White Night

Last night a bunch of us international students went to La Noche en Blanco, or White Night, in Madrid. Basically, everyone stays up all night long and there are many free cultural events throughout the city. There were street musicians wherever we went that ranged from harpists to jazz bands to a guy with a huge set of water glasses playing Beethoven.

We also went into what we thought was going to be a tour of the Royal Palace but turned out to be a tour of the Royal Kitchens (yes, really). It was still neat, though, to see where everything happens behind the scenes. We saw an entire pig being dried on one wall, and there was a whole room full of cheese. I was also picked by one of the chefs to take a cheese on a walk with a sausage leash while he made barking noises. I guess if you're down underground cooking all day, you're bound to become a little strange.

Last, we walked down Gran Via, one of Madrid's largest streets, which had been converted into el Camino de Luz for the night. The city blocked off the street, so it was full of people instead of cars, and then shut off the normal building lights, replacing them with colorful projection lights. It was like walking through a movie set.