begin Spain

Of all of the places I’ve visited since I’ve been in Europe, I’m definitely happy that I chose to live in Barcelona. This place seems like a good fit for me. I already getting used to living in this city and I’m so glad I have another few months to stay. There are definitely some crazy things going on here, but it keeps it interesting. So far there has been no terrible luck. My house and “madre” (as I refer to her) are excellent. I have made some friends. I can find my way around the city pretty well. My classes should be good. My school is close enough to my house. I learned how to use the metro, though I am probably also going to rent a bike. Barcelona is such a right-minded city. They do things that seem to make sense. I was walking along the beach with some friends yesterday and they were saying that at night these huge trucks come out and collect all of the glass from the streets, grind it up and deposit it on the beaches as sand. It’s smart thinking, right? And my planned bike rental: they have this new program here called “Bicing” where you pay the equivalent of about $25 and you get a card that lets you rent out bikes from one of dozens of bike stations across the city. Then you ride the bike to where ever you need to go and drop it off at the closest station.

I did have one bit of bad luck on the way to Barcelona, though. My dad and I flew to Europe on Continental. An American airline to Europe. Then I flew this other airline, Alitalia, from Rome to Barcelona, but my dad had booked it through Continental. Apparently European airlines, like Alitalia, have much different luggage restrictions. My bags were within the restrictions when I flew Continental, but when I switched airlines, I was WAYYYYY over the limit. My dad and I hadn’t thought to check Alitalia’s restrictions since he booked everything through Continental. The gory details: they charged 12€ per kilo over the limit you were. I was 20 kilos over! That would have been 240€, which is a little less than $300, I think. Luckily they reduced my kilos to 12, so I had to pay 144€, which is around $200. I was really upset because that’s about 1/5 of my money for the whole trip. I knew I couldn’t afford to lose huge sums of money like that unexpectedly. Especially when I spent all night before I left making sure I was within the luggage limits. I paid the money, but I think my parents might help me out a little bit.

Once I got to Barcelona I waited for the people from my program to meet me. We could either meet them at 11AM or 2PM. My flight was supposed to get in at 10:30AM, but it was delayed and I didn’t get off the plane till 11AM and then I still had to get my luggage and stuff. I got to the meeting point at 11:45AM and sat down at a table to the side to wait until 2PM. At about 2PM I moved my stuff to the exact spot we were supposed to meet. I waited ten minutes and no one was there. I noticed another guy, young, who seemed to be waiting, so I asked him if he was with API. He was in the program also. We waited until 2:20PM and no one was there, so I decided to call the lady. She said they had waited for us earlier when they saw our planes were delayed, until 11:50AM or something. But we didn’t know they were waiting, we just assumed to meet them at 2PM. Anyway, everyone had left the airport and no one was planning on coming back, despite what our instructions had said. She told us to take a cab to the hotel. We did, but were NOT going to pay for it. I was especially mad since I’d just paid hundreds for my stupid luggage, and the other kid I was with didn’t have euros on him. But we got to the hotel and API paid. :)

At the hotel, my roommates were cool. One was from Philadelphia, schools in Vermont, another was from California and goes to school there. We have our first meeting where the resident director, Amalia, tells us 70% of API students get stuff stolen at some point during the semester. I am being careful. Later we go to dinner as a group to a really nice restaurant for paella. I have not eaten since the pastry I had on the plane, so I eat ravenously. After dinner I go out with my roommates and some other people. We end up at a cerveseria and I drink beer. Eh. Later they decide to go to an international student welcoming party at some club by the beach. I wait at the bus stop feeling more and more sleepy. The combination of beer and waking up at 6AM, I assume. The bus is taking forever and I start imagining what this party will be like. An expensive club with a bunch of Americans who want to act like wasted idiots. Hmmm. I decided to save my money and go back to the hotel to sleep. One of my roommates had already done the same. I walked back and instantly feel asleep. The next morning I heard that drinks at the club were 9€. Everyone said they’d spent too much.

The second day we walked around as a group and then split off. I stayed with my roommates and we explored Las Ramblas, the main tourist street. I was clutching my purse desperately, since this is where the thieves are concentrated. We walked up part of a mountain called Montjuïc and got on a cablecar that took us across part of the city (in the air) and dropped us off at the beach. The views were beautiful; we hadn’t realized how huge Barcelona is. After walking around more and getting lunch we took a siesta. That night we were going back to the main part of Montjuïc with the group. Before we left one of the roommates was trying to plug in her hair dryer. As soon as she put in adapter in the wall there was a pop and all of our power went off. We tried fiddling with the power box, but nothing would work. Since it was almost time to leave we just left it, hoping it would be fixed when we came back. We were going to Montjuïc for a special fountain lights show or something. There are tons of fountains leading up to a big building that part of an art foundation. Little by little the stretch of fountains would start turning on, and then the huge one on the middle turned on and started changing colors. It could make cool effects and the water would change its movements. There were thousands of people watching. Later they started playing classical music and the water danced to the music. It was lovely.

We had been led to the magic mountain fountain by one of the API leaders, but were left to get back on our own. The leader told us to take the #27 bus back to the hotel if we wanted. We got on 27 and it took us further and further away. It didn’t even look like the city anymore. We started seeing highways. I was with my roommates and another guy...we all looked at each other confusedly. I joked that the bus driver was probably going to stop and tell us to get off when we were lost in the middle of nowhere. Then the bus stopped and he did. We talked to him and he said if we paid again we could keep going. Luckily we ended up back at the hotel, but it took at least an hour on that stupid bus. We vowed not to take advice from the API guy every again. That night we went out again, but it was pretty tame. There was a glass of wine at a “grown up club” a block from the hotel in L’Eixample. Then we tried a club in another area that seemed okay, but I wasn’t in the mood. My roommates and I left after about 30 minutes. Back at the hotel, our power was still gone. We tried to explain to the man at the front desk, luckily he fixed it.

Friday was crazy. I waited for my “madre” at the hotel, but she was late. While I was waiting in the lobby with Amalia tells me my mom is kind of “hippie”. I find this to be good news. A small woman with curly gray hair and lace up sandals walks in, rushed. It’s Anna! I stand up and we greet each other with kisses. We’re whisked away into a taxi, heading towards the Barri Gótic, where she lives. She’s explaining why she’s late and telling me about the other API student living in the apartment. She doesn’t speak any English, which I think is wonderful. We can understand each other to come extent. I find myself nodding a lot. The cab drops us off right on Las Ramblas next to La Boqueria, which is the most famous market in town. I had visited the day before and it’s the most colorful place I’d ever been to, with fruit, fresh juice, fish, hanging meat, candy, vegetables and almost anything else. I wheel my luggage across the street into the maze of the Barri Gótic. Anna stops for bread and we get to the door of our building. It’s covered in pink graffiti. Not ghetto, haha, just colorful. Many of the other doors in the area have it. It actually helps me distinguish our building. Anna gets Megumi, the other API student that lives with her, to help me with the luggage. There are about three flights of stairs, even though we live on the second floor. It’s so old inside the building, but not in a dilapidated way, in an awesome way.

Anna’s apartment is amazing! I feel like it could be used in a movie. It’s not that everything is really new and fancy, but the decorations fits perfectly with the kind of apartment it is. There are old distorted glass windows all over the place with wooden shutters and huge metal locks. The walls are all cement and the ceilings are ribbed. Anna had painted on many of them. Doors don’t have handles. I can tell all of the power outlets and light fixture were added way after the building was constructed. The balcony in the living room looks out into a crowded plaza. I can hear the noise of our neighbors and Las Ramblas from my room. I love my room. It’s much bigger than I’d expected. There’s a main room with two windows and my bed and then a narrower side room with another window, a desk and my closet. I have so much space; it’s almost like having a tiny apartment. Her apartment is actually really big for a crowded city. There are five bedrooms total. My windows look out to windows of other people’s apartments and they’re SO close. I have to be careful about my own privacy. I can hear everything, including other people cell phones and them washing their dishes. The window in my desk room looks out to Megumi’s window because our apartment is in a sort of U-shape.

I was fed breakfast again and told all about the house after my arrival. Since it’s so old, there are many little rules about how everything works. Like hot water, it’s controlled by a butane tank in the kitchen. We have to light a flame in a box on the wall to make hot water happen. It’s confusing to me, but I’ll learn. Anna cooks our meals and they’re really great. She’s an excellent cook! Plus we get to practice our Spanish at every meal. It makes me glad I chose a host instead of a residencia (dorm). Anna designs lamps and owns a store in the neighborhood. She’s from Barcelona. She’s tranquila, but sometimes gets really animated when she tells stories. It’s so cute! Megumi and I love her. Nuba also lives with us. Her 12-year-old dog, I think part German Shepherd. Nuba is big, but gentle. She likes to nap under my desk when I’m on the computer or on the rug next to my bed. Megumi moved in the day before me. She lives in another room in the apartment. She’s a junior from UC in San Diego. She’s really energetic and excited about stuff and so friendly. She was really welcoming when I moved in. She speaks Spanish about like I do, so we’re making it with Anna together.

After lunch that afternoon I had to go to a really boring meeting/grammar review class. On the way home I bought a calling card and called my mom because I’d found out that morning, via her email, that my uncle died. I’d never met him, but my mom was upset and had to break the news to my grandma. It’s very sad. She is going home soon to be with her mom. At least he died in his sleep, which means it probably wasn’t agonizing. They think it could have been a brain aneurysm.

We ate dinner much later that night, as they do here, and then I prepared to introduce my friends to Megumi’s friends because they all live at the same residencia. We dressed up and wore shoes that hurt our feet. We spent at least 30 minutes trying to get over there, taking the metro and walking till we had to take our shoes off. Everyone met and seemed to get along really well. About seven of us left to find this club in another part of the city. Some of the others were drunk and being typical “loud Americans”. I felt annoyed since I don’t want to attract negative attention in a city I am not familiar with and because people should know better than to get wasted in a place they don’t know. We had so much trouble finding the club, Otto Zutz, but eventually we got there. I’ve never been to such a big club, though I was told it was small by other people’s standards. There were two dance floors. It had been a long time since I’d danced like that, so much, so freely. Mostly I stayed close to my friends, but I was stolen a couple of times by aggressive men. They are too aggressive for me. This is precisely the reason I won’t be a “wasted American” in a foreign city. I did leave the club with fewer inhibitions that night, but I knew what I was doing. A few of the girls left in a cab, but cabs are expensive and wimpy. The rest of us waited a few minutes for the metro to re-open at 5AM. We rode together and got off at our respective stops. I was so glad to be with Megumi! We made it home, but not before witnessing a disgrace on the street to our house. There was man getting “serviced” by a lady (prostitute, I hope) in the open. I accidentally looked in that direction and saw everything before I realized what was going on. I pulled at Megumi and we walked even faster towards our graffitied door. She hadn’t seen it, but we were giggling. At home I took off what I could and fell asleep with very dirty, very sore feet.

Yesterday Megumi left to go to the Costa Brava. I was asked to go, but after the night before I wanted to stay in Barcelona and rest. I puttered around all morning and went to the beach with some friends later on. They are much more topless than I expected. Some tops I would have rather not seen, haha. My friends weren’t in their bathing suits so we sat in the sand for a while. Later we walked to a supermercado. I love looking at all of the foreign food! Bottles of wine are so cheap here. You can get them for less than a euro. I’m sure the quality is bad, but a decent bottle can probably be bought for just a few euros. We hung out at the residencia for a while and I eventually left because I wasn’t feeling well. I’m not sure if it’s the water here, or all of the coffee I’m drinking, or something entirely different, but my stomach’s been upset. The water is very chlorinated and tastes terrible. I have to take it in gulps at dinner. I’m thinking of sneaking in some bottled water for my room so I don’t offend Anna. Last night there was more drama in our apartment...well...in the apartment above. Anna had warned me the people living above us, a mother and her son, were unpleasant. We were in the apartment and we hear some yelling but ignore it. A few minutes later there is more yelling and screaming and then glass breaking and things being knocked over. Anna rushed in and made a motion like people punching each other. Apparently they were having a fight. Anna called the police and they came a bit later. It was very quiet upstairs. There was a police car and ambulance in the plaza below for some time. I don’t know...

Also that night Laura came. She lived with Anna as an exchange student two years ago. She speaks very fluently. It gives me hope, because she said she was terrible at speaking when she came here. She said she owed her fluency to the mealtime conversations she’d have with Anna. Laura is from the U.S. and visits Anna and her novio, who she met here in BCN when she was studying. That night we didn’t finish dinner till about midnight. I was exhausted and still feeling a little bit crappy so I just went to bed. I slept until almost noon today! I thought Anna would think I was lazy for sleeping so much, but she says my body needs time to adjust.

I spent a lot of time writing this afternoon, as I’ve been doing often. Then I went on a walk with Anna and Nuba around the Barri Gótic. She gave me an excellent tour and I even saw some ancient Roman ruins...just a few blocks from our house. We ate some seafood paella by the coast. The seafood comes complete with heads, eyes, bones and legs. She showed me how to crack the body open and how you’re supposed to suck on the head for flavor. I couldn’t bring myself to do that just yet. She also showed me a short cut of a narrow street that takes me right from our plaza to the beach. It’s very convenient. We got back and needed siestas. Nuba took her’s in my room. :)

Hopefully after this my entries will become a bit less rambling and lengthy. I’m just trying to take everything in right now and remember what I think about it all. It’s still strange to find euros in my wallet and read things in military time and type on keyboards with keys in different places and to find street names on the sides of buildings. I love it though. I feel so lucky to be here.