On March 11th 2026, Maynooth’s Return to Learning (R2L) course participants were visited by a group of language school students from “Escuela Oficial de Idiomas de Córdoba” in the city of Cordoba, in the Andalusian region of southern Spain. As part of their visit, our Spanish guests introduced us to some notable features of their culture and history, including some landmarks, attractions and cuisine that their beautiful city is home to.
Our guests, all of whom spoke English with impressive fluency, treated us to short, vivid PowerPoint presentations on what their home region has to offer. This included colourful and interesting introductions to Cordoba’s historic buildings, sites and some of the following festivals and traditions including the following :
• The Mezquita – a former mosque constructed in 785 AD which now serves as a Catholic Cathedral and UNESCO heritage site for the city of Cordoba.
• The Alcazar de los Reyes Cristianos – a historic fortress and palace that has over time served as a royal residence, military base and a seat of the notorious Spanish inquisition.
• The historical archaeological site of the city Medina Azahara (located approximately 5 miles from Cordoba) which was built in the 10th century by the first caliph of Cordoba, Abd al-Rahman III,
• The May Crosses (Cruces de Mayo) Festival, which involves decorating Cordoba’s streets and squares with large crosses covered in flowers, plants and other traditional Andalusian items.
• The Festival of Patios (Fiesta de los Patios), which is when homeowners open their courtyards to the public, inviting them to gather and admire their decorated patios adorned in colourful flowers and decorations.
RTL and EOI students are discussing similarities and differences in their cultures
Following the presentations, we split up into smaller groups consisting of a mix of Maynooth and Cordoban students in each group, where we discussed some of the cultural similarities and differences – most notably the differences in weather! It was very interesting to see and experience the real pride our visitors had in their city and history and equally it was nice we were able to show them a video of Sinead O’Connor and the Chieftains performing “the Foggy Dew” in introducing them to traditional Irish ballad songs.
Our guests were also generous enough to bring us some delicious traditional Cordoban pastries and some sample sherry which made chatting that much more enjoyable. Most of us R2L students had only been to some of Spain’s tourist hotspots on holiday, often overlooking its rich cultural and historical history and that of the smaller regions such as Cordoba, so it was refreshing and exciting to delve into this topic further.
It was a very absorbing and enjoyable cultural exchange for which we would like to extend a very warm thanks to each of our friendly visitors and Maynooth University’s Department of Adult and Community Education which kindly co-ordinated and facilitated the visit.
We suspect Cordoba’s tourist numbers may increase with a number of R2L visitors heading over in the not too distant future.
*Student in the Return to Learning Certificate Programme in the Dept of Adult and Community Education, Maynooth University, 2025-26
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