Hasta Luego, Barcelona

4/30/09

I am finally done with all of my school work YES. Now all I have left to do is pack and, IF I have no problems on the flight home, I should be back in los Estados Unidos on Saturday afternoon.

I have only just really started thinking about leaving, up until now I have had too many other things to worry about, but it’s starting to hit me as we do all of our ‘last’ things. Today we all went to the beach for a few hours and tonight we’re heading back up to the bar on Tibidabo that has a great view of the city and then going to dinner. It’s going to be so bittersweet to go back. On the one hand I am incredibly excited to be back in Chicago, to see my friends, to hang out with my family; but on the other hand I’m sad to leave my friends here, to say goodbye to Antonia and not know when/if I will see anyone again.

When I thought about it at the beginning, the 4 months seemed like a very long time, but it really just went SO FAST. Some kids have left themselves about a week to travel after classes but the consensus is that most would rather just be going straight home. I’m happy that I’m just going back, as great as traveling is, it’s also stressful and takes some planning and I’m just ready to be home again. It’s funny that I’ll be going home to summer because I really don’t feel like it’s been ‘school’. Not that it wasn’t a lot of work or I didn’t have class everyday, but there were just so many more exciting things going on as well that they overshadowed the school part.

Well, this will be my last post. One of our assignments for Travel Writing was to write that 20 page story and we shared parts of them out loud in class. I was the last to read and my class/teacher really liked the ending paragraph and said it was a good way to end the class, so I figured it would be a good way to end my blog as well, so below is an excerpt from my story:

As much as she liked being organized and planning ahead, she could admit that some of their best times and all of their best stories had come from mistakes, mishaps, and straying off course. And she knew that in a way, Sophia was right. In the end the journey isn’t about the amount of landmarks that you can check off a list of must-sees. It’s about missed flights and late night buses, warm milk and pig legs, it’s about waking up in a dirty hostel not knowing what kind of weirdo is making noises in the bed next to you. It’s about ordering things to eat that you don’t even know how to pronounce. It’s about getting lost and caught in the rain. It’s about talking to toddlers who can speak the language better than you. It’s about praying to God you won’t see that naked man that hangs out in the Parc again. It’s about learning and enjoying the exciting differences of a new culture while rediscovering an appreciation for the familiar. It’s about building new relationships and finding friends that help you find yourself.

Terraza

4/23/09

            Today is Saint Jordi’s day in Barcelona. Saint Jordi is one of the patron saints of Barcelona, whose myth involves slaying a dragon. In the myth a rose grew out of the dragons blood and so it’s traditional for men to give women roses. It is also the day that Shakespeare and Cervante’s both died, so it’s traditional for women to give men books. All over Plaza Catalunya, and really everywhere in the city there are stands up selling books and roses. There are book readings and live music and dancing all over, it’s really pretty, and the weather could not be better for it, sunny and warm.

            So of course I have been inside most of the day, working on my papers…

But I have significantly widdled down my to-do list so I feel productive at least.

Things left to do:

Finish a 20 page story

Write 2 take home finals

Take 2 other finals

Later in the day...

And now it is the NIGHT of Saint Jordi and I am rebelling and sitting out on our terrace. Antonia doesn’t want me to because my sickness isn’t going away and she thinks it will be too cold, but I had to put my foot down because it is a gorgeous night and the temperature is incredibly warm… so I waited for her to leave for work and now I’m outside.

            We’re going to a rooftop bar tonight, I’m celebrating getting so much work done/taking a breather before alllll of my work next week. I am, however, officially donezo with classes. Only finals are left. Only 9 days remain so we’re trying to hang out everyday and soak up each other’s awesomeness.

            Welp, Wilfred the Hairy AKA Antonia’s son just came over. (as he always does), so I bettah go back inside.

12 Days and Counting

The end is approaching.

Things I still have to accomplish:

Register for Iowa classes

Finish a 20 page story

Finish an 8 page paper

Finish another 8 page paper

Write a 4 page paper

Do 3 presentations

Write 2 take home finals

Take 2 other finals

Die.

I really don't have time to squeeze in any enjoyment of the last days... hopefully by the end of this week I will have finished at least a chunk of that stuff and then the very last week I might have a day or two of free time. 

I finished one presentation today and my Barcelona class teacher says my paper sounds like it's going to be interesting and enjoyable to read. I beg to differ.

And then things went horribly wrong.

4/13/09

            I realize I am shockingly far behind on updating this, but now that I have loads of work I need to do, it seems like the perfect time to write again.

            The rest of my mom’s trip went splendidly, despite the fact that we both got violently ill and I went deaf in one ear. Montserrat was beautiful, but on the tram down my ears popped so bad and because I was congested, one of them wouldn’t unpop… this problem still persists today. The train ride on the way back from Montserrat took forever and we almost got separated as we went to get on the last metro home and I jumped on the train before mom knew what was going on. We both quickly put our arms in the door to force it back open, which is quite risky I might add, as the Barcelona metro doors do NOT respond to that. But more people on the train were trying to help and the drivier noticed and opened the door. Mom got a little tsk tsk finger from one of the metro security guards. Always causing trouble.

My ear popped again on our flight to Sevilla which made our first night bittersweet as I just lazed in pain. But our hotel room was really cute and the weather cleared up from cloudy to sunny and we had a great time. We both really liked Sevilla, it was much more “Spanish” than Barcelona, it’s more what I pictured Spain to be. The people were great and the sites were really pretty. The favorite was probably the day we walked around Alcázar palace and through the gardens and saw the largest Gothic Cathedral in the world. We also went to see a Flamenco show that was really cool, we got some “free” drinks there, due to the fact that both the waitress and us failed to remember the bill, we didn’t realize until we were already on the way back to the hotel, and come on, at that point what are you gonna do? All in all Sevilla was one of my favorite trips.

            The last days in Barcelona were depressingly rainy and cold that went perfectly with our colds that were in full swing, but we made the best of it, took the bus turistíc that took us to some parts of Barcelona that I hadn’t even seen yet. Probably not the best idea for our cold to sit on top of a cold and windy bus, but we don’t let the weather ruin our plans. We also went and visited Parc Guell but there was NO naked man waiting for us in the bushes, what a disappointment, I think it might have been a little too chilly for him that day.

We had a fun last night, dinner and some cocktail del dia’s (that ended up matching our dinner bill) at a place near the B&B. I left mom on Thursday, and took off to Greece and she left on Friday with no problems.

            Greece was amazing. The weather in Athens was beautiful and prefect for walking around the Acropolis and through the Ancient Agora. The food was wonderfulll, we didn’t think we could order anything we wouldn’t like (I would later prove us wrong by ordering Bacalao, which is a fish served VERY different in Greece than Barcelona… more like a salt lick in Greece.)

Come to think of it… I kept Lauren and mom updated pretty much errday in Greece so I’ll post the excerpts from emails I sent them.

-- Today we set the alarm for 7:30... so we wake up around 9:30, which is good, we are both on the same page as far as the importance of relaxation on this journey compared to when we were in Rome. We went to the Acropolis today, actually we are totes following the guide book's "two days in Athens" suggestions... we really didnt start out meaning to but about halfway through the day we were reading the book and realized that we had been doing exactly what the guide says, so we decided to finish the day with their suggestions too. I didn't get a Parthenon burn, thanks to the large aerosol spray can of sunscreen that the Barcelona airport let me travel with. Thank you lax security. But I've already had to take a picture with an old greek man named yurgos who owned the restaurant we ate at, and I'm seeing them stray dogs everywhere. We booked our ferries today, we have decided not to do another island and just stay at Santorini. We went into Anek ferries but they were sold out for the days we wanted to we got bluestar... womp womp. But the travel agent insisted they were 'bery nice boats'. Our hostel for santorini looks amazing, like a second away from Perissa beach and its just the two of us in a room and theres a pool and free laundry and they pick you up and take you to the port for free and its all for just 12 euro a night, scizore. (oh and you can rent ATV's from them too. Scizore more). Funny things... today while walking down from the Acropolis this old lady just grabs my hand to help her down the stairs, no words were exchanged I dont know what language she spoke but we walked hand in hand down all the stairs and then she gave me a kiss on the hand and a tap on the bum for a thank you. She was a cutie. Also while standing in the hostel we heard this old greek couple and the lady was trying to tell the man the name of the guy at the front desk and she was like "jonathon" and he goes "shonoashoan" and she goes "No... Jonathon.. THON" and he tried again and this conversation must have gone on for 2-5 minutes and he never got it right and it was the cutest thing ever.

--Today we went to the National Archeological museum and then to watch the changing of the guards. The weather continues to be beautiful, sunny and clear and in the 70's. I got a little red today, but nothing obnox, should be gone tomorrow.

--Santorini is just so beautiful. Today we did the volcano tour, I swam in the hot springs, Tejas didnt have trunks - WHATEV he totally could have gone in his shorts. Then we rode badonk a donk donkeys back up. HAWesome! It was real sunny all day today. Ill look for Panos' tomorrow because I think I am going to rent the ATV again (this time by myself so I don't have Tejas all up ons) And he doesn’t want to go cause I think he was really uncomfortable on the back the whole time - I had my big backpack on LoLZzZ!

-- I met Panos today! I ATVed out to Oia again and found the hotel. He was super nice and made me some tea and we sat and chatted for a while. He was a cutie. I went to the "Red Beach" today, which was beautiful, and I laid out and read my book for my class, still not looking forward to the MOUNTAINS of work I have to do when I get back

to Barcelona. Tonight is the last night in Santorini, back to Athens tomorrow

AND THEN THINGS WENT HORRIBLY WRONG.

Due to ridiculous Greek trains taking us in all kinds of wrong directions into the middle of nowhere with no cabs to be found OR called, we ended up waiting for/ traveling on trains for SIX HOURS on what should have been a 50 minute trip to the airport, missing both of our flights, having to drop many euros on new plane tickets and wait about 8 MORE hours in the airport for our 2:30am flight which was then DELAYED 2 hours. We didn’t fly home until 5am, and I got back to my apartment at about 9am, making it 24 full hours of traveling…

            But whatev, I had the best spring break. I can’t complain.

MOM'S VISIT photo album

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2018613&id=1149720713&l=5c8fe69153

GREECE photo albums

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2018637&id=1149720713&l=e0261f1301

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2018634&id=1149720713&l=9fac3feaee

Madre

3/24/09

My moms is here yay! We are having a great time.

She got here on Sunday afternoon which was the day after the concert (which by the way I felt like I was going to be trampled to death in, but was still fun when we moved to the back of the crowd). I left late, ended up taking a cab, couldn’t get into where I said I would meet her, it was a lupe fiasco but we ended up spotting each other through the arrival gate doors just like in them movies and had a teary embrace.

On Sunday we just brought all of her stuff and found the B&B (mistake on my part to take the train and metro which left us hauling the luggage up and down flights of stairs). We found the place right away though, and it’s a really cute apartment run by 2 guys (A couple? I think yes) Kiku and John : Kiku is nice and funny and helpful : We heard John puking last night. Guess which one we like more.

On Monday after my classes we met up and went to lunch at the restaurant with the culinary students that has a nice menu and atmosphere but is still inexpensive because we are the guinea pigs from the students work. I’ll give ours an A+. After that we walked down La Rambla and went to the Boqueria market, a lot of it was closing already, but we saw a lot and bought some fruit from one of the stands. Then I gave mom a little walking tour of the Gothic Quarter (I had just had to give a tour with a group for my Spanish class so I had the info.).

That night Antonia had us over for dinner back at my apartment. Mom actually understood a lot of what Antonia was saying, (that high school Spanish pays off.) and I interpreted the rest. Antonia made the traditional stuff – tortilla de patatas, pan con tomate, fried calamari and a fruit salad. We sat in the living room and chatted and I gave mom the tour of the apartment. (She mentioned my room looked bigger in pictures/on the webcam… so if you thought my room looked small before… it’s smaller). I also introduced mom to Maria on the way to dinner (my friend, the dancer who works at the store on my block) and Marta (the sweet little cleaning lady). Both of them, and Antonia and Chessie said right away that we look a lot alike, especially in the eyes. What a great compliment to my mom.

As we left Antonia told mom some nice things about me (of course who wouldn’t) And I went with mom back to the B and B. Today we walked to La Sagrada Familia, which is incredibly close to the bed and breakfast, and then walked down to the Picasso museum (which is not so close). We had some great Tapas tonight at a little bar, from Kiku’s recommendation. Tomorrow we are heading for a pretty big trek at Montserrat, I have never been there before, but I hear it’s beautiful. 

Jamón Jamón

I saw my second Spanish film today in which someone is beaten to death with a ham leg.

Sitges

     We took a day trip to Sitges on Fer's last day.

El Desnudo

3/7/09

Fer is gone, even though it was fun having her here, I am glad to have some alone time now so I can get some things done. Parc Guell was great, the weather stayed beautiful while we walked around and we decided to sit at the café for a little while and get a coffee. We walked up to what we THOUGHT was going to be the little room in which you order your food and drinks. As it turns out: Men’s Urinal. Woops. Didn’t even realize it until we were too close for comfort and were definitely noticed by everyone inside.

Oh but that was not the last uncomfortable encounter we would have with indecent men that day…

After sitting outside while the sun went down, it started to get a little bit colder, we were both in T-shirts so we decided to walk home. As we were leaving the park I hear a ‘psst psst’ coming from somewhere above me. I look up on the ridge and lo and behold. Naked Man.

I don’t know if I’ve written about it before but this is the THIRD time a naked man has approached me and/or my friends. The first was by Montjuic and the last two were in Parc Guell. I’m pretty sure it is the same guy because he always uses the ‘psst psst’ technique to get our attention. A harmless fellow really, just getting his kicks out of shocking people I guess, he waved at us while standing proudly as we scurried away. I’ll go to Parc Guell again with my mom. Perhaps she’ll get the pleasure of spotting him as well. Always a treat…

Thea and I are supposed to be switching rooms so she can have her own room and I will be moving in with Chessie, as it was agreed upon in the beginning. I’ve taken down all my décor and organized my clothes and stuff for the move, but Thea seems to still just be chillin. Bettah him than me – I’d rather keep the room. I do feel bad for Chessie though, I know she wants to be done dealing with Thea, who rarely emerges from her room. I think we may stop seeing her altogether when/if she gets her own room.

Warning: I start rambling right about herrrrre so feel free to stop reading…

I’m sitting in El Mos right now,  the cheap sandwich place we usually go to, I bought a café con leche simply because it’s one of the cheapest things to buy. Just trying to kill some time before my next class/presentation. I’ve made a to-do list for myself, but of course left all of the supplies needed TO DO the list at my apartment. I did book Sevilla tickets for me and mom for a weekend she is here, which I am excited about because I have been really wanting to see the south of Spain. I need to get on booking my Greece hostel as well. Spring Break 2009 WOO ((SB shuffle))

I got a ticket for Girl Talk (A DJ) for this Friday night because he is coming to Razzmatazz (the biggest night club in Barcelona, one of the biggest in Spain). I’ve been to one of his concerts before at Iowa and it was crazy so I’m sure this one will be even more so. It was only 12 euro, which is a great deal considering Razzmatazz usually costs 12-15 Euro just to get into on a regular night anyway.

I think the pigeons had some sort of game going amongst themselves today to see who could make me flinch the most. (It was a tie amongst all of them for the win.) A while ago I decided I would not fear the pigeons in Plaza Catalunya, I would walk through them with confidence and they would make a path for me and sometimes they would all take off in a swirl around me and I would feel like some sort of deity. But todayyy they were NOT havin it. They were literally flying right for my face and would swerve at the last second. I’ve ducked in panic at least 3 times today so far. Embarrassing.            

Nietas

Blanca and Lucia, Antonia's granddaughters. Don't mind the oversized chin bandage, there was a minor bump.

Catching Up

3/14/08

I’ve finally got a bit of break from working - 3 tests and a project this week so it was a little rough. But I should start from where I left off because I’ve gotten behind on things.

London was a blast. I went with 9 of my friends and we got there pretty late on a Thursday night so we went right to the hostel where we filled up our 5 bunk room. On Friday we did the typical sightseeing, Parliament, Big Ben, the Tower Bridge, the Palace (Of course always exciting to be in the land of Princess Diana), had some delicious fish and chips, the real London thing. We went to Westminster Abbey later that night to see the choral evensong, which was really pretty. Unfortunately my phone wasn’t working so I couldn’t get a hold of Sara or Katie right away, but eventually we  got in touch so I met up with Sara that night. Sara, Mateo and I went to dinner while the rest of the group went to go see Wicked (I had already seen it and Mateo says ‘musical theatre isn’t exactly his thing’). It was great being able to catch up with her.

On Friday night I took the train out to East Croydon which is bout a half hour outside London, so that I could stay with Katie fo free at her 4 star hotel that her work put her up in. It was good to get away from the big group for a little which and pretty nice being able to be in a real hotel and a big bed. We had a free breakfast buffet in the morning too which was swizeet to finally have real breakfast. On Saturday Katie and I took the train in and met up with some of the group for lunch and then headed to the British museum where we got to see the Rosetta Stone and Katie and I highly enjoyed some African Dancing demonstrations. After that I broke off with Katie and we decided to head to Covent Garden, which is a cool area with lots of shops, performers and the like, I remembered it from my last time in London and wanted to see it again. We did some more wandering on foot before it was time to meet up with the every body at Big Ben. It was really beautiful to see everything lit up at night, Parliament, Big Ben and the London eye on the river. Since our flight was leaving so early on Sunday, we decided not to book the hostel for Saturday night and live the hobo life instead. Unfortunately everything in our area seemed to close down by midnight so we ended up riding the double deckers for a few hours before making it to the airport around 5am. All in all, London trip: success.

The week after that was our “study week” which is an absurd name to call it because you actually don’t have any time to study for your 3 midterms that will be happening in one day when you get back! It was basically 3 days of conferences in Barcelona and then we went to Navarre, Spain (stayed in Pamplona) from Thursday till Saturday. All in all Pamplona trip: FAIL. The biggest question on everyone’s mind was WHY they would take us NORTH in the winter. It was cold. There was snow. There was rain. There was sleet. There were walking tours. We did go to a vineyard, which was pretty cool, but we had a horrible tour guide for the rest of the sites who claimed English was his native language (as he was from England). But I would beg to differ. He seemed to know little to nothing about the sites we visited and when he DID talk it was long and drawn out and random and weird. I wasn’t havin it.

The good part of the trip was that we got to spend a lot of time with our friends and new friends from the program. We stayed at a nice hotel and hanging out there was a lot of fun. We also spent about 7-9 hours on the bus trips there and back and god knows how long in between our “interesting” site visits. We had to fill out an eval. At the end because this is the first time they have tried to do this. We are like the experimental group for IES. I assume they will not be going north next year. (And I hear the kids will also get a computer lab where the computers actually WORK.)  How lucky.

This week, like I said, has been busy. Katie was here from Saturday to Tuesday and my friend Fer has been here since Saturday and leaves on Monday. I felt bad I wasn’t able to tour them around as much as I would have liked, but I was glad that they had each other for the times I had to leave them to study or work. We did manage to get some fun stuff in, they went on the bus touristic and  we went on a boat tour on the Mediterranean which was gorgeous. We have been having some really nice weather lately. Fer, Chessie, Mateo and I had a long walk on the beach yesterday, which was beautiful. And now I’m writing this outside on my balcony. The sun is really bright and the sky is cloudless, the temperature is perfect, I’m sitting in the shade in a T-shirt, I think it will be beach time very soon.

In other news, my mom is coming to visit next week so I am very excited for that! I’m off now to go meet Fer, we’re going to see Parc Guell.

M.I.A

I have been quite behind lately with blog/responding to emails and messages because I've got some busy times right now with 2 visitors and 3 midterms this week.

Things I will remember to blog about: Trips to London and Navarra

I highly enjoy getting the emails/messages (and the actual letters of course, always the most exciting), so thanks and sorry if I'm slacking lately but after this week hopefully I'll have a litttle more time on my hands. 

Today we went to Jazz Si again and we asked Antonia to just have some sandwiches to go instead of cooking a dinner b/c we had to leave early. So she made us our sandwiches, wrapped them, and left them on the counter with our "names" on them:

Chesi, Tía and... Queli

Sickos

"How did you lose your voice? Did you drink something cold?"

-Antonia to Chessie-

Thea and Chessie are both sick right now. Needless to say, the slippers in the house rule is on crack down.

Antonia completely lost her voice last week and I was talking to her about it. Here is a lil excerpt:

"Well, I'm glad you're doing better. I hope I don't get sick."

"Yes, well I went to lunch with my friend last week and she likes to drink her beer cold. So she put some ice in my beer. That's why I got sick."

Obviously.

Roma Tomatoes.

2/25/09

Ohh the things I should be doing right now instead of writing this. But I guess it is technically homework, so I’ll justify it.

Rome was amazing, we were there for four full days and we packed so much stuff into all of it. We walked the entire city on foot and by the end of it our feet were literally throbbing and our bodies were exhausted. We worked that city over. We saw… I want to say… EVERYTHING there is to see in Rome. We even got into the Vatican museum for free because it was the last Sunday of the month. We got blessed by the Pope in St.Peter’s square and went to a mass in the Basilica, so many things. Tejas and Chessie basically mapped out the whole thing because they both had specific things they wanted to do and I just wanted to do everything.

 Our hostel was Ok, Chessie and I were in a room with 6 other girls who inexplicably went to bed AND got up before we did even though we were slumbering and rising very early, so we never really met anyone there. But one night we decided to go get some crepes, and on the way we stopped at a grocery store to buy these little pops called “Sanbitter” that we had been seeing everywhere, because we figured they must be good and also the bottle was tiny and cute and the pop was red. Turns out these things tasted sanBITTER and were disgusting. We asked these three girls who were in the store to take a picture of us being disgusted… because these are the things we think are important to document. It turns out they were Americans as well, who just graduated from college within the past two years and were all playing professional volleyball in Switzerland. We talked for a while and they ended up coming to get crepes with us and hanging out for a long time. They said if we do end up taking a trip to Switzerland at any point while we’re here that we can stay with them for free. International connections. (crepes by the way: delicious, gelato: deluxe, pizza: of the gods.)

I went with Chessie and Matt to Sitges (a city on the beach) last night for Carnaval, which, if you haven’t heard of it, is a huge mardi-gras like celebration where everyone dresses up and there are DJ’s on the beach and parades and stuff. It was so much fun, we ended up not getting back until 7:30 the next morning. Spain be crazy.

I leave for London tomorrow night. I’m very excited, I loved London when I went there the first time in high school and I have already done all of the touristy things. Sara and Katie will be there so it will be nice and I can just hang out with them and visit the places again that I liked the best.

After London I’m bout to be hit with a wave of homework, papers and exams…

Roma Album

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2016419&id=1149720713&l=129cb

Writing to come later. Laziness to occur now.

Perfecto

2/15/09

            Where to begin with this glorious weekend…

The boys went off to ski in Andorra, so originally we thought we would just be jealous of them and have a regalar type weekend here. We ended up having a great time in Barcelona.

            Things did not start off THAT great, Chessie had some friends visiting and the first night they were here, right after we left them to go to a dinner at our RA’s apartment, one of the girls got her purse stolen. Womp womp. What a nice welcome to the city. But she was a trooper about it and didn’t let it ruin her time.

            We also met up with more intercambio’s on Friday. This time Chessie and I met with young Spanish University students, one girl and one guy, Jordi and Marta. We went to a café and talked with them for a couple hours, they were both really great and we like them a lot.

So Saturday we decided to try going out to a new place, one that was really close to our house, right up on Tibidabo (the mountain behind our apt) It was a great place, very class class, and since it is embedded in the mountain it had a gorgeous view of the city at night. I wish I brought my camera, but o’course, I did not. We sat at a table by one of the windows overlooking Barcelona all 5 of us ordered one over-priced cocktail. We sat and chatted for a long time and thought we had better make it an early (3am at this point) night since three of us wanted to go to the Gothic Cathedral for mass in the morning. Before we left we went downstairs to go to the bathroom and that is when the music drew us in… none of us can resist dancing when we like the music so we ended up staying a couple more hours. What was really great about this place is that it was NOT a tourist spot. We were the only Americans in there. It also seemed to be an attraction for the middle aged crowd, which was fine with us because there were less of the creepers we usually encounter… though the creepers that WERE there were middle-aged… There was one group of younger, attractive Spanish chicos but they, like us, only seemed interested in dancing in a circle with each other this night, which was both hilarious and awesome to see.

So Sunday morning rolls around, I (like always) seriously consider not waking up when I planned to and just going back to sleep for hours. Somehow I managed to roll myself out of bed and made it to mass with Chessie and Meg. The cathedral was beautiful and we spent a while in there after mass to look at all the art. Then, as we’re leaving we hear this band and procession of people in the street, so we go to look at what it is and we see all these people with these matching outfits on. We weren’t sure what they were doing, and we were walking in the opposite direction of them, but luckily Meg saw a label on one of their shirts that said “castellers” which she had learned about. These are the people that make the human towers (as shown in the picture). We went and watched them for about an hour, it was so amazing to see. I was most terrified for the littleun’s who had to be like 4 or 5 years old who would just scale these peoples bodies to get to the top like no big deal. I don’t think I ever possessed that kind of fearlessness, def. not at the age of 4. We were just really excited that we happened to walk out of the cathedral at the perfect moment to see them, we had heard about them before and always wanted to watch it but didn’t know when it would happen. I still don’t know why they were there, there is definitely some sort of festival going on but I have no clue what, Carnival isn’t until next week.

After we watched them we went and got Hot chocolate and churros, which is just never a disappointment so no surprises there.

And then, we had the cake topper. As we are walking back to the metro we were thinking, the only thing that could make this day more perfect is if we run into those break dancers again. Lo and behold, there they are, performing in front of our metro stop. Clearly this was fate that brought us together ONCE again. So after the show, we really felt that we had no choice BUT to go and talk to them. So we went and asked them about how they all met (seeing as they are all from different countries). I guess there is a break dancing gym nearby where they all go to practice and that’s how they got together. So we finally talked to them and felt incredibly accomplished afterwards, having spoken to such awesomely talented chicos, and I left with their number, so we now really have break dancing friends to call our own. Que guay.

Directions

2/10/09

NOBODY can give directions in Spain.

Obviously within my first month here I have gotten turned around and/or lost a few times, whenever I need to find a store or like… my house, I ask people on the street for directions. Let me tell you - not once have they been correct. It is usually always the same sequence of events: They pause…express that they really have no idea where it is… take a random wild guess and send me on my way… stop me after I have gone 2 steps and admit that they really don’t know if what they told me was correct … point to another random person on the street and tell me to ask them. 

Repeat formula. 

The best part is, EVERY TIME the place I am looking for has been no more than 5 minutes away from where I asked them, and in one case, was literally two stores down.

The other day I accidentally walked down a different hallway and got off the metro at a different exit than I usually do so I asked a woman which way to Plaza Kennedy. This woman told me I was way off and that I would have to walk so far to get there. Luckily I have had enough experience with Spanish direction and also knew that there was no way that getting off at a different metro exit could place me THAT much farther away from the Plaza, so I politely thanked her but continued to walk in the opposite direction that she told me and found the plaza not 5 minutes away.  I have no idea why people don’t know where they are.

I had my intercambio meeting today and it was awesome. We went and got coffee and talked for about an hour before I had to get home for dinner. We spent about 80% of the time speaking in Spanish and it was great to actually be able to carry on a conversation, she said she thought I could speak and understand very well and she helped me clear up a few things I didn’t understand from my Spanish class because I have my first exam tomorrow. Then we talked in English for a while, which was also good because I love FINALLY being able to help someone else struggle through a language. She is actually better than I thought she would be, she understands a lot, but she hasn’t spoken English in the last 8 years so she still needs help with a lot. During our convo she also made me speak with a country accent at one point so she could hear it (but really probably so she could laugh at me, which she did). Let me just say, it is no easy thing to go from speaking in Spanish, to English, to a Southern drawl.

I got mail! Seriously so excited to receive letters today. 

Foreigner

2/9/09

I know I am getting less consistent with my updates, but luckily a journaling assignment has made me write again:

            I am sitting in a café across the street from my apartment, I ordered a café con leche, which I am quickly starting to become addicted to, which is weird because I generally don’t like coffee. Maybe I’m like a real grown up now.

            I came here to force myself to do work. I had nothing important this weekend and somehow managed to not do any of my homework for the week. I truly astound myself sometimes with the amount of time I can waste.

            I just finished doing the reading for my Barcelona class. I accidentally slept through it this morning. I will never understand the design of cell phone alarm clocks with the snooze button on one side and the off button located just one space away. When my alarm goes off in the morning the only thing I want is for it to shut up, so I slap it across the face with my finger and sometimes I hit the wrong button. That was the case today.

            The class I missed was a field trip to the Gotchic Quarter, which is a bummer because of any of the classes I would want to miss, a walking tour is not one of them. I have really been enjoying my Barcelona class. It’s gotten mixed reviews from a lot of students and generally the class is not that exciting, but getting to see and touch and visit the places we’re learning about has made it much more interesting. I really feel like I’m walking on history in a lot of places here.

            The reading we had to do talked a lot about Catalonia and the Catalan pride. It’s funny to see the differences in attitudes toward the Catalans. My senora hates Catalan, refuses to learn it, and gives her calendar, (written in Catalan), dirty looks when she has to look at the dates. My friends just got back from Valencia and said that they have their own language there too, which apparently was a fairly recent ‘take back the culture’ movement there. She was a little salty about the fact that, while in Spain, we have to decipher so many other languages. I haven’t really minded it. At first I was aggravated with Catalan, considering this IS Spain, why isn’t everything just in Spanish. But I have gotten used to it and I can see the point of wanting to preserve the language of your ancestors and taking pride in Catalunya. It was after all, a pretty powerful territory at one point. 

            I have a meeting with my intercambio partner tomorrow, which should be interesting. I feel a lot more confident when I have conversations in Spanish now, since I have to do it so often. But still, sometimes I can’t help but think about HOW DUMB I must sound. It’s almost impossible to appear at all intelligent in a language you struggle to speak. The other day I caught myself having just said a sentence that must have sounded something like, “I no need the dinner this night. I go to bar for futbol.” Eventually I put it more eloquently, but still, I think I sound like a caveman a lot.

Salada

2/3/09

            I asked Antonia the word for salty today. I wanted to know because I often use the slang meaning in English, such as, “I think she is a little salty about the fact that she wasn’t invited.” Etc… but I made the mistake of asking the meaning of this word right after we ate our over salted dinner. I think ANOTNIA felt a little salty about the fact that I needed the meaning, so I quickly (and by quickly I mean struggled and acted out many different scenarios while trying to come up with the meaning of ‘slang’) explained to her the meaning in English. (P.S. slang=argot in Spanish). She got the gist and was no longer worried about her seasoning skills (though she should be).

            The first Sunday of every month is a free day for certain Museums in Barcelona so I went with some friends to the Catalan Museum of art this weekend. It was the perfect day because it has been a little damp and dreary ‘round these parts lately. Though today the sun did come out, I was so happy I decided to walk home to enjoy the weather, only to realize I needed to turn right back around as soon as I GOT home in order to go to the intercambio meeting I had forgotten about.

            An intercambio is when a Spanish student and an English student get together to talk and help each other learn the respective languages. There were way more American kids who showed up than Spanish, so we had to group up instead of one on one. Chessie and I got placed with the same person, a woman who is probably late 20’s maybe early 30’s, named Isabel. We were both kind of hoping for someone younger so that we could maybe merge groups and get some more Spanish friends, but oh well. I still might email someone else to get another partner. I think we’re starting next week and we have one on one meetings with her to chat. We spent the entire hour and a half this time speaking in Spanish and I really don’t think this woman can speak English well at all. She only said a few words in English, I think she was a little nervous to try it out cause she said she hasn’t spoken it in ten years. Bettah him than me, more time to practice my Spanish.

            Chessie and I stopped in to visit with Maria again, that girl who works in the store on our street, the one we interviewed for our project. She is a hip hop dancer so we were talking about music. There is so much American music Spain, almost all of it is, but it takes a while to get here so she hasn’t heard of a lot of the newer hip hop songs from the US, so I told her I would put a bunch of my music on my flashdrive so she can put it on her computer and she was pretty excited about that.

            In other news: I booked my trip to Greece! I’m going for Spring break with David in April, I’m really excited, it is one of the places that I have wanted to visit the most. I love looking through my day planner now, my life has never been this exciting. 

Explanations

1/31/09

            Everything makes sense now… Antonia’s mother passed away on Friday morning so she took off to Sevilla, leaving us each 30 euro to cover our food expenses until Monday when she will come back. She didn’t want to wake me up (and I assume didn’t want to explain everything) so she just creeped on into my room and left the money on my computer.

            As for the mustard and bags… it was a DIFFERENT creeper into my room who left those. Chessie had bought the Dijon and the sandwich bags the previous day and thought I might need them to pack my lunch so she left them on my floor so I would know where they were. It’s all seems clear NOW, yet I was by myself that entire day left to my own speculations as to what had occurred in the morning hours inside my room next to my sleeping face. Chessie and Thea both had a field trip that day and Antonia didn’t leave me a note or anything. When I came home in the afternoon Marta was there, jamming to her tunes and cleaning the kitchen, and she told me what had happened.

            We’ve had a 3 day weekend which means I have put off doing any homework and I have to finish Orwell’s “Homage to Catalonia” which means I need to start reading rigggghhhtt…. NOW.

Curious

I woke up this morning to a sound in my room, so I look over my shoulder and Antonia is shuffling out as if she has been caught red handed. I wait a little while and turn on my lights. There is 30 euro on my computer, a box of plastic bags on the ground, and a jar of mustard rolling across my floor.

Hopefully Some of this will be explained but I thought it would be more interesting for everyone if I gave them only this part of the story first...

Eurotrip

1/28/09

            I booked another flight – to London, the weekend after Rome. World traveler over here. Now I just need to plan spring break (hopefully Greece) and my pipe dreams of travel will be realized.

            I have to keep a journal in 2 of my classes, one for Travel Writing in Spain, where I just have to journal continuously throughout my time abroad, and one for my Barcelona class, where I have to journal about our field trips.

            Needless to say, my blog=my travel writing journal. However, in the spirit of killing 2 birds with one stone, I will also be recording my field trip journal reactions in here, the first one being today. The following will be me imparting my knowledge on you, so read on if you would like to become a little bit smarter today:

El Museu d’Historia de la Ciutat

            I went with my friend Cindy today to go visit a museum for my Barcelona class. We watched a short video about the progression of Barcelona and then walked through some ruins of the original Roman city of Barcino. I actually didn’t know that Barcelona started out as Barcino, I don’t think a lot of people in my class did so I don’t feel so dumb – I DID plan on learning about Barcelona whilst being IN Barcelona so things are going according to plan. 

            When we were at the clothes washing site we were told by our british automated tour guide that there would be places for the citizens to pee outside, and the urine would be used to help bleach and wash the clothes. The laundry place actually paid a tax in order to keep these things out in their street… so that people could pee in them… and their urine could be used… to clean. I guess I know how I can hold myself over on clothes until the senora gets around to putting them in the washing machine.

            Something that I find pretty bizarre is how much the citizens were concerned with personal hygiene and appearance. The women wore makeup and even used tweezers, people brushed their teeth to make them white and chewed mint to make their breath fresh. Women had extensive collections of jewelry and men wore jewelry as well.  Even though it is such a huge part of our society today, it is hard for me to imagine it being so important for them. There were cases that showed some of the tools they used and we read that the women would blend pastes and powders to make the make up that they would wear. In our time, we can go out and buy some blush or lipstick so easily, but it’s a different thing to think about spending the time to make it yourself, not to mention, making the tools that you use to make it yourself.

            It is really amazing how much Barcelona has grown out of  its original walls. What was one merely a stopover city, built for convenience and retired people, is now an enormous busy area that attracts tourists from all over the world. Barcelona grew while the rest of the Roman Empire was going down. While Christianity spread, Romans began to question authority and undermined the empire, becoming one of the major factors in its decline. In Barcino, Santa Eulalia, a 13 year old girl, became one of the first Christian martyrs. Eulalia was tortured and killed for her faith and was supposedly buried in Barcino, making it a place of pilgrimage for crusaders, and bringing in revenue for expansion.

            It was definitely an experience walking through the ruins There were remains from houses, the original Roman city, remains from where they washed clothes, had public baths, made wine, dyed fabrics, dried fish. You could really picture the citizens living a life there and walking through the same passageways we were led. It is surreal being in a place with such a huge history, it makes me realize how young the US actually is. 

Jazz Si

Chessie having fun with photoshop : Parc Guell
A pathway in Parc Guell
Shane, David, Matt at the top of the Parc

1/25/09

            I have done a few blogable things since my last post so I will blog them all into one. (blog is a word that can replace many words for me, even though the sound of it makes me want to blog.)

            We went to Park Guell last Friday after our class. (I’m going to assume you know by now that “we” = Chessie, David, Matt, Shane and I). The Park was designed by Gaudi, as is almost every other famous building in Spain. We took our lunch there and ate on the benches, then walked around the park for a long time. We went up to the highest part where we climbed this stone structure that has stone crosses on the top, we had a great view but it was really windy that day (the day before the hurricane-strong winds). There were no railings so Chessie and I clung to the benches in the center, but the boys stood on the edge (as seen in the photo).

            After Parc Guell we went to walk around the Gothic Quarter, which is where the original Roman site of Barcelona was. When we were walking out we saw two guys stretching out and they had a speaker with them, so we thought they might be putting on a show in a little while, we decided to wait… So we waited an awkwardly long amount of time and I’m very sure they knew we were waiting for them to start cause we were the only ones standing there. Eventually 2 other guys showed up and they break danced, which was awesome and drew a big crowd. It was cool because when they introduced themselves, one was from South Africa, one from Latin America, one from Spain and one from Britain (who I proceeded to fall in love with).

            We went to a bar on Friday night called Dow Jones where the prices of the drinks go up and down depending on who is buying them and sometimes there is a ‘crash’ and all the prices go way down. It was a cool idea, but filled with Americans and we only stayed for a little while. Then Chessie, Kelly and I went to a Discoteca called “Opium” that is right on the Mediterranean. The place was really cool, very lavish and large with a patio right on the beach. We ended up dancing the night away and getting home around 7am.

            Saturday we bummed around all day, but we went out to watch the Futbol game with a bunch of people at an English pub called George and Dragon. The place was cool and it had a big screen for the game, Barca won. We have all been really getting into the games so we love watching them.

            Today Chessie, Matt, Shane, Brett, Meg and I tried to go a “Labyrinth” park that is supposed to be free on Sundays, but we got all the way there only to discover that it had been closed because of the strong winds the day before. Womp womp. So we decided to go to the Beach. We took the metro down and walked along the shore, it was a gorgeous day and we finally got to touch the Mediterranean. Definitely will be going back when it warms up. We were all pretty hungry so we grabbed some comida (not quite lunch but not quite dinner) before we met up with Kelly and Sante to go to a jazz club they had been to.

            This is my favorite spot in Barcelona so far, it’s called “Jazz si” and we heard about it because Sante’s house brother plays the piano there. It’s a very small place and it costs 5.50 euro to get in but you also get a free drink with your ticket. We got there at around 7, which is when the music starts, and it was pretty full already. It’s a small room and it’s got a small stage, but there are also stairs up to an indoor balcony that wraps around the room, about the size of a hallway. People sit on and dangle their legs over and other people stand behind, we managed to find a great spot sitting on the edge upstairs on the side of the stage, even though it was pretty packed. (By the 8:30 it was completely full). The musicians were great, it’s a thing where a bunch of musicians come and bring instruments and sign up to play. Then there are also a few different singers who come sing and the girl had an amazing, powerful voice. It’s not actually Jazz really, a lot of different kinds of music from U2 to country was played, all American songs. It’s the kind of place that has a lot of regulars and all the musicians know each other. It was just a great environment with awesome music and we plan to go back every Sunday that we can.

            In other exciting news, Chessie and I booked a flight to Rome for 4 days from Feb 19^th to the 22^nd. I. am. Psyched. 

Views

This is the place Chessie and I found for our picnic, when we were looking for that park. It's about ten minutes from our apartment.

Hielo

1/21/09

Yesterday, Chessie and I stopped in a little bar on the way back from picking up our books, because we noticed that it had a big TV. We asked the bartender if they would be playing the inauguration and he said that they could. So after our class, we walked over with a few friends to watch and they turned it all the way up for us and put it on an English station. How nice.

Yesterday we had picked up a few groceries so that we could start bringing our lunches and we picked up a little combination platter of cheeses so we could find which one we liked the best. (spoiler: we later discover that we are easy to please as far as cheeses go and we liked all of them). So today, Chessie and I came home, grabbed the cheese and bought a baguette at a store a couple doors down from our apartment and went off to try and find a park we kept seeing on the map but could never locate. We twisted up all these roads and steep staircases and finally ended up with this gorgeous view over Barcelona and the Mediterranean. We had our baguette and cheeses (so Euro). Then we walked around the different paths. It is a beautiful day today, cloudless sky, sunny and cool weather.

            Interesting tid bits:

            The other day I got a glass for water and put some ice in it (they like their drinks warm here so the pitcher is always just on the table at room temperature.) And I could kind of see Antonia trying to look at what I was doing, but she was on the phone and didn’t say anything to me. Then Chessie sees my ice and thinks, ‘what a good idea!’ (up until this point we all just drank room temperature water). So she goes and gets a glass and puts ice in it and Antonia puts down the phone and starts loudly saying (all in Spanish of course) “No ice! Chessie, no ice! You’re going to get sick! In the summer, yes you can have ice. But in the winter?! No ice! It’s too cold! You’re all going to get sick!” So, in case you weren’t aware of this hard fact: Do not put ice in your drink in the winter. You WILL get sick. Another little known fact: If you walk in an apartment without slippers on you will ALSO get sick. 

La Red

1/19/09

I finally have wireless.

Skyping success.

We went to mass at La Sagrada Familia yesterday, which was pretty cool. It was kind of a makeshift church in one section of the cathedral, very small and boarded off from construction. But the music was cool, the mass was in Spanish, and I donated 1 euro so now I can say that my money helped build La Sagrada Familia. I also went to go try and light a candle to say a prayer at the end, so I'm waiting in line, I see the candle supply dwindling, I finally get up to the front and see that there's ONE candle left when all of the sudden some chica behind me reaches around and snatches it before I can... This is a church candle woman, have some respect. So I kicked her in the shins and ripped it out of her hands and told her to see who would listen to her prayers now. Actually I just sighed and walked away defeated.

             Today we started our actual IES classes, which are taught in English. I had 'Barcelona: The Cosmopolitan City.' I think it will be pretty cool to be learning about the history of the city so that I will be able to better understand the significance of the places I visit. After that I just had the usual spanish class, then lunch with my friends at a cafe two stores over from my apartment. I ordered a Bocadilla (a sandwich) which is pretty much what we always order from everywhichwhere because it's the cheapest and one of the only things we know how to read (Since most menus are in catalan)... turns out this Bocadilla cost 6 euro... 4 euros more than what we usually pay for the same thing. Preposterous. So... bump that, not going back there.

After lunch, David, Chessie and I climbed most of Mt.Tibidabo, which is the mountain that’s very close to Chessie's and my apartment. We got some nice views, and the weather was really great today, high 50's and very very warm in the sun.

 I think my days may become less and less interesting once we get into the school routine, so I will probably won't be blogging as often. Just occasional updates or when something blogworthy happens...  blog blog blog.

 But I will always try and remember some Interesting Tid Bits::

 Remember those scary, somewhat hairy pig legs that hang in our kitchen? We thought...she must not eat these, they're two years old and look like they haven't been touched.We sit down at dinner and she starts telling us about this particular kind of meat. How it's very rare and expensive (400 euro) because these pigs only eat this certain kind of fruit and it somehow makes the pig taste good, i don't know but she went on for a good 10 minutes. So she walks over, and thats when I notice that one of the legs has a little towel on it. She unwraps the towel, and lo and behold... Has definitely carved into that carcass. So she cuts me and Thea off a piece. What can I do? Refuse to eat this thing after she has told us how much it cost her and how rare it is and how good the meat is? Just because I feel uncomfortable looking at the hoof and hair of the animal I am about to eat? We couldn't turn her down. It tasted... moist.

Mullets

Mullets seem to still be in style here.

Bob Loblaw Law Blog

1/17/09

Chessie and I got up at like 1:00 today, but I justify it by how tiring our week was. (Thea had gotten up early to walk around Barcelona with Miquel, her Spanish chico). We had planned to meet for lunch at 2:30 so we just got ready and left. We met up with Thea, Kelly and Meg at ‘La Rosa Negra,’ a Mexican place we had heard about. We had some good burritos and a leisurely Spanish lunch. Everything is much slower here. When you go out to eat, most people stay for a long time just sitting at the table. And also you always have to ask for the check to be brought to you, it’s not put down right at the end of the meal. Everything just seems a lot more calm, as opposed to the rush you usually see in Chicago, or any other big city in the U.S. Something else that is weird is that juice, pop and water are all the same price, and a beer is only like 10 cents more. Which is also bad news because how am I ‘sposed to drink water when I can get some nice jugo for the same price?! They don’t give you a glass of water, only bottles. There was a drought here a while back and they had restrictions on how much water they could use… but they DO hose down all the sidewalks downtown at night. Personally I’d rather walk on a little grime and be able to get a glass o’ water or take a leisurely shower, but that’s just me.  Also the tap water doesn’t taste very good in most parts. In our house it’s ok, but we still use a Brita pitcher.

After lunch the girls wanted to go to the chocolate museum, but I came home so that I could try to Skype with my family… which only half worked because they could see and hear me but I couldn’t see or hear them. Technical difficulties, they will be worked out.

We have discovered that Antonia’s cooking, while good, has two main ingredients that are: salt and oil. Tonight we had salty chicken and oily French fries. However, she DOES understand that Chessie is a vegetarian so Chessie had an omelet that I wished was mine.

 After dinner Antonia wanted to see pictures of our families and cities, so one by one we sat and talked with her. I went last and ended up talking to her, and her son who had stopped by, for quite a long time. I told them about my weaknesses in Spanish but Antonia told me she thinks that I am better than I think I am at the language. She said that I understand a lot more than her other students. I told her I could understand very well, but I can’t speak very well. Her son reassured me that little by little, being here would help me improve a lot. We talked about the importance of experiencing new places and cultures, about cities and countries I want to see, about the students she has had in the past; overall it was really nice being able to get to know her a little better. Oh, and I also showed her a picture of Andre because he looks SO MUCH like her son. They both agreed, and her son now calls Andre his Brazilian brother. Har har, I now have an inside joke with the Garcias.
It was Matt’s birthday so we decided to go out and celebrate with him, Shane, Brett, Meg, Kelly and 2 of Chessie’s college friend’s Chris and Justin. We tried going a couple different places we had heard about, but they were all crowded with Americans. Finally we ended up going to this little place we found that was mostly Spaniards, and we got a table for all of us and shared some Sangria. Justin and Chris were hilarious telling us about they’re living situation. Their senora is not the best, she cooks herself a nice dinner and feeds them boxed meals. I think we’re pretty lucky with our homestay sitch

Photo Album of Besalu and Vic

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015783&l=1a910&id=1149720713

Photo Album of Barca

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015859&l=298fd&id=1149720713

Ay Carumba

My senora said something today that I have only heard out of the mouth of Bart Simpson.

1/16/09

Today David, Shane, Chessie, Matt and I wanted to go see Montjuic and we ended up putting together a sizeable crew of 11 people to go. We took the bus that took us to the funicular to go up the mountain, but we ended up deciding to walk instead. It was a hike, but it really wasn’t too long. The views from the top were amazing; we looked out over all of Barcelona and the Mediterranean. We got to the top at about 4:30 and stayed until the sun set.

After that we wanted to go see the fountain light show outside the Museum of Catalonian art, so we walked down there. The show was starting at 7 and we got there around 6:15ish to get a spot and wait. So wait we did… until 6:58… when we were told by a passerby that they don’t start the fountain shows until February… fools.

When we got home we discovered that our rooms had been legit cleaned. I’ m talking organzing, folding, washing, bed making. It’s a pretty nice situation I’ve got going on here.

After our dinner of fried calamari and tuna empanadas (healthy.), Chessie and I went to meet up with some people from our class at a little bar downtown. We had a little trouble finding the place since the door looks like a little window right at street level. We had to duck to get through the door and climb downstairs to the basement. The name of it was in French but it meant “The people I like”. It was a cool place, very small (as every place seems to be), dim lighting, red velvet couches. Swank. We only stayed for a little while because we had to catch the metro back before it closed so we left and got to the metro right at 2am (closing time) and made it home.

Fun fact of my day: Saw a woman pop a squat whilst waiting for the metro. Right at rush hour. Right in the metro station. Right in front of about 30 people. I got the rear end view.

La Sagrada Familia

1/15/09

            Forgot to mention last time, and I know my thousands of faithful readers are dying to know: we lost the Gymkhana by a HALF A POINT. Rigged.

            After class today I went with Shane, David, Chessie and Brett to go see La Sagrada Familia. We got on the metro near our center and it only took us like 15 minutes to get there. The church is beautiful, although of course it is still not finished. They have been building it for over 200 years and it’s still under construction because when it was first being built it was decided that all the money would come from donations; so big cranes and everything were at work when we were there. It is really large already and what we were looking at are only the lateral facades and the smaller spires, I can’t imagine how huge it is going to be whenever it is completed. We didn’t go inside because it costs 11 euros, but we plan to go back for a mass this Sunday. You can go to masses without paying, you just don’t get access into the spires, or the museum.

            After we did that, we walked out of the touristy area in search of a cheaper lunch. We ended up finding a place where the cleanliness was questionable but the price was right. There were 6 of us, and for 5.98 each we got 2 bottles of wine, bread (which generally doesn’t come free with a meal here), 2 courses each (Cuban rice and tenderloin and potatoes) and dessert (flan). Of course, at these prices, this was not a high quality cuisine... in fact quite low quality cuisine, but it was cheap and a lot of food.

            When we got back to the center, Chessie and I decided to sign up for a walking tour of the city (because we really needed more walking…) that was at 5:00. So we show up at 5 with no idea what this tour is. Guess where we go. La Sagrada Familia. At first I was all, been there done that, bought the T shirt (that’s a saying… I didn’t actually buy a Sagrada Familia T shirt) – but it was good because we were able to learn more about the history of the building. We also walked up la avenida de Gaudi, which was a nice walk, and went to see a beautiful hospital that was built (at the same time Gaudi was working on La Sagrada Familia) by the number 2 top ranked architect of the time. It was dark by this time so we couldn’t see all the colors of the tiles so we plan to go back.

            Tonight Antonia made us tortilla de patatas… which I think you can translate but j.i.c. – “Potato Tortilla”. It was reallll good. Ironically has nothing to do with tortillas except maybe the shape, but she said it has eggs, potatoes and onions mainly. It tasted kind of like cheesy potatoes, kind of like potato pancake, whatever it was good. We also had pan con tomate, which is bread with tomato guts and olive oil, a pretty popular dish here, and a salad. Best dinner yet. Still she doesn’t eat with us, but she talked to us the entire time telling us about her family and herself. Apparently all the paintings hanging in the living room were painted by her, she is an amazing artist but she says she doesn’t paint anymore since she started having students live with her because she doesn’t have time… womp womp, sorry senora. Antonia is.a.talker. she speaks fairly fast and she speaks a LOT. I love it though because 1) I feel cool understanding everything she says and 2) She has pretty interesting things to say.  

Shin Splints

1/14/09

            We met our senora today, finally! Chessie and I bought her some potted carnations from La Rambla and brought them home because we thought she would be back this morning. She didn’t arrive before we had to go to the welcome ceremony so we left her a note and left the flowers on the table.

            The welcome ceremony was short and sweet. Refreshments, chatting with other IES students and the like. It is only my first week and today was the first time I said something in Spanish that I had meant to say in English. Weeiiird, coooool. Chessie is a good friend to have because we both want to practice so we try and speak Spanish to each other a lot of the time.

            After the ceremony we came home and, not only was our senora there, but her son, daughter, and nieces were there as well. (Her nieces are preciousness in human form, and one of them is taking English classes.) Antonia so far issss hawesome. She was very excited to see us and was just really nice and enthusiastic. We were worried originally because we figured, her mother is in the hospital, things aren’t looking good, is she really going to want to come home to three chicas with broken spanglish, asking her when dinner will be ready? Problamente no. The thing is, it is harder to be my usual charming self in Spanish. Being polite is harder, making jokes is harder. I’m sure  sometimes we come off like “Want food, can you put me dinner now?” But Antonia has had a lot of students before so I think she knows the drill. Anyway, we really didn’t get to visit with her very long before Chessie and I had to leave to get to el partido de Futbol!!

            Side note: on the way to the stadium Chessie and I befriended un Rastafarian hombre in the metro station who we always see playing the guitar and singing. His name is Jimmy and he once played with Bob Marley and the wailers. He is my new BFF.

            Talk about excitement. That futbol game was really cool to watch. Both halves are 45 minutes, but the time really flies by because it’s not so stop and go every 20 seconds like American football. And we won. Barca beat Atletico Madrid 2-1. The place we had was in them nosebleed seats and it was reallll cold because the wind was so strong up there, but the excitement overpowered the cold and it was a very good time.

            Thea said that while we were gone, Antonia took care of her and made some special concoction for her throat made with fruits and honey, cleaned up her room and took her temperature. Thea thinks it’s a little weird. I think Thea is a little weird.

            Only problem is she ALSO moved the internet hub (I don’t know if that’s what you actually call that thing…) into Thea and Chessie’s room so that she could use her computer in bed. So I suppose I will have to post this tomorrow as I will need to go in their room from now on to use the internet at home. Wireless should hopefully be working around the 19^th. I heard of a website today that my friend, Meg, uses called callingamerica.com or something similar, that allows you to call landlines in America for free. Which is essentially what Skype should be able to do but people have had problems with it on landlines, so I think I’ll try the other one out some time.

            Oh, yes, we also met our RA yesterday. Her name is Natalia, she was really cool. She showed Chessie and I (Thea was sleeping) around the barrio a little bit and we found some super markets close to our house. She said that after her exams she will be able to show us around and hang out more.  

We walk around the city so much here.

I got shin splints.

Gymkhana Dos

1/13/09

            I hate the word blog. It doesn’t sound fun, or funny, or exciting, which is clearly all the things my blog is. It sounds like something you cough up when you’re sick. Speaking of sick, Thea has been ‘blogging’ all over the place cause she has the flu, apparently. Really nothing is going well for that girl. She still doesn’t have her luggage, she was put into the wrong Spanish class, she skipped both Gymkhana’s… womp womp. She actually went shopping at H&M to buy some clothes in the meantime. She comes home and the first thing she pulls out that she bought… 4 inch heels. She.Would.

            Before the Gymkhana, we stopped at a café called Farggi that is right on the corner of the block that our center is on. Chessie, Shane and I got some hot chocolate, which I think should more properly be called: the nectar of the Gods. It was like a straight up melted chocolate bar. It was so thick we ate it (yeah ATE it) with a spoon. Delicioso.

            The second Gymkhana was totes more fun than the first one because we knew what to expect. We went into this Catalan-gothic style church, Santa Maria del Mar, for one of the clues and it was really beautiful. We got to spend some time there and I said a prayer for my Nana, it was very cool. I love my Spanish class, we are the only ones who are really gung-ho about these scavenger hunts so who knows, we may actually win that free trip after all, though we don’t know exactly where we go if we win, it was rumored it’s Montserrat, but we’re not sure.

            Today I went with Chessie, David, Shane and Matt over to the Futbol stadium and we bought tickets for a game tomorrow night. It was only 10 Euros because it’s the B team, and it aint like we know any of the A team players anyway so we figure it will be just as exciting. The game doesn’t start until 10pm so we’re going to go after we go to the welcome ceremony that we have tomorrow night at some hotel. I’m excited, it should be a good time.

            When we came back from the Gymkhana, Chessie and I decided to take the bus home so that we were familiar with that way home as well. When we sat down, this couple got on and they started talking to us a little bit and we told them we were students. They chatted us up the whole way back, all in Spanish, it was so fun, I love being able to figure stuff out like that. They mostly spoke Catalan, and no English, so we were all trying to use our Spanish. They were probably in their 70’s… and I love me some old folks, so that was just the cake topper. They were super cute.

            We are finally going to meet our RA tonight I believe, we were supposed to have met her a few days ago but we had some failure to communicate so she just got a hold of us now. Our signora should be back tomorrow because her mother is doing better. If Antonia is anything like her friend Conchita, things are lookin good. Although, Sandra told us today that Marta will probably still cook for us, which is fine, except for the fact that Chessie is a vegetarian and has told Marta repeatedly that she doesn’t eat beef or chicken or anything… we have had a meat dish almost every night. Chessie is a good sport about it, but her meals have mostly consisted of the same vegetables and bread, so for her sake I hope things get figured out. (There are plenty of vegetarians in Spain so we aren’t really sure what else to tell this woman). That being said… tonight’s dinner was mashed potatoes, vegetables annnnnnnnd chicken.

La Boqueria, that heavenly market