Escuela and learning about Madrid

School this week has been awesome. I’m studying Spanish tons and getting way more comfortable. I’m taking a history of flamenco class which I hope is not as boring as the first class was. We watched a DVD from ‘92 that showed about 30 performances of flamenco for an hour and a half. Que aburrida. After, I was so exhausted I took a 7 hour siesta, I think that was still from my food poisoning though. My otro class, Spanish civilization y culture is going to be great. Today for my drawing Madrid Class, I bought 50 bucks worth of art supplies and we met at the Plaza Mayor. Our teacher gave us a walking tour of the area (which is in my backyard) and I learned a lot. Madrid was founded by Arab Traders in the 9th century and built great mosque around the city. The Christians razed and built over them and all that remains is one wall, which I saw today. We saw the catedral y palacio y jardin de palacio. I’ll take pics tomorrow (thanks Dad for the cam). Welcome to Jamrock by Damian Marley is a great album…go buy it. Anyways, after walking around we sat at the Plaza Mayor and painted. The teacher basically gave us no instruction and wanted to use this session as a benchmark for us. After about 15 minutes I wanted to break my charcoal in frustration but she helped me with my perspective and my drawing turned out pretty awesome. I’ll post a picture tomorrow. My teacher is obsessed that my last name is Lobdell. She says there is a painter from California named Frank Lobdell, who is one of her favorites and his paintings has a mystical property. She will not stop mentioning him to me. She swears were related. Get ready for this blog to grow into version 2.0 when I get my camera tomorrow. Adios Amigos.