My Wish

"My wish for you is that life becomes all that you want it to.
Your dreams stay big, your worries stay small,
You never need to carry more than you can hold.
And while you're out there getting where you're getting to,
I hope you know somebody loves you,
And wants the same things too."

This has been my very favorite song for the past... three years. Hands down. Nothing tops it. I often listen to it and think about my life, thinking about all the people that love me, that feel that way about me, thinking about all the things I want my life to become. I think about my dreams, the ones that came true, the ones that didn't, the ones I still wait for and hold in my heart, and the ones I'm living every single day.

However, more often than I think about my dreams and the wishes I have for me, I think about the people I care about more than anything, and the wishes I have for them. And somehow, it means a lot more to me than my own dreams and my own wishes. There's something wonderful about seeing someone else's dream come true, watching their successes, their happinesses. Loving others somehow makes more of a difference in my life than any amount of love anyone has for me.

"If it's cold outside,
Show the world the warmth of your smile"

When you share a smile, you can't see it yourself.
But it blesses your life anyway.


- song: My Wish - Rascal Flatts

Only in Spain...

would you go to class in the morning and find the outer door's lock glued shut, yet STILL have class, in a different building, which class consists of talking about everything under the sun and pretending to try to get the computer to work so you can have REAL class, then going back to the original building for your SECOND class of the day, watching two men drill the door open, entering, and then having class in the normal classroom, which class consists of girls against boys Scrabble and Scattergories, and learning all the words you should never say in Spanish, just for your information, so that you don't accidentally say them.

Today was the day of the "Huelga General" - general strike - in Spain, maybe just in Madrid, not sure. There were stickers stuck all over EVERYWHERE, and people had gone along last night gluing the doors of businesses shut so that people wouldn't be able to enter and work. By noon or so, most people had made it into their stores, though a large majority were still closed. There was picketing and flag-waving in the plaza, large groups of police officers everywhere, on the watch for chaos, etc. In Madrid it's the same, only on a much larger scale - we were advised not to go to Madrid today just in case there were picketings in the stations or Metros, etc.

Well, I don't know that a strike such as this will really work, but it sure made for a great day at school! :)

My Achilles heel...

So I have a weakness for good deals...

And shoe stores...

The good news is I got all of them for under 9 Euros each... that makes it okay, right???

No worries, the end of summer sales will soon be over. Hopefully my wallet survives until then... haha. Just kidding. It will. I promise. :)

Bus ride to nowhere

Trip 3 - Cuenca day trip

Okay, so maybe it wasn't that bad. But seriously, we spent all day in a small town where there really isn't an incredible amount to see - that we knew of. After Cuenca, I resolved to research the places we're going before we go, so that I know what's there and what things I want to find if we have free time.

We first stopped in Ucles, at a monastery that was originally a sort of fortress, but during the Reconquista of Spain (where the Christians swept through the country and kicked everyone else out) it was converted to a monastery. It's been declared a National Monument of Spain.

Our group outside the monastery

The main chapel of the monastery

The holy water horse trough? Don't ask me...

The view between Ucles and Cuenca. Note the windmills. We're in the province of Castilla La Mancha (side note: does that make anyone else think Castilla La Munchie? I'm thinking Fritos Corn Chips. Thank you, mother, for singing that advertisement to me all my life.) Anyway, Castilla La Mancha is the setting for the famous Don Quijote, if anyone remembers the part where he tries to fight the windmills - that would be why. It's quite windy, open, dry, etc here, perfect for windmills. And Quijotes, too, apparently. And munchies. Right. Moving on.

We then continued to Cuenca. Cuenca is built on a hill. All the good stuff is at the top, and of course, the buses have to stay at the bottom....

Lovely park in Cuenca
Our group in front of the cathedral in Cuenca.

The cathedral in Cuenca was the first Gothic style cathedral built in Spain - in the 1100s, though it has undergone some changes since that time.

Another thing Cuenca is famous for is the "Casas Colgadas" (hanging houses). These are houses built literally hanging over the edge of a cliff - typical in medieval times, but only a couple remain. They currently house the Museum of Abstract Art, which we also visited.

Las Casas Colgadas. Cool, huh?

Unfortunately, you had to go out on THIS bridge to get the full view.

I'm not even kidding, the bridge got narrower the farther out you went on it... at least, that's how it felt to me! And it shook when you walked on it... This picture was taken out about 10 feet. That's as far as I got. :) Melanie took my camera out and took pictures for me. I stayed on solid ground where I belonged!

Museum of Abstract Art. Can I just say, I hate art museums? Especially modern ones? Seriously, what IS this?!

Okay. This does NOT even count as art. I thought it was a blank display. No. That IS the art. Completely ridiculous.

All in all, Cuenca was cool, but, as Melanie put it, kind of a letdown after our other trips. However, it was kind of nice to just chill in a beautiful little city in the fall sunshine and enjoy being Spanish for a few hours.

So innocent looking...

This:

Has it in for me.

I don't think sitting down is going to be comfortable for at least a week.
Stupid futbol. Who needs you anyway...

Institute

Scriptures.
Singing a hymn.
Prayer.
Refreshments.
Laughter.
Friendship.
Peace.
New friends.

Excellent. Can I just say, I love Spain, I love the people I met tonight, and I love the gospel with my whole heart? No matter how out of place I feel, the gospel feels like home - no matter where or with who or in what language.

Humorous story of the day: So I go to institute with Melanie and a friend of a companion of my best missionary friend. I met this friend, Ana Elena, for the first time tonight - she was awesome, I really like her. Anyway, we get to Institute, and I met some more people, and we're talking to one of them, Alma, and she says, "Oh, I know about you, Elder Morales talked about you!" Basically, my best missionary friend's companion went home and told friends about how his companion's girlfriend was coming to Spain to study translation. And this girl remembered when she met me. I'm famous. Spain welcomes me with open arms. Isn't life random sometimes?

A rainy Catholic weekend...

Trip 2 - Leon, Burgos, and various small towns with castles and cathedrals.

Thursday, September 16 - we left early morning by bus and headed to the province of Castille y Leon - north and west of Madrid.

On our way we stopped at this fantastic castle:
It looks like castles out of fairytales! However, this type of castle is very much designed for armies and fighting. It had narrow halls and small doors, so that large numbers of soldiers couldn't pass through at the same time, it had a dry moat surrounding it with the pillar that supported the drawbridge anciently still standing, and it had walls and towers with holes built just for shooting arrows. Very defense-oriented- and incredibly cool!


After stopping at said castle, we continued to Leon. Leon is a lovely city full of cute houses and quaint streets, and a cathedral that was AMAZING. This cathedral contains over 1800 square meters of stained glass - the most stained glass in any cathedral in Spain.






While touring the cathedral, it started raining. It didn't want to STOP raining, so we headed out into the rain to another church/museum our tour guide wanted to show us. I was foolish enough to have left my umbrella in the bus, and I got soaked. It was only about 45, 50 degrees Farenheit, and sadly I remember very little of whatever church/museum we went to after the cathedral, because I was so cold... it was awful. By the time we finished there, the rain had slowed, but we were now faced with trying to find something to eat at about 7pm. Just so you all know, basically that's impossible. Lunch ends around 5, and dinner doesn't start until about 8, and basically all the restaurants close. We finally found a supermarket and bought bread and lunchmeat and went back to our hotel and had a lovely picnic in one of our rooms. And I got dried off :)

That evening we went to a concert in the cathedral at Leon. It was SUPPOSED to be an organ concert, we thought, but it turned out to be Baroque style orchestra music, by Mozart and such. It was very excellent music - I went right to sleep, which means they did a very good job... I'm not much of a classical music person... but it was amazing being in such an amazing building for a concert!

Friday, September 17 - we went to Burgos, stopping a couple times on the way to see more churches. (By this point, we'd seen probably 4 churches, all very similar...) Once in Burgos, we ate lunch at an overpriced cafe, had a dance party in my bedroom at the hotel, watched a Spanish drumline march down the street below our hotel balcony/window, ventured into the freezing wind to do some shopping, took pictures with a statue of El Mio Cid (a legendary figure in an "epic poem" from Spain - one of the most important literary works in Spanish history. He lived in Burgos, supposedly), then enjoyed churros y chocolate in the cafe across the street from the hotel.

The little balcony off our hotel room

Awesome Spanish drumline!

Statue of El Mio Cid

At this point, most of the group went back, but Kenneth and Melanie and I wandered the streets of Burgos, and this is what we found:

Excellent trees to climb! Super fun.

We also found this awesome performance of people dancing around with fire, scattering flaming coals and dancing over them, which ended in a large bonfire in the middle, I have no idea what it was all about but it was super cool! I tried uploading a video, but it wouldn't work... sorry...

Saturday, September 18 - we first toured Burgos officially with our tour guide, entering the cathedral and passing through the Plaza Mayor - where the fire dance had been the night before. Then we jumped on the bus and went to the Cartuja de Miraflores - which is a monastery where the monks are only allowed to talk for one hour on Sundays, after dinner. It was basically just another church, but they showed us these Catholic rosaries that are made of beads made from compressed rose petals. There are 3000 rose petals in all. All of the girls bought one. I don't even know any Catholics! It was, however, very cool.

Outside the cathedral at Burgos

Altar showing the "tree of Jesse" - Christ's family tree - in the Cathedral at Burgos

We then proceeded to visit various medieval-ish villages, in which were MORE churches. By the last one we were so tired of churches that we opted to hike to this statue on the hill overlooking the town instead. It's a statue of the Virgin Mary. The view was absolutely beautiful! It was my favorite part of the whole weekend.

Covarrubias - one of the towns we went to.

Looking over the town of Silos from the hillside where the statue was.

Me and the virgin looking over the town.