Let me just check on what I've already documented... Rome. Alright.
WELL, Tina and I woke up early around 5 am to leave for the airport yesterday morning (Sunday). We slept in the airport until our 9:40 flight to Barcelona, Spain. We were exhausted, to say the least. Lack of good sleep has filled our weekend, and I'm looking forward to catching up this week on the beach.
Coming into Spain, I was hoping that some magic would occur and suddenly my brain would remember and regurgitate all words and grammar of the Spanish language that I've been around forever. However, I guess I was asking for too much. I was disappointed about the language thing (as I always am, I want so badly to be multi-lingual, but I wish it wasn't so difficult) but on a bright note, Spain seems to be a lot friendlier than Italy ever was.
When Tina and I got to the airport, the next step was to find our hostel. The directions of hostel world said to take a train there, and so we followed the signs to the train stop. Getting on the train was a lot easier than we expected, as we followed the sign to a tunnel and was literally THRUST onto the train and handed a free(!) ticket in the process by some random Spanish airport workers. We walked down the tunnel and at the end of it these people began running towards the only train before us as it was ready to depart. People were encouraging us and telling us to hurry and get on in Spanish. Was this the right way? How do they know where we had to go? Who knows, but Tina and I decided to take a chance and hopped on with our free (?) tickets just as it left the airport.
It turns out that this train was exactly what we needed and it connected with the huge Metro system of Barcelona. From there, we figured out the Metro stop and entrance that we needed. It was pretty easy for me, Metros aren't complicated and they are similar in most countries. This one reminded me of Paris. Anyways, we found out where we needed to go with miraculous ease.
Our hostel for the next 4 nights: Hello BCN. Upon entry, there was this tall skinny, semi-nice looking guy who immediately began talking to us about his morning breakfast kebabs. The first thing I thought was "Who is this guy?" He was obviously not Spanish, his english was perfect, and I couldn't tell where he was from. But he went on and on, trying to make us laugh and frankly, with less than 5 hours of sleep for the past couple nights, running around a strange town with a seemingly 50 lb bag on my back and duffel bag with wheels that refused to cooperate, I was not in the mood. I was a bit annoyed.
So we got our room and decided on taking a "nap" at the beach. We set out to find it and got our first taste of awesome Barcelona.
Barcelona is a big, yet friendly city and has a "sleepy beach town of Cali" feel to it. So far-- I really really really love it here. One of my favorite cities so far. Many Europeans vacation here and I haven't picked out too many Americans at all.
On our way to the beach we got probably the most delicious kebab I've
ever tasted in my life, and ate it on the way to the beach. Before we got there, however, we ran into a random outdoor antique market. We looked around, just enjoying ourselves, not a care in the world. We grabbed a coke before we hit the beach and looked around for a spot.
Let me tell you about the beach. It was an experience. The sun was out and it was hot, so the beach was completely crowded. This was something that I've seen in pictures but always avoided, when it came to Cali beaches. I prefer finding ones that are empty. But there were no secluded areas in sight, so we just dived right in.
And there were people. People with no shame. Many bodies, so diverse, they didn't care what kind of swimsuit they wore. Women went topless, people were simply in their under ware, others didn't care if their bathing suit was a couple years too small or what. It was... I don't quite have the right word for it. I was going to say awesome, but I don't want anyone thinking, "what a freak, she likes those crazy European beaches." But I like things that are different and this was surely different than any beach I've been to.
So Tina and I found a couple of random beach chairs to lay on, which many other people were doing. It was a good spot, there were two chairs next to each other, close enough to the water and far enough from the surrounding crowds. So we tried to nap, and catch some sun and although there were many immigrants interrupting us, trying to make a living by selling stuff at the beach, like beer or massages, it was a comfy spot.
We stayed out there for an hour or so, listening to music and relaxed, when this big, tall, dark man comes up to the French lady and her daughter who were sitting next to us. He was talking to them and they eventually gave him some money. I looked over, and he saw me, and came to use next. HOWEVER, apparently Tina was deep in sleep when he walked to her chair and woke her up. Immediately she became upset with his interruption and before he could say anything, she snapped, "NO, GO AWAY." But he kept talking in some Spanish and as it turns out, he was telling us that we had to pay 5 euros to sit on these beach chairs. But Tina kept refusing because she didn't know what he was talking about. Eventually I translated and she asked him, "well, who do these chairs belong to?" He showed us some tickets that looked totally fake and we weren't buying it. So we said, "fine, we'll move." And he left. But actually, we stayed there. This guy had to be fake because he had no back up plan for when we refused. He didn't call management or the police, he just tried to use some English by yelling at us, "Hey!" Ooh, like that was supposed to scare us. What a scammer.
About 40 minutes later, our friend came back again. He said "six euros" and pointed to the chairs. Tina said, "What? No. It was five last time." He looked confused and unsure of what to do. By that time, we were done on the beach because the sun had been covered by the clouds and it was getting cold. So we left so this guy would stop bugging us.
We headed down the street where we saw a band drawing a large crowd. We stopped to watch and slowly got sucked into their music. It was a largely diverse group with songs that kept you swaying and entertainment that kept you laughing. They were really good at the entertainment part. They had their set well rehearsed and timed.
When the set was over, we were sad to see them go, but we took that time to explore a bit of the city. We searched a bit and eventually found the street Las Rambas. It is a huge street and pretty famous. Wow. It was amazing, there were people galore, shops and street performers like crazy. (I will post some pictures of Las Rambas when I get them, it is in process.) But first let me write about how we got attacked by a mime.
So we were walking down this busy street of Las Rambas enjoying the sights and taking it all in. We suddenly noticed crowds of people crowed to one side of the road, all looking at something. Not sure of what it was, but very suspicious that it was someone famous, we began to walk on the side of the street that people were staring at, towards whatever it was. All of a sudden through a mix of people, I saw a mime waving a gun. Immediately I ran back the way I came, calling Tina's name in the process. Unfortunately, she did not hear me and continued to walk towards the mime instead. So he, hid the gun, and beckoned her, in his mimey ways. She got nervous of everyone staring and said "no." Eventually, she realized what he was hiding and took off running too.
Good thing, this guy was a street performer and the "gun" was fake. We were certainly a small part in his show as everyone watched and took video of what this guy was doing. We took a few steps back to watch what he was doing, and basically, he accosted anyone who walked up his street. Quite annoying, but good entertainment.
After the mime, we sat down in a plaza, completely exhausted. Eventually we settled on eating at an Indian restaurant for dinner. We ordered a whole meal, with starters, first and second plates, the works. The service was awesome and people were so nice to us. Eventually, the restaurant filled up with British men. It was completely crazy. Literally, every chair became occupied by British men, and I'm not sure why. It was such a fun night, the British are funny funny people. Quite hilarious actually. I was so tired though, I got really giggly and began to say crazy things.
By the way, the Spanish eat dinner way later than Italians do. In Italy dinner starts at 8, but in Spain dinner starts at 9 in most places. The hour makes a big difference. By the time we left dinner it was 11:30. We stayed in a four bedroom hostel that night with two girls form Canada one was living in Paris.
The next day we got up and ran along the beach and it was nice. Lots of people run in Barcelona. It's not like Italy. Later, we did some errands that we had left, like planning out the rest of our trip. And later that day saw some more of Barcelona. I had a (stressful) attempt to call home for my Dad's birthday, and finally got through.
We saw some of Gaudi's stuff (pictures later) and ate at a horrible buffet. We are now back at the hostel on the internet/journaling.
For the moment, I will write on how things currently are with me. I am loving Spain, currently. Barcelona is such a great city and I love how friendly the people have been. I really really really want to learn Spanish, increase my Italian skills, and hopefully Russian because I am simply amazed at multi lingual people. There are many people that I have come across here, that I wish I could speak more in-depthly to, but can't. People amaze me. When I was buying my CD earlier, I wanted to talk to the guitarist a bit more, and I feel as though I would have if I was more comfortable with the language. Also, I think I have a problem with telling people how I feel. I am not good at communicating what I'm thinking about.
Anyways, I love this city. I love Barcelona, but as an underlying point, I wish that I wasn't experiencing this all by myself. I know that Tina is with me, but when I go home, she won't be there anymore. It's frustrating for me to get online. I think I need to read my Bible more.
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