Sevilla

Let's face it folks! I'm in love. I'm in love with a city! My colleague Bente (from Berg vgs) and I have spent some lovely days in Sevilla, and I'm totally in love with that place! What a place! What an atmosphere! Nueva Andalucía is nice, but not "typical Spanish" (feels like "Little Britain" quite often...). So my impression of Sevilla was bound to be a positive one! And it was!

 

The amazing cathedral! 

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seville_Cathedral)

 This reminded me of a scene from Monthy Pyton and the Knights of the Holy Grail (I think...)

 

Koselig! 

Since Pedro had to stay a few extra days at Marbella Automecánica, we decided to take the bus to Sevilla. I got an immediate attack of carsickness when I realised the bus would take us through Ronda (everyone talks about the roads leading up to Rona), but I have to say the roads were great. No te preocupes! A funny thing is that we didn't actually see the spectacular canyons of Ronda. Hmm... Maybe the bus didn't really stop in the city of Ronda? It was all flat up there, reminded me a bit of Hedmarken. (Click on the link to see what Ronda is really like ... http://www.igreens.org.uk/ronda_puente_nuevo2.JPG)

We enjoyed nice food and wine in some excellent (and very authentic) tapas bars, stayed in a great hotel which was called Confortel Puerta de Triana (thanks, Elaine!), walked in the Jewish quarters, tried to find our way around without a map (mostly a great success!), were amazed by the Cathedral and the TOWER, had coffee at Starbucks (!) ...

This is the first time I've seen Starbucks in Spain

... enjoyed the sun and the spring (no rain -- the weather forecast was wrong! hurray!), bought lots of Spanish films, Spanish books, and other books, had bocadillos con aceite y tomatas (I'm beginning to like it now), discussed Spanish words and other aspects of Spain and life and all those things. And yet one of the greatest experiences must have been the flamenco show, regardless of how tacky it may sound. You can read about the Museo del Baile Flamenco here.

 

Monica Idalgo in a dress with a loooong rope

Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of Bente, an American guy and myself when we had a flamenco class with the great Monica, but boy do I have pictures of the two dancers (Monica and a fantastic male!), the singer, and the amazing guitar player. I m p r e s s i v e !!!

 

Meget imponerende!

It was kind of difficult to take pictures of them dancing, but these pics may give you and idea of how it was. I was really impressed by their energy! Oh oh oh! 

Finally, I would like to recommend a really great tapas restaurant which was called Levíes. They had great vegetarian food, and their croquettes (?) were almost as good as those Ascención made before Christmas. The other picture is from a fantastic tapas bar where we dined another night. I'm sure we were the only tourists there! Great wine, great food. Can't remember the name of the place.

 

I will finish off with some gossip. Actually I came across three celebrities when in Sevilla:

1.) The Turkish Prime Minister was in town, and I saw his car driving by while we were in the tapas bar whose name I've forgotten

2.) It was nice to catch up with George Clooney again, this time not in the form of a calendar, but in Seville near the railway station.

3.) Christoffer Columbus was buried in the Cathedral. What are you saying? Don't you believe me? Take a look at this picture.

So, that's about it, I guess. This must be my looooongest blog entry ever.

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I picked up Pedro from the garage this afternoon. Now I'm broke. In hindsight it was actually alright to go to Sevilla by public transport. We ended up spending the last night in Málaga instead of Córdoba because of the public transport. But that's alright.

Right now I'm enjoying something Bente brought me: Ingrid Olava's CD "Guest". Here's a review of this fantastic CD: http://oslopuls.aftenposten.no/musikk/article346008.ece 

I've had a great half term so far, and there are still 4 days to go! Yohooo! :)