First Day! Airports, Tapas, Walking and More!

Hey everyone! Ok, I know I´m a few days behind but I finally found a stable source of internet at my hotel. So for the limited amount of time I have right now, I´ll talk about my trip over and the first day. I left my house around 2 pm (Houston time) on Sunday Aug. 22. My companion for the 9 hour 40 min flight to Frankfurt, Germany was my mother who wanted a little vacation with me as well as help get me settled over here. We flew Lufthansa (business class) in the nose of a double decker plane. The capitain and the first class passengers were upstairs, so automatically I knew this would be a cool flight. My mom and I had some lovely pre-departure snacks and drinks. Soon we were off, taking pictures of the clouds outside of our plane and eventually the sunset. We watched a few movies, ate some delicious food (cheeses, beef ribs, salmon, dessert etc.
At around 9 am we landed in rainy Frankfurt and had to hop off the plane outside and take a little bus in. We found our way to customs and in front of us was the whole Azerbaijan football (soccer) team, heading somewhere. I was trying to pick some words out that they were saying but for me the Russian part of their dialect was too distored lol, so I only knew a few words. After we got through customs, we sat in a lounge waiting for the connecting flight to Madrid. My mom wanted to try some franks and sauerkraut, which was ok but then again, we were in the airport. Two hours later we were on the plane to Madrid, and as the plane was boarding, an influx of Spanish people filled the seats and I was one step closer to my favorite city.
We arrived in Madrid around 2pm but my mom´s friend who was meeting us there, had no cell service and for at least 15 mins. we couldn´t find her. Thankfully, she had bought a calling card and reached us by phone and she met us on the ground floor. We hopped in a taxi and 20 mins later arrive at the Westin Palace Hotel near the Parque del Retiro, the Prado Museum and just 10 mins down the street from my dorm and the center of the city. The hotel is a gorgeous nearly 100 year old building with beautiful marble floors, a huge rotunda with a stained glass dome and cute shops. The interesting part of checking in was that we had JUST missed the entire USA National Basketball team who had played Madrid the night before, and had stayed at this hotel. They have the World Basketball competition in Turkey this upcoming weekend so this was just a friendly match, that they won by 1 point (86-85). I was so close to meeting Lamar Odom. I could´ve scaled down my degrees of separation from the Kardashians by one....oh well lol.
After we settled into our hotel, we all were in need of something to eat, so the concierge recommended this marketplace (Mercado de San Miguel) near Plaza Mayor, that had tapas and other things to eat. I guided my mom and her friend, past Sol and straight to the market, which was indoors and had seafood, tapas, chocolates, cheeses, meats, all at different stands. We searched around for some empty seats at one of the bars at each end and finally found some chairs. We got a little bit of everything, some croquets with chorizo (Spanish sausage) with cheese, salmon with caviar spread, fresh grilled shrimp, cod, and some other things. To make it an authentic Spanish tapas ¨dinner¨ (really it was around 6, so snack time) we had some sangria! Everything was delicious and after we finished we decided to walk to my dorm. We walked up the street to the center of the city, then up another street, Calle de Preciados, which had tons of shops, a huge department store (El Corte Ingles), a huge European version of Best Buy (FNAC) and around the corner was a huge movie theater (Inception is still playing here). Just a minute from the movies and just past a cute cafe, was the street of my dorm. We couldn´t get in at this point though we tried ringing the bell, but the inside of the ground floor had dark wood floor and looked nice. I´m living on the first floor (think ground floor then 1st)and I will meet my roommate Daisy, from Sugar Land, on Friday. So really Day 1 was just trying to find food, and walking around my area to see my living space. I think I am in a pretty awesome location, so I´m excited to actually live there.
We went back to the hotel and went to bed around 11pm but around 4 am, my mom woke me up as well as her friend, talking to my dad on the phone and trying to get her friend´s husband through to speak with her. So sleep the first day was minimal but we got enough sleep to deal with Day 2. I´ll post more about my past couple of days this weekend, so stay tuned.

Besos y Abrazos