Eleven Howard Payne University students recently returned from a 10-day trip to the Spanish cities of Madrid, Toledo and Segovia.
Carla Hawkins, assistant professor of foreign language, and her husband, Frank, served as sponsors on the trip along with students Marisa Bernens, Amber Cantu-Curry, Paul Deets, Allison Harp, Adam Garcia, Molly Gore, Jeffri Malone, Christina Meazell, Francisco Medina, Ruth Tapley and Lupita Vidales.
On their trip, the students toured royal palaces, castles, Roman aqueducts, art museums and cathedrals as they explored the foreign cities.
“Sitting and journaling in those cathedrals and admiring the medieval architecture with breathtaking frescos was one of the most peaceful experiences I’ve ever had,” said HPU junior art major Allison Harp.Using metro and city transit to really immerse themselves in the culture, the students used the Spanish they have learned in their classes to converse with the local people.
While they were there, the Spanish were celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Gran Via, a historic road in Madrid featuring early 20th Century architecture. They group watched a famous Spanish play called “La Celestina,” based on the Medieval novel by the same name published in 1499, and saw El Greco’s masterpiece – “The Burial of Count Orgaz” at the Church of Santo Tomé.
One of the most memorable parts of the trip for senior art major Molly Gore was standing in front of Picasso’s masterpiece “Guernica” at the Reina Sofia Museum.
“It was surreal standing in front of a painting I’ve studied about in textbooks,” she recalled. “It was so much bigger and more brilliantly composed than I ever imagined it to be. I found it so hard to walk away, knowing it could be the last time I got to see it. I just kept thinking, ‘How do you get enough of ‘Guernica’ to walk away?’”
Junior family studies major Ruth Tapley summarized the trip by saying, “This was a life changing experience that I will never forget!”
Photo by Carla Hawkins: Pictured on the tower of the Alcazar castle in Segovia, (left to right) HPU students Jeffri Malone, Allison Harp, Marisa Bernens, Amber Cantu-Curry, Paul Deets, Lupita Vidales, Francisco Medina, Ruth Tapley, Tina Meazell, Molly Gore and Adam Garcia.
