Spain - Parte Uno - Sevilla

Whew! 10 nights, 11 days of trains, airplanes, subway rides, taxi trips, countless miles of daily walking, and most importantly tons of FUN and bucketloads of photos later... we back!!!! We had an awesome vacation, though we are happy to be able to read menu's without a Spanish dictionary again, and finally able to understand local TV broadcasts!


We'll blog the cities we visited over the next few weeks, starting with Seville or Sevilla as the locals call it! On the right, was our first day of arrival in in Sevilla with the Giralda tower in the background. For those of you guys in KC, you'll probably recognize this from the belltower next to the Cheesecake factory on the Plaza... After all, Sevilla and Kansas City are sister cities!!!


Nothing like being almost late for our train ride to start our hearts pumping for our adventure. Our first stop was in Seville actually came by way of Madrid. After landing in Madrid late at 9am, our Spanish driver drove formula-one style weaving in and out of traffic to make our 10am train ride from Madrid to Sevilla. Kinda reminds us of our Genting to KL taxi driver, except the cursing was in Spanish, and he was dressed WAY better, and his Mercedes was more STYLO. Still, he got us there with 15 minutes to spare, giving me just enough time to to navigate the language barrier and get our tickets validated, jump on the Train, and finally relax.


Speaking of the language barrier, we actually trained a little via Spanish language CDs in preparation for this trip. Nothing too fancy really, just basic travelling Spanish, enough to check into hotels, get transportation, order food, and find the bathroom. Interesting thing to note though for those of you that know Mexican Spanish, it differs slightly from Spanish Spanish. For Example, Cerveza "ser-ve-sa" is Mexican Spanish, while its pronounced "Ther-ve-tha", kind of like saying the word with a lisp. Different huh? Interesting myth stating that the "Spanish Lisp" came from a king that had a speech disability, unable to pronounce "s" properly he Lisp'ed his way through conversations. More on it here.




Nickelback sings "... And a bathroom I can play baseball in. And a king size tub big enough for ten plus me." Well, under the Sevilla Alcazar (Castle), the "Baths of Lady María de Padilla" are really rainwater tanks named after Maria de Padilla. Supposedly, King Pedro fell for María and had her husband killed (Talk about eliminating the competition!). María resisted his advances and in turn poured boiling oil over her face to disfigure herself to stop Pedro's pursuit (ouch). I guess Talk-to-the-hand wasn't invented yet??!!... Later she became a nun and is respected as a symbol of purity in Sevilla. I took this picture as an sweet background for my desktop.

OOOhhhh...Macarena!!! Unbeknown est to the poor church goers at Basillica de la Macarena in Sevilla, a local pop group called Los del Rio launched this greatest one-hit wonder hit song in 1995. Unfortunately, that darn song kept playing in my head as I strolled through this church, which hold Sevilla's most holy image. the Virgin of Hope - "La Macarena". Her claim to fame is her signature glass teardrops across her face, where her procession put her up on a 3-ton float to parade around Seville. Another item of note, she is the Patron of local the bullfighters, where a local bullfighter Joselito spent a fortune buying 4 emeralds for her. Too bad the favor wasn't reciprocated... He was gored to death in the bullring later. BTW, the she kept the emeralds.

And yours truly will be willing to take credit for a most fortunate event that happened on the 27th. As the sign on the left can attest, I timed our trip just perfectly to coincide with the World Day of Tourism. Short story so that we can move along, is entry to the Church and Giralda Tower was Free, aka Gratis!

Next the Giralda Tower (La Giralda), one of the most recognizable landmarks of Sevilla. You can pretty much see it from everywhere in town. The version in KC is pretty much a miniature version of the one at Sevilla. The tower used to be part of an ancient mosque, and when the Christians invaded, instead of tearing it down, they merely added a bell tower at the top. To this day, the bells actually do sound on a regular basis. The climb to the top was pretty tiring but interestingly enough there are actually no steps, just a steep walkway that winds itself around the tower until the top. The history behind it is the the Moors used to ride their horses from the ground floor all the way up to the top for the daily prayers instead of walking. That's what I call being efficient! Here's a pic from the top of the tower!

Finally, last but not least, the Star Wars fans in you guys will definitely appreciate the following fine location that we visited next, Plaza Espana a.ka. "Naboo" in Star Wars II - Attack of the Clones. Its original purpose, before hijacked by George Lucas was for the 1929 Spanish-American Exhibition and is a perfect example of Moorish Revival type architecture.... Personally, I think Naboo sounds more interesting, as we're more of movie buffs than architecture ones! It doesn't even take any imagination to see how this location works out great as the set for the movie!

In next week's Blog... Madrid!