Cervantes Week, Paris, Other Random Thoughts

The town that I live in , Alcala, is where Miguel Cervantes, author of the novel Don Quijote, was born. Every year they have Cervantes Week where they do reinactments of his stories and the plaza is converted into a medeival marketplace. The venders dress up in old clothes, there are donkeys and other farm animals in the streets, and there are a ton of little shops selling everything from spices and cheese to jewlery to toys to delicious food and drinks. At the end of the festival, a person dressed as Don Quijote (complete with armor) and a person dressed as Sancho Panza, his sidekick, ride through the plaza on a horse and donkey. There are also groups of singers drinking beer and singing traditional Spanish songs (not sure if that´s a great combination) on about every corner. It´s a very unique festival and people come from all over Spain to attend it.
That was a few weekends ago but I forgot to write about it earlier. This past weekend I made a trip to Paris. Other people in my group had already gone and they didn´t think it was that great and warned me that everyone would probably be mean to me if I spoke Spanish. False and false. I thought Paris was a really pretty city and everyone there was incredibly nice, even when I spoke in English (which I did most of the time since it is more prevelant than Spanish). Our first stop was the Eifel tower, just 15 minutes from our hotel, which was something in itself--if I stretched my arms out I could reach both sides of the room, the showers were outside, and it could definitely use a good spring cleaning. But it was cheap and I figure I better stay in these sorts of places before I get old and care about things like germs and heat :)
The Eifel Tower is definitely something to see, if only for its magnitude. I don´t know what exactly I was expecting, but I didn´t expect it to be so gigantic! We posed for some pictures and I tried to recreate a photo of my Grandpa Good that was taken of him in front of the Eifel Tower during World War II. It´s odd to think about the vastly different circumstances that brought us to the same place. My worries at the time were about midterms while his were about winning a war. Just some food for thought.
We climbed the 668 steps to the second deck of the tower before taking the lift to the very top of the Tower. The views of the city from the top were pretty cool. We saw the Eifel tower both during the day and at night when it was all lit up. Every hour at night there is a light show where the Tower sparkles for 5 minutes. We decided to be very French and bought some wine and a block of cheese to eat by the Eifel Tower at night. Very cliche, I know. But being shortsighted, we didn´t think about how to uncork the bottle, which lead to me going into a random restaurant and asking a waiter if he would uncork it for us if I gave him a Euro, which he did.
We also went to the Louve, though we didn´t go in because of the huge line, but instead walked around the park next to it, looking at the sculptures there. We went on to the Notre Dame cathedral and marvelled at its beautiful stained glass windows. We hit a couple restaurants for crepes, which of course were amazing. We didn´t have much time there (only 2 days!) so I would love to go back and see all the things I missed if I ever have a chance.
On the plane to Paris I was reading the Spanish newspaper and there was an article about the Spanish Prime Minister´s visit to Washington. There was a part of the article where the Minister said that the key to peace in the middle east is in Obama´s hands. Through the news and just talking to Spanish citizens, I have come to the conclusion that the world has a lot more confidence in our President than we do.
This weekend will be dedicated to studying for my midterms coming up next week. But it shouldn´t be too bad because I have something pretty awesome to look forward to after I finish testing on Wednesday--my parents and Nikki will be here on Thursday!!!