I left the States yesterday (Saturday) on the evening flight to Madrid, and I arrived this morning at Aeropuerto Madrid-Barajas. After clearing customs, getting my bag from luggage claim, and withdrawing some Euro notes, I made for the metro into downtown. Since I wasn't able to buy online tickets for the Sunday night bullfight, I stopped at La Plaza Monumental before even checking in at my hostel. The arena is massive and reminds me of the splendor that the Roman coliseum must have once had. The exterior is brick adorned with all sorts of colorful tiles and the Spanish architecture is just marvelous, the Moorish / Mozarabic influences are instantly apparent. I got in line for tickets and, to my luck, there were some cheap seats left. The guy looked at me like I was crazy when I requested the sun portion of the stadium, but I told him that I was used to heat way worse. I need to conserve the money anyways. But for €16 I got a ticket in the front section of the 'sol' part of the arena.
After that I made it back to my hostel by about 1:30. I got checked into a room and took a shower, all ready to go out and be a good tourist. However, I realized when I got to the National Archaeological Museum that Spain has weird hours. Not only is everything museum-wise closed on Mondays, but they all close super early on Sundays as well. Thus, without a palace or museum to go to I just wandered the big avenue Paseo de Recoletos for a good tapas place for some food and sangria. I stalled there for a couple hours with my book, and then around 5 o´clock headed back up toward the Plaza Monumental to get into the arena in time.
As I made my way into the stadium, I took a lot of pictures of the architecture. The Moorish arches and colorful, leaf-pattern tiles were some of the non-Spanish elements that modern Spanish buildings frequently exhibit. Furthermore, every major city in Spain is represented by a crest over an archway on the second-level that is surrounded by blue and green patterns typical of the Arab style. I wandered around taking pictures for awhile, and then drifted inside the interior halls of the arena. As I moved along the perimeter, I noticed that in the back they were warming up the horses used in the games, and that some of the matadors were already out of their dressing rooms and mingling with the horse trainers. I watched them for awhile and then went and took my seat for the actual spectacle.
A bullfight is divided into three rounds per bull. In the first, lower matadors get the bull riled up by twirling the pink and yellow capes to their side. There´s usually five or six of them in the ring at any given time and they basically serve to bounce the animal across the arena a few times to get it agitated. After this round, however, these matadors take a backseat and have more a role similar to a rodeo clown. 
In the second round, there come the picadores - matadors mounted on horseback with long, sharp lances - and banderilleros - matadors equipped with two bright, colorful spears. The lower matadors get the bull to charge them a few times, and then diverts the bull´s attention to one of the two picadores. The bull usually charges the mounted picadore, whose horse is wearing a lot of padded material to absorb the blow, and while the bull is unsuccessfully attempting to gore the horse the picadore thrusts his lance into the bulls shoulders. 
After a few rounds with the picadores, the mounted matadors leave and the banderilleros take over. After the lower matadors force the bull to charge them, the banderillero raises his two colorful spears and himself charges the bull. Right as the bull is about to blow back into him, he launches the spears into the bull´s shoulders and then slips to the side harmlessly. All this is done to weaken the bull and lower its head for the third round. In the third round, the main matador - the stud athlete - takes over. 
He uses a low-hanging, blood-red cape (what we normally think of when we think bull fighting) to entice the bull to charge him over and over and wear itself out. At some point, when the crowd is sufficiently ready for the kill, the matador buries a sword through the bull´s shoulders when it charges him. Sometimes this would take a few times, but often it´d happen once and be done. The bull would slowly weaken and fade become collapsing, and then the lower matadors would mercy-kill it quickly.
Typical fights are 3 bulls, but today for some reason lasted for 8. The day was complete with matadors doing very well - even one taking a victory lap around the arena at the insistence of the crowd - and some doing extremely poorly - the first matador missed with his sword-plunge seven times in a row and was booed heavily. 
Old Spanish men were standing up and yelling and talking trash like they were drunken Red Sox fans. The whole thing reminded me immensely of baseball mixed with the movie Gladiator. The pomp and circumstance of everything especially, including the opening procession that included the participants bowing to the minor royalty there. Additionally, trumpets and drums were sounded to signify the end or beginning of various phases; and finally because the crowd definitely had a say in when the kill was made. If the matador was taking too long, the whole audience would erupt into anger and three claps in quick succession. It was certainly a most unique experience.The whole bullfight itself took about 2 1/2 hours. I got back to the center of the city on the subway and unloaded my bag at my hotel. By this time it was already 9:30, so I headed almost straight back out the door to search out a dinner location. I wandered the streets for awhile, going from my hostel to Puerta del Sol to the Teatro Real. Then, I just so happpened to see a crowd, hear drums, and instinctively headed over toward the rabble to stumble into a Palm Sunday procession. Travel lesson: even for a simple task of searching out paella, never ever forget your camera. I watched helplessly as an entire parade went past, complete with military personnel and the priest hierarchy that wear the masks that look like KKK hoods, and wasn´t able to document it. The highlight of the parade, right after a slew of priests wearing the pointed Inquisition-era hood, was a massive float with a statue of the Virgin. She was illuminated by countless candles around her that had to be continuously re-lit by priests standing by. It was certainly not the first time that I´d seen those priests in the hoods before, but never in person, and it was an additional culturally unique experience to add to the bullfight hours before. Take away some of the surroundings and the procession looked like something that Tomas de Torquemada, Ferdinand y Isabella´s head inquisitor, might have lead in the 1490s.
Finally, outside the Palacio Real, I found a place I could get seafood paella at a reasonable price. Thus I spent the last few hours of my first night sitting on a terrazza with paella and the house red wine, listening to some old men playing two violins (quite well, too) as street performers, and watching people wander the gardens of the Palacio Real in front of me. Tomorrow (Monday), since a lot of places are closed, I´m going to go on a walking tour the hostel offers and then check out the Palazzio Real and the Catedral inside the palace grounds, the two things that I´ve found that are actually up and running tomorrow. Stay tuned!
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