Touring Around Alcalá

Ok so yesterday we had our placement exam to see which level class we would be in at Alcalingua.  Alcalingua is the international portion of the University of Alcalá so we have classes with other international students.  In my class we have students from Russia, Norway, Japan, China, Italy, France, and Australia.  It's really neat!

The placement exam had 100 grammar multiple choice questions and a quick interview session with one of the professors.  Afterward, another professor took us on a tour of the city. That's what the photos below are from.

 This is the Cathedral at La Plazo de Los Santos Niños where 304 children were beheaded when they wouldn't renounce Christianity, a religion that wasn't accepted in the Empire.

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 Everyone on the tour!  This is everyone from Alcalingua, not just our group!

 A palace.

This is La Calle Mayor (Main Street) where there are beautiful shops and cobblestone.  It is one of the oldest streets in Europe and has covered store entrances so you can still walk when it is raining.  It's in the center of town, and we have spent quite a fair amount of time there so far.

Next we walked through La Plaza de Cervantes which is located right next to Calle Mayor.

 Us on the tour walking through La Plaza de Cervantes, the main plaza in town.

 It has a statue of Cervantes in the center!

Cervantes!!!

Finally the guide took us to the official entrance of the University of Alcalá.  Not only d theo tall buildings here look beautiful, but some have these giant crane nests on them!  In the next picture you can kind of see the nest.  I couldn't get a great picture but one of the huge birds is forthcoming!!!

You can just kind of see the giant nests atop the tower.

Now for La Universidad!

If only Maryland looked like this.  Apparently every carving on the front has some significance or story.  It's awesome.

So after the tour I went shopping with a few people and (as my mother knows about my planning for future things like my future bathroom etc...) I found my future wedding dress, oh and giant slabs of chocolate.  It's insane.  Sadly when I went back to the Pasteleria (bakery) today the giant chocolate was gone...

 So I tried one of the things on the left today that looks like a donut.  SO not a donut!  It's like more flaky pastry and it is SO SO rich that I could only eat half of one.

 THE AWESOME GIANT CHOCOLATE!  Just a frame of reference, my hand spans two of the lines and both my hands side by side are the width.  Giant freaking chocolate.

 FUTURE WEDDING DRESS!

Sadly it's in Spain, I'll never see it again, and I don't know how much it costs haha.  There were a lot of wedding dress places surprisingly.  Not sure what the demand is, but it must be fairly high!

After class and shopping I came home.  Today was the first day of classes so I did that for the morning, came home for lunch and a little rest, and returned for classes.  I got back home around 8pm and have been updating this blog and chatting people ever since.  It was a nice relaxing night!  Now I look forward to day three!