Prado, Caixa, y Volver

Thursday was our first field trip to the Museo del Prado - home of the works of some of Spain's most renowned artists such as El Greco, Velazquez, and Goya who we will be studying for the next few weeks.

Walking in and up to the 2nd floor where the the museum's most known and arguably beautiful works were, we passed by Velazquez's Las Meninas, one of the most famous works of Western art. DESAFORTUNAMENTE our teacher decided to plot us down on a bench 20 feet away from it while she lectured for about 30mins about spanish history and epochs and which artist belonged to which. No worries, we're going back twice.

After our trip to the museum we decided to grab some lunch. Assuming that most restaurants around the Prado would be ridiculously expensive, we opted to go little bit off the beaten path. In one small bar/restaurant we saw something on the menu about 6 tostas (toasted bread topped with any given number of things) for 24.60 Euro, meaning about 6 Euro a person - DEAL. The plate of total 8 pieces of tostas they gave us was alright, nothing to scream about. About 20 mins later we began wondering if there were anymore tostas coming - the answer was no. Apparently 6 meant 6 pieces total, and I guess they threw in 2 more just because. 6 euro for 3 pieces of toasted bread plus 2 for a tiny Coca-Cola. WORST PLACE EVER. We paid, left and headed over to Sol for ice cream. Be sure to note that we are going to that area again for more museum trips, and each time we will remember and scold that damn place.

Aside from that pure failure, the rest of the night was alright. We went to the Caixa Forum ("kai-sha" in catalan), basically an art gallery for new, young spanish artists. The building itself is pretty awesome, red all over and with a vertical garden that you must see to believe AND an enormous statue of an elephant standing upside-down on its trunk. Just the outside beats any trip I've made to SF MOMA. There was a special exhibition of Miquel Barcelo's work, a very important artist of today's Spanish artists, which was pretty cool, but the true highlight was the photo exhibition, a collection of documentary photography of events/happenings from different parts of the world. The winning collection was that of one photographer who simply took medium head shots of Pakistani women who had be violently harmed or beaten. Many of them were attacked with acid and severely disfigured, many of the reasons were due to disputes with another family, marrying a certain man or refusing to marry another. Truly captivating and heartbreaking.

The rest of the night was not as intense. Most of us in the apartment decided to stay in and rest. I got to watch Volver again show it to a few of my apt mates for the first time, something I always relish doing. I envy people watching movies like that for the first time, because there's nothing like it. I should know, I've seen it countless times. That same involvement, captivation, and suspense is never the same after you know everything that happens. Nonetheless, I still love it for all that it is and what it has meant to me.

The next day I made it a point to make a list of all the Almodovar film spots in the city that I want to see and mark them on a map. It seems a little silly to go to these places just because I saw them in a movie, I know. I don't expect to find and meet him or Penelope Cruz or anyone from his films just by being here and going to those places. But it does seem like this as close as I can get. And I'm more than fine with that.