Viva la Espana!

Spain (Se-pha-rad) ספרד
Spanish (Se-phar-a-dit) ספרדית
Sangria (San-gri-ah) סנגריה

Over Sukkot break, I was lucky enough to spend time both in Israel and outside of Israel. The first day or two of my break I was in Israel. I spend the first night of Sukkot in a sukkah with some good family friends and then promptly left for the airport to spend the better part of a week in Spain with my good friend Julie. I will spare you the boring details about how my flight was delayed because of the general strikes in Greece, but I will say that Israeli customer service, when it comes to delays is much better than American customer service!

I spent the first day that I was in Spain in Madrid, which is where Julie lives. We went to Templo de Debod which is an ancient Egyptian temple that was rebuilt in Madrid. It was built very close to the Royal Palace of Madrid, and sits on the side of a mountain overlooking part of the city. We didn't do much else in Madrid that first day, as I got in relatively late and we were getting up early the next day to go with the program that Julie staffs to Toledo, Spain for the day. Although, I did have my first real Spanish sangria and I can tell you that it doesn't even compare to that of any sangria that I have ever had anywhere else in the world.

Templo de Debod, Madrid, Spain

Real sangria in Spain!

On Friday we spent the day in Toledo, Spain. I happened to luck out at the time that I went, as Julie's program happened to be taking a day trip there and they allowed me to join them for the day! Spain, prior to the Spanish Inquisition, was a very important location to the Jewish people. Some of the most influential thinkers have come from Spain, including one of the most famous Rambam (Rabbi Moses ben Maimon). Toledo was known and recognized as being a place of coexistence of Christian, Jewish and Muslim cultures. Throughout the day we visited churches that had once been mosques and churches that had once been synagogues. It was amazing to see how the original architecture and religious influences had remained in the buildings, even after other religious took over them. Additionally, especially in the synagogues, it was amazing to see how much Hebrew truly remained. A lot of the Hebrew was hard to read because of how intricately it was it was designed, but it still remained as a reminder of how the synagogues used to look, before the churches redecorated. One of the things that I had always learned about, both in my Spanish classes at school, as well as my religious school classes, was about how the Moorish and Spanish architecture had influenced the design of synagogues in Spain. This could clearly be seen in the two synagogues that we went to, that had many archways that resembled the keyhole arches that Spanish architecture is known for. While I was in Toledo, I also of course had to try marzipan, which is another thing that Toledo is known for. At first I got a kick out of it because I thought they were talking about rugulah (which was entertaining to think that when I had thought of marzipan I automatically equated it with Marzipan rugulah and not with actual Marzipan). However, at this Mazapan they make real marzipan which was absolutely delicious!

Marzipan in the shape of fruits!

A sukkah for Sukkot at one of the synagogues in Toledo!

Inside one of the synagogues. Can you see the Hebrew at the top? 

The keyhole arches inside one of the synagogues in Toledo

A view of Toledo from outside of Toledo

Julie and I outside of Toledo

We got back from Toledo relatively late on Friday, and promptly left early Saturday morning to spend the next two days in Granada, Spain. I have learned and dreamed about going to Granada since I can remember. There are a lot of reasons for this, but two of the most important are that a) I can now say that I have been to and seen both cities of Granada (Spain and Nicaragua) and b) I have now seen and explored only parts of the Alhambra, which means that I definitely need to go back to see more! Granada is a beautiful city in Spain located in the Andalusian region of southern Spain. Since we had reservations to go and visit the Alhambra on Sunday morning, we decided to spend Saturday exploring  Granada. We went to the Parque de las Ciencias, which had an interactive science museum, as well as a butterfly house that we explored! After educating outselves for a little bit we went to the famous Catedral and Capilla Real where Ferdinand and Isabelle used to worship, and are now buried. I have been to some of the other famous European cathedrals, and they never cease to amaze me with just how much detail and beauty they have intertwined in them. There was gold every way that you turned, whether in the main cathedral, or in one of the side private cathedrals.

Consuming fruits and vegetables in Spain is natural and the ones of Granada are exceptional! 

Albert and I are now on a first name basis

Butterfly at the butterfly world at the science museum

One of the sculptures and installations in the Catedral

The graves of Ferdinand and Isabelle 

We spent the rest of the evening walking around and exploring Granada. We had some exceptional tapas and even got caught in the middle of a social justice protest. I felt right at home! On Sunday, we spent basically the entire day at Alhambra. I knew that it was a large palace, but I had no idea how enormous the ground of Alhambra actually are! I will let the pictures speak for themselves...

Julie and I on top of one of the lookouts at Alhambra

The last two days of my trip to Spain I spent touring around Madrid. Julie was working, which meant that I took a map and for the most part, got myself around Madrid. I only got lost once (which for those of you know me is probably a world record) and managed to find my way back without too much trouble. My first day I spent exploring some of the parks, as well as the Royal Palace of Madrid. Like many of the other royal palaces in Europe, it was ginormous and over-extravagantly decorated.  My second day I spent visiting museums in Madrid. There are three famous art museums known as the Golden Triangle because they are all so well known and contain so many famous artists. I was only able to go to two, the Prado and the Thyssen, both of which had world renowned collections of arts from both Spanish artists like El Greco and Picasso, to Monet and Van Gogh. Julie also took me to see the Retiro Park which is like Madrid's Central Park.

Overall, it was an absolutely amazing trip to Spain! I definitely didn't get to go everywhere that I would have liked, but all that means is that I need to go back to Spain in the near future to keep exploring! And who knows, maybe next time I will actually be able to speak in Spanish in them, as opposed to understanding all of their Spanish and responding to them in Hebrew!