Cordoba

We went to Cordoba, Spain this past weekend with our study abroad program. It is a city in Andalusia (Southern Spain) that is known for it’s beautiful and obvious representation of both the Muslim reign, until the 13th century, and its Catholic history. Its famous Mezquita, was the worship center for the Muslims since the 9th century. It is a huge hall of hundreds of columns and double arches- that they picked up from the Roman ruins left in Spain. Then in the middle of this grand room the Catholics decided to build a gothic cathedral. They knocked out the central columns and ceiling and built their house of worship right inside that of the Muslims. The cross of cultures was so amazing to see- giant Muslim style arches with the Catholic saints painted on them.
Honestly though, I wonder why the Catholics bothered to save the Mezquita at all. They weren’t exactly known for their tolerance of other religions. Why wouldn’t they have destroyed it completely and built their cathedral where it was?
After the Mezquita we went to the house/castle of Fernando and Isabel and we got to stand in the room where Christopher Columbus presented his plan to go to the East by sailing West to the King and Queen. The gardens around the house were just fabulouse!
That night, my girls and I went to a Moroccan style tea-house and got to watch a free belly dancing show while sipping on sweet mint tea.
The next day we traveled a bit outside of the city to Madinat Al-zahra, an ancient Arab city that unfortunately today is mostly in ruins because of civil wars among Muslim tribes. It was still very impressive and so much fun to imagine how life would have been there a thousand years ago. It makes me excited to see the Alambra in Granada, which is a similar city to the one be saw, but completely intact.