This Sunday I got up in time - for a Sunday, of course, so that means around 10am - to go... to a museum! I´ve decided that Sundays will be museum days, because almost all museums are free on Sunday. I decided to go to the National Ceramics Museum. It doesn´t sound very interesting, and ceramic itself doesn´t really get me excited, but the museum is located in a beautiful 18th century palace in the centre of town. Look at the fabulous entrance! The lower floors are still decorated and furnished as they were 150 years ago, so it´s really beautiful to see! On the second picture you see the ballroom. If you are to visit any museums in Valencia, then this one should be on top of the list! And the ceramic is in itself even interesting, because even the Moors made ceramic plates with lots of curly golden floral designs. And did you know Picasso made ceramic plates? He did! And there´s also a beautiful Valencian kitchen decorated with painted ceramic tiles.

After visiting the museum, I walked around a bit in a part of the city I didn´t know very well yet. I discovered beautiful little squares, churches, and the old university building of the Universidad de Valencia!

Then I walked to the metro station to return home, but I went one metrostation further than my usual stop, to show you the Alameda metro station, which is the most beautiful metro station of Valencia. It is decorated with... ceramic tiles! They´re all broken down in pieces, a bit like the façado of Gaudís Casa Battló in Barcelona. The white sparkling of the walls gives you the impression that you´re in an ice cave. Very refreshing after walking around in a city that lays baking in the sun! 33 degrees Celsius on an October day!

In the late afternoon I went to an open-air concert, to which I was invited by my Spanish mentor, which is a fancy word for an erasmus buddy. I haven´t told you about him yet, have I? Every erasmus student in the faculty of economics is assigned to a Spanish student, preferably and ex-erasmus student, to help us around with classes, course notes, going out and general info like that. My mentor is Guillermo, a last-year economics student like me, who has spent one year in Poland last year. At the faculty, they just gave me his phone number and e-mail address, so I knew nothing about him when I contacted him last Friday, so when we agreed to meet to go out to dinner, it kind of felt like a blind date. :-) But he´s a very nice person, has similar interests in the specific fields of economics, and plays the clarinet, like my brother used to. And hence the open-air concert on Sunday: he plays the first clarinet in a band that plays classical and Spanish music. And so I went to see Guillermo play at sunset, on a square in the old fishermen´s part of town. Here´s a picture of him playing the clarinet, but it´s a little dark... Told you, the concert was at sunset... He´s the first illuminated profile you see from the right. Yeah, I know, I know, not much to see... I´ll have to meet him again to take a picture of him by daylight. It´s on my to do list! Bu what´s next on my to do list is to take a swim in the nearby swimming pool of Ayora, then go grocery shopping, and then yet another class. Today I have 8 hours of class, of which 6 in one shot in the morning, from 8h30 to 14h30. Heavy!

The rest of the weekend wasn´t very exciting, I stayed home to read papers for my thesis and to read "100 años de soledad" by Gabriel García Márquez, in Spanish, oh yes! So that´s all for now...