Day Six: Megan & Chelsea's Madrid Shopping Guide

I slept in til noonish when I received a txt message from Megan asking if I'd like to go to Madrid with her for the day!! I quickly got ready (and actually did my makeup - wth?!) and told my familia I was going out for the day with a friend. Mi madre told me repeatedly, "Tu vez muy guapa!" and to enjoy my day lots! :) So cute! Megan and I had bunches of places we wanted to go but ended up shopping in Grand Via for almost seven hours. It was quite the HOOT, let me tell you. We quickly learned each other's style and helped each other pick out clothes at each shop. By the end of the day we actually got pretty good at it, too! Haha. We stopped for a quick slice of pizza for lunch (actually, Megan went back and had another - LOL - it was pretty awesome) but shopped non-stop otherwise! We are dedicated to our missions!! Hee hee. I <3 Megan!

Below is an advertisement for the alternative/indie salon in the lower floor of Mercado de Fuencarral. Megan thought I was weird for taking a picture of it, but the simple fact of the matter is, you'd NEVER see an ad as risque as this in the US, but in Europe, it's totally normal. So strange! But pretty cool, too! ;o)

And now it's time for our favorite game called, "How Much Does Chelsea Love Desigual?!"
a.) As much as Forever 21
b.) As much as Juicy Couture
c.) As much as Free People
d.) AS much as Cupcakes


The answer? ALL OF THE ABOVE!!! On our stroll down Calle de Fuencarral I stopped in Desigual to show Megan the splendor of it all (and, okay, maybe fell in love with a purse around the same time)... but nothing could compare to the Desigual we found in Callao - Oh. My. Goodness. It was SIX (SERIOUSLY) floors of heaven in the form of the most colorful yet chic clothing you have ever seen. Just as we walked in, a huge downpour started so poor Megan was trapped in there while I went floor to floor, staring at each garment as if it were an enchanted piece of cloth that at any minute would whisk me away to another land where everything was sanguine and bright and colorful and smelled of freshly baked cookies and extra pink frosting all the time!

 

By the time I got to the dressing room I could barely carry all of the amazing embroidered jeans and crazy shirts. When they lady asked me how many I had to try on, I said "too many." She looked at me seriously as if she were going to yell at me and then said, "Twenty? Thirty?" and then laughed as if to say, "Don't worry - you don't have too many!" ^_^ Hee hee! I narrowed all of my denim choices down to two, but mi madre says that rebajos are in July and I should wait til then to buy anything full priced, so instead I bought a really adorable skirt on sale from the 6th floor that makes me smile a ton. ^_^ YAY!


As if I wasn't already in love with Desigual, on the third floor I ran across a tiny lemonade-type stand in the middle of the store which said (in Spanish), "Customize your jeans for free!" There was a little lady there sewing on patches of colorful fabrics and embroidering people's newly purchased denim. Oh. God. I have imagined something like this since I was like 10 and wanted my own fashion line just so I could do something as adorable and unique as this. If anybody doubts for two seconds that I'll be leaving Europe without a pair of customized Desigual jeans, they they're NUTS. <3!!!

 

Somewhere along the Journey, Megan purchased her epic "cat suit" (leopard printed romper type dealio) and I purchased a few goodies: a bear shaped nail clipper, a doughnut shaped mirror (that also SMELLS like  doughnut - omg) and a sparkly thing to put my hair up since it continues to have a stick up it's a** about Spain's water. Success! ^_^

On our journey, we also saw this on one of the side streets! AMAZING!!! ^_^

By around 21:00 we were uber exhausted (Megan was dozing of in the Desigual fitting room while I was in the midst of my epic fitting room adventure) so we decided to head home. We'd just barely made our train back to Alcala and were sandwiched in like sardines when we smelled something peculiar... We quickly realized it was cigarette smoke from a lady sitting in front of us smoking away on the train! The two people near her seat started SCREAMING at her that she couldn't smoke on the train but this woman completely ignored them ("like a badass," said Megan) and continued on, not seeming the least bit bothered. Two girls about our age next to us started to giggle and so did we. I quickly pulled out my camera but couldn't get a good angle. The woman screaming at the lady saw me and said (again, in Spanish), "You want a photo of this? I'll take a photo of this for you!!" and she took my camera out of my hands and her and her husband started snapping pictures of the woman and her cigarette! HAHAHAH!!!  Photo below curtesy of these ballsy individuals:

Train picture! WOOT! (The woman in the back of this picture was the ballsy woman, fyi.)

I arrived in Alcala too late to have dinner at home so I ventured over to the McD's across the street from my casa. It was kinda gross, but satisfying. :o) The fact that everything was in Spanish was just so endearing that I temporarily forgot how nasty McD's truly is. Haha.

When I arrived home mi padre laughed to see me carrying a Desigual bag. I'd told them yesterday how much I loved the store so they were not surprised to see me with it. Mi madre adored my new purse and told me all about rebajas (sales) in July and how they're going to take me to the best outlet store in Madrid soon. Yay!! As soon as I sat down mi padre looked over at me slyly and showed me his empty muffin wrapper and said, "Quieres?" with a coy grin on his face. Before I even answered he ran to the kitchen to get me a chocolate chip muffin. Haha! Mi madre, padre and I watched Chronicles of Narnia and drank infusions (that's what they call tea here - it's so adorable) and talked until midnight when we all decided to head upstairs. I <3 mi familia espanola! Everything feels so quaint here!

Spent the remainder of the night talking to friends and possibly making a new one here in Spain. More on that later as it develops. BED TIME!

XOXOXO!
Jet-set Cupcake