On a Barcelona High

The church quad




View on Montserrat
The guys on the hike


Tony the funniest tour guide ever

We started classes on the 7th. I have Spanish everyday at 9:30 am. My Senor is named Cesar. He is a great guy and helps us a lot. There is not much to say about class except it is really difficult to think in Spanish with very little sleep. Many people miss class even though we are only allowed to miss four. Soon they will either learn not to party as much or power through the fatigue and make it to class. Also my ESCI classes started which are business classes from the local University. ESCI http://www.esci.es/
is apart of the large school UPF http://www.upf.edu/ . Currently I am in Human Resources Management (a joke but horrible teacher… I am actually writing this in class right now) and Strategic & Operational Marketing (Really cool teacher and a joke too because I already did the big project two semesters ago). After Spanish class I usually grab lunch with friends ranging from 5 Euros to 10 Euros depending on my hunger level. Plus most places here don’t take credit card. They seem to not embrace the plastic as much as we have in the states. My ESCI classes are all after the country wide SIESTA (which is soooooo cool by the way). My CIEE classes besides Spanish start on January 26. http://www.ciee.org/participant.aspx

The clubs are crazy. There are so many club promoters around the city and on facebook. Free entry is key since, if not, it is around 20 Euros for Americans. The Spanish always try to take advantage of us so we need to watch out. When I go out I stay up till 6,7,8 even later in the morning. It is not uncommon to end your night eating breakfast next to someone who is going to work. Oh I have also grown found of the best drink in the world…. Café con leche. This coffee is like candy. I am surprised Starbucks has not tried to replicate this (or if so I have no idea about it). The club scene though is getting old quick; it is better when I got out with the Spaniards.

I finally have met a local. Her name is Laura and went out with my friend Jake Huston from Georgetown last semester. She also goes to ESCI. She is a lot of fun and took me and some friends to where the Americans don’t go. It was great…. Sooo much fun! I am sure Laura and I will be going out a lot. She also likes hearing me speak Spanish so I practice a lot with her. She is also very smart and fluent in English. She even has studied the two cultures. She says there are a lot of stereotypes such as American men are all Homer Simpson. Clearly, this is a horrible stereotype.

On Sunday I went to Montserrat. A church and montestary on top of a HUGE and steep mountain outside Barcelona. I went there with some friends from my group. Additionally, I did not sleep form the night before. We went up this ridiculously shady looking gondola to the town. Then we went on a trail to the top of the mountain which is snow capped. As you can see we were above the cloud level and could see Barcelona in one direction and the Pyrenees Mountain Range on the other. Oh, and the Mediterranean Sea. In total the hike took around 4-5 hrs. The view was spectacular. The church was too! This place is said to be the most sacred place in Spain. They also have an unusual large amount of stray domestic looking cats in the town. After this I went home and slept for the rest of the day until the next morning for school. http://www.barcelona-tourist-guide.com/en/tour/montserrat-spain.html

Last night was a weird night. It started out with my Guardian Angle group going to Flamenco. It was cool but short and had a male dancer (which isn’t bad but we all wanted to see the typical female dancer in the red dress). Then we went to a bar and played drinking games. Our GA invited some of his Spanish friends too, which always makes any event better when the Spanish are there. Then we went to this famous or well-known club called Apollo. It is specifically popular with ESCI kids. I was having a blast and as we all know I get really hot. I started sweating and went outside to cool off. I told the bouncer and he agreed to let me back in. 5-10 mins later, I try and get back in and there was a different bouncer. Long story short this bouncer would not let me in without paying again. I thought this was ridiculous especially since I had a coat check ticket. He went and got my coat and then told me to pay to get back in. Again the Spanish at clubs always take advantage of the Americans whenever possible. I said screw this and since I lived 4-5 blocks from the place I thought I could make it home safe. (note: there are a bunch of Pakistan immigrants who sell cheap bear and drugs to people around the clubs. They sell aggressively from time to time but are not known for anything much shadier than that (oh I also met some Britain’s and they say dodgy for shady and it sounds really funny)) I was approached by a Pakistani on my way home and he was saying words in Spanish that I did not know. I figured he was trying to sell drugs so I said “No Drugas, No Drugas.” He came closer as they all do to aggressively sell their products (plus in Spain and Europe in general the personal space is much smaller than in America). Anyway instead of leaving you alone like most of the time, this guy grabbed me and showed me a needle with what looked like blood in it. At this point I was surprised and scared and told the guy he could take whatever (oh and of course as soon as he pulled out the syringe he started speaking fluent English). He only wanted 10-20 Euros but I had no money. I told him and showed him that I was the wrong guy to rob since my wallet was out of money. He would not take my credit cards, but wanted my phone so I gave it to him and that was the end of that. I was a little shaken up but I am all good now. I have learned from the experience to just run and make a scene before they get too close. Anyway new phone and the next day it was the story of the day for sure.

With CIEE I have also gone on a tour of the Gothic district that is cool and I had a hilarious tour guide named Tony. On the tour, some friends of I met these 11 year old Spanish girls. They were really excited to see and speak to Americans. It was cool and they are easy to understand and talk to because they have a smaller vocabulary and tend to talk slower. Here I learned about Caixas (in short regional banks that work as non-profits more or less and give their profits to improve schools, hospitals, and other public services http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Caixa) Something I think should be adopted in the States. The Caixa came about from the workers movement in the lower class. I also went on a tour of the Palau de la Musica… An amazing theater with incredible architecture. The intention was to see a concert in a garden, but it is indoors. Hard to explain but amazing http://www.palaumusica.org/ . It was made by the second most famous architect of his era whose name is dwarfed by the Modernist Juggernaut Gaudi.

Currently, Paco is on vacation because he planned this vacation before even knowing I was coming to stay with him, which was last Friday, and I came in Saturday. His life long best friend Juanjo is taking care of me and cooks AMAZING Food. He is also from a part of Spain that speaks in perfect dialect and says every word correctly. This makes it easier to understand and he is a great guy to correct my Spanish. Yesterday his nephew was in town and we all ate Paella together. His nephew played on the Olympic Beach Volleyball team in the Atlanta games and now is the coach of the Spanish National Beach Volleyball team. His lives on some island where they can play all year round. Not a bad job huh? Anyway Life is cool!

Especially… Because I went to my first European Soccer Game watching arguably the best club in the World in the biggest stadium in Europe Camp Nou http://www.barcelona.com/barcelona_tickets/fc_barcelona_football_tickets/the_camp_nou_stadium ! This was amazing! We sat at the very top but at half walked down to the second level. It is not as busy or hyped up as a football event in America and the Spanish do not drink before or during the game. They only sell non-alcoholic beer. They also had the opponent fans in a cage/net like area. I thought that was funny. Anyway, after the game we went to some club where I met some people I know from Michigan and GW. I am glad I said hi so now I don’t have to feel the pressure to meet up with them for at least a while.

I will be thinking about my schedule. Bad weekends to come are February 6-8, 27-March 1, March 20-22, April 3-13 (my spring break). When looking at the schedule my time here looks short. Oh well I will try and make the most of it and get some traveling in to. If you plan on visiting shoot me an email when you want to come ASAP, so I can plan some trips. If not I may end up scheduling a trip on a weekend you want to come and that will just be really poor planning on both our parts. Anyway I love all you who are in the states and abroad. Look for updates on the blog about once a week; it’s the best way to get the best gist of my time here. I miss you all even though I am having a blast here.

Some observations:
Spaniards do not drink a lot of water; it seems to be only Wine (vino) and fanta (totally a generalization, but its just what I have seen)
Spaniards do not double step steps no matter how much in a rush they are in
Que Guay means that is cool in Spanish.
They say Vale (ok) for everything and at anytime in a sentence.
Barna is short for Barcelona
Barca is short for the Futbol Club (also it’s the only team that is sponsored by a Non-profit unicef… which is awesome because the club gives soo much back instead of just to corporations)