Madrid Bombing 2

Well, after that we went back to Plaza Atocha to eat and find a hospital to give blood; however the hospitals didn´t want my blood. Everyone in Madrid practically had donated blood and they didn´t need anymore sangre. So then we followed the huge mass of people to see the manifestaciones, and people were lined up on the sides of the streets of Madrid with policia and guardia civil, helicopters and camera crews running around everywhere in the rain. Those particular streets in Madrid are HUGE, I can´t believe that they blocked off roads the size of a highway for this procession. So we waited in the rain for about an hour...well worth seeing the procession of the Prince of Spain, the President, all of the major political leaders all walking TOGETHER in the SAME STREET! They have guts...I was so surprised they would walk in the open like that when it would be so easy to plant a bomb in that crowd and kill practically everyone in Madrid. Over 2 million people in Madrid and millions in every other city in Spain joined together chanting: No mas muertes de personas inocentes!! Mira, nuestros manos, nosotros no matamos!! ETA NO, ETA NO! HIJOS DE PUTAS! HIJOS DE PUTAS! (clap, clap)The streets were so full, that we were all scared that it was going to be a stampede. You couldnt see anything past the see of people chanting and crying. After the Big Wigs passed, all the crowd jumped over the fences and joined the procession down the street. After being swept away by the sea of people, we tried to go about 10 feet to a Metro to get to the bus station on the other side of the masssive crowd, it took half an hour. We thought that we were going to miss our bus. All public transportation was free; all buses, metros everything for people to move around freely, so that was nice. There were policia guarding the entrances to metros because if not people for sure would have been falling down the stairs in a stampede. We couldn´t control where we went, we were pushed along with everyone else: thank God it was towards the Metro. So we got out of there! Then on the way home, we got stopped by the Guardia Civil who asked for everyone´s pasaportes. Oh crap! I NEVER take my passport when traveling through Spain because I´m afraid of being pickpocketed. So por supuesto when he asked me I didn´t have it. And my driver´s license didn´t work for him. He asked why I didn´t have it and I said: Porque no necesito (Because I don't need it). I didn´t mean to sound rude, but I didn´t know what else to say, I really don't need it as long as I stay in Spain. He heard my accent and said: Oh you´re American, ok it doesn't matter. Being American here is like having a Visa Gold Card, no wonder everyone hates us. Anyhow, my senora Nico said that I was SOOO lucky and he was really nice apparently, because he could have made me go to the police station and wait for a long time until everything checked out and it would have been a big mess. They were so surprised that he didn´t! I made it back to Salamanca at 2:30 in the morning.