Alhambra #1 and Birthday Adventures

The Alhambra, the greatest last and the greatest Moorish palace, was built in the 13th and 14th centuries by the Nasrid dynasty, and combines the architectural elements of the dynasties that came before them.  My art history teacher likes to say that the Nasrid rulers had a "carpe diem" mentality, where they worked hard and played hard, knowing they would be the last Muslim rulers in Spain.  The result was architecture that was very lavish, but because of the stress of war, the Alhambra is nowhere near as big as Madinat al-Zahra, which blows my mind, because to me the Alhambra seems huge.  They also used cheaper materials, like concrete and plaster, instead of the masonry that the Caliphate was able to use.

This week we had our first of three visits to the Alhambra, and because we are "researchers" we got to go into areas where normally tourists don't get to see.  We focused on the complex as a military building in this first visit, walking in like people would have been made to in the 14th century, through the checkpoints and walls, and we also visited the towers where soldiers and guards would have kept watch over the city.

View from the bottom, clearly if you're down here you have a disadvantage.

You would have been able to see the whole city too.

View of another tower from the top.

The foundations on one side of the wall mark where the soldiers would have lived when they were on duty for a few days.

On the other side, the area where the royals and high government people would have lived.  We're going to tour all of the inside next week.

One of the main doors to a checkpoint.

We walked through part of the palace, and this picture is dark but it is amazingly beautiful.

These paintings are in a tower that is now called the Peinador de la Reina, the Queen's Dressing Room. It was painted to please Queen Isabella after the Catholic Monarchs took Granada, and it has a bunch of French soldiers names carved into it. Part of the palace was also destroyed by the French, and there is a Spanish legend about a man who ran around all night putting out the fires.

Strange Creatures.  They guess the paintings were done between 1539 and 1546, in an Italian style.  Whoever lived there before the Queen was probably powerful, because they have found a secret staircase that goes down to a clearing in the woods.  With all of the security, it would have been a big deal to be able to get in and out undetected.  This also probably means it was a mans room, as nobody would have let a girl have a secret staircase.

This tower, Torre de la Cautiva, the tower of the Captive was my favorite.

The carvings were this detailed around the entire room, with high ceilings and a nice breeze.  There was a poem that ran around the entire room that was from the perspective of the room talking about how pretty she is inside, even when she looks like a military building outside.

The last tower, Torre de las Infantas, or the Tower of the Princesses, gets it's name from a story that Washington Irving wrote about the Alhambra. The princesses were called Zaida, Zoraida and Zorahaida.  We also saw the room where he stayed and wrote.

The artwork is very much like architecture, with mini columns and arches, and of-course a lot of calligraphy.

My birthday lunch, and my host mom.  It was delicious.

Started the night with the end of the sunset and some champagne.  After that we went for Tapas and bar hopped for a while.

This was a bachelor party, their t-shirts say something like "Grab the Sausage," and they picked me up and sung happy birthday.  From there it only got stranger, as we went to a few more places, and then ended up drinking tea at 4 in the morning?  Anyway, made it to 21.

On Thursday, I'm leaving for Morocco.  First we are going to Gibraltar, then to Tarifa to cross to Tangier.  We're visiting a women's center there and meeting with some students.  Later in the afternoon we'll see Assilah, then go to Rabat where we'll be staying with families that host other international students.  We'll spend the entire next day in Rabat, and on Sunday, we're going up to the Riff mountains to see a smaller town.  Then we'll head north again to Chefchaouen where we will spend our last night.  Should be an interesting experience, I'm very excited.   

Halfway done with this blog?  It's odd that I'll be home so soon. Time flies.

Córdoba

This past weekend I went to Córdoba with my art history class.  It was a long bus ride, but worth it.  First we visited the Madinat al-Zahra, which is an active archaeological site, and the ruins of a medieval Muslim Palace and Royal city.

Quick History Lesson (feel free to skip it and just look at the pictures):  The Prophet Muhammad died without giving instructions on how to choose successors, and skipping over a lot, eventually it was too hard to keep the political power of the Caliphate in one location.  Abd ar-Rahman III, who was descended the earlier Ummayad dynasty, declared himself Caliph of Córdoba in 929. He was the third, with the existance of the Fatimid and Abbasid caliphs, in Cairo and Bagdad respectively, all claiming to be the one legitimate power.  Abd ar-Rahman III needed to demonstrate that he was the true successor of Muhammad, and also wanted to show off his new power and status, he built Madinat al-Zahra.  The city was a place for the royals and the army, and had to have all kinds of ways to protect himself because people were trying to kill him all the time.

Ruins

Arches.  They found the pieces but a lot of them were missing, but they decided that they would put it back up if they could figure out how it looked.  So that's why some of it looks new.

Parts of the decorative patterns that covered the outside of the buildings.  There are SO many of these pieces, and they all get cataloged and then they try to place them.  Still a lot of work to be done.

Medieval Pizza Oven 

The Friday Mosque for the complex.  Easy to identify because all the other buildings are oriented in the same direction, and this one is turned to the east.

This is called the house of Ya'far.  Ya'far was a slave, and a eunuch, who was able to become very powerful partly because he was very smart, and possibly because he was, as my art history teacher put it "a very, very special friend" of the second Caliph of Córdoba, Al- Hakum II.

This is a swimming pool in front of the throne room that they are working on restoring.  A lot of the knowledge about the palace and the complex comes from the writings of travelers, and one traveler recorded an incident where Ya'far, upon seeing an old man in the pool, said something like "Don't drown old man."  The traveler wrote that the man answered him "Don't worry, I can float because I still have my balls."  Besides being a funny story, it is interesting to think about how stories like that tell you more information than just the story, as now we know that people swam in this pool.

Unfortunately, the throne room was closed while we were there.

After finishing at Madinat al-Zahra, we went into the center of Córdoba.

Calleja de las Flores, with the Great Mosque in the background.  This is a popular postcard picture, and I guess the people who lived here started keeping the flowers like this, but now that it is such an iconic spot, the city takes care of them now.

Inside the Great Mosque, which was started by Abd ar-Rahman I in 784, and improved on by his family line. This includes construction ordered by Abd ar-Rahman III, and Al- Hakum II.  In this way, parts of the Great Mosque were build at the same time as the Madinat al-Zahra.

The Mihrab, which is the place where everyone focus their attention during prayers.  The Mihrab is surrounded by passages from the Qur'ran, and is very richly decorated.

When Córdoba fell in 1236, the Catholic monarchs turned the mosque into a church, and added a Renaissance Cathedral right in the center.  This picture looks across  the space, and you can see the elements of the mosque that continue on the other side.  Charles V gave the permission for this change, but it is said that after seeing the construction, he regretted allowing the building to be altered, however it is possible that without the change, the entire structure would have been destroyed.

One interesting opportunity that comes from having these two styles contrasted so closely, is that it is easy to look at how the Muslim and Christian religions saw their places of worship as manifestations of God.

The Mosque in Islam is the house of the community, and as all people are supposed to be equal before Allah, the space for worship tends to be uniform, full of repeating elements, and would inspire a sense of community for the faithful who have come to pray.  A Cathedral on the other hand is build to be the house of God, and the high ceilings, high lights, and the decoration is all designed to make those in the church feel a sense of awe, or to feel small in the presence of the divinity.

After the tour of the Great Mosque, we went to see the last surviving medieval synagogue in Andalusia, and also to hear some traditional music, which was very beautiful, and so soothing that I think I feel asleep.

It was a very small space, likely private, or just for a family.  The upper room would have been for the women.  This was eventually hidden behind plaster, as even having a piece of paper with Hebrew written on it was crime, it would have certainly been incriminating to have been found with a synagogue in your home.

Well, that's Córdoba.  This coming week will be a busy one, five days of class compared to my usual four, and my birthday this weekend.

Bye for now.

What happens in London...

Is absolutely strange.  And that is excluding the fact that all the cars drive on the wrong side of the street.  For real, this past weekend was by far the oddest weekend I've had in a long time.  Alright, let's go.

I landed in London Friday afternoon, and it took me over an hour to find my friend Ash.  I didn't expect him to be on time so I didn't let it worry me, but it turns out he had been waiting for me somewhere where I wasn't.  Anyway, after I finally found him, the very first thing we had to do was go to a police station and explain to them that Ash was no longer a missing person.  Apparently his mother reported him missing after she couldn't get a hold of him for a few days.

Later that evening, we went to see where the Olympics will be held later this year.  We saw the different stadiums, what will be the athletes villiage and later apartments, and the biggest mall ever.

Gold Metals for the Olympics and Paralympics

Countdown.

After that, I had some cider in one of the bars while we waited for Ash's friends.  We hung out with them for a while before Ash got a call from his mother, and we went to a party.  The party was a reception after a funeral, but if nobody would have told me that, I would have thought it was a birthday party.  Everyone was certainly celebrating that mans life!  After that, we decided to call it a night so we could get up early tomorrow to see the sights.

We took London's subway (tube) into the city, and obviously, my first stop was Platform 9 3/4.  We also saw The British Museum, The Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square, Saint Paul's Cathedral, and a lot of central London in between.

Finally got my Hogwarts letter!!

After that, we went to The British Museum, and let me tell you, colonialism lets you have some really cool stuff all in one place.  As many of my friends and family already know, as a child I loved Ancient Egypt, so naturally, I spent the largest chunk of my time in that section of the museum.  So much cool stuff.

The Rosetta Stone, the museums most famous artifact and the most hotly contested.  Obviously claimed by Egypt.  

Ramesses the Great

This guy died and was buried before they started using coffins, and he dried out from the sand so fast that he still has skin and hair.  He's dated to 3400 BC.

Old chess set I thought was cool, but it must have been hard to remember which piece was yours when they were all the same color.

Easter Island Head.

This was a really neat exhibit.  Using the medical records and interviews with a married couple, they laid out every pill, every injection, every inhaler used by these people throughout their lives.  It is staggering to see the medicines displayed like this, and to think that they were relatively healthy people.  This also didn't include vitamins, and as you walked along the display, you could read about for what the person took antibiotics for ect.  Makes you think.

Fish and Chips for lunch!

North Entrance of Westminster Abbey.

Stumbled upon a protest.  Just before this Ash was telling me about how the London Police keep getting in trouble, and I think I saw why.  One of the police said to a group "Blokes, form a line" very clearly indicating where he wanted it with his arms, and about 8 other policemen proceed to panic a bit and run into each other trying to follow a simple direction.  It looked like something out a a movie.  Not to mention the pro-peace and welfare protesters didn't look very threatening to begin with.

Ash and I outside of Buckingham Palace.

Later this night, we got home and got ready to go out, only to realize the party was actually the night before, so Ashley, famous at UNC for being out every night, and I watched The Terminal, and passed out after a full day of touring.  I still don't know what happens at the end of that movie...

Day 2: Tower of London, Tower Bridge, HMS Belfast, Globe Theater, The Millennium Bridge, and the London Fire Brigade.

Tower Bridge, over the Thames River, which I learned on TV while I was there, now has seahorses, so must not be as terribly polluted as everyone thought.

Tower of London, read all the information signs here in Spanish. ha.

Ash made a friend.

Globe Theater- In honor of my Courtney Kelly!

HMS Belfast.  It didn't seem right not to go see it when my entire childhood I stopped at every ship or battlefield we went by.  For you Dad!

This was called a "Peddle Bus" and it was stopping traffic while all of these men peddled to propel this thing down the busy London streets.  Did I mention they were sitting at a bar and all had beers?  WHAT.  Why does nothing in London make sense?

It was a nice taste of fall!

Okay, so this is the part where I couldn't even believe what was happening.  Ash and I got ready and went out with two of his other friends, and as we were looking for a parking spot, the entire engine caught on fire.  And not just a little fire, a big one, with smoke and breaking glass and the whole deal.  Needless to say we got out and ran, but I did take a picture. Ha.

Poor Car.

Damage.

We called it a night after the car tired to kill us, and I got to meet some of the London Fire Brigade.

Overall, an awesome trip, filled with sights, historical and non.  Hopefully I make it back to London someday with more time and more money!

THANK YOU ASHLEY.

Cordoba next weekend, and my Birthday after that! Bye for now.