Madrid! Carnaval and couches

I'm in Madrdid!
Madeline, Matt and I arrived on Thursday to begin our ten days of traveling during our "spring break". we refused to call it that because it is February and there was snow on the ground when we left!
Anyway, we have had quite the adventure so far. Last minute we decided to use the website couchsurfing to find a place to stay. It is an online community of travelers who are all interested in meeting new people and getting to know new cultures. So we are staying with a Frenchman, Anis, and his Spanish roommate, Pancho (it's a nickname!). They have been fantastic and it addition to obviously knowing the city and what it important to do in Madrid- something I would suggest looking up whenever you travel - they have also taken us out! Thursday night we went to a bar where they zas a meeting of international people, called a language exchange. And lasr night is when carnival started, so everywhere there were people dressed in costumes - very very similar to our halloween. It was so funny though, I think there must have been a sale on Princess Lea costumes - there were tons of them. we met many cross dressers, a few pacmen, and a lot of chaquita (like the bananas) women!

Oh! and we also saw some sites. Yesterday we toured around a bit in the main centro area, around peutro del sol. We bought a mini guide book and made our way to the banco espana, the cathedral, the palais real, the gran via - we're pretty sure we covered most of the main highlights. Tomorrow we plan on going to the three main museums and go to the flee market!

Being here actually just makes me miss Italy, I tihnk because they are similar cultures. I keep confusing the little Italian I konw with the little Spanish I know!

We want to start our day, so I'm going to get going! This keyboard is also french and very difficult to write on!

Ciao!

Tess