Well, it's hard to always be writing this so I apologize for not many blogs, but I promise the content inside of what I do post is worth reading :) With that, lets begin with my first weekend in Madrid for a while last weekend!
It was the first time I was home for 2 weeks and the next 6 weekends following I will be gone traveling! Highlight of my weekend was definitly finding an Asian grocery store that sells tofu for dirt cheap so I can eat happy from here on out! Sooo exciting :) This weekend we all relaxed which was very necessary considering we'd be go-go-go for so long. That weekend my roommate had friends who were studying in Alicante come visit so it was fun to have more girls in our little group. We conquered a popular club in Madrid, Kapital, it's 7 stories and like an amusement park.We had fun dancing the night away and since we're all poor kids who can't afford cabs we live like the Spaniards and stay out until 6am till the metro opens so we can get home cheaper :) More fun that way too. The next week wasn't anything too exciting, just midterms, yes somehow school still exists here (doesn't make sense to me either). But I did go to a language intercambio (exchange) and it was actually pretty fun! I was hoping one of my friends would come with me but they had midterms to study for so I was on my own! I had been trying to find one to go to and my school here supposedly organized one but since I'd never heard back I got frustrated and found out about one on my own. It's been going on for about 10 years so I thought I'd give it a try. I walked in and it was in a bar which it didn't say online, but I guess where else would they have it? But I walked in and realized it would have been more fun it there were people with people to practice with but I'd walked all the way here and I was going to stay! I met the director and told him I was here alone so he introduced me to a few people to practice with! I was really nervous but excited because the hardest thing about trying to learn Spanish is actually practicing speaking it. I know it's the only way I'm going to learn but I get shy and afraid to speak it. He introduced me to someone named Roberto and he was super nice! He knew English so if there were ever any problems he'd offer the English translation which was kind of helpful. It was really loud unfortunately in there and hard to hear but I made the best of it and got a little practice in. He seemed to be talking most of the time, but he taught me a few slang words and advice on the various Spanish "accents" within the country. It was really interesting! Him and his friends were shocked that I a) didn't smoke ( but nullified when I explained I run) and b) wasn't drinking (school @ 11am buddy) so since it was getting late I decided to head back and get some sleep. I was glad I'd went out and done it but next time I'm going to try and bring some other friends trying to practice their Spanish along and I think it could be a fun night out!
Then the weekend came! Last weekend we went to Barcelona. My roommate Danielle had planned to go for her best friend Olivia's 21st birthday so obviously me and Kelsey tagged along to see the city! It was beautiful, I was in amazement the whole time we were there. Friday our flight got in around 11am and we went to our hostel, checked in and we're ready to explore! This was also our first very "hostel"-esque experience. We stayed in a room with 9 other people...yes that makes 12 total. It was us 3 girls, two kids studying in Nice, one from Mexico one from the US, two guys from IU, 2 french guys, 2 korean girls, with the four of them studying in Malta, and we had an other girl from Notredame who was studying in Rome. Phew! Full room to say the least, LET ME TELL YOU. Personal space was nonexistent but it was fun! Everyone was always friendly and we had such a great time teaching the foreigners English. They loved practicing and it was honestly so hilarious for us. The korean girl was really eager to learn and asked about a lot of expressions we use such as "not my cup of tea" and "I'll take a raincheck" because she was really confused on the literal meaning of it. I forget how weird those expressions could be. But, it was fun teaching her and she was hilarious. Definitly made lots of new friends. The hostel was centrally located in the city and HUGE. It held about 400 people and was definitly almost to capacity. So back to exploring, we got our maps and was ready to take on the city. I was DYING to see the beach, it was a beautiful day out with the sun shining and it was definitly time to be reunited with that beautiful blue oasis. We walked down the famous tourist "Las Ramblas" street, filled with vendors, street performers and of course tourists. It leads down to the ocean with a beautiful view of the coast and city behind it. We walked onto a little marina where we got some starbucks sat and enjoyed the view. Green tea and the ocean= a happy chlo chlo. After resting our feet we were ready for more walking! We headed back down the coast for a while before turning back. We knew Barcelona had a chocolate musuem and we were obviously all about that! We made our way over and well it was a little dissappointing, not quite like Cologne's magnificent one, but it was fun nonetheless. You got a free chocolate bar when you got in so I was loving life. It was dark chocolate too mmmm my fav. They had a ton of chocolate statues and it was fun to see it all. After the sugar stop we went and got more sugar! I was shocked by all of the gelato places in Barcelona and since I've been missing out on my froyo back home I knew this was as close as I was gonna get! Mmmmm delicious I got a nutella type flavor that was to dieee for and was just what I needed. After walking around for a few hours we were exhausted and it was time for siesta so we were all about that and headed back to our hostel. We'd seen a lot of all you can eat sushi restuarants while walking around and had planned to go to one for dinner. After our siesta we were starving but had to was]it till 8 for all the restaurants to open. We literally felt like we were going to faint on the metro down to the restaurant but ran inside, got our seats and were in Japanese food heaven. It was one with a conveyer belt, all you can eat amazingness. We sat down grabbed 3 plates of edamame while we sat and assessed what was in front of our eyes. They had all kinds of sushi, noodles, veggies, fish, which I obviously didn't eat, but my roomies happily enjoyed! All the sushi I wanted had fish on it which just resorted to me picking it off and eating the veggie part- delicious. I think that was argueably the best meal I've had here. I was so full afterward and happy. From here we hobbled back to our hostel full and happy like little clams to get ready for a night out and we were going to meet up with Danielle's friend Olivia. She was also in Barcelona for her program that she is studying in Madrid with. We headed down to Olympic Village (named so because it was where the Olympics were in 1992) which was filled with really fun themed bars and located right on the water. We stayed for a while before headin back into the main area of Barcelona where Danielle and her friends wanted to keep going but me and Kels decided to call it a night and headed back. Dinner was so filling I was tired to begin with so it was time to sleeeeeep.
Saturday morning we woke up in time for the free breakfast at our hostel (obviously) which was actually pretty good. They had a good bran cereal, which I picked all of the dried fruit out of, and enjoyed! Along with a double epresso to get me energized! Baby apples and oranges were taken for a snack later in the day :). Our plan today was to visit some of the beautiful architecture by Gaudi. His work covers all of Barcelona and there is a park where his house was and a lot of his work is located. We weren't about to pay for a metro ride there so we got our maps and began hiking up the (very high and steep) mountain to the top! On the way we visited La Stragada Familia, a church, still under construction, designed by Gaudi. It's absolutely amazing! All of his work is inspired by nature and he didn't believe in straight lines so everything has such depth and detail you could stare at it for HOURS. There's lots of little fruits on all the points and on the exterior overlooking the entrance is one of the most creative Nativity scences I've ever seen- very cool. Only problem with Barcelona= muy caro! Aka very expensive :/ boo. It cost 15 euro just to go inside....um not happening. And knowing that I'm going back in a few months when my best friends come and visit, makes me know to now save a little to see these sights then. We kept on walking to the park and after about 1/2 an hour up a huge hill we made it! We were loving the weather too, it was sunny, probably about 65 degrees and BEAUTIFUL- it was the perfect day. We got so lucky because this week after we came home Barcelona was hit by a snow storm! So crazy. Back to our beautiful day, we were so happy, no coats on, walking around this beautiful park sprinkled by various architecutral designs by Gaudi. It was like a dream. We saw an adorable little pink house that he lived in in the years before his death, which again cost 307423940 euro, so we passed on going inside but also saw two of his other works that looked like little gingerbread houses! So cute. Then we were in a huge plaza with a beautiful view of these houses with the ocean in the background- picture perfect! Also at this spot was a huge famouos lizard moasiac fountain, so many colors and beautiful! I loved all of his work you can't help but feel like your in an other world or something looking at all of his work. We also hiked up to a higher peak where we got to over look allllll of Barcelona from a higher view and sicne it was such a perfect day you could see all along the coast and the beautiful ocean. After getting in all our pictures we started making the much easier walk back down into downtown of the city. We were definitly hungry and had seen this huge mercado with all sorts of yummy looking delights we had to check out. They were abundant with the most fresh fruit, smoothies, chocolates, and alllll other kinds of foods you can imagine. I got the BEST chocolate, banana and coconut smoothie that was gone in .5 seconds- loves it. They had so much it was amazing to look at- also a hilarious organic station that looked yummy mmmm. After a happy lunch it was siesta time! We were dead tired from all the walking. We all managed to sleep for about an hour luckily! Danielle had a dinner for her best friend's birthday (which was on Sunday) so she had to leave early and me and Kelsey just strolled down Las Ramblas. We decided to give Danielle and her friend the night to celebrate and we befriended our roommates and hung out with them for the night. It was fun! We also met some other people in the hostel and befriended one of the workers there, more friends the better!
The next morning we all grudgingly got up for breakfast even though we'd literally only slept a few hours we weren't about to pass up free food. We took our time and decided what we could manage to do before our flight out later that day. We checked out and decided to just walk around town, knowing that most things would be closed. But that day also happened to be the Barcelona marathon! It lead all through the city and right in front of our hostel so it was so cool to see everyone running! We just spent Sunday lazily walking around, it was a little overcast and not very nice outside, so we just took it slow and cheered on the runners! Our flight was at 4 and since it takes close to an hour to get to the airport we left around 130 to make it on time. Luckily, we had good luck with these flights and made it home safe and sounds :)
This week is Kelsey's birthday! I'm baking her a special cake and tomorrow we're enjoying a nice dinner out before our earlyyy flight to MOROCCO on friday! So excited :)
besitos xo
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