April 16-19

Our first full day in Madrid was a very full one. It started with a guided visit to the Museo del Prado, and I got so much more out of it with the guide than I had with my parents. He took us through the most important works of El Greco, Velazquez, and Goya. Velazquez was my favorite. I absolutely loved the detail he throws into to expressions of his paintings of court fools. I was also really impressed by the story of his particular painting of the Crucifixion of the Christ. The king of his time was so repentant from his sins that he commissioned Velazquez to create the most spiritual painting in existence. On my own, I saw the collection of paintings by Hieronymus Bosch--they are even more impressive in person than online. I also saw an exposition of English paintings of Sleeping Beauty and the Arthurian legends. These were so soft in their light, like a dream.

Our next appointment of the day was to see the Palacio Real, but our guide didn't show up on time, so we waited outside for an hour. One of our students posed as one of the street performer human statues with a hat in front of him. A crowd gathered in front of him, and in five minutes there was more money in his hat than the local artists had been able to make in an afternoon. A man told him off, with a somewhat racist comment, but instead of reacting with anger, this student calmly collected his hat and emptied it into the can of one of the street performers. I wish I was capable of such calm in the face of rudeness.

I went straight from the palace to the opera house, paying at 6:15 for an opera that was to start at 7. For 8.50 euros, I got a proscenium seat, but when I took my ticket to the usher, she realized that there was a spotlight there and transferred me to the front row. I felt strange there in my jeans, especially when a well-dressed man sat down at my right and a number of people started to greet him. I listened in and realized with a shock that he was the director of the opera, Monteverdi's Il Ritorno d'Ulysses a Su Patria (The Return of Odysseus to His Homeland).

It was thrilling. I loved it, every minute of it, from Minerva's playful meeting with Odysseus on the beach of Ithaca to the contest of the bow with the suitors. I was so close, I could see the finite expressions on the faces of the singers. The one part I didn't like was sitting through a five-minute aria about how hungry one of the characters was when I hadn't eaten anything in hours. Because it was opening night, it ran extra long with the applause, and I got back to the hotel a little late, to discover that someone had attempted to rob my friends on the metro. Everyone's adrenaline was so high, no one got to bed very early that night, either.

We went to church in the morning, and there was a lovely sermon on the Holy Spirit. Also, some of our classmates sang a lovely special music. Afterwards, Jenny was having a bad allergic reaction to something, so we returned to the hotel to get her medicine, then set out again. We walked to the Plaza Mayor--quite a distance, especially if one gets lost on the way. We enjoyed its many colorful street performers before eating lunch at the same kebab place where my family and I had eaten Chritmas eve dinner. I enjoyed my baba ghanouj immensely. Then, we walked all the way to the arc where we were supposed to meet the school--but we didn't find them. So, we walked back to the hotel, stopping to observe a protest in favor of a third republic. This was interesting, though it seemed a little silly to me.

Once we got back to the hotel, even though I was tired already, I headed to the Reina Sofia Museum to see Picasso's Guernica, and I've got to say--it is huge. More impressive to me, though, was all the documentary footage near it about the Spanish Civil War. The rest of the museum just confused me. Dali, as it turns out, did film as well as strange paintings, and this made my head hurt. There were very few pieces in this museum I actually liked, but then again, that was probably just because I was so tired. Going back to the hotel in the rain, passing the illuminated Atocha train station, my feet burned with pain and I collapsed onto the bed when I got there, not to move again until morning.

I could not believe that they saved the Escorial for the last day--it's the largest historical building in Spain. We all saw it and groaned, our feet dead. It is designed to look like a grill, in honor of San Lorenzo, who was martyred on one. We started with the library, which was by far my favorite part of it. Their extensive collection is stored in a strange way--with the spines facing the wall. For this, their large collection of Arab texts, Biblical manuscripts, and books condemned by the Inquisition are all still in excellent condition. The NEWEST book in the collection is 300 years old. Over the library door is a foreboding message that if anyone takes a book out, they will be excommunicated. In the time that was written, that wasn't just a threat of eternal damnation--it was cause for the Inquisition to take everything, and torture and kill the poor person who just wanted to take a book home.

The king who built the Escorial, Felipe II, was a man of strange contrasts. He married four times, collected Bosch's paintings, and ordered the Inquisition. One of the things that fascinated me were some early maps of America--it's impressive how accurate they were for having nothing but military reports on the territories. The main attraction of the Escorial, though, are the extensive royal burial rooms. In one room, there are over ten Spanish kings and their wives buried. This did not impress me as much as the incredibly beautiful tomb of the infamous Don Juan--there's a very life-like sculpture of him over it. As of now, no one knows where the current king, Juan Carlos, will be buried, as there is no more room left in the crypt of the kings.

Our last stop on the trip was La Valle de Los Caidos, or the Valley of the Fallen, where the dictator Franco is buried. At one time, such a monumental structure would have impressed me, but it filled me with a sickening feeling. The cross, which is as tall as the Eiffel Tower in Paris, exists only for one man, who killed anyone who disagreed with him. When I walked through the cold, tall cathedral dug into the earth, I felt almost threatened by its monumental size--as large as the Sistine Chapel in Rome. Beholding Franco's grave, shivers went down my spine. The teacher's wife explained to me how people would just mysteriously disappear--the Adventist church had to meet in secret for fear of being discovered and sent to jail.

I couldn't get out of there fast enough, to look at the beautiful valley it was built in, instead of the monstrosity it was. My reactions were so powerful, I had to record video on the spot to try and sort through it all. I was confused, at how people do these things to each other--how power corrupts and makes the powerful treat those under them cruelly. I returned to the school, pensieve. I came to Europe hoping to understand not just language, but history better, and I see certain themes repeat.

The same story happens over and over again. One man becomes more powerful than the rest, then uses his power against those he should be serving. I don't know if there is a solution, other than the hope in a God who is more just than man, fairer and more loving than the people He created. If I had any doubts as to which profession I should dedicate my life to before now, they are now wiped away. I hope that each of you comes to know, at least in part, this one hope, this one solution to the pain and problems that plague us all