Gothic Quarter, La Boqueria

This all actually happened two days ago, but I was either too lazy or too busy to write about it. So I'm finally doing it now, as I lie in bed preparing to go to sleep so I can be well rested for my hike tomorrow. There was a scavenger hunt event today, but I made the mistake of getting off the metro two stops earlier than I was supposed to because I wanted to walk some more and enjoy the city. Well, first of all, it was raining, and second of all, I wore a sundress and was freezing my butt off. I've been hearing from people that it's super hot back in Maryland, which is ironic because I came here dreading the heat and humidity. It's like monsoon season in Barcelona, so it'll be rainy and cold for a few weeks,  and then it'll be back to sunny weather.

I think my favorite orientation event has been the tour of the gothic quarter. It's the oldest part of Barcelona, and there's so much rich history behind it. Unfortunately (and unsurprisingly) it was pouring rain for most of it, so I didn't take as many pictures as I wanted. Our tour guide's name was Xavi (like the footballer) and he did an awesome job at explaining everything for us.

This part really reminded me of Dorne in Game of Thrones, even though I know they film those scenes in Seville. The architecture is a little similar, though. I'm probably totally wrong and someone out there who is an expert at Spanish architecture is really offended haha. Now I'm thinking of Oberyn Martell :(

It was probably just because of the weather, but all the squares that we passed were pretty empty. I definitely have to go back when it's nicer out so I can explore and see everything in its full glory. It's so awesome that I have like four months to take everything in, rather than having to cram everything into like ten days and only being able to visit things once. I've already been to La Rambla three times, although the third time was not as charming because everyone was speed walking with umbrellas.

The gothic quarter is so beautiful. This street reminds me of Diagon Alley from Harry Potter or something. If everyone was wearing black cloaks, it would totally complete the image.

Not swans, but geese! I could tell they were ticked off because they raise their crests (I think that's what they're called) on their heads. I didn't dare put my hand through the iron fence because geese are known for biting peoples' fingers off. Don't mess with geese.

Too close for comfort

The one in the foreground has its crest raised, and you can compare it to the others ones, too. That one is mad! 

I took so many pictures of them....

Next, we went into Barcelona cathedral. It's the oldest cathedral in Barcelona, built in the 4th century and rebuilt in the 14th century. So it's pretty freakin' old. This place is free for entry! On the evening of the first Sunday of every month, they play the organs and it's open to the public. I'm definitely going to that, it's going to be amazing. The organs are HUGE (I don't think I took a picture) and I don't remember exactly what, but Xavi said that they're different from any organs in the world. Something about horizontal pipes that add a different sound to the music.

If you think this is detailed, wait until you see Sagrada Familia. That thing is crazy. And I live so close to it!

This bakery has a basement that has... damn it, I forgot what they specialize in. I should have paid more attention or taken notes or something. But I'll probably come back here and try some of the pastries. The food here is so good (AND SO CHEAP), but it's a little dangerous because a lot of it is bread, cheese, and meat. I already lost a pound or two because of all this walking I've been doing, but I can't get too comfortable and let myself eat whatever I want. 

I love how there's so many Catalonian pride flags everywhere in the streets. I don't know enough to form an opinion on the Catalonian independence issue (it's a very sensitive topic so you'd be well advised to not discuss it with locals), but it's nice to see a group of people that are so proud of their culture. 

Finally, the moment I've been waiting for, LA BOQUERIA MERCAT! Actually no, the moment I'm still waiting for is Camp Nou. It's kind of on the outskirts of Barcelona so I haven't had time to go see it. I still can't believe I'm in the same city as the FC Barcelona stadium. I'll probably shed a few tears when I see it in real life haha. I'm going to the Real Sociedad game in November, so that's going to be absolutely amazing. There's NO way I can afford to go to the clasíco (tickets are like 400 euros, and that's for the cheap seats), but I can put my jersey on and go cheer them on at a bar or something. La Boqueria is a huge open market in Barcelona on La Rambla and they have everything you could imagine.

Tourist selfie!

The fruit looks like plastic because it's so pretty, but I can assure you it was real. It was so crowded that I was being pushed along and I could only snap a few quick pictures. 

Hello angry looking Spanish man!

Mmmm candy. I wonder if it's stale because it's been sitting out for such a long time. I didn't really buy anything at the market except for a raspberry pineapple smoothie for 1,50 euro (That's another thing, they use commas instead of periods when writing prices. Weird). The food here is pretty cheap.

We eventually separated into two groups and we ended up at Sagrada Familia, which is three blocks from my apartment. I'm really happy with our location. It's one block from the metro (which is SO easy to navigate) and one block from one of our school's campuses. I've heard that some students got placed an hour away from campus and seven blocks from the metro. No thanks.

You really can't capture how awesome this building is. It's still under construction, too. I think it finishes in like 2022...

My roommates went out for dinner a few nights ago, and we totally got ripped off by the restaurant lol. We sat down, and they were like "Tapas? Paella?" and we said "Sí", and then he disappeared and came back with a ton of food and our bill came out to 256 euros. So he took advantage of us and just brought out whatever he wanted us to pay for. It's okay though, now we know to actually ask for a menu and read through it to figure out what we want. And I'm not that mad, because the food was SO GOOD. Oh my god, I'm in love with paella. I've never had it before! I also found a Korean restaurant a few blocks away from me, so I'll definitely be going there when I'm missing my mom's cooking. I popped my head in and made sure that it was run by Korean people, haha. 

This is my school, the Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona (am I putting those accent marks in the right direction? Too lazy to check) Sant Pau campus. It's seriously so beautiful. The Eixample campus (pronounced eh-SHOM-play, I learned that the first day and I was like Oh! That's how you pronounce it! I've been wondering all summer how to say that word) is more downtown, closer to Plaça de Catalunya, and it's more of just a nondescript building, but it's okay because I can get out of class and it'll be easier for me to explore. 

That's all for now! I have a hike at Parc de Collserola tomorrow, and it has a view of Barcelona that is amazing because it's on a mountain. Gotta get some zzz's now. 

Finally in Barcelona

This post is going to be extremely long, but it'll be mostly pictures so it'll be pretty painless. The past four days have felt more like two weeks. I procrastinated so badly that I ended up packing Friday and Saturday (my flight was Sunday). And to think I thought Daniel procrastinated bad... but eventually I finished and I was able to relax on Sunday morning before heading to the airport. But first, we had to have my going away dinner which was delicious and I literally felt sick when I got home because I had eaten so much food. Still worth it. 

I headed to the airport at around noon with two huge bags and my backpack. Originally, Lufthansa only allowed me to bring one checked bag and one carry on, so we were just going to pay for the second one. However, when I asked about it, the lady at the counter just waved her hand and said "It's fine." and checked my second bag free of charge. Sweet! 

Lol @ my dad with my stuffed animal...

Family picture before leaving! Shoutout to Jin for wearing a Messi shirt in support of me, even though he doesn't really care about Barça. This was a way less tearier goodbye (in other words, no tears) than when we dropped Daniel off at the airport, because I'm seeing my parents in three weeks when they come to visit me. Also, I don't really cry when I say goodbye to my family haha... (guilty laugh) but sometimes I tear up when I talk to them on the phone when I'm really far away.

Getting on my plane was pretty straightforward, and I got an aisle seat in the middle row of seats (like how on a 747 it's three seats and then four seats and then three seats) and only one other person sat on the other end of the row, so we had two seats in between us. Needless to say, I put the armrest down and laid down when I slept. It was actually the worst flight I've had in a while, because I'm an idiot and didn't take my Dramamine in the beginning, so I got sick right away and couldn't eat my food. I tried to sleep, but I was only able to get about two hours of shut eye. Eight horrible hours later, I finally arrived in Frankfurt in the middle of the night. I never got to see the actual airport since my connecting flight was in the same terminal, but it was kind of depressing haha. Not all of the lights were on, and it was very hot because there was no AC. That's another thing about Europe that I have to get used to. Europeans don't depend on, or expect, air conditioning like Americans do. I'm still surprised when I walk into a shop and it's HOT AS HELL. Anyways, I sat at a table at my gate and browsed the internet on my laptop until boarding time. 

I got to watch the sunrise while we waited to take off, which I would have appreciated more if I wasn't dying of sleep deprivation and sweaty/hungry/nauseous/basically every unpleasant feeling you can imagine. I sat next to a young couple in their late twenties, and I asked them if they were going for vacation. They said they were, and then asked me what I was going for. Eventually, I found out that the husband/boyfriend (didn't check for rings haha) graduated from Maryland. Like, WHAT ARE THE ODDS? That I A) am in the same city in Europe with a UMD alum, and B) I get a seat next to them on a flight to Barcelona? Maybe I'm freaking out about it too much, but I thought it was really cool. 

After 12+ rough and exhausting hours of traveling, I finally arrived in Barcelona! Or should I say, Barthelona. I thought it was a joke when people told me that's how Catalonians pronounce it, but it's true. One of my program directors, Helena, is Catalonian and she pronounces it like that. Also, she literally is unable to pronounce my name because the y's come out sounding like j's so I just told her to call me G hahaha.

The Barcelona airport was the most confusing one I've ever been in. Plus, the signs are in Catalan first, then English, then Castellano ( = Spanish. No one calls it español in Spain) Well... okay, it wasn't confusing, but I was dead tired and I had to walk forever to find the baggage claim. It took forty minutes for my bags to finally appear and I seriously started thinking that they lost my bags. I was at the point where I asked random people around me if I could borrow their phone to call my RD, but I ended up asking a German and an American, so it was no use anyway. The German didn't even understand me lol, I had to make the cell phone sign with my hand and point to him, and then he just shook his head. It was just too good to be true that I got two checked bags for free... but eventually they showed up and I basically ran to my pick up spot because it was like 10:54 and the pick up time was 11:00. It didn't matter anyway because we ended up leaving at around 12:30. That's another thing I'm getting used to. Europeans are never on time. If they say 10:00, they mean 10:30. 

The FC Barcelona merchandise store in the airport! There were two of these. It's so awesome that I'm in the actual city now, where literally everyone knows about/supports the club and wears their jerseys.

The cafe where everyone met to get on the bus to the apartment. I would have bought some water and a sandwich or something, but it came out to like 13 euros and I decided to just wait it out. 

After what seemed like forever, we finally got on the (air-conditioned and free WIFI) bus to the apartments. We actually are nine students from UMD, and about 30 students from Wake Forest, so we had to drop them off at their pisos too. Dos de Maig (our piso, pronounced dos de MAI-sh) was the second to last stop. I fell asleep at this point lol.

The view from our balcony on the sixth floor! That's my school, UAB. Or at least, one campus of it. The other campus is in the Eixample neighborhood and it's about 20 minutes away. I have yet to see it, though.

Not that long after we settled in, we went grocery shopping. There's a supermarket literally 20 steps from the front door of our piso, which is nice. The weird thing was that eggs and milk weren't refrigerated. 

I WAS SO HAPPY WHEN I SAW THESE. I cannot live without salt and vinegar chips. I didn't buy them though, because I'm trying to start off on a healthy foot. So far, so good.

Today, we had orientation at the Maryland in Barcelona office at Carrer Bailen, so we had to take the subway to get there. There's a subway station a block from the apartment which is super convenient. AND, we all got a T-10 card with our welcome packets, which gives you ten trips on any public transportation in Barcelona, so we could get ourselves settled in before we spent a hundred euros on the 3 month card. The subway station was hot because it's not air conditioned, but honestly, that was no different than the DC metro. However, the actual subway cars are air conditioned. And quite nice! I can't begin to put into words how much I loathe the DC metro system. 

I can't believe how close we live to Sagrada Familia. I haven't seen it yet, but I'm sure it's amazing. Our orientation lasted like four hours, and then we went to lunch together (which was paid for, thank god because the place was pretty fancy) and walked around the city for a while.

The first course was tagliatella with gorgonzola and walnuts. It was so rich that I couldn't finish it, and plus, I knew we had more courses coming so I wanted to pace myself.

The main course was pork with some kind of sauce and deep fried pears. The pears were delicious!! The pork was a kind of rare that would probably be illegal in America, but I didn't really mind because it tasted so good. I knew that portion sizes in America were way too big, but this really put it in perspective.

This was Brandi's main dish, and she ordered arroz negro, which is rice that's been cooked with squid ink, squid, and some vegetables. It came with a garlic aioli. I tried some and it was really good. It kind of tasted like this Korean dish, but it makes no sense because the two use totally different ingredients. 

This is cava, which is like the Catalonian equivalent of champagne. I don't exactly know what the difference is, but we just assumed it was champagne until Helena corrected us and emphasized how much better it was. I love her, she's so funny and sweet and helpful. That's another thing, Catalonians are SUPER proud of their culture. There are multiple holidays where they just have giant parades and festivals to show how proud they are. On every block, you will see at least ten Catalonian flags hanging from peoples' balconies. There are two kinds of flags: the one with just yellow and red stripes is just a Catalonian pride flag. The one with the stripes and the white star on the blue triangle means that they support Catalonian independence. 

Casa Milà! One of Antoni Gaudi's works on Passeig de Gracia. When you see a building, you know immediately if it's Gaudi or not, because it just looks so funky.

Another Gaudi building.

This is Plaça Catalunya, which is one of the most famous plazas in Barcelona. It's at the end of La Rambla, which is the most tourist-y and well known streets in the city. I didn't take any pictures during La Rambla because the chances of getting pickpocketed skyrocket on that street, so I just put my phone away. Not worth it!

We walked all the way down to Barceloneta beach, which is the man made beach in Barcelona. It's nice, but there are nicer beaches north and south of the city.

That's it for now! I actually meant to post this yesterday, but I never finished writing it and so I'm posting it now and then writing another one for what I did today...lol