Living the Madrid nightlife [on a prayer!]

I've just come back from my afternoon/evening out and about in Valencia (which has unfortunately culminated in a very boring match between England and Algeria (ending in a draw), and with an stomachache that is currently inexplicably plaguing me). I do want to talk about Valencia, but I think I might wait until Sunday night when I return to do that, so I can actually post some pictures with my entry.

Instead, I figured I'd talk a little bit about what I did yesterday in Madrid. In the afternoon, once I'd had my lunch and my daily fill of Gilmore Girls (I brought Season 3 with me, for my down time), I met up with Dashell in Plaza Colón to see at photo exhibition. Currently, there is a large-scale annual exhibition happening in Madrid called PhotoEspaña, which installs and promotes photography exhibitions by international artists in art/photo galleries all over Madrid. So basically, you can go online and look at the listings of artists, with descriptions of their work, before you select the exhibition to go to (and the website tells you the location, of course). Dashell and I saw the group exhibition entitled "Between times: Instants, intervals, durations." It was an excellent collection of work by seventeen different photographers; I liked several things a LOT. For those of you reading this who are currently in Madrid, I would highly recommend going to see it. I liked that you didn't have to go through the entire gallery looking at the work of a single artist, but instead could jump around and sample very different kinds of work, all united by this theme of stalled time or invented time or projected time, just to name a few. It was all very beautiful; techniques varied widely; and there were photographers from many parts of the world represented. There was a set of photographs by one artist representing old real estate opportunities in the Pico Rivera/Downey/Santa Monica areas of L.A. that made me very excited, just because the streets looked so familiar. Oh, I'm such an obsessive Angelino sometimes.

Anyway, there are several more exhibitions that I want to see before I leave, including another group one, so I think those will be on the list of things to do for the coming week.

Thursday night was interesting. I spent some time in the evening talking to Shira (love!) because we had much to catch each other up on, and it was a GREAT hour and a half of conversation. Then I packed up my stuff for Valencia because I knew I wouldn't have time to do it in the morning. Finally, the plan was to meet up with a big group of people and then head to Kapital, a club not too far from my apartment, which had free admission for girls that night, and which is famous for its seven floors with different themes, of sorts. I was a little late in heading out, since we had to get to Kapital before 12:30 to get in for free. I left to meet up with the group at 10:50, thinking I could get there by latest 11:30. But when I got off the Metro station that they'd suggested, I realized I really wasn't sure where I was going. I started walking and thought about asking a couple that passed by, but refrained. Then I thought better of it and asked the next couple approaching, walking in the direction from which I came. I asked them if they knew where I could find Calle Fernandez de Hoz, and the woman said, "Uyyy, mujer, estás más perdida!" and said she could help me find my way because I was quite far from where I needed to be.

When she finished saying that, I of course immediately asked if she was Colombian, because I could tell from her accent. And she was! She was from Medellín and her boyfriend from Cali (woo!). So they told me to walk with them and we all happily chatted about Colombia, about where we each live (the guy lives in Barcelona and was actually heading out to catch a cab to leave Madrid when I ran into them), about how long it had been since we'd been in Colombia, about how fun it is to visit Colombia...all sorts of things. I was happy to hear that they thought I still retain my Cali accent, despite living in the US for 14 years; it is somehow really great to hear, because it means that not only is my Spanish still good, but my Colombian roots show. Just as I could tell she was from Colombia, it would've taken no time for her to realize I am too. Anyway, they were super nice, as Colombians are wont to be :P They kept telling me, "Good thing you asked, because you were SO lost." They very kindly walked with me the whole time, though we did pause briefly for the guy to get into a cab and head to the bus station. So I stood there while they kissed goodbye, which was sweet because it wasn't even awkward, like we were all good friends. Then I kept walking with the woman, and talking about why she's living in Spain. Basically, she had come to live with her sister with her daughter, and then her sister had some issues which forced her to return to Colombia. So then this woman sent her daughter to live in Colombia as well, because she couldn't raise her alone, and now she lives in Madrid by herself, and hasn't seen her four-year-old daughter for months. And she was telling me that she's going to Medellín next Sunday to see her family but also to scope out a possible living situation there, but she says she's afraid because she's not sure things are well enough in Colombia to merit living there. At the same time, she knows she can't go on living by herself in Madrid, so far away from every single member of her immediate family, including her little girl. And while she was telling me all this, I definitely noticed that her voice was shaking and her eyes were tearing up a little bit. And I just felt so grateful, not only that she was keeping me company at 11:30 p.m. in a part of town I wasn't familiar with, on her own time, but that she was so willing to share all of that with me. So even though I got so completely lost and totally missed the pregame (when we finally got to the apartment, everyone was on their way out, so I just left with them, straight back to the Metro!), it was actually a really, really awesome way to spend half an hour. What coincidences...the world is truly too small.

What's even more funny is that later, at around 3:00 in the morning, when I was buying a mojito (for 12 euros!!! But wow, it was delicious) from a bartender at Kapital, I heard her speaking to another customer while she was making my drink, and when she turned back to me, I said, "Can I ask you something? Are you from Madrid?" And she said, "No..." to which I replied, "You're Colombian." And she was also from Medellín! She said she hasn't been back for many years, and when I told her I'm going in December, she was like, "Ah, marica, que bueno!" Hahahaha. It was just a Colombian kind of night, I guess.

Kapital was really fun, not only because we got in for free AND got a drink for free (my first mojito; the one I bought was my second. SO TASTY). There was plenty to do, roaming up and down the seven floors (even though one or two were closed). Also, basically the entirety of the program, with the exception of a handful of people, went. I spent most of my time with Naomi, Lauren, and Valentina. At one point, Alex, whom I recently likened to Bacchus in Velazquez's The Drinkers, actually stole a small bottle of whiskey from the bar on the top floor (which had part of the roof missing, so we could look up and see the night sky!), so we had a bit of that as well, towards the beginning of the night. Thinking about it, that whiskey in the ice/water slush that I had left in my cup after my mojito was probably the grossest thing I've had in a while...but it didn't have any negative effects, and I was happily tipsy for the rest of the night. The best part of the night was hands-down the karaoke part. A big group of us inadvertently invaded the karaoke room, because we got super excited when we started shouting out songs we could all sing. The ones I particpated in (because they were all big group songs): Hit Me Baby One More Time (LOL), Shape of my Heart (a tribute to my best girls), American Pie (I sang along from the crowd of IES kids in front of the little stage, mostly remembering the words from the Weird Al version), and the winner, Living on a Prayer. God. We sand Living on a Prayer like our lives depended on it. We were SO into it. I think I was using up all my recent outpouring of love for Yale in the form of its Bon Jovi anthem among the student body. It's like the fight song: almost everyone knows Living on a Prayer. So I really enjoyed myself during that whole portion of the evening. It was also just a lot of fun to goof around dancing, especially to the random Spanish songs that a few Spanish people went up to sing. We were all so ridiculous and silly and full of mirth. The things music can do to people.

We left Kapital when it closed at 5:30. Because I live close by, I figured I'd hop on a bus and get home in like 5 minutes, and then go to sleep for a little while before heading out to be at the IES center at 7:15, to head out to Valencia. I saw a bus waiting near Atocha, so I asked the bus driver if he stopped at Embajadores, and when he said yes, I got on the bus. Next thing I know, he's tearing past Embajadores, and I don't have the sense to push the stop button to get off at the next possible place, because I figured, "Maybe he'll turn around..." BUT NO. Bus got on a highway, got off at some exit a few minutes later, on the very outskirts of Madrid...I basically had to ask him if he was going to go back to Embajadores, and he told me that I should've gotten off way earlier, and that he would probably be back there at around 6:10...I needed to be on my way at 6:40 at the latest, but I had all my stuff packed, so I figured I'd be okay. Except we barely STARTED turning around at 6:10, and then it turned out the bus didn't actually stop again at Embajadores, so I had to get off at this bus station and catch a different bus....SO, by the time I was running down the street to my apartment it was 6:40. I went inside, changed my shirt, grabbed all my stuff, and ran out, so that by 6:45, I was walking to the Metro. And SOMEHOW, I made it to the bus on time (of course, they never leave when they say they do...we left at 7:30). But it was RIDICULOUSLY stressful, especially because I could've walked home in like 15 minutes at the most. I never want to be in that position ever again. But I guess it makes for a ridiculous, crazy story.

An eventful night in Madrid. I never went to sleep, so I finally did it the way all the natives do it here. It's pretty insane; I don't know how they do it every weekend (Friday AND Saturday nights). I was more exhausted than I've been in a while (except maybe coming back from London, haha). When the bus got going, I knocked out, and slept during the entire bus ride...but still, I am totally pooped now. So, off to sleep, so I can wake up and chat with Andy on Skype, and then enjoy Day 2 of Valencia!

Ohhhhh, we're halfway there. It's so true right now. I'm actually halfway there (Yale-wise). EEK!