Week 8 in Sevilla

 Entry 9

    The Week

Finals week! I had one final last week, but the rest were all this week so one on Monday, a mini presentation on Wednesday, and two tests and an oral exam on Thursday. I had tutoring with my kids on Tuesday which was a nice break from studying. I was thrilled for Thursday when I was finally done with everything, but I didn't get a lot of downtime as I spent Thursday night packing and then headed to the airport early Friday morning.

    The Weekend

            Friday

We went to Vienna this weekend! Isabel and I somewhat last minute joined Margo and Julia's trip to Viena because Friday was Isabel's birthday, so we wanted to take a little trip to celebrate. I was surrounded by children on the flight there, but the flight was direct and only a few hours, and they were all sweet, so I didn't mind. 

First impressions of Vienna/Austria: the bathrooms are WAY nicer (I hate Spain's public bathrooms). The U.S. also needs to take notes on these restrooms because the stalls actually go down to the floor and there is spray to wipe the toilet seats. I appreciate it so much more after Spanish bathrooms where you're lucky to find soap/toilet paper/a working hand dryer/and sometimes a toilet seat--and you're definitely not finding all of them in the same bathroom.

my mom is going to laugh at this, but look at how big and nice the bathrooms were

We were a bit rushed on arrival because we landed in the afternoon and had to check in at the hostel, grab something quick for dinner, and then figure out how to get to the Vienna State Opera House. We figured out the airport train and Vienna metro without much issue--thankfully--and checked into our rooms at the hostel, with Margo and Julia being in a separate room from Isabel and I since we booked it at different times. When Isabel and I checked in, we were the only ones in the room and it looked quite nice and clean, but it all goes downhill later. We grabbed mini sandwich things at the metro station and ate on the ride over to make sure that we got to the opera house early which was nice because we weren't worried about being late and we were able to look around before the show started. The show itself was a romantic comedy in Italian and it was absolutely amazing but also exhausting because we were standing for three hours.

Me! during intermission, on a patio, because it was sweltering inside

After the show, we wanted to try the Sacher torte cake that Vienna is known for and as a pseudo birthday cake for Isabel. We found a place next door to the opera that we didn't really do any prior research on, we just searched the cake and picked the closest spot, but it was actually a semi famous restaurant known for its cake and it had a little history section in its menu, so it was an accidental perfect pick. We tried the cake, sang Isabel happy birthday, bought her a glass of wine, and our very sweet server taught us danke schön, which is the extra polite and common way to say thank you there. 

Me! about to try my cake

We got a bid sidetracked heading back to the hostel because we could see the top of a cathedral and wandered to find the building, but it was worth the short detour because the pattern in the roof was amazing and there was a mini model of the cathedral. 

When we got back to the hostel, men had filled the empty beds in our room and taken all of the towels, touched/moved all of the bedding which had been folded, and the room REEKED of BO, as in genuinely difficult to breathe through your nose. With how tired I was at this point; this was basically worst-case scenario, but the hostel moved us into another room quickly and it was occupied but still a major improvement.

            Saturday

We started by going out for breakfast on Saturday morning. Food is pretty expensive in Austria, but it seemed worth it to start out the day with a full meal, especially since our dinner was small. Once again, did very little research but I picked an awesome restaurant because the food was great, but more importantly, I tried to order the "chocolate milk" only to learn it was hot chocolate and I was devasted and then the server offered to make me regular cold chocolate milk and I was so happy, and it was delicious.

Me! with my first chocolate milk in two months

From there, we went to the museum quarter and started at the, Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien, which is a history of art museum. I don't generally love art museums but as this involved history too, the paintings had little descriptions and often historical context and characters, so I loved this museum. As Spain and Austria were connected through marriage alliances in the 16th century, I was also able to find several Spanish monarchs that I had learned about in my history class and see others that I would learn about literally the Monday that I got back from the trip which I think is just so funny and cool. I also discovered my favorite painting here and I didn't have one prior so that's kind of cool.

Me! with my favorite painting: Bouquet in a Blue Vase

We spent a few hours in this museum before somewhat splitting up as Margo had a tattoo appointment, Julia wanted a break at the hostel, Isabel had another art museum in mind, and I wanted to see the natural history museum that was across from the other one. Isabel and I bought little sandwiches from a grocery store and ate them in the park that lies between the two museums before splitting off to our different museums. I spent a couple hours in the Natural History Museum, mostly because they closed at 6pm or I definitely could have spent longer in there and I actually wasn't able to finish all of the exhibits unfortunately.

Isabel and I met back up after our respective museum trips and then met everyone back at the hostel where we discovered that a weird man had moved into our new room. He was honestly a bit unsettling but thankfully was gone most of the night. We regrouped and then did a quick run to the metro/bus station, where there were several shops, and we bought quick things to take with us back to the hostel. I bought a wiener schnitzel burger--since it felt like I had to try it before I left--and an ice cream cone that I ate on the 1 block walk back to the hostel.

            Sunday

We got up fairly early on Sunday to get as much done as possible before our flight in the afternoon. We went to the Schoenbrunn Palace which honestly, I found a bit underwhelming after being surrounded by the gorgeous architecture in Sevilla, it wasn't really my style, but the gardens behind the palace were amazing. I wish things had been blooming during our visit but as the weather is still cold, unfortunately there weren't too many flowers, and the fountains were not filled. There was a really pretty area and view at the top of a hill that only killed me a little to climb (the opera at the start of the trip was possibly a bad idea because my feet were in agony the rest of the trip).

From there, we headed to the Belvedere Museum but found something to eat on the way there, at the metro station again, as there was a bakery nearby. This museum was a bit more art focused than the first, so my interest waned depending on what area I was in. One room had painted ceilings that were basically an optical illusion as it appeared as though there was molding and pillars, only to realize that its only paint and is all completely flat. This room obviously had my full attention, and I could have spent half an hour staring up meanwhile I more or less just strolled right through the modern/abstract art rooms.

After the museum, we went back to the hostel to collect our bags and then headed to the airport. I, of course, have incredible luck and was "randomly selected" to be patted down and had to wait ten minutes for a woman to be available to pat me down while my friends waited. Other than that, security was quick, and the flight was fairly short although frustrating. There was a family sitting behind Isabel and me, and generally I have a lot of patience for children in airplanes and mostly don't mind them, but the dad was really testing my patience because he was hitting the back of my seat the entire flight, while playing some game with his daughter where he pretended that my seat was a screen or something, I'm not sure. The daughter was hitting Isabel's seat so neither of us were able to sleep on that flight which brought us to Palma. We landed on Sunday night and stayed in that airport until our flight left at 7am on Monday morning. We arrived around 9:30 and all of the food options closed at 10 so I was only able to grab a tortillas patatas sandwich for dinner as every other option was already closing. Sleeping in the airport was a terrible experience because it was freezing, and layering all of my clothes didn't help. I slept on and off for a total of maybe two hours.

We arrived back in Sevilla on Monday morning, where I rushed back to my apartment for a quick shower and then ran right back to the metro to get to school, feet aching and running on two hours of sleep.

    Food

I bought a pizza bread thing at the metro station on the way to the opera house; 5/10, it was fine but nothing special. The Sacher torte was dark chocolate cake with a thin layer of apricot filling; 8/10, delicious but a little dry on its own, I think it would have been so good with a cold glass of milk. My chocolate milk and breakfast; 10/10, all of it was so good. I had a sandwich at the park in the museum quarter; 4/10, meh, it was cheap and filled my stomach so good enough. The wiener schnitzel burger; 7/10, good but basically just a fried chicken sandwich. My ice cream cone and these candies I found that are kind of like York substitutes; 10/10, can't go wrong with either of those things. My bakery breakfast on Sunday morning was a cinnamon roll and something labeled "chocolate dessert" which sounded right up my alley; 10/10, both were so good, the chocolate dessert was like a mini Sacher torte but with a fudge frosting layer that solved the dryness issue, and I bought a little chocolate milk with it, and it was all such good breakfast.