Espagne 2013

A special thanks to Tamara Nakib who dedicated a lot of her time, energy and creativity to work on this site. Tamara spent hours and hours choosing and editing the pictures, and typing the texts. Mostly she did it openheartedly and patiently ,"against the odds": slow internet connection, missing night activities with friends or simply getting sleepy. Well done Tamara!!!

We want to thank you, for the amazing trip you granted us, for the experience we will never forget!

During this trip we formed a new family, the seconde A family.

Thank You!

The Alcazaba is a palatial fortification in Malaga, Spain. It was built by the Hammudid dynasty in the 11th century.

This is the best-preserved alcazaba  in Spain. Adjacent to the entrance of the Alcazaba are ruins of a Roman theatre dating to the 1st century BC, which are undergoing restoration. Some of the Roman era materials were reused in the Moorish construction of the Alcazaba.

Ferdinand and Isabella captured Mālaqa from the Moors after the Siege of Malaga one of the longest sieges in the  Reconuista and raised their standard at the "Torre del Homenaje" in the inner citadel.

According to architect restorer, Leopoldo Torres Balbás, the Alcazaba of Málaga is the prototype of military architecture in the Taifa period, with its double walled and many fortifications. Its only parallel is the castle of Krak des chevaliers in Syria.

"It is strange about pictures, a picture may seem extraordinarily strange to you and after some time not only it does not seem strange but it is impossible to find what there was in it that was strange.

A child seea the face of its mother, it sees it in a completely different way than other people see it, i am not speaking of the spirit of the mother but of the features and the whole face, the child sees it from very near, it is a large face for the eyes of a small one, it is certain the child for a little while only sees a part of the face of its mother, it knows one feature and not another, one side and not the other, and in his way Picasso knows faces as a child knows them and the head and the body."
Gertrude Stein. Picasso(italique)

"Of course, one never knows what's going to come out, but as soon as the drawing gets underway, a story or an idea is born. And that's it. Then the story grows like theater or life-and the drawing is turned into other drawings, a real novel"
Roberto Otero. Picasso: an intimate look at his last years

"Among the several sins that i have been accused of commiting, none is more false than the one that i have, as the principle objective in my work, the spirit of research. When i paint my object is to show what i have found and not what i'm looking for. In art intentions are not sufficient and, as we say in Spanish: love must be proved by facts and not by reasons. What one does is what counts and not what one had the intention of doing"
Marius de Zayas Picasso Speaks(italique)

"You have to wake people up. To revolutionize their way of identifying things. You've got to create images they wont accept. Make them foam at the mouth. Force them to understand that theyre living in a pretty queer world. A world thats not reassuring. A world thats not what they think it is."
Andre Malraux Picasso's Mask

"I'm treading very gently. I dont want to spoil the first freshness of my work. If it were possible, i would leave it as it is, while i began over and carried it to a more advanced state on another canvas. Then i would do the same thing with that one. There would never be a "finished" canvas, but just the different "states" of a single painting, which normally disappear in the course of work. To finish, to acheive- dont these words actually have a double meaning? To terminate, to execute, but also to put to death, to give the coup de grace? If i paint as many canvases as i do, it is because i'm searching for spontaneity and when i have expressed a thing with a degree of happiness i no longer have the courage to add anything at all ..."
Brassai Picasso and Company

On Thursday April 11 we leave Cordoba, sad because the trip is almost over, heading to Malaga.

We embark on a two hour bus ride to Malaga where a pleasant surprise was awaiting us.

A four star spacious hotel where we got to enjoy large rooms and breathtaking views of the sea, under a beautiful warm sun.

Mr. Garde took the students to a bar near the hotel to watch the Barcelona vs. PSG game.

In the afternoon we went to this little place called "Don Pepe", A churro, sometimes referred to as a Spanish doughnut, is a fried-doughnut pastry—predominantly choux—based snack.

For the second time on this trip one of our dear friends turned sixteen, Jad Fares. We celebrated by blowing off sixteen candles in the hotel. Happy Birthday Jad!

After visiting the Cordoba Sinagogue, we took a stroll in the narrow streets of "La Juderia" and bought souvenirs. It was now time for the challenge: we were divided into four groups, each one containing at least one spanish student to help with the translation, we then had eleven questions in french that we had to translate to spanish and ask complete strangers for the answers. ex: "Quel est le nom du fameux torrero ne en 1917 et tue par un taureau en 1947? "