A Day in Lisbon, Portugal

It never ceases to amaze me just how close the countries in Europe really are. Lisbon, Portugal was just a hop away from Madrid, and there were so many different things to see!

Friday morning: My roommate & I get on a plane.

ONE HOUR later: We’re flying over the coast of Portugal!

Over the gigantic Atlantic!

We had wanted to try CouchSurfing for this trip, but our fellow Madrid interns who had already been to Lisbon highly suggested that we stay at The Independente Hostel. We also highly suggest you stay there because it was amazing. Getting there involved more hill-climbing than expected (were we actually in Pittsburgh?), but it was more than worth the huffing and puffing.

View from the lookout across the street from our hostel

Traveling makes you a crazed hungry person, though, so we had to find food fast. Good thing there was a restaurant attached to our hostel! All the food served at The Decadente, as it’s known, uses solely Portuguese ingredients that are in season. I figured I’d give the sardines a whirl since they’re used so often in Portuguese dishes.

“These still have eyes…”

After filling up, we threw our stuff in our room, and went downstairs only to run into two other girls from our program who were checking in downstairs. Yes, in Europe, you can just run into people in other countries. Once they got settled in, we jumped out into the streets of Lisbon.

These little gumdrop chairs with trees in them were everywhere. I’m a fan.

I was happy to discover that Lisbon is much more graffiti-friendly than Madrid.

“Remember who you are.”

Hey, your house fell over!

A real Angry Bird

We got to see so much of this art because we walked approximately forever plus an hour or so to get up close to the Ponte 25 de Abril (25 of April bridge) in Lisbon that’s based off of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, but that everyone says looks like the Golden Gate Bridge. We were thinking it was a rip-off, but it’s ok because they were made by the same company. 

Also note the mini Christ the Redeemer statue, like in Rio de Janeiro, in the back there.

Oh, and remember the OCEAN?!

Fishy fishy fishy

That’s where you could find us the next day. Beach + some Portuguese practice + a little bit of sight seeing = a fantastic break from the everyday life in Madrid. We were fine with getting back to "our city", but it was a little more difficult to do than on other trips. Maybe the IIP should expand over into Lisbon in upcoming years!

- Alexa

The Olympics - No big deal!

This weekend I had the opportunity to jump up on plane and fly to London none other than the 2012 Summer Olympics!!!  I have a friend who is living in London for an internship so I was able to avoid the insane housing cost by staying with her.  London is one of the most culturally eclectic cities in Europe but adding the Olympics makes it even more lively and diverse!  Unfortunately, I didn't have 200 pounds to spend on a ticket to any of the events in any of the stadiums but I did have the chance to see the men's and women's road races and other Olympic related events!

Friday I went to Trafalgar Square to watch the countdown to the start of the Opening Ceremony!

I saw so many people with so much pride for their countries but of course Great Britain was not going to get shown up on their home turf!

Everyone waiting!

The Olympics have begun!!!

Hello David Beckham...

U-S-A, U-S-A, U-S-A!

Men's Road Race - These two bikers were sprinting towards the finish line.  The  racer from Kazakhstan ended up winning. 

More bikers!

Next, we went to the London Live area in Hyde Park where you could watch Olympic events on the big screen.  Here Ryan Lochte is accepting his Gold medal.

On Sunday, I was able to see the Women's Road Race right outside of Buckingham Palace!

This was a once and a lifetime opportunity and I truly loved every second of it!  The Olympics are amazing because they bring so many different people together from all over the world.  Everyone I met was wonderful and was there to enjoy the beauty of the games.  I loved it so much that I was really sad when I came back to Madrid (to where I don't even have a TV) and couldn't be part of the action or watch the games.  I guess I need to start looking up flights to Rio for Summer 2016!

Corinne

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REBAJAS!

In Spain. They don't use coupons or have sales for every holiday. They just have two big sales a year called Rebajas.

 From July to August, everything is on sale to make new room for the new inventory and every store front looks like this:

They start with 1st Rebajas. Clothes are discounted 20% to 30%.
The after a couple of weeks 2nd Rebajas. Clothes are then discounted 40 - 50%.
Some things are discounted more heavily but all the stores look like a mess.
"Rebajas" will happen again after Christmas.

I don't know if I like this way of doing things because I don't like being in the store with a lot of people and the stores are always crowded now. But it's better than having to deal with coupons.

A Needed Dose of Awesome from MULAFEST

I literally just got back from a weekend in Lisbon, Portugal, but first I had to share the things I’ve done in the last week that are all backed up on my camera! #1 on the list: MULAFEST in Madrid.

Corinne & Liz helping to advertise at the entrance 

As soon as I found out about this… let’s say “alternative” festival, I was super excited and knew that I absolutely had to go. On the news, Madrid referred to it as a “festival of urban tendencies”, which I thought was pretty funny. Basically, it was a big showcase of various art forms like dance, graffiti, painting, and tattooing along with a free-for-all of BMX biking, skateboarding, motorcycles, and souped-up cars. How could I possibly miss seeing all of that craziness in one place?

First sight: Motorcycles galore

There were live bands at stages all throughout the convention center!

Mulafest graffiti artists made sure there was not a blank wall untouched.

Paint something!!

It spells “GRAFFITI”. Get it?

The BMX bikers made me feel lame for being on the ground.

Sk8r b0iz (Sorry, I had to.)

Corinne, Liz, & I in front of the GRAFFITI wall

Side story: I asked someone in Spanish to take this pictured and realized later that he probably didn’t speak any Spanish at all. Might have even been American. Oops!

Tattoo booths! As tempting as it was, none of us got anything done.

There was live karaoke with a band. This guy started it off, and was absolutely fabulous with his rendition of “Billie Jean”.

Dance class!

Crazy paintings – Wasn’t sure what this one was supposed to mean with its combo of brands and zombies.. Especially because all of the zombies were actually Snow White..?

I bet you thought the graffiti was over! It’s not!

We ended our visit hanging out and watching these dancers do crazy amazing things. It was sweet.

I don’t remember having an extremely artistic or urban experience when I was younger, but for some reason, being at this festival made me feel like I was in high school. Everyone was doing whatever they felt like doing, experimenting with random ideas, and was really passionate about the things that brought them the most joy. Mulafest’s main goal was to bring together artists from all backgrounds and places to collaborate in this one space and feed off of each other to allow their best work to come out. The result was more than impressive, and it highlighted a side of Madrid that I don’t think everyone gets to see. All of my waiting and anticipation was definitely justified. I know Pittsburgh has a lot of cultural and artsy festivals that go on throughout the year, so we'll have to see how they measure up!

- Alexa