather well is this single word: lotería. The Spanish are obsessed with this lottery, and I don't mean by this that they get really excited about it and buy lots of tickets or something. No, pretty much every family, group of work colleagues, group of friends, or whatever other social group you can think of (entire villages, even!) get together and purchase tickets as a group, with the intention of course to split the winnings should their ticket win. For example, at my school, the teachers all pooled together to buy tickets.

Now, I know I probably sound like I'm being overly dramatic about this, but I cannot tell you how many times I passed by little lottery vendors in Madrid during the month of December with lines that literally went for blocks and blocks. I think perhaps it just blows my mind a little because for one thing, I'm not much of a gambler. In fact, I don't think I've ever even bought a lottery ticket of my own in the US. But the bigger reason I can't really grasp the idea of the lottery obsession is perhaps also one of the causes of the obsession: the economy here is currently, well, not good. Why waste money on stupid lottery tickets?!  

Now, the lottery here is different from what we Americans are familiar with - there are several different "prizes," or different cash sums that are distributed among people with winning tickets. According to my favorite source, Wiki, around 98% of Spaniards buy Christmas lottery tickets (which began in 1812), and said tickets are available for purchase starting as early as August. Ironically, apparently this past Christmas's lottery was the biggest in history (the equivalent of $950 million). Anyway, this past Christmas's first prize winners came from a small village up north in Aragón called Sodeto. The main reason for this post, actually, is because I was reading about El Gordo ("the fat one"), as the lottery's first prize is called, in this article in the NY Times. Just another bit of Spanish culture about which I'm slowly learning.

#51 Spend a day in El Escorial

Well number fifty-one on my list is one thing that I actually (and very shamefully) had never done before. Despite the fact that I've lived in Madrid for nearly a year and a half now (and that's not including the semester I spent here as an undergraduate), I had never before visited this town only an hour northwest of Madrid. San Lorenzo de El Escorial is famous for the monastery there, which also used to serve as a palace for the royal family of Spain. The monastery was built in the 16th century by the king Felipe II up in the Sierra de Guadarrama (a mountain range) just outside of Madrid. Supposedly (well...ok, according to Wiki), the original floorplans of the monastery were inspired by descriptions of the design of Solomon's temple. According to Wiki, "the most persuasive theory for the origin of the floor plan is that it is based on descriptions of the Temple of Solomon by the Judeo-Roman historian, Flavius Josephus: a portico followed by a courtyard open to the sky, followed by a second portico and a second courtyard, all flanked by arcades and enclosed passageways, leading to the "holy of holies". Statues of David and Solomon on either side of the entrance to the basilica of El Escorial lend further weight to the theory that this is the true origin of the design." I like architecture a lot, so I think this is a pretty interesting theory.

Main entrance at the Courtyard of the Kings, with the basilica behind it.

Anyway, aside from being a monastery and a royal palace (at one point in time), the building also has a library, a basilica, a pantheon where twenty-six kings and queens from the Hapsburg and Bourbon dynasties are buried (or rather, stored in fancy coffins that are stacked on the walls), and now, of course, a museum for visitors, among other things. There is also a room called the Sala de las Batallas, which is basically huge corridors with frescos and paintings on the walls depicting various important Spanish battles, including, but not limited to, battles against the Moors in the middle ages and then later on against the French. Unfortunately I missed this room, but it's okay because it gives me an excuse to go back.

The pantheon (picture from Google; you can't take pictures inside).

Sala de Batalles (Hall of Battles) (picture from Google).

Aside from the building itself, the monastery is also surrounded by several gardens. We didn't spend a lot of time in the gardens because we didn't have a lot of time and also it was freezing and really windy when we were there, but they're nice gardens (though not as extensive or beautiful as those at the royal palace in Aranjuez).

Me, Nicole, and Kristin in the gardens of the monastery.

Me, Nicole, and Amelie (pictures courtesy of Amelie).

Anyway, after Nicole, Amelie, and I visited the monastery/palace, we met up with our friend, Kristin, who is living in El Escorial and doing the same teaching program as us in a school out there. She took us to one of her favorite restaurants there for lunch, and then afterwards we walked around the town (which is really pretty; I didn't have very high expectations but I was impressed by how nice it is) and the gardens of the monastery. Kristin also invited us to her apartment for a little while, which was fun. Her place is really nice and she has a terrace that has a great view of the monastery.

So, the wait to visit El Escorial was well worth it. I would definitely recommend taking the day trip up there to any visitors to Madrid. A good way to start off my list of 101 things to do in and around Madrid! Oh, and here are the pictures (mostly just of the monastery) that I took.