Birthday Night

So it was pretty fun to celebrate May day in Madrid. Nithin and I had a serious disadvantage of our birthday coming on a Monday instead of any other night, so we celebrated it on Sunday night, since nothing starts in Spain until midnight anyway and we managed to have a good time. We started the evening with a football (soccer) game between the two smaller of the three Madrid soccer teams. (Atletico and ... someone else, Real Madrid is the big Madrid football team). Despite the fact that it was two of the smaller clubs playing, the place was still really full! It is very interesting to notice the defenses between watching American sports and Spanish soccer because there was really none of the typical American theatrics involved in the game, meaning no band, no cheerleaders, and very very little announcing, however I don't want to be painting the picture that the stadium was quiet by any means. Nearly the entire 90 minutes people were chanting, screaming, and cheering. I think there were two substitutions the entire game. Now all of this may just be a soccer vs. Basketball, American Football sort of thing, but still ... I found it very interesting and fun.

(Pictured Aaron, Me, Taryn, Karina)
From then started our night which was rushed from the very beginning... As Aaron already wrote about we had quite a full night, the evening prior, so Aaron and I were running on low sleep, and I managed to fit in a 30 minute nap at 10:30pm - haha, I love the Spanish lifestyle. Well, after we all showered up, got ready, and grabbed the metro we were already nearly 30 minutes late for our 11:15 rendeux-vous at the Plaza de Santa Maria, opps.

We managed to meet up with a bunch of people, including my friend Laura who I studied abroad with in France three years ago, however no one could decide where to go... In the confusion, Aaron, Laura and I slipped away to grab the best grec (a Greek sandwich filled with lamb, which can be found ANYWHERE around Europe and I believe in bigger cities in the US, I wish they had them in Kansas) I have ever eaten my entire life! Anyhow, we did manage to jump to a couple different bars, include a really small friendly bar where as soon as we entire with our group of a dozen or so people the owners started cheering, clapping, and dancing around the bar.



(Pictured: (Left) Aaron and Nithin DANCING! (Top Right) Me and Romanian girl (Bottom Right) Me and JB)
We started to slowly loose people, which was sad but then Aaron ran into the Romanaian girl and JB (the French guy from our first hostel). As you may have gathered, we aren't very good at remember everyone's name... So we ended up going to another club (if you could call it that, it was very small), but we somehow got drinks half price cause we knew people there. Only a week in the country and we are already connected. ;) I love going to clubs overseas with Aaron and Nithin because, again, they both started dancing in this tiny little club with people we have only known for a few days, acting like best friends already.

By the time this club closed (3am, keep in mind it was a Sunday), everyone else was going home, and we walked Laura to her Bus stop. Determined to stay out until the sun came up, Aaron, Nithin, and I, set out for another bar we saw earlier, alone, for the first time all night.

However, before we got to this next bar we met some friends who were really eager to show us the best club in town which was open really late. Naturally as travelers we were both open to being social with everyone that we met, but cautious at the same time. This group of kids seemed friendly enough and before I knew it I looked around and Nithin was in a different group talking with two other guys and a girl and Aaron was in yet another group talking with a mixed group of guys and girls. This shot a red flag up in my mind, and then I felt the piece of paper in my back pocket slowly slip out of my pants. I turned around to find another girl just standing there smiling at me like nothing happened. Perhaps I should have been more assertive right then, but I decided to politely start excusing myself claiming that we were really just hungry and were going to a food place down the road and we would meet them later. Oh no, they were too friendly to accept that as an answer so as appropriate answer so as I keep walking away calling to Aaron and Nithin to come, but I only saw Aaron, who looked at me curiously like why was I shunning these nice people so quickly after meeting them? (Keep in mind we had dozens of great experiences with the people in Madrid before this, even late at night). It must have been soon after that, when Aaron found one of them in his front pocket because in the matter of a minute or two he quickly changed his mind that he DID want to go find some food with me. All the while, I kept feeling things in my backpocket gravitating upwards. Maybe I should have let them succeed, and end the night with a valuable map of Madrid. In the bar, we realized that Nithin was still missing, so Aaron, pockets emptied, walked out into the fields, to rescue our friend.

(Picture: Nithin and I outside of the cool bar with cool bartenders)
Reunited we all had another beer, and got to talking with the bartenders who were so much fun and eventually got free shots. Madrid did end up redeeming itself. As we left we saw one of the guys from the group of pickpockets who came up to say goodbye to Aaron and one more time try to reach in his pocket. Amazing...so, we got home safely at 6:30, exhausted and fell immediately asleep a half an hour before the sun rose ... almost made it, maybe next year!