consejos para ti

Didn't I see this somewhere in NY?Well let’s just say that I’m not meant to get into real estate. Studying in Spain was my first experience at choosing a real apartment to live in. I looked the excel spread sheet up and down until I knew exactly what I wanted. I decided on one of the bedrooms in a four bedroom, mostly because it had three bathrooms and a terrace. Upon arrival I was thrilled—our apartment is gorgeous. I have a room that’s like 150 square feet, my own bathroom, as well as a kitchen and living room with a terrace. That said, I wanted to shoot myself when I moved in because we didn’t have air-conditioning.

As it cooled down, this became a non-issue. We have one real problem: nice as our apartment is, we live in the middle of nowhere. We live in the southeast corner of the city—basically below any and all forms of civilization. There is nothing down here, and taking cabs gets expensive. We live only two blocks from the 6 train, but to get most places you have to change lines at least once (if not more).

Oh, another note on the metro—it closes at 1:30am and opens again at 6am. Why this happens is beyond me. The Madrilenos party till all hours of the night—many not returning until the metro re-opens the following morning. That said, I found it wholly obnoxious to want to leave a club at 5 in the morning only to realize that the metro was closed so I would have to take a cab.

My advice on living and going out: try, as hard as you possibly can, to live near the center of the city. On the housing sheet it will tell you what the nearest metro stop is to the apartments—look for Gran Via, Callo or Sol. In terms of going out, there are two main ‘discotecas’: Joy and Kapital, the cover charges get expensive so either make friends with promoters or go early, before they start charging.

Drinking here is part of the culture—that said people don’t really drink to get drunk like they do in the states. They know their limits. You don’t often see people completely drunk, and if you do, chances are they’re foreigners. I personally think it has something to do with the fact that (because of the lower drinking age here) they’ve had longer to learn. Regardless, be careful and have soso much fun!

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