Weird Germans are Weird

Hello everyone!  The ridiculously hot weather seems to have passed... knock on wood.... so life is improved significantly.  The first few days were rough, but I'm getting the hang of things now.

Today, I didn't know what time I had to get up, so I just woke up at 7:00 when Señora started banging around down the hall.  For some weird reason, I wanted to listen to a random song first thing in the morning, so I reached over and turned it on.  I've been seriously regretting that decision all day.

Anyway, humming "Mala Gente," (translates to "Bad People") I got ready, dressed, and ate breakfast.  Señora and the three of us are on much better terms now, and she made us tostado (toast) to go along with our cereal.

We had asked Maria, our guide, to meet us and help us get to the meeting place, though after our warp street discovery we didn't really need her advice anymore, but we were grateful for the conversation.  Maria is amazing, and we like walking with her.  I do, because she walks as fast as I do and I just enjoy watching people struggle to keep up with my "brisk" pace. ;)

We met up and walked to Setas.

Las Setas are actually really cool.  Sometimes, they're called Los Parasoles (the parasols, umbrellas, whatever) because they're designed to provide a whole lot of shade.  They do, by the way, but the locals call it Las Setas because they also look like, er, mushrooms.  Setas means mushrooms.

They were built five years ago by a German architect named something or another.  The project was three times more expensive than they had originally thought because the entire thing is made of wood.  Finnish wood.  It's imported, which costs a lot of money.  Besides, wood got damaged and needed replacing or reinforcing or something, so it cost a lot of money.  But, at the end of it all, Las Setas is the largest infrastructure made of wood.  Cool, right?

There are four levels to this lovely art.  Street level, there is a market that is way cooler than the one in Madrid, and inside you'll find people selling fruits and veggies.  By the way, there are like twenty types of tomatoes that you can easily find in markets.  I'm not joking.  Apparently, Spain is the perfect climate for tomatoes, which is why they're so good.

In addition to fruits and veggies, there are fish markets that sell whole fishes, shrimps, sea-snails, crabs, lobsters, you name it.  And a butchery with conejos hanging from the ceiling.  We were walking by and saw a wooden bunny, wondered why it was there, and then noticed the conejos.  That means rabbit.  They sell furry dead rabbits.  That is so weird to me.

Then we went down below.  Now, before Las Setas was even imagined, the square was this empty market.  It was surrounded by nice hotels and apartments, but there was nowhere really to park.  So, the city decided that they'd build a parking deck beneath the square.  Not a good idea.  Here's why.

Sevilla was occupied by two major civilizations before it became Sevilla as we know it today.  Firstly, the Romans occupied it and made a city out of it because of its proximity to a river and how flat it is.  Then, when the Moors came in, they couldn't remove all of the solid stone buildings the Romans had left, so they knocked down the walls and simply built on top of it.  When Spain reconquered Sevilla in 1492 (you know, when Columbus sailed the ocean blue.  It was a big year for Spain) they knocked down the Moorish buildings, and built on top of those.  So, we have three layers of history in the Sevillian soil.

In 2005, when they were going to build the parking garage, they discovered these layers directly below the square.  They realized that there was so much important history down there, they couldn't just destroy it.  So they announced an architectural design contest to build something nice on top of it, that would provide art or shade to the market.  The ruins, below Las Setas, became a museum.

Your history lesson for today is over.  I promise.

So we went down there, and saw the ruins.  They were no more than foundations and mosaics, but it was still cool.  The Moorish ruins were a good five feet higher than the Roman stuff, so that was interesting to see.

We then went to the very top of Las Setas, where you can see literally the entire city.  We got a lot of pictures, so I'll give you some of them.

Apparently my picture isn't as good as I thought.  Sigh.  I can't convey the vista in a photo, anyway.

Today was apparently Germans Mess with Kailey's Head Day, so some friendly German tourists came up to us and asked us directions to the bull ring.  I think that's what he wanted, his accent was really really thick.  Luckily, we have a German guy on our team!  He cleared things up.  Thanks.  Oh, here is a picture of him and his friend... they really wanted a picture.

Three guesses which is the German guy

When you get a ticket to the top of Las Setas, you also get a complimentary drink at the bars down at the market.  We went down, and the only thing our vouchers covered that we could legally drink was coffee, so I got a Cortado.  In Spain, coffee is a big big deal.  There are four types that you can get:  Black, cafe con leche, un cortado, y un manchado.  A cortado is like an espresso with a little milk blended in, but it comes in a little cup.  I'm not a coffee drinker, at all, so I wanted the smaller mug...

I imagine a coffee drinker would find it divine.  I don't like it, but two weeks in Spain might change that.  Coffees are like one or two euros a pop, so they are far cheaper than even water.  Pro tip!  Did I mention that you have to pay for water?  Unless you ask for "un vaso de agua," you get a bottle of mineral water that can cost three euros.  "Un vaso de agua" (a glass of water) is free.  

Well, we went back down and Maria had to go back to work.  Sadness.  Before she left, she directed us to the Hippie Market (there's apparently a Hippie Market in a square not too far from Setas on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays) and we walked down to it.  There wasn't a lot of Hippie stuff, mostly purses and jewelry, but it was fun to walk around anyway.

There's a really big department store right by it, so while the others were looking through the market, I wandered into the store.  I was greeted by the perfume section- why is the perfume section always by the entrance of department stores?- and I thought about my perfume.  It's Swiss, and impossible to find in American stores, but I recently got a bottle of it for Christmas.  However, my loving mother also suffers from the evil that is a store not carrying her perfume, so I looked for hers.  I found it, too!  I love you, Mom!

The German guy and his... friend... were having shoe problems, so we all went on a great adventure to find replacement shoes.  We didn't succeed, but we found them clothes and had them try on stuff.  They, being good sports, went along with it, but German was the only one who'd let us see the outfit.  I have a picture, but I don't want to scar you so I won't post it.

We went home.  I had lentil soup and... something, but I can't for the life of me remember what it was.  Oh yeah!  A banana.  I like bananas a lot.

We decided to try yet another route to school, and it was fast, but I personally don't like it as well as the other, so I will be going on the warp street route again tomorrow.

In class, today we learned about some idioms that won't make sense to you because they're idioms, more ser vs estar stuff, how to deal with compliments in Spain (turn down the compliment the first time, do not thank the person for the compliment.  That's incredibly rude.  Oops.) and some holidays.  Of course, we talked about The Running of the Bulls, which I still think is silly, and some holiday where you pelt your neighbors with tomatoes.

There's a guy in the apartment next to ours singing.  That was random.  Sorry.

Then we went home, and had noodle soup with tomatoes.  Tomatoes tomatoes tomatoes.  If I don't love tomatoes by the end of this...

Tomorrow, I get to go inside the cathedral.  I'll have some more history lessons for you then!