Málaga & Córdoba

On Thursday the 22nd we finally moved into our apartment. We picked a place in the center of the city on a pedestrian back-street with an absolutely picturesque view of the cathedral and the street below. The apartment is quite big, it has three bedrooms (one room has two beds), two bathrooms, a kitchen, living room, patio and a balcony all for 500 Euro a month, meaning rent is a measly $250 a month per person. There are some setbacks to the apartment… like it lacks an oven (which we did not notice until we bought a frozen pizza and had nowhere to cook it but the stove top), the TV is quite small and fuzzy, a couple of the doors and the door to the refrigerator don’t close quite right, there is almost non-existent storage room in the kitchen and the bathrooms, and there’s no light in one of the bathrooms… but these are all minor details that the landlady agreed to fixing. Her and her husband bought us a new flat-screen TV, they ordered an electrician to fix the lighting, and they are allowing us to buy all new pots and pans along with more storage space. We did not, however, ask for an oven. The picture to the left is the view from my balcony.

The first weekend we had our apartment we decided to take a little weekend trip. For the weekend Holly and I decided to go to Málaga, a beach town that is supposed to be really beautiful and relaxing. Well, Málaga was kind of a dirty dump with not much to do or see besides the beach, which we never made it to (I will explain why later).

It was Halloween. Upon arriving we went to an internet cafe to try and find a hostel. We left behind my absolutely favorite green sweater and Holly's cell phone. Once we got checked into the hostel and realized we had left her cell behind, I called it to hear some shady dude at the other end claiming he was a "friend" of the cell phone owner. I challenged him, "No, you stole my friends phone," and he agreed to meet us at the bus station in ten minutes to return it. For some reason, we believed him, and went to the bus station. Of course, he wasn't there and he had shut the phone off so we couldn't call him back. So we spent the first two or three hours of the trip 1. Trying to get Holly's phone back and 2. Trying to buy her a new phone. Great start to our beach-town vacation. Afterwards we headed to an over-priced Picasso museum with not so exciting pieces of his art (his best works are all in Barcelona and Madrid). By this time, it was too late to go to the beach, so we decided to nap and then start drinking for Halloween. We painted our faces, I was a cat, and Holly was a cat victim, and we headed out to the botellón in the middle of a park about only 1 block from our hostel. Everyone was dressed up in scary costumes- I think they were better at dressing up for Halloween than Americans actually are. Eventually, somewhere between botellón and going back to the hostel, I lost the hostel keys (not sure how I managed that). In the morning, I vomited bile, eww, and when I told Holly the news she wisely proclaimed, "Let’s cut our losses and go to Córdoba instead." "Yes, definitely." The bus left at 4pm and so we wandered around the streets and parks of Malaga like hung over homeless people.

Our arrival in Córdoba was quite pleasant. Córdoba is up for the “2016 European Capital of Culture” and I would not be surprised if it won. The entire city is sparkling clean and very well put together. There are historical sites and green parks… the city is just a nice place to be in general. Córdoba is famous for La Mezquita, meaning The Mosque in English. The building and place where it stands has quite a bit of history to it. The first religious site to stand there was the Christian Visigoth church of St. Vincent, built in the year 600. Muslims started invading Southern Spain in 711, which led Muslims to tear down the church and build a mosque in its place in 784, finishing its construction in 987. In 1236, Córdoba was reconquered by Spain and the inside of the mosque was partially transformed into a Catholic church. The mosque is now famous for its jasper columns and it’s oddly placed catholic nave smack in the middle. It was, to say the least, absolutely strange and extremely intriguing.

Our trip to Córdoba also included a trip to the Arab baths. The baths were an extremely relaxing experience—three different rooms with three different temperatures. There was a (very) cold bath, a room temp bath, and an (extremely) hot bath. There was also a sauna and a 15 minute massage included. It was a great way to end our day in Córdoba and head back to Jaén.

Now, it turns out that my massive hangover and dehydration Sunday resulted in a clogged, bacteria infected salivary gland on Monday. My upper jaw, below my right ear, swelled to the size of a golf ball within a couple of days. It's fair to say it's immensely swollen and painful, but it seems to be improving with the aid of a good dental specialist and antibiotics. We could say that I am going to avoid Malaga for as long as humanly possible.

Hasta pronto!
Molly