Things I Will Miss About Madrid

Now that I know I’m going to leave, this is something that’s on my mind a lot. I’m going to make this post, and the “Things I Won’t Miss” post sort of rolling posts, I’ll repost them every time I update them with something new that’s popped into my head.

1. My neighborhood.

La Latina. It’s fabulous. For the last two years I sometimes feel like I’m living in a cheesy movie about living in Europe. During the day, I stand on my balcony and look out over the square and the people sitting at the sidewalk cafes, and the beautiful murals on the sides of buildings, and I listen to the street musicians serenade me (ok, some of them I hate, but in general its nice), and I pop down to the bakery that’s right next door, or to the stationary store or the video store or the incredible Mercado de la Cebada where they now know me, and I think, I’m never going to get this in the states, so I’d better enjoy it now.

And at night, it can be absurd, certainly not to just anyone’s tastes. It’s loud. I mean loud. So many people are out in the streets going from bar to bar (I’ve been here 2 years and haven’t been to half of them – though that’s mainly due to being too poor) that when you open the balcony doors in our living room on a summer night, the noise is deafening. I sometimes have to close them if I want to talk on the phone in here. And I can’t count the number of nights I have fallen asleep to the sounds of people in the plaza drunkenly playing, singing, clapping flamenco after the bars have closed. Seriously. It feels like a cheesy movie but that’s how it is.

My everyday view from the balcony of San Andres and Plaza Carros

View towards Cebada

Basilica San Francisco just down the street

Plaza Carros on a typical sunny Sunday

Mural on building near mine

Festive Plaza Puerta Cerrada with murals