Busy, busy, busy.

So my life is soo much busier here in Barcelona that it ever has been. It's crazy and I think its really starting to get to me.

A typical day usually consists of waking up, going to class for like five hours, coming home, running, eating dinner usually around 8, and then showering, and maybe getting ready to go out for the night or if I don't go out then bed around 12:30-1 and then the cycle starts over again the next day. It's definitely hectic. And its making my time here in Barcelona go sooo quickly! And I don't want that to happen at all! So I'm trying my best to seize the day (haha) and make the most out of them. I think the main reason that my days seem so busy is because when I leave for school in the morning, I never come back to my apartment until 6. So it just seems like a really long day because I am in the area of our school for like 5-7 hours a day. Oh well... nothing I can do about it. Tomorrow is Friday, which means no classes, which means a whole day to do whatever I want. Finally.

So this week so far I haven't done anything exciting. In one of my classes we had a field study and our professor took us to the Museu d'Historia de la Cuitat. The Museum of History of the City. It was so boring. I thought I was going to fall asleep standing up. It was all about the Roman city that first started Barcelona or as it was known as, Barcino. Looking at an old pile of rocks isn't my thing. The dumb thing about the ruins is that someone along the way decided to build a huge house ontop of the ruins so what I saw was definitely ruins. It was even worse than going to a place where the ruins have actually been kept safe over the years. You couldn't tell what anything was because everything was broken. And then it was underneath the museum so it was even harder to tell what things were because you couldn't really see streets or anything. It was awful. Oh well, I had to go so I'll stop complaing. The one class that I am loving right now is my spanish class. I have an amazing professor. He is so animated and will talk about everything. Like for instance, today he was saying how he is going to try to take us somewhere to cook us an authentic spanish meal, but unfortunately no booze can be involved. And he doesn't like that becuase he would love to drink with all of us and hear how we "think" we are so good at spanish. Which is usually the case. Hes so awesome. Other than that my classes are pretty boring and dull. In one of them this week I had to draw the layout of my apartment, as like an architect would. Now please, can you tell me what in the world I would ever need to do that for?! Seriously. Sorry mom and dad, this might be a waste of your money. Just kidding, I'm learning so much more about life in general by being here than I ever would back at Butler.

I feel that I have already grown so much since being here, and I've only been here for three and a half weeks, almost four. Wow, I can't believe its been that long already. But one thing I've definitely have learned about myself is that even though I like to get my way and yes, I'll admit it sometimes I turn into a brat and throw a little tantraum... I can go with the flow too. Especially in a group of girls and when I don't know them all that well. I've definitely learned that there is a time and a place (usually with my family, sorry. haha) to voice my opinion, make it heard, and get my way. And in a situation such as I am in, it is definitely not the time to have to get my way all the time, I need to go with the flow. Another thing that I have learned is that I am pretty happy with my life and my decisions. There is very little I would change. I know what I want out of life and I do what I can to get it. And I don't think I do it in a bad way or a way that will put someone else out because if I have to, I will do it on my own. But I am usually very sure of my decisions and don't usually regret them because I make sure its what I want. One more thing that I've learned, especially in the past week, is that I love life. I love living life, loving life and learning life. I decided to embrace life as much as I can because we can only do it once. So, in the words of my dear friend Whitney Cockerham, I am going to live life 100% always.

Enough about my personal growth, I'm sure you are all either rolling your eyes or have just returned from the bathroom after loosing your lunch. Sorry. But this is also MY journal, so I can write what I want, when I want. Ok, so maybe I still have to work on that aspect of me a little... :)

Last night, some of my roommates and like five guys we've become friends with decided we were in the mood to smoke hookah. Don't worry for those of you who don't know what it is, its totally legal. Its just flavored tobacco that goes through water to cool it down and make it smooth. I bought one for Austin for his highschool graduation present. Anyways, it was a really nice change of pace. It was fun to just sit around with everyone and chill out and talk. We all had a really good time and I got a rose out of the night.... I'll explain. Its kinda funny. So, later in the night Middle Eastern guys will walk around bars and the streets trying to sell roses to drunk people. I was just sitting around the table with my friends and this guy selling roses comes up to me and hands me one. I said "No gracias" and he continued to try to give it to me while pointing in the corner to this guy. So this random guy who I hadn't even talked to at all in the night and didn't even notice he was at the bar because I was just hanging out with my friends, bought me a rose. Hilarious. He then proceeded to come over to our table and talk to me. He kept asking me to come dance with him and his friends and I said "no, mis amigas estan aqui. No voy a contigo" (No, my friends are here, I'm not going with you.) So he asked for my number, and instead of saying no, I just gave him the wrong number... oops. Hes the dumb one that spent like four euros on a rose for a random girl in the bar, he deserved it. And anyways, its not like I wanted a random guy to have my real number anyways. I'm not dumb. So yea, that was my night last night. Fun and funny.

This weekend is the beginning of Carnival (Car-knee-vahl is how you pronounce it with the proper Spanish accent.) It is basically the Spanish version of Marty Gras. Its going to be crazy. There are tons of parades, costume contests, food, and drinks. They are celebrating and getting all their "partying" out because lent is about to start. The best place to go to experience Carnival is Sitges, which is a thirty minute train ride from Barcelona. Yep, you've guessed it, I'm going! Not to get crazy or anything but I want to experience the Spanish culture and this is one of the biggest things in Spain. My room mates and I are heading to Sitges on Saturday afternoon and then staying there alllll night because the train stops at like midnight and then starts up again at 5 in the morning. But don't worry mom, or anyone else, this is what everyone does, this is how you do Carnival. And we are going with some of our guy friends so it won't just be girls (Thank God.) So yea, Saturday should be interesting for two reasons, one I'll be experiencing Carnival hands on and second, we'll see how bitchy I get after being awake all night in a place that I'm sure will be so dirty and disgusting. Its all part of experiencing and living life though right?

Well, anyways, thats my life thus far. This weekend, other than Carnival, should be pretty low key and I'm excited to be able to stay in Barcelona. Miss you all.

-Adios

Madrid!

I definitely had a busy, long weekend in Madrid with lots of stories like I promised.

So we left late on Thursday and got to Madrid around midnight. We went straight to our hostal and the whole time I'm freaking out internally thinking, "omg, I can't believe that I am staying at a hostal." I just never saw myself staying in one. I always thought of them as really creepy, sketchy, and dirty. This one however was not at all. It cost 20 euros a night and it was sooo clean and so nice. It was almost ridiculous, but I liked it. Since it was late by the time we got to our hostal and "checked-in" (if you can really call it that...) we were pretty tired and decided we would rather have a good nights rest so we can get up at a decent hour and start seeing the city. The next morning we got going around 10 and went to this cafe muy barato (very cheap, as the lady who owned our hostal described it) and had breakfast. It was delicious. I was not really in the mood for just another pastry and coffee and they had this ham cheese and egg sandwich that they made fresh when you ordered it. It definitely hit the spot. I was loving it. After breakfast we headed off to the Prado Museum. Its the most famous museum in Spain. It had a ton of religious art. I'd say about half of the paintings were about Jesus' life. It was really amazing. I thoroughly enjoyed myself. The museum was HUGE! We were there for like three hours and probably only saw half of it. After we left we were all feeling hungry and wanted to eat lunch before we continued our tour. We found this little Mexican restaurant that was sooo good! We all "bonded" and "visited" (visited is for my dad, mom you know what I'm talking about) it was definitely a good lunch with good food and margaritas. After lunch, we made our way to the Palace Real, the Royal Spanish palace. It was out of this world. I would definitely say that it is the most unique, lavish palace I have been to or even see pictures of. There was so much detail and intricate designs that one could only stand there and be amazed. The coolest room was the one with the King's throne. It is beyond description. The tour took about 45 minutes, you could only see like 1/4 of the rooms, if even that. We then went back to the hostal to take a nap before we went out for a traditional Spanish meal - Tapas! One of the girls I was with had a friend studying abroad in Madrid so we met up with him and he took us to this really authentic Spanish tapas place. For those of you who don't know what tapas are, here's a little lesson - Tapas are just like appetizers. There are many different kinds and it usually consists of something on top of a piece of bread. The name comes from back in the day because at parties people would walk around and socialize with their wine in one hand and a plate of appetizers on top of their drinks. They did this because they would be socializing as I said, and would want one hand free to greet people or whatever. So anyways, some of the tapas we tried (and to save my fingers, I would usually say "save my breath," just know these were all on top of a piece of like french or baguette bread) were a piece of spicy sausage, blackberry jelly with cheese, a red pepper stuffed with cheese, rice and beans, ham and cheese, shrimp with this cheese stuff and the list could go on but those are the ones that I can remember right now. So we just stood around this crowded, small tapas bar, acting like a native. Definitely one of the cooler things that I have done since being here. I felt like I was really experiencing the true, Spanish culture. After that we went back to one of the main plazas in Madrid. Its so funny to see the difference in cultures. The plaza was crowed with all ages of people, grandparents, parents, people my age and children, and it was around midnight! Everyone was just walking around, conversing, hanging out. So different from the US. We found a little bar and went in and hung out for a while and then decided to head back to our hostal. Our hostal was only like a ten minute, if even that, walk from the plaza we were in. It was located in a really nice location. The next day we slept in because we didn't really have all that much to do. We got up and decided we wanted to have a picnic in the park, with sandwiches and a bottle of wine. So, we get ready and decide not to eat anything before we have our picnic. We walk to the park, it was like a 20 minute walk. We had decided to wait until we get closer to the park to buy food so we wouldn't have to carry it all the way there, bad idea. When we got to the park we noticed there was no grocery store and hardly any cafes around. And then it was siesta time so the things that were around were closed. We were all starving and getting pretty cranky. Five, hungry, tired girls is never a good combination. (I think we learned that from now on we need to travel with guys to relieve the stress of being with only girls 24/7) So we walked back to a busier area and searched for what seemed like 5 days for food. We finally decided that Madrid didn't have any grocery stores and we were too hungry to continue searching for one. Then we had to decide on a restaurant. Another difficult thing to do with five starving, cranky girls. Finally we just chose one. It was weird. It was a Cuban restaurant. They had a special where you could get a starter, main course, and desert. I don't know what I was thinking when I ordered, apparently I was in some weird state of mind due to my life threatening hunger. For starters, I ordered cold tomato soup with garlic, oil and vinegar, please someone tell me why I ever thought that was a good idea? Then for my main course I ordered scrambled eggs with vegetables. Once again, for lunch, good idea? Probably not. It didn't taste bad it was just a weird lunch. Finally desert, can't go wrong with this right?! They had helado (ice cream). That's what I tried to order but oh wait, they were out. Of course they were. So I had natailla, I guess it was just like a vanilla custard. It was really good actually. But it was only desert and it was small... I know, fatty right? But I was still hungry because I didn't eat my starter and my scrambled eggs were just weird for lunch. So we left that restaurant and went back to the park and walked around for a while. It was a HUGE park. It reminded me of Central Park. It was very pretty minus the fact that it was sooo cold out! Madrid is like 10 degrees cooler than Barcelona, at least. So after a while we decided to leave, some of the girls went shopping, but I was sick of spending money (I know right?! You never thought that I would be sick of spending money!) so one of the girls and I just went and got some cafe con leche and churros with chocolate. We stumbled upon a demonstration in one of the main plazas. I was a little freaked out, like there was going to be a bomb going off any minute, but it was cool to see a Spanish demonstration. We then went back to the room and took a nap until the other girls got back. I think by this point we were all wishing we would have just flown out on Saturday night instead of early this morning. Our trip was getting a little long. The other girls got back and we decided to find a nice restaurant to eat dinner at and just chill out. So we walked for a while, and couldn't find one that we could all agree on. Imagine that. So we knew there was a Mexican restaurant, yes Mexican again, right across the street from our hostal. We went there and had another amazing meal and good Margaritas. I guess you can't go wrong with Mexican food. We went back to the hostal around 1, because in Spain you don't eat dinner before 10, especially not on the weekends. We had to get up this morning at 5 to get to the airport in time. So we had like three hours of sleep, great. But the flight to Madrid is less than an hour and we didn't check any bags and so we didn't have to wait in baggage claim. We came back to the apartment and all just passed out.

Madrid was fun, but I am partial to Barcelona. Barcelona just seems friendlier and more unique than Madrid. I still had a good time and I'm glad I went but it feels good to be back in Barcelona.

I'm the first one up, of course. But its nice because I wanted to catch you up on my weekend. Today I have so many things to do. Or at least I feel like I do. I have like two hours of Spanish homework. Yuck. Oh well, gotta do it. In a little bit, one of my room mates and I are going to go grocery shopping and I really want to buy stuff to make chocolate chip cookies, for some reason I have been craving to bake them, I don't even really want to eat them, but I know I will. Then I want to get a run in sometime today and I also have some things to fill out for Butler so I can have an internship in the fall. Then I'll have the rest of the day to chill out and get things ready for this week... So I miss you all, and I'm sorry this was soo long, but hopefully it makes up for the really short one before it.

-Adios.

walking in Madrid

Prado Museum

The Palace

Tapas

The Park

So Euro.

I thought that, in a weird way, I would like starting classes so I would have a routine blah blah blah... NO. I hate it. I hate being stuck in a classroom all day. Its totally taking away from my 'living life' experience. All of my classes are an hour and a half long and all I can think about is how much I just want to be out exploring and doing whatever I want. And it also sucks because IES (my program) feels like high school.... I am basically stuck in this building all day except for a two hour break on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I can't eat or drink anything in class, and I can't leave to go to the bathroom without asking and even then we aren't supposed to go unless it is an emergency....I also feel like there is going to be more work than I expected and the teachers actually expect you to do it and stuff... weird I know but I didn't really come here to learn in a classroom, turn in papers and take quizzes... I came to experience life in a different culture. Oh well... enough of my bitching ... haha

So nothing really exciting has happened since my last blog... I've been going to class during the day and then hanging out at night and doing some reading for classes. The other night I felt really European, I went to a cafe after class, had cafe con leche and read for two of my classes. I felt pretty cool.....

This weekend my room mates and I are heading to Madrid. Actually we are leaving in like 15 minutes for the airport but I wanted to write quick before I left. Its only costing like 80 euros for the plane tickets and then we are staying in a hostel for 20 euros a night. Its definitely a nicer hostel, at least it appears to be on the website. I'm excited to see Madrid but I just wish I didn't have to travel to get there. I was sooo sure I was going to travel almost every weekend when I was here but then I was thinking, I can come back to Europe to travel any time I want, but when am I ever going to get the chance to actually live in a European city? Probably never. So I've decided to not take a lot of trips, maybe like one or two a month, that way I still have like two weekends a month to spend in Barcelona and live like a native, with a little bit of touristy stuff on the side. And anyways, that will be a lot cheaper than traveling every weekend although you can usually find decently cheap airfare in Europe.

Sorry so short but I need to go and double check to make sure I have everything for the weekend. I'm sure I will have a lot to talk about when I get back, I'll promise you that I'll give you a longer entry.

-Toodles.

First day of responsibility ... well maybe...

Classes started today. It felt so weird going to a class that was not at Butler. It really hit me today that I won't be taking classes at Butler....weird, but I definitely like the change. The classes are going to be a joke... well not completely but I mean they understand we are here to experience life in a different culture and not to learn from books. So it's a pretty nice. One of my professors even said "I know that whatever you have going on over a weekend is more fun and interesting than reading what I assign, I don't expect you to read it." SWEET! My schedule is pretty nice too. On Mondays and Wednesdays I have two classes from 1:45-5:15 and then Tuesday and Thursday I have a class from 10:15-11:45 then a break and I have class again from 1:45-5:15. Easy. Muy facil (Very easy). I think I will enjoy actually having a schedule. This way I will stop picking at food all day and will get into a workout routine.

Since I didn't write all weekend, I'll fill you in. So Joey came on Saturday morning. We didn't do a whole lot on Saturday. We just went to Las Ramblas and Plaza Catalunya and walked around there. I really wanted to cook a good, put together meal. I knew he hadn't been eating well in London and I know that I haven't been eating well at all, and besides I love to cook! So we went to La Boqueria on Las Ramblas, the fresh food market. Wow, what an experience. All I wanted was a green pepper (love them, they give you good tasting burps! haha), a red pepper, some onions and some chicken. It literally took us like 30 minutes to find what I wanted among all the different stands and the hoards of people. We left the market with one HUGE red pepper, a semi-wrinkly, small green pepper, and one kilo of onions.... the place I bought the onions at made me buy a whole kilo! I only wanted and needed one, but I came home with like, oh I don't know, like 8! Oh well, I'll have onion soup, onion salad, onion sandwiches and onion cookies for the next month. My breath will smell amazing. Maybe it will keep the creepy Spaniards away, no? We didn't buy any chicken because we were both so grossed out at the sight of an entire dead pig just chillin' in the glass case and the women behind the counter with bloody gloves taking money and putting the meat into bags. We decided I would just run into the grocery store next to my apartment for prepackaged, non-bloody chicken. So we came back and I cooked an amazing meal if I must say so myself. I just made it up, although it wasn't complicated, but I sauteed the peppers, onions and chicken in olive oil and white wine and then put it over pasta and added salt, pepper and garlic. YUM! It was good. You should try it out, tell me what you think. Your input could help me decide if I should open a restaurant or not... After dinner, we were both feeling lazy so we just hung out and tried to figure our problems out. Bad idea, it just brought tension and confusion for the rest of the weekend... oh well. On Sunday we went to the Picasso museum. After taking the wrong metro line to the wrong stop and then a minor freak out about where we were and how to get where we wanted to be, we didn't even see any of Picasso's art work. My spanish still isn't where it should be and I didn't understand the lady when she asked if we wanted to see Picasso's actually art work or his collection of other Artist's works. So we only got tickets to see Picasso's collection of other artists... not too exciting but whatever it was an adventure. I bought a pretty poster of one of Henri Matisse's paintings though, so my walls aren't completely white anymore. After that adventure, we just hung out around the apartment until we went to get dinner. We found a really good Italiano restaurant just a few blocks away from where I live. Other than the meal I made, I think it was the best, most flavorful, biggest meal I've had since I've been here. It was good. That leads us to today....so were back to the beginning of this entry...


Right now I'm just sitting in my apartment all alone because all of my roomies went out tonight. I on the other hand, after my stressful, tension filled weekend wasn't in the mood. I wanted to just update my blog, get my planner and my class stuff organized and chill out. But now its really quiet and kind of lonely.. oh well.. I'll go to bed soon anyways. Its almost 1:30 am here and I have class at 10:15... I know soooo early right?


Who knows what tomorrow will bring, other than classes I have nothing planned. I think tonight is seriously the first time I've had complete silence and alone time since I got here and its kind of nice... but I'm sure tomorrow I will not have this and there will be something new to see or do. I'll enjoy this peace and quiet while I can, although I am not complaining at all about the fact I never have peace and quiet here. I love it that I don't, it keeps my mind off of the fact that I am here, so many miles away from my friends and family and worlds away from everything I consider normal, but once again, not complaining about things being different. I love it the differences. So now I'm just blabbering on and not talking about anything important so I'll just go read my book (for like the second time since I arrived...) and go to bed.


-Buenas Noches.


Here are some pictures of that all you can eat, Japanese Sushi restaurant from my last entry that I just uploaded from my camera...

Made For Each Other

So, I am convinced that study abroad was created just for me. Or at least I was born to study abroad. But I'd like to think that it was created just for me, because I'm so special. :) But seriously, its such an adventure and I love it! There is never a dull moment and we all know that I am definitely an on-the-go, impatient, and hate to have nothing to do kind of person. Experiencing and living in new cultures, traveling, meeting tons of new people, totally for me. This is amazing.

I am absolutely loving meeting new people. I am not shy as you all know. I love talking to people and even if I only have a lame, surface conversation with someone, I walk away with a smile knowing that I just met someone new and they let me in on a little part of their life.

Anyways, enough about how I'm enjoying living in Spain and everything that comes along with studying abroad..... After I wrote on Wednesday my room mates and I went to Parc Guell. It is a park that was designed by the great Artist Gaudi. Gaudi's buildings are all over the city and they are all really cool. They kind of remind me of cakes or the Little Mermaid under the sea. The park was originally created to be an exclusive neighborhood for the rich (anyone remember the Spanish word for neighborhood? You won't get anything for remembering other than the feeling you get of being a little smarter than everyone else hehe). There was even a place that was designated for the market. This never happened though and now it is open to the public to come and enjoy the pretty buildings and designs. Its what my main picture on my blog is of. I'm pondering the life while looking out over my new world. Deep, I know. I told you I'm going to become European and educated, this is only the beginning. Anyways, after that we just came back and ate dinner and then went to hang out with some guys at a local bar. The bar was really cool and had an Arabian/Middle Eastern vibe. Really good Mojitos. (Yes, if Ann and Kiki are reading my blog I said good Mojitos. We just suck at making our own.)

Yesterday we had orientation again but for the last time! WOO HOO! After that I came back and took a much needed nap. This life style is going to kill me for sure. Not getting my much needed eight hours of beauty rest a night is starting to take its toll. Then one of my room mates and I went shopping, yes shopping again, I know. Then we met up with some of our guy friends for the night.

Today we went to get our readers for class since we start on Monday, apparently they are not called books?? Ugh, I have to start having a schedule and a half ways normal life. Don't worry I will still be living la vida loca, but I'll actually have some responsibilities. Crap. It was so nice to only pay like 60 euros for books instead of the usual 600-700 I pay at the Butler bookstore that has a huge monopoly and charges 200% more than the book actually costs and about 500% more than what the book is actually worth. After that we went to this all you can eat, 9 euro Japanese sushi bar just down the block from our apartment. Yes, I ate sushi! This is only the second time in my life. I was always really turned off from the idea of eating raw fish wrapped in seaweed. Disgusting! I could never understand why anyone would actually want to put that crap in their mouths! But I actually kind of like it. Its not bad! But yea, we definitely all ate at least 9 euros worth of food. Now I won't have to cook anything for dinner. Yay! Tonight I'm not really sure whats going on yet.... it all depends....

Here's a little personal, juicy, gushy topic for you to indulge in, just in case your life isn't interesting enough and the best thing that you do in a day is read my blog (which if this is the highlight of your day, I'm sorry. You might want to consider some help, Lexapro or Zantax maybe?! Just kidding! haha) Anyways, Joey is supposed to be coming this weekend to visit since its been over a month since we last saw each other. Studying abroad is definitely harder on our relationship than I thought it would be. Its been pretty difficult to find time to actually have a good, long conversation and then with the high prices for the cell phones, its just ridiculous. But anyways, last night got pretty heated between us and now I'm not sure if hes still going to come this weekend. I hope he does, I think it will do us both good to see each other again and actually have a real conversation face to face. We'll see though....

I just wanted to say that I love all the comments I'm getting! Its soooo good to hear from all of you. Sorry I don't respond to them individually, I have a life, but I really do enjoy them all! Keep 'em comin!

Anyways, I'm about to take a quick nap. I'm falling into a sushi buffet coma and would like to be fat and sleep it off.

Parc Guell over looking the city with a few Gaudi buildings

Pictures!

So I finally got the pictures to work.... guess you just have to be a little patient. :)




Roomies! Valencia center square





A fountain in Valencia Cool buildings in Valencia, the aquarium and science museums


Open market in Barca in Las Ramblas My street, sorry its sideways

my tiny, cramped room.

Partido de Futbol!

90,000 screaming fans, most of them yelling curse words in Spanish, about 80% of the fans smoking cigarettes, non-alcoholic beer, red and blue all over and no voice this morning.... any guesses?

Partido de Futbol! Soccer game! FC Barcelona played Seville last night and I went! What an experience. The game wasn't the most exciting thing I've ever watched, it ended 0-0, but it was still fun!

First of all, the stadium was huge and there were around 90,000 people there, but it seemed weird that all these people were Spanish. Somehow that made it seem even cooler than being in a stadium with that many people in America. Weird maybe, I don't know, but it still felt totally different. I swear that 90% of people in Spain smoke cigarettes, yuck! And that everyone who smokes in Spain decided to go to the game last night. It was awful, I hate cigarette smoke and I forgot my inhaler. Oh well, I survived but I'm sure I inhaled enough second hand smoke to give me lung cancer and will have the first symptoms in about two years. I guess its just part of the Espana experience.

The weather wasn't bad at all. I was nervous about being cold because I hate being cold and it is in the 40's here at night but I put on my big girl panties and sucked it up. It really wasn't bad at all, it was pleasant.

The funniest part of last night is that these two men, probably around dad's age (I won't say his age, I don't want to hurt the old farts feelings!) that were sitting in front of us were teaching us how to curse at the refs and players in Spanish. Hilarious.

The biggest difference I noticed between an American sporting event and a Spanish one is that they don't serve alcohol. I don't think the sports goers of America would be able to survive if the venue didn't at least serve beer. Some of the guys we went with didn't realize it was non alcohol and were feeling pretty cool drinking a beer at a Spanish soccer game until I informed them that on the sign it said "non alcoholic beer" in English. Don't worry, I didn't know this tid bit of information because I was wanting to buy a beer. I bought a sucker and was reading the menu and saw it was non-alcoholic beer and found it interesting.

The whole experience was cool. I was super excited because that was one thing I definitely wanted to do when I was here and I'm glad we didn't wait around until the last minute to do it. Now I have time to go to another one if I want to! I probably will, I'd like to see a really good game.

Anyways, today my room mates and I skipped orientation because we were so sick of getting up so early for nothing. I'm going to go running in a little bit with two of my room mates and then its shopping time! I have to get started on my plan of being completely European when I get back and it starts with clothes! I won't go crazy, just a few things to get me started. I don't know what were up to the rest of the night. I kinda hope just keeping it low key and hanging out around here. I really want to watch a movie or something but no one has any and finding one in English would definitely be an adventure. Oh well, I can surf the web and research grad school..... haha

-Hasta Luego

Pictures!

The stadium (and 2 bald guys' heads haha)

Settling In.

I am sick of getting up so early for orientation. End of subject.

Yesterday, after orientation, my room mates and I strolled around the area by where our school is. There is a really touristy area called Las Ramblas that we walked around in. It was kinda cool, except it was really touristy. But there is a huge food market in the middle that was fun to walk through. The fruit looked so good I just wanted to snatch some. I won't even mention all the candy that made my mouth water... it will just start watering again. We just walked around the winding, narrow streets and stopped in stores and ate lunch along the way. It was a lot of fun.

We then came back and chilled out till we ate dinner and then we went to a club. It was a lot of fun. Yo baile mucho! (I danced a lot!) Era muy divertido! (It was very fun!) There were a ton of American students there from all the different programs. In a way that was nice but then again I came to immerse myself in the culture and it just felt like being back home or something. But it was still fun.

Today we had orientation, again but this time we actually toured the area around the school with our professor. We saw a Cathedral and a few other cool things. After that my room mates and some guys we met decided we wanted to go to the Futbol (soccer) game tonight! It is FC Barcelona vs. Sevilla. I'm super excited! I definitely wanted to go watch a game while I was here and I'm glad we jumped on the opportunity to go right away instead of waiting till the last minute and possibly not going. It should be a ton of fun!

I just got back from a run with two of my room mates. It was the first time I've worked out since I've been here and it felt soooo good. The path we took is a nice one, it is pretty long. It took us about 35 minutes to run it and then like 10 minutes walking to and from our apartment to get there. There weren't any interesting sites or anything a long the way but it was different than running around good ol' BU. I plan to do it at least every other day. I can't come back looking like a fat cow, that is just not in my life plans. Anyways just wanted to catch up quick but I need to get in the shower. I stink. hehe

I'll try to upload some pictures but every time I've tried it just freezes. I'll keep trying though.

Hasta luego.

Epiphany.

So here's an idea.... How about we take kids on a four hour bus ride for the weekend after they just arrived in a new city. Yea that sounds like a good idea.....?!?

First off, we had to be there at the crack of dawn on Friday morning to leave. I mean seriously, I didn't even know that 7:45 am existed! So we leave to head to Valencia. A four hour bus ride. Not good. I get car sick soo easily and four hours in a bus did not sound appealing. So we finally get to Valencia and then took a tour of the city. It was actually a really cool city but we only had like three hours to spend in the downtown area and two hours of it was with a guide so we couldn't really just explore. Then we went back to the hotel and got our rooming assignments. We were just paired with random people. It was kind of awkward but I feel like this whole situation is awkward. I feel like I'm starting college all over again. I'm about to just wear a sign around my neck that says my name, where I'm from and what school I go to. It will save a lot of breath. Anyways, back to Valencia... we went out to dinner and then out to a bar. A very crowded smoky bar. It was ridiculous. You seriously couldn't even move, just standing you were always touching someone. It was awful. We only stayed for like 45 minutes then went back to bed. The next morning we had to wake up early again and head to an aquarium and a science museum, like I couldn't see those anywhere? Neither were anything special. I felt like such a tourist. Traveling in a big group with a lady who held a fan in the air. Yea, straight up tourist. And the whole point of this trip was to meet people but I didn't really feel like it was that good of a way to meet people. But oh well. Then today we left early in the morning once again but on the way home we stopped in like the oldest Roman city in Spain. It was a cool city but I was so over the trip and just wanted to get back to my apartment. The best part of the trip I would have to say was the bus ride home. Pretty much everyone was sleeping except for me because I had cafe con leche (coffee with milk) for lunch. Oh yea, by the way, apparently I like to drink coffee now?? I used to hate it and only drink tea, but a lot of places here only serve coffe so I started drinking it. I've drank more coffee in the past five days than I have in my entire life and unfortuately I'm starting to like it. But with milk and sugar of course, their coffee is sooo strong! But anyways, since I was pretty much the only one up I planned out my life. So first, while I'm here I'm going to become very European and educate myself on worldly issues. When I come back you will be amazed. Then I am going to seriously look into Grad school... I just got into this mood lately that I am going to go to Grad school. Weird? I think I just don't want to be living in the real world yet, I like the half reality vibe that college has. :) Then after Grad school I am going to live in Chicago. So yea, this weekend was good for something I guess.

So here I am finally. I'm glad to be back in Barcelona. I really need to start to get to know the area and the city. I am making myself venture all over the city this week while I still have basically nothing to do during the day other than two hours of orientation. It should be a good chance to get to see and learn the city.

I'm having a good time but I just want everyone to know that I miss you all! Its been really hard not having anyone I know here. I mean I'm an out going person and talking with people isn't hard but I definitely feel lonely. Hopefully everything will work itself out soon and I'll get into a routine and have a good group of people I hang out with and feel comfortable with. But I definitely miss everyone.

So I feel like this blog posting is all over the place since I was talking on AIM with friends and on Skype to my mom while I was writing this... sorry if it is. I hope I didn't forget anything important and that it makes sense! haha Anyways, time to unpack my bag from this weekend and hang out with the roomies. Epiphany

My luggage has arrived!

My luggage has finally made it! Yay! It was so nice to take a nap in my own pjs under my own sheets. The bed and pillow are still awful though.

So last night was my first night going out in the city. It was a blast. Well kind of. The bar we went to was having a party for all of the study abroad students in Barcelona. There was free food, beer champagne, and wine. (I steered clear of the wine and champagne for those of you who were in Australia understand this. haha) It was fun to mingle with everyone but there were so many people there that you could hardly even get to the bathrooms. It was pretty annoying actually. But I got a little dance on and had a few beers (yuck but it was better than the other choices) and had a really good time with my room mates. It wasn't like being at home with my friends but they are all really cool and as the days pass its so fun getting to know all of them.

Nothing exciting has happened yet today other than my luggage and I don't think anything exciting is going to happen. We might go walk around the city or at least our neighborhood (remember the word?) later. If my room mates every get up from their naps. We we met two American guys last night who have already been here for a semester so they know the ropes. One said he would take us on a tour if we wanted so maybe we'll take him up on it.

One thing I wanted to do for myself is list things that are culture shock or little things I've already noticed about the city, and since this blog is my journal.... you get to read them too!

Culture shock:

-Everything is in Spanish. Ok so this might sound dumb and I obviously knew it would be the case but its so annoying. I know Spanish decently well, enough to get by but its just hard to see Spanish everywhere, especially in stores but then they had to go and make it difficult and speak Catalan which has like French influence. You can usually decipher the words but when they speak it it is hard. Back to the stores, for instance, I was looking for skim milk. No idea how to say that in Spanish. So we went with soy milk.... oh well I don't mind it.
-They don't drive on the opposite side of the street. I thought everywhere in Europe drove on the opposite side.
-I don't know how to use metros or buses in the city. I attribute that to my "amazing" small town up bringing.
-Everyone drives a moped. And they are crazy drivers. Women drive them wearing skirts and high heels. It is quite a sight. Yea mujeres! (women)
-Most people are pleasant but a lot look at you like "stupid American"
- No tipping! YAY! I mean everything is expensive enough I'm so glad I don't have to tip on top of it. The only time you really tip is if your service at a restaurant is excellent or in a cab you usually round up to the nearest euro.

So those are the things that were and still are a little bit of culture shock. At least all the ones I can think of right now.

This weekend I have to go on a orientation trip to Valencia. It is just south of Barcelona and we have to ride a bus. Can't wait to get car sick! I don't know how I feel about it because I have to be at the bus at 7:45 in the morning and then do touristy things all weekend. I wish I could just stay around here and get settled. Especially since I just got my luggage. But I gotta get going though. We have an orientation welcoming thing tonight. It will probably be really lame but oh well, supposedly there will be free food. Since I will be gone this weekend this is the last post until Sunday. But I am sure that I will have plenty of things to talk about when I get back.

-Adeu-siau (goodbye in Catalan)

Things can only get better...

So after a stressful, and tearful day I must say that I think it ended very well.

It started very early in the morning when I had to get up for orientation. The orientation was pointless and not worth my time but whatever. After orientation I came back to the apartment with my room mates and ate some lunch and then we all lied down to take a nap. Well, I couldn't sleep. I was too stressed about my luggage.

I had called the airport last night and they said that my bags should be landing around 8 pm but this was after the delivery service stopped for the night so I wouldn't get them till tomorrow. I checked at my programs main center today (that's where its getting dropped off) and there was no luggage to be found. Great. Another day in these stinking clothes. I called the airport about 3 times and the man kept telling me that the bags are still in London. He probably didn't like when I called because every time I got an attitude with him and said "Well I was told they were here last night. Where are they and why aren't they here yet?!" I finally had to resort to using good old dad. Trying to explain through tears how annoyed I was and how I didn't know what to do anymore, dad said he would help. I decided I needed to do something to cheer me up.

SHOPPING! I mean I did NEED clothes for tonight and tomorrow. So I went shopping, alone, yes mom, alone. Don't worry it was in the afternoon and only two blocks away. I turned on my iPod and went. I found everything I needed to get through the next two days, three cute tops and a pair of jeans and so I can fit in with the locals, a pair of boots and a scarf. I felt a lot better. I felt empowered for walking around Barcelona by myself and being able to talk a little Spanish to get what I wanted. In the mean time dad called and said that they confirmed my luggage was in Barcelona. Finally! I'll get it tomorrow. Unless they lied again.

After I got back from shopping we had a barrio (neighborhood) tour with our RA. It was lame and boring and I still don't know where stuff is really. I'll learn better by just trying to get to places on my own. Tomorrow some of my room mates and I are just going to walk around our barrio (Learn Spanish and read my blog ha ha) and find things. Like a new pillow! The pillows they gave us feel like they shoved twenty cotton balls into a cottonish bag. Awful.

I need to get going, were going out tonight to a party with pretty much all the Study Abroad students in Barcelona. I'm excited to actually be going out and meeting people. AND in my new outfit. :) It can only get better...

It begins!

So I'm sitting in my high rise apartment, positioned just outside of the city, with my five other room mates. I think I'll love it here.

So, my journey began in Chicago. Everything seemed to be going smoothly after a few tearful good-byes (well on my end, mom I'm proud of you but then again you NEVER cry. hehe) We boarded the plane and then sat at the gate for a good hour waiting for people from connecting flights that were delayed, that was fun. Finally we pull away from the gate but only to sit on the runway for another hour and a half while storms pass. So not only was I freaking out because our flight was two and a half hours behind, but there was lightning, everywhere, and I was in a metal box. Oh and the guy next to me obviously didn't know that when you are sitting coach on a plane, there is little personal room as it is and decided to take half of mine with his right arm and shoulder. How comfortable?

So we finally take off and make up some time in the air. When we got to the airport they had a special bus waiting for us to rush us to the next terminal, almost like we were V.I.P. but not. So you can all probably guess what is coming next...

We get to Barcelona, finally. Customs was a breeze, literally all they did was stamp our passports. No papers to fill out, no questions, no checking our bags. Weird, but I liked it. We head down to baggage claim to find out that our luggage of course didn't make it. I mean I'm nervous enough as it is, I'm in a foreign country where I can only speak words and some phrases so why would my luggage make it? So we go to the lost baggage area and get all that figured out but the earliest it will get here is tomorrow morning. Great, I have orientation at 9.

I go through all the little stations they had set up for IES with information and the key to my appartment. MY APPARTMENT. :)

My apartment is in an amazing part of the city, just a little outside of downtown and in a higher class, respectable neighborhood. The appartment is surprisingly big, at least bigger than I expected. Our bedrooms are a little small but everything else is decent size. My room mates seem cool, but I can definitely tell I will be the little girl from the mid-west. Three of them are from New York and the other two are from St. Louis and Texas. I'll probably be the outcast but oh well, I always seem to make my presence known. I'll get by.

Were all going to venture out to the big department store here, hopefully get me an outfit or two, some underwear and a towel so I can at least look presentable tomorrow. Sorry dad, I need to spend money! :)

-Adios!