|
Thursday, January 17, 2002 A nice thing about having to get up for 9 a.m. classes: Madrid mornings are beautiful at this time of the year, this gets me out into them. As I mentioned in an earlier entry, because of the bizarre job some bureaucrats did while drawing up the European time zones -- a job perhaps undertaken while working their way through someone's liquor cabinet -- Madrid is an hour ahead of London, despite being further west. Meaning the sun comes up an hour later here than it otherwise would, producing mornings that get up to speed slowly -- great for me since I tend to sleep better when it gets light later. I leave the house around 8:35, stumble down into the Metro. When I re-emerge near the school -– at the station named Opera, on Madrid's green line, in the barrio clustered around the Royal Palace (el Palacio Real), an area with winding narrow streets lined with lovely old buildings, including El Teatro Real, the royal opera house –- the light is growing, it's clearly not pre-dawn any more, but the sun is still not visible. The air is soft, often feels a bit damp. And as the sun lifts itself slowly up into the morning sky, the air takes on a misty look. There are people out on the way to wherever they're going, but the sidewalks are far from mobbed. Cafés, cafeterías, restaurantes are open, peddling coffee, sweet rolls, croissants. The atmosphere is relatively sedate. Of course, I don't have to drive in to the city. That may be absolute torture. Lucky me. rws 1:13 PM [+] |