Madrid, Spain.

My wallet was stolen less than an hour after landing in Madrid.

That was the welcome I got from this city. Even the French treated me better in the Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris when I was there in transit for four hours, haha!

I was taking the subway from the airport to the hotel and in the mix of exhaustion, awe, and being caught in rush hour on the Metro, I just wasn't paying attention to my bags. Luckily, I caught it almost right after I got to the hotel, so I was able to cancel my credit cards right away without there being any activity.

And I was lucky too! Really, pickpockets here in Spain are just looking for cash, so everything else valuable in my bag was left in tact - iPod, camera, cell phone, and PASSPORT, thank the Lord. Losing my passport would have been a whole different ball game...

On the upside, Madrid is AMAZING! It is so different from anywhere I've ever been, and I actually see a lot of other cities I've been to all here - I see parts of LA, NYC, Boston, Taipei, and Central America all in Madrid. It has old school culture but is still very hip and modern at the same time.

I am taking classes at la Universidad Rey Juan Carlos at the Vicálvaro campus. With my abono mensual - monthly travel pass - I take the subway to and from school. The Metro, other than being pickpocket heaven, is incredibly convenient and there are stops everywhere. I forgot where I heard it from, but Madrid's Metro is among one of the cleanest and most efficient subway systems in the world. Most of the time, the subway comes by every four minutes, and only a little bit later after 11pm. Quite a difference from dirty New York City's and Boston's slow-running T, haha! Even so, I walk EVERYWHERE. As much sunblock as I put on everyday, I can see that I'm noticeably tanner, and I'm not sure I like that! =)

One thing about Spain is that this place runs LATE. What time do I eat dinner? No earlier than 9:30pm. EVER. What time does the subway stop running? 1:30am. And Spaniards in Madrid go out EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. Not even Vegas can catch up with this town! At least in Sin City most of the industry slows down on Mondays and Tuesdays to recover. Not Madrid. You can be out any hour of the day, any day of the week. It is insane.

I am living with a host family that consists of a 51 y/o single mother, Pilar, and her 25 y/o daughter, Mónica. There is another daughter, Maria Teresa, but she's married with an adorable 2 month old son named Carlos, so she lives with her husband - but only ten minutes away so she's over pretty much everyday.

Sorry for the lack of photos in this post - more to come later. It took me a while to even get this post up because I've been computer-less for about a week. Spain has a different electric socket so I've been running around Madrid looking for a converter. Or adaptor. Whatever. The thing that changes the shape of the socket.

Oh. And just thought you'd like to know that there are a ton of Chinese people here. Again, this is pretty much like everywhere else I've been. Apparently we just love to leave our home countries and settle down elsewhere. I'll bet you $1 to guess what kind of businesses the Chinese own here.

If you said, "markets," you win. But no $1 for you, haha. The euro is so much better than the dollar that I feel like I'm flushing cash down the toilet everyday when I spend money. Back to the markets. Yep. A lot of them own little convenience stores or dollar stores. Er, I guess I mean euro stores. Haha, so as much of a novelty as I still am here in Europe, at least I know I'm not the only one!