VIAJE SEGUNDO DÍA

The south of Spain I've noticed is quite different than the north. Today I was in the presence of blooming magnolia trees, irises, and a montón (close to über amount) of orange trees. A fun fact: oranges are only sweet when the leaf is just one, if the orange leaves have a smaller leaf above the big one (two in one leaves) then the oranges are bitter and you should harvest them in December to make marmalade that usually gets sent to england. Besides the lack of vegetation on the side of the highway but longer gardening periods, I feel the south has more diversity or acceptance of diversity. Today we saw two muslim edificios.

First in Granada we went to la Alhambra, which is a fortified city, now just tourist/historical site, built by the muslims. It contained in its walls seven palaces full of colorful designs and arabic inscriptions on the stucco. One of the palaces is now a hotel, the most modern one is now in ruins and there was a neat fountain made out of lion statues that all had different mane and nose designs. From inside this city was a beautiful view of Granada (which is the spanish word for pomegranate) and it's tiny winding streets on the hill with the beautiful white spanish homes.

Then we went to Córdoba where we met our amazing tour guide Lola, who my dear Steffi can only describe as sassy, and were shown the mosque. It is actually the third largest mosque in the world but it is also a cathedral. The muslims first built it in the mosque, which consists of three parts; a tower, a courtyard and the temple. It was beautiful. Every column was made of a different stone, and the arches were all red and white because they used a mixture of limestone and brick so that it was flexible. They also had some roman designs because Córdoba was founded by the romans in second century bc. The temple was made larger in the eighth, ninth and tenth century. Each century expanding a bit more, and using newer materials, until there were one thousand and thirteen columns. In the thirteenth century, when the catholics arrived and took over, they decided to use the mosque to hold a cathedral. A lot of people were against this but then the ignorant king gave permission and now there stands only eight hundred and fifty six columns and a cathedral smack down in the middle. This is unfortunate for a few reasons; now you cannot see from corner to corner in the mosque, which would have been amazing. Mosques also don't have any sculptures of animals or people in them and now there is because of the cathedral (literally smack down in the centre). Some of the newer construction actually has cracks in it because it's just the one type of stone so when Lisbon had a big earthquake the cathedral part suffered but the mosque held strong. The archways that used to be open to the patio/courtyard are now closed and have some catholic sculpture temple things. When the king came to see it, and finally realized just what was the plan, he regretted his decision. I've seen a lot of old cathedrals here but seeing what was once and still has roots of a mosque was very interesting. Having the cathedral right in the middle to me is only good because it prevented the mosque from being destroyed like all the other three hundred in Córdoba by the catholics.

Both these amazingly beautiful places were taken over by catholics and changed in some manner. So maybe acceptance of diversity isn't the right word. I did enjoy the gypsy playing the string piano with mallets made out of a table on the street though.