In La Latina quarter are even normal shops. Closed on Sunday..

Rastro is a Madrid’s open sky market where you can buy literally anything. Heaps of people are coming there, probably not some much to buy anything, but more to hang around.

Thousands of people

Green shoes

Some people come and try to sell any old garbage they find in their homes

Even paintings can be bought here

But these paintings will probably be of low quality

Artistic street

Throne

Sometimes you ask: What are these things good for?

African masks

Sometimes there is a large group people watching something…

(-;

Army shop

Kamča selecting some clothes

Necklaces

Grannies

I like this shop for sailors

Wanna cow?

A sensational machine!

Plaza de España

These are some pictures from a walk around Madrid. Temple of Debod is an old Egyptian temple relocated to Madrid – wikipeadia.

Temple of Debod

Temple of Debod

View to El Campo

Royal Palace

The sky looks like in El Greco’s paintings, right?

One of the buildings in Gran Vía

Some army thing we saw

Battle horses. Must be protected from public. (-;

A lamp in Royal Palace

Kamča

One of the houses in front of the Royal Palace

View through a gate in Plaza Mayor

I love those!

This doesn’t look like Sunday evening in Olomouc (-;

Tío Pepe – actually, I don’t like that drink…

Madrid town hall

Centre of Spain (for Spaniards = centre of the Universe)

And this is a proof Kamča was there

Kamča

Town hall

Sol

Atomic prices! (-;

Cobeña

These are the first pictures from the vacation in Spain. There are pictures at first from Barajas airport and then from Cobeña, a small village outside of Madrid where lives my cousin with her boyfriend Natty. During the time we were there, there was a fiesta of the village, basically a week when nobody works and just does party. Well, actually, do you really expect anybody to work in Spain? (-;

Access to the terminal

Ceiling

Corner

Kamča, the traveller

View to the check-out area

Kamča

A public tractor cannot be missed on any village event

Feria de pueblo

Feria de pueblo

A stork nest on the roof of the church

(-;

Rain

A mess from the trees

Rainbow

Natty and Dita

Train

The another day we had to leave Morroco and Spain. We left Fes really early in the morning to Tangier. From Tangier, we took a ferry to Tarifa. From Tarifa we took a bus to Algeciras. From Algeciras we took a bus to Málaga. We left Fes at 6 AM, and arrived to Málaga at 9 PM. Quite a long journey.

The ferry from Tangier to Tarifa

In Málaga we took one day off just haging out. And the next day we took a bullet train to Madrid, and plane to Prague.

Leaving the ferry

These Spaniards have indeed nice villages

Inside the train

Train station Puerta de Atocha in Madrid

In a cafeteria in Madrid

Mp3 powered music instrument in metro.

Línea 1 de metro in Madrid

Línea 8 de metro in Madrid

Airport Barajas

Does anybody know how to handle this machine? (dashboard of tunnel to plain)

Yes, month is gone, so it’s the right time for new pictures. Me, and Tomáš went to Spain and Morocco last month, so this is the series that will show where we were.

Thomas making drinks. He is really good in partying.

The first stop was Madrid. We stayed at Thomas’ place. Yes, at the party man! At the piece of French house furniture! We saw each other after a half year when we met in Paris, and stayed together at Patrick’s parents.

Thomas and Zoya

But sadly, Thomas had to go to Germany, so we just met, and made one small party in his flat. But wait, it was something! There was some Absinth. Thomas’ favourite drink. Again! That was a fun! We sad lot of bad things about Spaniards, we complained about them a lot… [-; We drunk quite a few drinks… Nice evening…

I was also pouring and drinking this evil drink

Two witches in metro!

Metro Madrid, un mundo differente. We caught 3 witches now!

Metro Madrid

I also met my cousin Dita who almost moved from sunny Andalucia to Madrid.

A small lunch (maybe breakfast). Bocadillo de calamares. And beer, of course. Me and Dita (she looks like a Spanish girl now…). Both hangovered…

Ahhh, reminds me the old times. El Tigre completely, but completely full

This post is little bit late, but I just wanted to put some pictures here. So it will be all about my birthday party which was also the last party. It was bit small one, but because of not that many people come, I enjoyed it even more. So thanks to everyone who came!

Apparently Fillipa likes smoking shisha! She bought one in Marocco as well

The main thing in the party was smoking my new shisha.

My new shisha

Also Thorsten was smoking

Marcin smoking

We (me and Filippa) were cooking enchiladas.

Enchiladas

Thorsten and Marcin

Carmen and Thorsten

Casandra came when the party was almost over

But she gave me great present!

League cups at Edificio de Telecomunicacion

After long years, Real Madrid finally has won the title in la liga. The previous titles went to Catalunya to Barça. I have to say that I’m not really fan of Real, but I think it’s good that they won the league when I’m here. Good thing was that the decision was made in the last game of the season. Bit more tension in the air…

Crowd going in Calle de Alcala to Plaza de Cibeles

We went to watch the game to O’Neill, Irish bar in the centre. Most of the game I even didn’t think that Real will gain the game, and thus the league title. Mallorca was playing really good. Mallorca’s defense was really good, and Real’s one was quite bad. But they put all the energy to attack the opponent’s gate. Mallorca didn’t show much in the game forward, but when they were attacking, they were really dangerous. But finally 10 minutes before the end shot some goals, and won. Final score 3:1.

Plaza de Cibeles from distance

Marcin

After the game we went to Plaza de Cibeles to see the players. When I was there, I was thinking that it will be a little bit wilder. You know, Spanish are supposed to have hot blood… [-; But it turned out, that we were not in the center. But Petr told me next day that there were bottles flying in the air, and pissed police, and that they had to run to escape them… [-; (Read very aggressive police…). Maybe they called some additional troops from Barcelona. [-; Me and Marcin, we have seen only crows pushing, and bit of panic in the crowd. We also have seen just few players on the fountain. Among them Raúl dressing up the statue of Cybele to the scarf of Real.

Raul dressing up the statue of Cibeles

Camera and the crowd

Some people were SOOOO happy

My brother visited me for about a week in Madrid, and I have to put here some pictures. Also if you were looking at TV – channel TVE1 – I was there! On sunday 20.5. we randomly met Thorsten, and his sister Bettina at Plaza Mayor, and we made a small picnic there – just sandwiches with calamares. At that time there was some celebration of Madrid pork, so some guys did an interview with us, and also gave us this cerdo madrileño. Anyway there are some pictures here:

Puerta del Sol

Picnic on Plaza Mayor

Thorsten with Cerdo Madrileño con garbanzos

Bettina with Thorsten

Royal’s palace

Main cathedral in Madrid

Pepa, me, and Thorsten

Gran Vía – the main street in Madrid

Edificio de Metropolis

Thorsten, me, and Pepa on Calle de Alcalá in front of the Bank of Spain

The main post office in Madrid

Thorsten was cheating, so must be beaten! [-;

If you don’t know what tapas are, you are missing a lot! They are snacks served with drinks in Spanish bars. It’s really nice food, usually some small sandwiches, pieces of seafood, croquettes, potatoes with some sauce, olives, tortilla de patatas, and many more. Tapas are usually served between 9PM and midnight, and sometimes free, sometimes not. But they are usually quite cheap dinner (and sometimes free [-;). Sometimes you can also see the name reción which are tapas, but in bigger amount, and they are paid.

I also have to say, that I quite like food in Spain. There is lot of sea products which I can eat every day at every occasion. Also we have free food in school as encouragement for all Erasmus students to come to school, and I cannot complain in cafeteria in school since it’s free. The only complain is that Spanish food is swimming in the oil. I like that they use lot of olive oil; however not all the time. And I really don’t understand why do they pour so much oil to foods. Maybe they think that it’s such healthy thing, as my Portuguese friend was trying to explain me. I don’t trust it. It’s just oil…

Well, why am I talking about food now? Last week visited me my brother Pepa, and also Thorsten’s sister Bettina, so we went couple of times to eat in the city which is really nice experience. I post pictures from tapas restaurant close to Calle de Huertas, but I cannot recommend it since they tried to rip us off. I also include pictures from Galician restaurant which is excellent, and is located also in Calle de Huertas. Also one more thing not common for me as person from the central Europe is that in Madrid you have to wait sometimes before restaurant before you can come in, and get the food. Once we were waiting about one hour to get food. Well, we were drinking beer, so it didn’t matter so much, but you should be prepared anyway. But anyway as we say en Madrid se come de puta madre… [-;

Bettina, Pepa, and me in front of this Galician restaurant

Mussels I

Mussels II.

Me, Pepa, and Bettina

Tapas – fish at the bottom, and small sendwiches on the right side, and some salad.

San Isidro is patron of Madrid, and this tuesday (15.5.) we celebrated him here. Me, and some friends, we went to Parque de San Isidro to hang out. Some pictures are bellow, the rest HERE.

Botellón

Shoppiiiiiing

Somebody always need to make new make-up… [-;

In Metro

Yesterday we went to Kapital, one of the biggest discos in Madrid. I’m not really disco fan, but this was really cool, and I enjoyed it. 7-floor building full of tuc-tuc-tuc… [-; Ok, so better some photos…

Me and Kristin (party girl… [-;)

Dreaming Esteban….

The rest of the pictures are HERE

Let’s celebrate, we have new roommate! French girl Caroline. And also we will make an invitation party this Friday, so if you are coming over, drop me few lines…

So Caroline is coming from Marseilles, and will spend two months in Madrid doing her internship in Eurocopter. She wakes up very, very early in the morning, so she doesn’t want to party during the week, but she has promised to hang out the whole weekends… [-;

This Tuesday left my roommate Sophie. She came back to Paris to work on her thesis. We miss her so much! You know, it’s really sad when somebody is leaving. Just the process when you see the person, and you don’t know when you see her again. So I wish her good luck, and hope to see her soon!

So on Monday we made goodbye party in Calle de Huertas. At first I went to visit Sophie how is she doing (sleeping) in library in Museo de Arte de Reina Sofia, and also I went to read some books about Schiele and Kokoschka. This library is really excellent for the art books. I even found one book about Czech arts from twentieth and thirties (Sophie even has it at home). And what more. When we were about to leave the library, I randomly met one Czech girl, or better said she met me – her name is Maruška, and she studies arts at Universidad Complutense. The thing was that I was speaking Spanish with really Czech accent, so she recognized me. So this time it was good to have some accent! [-;

Then we continued to eat tapas, and also to drink some cañas. We got really lucky, since we found new bar which had really excelent tapas. Bread with something – cheese, ham, and seafood. And seafood is what I really love. I know that some people, specially Maruška couldn’t look at it, but that’s not my case, and I can eat anything from sea anytime! Maruška also got very lucky with seafood, because when she asked for some more tapas, she got calamares, but at least she got to know them. At the end of evening we even got some cañas for free. And even later gin and tonic at home finished everything… So very good one…

And this time enjoy only one picture:

It had to happen once. Party in school. Lot of drunkards from computer science went to school, even those who usually won’t come, and all of us came to enjoy Sun, paella, beer, sangria, alcohol, alcohol, alcohol…

All of us 1 – me, Tobias, Frank, Daniel, Birgit, Casandra

All of us 2 – Tobias, Frank, Thorsten, Birgit, and Daniel

Even some Spaniards came. That’s right, not only Erasmus students do party!

Tobias and Frank

Frank excited from techno music.

Casandra was smoking so much that she forgot to light the cigarette…
Poor girl…

Me with some random Spanish guy who wanted to have photo with me (Gustavo)
I’m so popular here!!! [-;

School didn’t trust us, they don’t think we are nice people, so they better hired guards. Looks like next year there will be army around.

But maybe they knew what they were doing. What would happen without guards if this nice drunk couple would do something unexpected?

Anyway all pictures are as usually here on stromecek.

On sunday we made a small picnic in the “forest” (in summer desert) Casa de Campo.

So enjoy the photos. The rest is here on stromecek as usually.

All girls together – Birgit, Carmen, Ciel, Jessica, and Steffi

Marcin and Thorsten

From left: Marcin, Birgit, Thorsten, and Carmen

This park is famous sunday walking place in Madrid. So this sunday we finally made a short walk to there. Retiro the biggest park in Madrid. It covers area about 1.4 km², and is right behind Museo del Prado. It was founded between year 1630 and 1640 as a garden for monastery. Later it has been converted to the public park. In the middle of the park, there is interesting artificial lake – Estanque de las Campanillas You can also hire boat there, but with that many people there it can’t be fun.

All pictures can be found :: HERE ::

Well, so you might think that I just travel here in Spain. Not true, not true [-;

This was waiting for us… [-;

Me and Zuzka

Some random girls [-;

Marcin (my roommate, and he usually doesn’t smoke neither… [-; ) with Zuzana

Marcin a Hanka

On the way home – me waiting on Metro in Tribunal

All pictures :: HERE ::

Ok, so another quick catch-up. Pavla visited me in Madrid, and there are some pictures from El Escorial – monastery couple of kilometers behind Madrid. El Escorial is really beautiful place, specially when you count the surrounding mountains. So there are some pics.

I haven’t written anything long time, so I have to catch up. The first will be few pictures from bull fight. I visited with Pavla and Marcin Corrida de torros in Ventas in Madrid. This was the first time I saw it, and before I had had quite bad opinion on this. Specially because I have seen some really ugly things what Spaniards are doing with bulls. I better don’t talk about that, but I have to say that my negative point of view changed a little bit.

This change was specially because of one old afficionado. We met this old guy in the stadium, and he explained us all the stuff about corrida. I really liked the way he was talking about the fighting. It was talk of a man who is real enthusiast. He explained us all from how the bulls are grown to their death. The feeling is just unexplainable.

Interesting thing is that bulls are being grown in the free nature, they don’t have any special training. They are fed by just natural grass, and they should run a lot to be strong. The decision if the bull is good enough for corrida is being made according to mother, and bulls she gave birth to before. There are also referees who can disqualify the bull to be too weak. This might happen, and actually it happened once, but the bull was not disqualified.

In every fight act 6 bulls and 6 torreros. Torrero is the main protagonist, and he is also dancing with bulls. At the end he kills the bull. He is supposed to kill him with sword through hole in backbone to hearth (here he is called matador). There are also banderilleros who plays with the bulls, guys on the horses.

Anyway corrida is very popular, but depends on who is the torrero. I was in the game where was no famous or really good torrero. So the stadium was quite empty, but when there is somebody famous, the game is sold out. Also I should note that corrida is no competition. It’s only performance, so everybody is trying to be elegant.

The old guy also admited that lot of people might not like it. Even king’s family is divided. King and his daughter like corrida, but his wife and son don’t. He told us that king come always three times a year (maybe more, but three times for sure), and he sits in his part of auditorium once, and twice in the first row.

So some pictures as always.

Since last week we have full flat. The first person is french girl Sophie who is writing her thesis from Spanish historical photography. She lives with me for 2 weeks. And last thursday moved in Polish guy Marcin who is doing Erasmus at FI UPM as me. That means that I don’t accept any offers for new roommates. [-;

So as I said the crew is complete for this semester, and yesterday we went to celebrate that. We went to one Gallegan restaurant near Anton Martín. From the beginning it looked like the whole Madrid wants to eat with there, because all the restaurants were full. And also we had to wait about 40 minutes for the meal. This is exactly what I don’t like. Well, but positive side of this was to have at least some beer before dinner. We had some seafood – some shells, navajas, octopus. That’s the best kind of food I can have [-;

I still didn’t show any picture of my new roommates. So on the next is photo is the whole group. From left clockwise: Marcin, Sophie, me, and Natalie who went to dinner with us.