Sevilla, Sevilla, Sevilla.

At least Sevilla didn’t lie to us in the beginning. When we stepped off the train in Cordoba at eight in the morning, there was a cool breeze and the day seemed promising. It wasn’t until after that nap that the scorching reality of the sun said hello.

Sevilla, on the other hand, was straight to the point. Honest. Cruel from the get-go. We entered the city around nine, moaning and gasping as we hopped off the air-conditioned bus and into the oven that is this place so many silly people call home.

I’m pretty sure the first thing we did was drop our things off at our Airbnb…. But for some reason… I just can’t seem to remember anything about our host or our stay…. It is literally all a blur………. Gahh…. Come to me, memories!

Oh! I remember! Wow, that was weird. Okay. Yes. We went straight to our Airbnb, and we celebrated at how close our stay was to the train station. Go us! Go planning!

Our host buzzed us in, and he began speaking rapid Spanish the second he opened the apartment door. Kristina was terrified. I was delighted! It was pretty easy to tell that he was just giving us a tour, showing us how to use the keys, giving us the WiFi and a map. I’m sure he said some stuff in between all that, but I figured I could fill in the blanks. Every time he turned his back, though, Kristina looked at me with raised, scrunched eyebrows and widened eyes. This delighted me even more! Bahahaha.

At one point, he asked a question that we could not answer, and Kristina finally told him what she’d been dying to all along. Well, technically I started it by saying, ‘Espanol…’ with a shake of my head, and Kristina added, ‘poquito.’ Our host laughed and repeated the question in English. ‘Where are you from?’ We told him Seattle, but he had no idea where this was. I think he may be the first person I’ve met abroad who hasn’t known this famous coffee capital!

Kristina was relieved that he now understood to speak in English, but he threw us a new one by switching right back into Spanish once we had established that Seattle did not exist on this man’s mental map of the world. Bahahaha. We walked around for a few more minutes and he gestured and blabbed, showing us the lights, the AC, and the bathroom. Gah. So great. I love pretending I know what people are saying, and I’m pretty sure he believed me!

Recalling the disaster that was The Great Cordoba Slumber, we made a huge effort to rest hardly at all so that we could attack the city before it reached You-Might-Die temperatures. It was already pretty stinkin’ hot, though, so we were fairly slow moving. We managed to see some pretty things and buy gigantic bottles of smoothies and some fresh fruit to cut through our thirst during our explorations.

Then we passed by this cute little coffee shop advertising iced caramel lattes, and I couldn’t not check it out! It was like a mini, hip Starbucks. The menu had basically all of Starbucks’s drinks, and everything was in English. It was all run by an adorable-yet-swarthy Spaniard, who gave me extra caramel without even having to ask. He also taught me a pretty cool coffee trick. You know those mini little French press things that I think you can make coffee or espresso in at home? He poured my milk into that, plunged the plunger thing about a dozen times, and voila! (sp? haha) Frothy milk! Pretty neat.

Shortly after this, we found an outdoor restaurant that sprayed mist onto its customers while they ate, which was kind of exactly what we needed at the moment. Kristina ordered a coffee, a tomato toast thing, and a ham and cheese croissant, and I ordered a plain croissant and my now-standard fresh-squeezed orange juice.

You see, we have this problem, Kristina and I. We think it will be a good idea to explore early, before the heat, but then we realize that we are hungry. And after we sit down in the air conditioning of a cafe or under the mist of an outdoor restaurant or in the shade of an awning, it becomes easier and easier to want to stay there forever. Thus, by the time we decide we had better get to some Actual Exploration, the heat is out. This has happened nearly every day since leaving the rain of Berlin. Meh.

We found a set of swings near our restaurant, and they were in the shade, and I love swings, so we swung a bit there, which was nice. We did manage to explore just the teensiest bit more…

But then Kristina gave in. Mrrrrr…. I wanted to give in, too. Believe me, I did. The heat was clawing at my body and throat like a million monsters trying to reach into my very soul. I have thought I’ve been hot before, but never before have I experienced the physical sensation of Real Heat. I was wearing a skirt and a lightweight long sleeve shirt, so my torso area was just generally sweaty, but my legs, the two largest exposed body parts of mine…. My poor legs. It felt as if a scaly, lizard-like demon hand that had spent its whole life in the fiery depths of a volcano was grabbing onto my calves and ankles. Wrapping its fingers around and around, pulling me down and telling me I would stay put and I would like it. I kid you not! I could actually feel physical hands!

Kristina felt the same physical sensation, though she put it a little more kid-friendly and less-creepy: ‘It feels like I’m just wearing a really warm snuggie, but I can’t take it off.’ Never before have I heard truer words, my fellow heat warrior. Never before.

The thing is, despite all this heat and general I-Want-To-Die-ness, I couldn’t help but feel horrible about our mostly-wasted day in Cordoba, and I really didn’t want the same to happen in Seville. We might tell ourselves that we were only retiring for a one or two hour nap during the worst of the heat, but we had a pattern, and that pattern involved stretching one-hour naps into six. Kristina set off for the apartment, and I lowered my head and walked straight into the sun.

I had many thoughts during those three or four hours of solitude, and many of them involved phrases such as: Why me? Why am I so stupid? Why is it hot? What is this? What is life? What would happen if I just lay down here for a little while? Would I melt? I think I’m melting.

It was clear that the city was on siesta. The streets were slow and empty. Only a choice few bars and restaurants were still open, all of their lights off and their workers hiding behind counters or in the refrigerators in back.

I walked these empty streets and felt I was the last woman on earth who hadn’t already been incinerated by the sun’s heavy rays. My throat screamed at me like it would never be not thirsty again. I fed it water, but it wanted more. It protested my stupid decision to leave the rain of home.

And then…

And then I found a shopping mall.

A huge, air conditioned shopping mall.

*insert heavenly music and crashing cymbals*

It was really more of a gigantic, six-level department store of some sort, but they called it a mall, and there was even a grocery store in the basement, which was pretty darn weird. I also got an ice cream on the way in. I was pretty proud of myself.

As I walked through the gracious doors, I encountered the entire city of Seville. These people ain’t dumb!

I wandered slowly and lavishly, savoring every second of the cool and begging my body to return to its normal level of function. I even found my dreamy mint-colored printer that I spent last summer pining after! (They made these in the same office I worked in last summer, and the mint is too cute! I spent many working hours trying to plot how to get them to give me the one mint printer we had in the office which was on display, but no luck.)

Close to the printers, I found my final resting place.

I almost fell asleep in this hanging egg basket chair, not gonna lie. I think I will almost certainly invest in one in the future. I kept getting nervous when I saw employees because I didn’t want to get kicked out, but then a group of boys my age joined me on the outdoor couch sectional in front of me, so I figured if they could do it, I was in the clear!

But then they started talking, and I realized they were just Americans, too… Haha. Oh, well. None of us were ever bothered by workers.

I left shortly after them, once my body had stopped whining and yelling at me, and I took off to teach it another lesson.

It was bad.

…

It was so bad.

…

That hot lava monster had brought its friends this time, and they meant business. They dragged me back and melted my shoes to the concrete below so that I had to put in a conscious effort to lift each leg with every step. When trying to get to the water, I encountered this one long stretch where Old Town ended and New Town began. Thing is, these stupid newbies didn’t seem to have the sun in mind during their city planning.

Old Town is made up entirely of alleys and crooks full of shade and shadow. The squares are small, so it is easy to dart across or to skirt around the edges. But when I came to the end of this glorious city design, I was met with an endless, unforgiving, menacingly calm stretch of sunny sidewalk. No trees. No buildings. Just me and the sun.

I took a deep breath and speed-walked, picturing some action movie explosions happening behind me and a fire-breathing dragon ahead. I almost didn’t think I would make it.

But I did. Barely. I made it to the shade of a tiny city map on a post, where I was joined by five others waiting to cross the street. It would have been a pretty funny sight to see, if not so horribly sad and horrible.

I finally found a park:

And some pretty buildings:

And then I made it all the way to the river:

The end goal here was to make it to the monastery on the other bank. It was around five o’clock by this time, so it was as hot as it was ever going to get. All cool-down from here, right?

I wasn’t feelin’ it, yet, that’s for sure. I literally ran from shadow to shadow while I was in that monastery. It was really pretty, though, in its deserted state. I got a second wave of the apocalyptic feelings while I was in here.

And then the worst of it: getting from the monastery back to the other side of town. The most direct path took me along the riverbank for about ten minutes. With no cover.

You’re probably getting tired of me complaining about the heat, but I’m just trying to adequately convey how ridiculously and painfully and unbearably HOT it was. It felt like my feet were going to burn off! And my poor legs! The sun had no pity for me.

I was also starving, so when I finally made it back to civilization, I sat down in the first restaurant I found and ordered a salad and a fresh orange juice. I needed something that was the exact opposite of hot food.

There were three other customers in the bar, and I was the only one who wasn’t there just to drink the heat away. A Jackie Chan movie with Spanish voice-overs played on a small TV in the corner. I sat there for about an hour and chugged about a gallon of water, but I still had things to see, heat or no heat, so I set off once again.

I made it all the way to Sevilla’s round tower, but… Oh no! It closed about two minutes before I got there! Curse you, Heat, for trapping me in that restaurant! Curse you, Jackie Chan!

So no climbing for me. Luckily, there was another tower to be had…

Cathedral time! There were so many carriage horses surrounding the cathedral, and it made me so sad because they were obviously dying in the heat. They all just stood there with their heads down, hardly ever moving. It was like they had already died but had melted into place so they couldn’t fall over… :/ I really wanted to feed them some of the granita I was slurping on!

AND, to top it all off, both the tower and the main cathedral seemed to be closed. I couldn’t even find a door, in fact, and was forced to settle for the small chapel inside. As I walked in, I noticed the No-Scantily-Clothed-Humans sign like the one we had seen in Barcelona: a male stick figure in a tank top and short shorts and a female stick figure in a tank top and a short skirt, both with a big X over the top. Next to this was a conservative male stick figure and a female one with long sleeves and a skirt below her knees. Cue skirt-pulling. I didn’t get it all the way to my knees, but there wasn’t a scarf patrol at this church, so I figured that was good enough.

I sat down for a while and admired the architecture and the shade. When I was feeling close to being ready to leave, I reached across with my right hand to pull my left shoulder purse strap up, but I did this motion rather quickly and forgot I was holding an open bottle of Coke in that hand. Needless to say, that Coke went everywhere. I poured it ALL over my shoulder, on the side of my face, on my purse, on my hat, and all over the pew next to me. I was pretty shocked, especially at how the Coke seemed to be warmer than the air around us now. As the cola made its way down my arm and neck, I began hearing snickers from the rows behind me and decided to make my exit.

The liquid dried almost immediately after walking outside, and honestly, I was already so sticky from sweat that I quickly forgot about the incident entirely.

Plus, I found some art! Huzzah!

So pretty! The paintings were really small, but they were gorgeous oil painting originals, and the artist was selling them himself, which I love. As I picked mine out, he said, ‘Ah… and this…’ he then grabbed my shoulders and gently turned me around to look out of the archway we were standing under, ‘Is this!’

The painting I held in my hand was a miniaturized, nighttime version of the view in front of me. So cool! He said this was the best view of the tower in the whole city, and that’s why he did all of his work here. He was pretty cute, and he even made me stand under the archway so he could take a picture of me with the same framing as the painting.

I didn’t take a photograph of the painting I bought, but picture that without me in it, with a crescent moon hanging overhead.

And then it was time to finally meet back up with Kristina at Plaza de España!

This place was beyond gorgeous. I hung out for about twenty minutes before she made her way there, and I quickly and graciously joined the other plaza-goers by taking off my shoes and sitting with my feet in the fountain. It felt so good. My feet screamed at me at first, and I couldn’t tell if it was because the water was too cold or if my feet were just sore from being taken advantage of every day for the last week. I think it was the latter. They calmed down eventually and thanked me for the drink.

When Kristina joined, we spent quite a while walking around this massive square. The moat in front of the building even had boat rides, which was pretty hilarious considering it was only a ten minute walk from one side of the building to the other. Not much of a sightseeing boat ride.

The plaza was also lined with these beautiful ceramic benches, each displaying one of the founding moments of one of the major cities in Spain.

There was also a little group doing flamenco! Two or three guys played the music and sang, and these two positively fierce young ladies killed it with the moves. They were mesmerizing to watch. So passionate and into it. There was one dance that they did together, and one of the dancers was waving a bright red fan around with practiced swooping and slicing motions. The fan matched the giant flower in her hair, and I couldn’t take my eyes off of it. Then, boom! The other girl whips out her own fan, cream colored to match her scarf. Kristina and I both audibly gasped. They waved and swirled their fans in sync, twice as mesmerizing as before. Kristina kept shouting, ‘Olé!’ every once in a while, and people gave us funny looks but she just couldn’t help herself. Tehehe.

We did one last walk around the square…

And then dinner! We went to a pretty shmancy place, and people kept coming off the street to sing for us and ask for tips. One of my favorites was a man who sang ‘Don’t Worry About a Thing’ by Bob Marley. His voice was so pretty, but I had to pretend I wasn’t interested so I wouldn’t have to tip him… haha. Another favorite was this young vocals-and-guitar duo.

The guy singing had such a clear, beautiful voice! It was magical!

For dinner, I got scallops with hummus because it was the cheapest thing on the menu, and it came served in a giant seashell. Kristina got an octopus and potato dish that she had heard was a traditional Spanish dish. Yikes! It wasn’t horrible, but the octopus was definitely too chewy for my liking. At one point, we were attacked by a HUMONGOUS grasshopper. This thing was as big as my hand! It hopped out of nowhere and landed near my feet on Kristina’s purse. We spent about five minutes squealing and squirming until our adorable waiter came out and shooed it off. Haha.

All in all, it was a nice day in Sevilla despite almost dying most of the time. I’m never traveling south in July again, I tell ya. Never ever.

That cold shower felt so good that night. Actually, when we were in Cordoba, our host had explained that if we wanted hot water in our shower, we would have to plug in the water heater. That evening, Kristina brought it up and said, ‘Yeah, when he said that, I was like, Why would we not want hot showers? …Eh. I get it.’ Hahahahaha.

Last night in Spain!

 

Venlig hilsen/ hasta luego,

Lizzy-wa