Salamanca

The south of Spain is much hotter than up here in the north. The trip to Cordoba was wonderful. I fell in love with the city; I found where I want to come back to live. We saw the Mesquita. It used to be the largest mosque in the world when Cordoba was the center of arabic culture. After the conquistas it was turned into a catholic cathedral which it still is today. You know the pictures of Spain with a hall full of red and white arcs? That´s where we were. A whole big section of the town is considered a historic preservation site. It´s the largest remaining Jewish quarter in any southern city. Most of the Jewish quarters were destroyed durring their expulsion. It was 42 degrees centigrade, which means well over a hundred farenheit. The heat kind of whiped me out. I haven´t really recovered from it until today. I think I got a little heat stroke there.
Anyway, that was Friday. Saturday was a nine hour bus ride from Granada to Salamanca. My new ¨family¨is a single mom with a seven year old daughter. One of the first things she said was that her house is our house while we´re here. She´s much nicer and more open than the last people. And apparently the last people were really jipping us on the food too. No wonder I was always hungry! I guess our last family was not normal as far as food, but at least they were nice.
As much as I like the food and new family, I don´t like that´s it´s a half hour walk from school and part of it up this big BIG hill. A well, work off that home cookin´.
Also my glucometer just stopped working. I don´t think it was the battery because it never showed a low batter signal or anything. So, I´m woking on that. I also underestimated things like soap, so I get to try some spanish brands.
Sunday we rested. I tried to find the church branch, but the internet didn´t have an adress or anything so I didn´t have much to go off of. I went on a little walking tour of city Sunday evening and let me tell you, what a city. Once you get the main part of town (not where I live) it´s like walking through history. We saw one of the oldest universities in Europe, for example right next to a historic house called the house of the dead. I like this city much more than Granada, but Cordoba was still my favorite.
Last night was a huge deal for Spain. They won against Italy for the European cup. They one 4-2 in penalty kicks after overtime. At the winning kick, you could hear a roar go up in the street. People streamed into the street waving flags and singing. I stuck to cheering from the balcony and watching the (illegal?) fireworks.
Today was class all morning. We were half an hour late because my roomate and I got so lost. The teacher was shouting the whole time (she kind of had to in order to be heard over this one group) which was really annoying, but we reviewed two tenses that I learned last semester, and I feel like I got a better grasp on it this time.
Tomorrow, my roomate and I are going to go picture taking and historical site seeing around the city. After class of course.

Side notes:
Kellie - I got about a one minute clip of that concert. They asked us not to take picture while they were playing, so the screen is black but the sound is good.
- I don´t know any further plans about Italy. The family that really wanted to go are leaving Spain tomorrow and not coming back until the plane out.
- Portugal is a two hour bus ride away.