More Madrid

It's hard to believe we've been in Madrid for four days already. Things have been going well and the time has really gone by quickly.
Monday morning Rachel and I went with Brian to the Bible Society office so that we could meet everyone. The people were extremely friendly and immediately made us feel right at home. That's one of the reasons Brian was particularly excited about our coming along with him this year - so that we'd have a chance to meet the incredible people who work for the various Bible Societies.
Brian got right to work with Ricardo and Gisela, and Rachel and I did our school work in one of the open offices. For lunch we walked over to a cafeteria that served the menu del dia, or the menu of the day. This is very common in Spain, and we've seen the same sort of thing in many different restaurants. You get a first course (usually some type of salad), a main course, bread, a dessert, and something to drink, all for about 10 euros ($15). Not exactly cheap, but a lot of food, much more than we typically would eat for lunch.
Tuesday evening we had quite the adventure as Ricardo and Ines, two employees of the Bible Society, gave us a tour of downtown Madrid. It would take too long to write all of the information they told us about the Royal Palace, Plaza del Sol, Plaza Mayor, Cathedral de Almudena, Gran Via, and so on. It was fascinating not only seeing the historical buildings, but hearing the stories behind them as well. It definitely made us want to go back downtown again!
For supper, we stopped at two different restaurants for tapas. Typically in Spain, breakfast is quite small, lunch is a very large meal around 2:00, then tapas around 7:00, followed by dinner at 9:00 or 10:00. The first place we went to for tapas was called El Museo de Jamon - The Ham Museum. It wasn't really a museum, but a chain of restaurants that has more kinds of ham then you could ever imagine! (see picture) We stood in front of the meat counter and had a delicious ham sandwich on a crusty roll.
We walked around some more and then went to another place for more tapas, again sandwiches with various kinds of meats and cheeses. I don't know how they have dinner after that because at that point we were already pretty stuffed. After walking around a bit more, Ines brought us back to the hotel.
Today Rachel and I did go back downtown and got to revisit some of the sights we had seen last night. But the first thing we did was go to the Chocolateria San Gines, which supposedly has the best chocolate in all of Madrid, Spain, and possibly the world. We each ordered a cup of hot chocolate and churros. The chocolate is so thick you really can't drink it, you just dunk the churros in it. It was incredibly delicious.
With all of that sugar surging through our veins, we had plenty of energy for shopping. And I think we managed to hit most of the souvenir shops in Madrid. What fun.
Sorry about all of the food references, but tonight around 7:30 we went to a restaurant for what we thought would be our dinner. The waiter asked if we wanted the regular menu or the snack menu, since it really wasn't dinner time yet. So trying to be good Madrilenos, we each ordered off the snack menu and got 3 tortitas (pancakes) with chocolate. Yes, we had chocolate again today! With all of that sugar in our systems, we walked around a local neighborhood that had apartment buildings, a movie theater, restaurants, and some high-end shops.
Thanks again for following us on our travels. Next time I'll write more about the projects Brian's working on here in Spain. If you ever have any suggestions or recommendations about what you'd like us to write about, please let us know! We'd love to hear from you. Take care, Donna