May 19th

Day one of class today and it seems like we've been here forever already! We had a gentleman from Scotland who has a degree in Spanish history give us a presentation about the history of Spain. It was interesting to hear a combination of a Scotish and Spanish accent. Interestingly enough we found out that the symbol for the dollar ($) comes from the Spanish crest which depicts the pillars of Gibraltar wrapped in ribbon.

We were done with class by 1:30 PM and had the rest of the day to see the sites. Sherry, Megan, Joya, Mariya, Jaime, Jeremy, and myself found a nice place to eat right across the street from our hotel. When we were done with lunch we spent several hours walking around the streets of Madrid. We walked by the palace and several very old and beautiful churches before I finally came back to the hotel to crash.