Night Life

Although I have not yet been able to go out in Jerez during the night time, I had a chance to experience Spanish nightlife in Madrid and in Segovia. Going out in Spain for young people is even more intense than in the States. There is always some sort of pre-party and Yesenia showed me a park in Madrid, telling me that when the weather is warm, the park fills up in the evening and is full of young people sitting in groups and drinking beer or wine for hours. It was a little bit chilly in Segovia, but we still went to a nearby park to chat and have a few drinks before we went downtown.

This made me feel like I was back in high school when there was no other option than the park (or the stairs for my 503ers) to have a party! It was weird sitting there and drinking a beer knowing that no one would bother us because it was not only perfectly legal, but normal as well. 
After being in the park for about 1 1/2 hours, we headed into town and stopped first at a Tapas bar. In Spain, from what I have seen, it is very uncommon to go out to a club or bar before 12:30 or 1 am. For me, this is a little bit too much. What can I say, I have grandmother tendencies! The big clubs in Madrid stay open until 6 in the morning and it is perfectly normal to come home from a night of dancing and drinking at 7 am. Anyway, we went to the tapas bar and had a little food and some more beer before going to the "real bars". The bars in Segovia were nice because they had big dance floors but were not really "clubby". 

The not so nice thing about these bars was the smoking that occurred inside. We all smelled awful by the end of the night, but we had a good time and I was able to see 5 different types of places or "sitios" in Segovia.

 


In Madrid, the following night, we had a much more low key time out (thank God!). The "pre-party" was at Yesenia's apartment and from there, everyone broke off into little groups to go to different places around the city. We went to an area in Madrid called "Sol" which is an area with many bars and clubs. On this night, we stuck to one club and did no drinking once we were inside. On the street in Sol, we each bought a beer for 1 euro, $1.75 or so. This was also funny to me. There was an Asian woman standing on the corner with a cooler selling beer and sandwiches and it was perfectly acceptable to just buy a beer from her and drink it on the street or throw it in your purse. After a few hours of dancing, we went home and slept deeply. 

I called this night in Madrid a "low-key" night, but what that means is that we left Yesenia's apartment at 1 in the morning and returned at 3:30am. I think the only reason I was able to hold up was because of the jet lag, my body was so confused as to what time it was really. I noticed that I would be very tired, but all of a sudden around 2 in the morning, I would have a rush of energy as this is 5 pm in the States.