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Sunday, April 4, 2010

Spain! In depth

Spain Spain Spain Spain....

So Spain started off in a really funny way. As soon as we had all boarded, this lady across the aisle from me let her terodactly children loose to scream and terrorize all on board. Not impressed, I sighed loudly, and the elderly lady next to me nodded, and then commented on it in German. Now before I continue, I should clarify a few things. One, even when I don't speak the language, I try really hard to blend in while traveling, partially because it's fun but mostly because a lot of people are anti-American and so traveling by myself as a young female American, I just try to not draw a lot of attention to myself. Second, as I mentioned earlier, I look German and people had been speaking German to me all week, but I had had Johanna with me to help. So when this woman spoke in German to me, I just reacted and replied "yah yah". Bad plan. Of course she thought I spoke German, but at this point I was embarressed because I realized what had just happened, so when she asked me another question, I replied "ugh, ya, das est gud". Then she started talking to me. For two hours. I don't speak German people. I know about twenty words, and believe me I used them all. However, she was apparently satisfied and felt we had connected, because at the end of the flight she introduced me to the man next to her, gave me a hug and I'm pretty sure told me to visit. Gotta love new friends.

After that I met Suvi, my housemate, at the airport and we hopped on a bus to Barcelona. Spain looks just like California and South America. It's the weirdest thing. I now am sure that all of Europe just found places around the world that reminded them of home and stayed. I mean England looks so much like the East Coast it isn't funny, and I'm very sure the same thing happened with Spain.

The bus ride was so sunny. I love the sun. Love it. I will always be that kid from Arizona. I live for Vitamen D. Suvi is from Finland, where it is very cloudy, and so she was happy too. We figured out the bus schedule, and we figured out the metro, but then we got very turned around trying to find our hostel. I wasn't panicking, but I was starting to get a little upset, because we're staying in a sort of sketch part of town, and it just sucks to be lost as a tourist, I always feel like I have a giant target sign on my head. We thought we had found our building, but we couldn't get in, and the man at the front desk wouldn't open up the door for us. Just when all hope was almost lost, this elderly man came up to us and asked what we were looking for. It was like jumping in the deep end after not swimming for six months with my Spanish, especially since this part of Spain speaks Catalan. I told him a hostel, trying to gauge his trustworthiness, but he seemed ok, especially when in the middle of our discussion, this elderly Spanish woman marched right up to him and demanded to know his intentions of talking with us were. It was kind of funny, but really sweet, and I was a little bummed Suvi missed it. The lady marched us down the street to wear our hostels actually was and we checked in.

Hostels have sort of a bad rap, but they're great. This one is super clean, and it's a lot like dorm life in college. And summer camp. Like giant hippy international dorm summer camp. Annnnnnd there are sooo many Americans and Canadians in hostels. Which is good and bad. And for some reason, most of the people traveling are both my age and attractive. Not a bad deal.

Sadly, I got sick again when I got to Spain, so my first few days here weren't the best. The combination of illness, extended travel, and unfamilar environment made Sarah very weepy and kind of pathetic. It's so hard to stay healthy traveling, let alone get better when you're sick. I decided to cut my trip short and go back to England instead of Rome this week. I think it was a good decision, but after the first few days I also started to feel a lot better too. Barcelona is really alive and cool, but it's also way more dangerous than the other places I've been. Wasn't really solicited a plethora of drugs in Le Mans or Hamburg, but then again I also didn't get to see Gaudi works or the beach.

It's cool meeting people. So far we've met people from Finland, Paraguay, Sweden, the UK, Australia, Canada, Spain, and the US.

Oh the beach. I love the beach. The second day we were here, I was tired and kind of grouchy because we'd done a (really cool) walking tour of the city, but I was exhausted and seeing the ocean was such a welcomed sight. On the walking tour we learned about the history of this region, like its Roman and Arabic past, the Germanic invaders, the plague, the inquisition and the time of Franco when all Catalan culture and language were supressed. Man, dictators are just really bad ideas. An intersting fact was that the patron saint of England, St. George, also is the patron saint here, because after all that hard dragon killing in the UK, he apparently went abroad to rescure more virgins and stab more dragons. Good for him.

We sort of all overdosed on art and history, so the last few days we've just been chilling on the beach, eating tapas and enjoying architecture. Guadi designed a ton of stuff here, which I have really enjoyed. His church, the Sacred Family, is my favorite I've seen in Europe. It's like a Dali and Picasso (who both incidently have ties to Barcelona) work mixed with a Gothic church. Sort of high style Dr. Seuss. But it is soooo cool. He also designed this giant park full of crazy buildings and gardens as sculptures that was supposed to be the playground of the rich for Barcelona during the turn of the century. Unfortunately Guadi was hit by a cart, and because of his beard and smelly clothes the rich he worked for thought he was homeless and so he was left in a hospital for the masses. His friend's found him but he insisted that he belonged to God and the poor, and he died.

The poor here are hard to take in. There is a visible level of poverty here that is different from home. Beggars are wretched. I constantly feel guilty for my reactions to the people on the streets here. It always makes me want to cry when I see these people that have very visiable diseases and terrible living conditions. Sometimes they try to steal from people and then they get spit on or kicked or worse. It's awful. It puts a lot of Biblical stories about helping the poor in a whole new context for me. I think experiences open your eyes about your own short comings. Traveling has made me both more open minded and more racist/stereotypical simaltaneously. It's frustrating. I think it will take me a long time to process everything.

The water here is turquoise. It is so vibrant and different from the other oceans I've been to. It's

not very warm, but it has lovely beaches. The beaches are all fake though, made from sand from the Sahara. So technically, my feet have touched land from four continents. The harbor is great too. The 1992 Summer Olympics were held here, so tons of stuff is virtually brand new and awesome. We went to one of the areas revamped for the Olympics, where this GIANT fountain does complex shows to light and music. We went on Good Friday, and it felt appropriate to watch this crimson sunset and blazing fountain dance to classical music. It was one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen.

We also went to cooking class, which was too crowded but fun. I love Sangria and tapas. And rabbit it turns out. So cute but so tasty. Oops. That's a little wrong around Easter. It's weird who you meet abroad. I seriously believe everyone is 6 steps away from Kevin Bacon and me. In cooking class I met a guy who knew one of my friends from school, and another kid who almost went to Whitworth but decided to go abroad instead. Suvi met two other Fins who knew all the same jokes about Swedish people. I feel like every country has their own nearby country they treat like we treat Canada. In England it's Wales, and in northern Europe it's Sweden.

And of course I experienced more European culture outside of cooking class. Much of our beach time has been spent discussing nudity. Public nudity isn't illegal here and I'm convinced it's actually encouraged, but it's still a shock to me and Melissa everytime it happens. Suvi kept reminding us that it wasn't impolite to be naked, but rather it was impolite to stare. Plus she's from Finland, wher


So two days ago when we were on the beach, telling the 900th person that no, we didn't want a massage/towels/beer/bracelets/weed, and this guy walks infront of us and drops trou and goes for a very brisk swim Melissa and I tried very very hard to look at the sky or at the very least his eyes. And when the same thing happened like 4 more times with people of all shapes and sizes we still tried very very hard to look at appropriate places. I'll tell you one thing, public nudity of other definitely makes you less self consicous about what you're wearing. Seeing as we were still wearing things.

Well, I think it's time to go since the guy in the bunk next to me in the hostel is changing and kind of weirding me out. Peace out girl scouts!

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