Sevilla, Spain plus a Birthday

It was supposed to be a rainy stay in Sevilla but we got so lucky. Yesturday we sat outside in the sun beneath Plaza de Espana it was hot enough to be in just a tee shirt which was nice. We have been tromping around in the rain since we left Valencia. Plaza de Espana is this huge half circle monument to all the "states" of Spain. So every few feet there is a beautifully decorated bench representing a different state, each one done in ceramics and tiles with brilliant colors and designs. There are ceramic bridges crossing a little canal over to the monument I took lots of pictures of the designs they used. There were tons of yellows, blues and reds it was gorgeous. 

Sevilla is pretty large at about 700,000 people its a huge university city. Its 2,000 years old and it shows. There are tons of baroque and renaissance influence through the city. We visited the bull fighting ring, but were unable to go inside due to the large fee that we didnt want to pay. The Cathedral of Sevilla is very similar in goth style to the Cathedral we saw in Koln, Germany. Sevillas was build around 1401 and it had a huge nativity set in it. Which I have come to learn that nativity sets are a pretty big thing in spain. There are markets with tons of little nativity set pieces. I am not talking about just Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus and some animals....no no no.... they go way out, they add the markets of Bethlaham with food, animals, merchants, shop owners, shepards in fields, trees, plows, mountains. One even had a light show. Which reminds me, does anyone know why its called a "nativity" set?

Last night was pretty fun, there are a bunch of 17 year olds staying in this hostel, its one of their birthdays and so they all gathered here to party. They bought a ton of booze and pizzas. It was interesting to see how they celebrated. They were really friendly, they invited us to join them and we did. They all spoke some english 2 of the girls were interested and spoke english with us pretty much the whole time. They wanted to know about our travels, where we had been and where we are going. They explained how british english is what they learn and its different then American english. We talked about smoking laws how Spanish people can still smoke inside yet in American its banned from within 10 feet of a building. Then when it was time for candels they had them on a pizza rather then a cake. I guess cake is an American thing. They also didnt sing Happy Birthday. It was really fun and interesting.