So I'm enrolled in two classes. One is called Art, Music, Folklore, and Traditions of Spain and the other is History of Spain. The latter is taught entirely in Spanish. This one is more difficult, seeing as I've never taken a lecture class completely in Spanish before. So far I've gotten the worst of my presentations over with - my coloquial presentation, which is where I teach my class for 10-15 mins on the new material for the day, and my informal presentation, where I get to pick any topic relating to Spain and report on it for 10 mins. For my coloquial luckily I got to teach about Christopher Columbus and the cultural Renaissance in Spain, and for my informal I picked La Tuna. What is La Tuna, you ask? Let me back up a little.
For my first class (Art, music, folklore yadda yadda... I'll probably just refer to it as my culture class) we get to go out and do things in the city to help us better understand the Spanish culture. Thank the LORD, because sitting for three hours in that room is not cool. Literally. lol. The first 'activity' was actually held at our school in the teátro. La Tuna is a musical group usually made up of university students, performing traditional Spanish music, singing and playing instruments like the guitar, tambourine, mandolin, sometimes the lute, bandurria -- you get the picture. The tradition goes back to the 11th century I believe. The purpose of a Tuna was to win over the ladies that they had been courting. Needless to say the tunos (members of a Tuna) are very romantic. Or at least they try to be romantic. This particular Tuna had only 4 members in it and were a bit older, but they were still really fun. It was a great way to be introduced to the Spanish culture! I'll try to post a video below so you can get a taste of it.
The next morning we had another activity: an outing to the Royal Palace! It was more beautiful than I ever could have imagined. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside :( but take my word for it, every room was ornate and gorgeous. There was not even one little hallway that was ugly. The throne room was my favorite, with red velvet walls, huge chandeliers, and silver embroidery on the walls. Every room had a fresco, a painting on the ceiling. Fact: The Royal family never sits on their thrones because they think it is rude if they are sitting while their guests are standing. (How nice!!) Fact #2: There are 2800 rooms in the Palace! We only saw maybe 15. Fact #3: The Royal family does not actually live in the palace (darn) because they think it is too big. But all the important meetings and such still take place there. Needless to say our visit to the Palace was incredible. It makes me wonder what Heaven is going to be like, where we will get beautiful mansions of our own!! :) I can't imagine walking on streets literally made of gold. What was cool about this trip was that I ran into a group of young Apostolics out in the courtyard! They were a part of AYC (Apostolic Youth Corps) and were here for about 10 days. It was pretty cool. More on that and my church outings later... For now, a picture:
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