My 50th Post

Well, this is my 50th post, and today marks the end of the first half of my study abroad. My fall break starts tomorrow (or on Monday, depending on how you look at it). Today is my 54th day out of the 111 that I'll be here. I know these numbers because I have this sweet Excel program that I've been using to budget my money. One of the formulas requires a count of days, hence my knowledge.

Anyway, goodness, I suppose this would be a good time to reflect back. I don't know if I'm too good at that though. Well, I guess I've adapted fairly well to the Spanish way of living. The milk, eh, isn't the best, but not bad. I get hungry at 8:30 now instead of 6, which means I only have a half hour of starvation left until dinner. I've also learned that I'll eat pretty much anything. Well, minus that langosta. *shudders*

The smoke doesn't bother me as much. During those first weeks, it seemed like there was cigarette smoke everywhere. However, I must honestly say, I've noticed that they smoke slightly, slightly, less than my first impression.

Fraternities are not that big at Santa Clara (although a lot of sorority girls and frat guys from SCU are here in BCN) so it was interesting for me to see frats boys from other schools. Personally, they are pretty funny to me. But again, less than 5% of SCU kids are a part of the Greek life. So anyway, that's another thing, although not Spanish, that I've been exposed to.

Deoderant is actually pretty darn important and useful.

Hmm... What else? I've just flat out learned a lot more about this city and of Spain. I also know where a lot of things are. I can get around pretty good in Barcelona. I also speak more Spanish. I guess you could file that under the "duh" column, but I'm impressing myself a little.

Okay, it's a little hard to think of these things on the spot. Regardless, things have definitely changed since that first, crazy day.

Going off that excellent lead in, I have had a crazy 24 hours. Not a whole lot of sleep. I woke up early to talk to my family (which was awesome!) and then studied some more before my first midterm. It was my religion/history/art class. I basically had to write an essay on how I would describe Islamic art to people in the United States (or the West) who don't know anything other than what they see on TV. As you can see, it was pretty open ended, but I think I did well.

I also think I rocked my Spanish quiz. However, I just can't seem to do well on the small compositions we have each week. I got a 8.5 and my friend got a 9.5. He had 6 small errors and I had only 1! You are also graded on content and difficulty, but I saw no big difference between our two papers. Err. I gotta step it up. Oh, also, at the bottom of the page, she wrote, "bien Talon." Um, that's the name of the only black kid in our class.

As I was studying before my Management Across Borders class, I ran across something in the reading that I found funny. It was saying that in some countries, like the United States, if there's a conflict, things are solved in court. In other countries, such as Japan, you work it out through relationships, etc. Here are some interesting stats that was there.

Lawyers per capita (100,000)

• US - 279
• UK - 114
• Germany - 79
• France - 29
• Japan - 11

Anyway, I took that test, and it was long with a lot of writing, but I think I did well. With all of that done, I'm free! Now I just have to get ready for my big trip. Boy, I'm excited! Should be great. This will probably be my last post until Nov. 3, but I might get Internet connection at one of my hostels. If I do, I might post something quick. Regardless, I wish you all a great week and a Happy Halloween! I'll leave you with this picture of me as of my 50th day (I hate taking pictures... haha).

And Happy Birthday Mom!!

Interview, BK, and schoolwork

Hey everyone!

Wow, busy day, and I still have a lot left to do. I have two midterms and a quiz tomorrow, plus a paper. Pssh, I can do it.

Anyway, real quick, I finally interviewed that one guy for my management class. He started a company called AdOne. They are into "Techno-Marketing." New ways to advertise to people. It was pretty interesting.

Also, I had another intercambio today. We met in between my classes. There weren't too many restaurants around, but he offered to go to McDonald's. Now, my goal was to not go to that while over here. However, he insisted. The Burger King was closer, so I finally gave in, but suggested that. I don't see as coping out or anything, though. It was differently different than in the U.S. First of all, it took us over an hour to eat our burgers. In Spain, lunch is definitely a big deal. It's a time for sitting down, relaxing, and talking. Overall, I won't go back, but I guess it was a good experience to see an American fast food restaurant in Spain.

The burger wasn't the same though. I swear.

I saw a sweatshirt on a guy today that said, "Warm Me Up."

Wine Tasting

So last night, no wait, I guess that was Sunday night, anyway, my señor came home around 10pm or so (so after dinner). He had some extra slices of pizza from some pizzeria that they went to. He offered us the last 5 slices. The other two guys didn't want any so I ate them all. (What?! They were tasty, and better than that frozen crap). Anyway, the one guy who knows Spanish told the señor that I ate all 5 of them. Our señor said that my cholesterol is going to be through the roof. Yeah, and the 3 packs a day he smokes is great for his health. And worth mentioning, cholesterol seems to be a big deal here. This fear is one reason why they don't eat eggs for breakfast. At least, that's what I've heard from 2 Spaniards.

IES offered a wine tasting class. Not knowing anything on the subject, I decided to sign up (this is similar to the cooking class I took). The lady knew pretty good English, and it was a lot of fun. Not a stuck-up, anal wine tasting event like I envisioned. We learned how to taste wine and how to check its age by the color, brightens, transparency, etc. We tried white, cava (champagne in Spain), rosé (pink wine) and two red wines. It was very interesting. Plus, there was meat, cheese, and crackers. Yum.

The quasi-snobbish, rich girls who have apparently had lots of wine in their days weren't too bad, either. Hmm... after rereading that comment, I realize I didn't word it very well. I'm not talking about their attractiveness, but the fact that they didn't annoy me.

I gotta go get some homework done. I have 3 tests on Thursday! Woo! But then, of course, it's Fall Break! I'm very excited for Italy and Athens.

Theology, Midterm, and the Kitchen

For the record, I wasn't trying to start anything with my previous post or offend anyone. Come now Carrie, the praying to Mary comment was a little harsh. Yes, it's an odd concept for some of us, being how we believe that no mere mortal can intercede for us, help us talk to God better, or whatever, but them fightin' words!

And this kind of reminds me about what I've learned in some of my classes, including the religion one that I'm taking here. Some scholars, especially Muslim scholars, believe that the Protestant Reformation was influenced by Christian contact with Islam during the Crusades. Islam is a religion that sought to purify the other religions (to make a long theological point short, Islam believes Christians and Jews were once true "Muslims" but their faiths strayed from the true religion and is no longer monotheistic.). Islam is against the representation of God (and people, really), similar to Protestants smashing Catholic sculptures (both believed this distracted believers and lead to idolatry). Mosques are generally plain, with only geometric art (which is really neat. More on that when I get back from some of my Spanish trips). Protestant churches tend to be a lot plainer than their extravagant Catholic counterparts (okay, I worded that harshly). Also, and a big one, the Protestants were against a clergy and believed people should have their own Bibles so they can read, understand, and interpret the Word for themselves. Islam and the Qur'an practically requires this from (of?) Muslims.

Whew, okay, so there's a quick, rough, theological, um, tid-bit. And worth noting, this is merely coming from a college student who has taken a few classes on the subject. So put respect and faith in it accordingly.

Wow, anyway, back to me :) My family sent me a letter about 3 weeks ago but I still have yet to receive it. Sad times. I double checked, and my address is correct on my blog.

I had my first midterm today in my art class. It was on Pablo Picasso. I'm really enjoying it (although I still flat out love my econ class. Man, I feel like such a nerd for liking it). The first painting we had to talk about was Les Demoiselles d'Avignon, or the Ladies of Avignon. We had to write the influences, characteristics, etc.
When you actually learn about a painting, you get a lot more out of it. It was pretty cool. This led the way to cubism. Ah, and most of his friends, critics, etc, absolutely hated this, causing him to "hide" it for almost 20 years until it was showcased at MOMA in NYC, which is where it is today.

We then had to discuss his Blue Period, where he was kinda depressed, very poor, and painted in, well, blue. The third question was about how his personal life affected his paintings (lovers, where he lived, Civil War, etc).

Finally, we had to write about Guernica. Picasso painted this in response to the Nazi air attack on the small Spanish town of Guernica. Dictator Franco gave Hitler permission to test some new technology. This became the first attack on a civilian city in the history of mankind. The city was destroyed and thousands killed.
This is in Madrid, so I get to see it when Michelle and I go visit the Spanish capital.

Overall, I think I destroyed that test. I studied pretty smart for it, and it paid off.

Ah, and some funny kitchen news. You all by now have the general idea that, while my señor is overall pretty great, you don't want to "disrespect" him. Case in point, last night I found out that the Mexican girl actually talked back. She accused him of not following his own rules. We're not allowed to smoke in the house (darn...) but he does. Double standard? Perhaps. But who the heck calls someone out on that?!

Anyway, he leaves for the weekends. On Sunday night, he still wasn't home, but the three of us SCU kids wanted to cook some dinner. He had left us with some frozen pizzas (oh, they are terrible over here) and frozen tortilla de patatas (kinda like Spanish omelets). Now, we learned from the Mexican girl that you can't use the stove. But that's kinda the same word for oven too (the whole unit) so we weren't sure if we could use the stove to cook the pizzas. However, how the heck else would we? And we couldn't ask him to clarify because we've made pizzas in the past and if we can't, then that would just prove that we've been "disrespecting" him for a while. Haha, yeah... But we were hungry, and decided to do it and hope he came home after we cleaned up. He did, so it's all good.

Also, for the last batch of cereal that he bought, he also bought some fiber, whole grain, and other yummy, healthy (read: not chocolate) kinds. Awesome. It was good (they're gone already). My body also liked it...

And you know when you get down to the last part of a bowl of cereal there's all that milk? I know it's not good manners to bring it to your mouth and drink it, but come on, it's only breakfast. You just woke up, hair is everywhere, and you don't want to waste the precious (yet kinda nasty) milk. I have no idea if this would be considered rude to my señor, and I wonder, "Can I do this?" My solution? Wait for him to leave the room.

I found a pack a cigarettes on the ground that read, "Smoking can damage the sperm and decreases fertility." No wonder they all smoke, the warning labels are in English! But seriously, where did this pack come from? All the others are in Spanish (and this was in big print, not that tiny print we have in the States).

Church in Spain

I figured that because I'm in Spain, I should attend a church service. Now, they're all Catholic (I haven't seen any Protestant churches anywhere, sorry Dad) but I figured it'd be a good experience. A few days ago, I realized that this would really be the last Sunday where I'd have a chance to go. I noticed one church that had hours posted. Unfortunately it was in Catalan. However, later that day I walked by one close to my house with signs in Spanish. There was a service at 12, so I decided to go on Sunday. Here's a picture of the inside.
Now, I've only been to a Catholic service twice before. Once with my family when Carrie was in her maybe-I-want-to-be-Catholic stage (We still love you Carrie!) and another time with Michelle (yes, she's Catholic).

Boy, there's a lot of rituals, and they are even more noticeable when you can't understand most of the words (although I was catching some, which was cool). Catholicism is, um, a little different, but we're all ending up in the same place.

Ah, one funny thing, I remember when we went as a family, while Chris and I stayed behind, my parents and Carrie went up for communion (hmm, is that capitalized?). I guess because they were not Catholic, they just crossed their arms and the priest just blessed them. I figured, pssh, when are you going to get another chance to do this, Chad? So I got in line here. As I got up to the priest he said, "El cuerpo de Cristo" (The body of Christ) and I crossed my arms across my chest. Hmm... I don't think they get too many non-Catholics in Catholic churches in Spain. He was kinda confused, and still offered the little wafer thing to me. There was a little awkward pause, because at this point I was already drifting away, but it was all good.

Anyway, it was nice to go to a service here in Spain. Gotta keep those random, different experiences coming!

Also, on a similar note, I suppose people have heard about the empty pews in Europe. How Europe is religious, yet not really and church attendance is down. Well, based on my guess of around 8 people a pew, the church could fit about 500 people. Based on a headcount, and adding on more to account for the "trickle" I'd say there were 70 people in there. Not that bad of a crowd.

Ah, but to my point, from what I've kind of heard and pieced together for myself, in Spain, one reason why there might not be great church attendance is because of what happened in the Spanish Civil War. The Catholic Church was on the "Right Side," or Franco's side, the dictator who overthrew the previous government and put Spain under a dictatorship until his death in 1975. Of course, not all Catholic priests and stuff were on the Right, but the reason why it was officially on that side is a little confusing to me. I think because communism was on the Left, and they were against the church (and in fact, many priests were killed during this war), and for various other reasons. Well, anyway, basically, that tarnished the Catholic image pretty bad. I mean, they supported a dictatorship. So that could be one attributing factor (pssh, hey, there's always the Protestants, Spaniards!).

I don't know if I've talked about ambulances in Spain yet. They seem to be everywhere, with their annoying little sierens.
It's also funny, and well I may not understand the complete picture, from my point of view and friends of mine whom I've talked to about this, it doesn't seem Spaniards get out of the way as vehemently as we do in the U.S. I've tried to pay attention to it more, and yes, at first it seemed like people would practically cut off ambulances and not budge at all, on closer inspection (with a more open mind) I think they just do a more carefree drift out of the way. This still forces the ambulances to dodge cars a bit, but not as extreme as I first thought.

And I just realized I can add videos to my blogs. Ooo!

And Nebraska is breaking my heart.

Why am I in Spain?

Excellent questions.

First, yes, I used to be allergic to shrimp as a kid, but now I'm over that, and that's a very good thing (mmm MMM). Also, worth noting, it's a good thing my body's gotten so much better as I've grown up. 10 years ago there's no way my lungs could have handled all of this.

What language did I study and why go to Spain? Good questions (and ones I think my dad also asks). It's kind of a long story, but I'll do my best to shorten it and make it interesting.

Going abroad is a really big deal at Santa Clara. Over half of the students (usually junior year) do so. From the start of freshman year, professors talk about how students should go, great experience, blah blah blah. I, for various reasons, didn't really want to bother with it, so I didn't think about it (although deep down, I was wondering if I was missing out on something). Besides, I would just tell people that I was planning on being a CF (community facilitator, what my school calls an RA). However, during sophomore year, I applied to be a CF and was rejected (ouch). I was suddenly hit with a big problem. Where was I going to live now and with whom? Plus, what was I going to do next year?

With being a CF no longer an excuse, I decided that, you know what, I should go abroad. It was passed the due dates, but Barcelona was one of a few programs I could sneak an application into. It also didn't require students to know Spanish. I filled out the application in basically a day and turned it in. Around 2 weeks later, I got accepted.

And I was planning on studying Spanish my junior year of college. I'd only studied it for 2 terrible years at Toldeo High School in WA (boy, that was a bad school, haha. Just ask Christine). So that was about 5 years ago.

The borderline rash decision to go abroad made for some pretty crazy, hectic, and dramatic problems and issues. However, by the good Lord's grace, things somehow came together and here I am, in Barcelona, and I'm really happy about it. I miss home and the people I care about, but I truly believe this has been good for me in a lot of ways. That said, it will be nice to see my family again in December :)

I went for a run this morning. Man, that felt good. I'm feeling very healthy right now, and it was good to burn off some energy and stuff. I then did a little bit of homework and met up with a friend to go to a good sandwich shop that she knew called Conesa. They were tasty sandwiches. Good price, too. Afterwards, we went to this really good gelato place. Homemade, with some new flavors everyday (along with the traditional ones). I got crema Catalan (amazing) and this chocolate with peppers. It was amazing. Good chocolate with this hint of spiciness.

I then walked back and to this park where I've gone to do homework a few times . Today there was something interesting parked there.


A Lincoln Continental. The plaque next to it said something, but couldn't really understand it because it was in Catalan.

And here's a picture of the park:
I'm now going to do some more homework and then eat some dinner. After that, I'm meeting up with some friends for one more hoorah at the Barcelona night life (ah, who am I kidding? I still have the weekdays, too).

Don't Eat the Sushi

Sorry, but there's no root beer in this country. Don't worry though, you can go to a bar without drinking and you can go to a bar without getting hammered. Don't worry about me, family. And yes, it is 18 here. Apparently the smoking age is 14, based on what I see kids doing (either that, or Europeans look really young).

Last night I just met up with a friend, went to this cool, new club for a bit, and then went to bed early.

Today I woke up early to go on a field study for my economics class, The Economic Effects of Spain's EU Membership. I just really love this class (despite the fact that no one else does). I've learned all about Spain's past with the Franco dictator and the economy during those years. We're now learning about what happened after he died in 1975.

Anyway, we were meeting at the Port of Barcelona Office. Only eight of us showed up, but oh well. It was pretty interesting. We went inside and watched this very well put together video about the port (and it was also in English). It was actually very cool and educational. Then we got on a bus and drove around it a little bit. Interesting to see. I never really thought much about Barcelona's port, but it's a major one in Europe and in the Mediterranean.

As I was walking home, there were protesters on La Rambla. Something about Phillips, I think. I then walked to Plaça de Catalunya and did some mild shopping. I walked into H&M because they were having a sale on their already fairly cheap clothes. I tried on some shirts, but man, they didn't fit well, plus the stitching was terrible. I mean, I'm not a clothes connoisseur, so if I notice it, that's pretty bad. So forget that place.

And as I walked up Gracia, I saw more protesters. This time about about Mercedes. Here's a picture of a sticker one guy gave me. It was hard to take a picture of it. From what I've made out, I guess they're closing a plant and laying off 500 people (I stuck it on the port pamphlet we got). Ah, and there were guys in suits, with breifcases, with pig masks on shouting stuff. Too bad I don't know Catalan.
When I got back, I found out my señor is leaving again for the weekend, so that's kinda cool. I was then told about a sushi place just a block away. It was one of those all you can eat sushi boat type places. I've never gone to one of those before, so I thought I'd give it a try. I had 29 plates (small portions on each though). And man, I felt kinda sick. First off, I'm never doing sushi like that again. Not very fresh. Not very good. Ugh. Especially in Spain, and especially when my diet has been mostly white bread and baguettes for the last 2 months. Wow, it was a shock to the stomach/system.

After sushi I withdrew some money from a Barclay's ATM. Apparently they don't charge Bank of America people. I'll see. Here's a picture of some money. Might be interesting. And I had my first intercambio by myself. The guy I'm with is pretty cool. He talks a lot and kinda fast (we were there for 2.5 hours. I finally told him I had to leave. I was meeting my housemate back at the homestay for supper). It was cool though. He had a beer and I had a coffee (see, family? I'm doing good). Very good practice.

Well, I've gotta go. We're meeting some of my housemate's friends in a few minutes. Have a good Friday, everyone.

A bar, my homestay, peanuts, and more

Hello again everyone. Today, Thursday, marks the start of my last weekend in Barcelona for, um, I think 5 weekends. Goodness. So I plan on walking around, seeing the sights, and tearing up the nightlife.

Okay, I realize I've said, "I'll explain that more in future posts," about as many times as, um, shoot, I can't think of a witty analogy. Well, anyway, first, let me explain the Dow Jones bar. It's pretty cool and fun. I only went with two friends, and it was pretty early, so I bet next time will be even better. Basically, it's a small bar (not too smoky, well, at least not at the time we went) and a nice ambiance. There are computer screens with the prices of drinks, and unlike the lame bar called La Bolsa (stock exchange or simply purse in Spanish) where the drinks don't really change, the prices constantly change. If someone orders a drink, you can watch the price go up and other prices go down. Supply and Demand. Well, mostly just demand, but awesome. I talked to the bartender and he said that when someone orders a drink, they enter it into the computer that has some kinda program. Darn cool. Oh, and every once in while, there's a stock market "crash" where prices will just drop. Lights and sirens go off. It's cool. Good food, too.

Ah, and it sounds like Michelle will be staying a week at my homestay. It's great for her because:

• it's relatively cheap
• she gets breakfast and dinner
• gets to practice her Spanish and experience a homestay
• laundry is done twice a week, so she'll at least get to have one load washed
• She'll be with me :)
• It's in a great location
• And more

Now for the entertaining aspect of this story. After dinner, I told my housemates that she might be staying here. I explained to them that I was surprised he had an open room because the 2 Mexican girls were staying until January, and I didn't think he had any other rooms. The one housemate looked at the other and said, "You didn't tell him?" Well, it turns out the Mexican girls were kicked out, I guess. The one housemate who found out about it wouldn't tell me about it (he felt uncomfortable talking about it in the house), so I'm not too sure what exactly happened. I'll see. Regardless, looks like that helped me out!

As I was walking to school, I grabbed one of the free newspapers that they're always handing out on the streets. I opened it up and read and understood my first article! Well, it's more of a summary or headline. It's under the picture of the black man thinking on the right.
It basically says Spain is the second recipient of immigrants in the world, behind only the United States. Ah, and next to it is a bag of peanut M&Ms. We were eating regular M&Ms for dessert one night, and we started talking about peanut M&Ms. I saw these at El Corte Inglés and decided to splurge. I also shared it at dinner, so I think I got some bonus points with the señor, haha. Plus, I don't think peanuts are grown on this continent, so it was very special and nice to eat. Peanut butter costs about $6 for a tiny jar. Oh, I miss it.

Today we saw a movie and then discussed it in my class called The Iberian Peninsula: Cultures and Religions through the Arts. We had to come in early to watch the movie. It was called Le Destin. It was all in French with English subtitles. It was made by an Egyptian director and it was about a famous Muslim philosopher in the 12th century. It was all right, but still interesting.

The class has so far focused on Islamic art and architecture and it's been so interesting, just like my other art class. Again, I knew nothing about architecture, and very little about Islamic art (although I did take an intense Islam class at Santa Clara). It's so cool to look at stuff after you learn a little bit about it.

Man, I'm such a nerd.

I was supposed to interview a Spanish businessman for my management class, but I guess it was canceled. I'll have more on that later.

Okay, and one more story and then I'll let you go. I had two elevator "experiences" today (the second one had to do with the interview, so more on that later). Anyway, I was riding the elevator down from IES and as I hit the 0 button (I'll tell you more about elevators in this country later, too) the light read "-2." I don't know why it even has that capability. The door closes and it takes me up, not down. Doors open and I step out onto the 8th floor. I get back in and press the 0 button. The doors close, and then open. I repeat and the same thing happened. I press 0 again and the doors just stay open, so I decided to press 1. The doors close and I go up again! What the snap?! I go all the way to the 13th floor. Once I got there, the doors open, closed, and then took me down to the floor 1.

Sheesh.

Picasso Museum

I'm taking one class called Great 20th Century Painters: Dalí, Miró and Picasso. This is my first real art class. I know next to nothing about art, and under the encouragement of Michelle, I decided to take this class. I really love it. I find it very interesting and I'm learning a ton of new stuff. All those art styles, periods, etc. The first half of the class is dedicated to Picasso and we're just wrapping that up. On Monday we have our midterm and it's all on him. It was neat to learn all about him. I got to understand, appreciate, and know a lot of his works and how and what influenced him.

With this knowledge, it was even cooler to go see his actual works at the Picasso Museum in Barcelona. I didn't take any photos, so sorry. It'll just be another text post.

First of all, it's tucked away in a pretty cool area of Barcelona close to Las Ramblas (a main and touristy area). It's in a 15th century palace. It still has the original wood rafters and they're beautiful. However, when you walk up to it via the very narrow street (big enough for one car), it has about 3 entrances. Hmm... this is going to be hard to explain. And I couldn't find any good pictures on the Internet. Oh well.

Anyway, continuing on, there are three open entrances and areas that some have described as caves. Just open areas within stone walls. The museum itself is very small and not very impressive. You climb up some stairs and wind around the hallways of what used to be a palace. It moves in chronological order from his first years to his last. While the museum isn't that spectacular overall, there are some key art works of Picasso.

As I said, the museum goes in chronological order, and it starts out when he was very young and painting traditional paintings, the way art schools were teaching. Here one can see his first self-portrait. Moving on you can see the influences from his father, who was also a painter. The famous First Communion is here, one of his few religious paintings. Then it moves onto to when he moved to Paris where his style starts to change. Onto his blue period, which happened after a close friend of his committed suicide. All of his paintings were blue and kinda depressing (he also apparently made lots of very sexual drawings... yeah...).

The best part about this museum is it has all 57 (I think that's the right number) of Picasso's paintings of Velázquez's Las Meninas. Picasso did his own interpretation of it, and there's one big version, but many smaller version of all or only part of the whole painting.

As I said, hard to explain the museum, but it was okay. It did have a couple of his famous paintings though. However, I'm looking forward to seeing better Picasso exhibits in Madrid (and seeing more art in Italy and Greece).

And I was asking my señor if he knew of any cheap hotels that Michelle could stay at when she's out here in December. He checked and he said that he had an open room during that time. So she might stay here! That'd be very convenient. I'll have more on that later.

And I'm not doing a mini Spanish lesson. However, I do have to go study for my quiz. Adios!

My Reputation and Phone Bill

The other day I saw someone smoking while driving a moped. Now that's dedication

Anyway, I got my first PicCell Wireless phone bill last night. All I can say is, I fared fairly well (like that word usage?) compared to others. In fact, I did great. I know one person whose bill was over 20 times higher than mine. I'm living on a strict budget, so I have to watch my phone usage (hmm "strict budget." That makes it sound so... so desperate, which it is not. However, if my loving family and friends out in Internetland would like to send me money, may I direct your attention to my Mailing Address and Some Stories post).

Today I was going to book my train ticket from Madrid to Barcelona for Michelle and I's trip (Carrie so kindly explained who this lady is through one of her recent comments). However, trains in December are still not available for booking yet. Oh well.

And man, my Spanish class is pretty hard for me. It's all in Spanish, including homework instructions, etc, so that complicates things. Things get lost in translation often, I feel. However, I'm doing all right and I'm learning quite a bit. Sheesh, I think we're up to to five verb tenses. Yes, it is five because I just counted. Anyway, I'm toying with having mini Spanish lessons at the end of my posts. Mostly for me because I feel that might help me out a bit. Hmm... I just might do that next time.

My other classes are going great and I'm really enjoying them. More on each individual class in future posts.

Ah yes, and this I found pretty entertaining. I may have mentioned this before, but in my homestay, I somehow got the reputation of going out every night. I mean, we're talking about me here. I feel like I've taken advantage of my time here in Barcelona (I walk around, check out the sites and different areas, etc) and part of that includes going out and seeing the clubs (heck, they're free, remember?). I guess I do go out more than my housemates, but last night, at dinner, my señor said something that I thought was pretty funny.

Note: It was all in complicated Spanish, so this is my translation.

He said asked me if I was going out tonight. After a pause to translate, I said no. I was going to rest that night. Besides, it was Monday for crying out loud. He said, "yes yes yes." The Mexican girl then asked my señor if I go out every night. He said, "yes, all the time." He thought it was funny, which I suppose is a good thing for me, although I am flabbergasted by this. Eh, oh well, haha. Makes me feel cool.

And speaking of which, I'm going out tonight (What?! I have a reputation to uphold!). Going to meet up with some friends; one is in town from London. There is this bar called Dow Jones. It is nearby (I think) and apparently the prices of drinks fluctuate with the demand of them. It sounds pretty darn cool to a guy who loves his Spanish economics course. I'll have a report tomorrow.

In my Spanish book, there's a drawing of a woman wearing a shirt that says "Pop Culture." She's cooking with her mom, so I'm not sure why she's wearing such a shirt.

NFL and a new job

Last night I met up with some people at this bar/restaurant to watch the Patriots/Cowboys game (darn that Brady...). The game didn't get over until almost 2am our time, if I recall correctly. It was fun to watch a football game, though. And they had some pretty tasty chicken wings, actually.

And today I received instructions for my new job at IES. It's about 3 hours a week at 6€ an hour. It's a pilot program that they just started. There's about 10 of us in it. There's this program called Moodle (www.moodle.org) that can be used to create websites for professors. Different activities and announcements can be made on it. That's about all the information I have. Because it's new, our job is to mess around with it and then teach it to our assigned professor. I was assigned my art teacher, so that worked out well. I'll let you know more when I get more information.

And on a similar note, I've been wondering about the legality of this. I remember that a Belgian my freshman year couldn't be a tutor because his visa didn't allow him to work. IES is also paying us in cash. Um... yeah. Is this some kinda under-the-table situation? Hmm... Oh well, it's money.

And the shirt for today said in big letters:

NO DRUGS

And then in small print underneath:

on monday mornings

Football, Moped, and My Trip Itineraries

Our señor finally comes back today. To be honest, it was nice having a break from him (minus the lack of food). The 5 of us (3 SCU guys and 2 Mexican girls) really bonded while he was gone. So it was good.

And I have to get this off my chest. This seems to be one of the best college football seasons ever, and I'm over here missing it. However, the one thing, and major thing, that takes away from the sheer awesomeness of the 2007 season is how terrible Nebraska is playing. Oh my gosh. It crushes me to come back from a club and see that Nebraska got destroyed. This team better turn it around! Ugh.

And speaking of coming back from a club, at about 4am I almost got hit by a moped while I was in a crosswalk. The light was green for me, but I hear the roar of a moped engine and look up. I see this off-pink moped barreling down on me, crappy breaks squeaking. He, and the lady sitting behind him, got within a foot or two of me. I could have literally touched it if I wanted to. I didn't know what to yell, so I just went "Heeyrrrrrahh," a combination of "hey" and grunting. The funny thing is, he looked scarred/embarrassed. Pssh, punk. He then sat there at his red light.

And today I went for a little walk to a really nice park. Just a few blocks away. A lot of trees and everything. I studied some Spanish there. Nice environment. Except, I guess there's one thing. Barcelona has little pools and fountains everywhere, and they'd be nice if it wasn't for the fact that they're all nasty. They could use more cleaning, which is surprising because they clean the streets and sidewalks here constantly.

This coming weekend is the last weekend I'll be in Barcelona for a while. Below I've listed my travel itinerary. I'm excited to see the different parts of Spain/Europe. All of my flights and hostels/hotels are booked. So it's official.

Fall Break: October 26-November 4
Fly into Pisa Fri. Oct. 26 and then take a bus to Florence
Spend three nights in Florence and take a train to Rome
Spend two nights in Rome and fly to Athens on Wed. Oct. 31
Fly home to Barcelona Sat. Nov. 3

That should be an exciting trip. I'll be with 2 lady friends, one from SCU and the other's her roommate here. We're going to try to meet up with some people in Italy if we can. There probably won't be blog posting for those 9 days or so. Probably won't be blog posting during any of these trips, I suppose.

San Sebastián: Nov. 9-11
This is the Basque area of Spain, in the north. Should be educational, fun, and beautiful. I'm going by myself, but there's going to be a bunch of IES kids up there at the same time.

Sevilla: Nov. 16-18
Southern Spain. Going with my friend Derek from SCU.

Granada: Nov. 23-25
Another area of southern Spain. Going there by myself.

Madrid: Dec. 14-17
Michelle is going to be over here and we're going to go to Madrid for the weekend. On the way back we're going to take an overnight train.

United States of America: Dec. 21
Yep, on December 21, I fly back home.

A Night in Barcelona

Note: There might have been some slight exaggerations in my previous post. Haha. Just trying to convey the Barcelona street experience.

And now to convey the Barcelona night life. My goodness. Spaniards do indeed party until the wee hours of the morning, as I think I've mentioned before. My travel guidebook for Europe claims that the Spanish get an hour's less worth of sleep each night, and I can believe it.

I met up with a couple lady friends, one who was visiting from her study abroad in Florence. We went to this small restaurant/bar and got sangria. I learned a crucial lesson here. First of all, I guess sangria is not a manly drink. Second of all, only tourists really order sangria from bars, restaurants, etc. From what I've read, sangria is really something meant to be made at home. I guess it's not hard. All you need is red wine, some cut up fruit, sugar or honey, club soda, and maybe some spirits. Lesson learned, and lesson to be applied. I guess that also explains why the stuff is so darn expensive.

From there we hopped on the metro (open until 2am on Fridays) and went to Villa Olimpica, the club-ish area down by the beach. In my opinion, this is where the best club in Barcelona is: Catwalk. Obviously I haven't been to all of them, but my favorite so far. If you recall, it is the one where the first floor is techno and the top floor is hip-hop/rap. Oh that top floor is so refreshing. I'm sorry, but I really like American music. I get plenty of techno other nights.

I was on the list for Catwalk, but when we got there (before 1am, which is very early in Spain. Oh well, the ladies didn't want to be out too late) they would only let me in and not them (which, now that I think about it, is contrary to most bouncer mentalities. Only letting the dude in??!). Every other night I've been out, as long as one person in your party is on the list, it's okay.

They were not about to pay 18€ cover charge, so we walked away and into this other club. I happened to be on that list. Well, kind of. Kike, the sketchy promoter guy, was at that club, and I've met him and he knows me because I frequent his "parties" (which he likes because he makes money off everyone who gets in under his name). So we got in because I mentioned his name. The lady led us to a VIP area and we sat down. She came up to us a few minutes later and asked us, with a hint of suspicion, why we were not with Kike, who was with a big group off to our left. I, seizing the moment to look cool, got up, walked over to Kike, and chatted with him a bit. Pssh, proved her suspicions wrong. It was all "heys!" and Spanish handshakes between Kike and I. You'd swear we went back 10 years. Oh promoters. Everyone's friend. We then danced for an hour or so. The ladies had a good time, but wanted to go home early, so they got a taxi at around 2:30am.

I didn't want to pay for a taxi, but wanted to wait for the metro to open at 5am. I went back to Catwalk, got in, and met up with some other friends who were inside. It was a pretty good time.

I went to bed at 6am (don't worry, I took a nap before I went out. I'm getting enough sleep, I swear, Dad) and woke up at 10am. Stupid body. I know I'm a little sick and need the rest, so I forced myself to go back to sleep until noon. I'll probably take another nap here in a bit. However, first, I'm going to do some homework.

And some black guy was wearing a T-shirt at Catwalk that read:

Who the **** is
Mick
Jagger?

Walking Around Barcelona

I've been meaning to do a post entitled "Walking Around Barcelona" for a while. Today was my opportunity to do it. My goal is to capture what it's like to walk around in this city. Let's see how good of a job I do. Also, yes, Donna, I got your comments. Thank you. I was hoping people were still reading this. I'm not sure if the "quality" has been as good lately, but I promise you I'll continue to find interesting things to share.

The very first thing I realized about Barcelona is that it doesn't have street signs. Okay, I guess it does, but not the way we have them in the U.S. They are these stone placards on the side of buildings. The locals claim they're everywhere and easy to find, but, even after being here for over 6 weeks, this system still doesn't make a lot of sense. I've got it down, for as well as one can get it down, but it still makes finding streets difficult. And again, contrary to what the locals claim, they are not on every corner or intersection. Here's what one looks like (carrer is Catalan for street):
Not too bad... Could be easier, but usable. However, the tricky part is when they're not at every intersection or when they are at what I like to call, hmm... actually, I guess I haven't come up with a name for the weird intersections yet. Let's call them... um... the octagon intersections. Yeah, that will do.

So, at octagon intersections, there are areas for cars to park as seen in the photo below. Kinda.

Anyway, the buildings on the "corners" are angled, so there can't be signs on them. This means the street sign, if there is one, is down a good 60 feet. So, if you're walking around, trying to find what the cross street is, you have to walk down it a ways to find the sign. This problem is magnified at night. Here's a good example. See the sign? Okay, when I went to draw the yellow box around it, I realized that it isn't a street sign. It's a sign for the restaurant to the right of it. Hmm... Well, I guess that proves my point that there aren't signs at every intersection. However, if there was a sign, it would be in that area, and you can see how far away it is from the crosswalk.

And here are a few pictures of what the sidewalk looks like at these intersections.
For these reasons, big main streets are a lot easier to walk on. You don't have to zig zag up the street but can walk in a street line (while dodging tourists though. I guess nothing's perfect).

Also, while walking around, I noticed a lot of water would be dripping on me. I soon figured out that it's water dripping from air conditioning units. You know, the window types.

And crossing the streets is interesting. Here's an example of the lights.
When it's green, there's a blinking yellow light to tell drivers to yield to we pedestrians. They get right up to that line, I tell ya. And when it starts blinking green, you better get your booty to the other side. As soon as it turns red, they're off. It's funny/scary too because a lot of drivers try to time the light just right. As it's blinking green, or the half second that it's red for both sides, one can hear mopeds revving up. So you're crossing the street, and all these little mopeds are going "vroom vvvrrroomm" (is that how you spell that?). And they love to honk at pedestrians. Let's say it's red, but you can easily, easily, beat the car coming towards you. They honk. If you're in the cross walk, on say, a big street, and it turns red, they'll honk. Even if it's still red for them.

And on main streets with lots of tourists, there are a number of beggars. I took this picture secretively so it isn't the best.
This is a rare photo. Most of the time, they are dressed like this, with their hand out, head down. It was really weird. They would just sit there with their head hanging down.

And today was suppose to have some rallies or something, but I guess I missed them. Nothing exciting happened on the day to celebrate when Columbus discovered America. Ah, and worth noting, 1492 also marks the year when the last Muslim stronghold, in Granada, was conquered by the Christians.

Here's a statue of Christopher Columbus. He's suppose to be pointing towards the Americas. Although, in my opinion, that's a big area to be pointing at, so I assume he's just pointing West.

So I hope you get a slight feel of what it's like to walk around Barcelona. A little different than in the U.S., but after you do it a bunch, you get the hang of it. Have a great weekend everybody!

Student Council, Cooking, and Warning

So, a couple of things to share that I'll try to make interesting.

The first thing to share is after class yesterday, there was a student council meeting. Each Spanish class "elects" a representative to bring up different issues their classmates may have. In my class, I was the only one who know about this, and because I heard there would be free food, I volunteered and got it by default.

I arrived and noticed the food wasn't out yet. Sad times. We put a bunch of desks in a large circle and then started talking. I have to admit, IES organized it well. The discussion went topic by topic. Arrival, orientation, orientation class, IES trip, rooms, safety, Spanish classes, etc. As the students raised their hands, the IES people basically took notes. I took notes as well.

Let's see, there was the giant tool who, for his first question, talked only in Spanish. Then apologized and spoke in English. This is also the same guy who complained that at his apartment, if only he could gain access to the router so he and his buddies could open up the ports to increase the upload/download capacity of the Internet. Yeah, to have a LAN party with his nerd friends and link up with his friends in the U.S.

Then there were the girls who complained about everything. My goodness. And it wasn't just one topic. It was ALL of them. Sheesh. Didn't know things were so bad here. I bet if all the students chipped in a buck or two, we could happily buy your complainin' booty a ticket home. This one girl was the worst. The funny thing is, when I was talking to other people about it, everyone, even those not at the meeting, knew who I was talking about. Haha, goodness.

I had to leave early (although I was there for over an hour. And not all the students were negative. Some said positive things and constructive criticism) to head out for my cooking class! I missed out on the free food :(

The cooking class was a lot of fun. It was mostly in Spanish, but very informative and cool. We got a recipe handout, too. It's in Spanish as well, so while I took some notes, Carrie, you'll have to translate for me. We made chupito de sopa (a cold tomato soup), tortilla de patatas (a Spanish omellete. Made with potatoes, eggs, and onions. Very good), pan con tomate (basically slices of bread with tomato and other things rubbed on. They love it and are very proud of this basic dish), paella de marisco (a popular dish that I'll talk about more below), and crema catalana. You'd love that last one, Dad. Basically crème brûlée (copy and pasted that from the Internet to look cool). I got to burn some of the sugar. Oh yeah!

And as for Paella (Pie-eh-ya is how it sounds, at least to me), it is a famous, popular dish of Spain. It actually gets its name from the paella pan, a special cooking pan that has small holes in it. I didn't take a camera, so here's a photo I jacked from the Internet. It has rice, seafood, tomatoes, meat, whatever really, in it. Very tasty.

I had my first Spanish test today. Not as easy as I'd like, but I think I did all right. Worth noting, at least I like pointing it out, but some people in my class, Spanish 102, have taken the language all four years of high school and at least a semester or two in college. Sheesh! I've only had 2 terrible years my freshman and sophomore years of high school. I'm happy with how I'm doing though.

And finally, tomorrow I'm walking around with my camera. October 12th commemorates Hispanity Day (Dia de la Hispanidad): the day that Columbus discovered America in 1492. It's a bank holiday, so all the stores will be closed. However, because I'm in Catalonia, everything's controversial. Here's a copy of what the dean of IES sent to us.

This celebration is very controversial here in Spain and there will be
patriotic displays in many cities. There could also be some demonstrations
in Barcelona and other cities in Spain with all kind of political
connotations such as independence groups or left and right radical political
parties.

We urge you to be careful with these kinds of celebrations and
demonstrations in the streets and try to avoid them as there could also be
disturbances.

Apparently there's been some trouble up in the Basque area lately, too. I'll have more information on that when I get back from my trip to there (in November), but basically, that's an area of Spain similar to Catalonia. They have their own language and culture and some wish to be their own country. There's even a terrorist group up there called ETA that set off a bomb the other day. Apparently Spain arrested some party leaders or something. Angered the extremists.

Anyway, so that should be interesting. Have a great day!

Funny Spaniards

Hey everyone.

I'm currently writing this post at the IES computer center. It's a little harder because the Internet is set to Spanish, and the keyboard is Spanish as well. Some of the keys are just in different locations. The Internet also kinda sucks. In fact, it borders on terrible. But oh well. I'll give the Europeans a break.

I thought I'd write this post now, between classes, because I won't have time tonight. I have a cooking class that goes until 10pm and then a Spanish midterm that I must study for. I'm feeling pretty good about that, though.

And speaking of Spanish class, I don't know if I mentioned it before, but the Spaniards are, um, not as politcally correct or sensitive as we are in the U.S. Several times now, the Japanese have come up in Spanish class. An example the teacher used was, "No puedo hablar Japonés" (I can't speak Japanese). As she did that, she stretched out her eyes, making them "slanted." We thought it was hilarious, yet terrible. It's happened a couple times in that class. ("No entiendo Japonés. ching cha chi chang." "I don't understand Japanese." So bad...)

Also, in one class, we're talking about the history of Spain and when the Muslims and Jews were here in the Iberian peninsula. He asked, "Do we have any Jews in here?" Not really politically incorrrect, but still...

Also, according to my Spanish teacher, Americans tend to dive into their homework without reading the instructions. Thought that was interesting.

And lastly, I have a funny story that I didn't share about my intercambio. I was talking to my guy and he noticed I couldn't roll my Rs (in an intercambio, you're suppose to correct and help one another. It's great). He asked me to say duck. So I said pato. He said, no no, duck. So I said pato. There was some slight confusion, and then he spelled out d-o-g. Oooohhhh. Dog. That was a tough one for him. Which, oddly enough, dog in Spanish, perro, is tough for me to say.

And an odd shirt that I saw the other day on a blonde girl I'd put at 16.

I'm Lost. Please Take Me Home With You.

Yeah... I don't think I'd let my daughter wear that.

Intercambio Lingüistico

I signed up for an intercambio lingüistico, linguistic exchange, and tonight was my first meeting. My housemates and I met up with our RA who took us to meet to Spaniards. We ended up staying that this bar/restaurant for 2 hours, talking with them. The guy I talked to was named Mawrio. He was pretty cool and it was fun talking in Spanish, and then talking in English later on. Our next meeting is not this Friday, but the next.

I also signed up for a Spanish cooking class. It's tomorrow and I'm looking forward to it. I also have a Spanish midterm this week that I have to study for. Sorry for the short post. More tomorrow. Take care!

A Few More Oktoberfest Stories

Here are some other funny/interesting stories that I didn't include in my last post. Also, excuse it if it was poorly written. I was running on airport bench sleep. Although, it wasn't as bad as it might sound.

Anyway, when it comes to drinking beer, there are several ways to go about it. While some liked the Pound-Three-Beers-In-One-Hour approach (which, if you do the math, is equal to about 12 American beers), I preferred the Buy-One-And-Nurse-It-For-Two-Hours-To-Look-Cool approach. Much cheaper (I spent 8€ while others spent over 100€) and you don't feel awful the next day (or later that evening) like most of the other people did.

Here's a picture of me with the beer I bought (9:27am). My goodness, I need to take Picture Taking lessons.
And here I am at 10:24am (digital cameras embed the time pictures are taken).
So you can see the rate of consumption. Also, by this time we met up with more people, one of whom had a hat we all loved. Everyone got a picture of themselves with the hat on. You have to admit, it's pretty cool. Also, you can see by the sweatshirt I'm wearing how I may have jacked a stein or two.

Speaking of the sweatshirt, if you can't read it, it says ACE on it. At my school, there's this business honors type program that, now that I think about it, I've mentioned before in this blog (when I did the Correfoc). That thing's gotten some serious, hard loving. A bunch of us at Oktoberfest are in that program, and they thought it was hilarious that I was wearing it there (and during the fire run. They loved the burns in it). They made a video of me pretending to be hammered and telling the lady in charge of the program that I love her and the ACE program. It's pretty darn funny if you ask me. I'd post it on here if I could.

Ah, and one last Oktoberfest story. We were in the train station in Munich (not the ghetto one) and I wanted to find a bathroom. I had an hour to find one, so I set off. The underground station is HUGE, but I could not find a bathroom. There are NO signs. Sheesh. I walked and walked, and finally headed for the surface. I asked a hotel manager, but he said it was for guests only. I went into a restaurant, and gave that up right away. I then walked by another stripper joint and into a bar/club-type place. It was playing some pretty good music (Timbaland's Way I Are). I danced my way to the back and got in line. I talked to a German guy and he said that, yes, the bathrooms are hard to find down there. That made me feel better. At least I wasn't a moron.

Today in my ECON class we finished watching this movie from 1961 called One, Two, Three. It was about an American businessman living in Berlin. It was a comedy and I actually found it pretty interesting. We then discussed the political statements and stereotypes that were in the movie. I enjoy that class a lot. The only problem is, I don't think anyone else does. Practically all of them are taking it pass/fail (I can't with my school. And besides, that'd be a waste if I took all pass/fail classes). They all hate the class, too. Oh well.

I was going to go to the supermarcado, but it started raining. I have no food at the moment for lunches, so I'll have to go sometime today. Also, our señor left for a 10 day trip, but we don't think he left enough food for us. We're kinda confused. Some of us thought he said a lady was going to come to make us food, and some of us don't think that. We'll see, I suppose.

Ah, and my nose is stuffy again. I just might have to accept the fact that I'll be sick off and on for the next 3 months.

Oktoberfest

Wow.

Where the heck do I begin? I guess there's no way to say everything, although, probably by the end of this blog you'll think I have. To start out with, Munich is so nice. The air was crisp (a bit cooler) and clean. Smelled nice. The food was amazing and a lot cheaper than in Spain. The people were great too and I didn't feel like I was going to be pickpocketed everywhere I went. A lot of German's speak English, which is nice because I speak no German. It made me realize how much Spanish I do know. At least in Spain I can ask where things are, say excuse me when I bump into someone, or ask how much.

Friday started out super early. Didn't sleep too well and had to wake up super early to catch the Nitbus (night bus). I thought it got there at 5 (I swear that's what the Catalan website said) but it arrived at 5:30. Also worth mentioning, there were two clocks on the bus. The one above the driver was a minute faster than the one right below it. Hmmm....

Oh, and as I was waiting for the bus, this kid across the street in the park threw something into the air. I then realized it was a dead pigeon. I then realized that it was a wounded pigeon. I then realized that it was a perfectly healthy pigeon. He was picking up sleeping birds and tossing them. Mildy, mildly comical, but ooooookay.

I got to the airport with around 45 minutes until my flight takes off. I get my ticket, run through security, and get to my gate when they were half done with boarding. We sit on the runway for a long time, making me miss my connecting flight from Frankfurt to Munich. Oh well. I finally got there though and met up with the three ladies I was sharing a hotel with.

A cab would have been 60 €, so we got on the 40 min train that only cost 4.50€ each. We got to our hotel and checked in. We had to sneak one of the girls in because we only paid for 3 people (it was still almost $100 each. Hotels cost SO much during Oktoberfest. And they're all taken, as you'll soon see). Sneaking someone in isn't really that hard, and they don't seem to mind, actually. The massive amount of foot traffic doesn't raise any red flags for the reception people.

Here's one shot of our room
The four of us then walked around the area a bit and then headed over to where Oktoberfest was, over in Theresienwiese park (by the way, German words look the same. We tried going to a restaurant that I thought was on our street, but it was actually on a different really big S word street. I swear there was 1 letter difference in a 20 letter long word). It is a huge area. The atmosphere wasn't what I expected. It's kinda hard to write about this in a blog. I was not as pumped as others were for this weekend. I figured it's just be a bunch of drunk people. There were a bunch of drunk people, but tons of games, rides, food, some shows, etc. It had a Disney kinda feel to it at times, actually. There was even a special family area with rides and attractions for children.

Here's one picture to give you a feel for it. Just big.

And then, of course, there's the tents. I'm really not sure who started calling them tents.

Absolutely massive. So big. And there are probably around 10, but I could be way off. But that'd be my guess if I had to put money on it. We spent a lot of time in this one place called the Hofbräu Festzelt (or Hofbräu Haus for short, I guess. Shown above). I later learned it was the more popular, youthful one.

There were all kinds of cheers and chants. Well, there seemed to be about 3 though. The more popular one being
"Hhheeeeyyyy! Heeeyyy baby! [Huah-Huh] I wanna know, if you'll be my girl."
They just loved that, and it's stuck in my head BAD. There were also the standard "Da, da da da, Dah Dah. Da, da da da, Dah Dah." (if that captures it at all, I'm thrilled).

It's also crazy when thousands of people hold up their mugs and cheer at the same time. There was music, prosts (cheers), and beer everywhere (along with broken 1L mugs, or steins).
Speaking of steins, everyone wants one, but security is tight. Many people got caught trying to sneak them out (or just stumbling out with them). I however, managed to come away with three, so I'm very excited. They are big and heavy though. Goodness...

So Friday was fun just running into people and getting a feel of the area. Saturday we woke up early and I got in line with a friend. Saturday (the 2nd to last day of Oktoberfest) was big. So many people. The line was crazy. And once it started moving forward... Wow. Borderline crushed.

It was a lot of fun though. Ah, and we even rode this ride, although at night. It was the most unique looking one, and was a ton of fun. Chris, you woulda loved it. It was called High Energy and had some creepy German cartoon-ish voice talking and Michael Jackson/techno type music playing.

Man, so much went on, but it'd be a little ridiculous if I wrote about all the funny stuff. Hmm... Oh, one funny thing, I guess in Europe there's this stuff called snuff. I first ran into it on Friday night talking to a very, very drunk Aussie (who kept telling my friend and I that the Chargers and the Angles were going to win their respective sports' titles). As we were leaving, he offered us some snuff for the road. I told him it was okay and then he pulled out a tiny bottle. Inside had this.
I was like, um, no no no, that's okay. I'm good. As we walked away, however, my friend informed me that it's not cocaine. In Europe, it's this tobacco/minty thing. I've heard it described as crushed up Altoids that you sniff up your nose. I don't know why you 'd do that, but okay. I guess it "clears" your sinuses or something. I was later told more stories about drunk people (actually, they were all American women studying abroad) who thought they had done coke, only to be relieved the next day when their friends told them it was only sugar, um, stuff. Way to be, ladies.

So, Saturday night, the four of us didn't have a place to sleep (we could only get one night at our hotel). The other people we knew at Oktoberfest had already filled up their floor space. We knew this, though, and had planned on sleeping in the airport. Besides, I didn't want to spend $100 to sleep on a floor when I've got benches and an early morning flight anyway.

We had to wait for the first train for about an hour. Then we later realized we had to get off 2 stations from the airport because the train we were on branched off. Here's the station.

It was about 3am and around 50 degrees or less outside (it's an outdoor station with a waiting area that has some walls around it. You're basically outside). We had to wait for 72 minutes. Haha, it makes a good story though. We finally, finally, got to the airport and crashed on these benches. These wonderful benches.
And that's my summary of Oktoberfest. I had a journal type thing, but typing out all the stories would be a little unnecessary. I hope you enjoyed hearing about it. It was a lot of fun and nice to travel a bit. If you have any other questions and stuff, I can write some more on my next post. I'm hungry. I'm going to have a bowl of cereal.

The Scary Lady Picture

Last night, at dinner, the other housemate that knows about the same amount of Spanish as I do was gone. Therefore, even more Spanish, at a torrid pace, was spoken. I learned one thing from that expereince. Jokes in Spanish are not funny.

Then, for breakfast, the German guy came back (he's been gone for a while, but he's friends with my señor). It was just my señor, the German guy, and me, so German was spoken at the table. Goodness.

Then, tonight, at supper, both of my housemates were gone. However, it wasn't too bad. It's fun trying to communicate in my terrible Spanish. They really seem to appreciate it. I surprise them to from time to time (oh yeah, brought out the past tense of estar).

For the first time, it rained in Barcelona. There's been modest showers and some spitting before, but this was a healthy, steady rain. Unfortunately, it did not help with the smell of the city, haha.

It was also unfortunate because I did a lot of waking in it for nothing. I signed up for some intercambios, which is a program here where you meet up and talk with a Spaniard. The idea is to practice your Spanish. The meeting was tonight, so I walked to the IES building and tried to check in. I wasn't on the list. It turns out my RA told the IES lady she was going to set me up with one of her friends. I later found out she's doing the same thing for my housemate and emailed him this. I kinda wish she would have emailed me, haha.

And now onto the main point of my post. There's this scary painting that hangs (crookedly) outside our bathroom. Here's what it looks like with the flash
And without
I'm not sure if I can truly capture the creepiness of this picture in a blog, but I'll try. First of all, just look at it. I mean, what the heck? She's got huge, crazy hair. Pasty white. Giant forehead and long neck. And is she wearing feathers? Plus, whenever the hall way is dark and I open up the bathroom door a crack, I jump. All I see is the reflection of a face in the mirror. So darn creepy. Here's my attempt at taking a photo of it.

Okay, this post didn't turn out quite the way I planned, but just try to understand. Darn that creepy pale lady!

And yesterday I saw a white guy wearing a shirt that had a circle on it. Around the circle it said, "Northern Soul." In the middle of the circle was a clenched fist wearing a black glove.

That's all for now. My next post will come on Sunday when I get back from Munich. Enjoy the weekend!

Munich & Langosta

Well, today I printed out my airplane ticket and hotel reservation for Munich, Germany. I'm going up there early Friday and coming back in the afternoon on Sunday. I'll be traveling with 3 lady friends, so that should be interesting. It's the last weekend of Oktoberfest, which oddly enough goes from Sept. 22 - Oct. 7. An estimated 6 million people are expected to show up during these 3 weeks. Each year, the festival is kicked off when the mayor says the traditional words "O'zapft is!" (the barrel has been tapped). Oh Germans...

Apparently there's a TON of stuff to do and the area is huge. I'll be sure to bring back a full report on Sunday.

Oh, and to answer a question, the drinking age here, and it most of Europe I believe, is 18. You have to be that old to get into clubs, too. They don't card too often, though, unless you look young.

On another note, I take pride in the fact that I'm fairly daring when it comes to trying new foods. I'll basically try anything. I've especailly gotten that reputation at my homestay. When my housemates reach for the American brands and the good ol' fashion ham, I reach for the more Spanish stuff, like this:

I think I finally met my match.

When I purchased this langosta, the only thing I knew about it was it was some kinda seafood thing. In slices of meat. Man, it even sounds disgusting. I would basically describe it as slices of imitation crab. I went to make my sandwich for today and whipped this out. Opened it up... It smelled horrible. Oh. My. Goodness. I was terrified at lunch. I opened up the container that my sandwich was in and got nauseous from the smell. I forced myself to take a bite, and had to find the nearest trashcan. I did not throw up, but I had to spit it out. I just could not swallow it. In summary, that stuff's going in the trash.

In other news, my señor is going to be gone for the next 10 days. Tonight is his last night here. He's going off to another house of his on some beach. I'm sure I'll learn more tonight.

Shirt of the day, brought to you by my housemate:

"I * really like New Jersey"

The "*" is meant to stand for a star.

PicCell Wireless

Hey everyone!

Today I picked up my new cell phone. IES requires that we have a cell phone, and they teamed up with a company called PicCell Wireless. The rates are pretty decent, especially if you don't use it very often, haha. It's about ,09€ a minute to call other PicCell Wireless kids, and I believe ,39€ for other calls in Spain. I don't know the rates for roaming calls outside of Spain, but I'm not too worried about it. I don't see myself making too many calls from Denmark. It cost $19.95 to rent the phone.

As I said, I picked up a new cell phone because the previous one I had did not ring. For over a week (almost 2) I missed tons of calls. I figured I was just being stupid. Were the settings correct? And do cell phones really stop ringing? Apparently ones rented by Americans studying abroad do. The customer service was amazing though. I emailed them, and less than 1o minutes later I got an email saying there was a phone waiting for me to pick up. It works, and I'm happy.

Here's a picture of the phones. The one on the left is the new one.

Today in my Management Across Borders class (where we spend most days discussing the reading on how businesses are different in different countries, etc. You have to do the reading and be on your toes) we had a guest speaker. He spoke only Spanish, so our professor, who knows over 6 languages, would translate our questions and his responses. The speaker worked for Abbott, an American pharmaceutical company. We got to hear about cultural differences, etc. It was pretty entertaining.

And last night, while waiting at the metro stop to meet some friends from up the road, I saw this shirt:

I'M
WITH UN..INC
--->

The arrow is meant to represent a cartoon arm pointing to the wearer's left. I'm not sure what to make of it. In the U.S., that shirt would probably say "I'm with stupid." I'm not sure what "un..inc" is suppose to be. A company?

Kike the club promoter

It's high time I share the tale of Kike with all of you (pronounced key-kay). Most of my information on him is based on what I've read and heard, so it's not the best information, however I think it is good enough to get the point across.

He used to be an RA for IES students in Barcelona. He then got into the club promoting business and last year he quit being an RA and started doing it full time. Here's how it works. He has a Facebook profile and uses Facebook to organize and share events (Facebook is similar to MySpace. A networking type website). If one befriends Kike, he'll send you invites to clubs and bars. You reply that you'll be attending and he'll put you on his list. When you get to the club, you tell the bouncers you're on Kike's list and they let you in for no cover charge.

He makes about 2€ a head. The club likes it because he gets a bunch of Americans into the club, together, where they will probably on average buy 2 drinks a night. At over 10€ a drink, one can see where the club comes out ahead. I like it because I get into clubs for free, and then, pssh, forget purchasing drinks.

One night, at a club, I told a few friends that I thought it'd be cool to one day open up my own club. Some bumpin' place in New York or something. I then thought about it, and 20 minutes later I came to the conclusion that this business is not for me. It's way to sketchy, shady, and dirty. I've come to see club promoters, owners, and bouncers to be like drug dealers or the mafia. They're your best friend when times are good, but when you run out of money, they're gone.

Here are some pictures of Kike I got off of Facebook. As you can see, he's kinda a sketchy looking guy (I've heard a few stories about ladies not liking him particularly...)
Except these ladies, I guess.Oh yeah, he's ssooo cool.

Kike was the original, but now there's a couple other club promoters on Facebook (there's even an IES student who's attempting to get into the business). All competing for us Americans. It's pretty sweet because, as I said, there's an option almost every night for us. It's going to be sad when I go visit other places and have to actually pay to get into clubs. Oh well.

Classes are going well. They're very, very interesting. I am really enjoying my art class and my economics class. At the moment we're learning about post-WWII Europe, and it's cool to learn how the EU came about.

My señor just came into the living room where my 2 housemates and I are at. He was trying to ask something about a program that cleans disks. We thought he meant CDs at first, and I said Windows will do it. However, I guess he was talking about his HDD, and I think he gave up trying to get help from us. I would try to help more, but goodness, I don't want to bother with the language barrier.

And today marks the start of my 5th week here in Spain. It's been a lot of fun and I've learned/experienced quite a bit. I'm really glad I decided to do this. That said, here's a short list of some things that I miss:

1. My nuclear family. Those webcam conversations are great!
   
2. Michelle, mi novia
   
3. The rest of my family. It's been so long since I've seen you guys! Thanks so much for the comments! Perhaps next summer I can go back or something.
   
4. American air. While I'm getting used to the air here, this city still kinda smells
5. Cheeseburgers, steaks, potatoes, good milk, free water, fried chicken, and much more. I'm abstaining from eating at American restaurants. It will be all that much better when I get home.
   
6. College football
7. NFL
8. Good quality Internet
9. English
10. House M.D. on FOX

I think that's about it. Have a great week, everyone.

And here's the random shirt of the day. The text on it was all upside down:

Reminder: Buy More Beer

I really don't think the Spaniards need to be reminded to do this...