The Museum of Popular Arts and Customs of Seville

Friday January 25, 2008

Fridays we don’t have class so typically we have an activity where our class meets up early in the afternoon. Today we were to meet at “El Museo de Artes y Costumbres Populares de Sevilla” (The Museum of Popular Arts and Customs of Seville) which is in El Parque de Maria Luisa, 45 minutes away on foot from our house. As we left out house the construction workers that have been working on a building near our house greeted us. Everyday we get some random Spanish phrase thrown out there but today was different. As we rounded the corner to get our daily greeting one of the guys said, “Hey babe.” I couldn’t help it. I started cracking up. They try so hard here its funny and a little sad on their part. Regardless, it made the 45-minute walk more entertaining. We got into the museum for free with our International Student I.D.’s and looked around for about an hour. The museum aims to popularize and research Andalusia’s anthropological and ethnographic heritage. The museum has collections of everything such as: domestic furniture, ceramics, firearms, religious objects and even musical instruments. It was pretty interesting to look at and to learn that Spanish legislation protects popular heritage; which includes the study and documentation of the knowledge, wisdom and behavior, which keep traditions alive in their everyday life. After being a nerd for a while we headed home to eat lunch with our Spanish family. On the way home there were two flamenco dancers and a small band dancing and playing in the street. They are pretty much amazing. After ogling them and putting a few small coins into their hat we kept on our merry little way but only to encounter a protest outside the Cathedral. Earlier in the morning there had been two huge police vans accompanied by 4 policemen riding horses and now we had kind of put together why. There we huge signs but we didn’t stop to listen or stare so I’m still not quite sure what all of the ruckus was about. When I got home I had the best card waiting from Meridith, it pretty much made my day. It’s nice getting mail here and knowing that everyone back home hasn’t forgotten about me! And lets be honest, getting mail in general is just exciting. This afternoon was pretty chill; I didn’t really do anything interesting. I read, took a nap and worked on making some calendars to hang up in our room. Later in the night we met up with a group of people from school and headed out for the night. We went to an Irish pub, where they spoke English, and talked in a booth for a while. After we left there we headed to the Tex-Mex bar, where they also spoke English, watched some figure skating/soccer and stayed until around 2am. After Tex-Mex (the name just cracks me up) we headed for home. Cortney, Nick and I ended up stopping at a café on the way home and having some hot chocolate so we could feel our hands again. In the early mornings and evenings it gets pretty chilly but its gorgeous here during the day. If you ever order hot chocolate in Spain, just a word to the wise, you pretty much will get a melted Hershey’s bar so be aware. It’s amazing but its pretty thick. Nick and Cortney walked me home and then I talked to Sam for a while before going to bed, Allison had already fallen asleep. Allison and Sam had walked Ashley home when we stopped for hot chocolate and I had gotten in a few minutes later than they had. It was a pretty late night when all was said and done but it was a good time going out with friends, talking and relaxing. Tomorrow morning we have to be up and at the Real Alcazar at 11am which doesn’t seem all that early but you have to get up pretty early to get in showers, breakfast (we have a sit down breakfast every morning) and walking for 45 minutes.