I've waited much too long to write this entry. Here are the past two weeks.

Amsterdam, Brussels and Bruges

My trip was a lot of fun, although at times decision-making was a little stressful with eight people. We didn't plan much in advance, which ended up working out pretty well. Amsterdam was one of the most wonderful and bizarre cities I've ever been to. It was a lot more charming than I expected. Some of the old buildings are sinking into the swamplands and leaning into each other, creating this great, chaotic skyline. And the canals are everywhere you go. I imagine it's really beautiful in the summer. The city also has this really kooky history, which I knew nothing about until we went on a free, three-hour tour offered to hostel-dwellers by the city. Some fun facts:

1) Amsterdam is the most diverse -- and supposedly tolerant -- city in the world, with 177 different cultures in a population of 750,000 (New York has about 152 cultures in a population of 8 million)
2) there are literally more bicycles than people
3) the city's seal is three X's lined up vertically -- ironically, they stand for the three "dangers" that faced Amsterdam centuries ago: fire, flood and disease
4) when the French conquered Amsterdam and Louis Bonaparte ordered that the Dutch people take surnames, the citizens made up ridiculous last names in Dutch that the French wouldn't understand (the joke backfired, and supposedly people still carry the last names Pubic hair, Jumping through a field, Born naked and Brown ass)

Amsterdam was also interesting for the obvious reasons (i.e. legalized prostitution and soft drugs). Though apparently only 10 percent of Dutch people smoke marijuana, there is such a high demand among tourists that there are multiple "coffee shops" on every block. The number of backpackers really was kind of astounding and made it hard to imagine what it would be like to actually live there.

We visited the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh Museum. I especially enjoyed the latter.

I don't have as much to say about Brussels. As a European Union political and business capital, it was very metropolitan and quite the opposite of Amsterdam. But the food was great and the people seemed more welcoming. It was a fun place to spend St. Patrick's Day, since there were a lot of Anglo-Saxon backpackers there as well. Very cold though. We went to Bruges for a day, too. It was even colder, but really charming and full of chocolate and lace(?) shops. We went to the Diamond Museum and the Chocolate Museum, both pretty cool, but I think my friends were a little more into it all than I was.

Pictures of all of the above here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2107140&l=39284&id=1414800

(Now that I'm using the less than reliable WiFi available in my room, I probably won't be dealing with the painful process that is uploading photos to Blogspot.)

I felt a little guilty about the lack of Spanish during the trip. My CIEE linguistics professor is always reminding my class how easy it is for us to take only a little Spanish away from this experience, and he's totally right. I just got a Spanish girl in my art history class to tutor me for our exam in June, and interacting with her has been a really good change, since it's completely different from talking to professors or Carmen, who now rarely says things in a way I won't understand.

Semana Santa

We returned from our trip to a completely transformed Seville. The tranvía wasn't running, everything had closed down and the city was totally inundated with tourists -- mostly Americans and other Spaniards. Thursday it rained all day, and the processions had to be cancelled. A lot of the pasos were constructed in the 16th century and are totally non-waterproof, and since Seville naturally hasn't found any way to account for bad weather, the yearlong planning and practicing for some brotherhoods goes completely to waste. Watching TV that day was so depressing because all there was to see was tearful priests informing even more tearful men and boys that their procession was cancelled.

Good Friday, considered the most important day of Holy Week here and when all the best pasos come out, fortunately went as planned. It began at midnight with la Madrugada, a series of processions that go all through the night. I watched the Esperanza de Triana procession from about 3 a.m. to 5:30 a.m. and felt a lot of Triana pride in the process. The streets leading to Triana Bridge were overflowing with people, both tourists and trianeros, and the pasos were really exceptional.

There's a really complex mix of emotions when a paso comes through, and I still don't really understand it. The band plays, a beautiful saeta, reminiscent of flamenco singing, is sung and then everyone stands in silence, with some shouting guapo! and guapa! (beautiful) to the figures of Christ and Mary. Some cry and some just make the sign of the cross. And then the paso goes through and it's all over, and everyone either goes out drinking or goes to bed.

I watched two more Triana processions during the day on Friday: the Cachorro, one of the most famous processions in Sevilla that began just outside of my apartment, and the procession of De la O, a really beautiful, small church where I went to Easter Mass. I might make another separate entry about all of the processions because I have to compile the photos and videos I took.

Yesterday I went to my first bullfight. It was so intense and beautiful and I'm so happy I finally got to go. I'm seeing one on horseback tomorrow, and I'll probably post about both in the next few days. School is going well, especially now that I'm sort of starting to study and feel less nervous about the daunting June exams. My most recent column is up at thehoya.com if you feel like reading. Hope all is well.