Relaxing day of travel

I'm testing my new blogger app from rdu during the most relaxing Thursday I have had in a while. I feel at home next to all the Raleigh signs! I bought some pretty sweet hiking sandals for the trip (kids price of course), and it's only reinforcing people's impression that I'm 12 years old. I'm rolling with it. Flight was supposed to leave five minute ago and I am still in the terminal, but the delay gave me the perfect opportunity to charge my phone. Best ever charge!

Barca

Please forgive my month long blog absence. IM BACK!

Trey and I met up for NCSU's spring break in Barcelona, Spain! We had made it ten weeks without seeing each other and just couldnt bear another minute. We booked flights to arrive within a half an hour of each other, but no one could predict the flight delays. I arrived around 9:20am (Trey was supposed to arrive at 9:00am) and couldnt stop smiling for an entire hour while I looked through the terminal, baggage claim, and then the visitor waiting area for him. I was beginning to get worried, I had been on a plane for the past 12 hours and wasnt sure what had happened. I went up to the ticket counter upstairs and asked about his flight.... DELAYED until 1:00pm. Oh my goodness what was I going to do for three more hours. You may say 10 weeks, 3 hours... I think you can make it, but I was literally about to die with anticipation.

I chose to go to the convenience store (definitely not as cheap as 7-11s in Thailand) and pick up a bag of mini oreos, a bar of chocolate and almonds, and a gigantic water. (I ate ALL of this within thirty minutes) I call it stress eating. I chose to position myself just outside the red-tape (the line that visitors arent supposed to cross) on the right side of the baggage claim door. I had a front row seat for all the excitement. At first it was really sweet, women and men (some families) would come out of baggage claim, someone would spot the relative or significant other, and then it was who could run faster. The girls would go straight for the kiss, the boys would go for the hug. I thought it would pass the time by quickly, but there were so many, and they just kept coming that I never got a break to read my book (I had been on this page since "Ladies and gentlemen, we are about to begin our descent into Barcelona"). After a while of this I was already exhausted, I was so incredibly jealous of the hugs and kisses, jealous of the reuniting loved ones. His flight number was 152. I remember it vividly because every 30 (probably every 10) minutes I would get up and go check the board to see if the arrival time had changed. When 1:00pm came around, I started paying attention to people's bag tags. Sure enough, 152, same as Trey. I knew he didnt check a bag, so I expected him out near the front of the line. Little did I know that this (silly) boy sat in baggage claim trying to get a signal so he could email me to see where I was. Then I saw him (nearly an HOUR later) come out of baggage claim and turn left. HE TURNED LEFT?! Who turns left? Anyways, I bent down and grabbed all of my stuff (a rolling suitcase, a bookbag, a book, and the water bottle) and started trucking it across the floor of the airport. He must have seen or heard me coming, because he was running when I next saw him (I had plenty of time to plan out this encounter in my mind). I dropped all of my stuff about 5 feet in front of him and just reached. Wow, it was probably the best and worst hug ever. Best because I hadnt seem him in forever... Worst because I was shaking from excitement, nervousness, sugar overload, you name it. We grabbed our stuff, and each other, and went to find a taxi to get to the hotel.

We were walking around trying to figure out what to do to get a taxi when a man approached us. I wasnt very brushed up on my spanish, and I thought he was asking us where to find a taxi, when in fact he was trying to get us to go with him in his taxi. No thank you! We both realized that we didnt want to get mixed up with this guy. We found the taxi stand a floor below us, and headed off to Hotel Zenit (pronounced THenit, I think. Ask Trey cause I dont know). He took us there for 30 euros. I thought we were getting a steal until I realized it wasnt 30 baht. it was 30 euros, big conversion difference. We checked and went up to our 4th floor room. The room was so small, but yet still workable. We had luggage everywhere, but it worked out quite nicely. We were both pretty exhausted, but we decided to take a walk around the city anyways. We walked for an hour or so, then headed back to the hotel to make plans for dinner. The concierge suggested El Moncho's. It was just down the street a bit and supposed to be really good.

We arrived at El Moncho's and were immediately confronted with choices. Buffet or a la carte. We both didnt think we were that hungry, and I wanted to know what we were ordering, so we went with a la carte and a table close to the door. The menu showed choices on the left (we got a menu in english) and then portion sizes on the right. This is a concept that was foreign to me... portion sizes? We quickly figured out that a small portion (or ration) is an appetizer. Good to know. I think it was a lot to handle at first. Everyone was speaking to us in spanish (which we didnt know that much of), we had so many options to choose from and didnt know where to start, we were jetlagged, we were tired... the list goes on. We picked a few of the of the tapas (or appetizers). Patatas bravas (mmm), grilled shrimp in butter sauce (mmm), spanish omelette (ehhh), and some fried cheese ham things (ehhh). The beginning of the meal started with free potato chips (looked like they came from the bottom of the bag) and green olives (ewww). I thought it was very weird, but we got green olives before every single sit down meal we had.  We never got used to eating them... just seeing them. We finished off half a bottle of red wine and then called it quits for the night, we were soo jet lagged.

The next day we got up and to the bus stop by 9am. We planned on catching one of those double decker bus tours that our hotel recommended but it didnt start running until 10am, so we went to grab breakfast at a local cafe. There are cafes everywhere in Barcelona! I mean there are probably four on every block! They all look the same to me, and they all serve delicious pastries! Oh, I love the pastries! I ordered an espresso and T ordered a cappuccino. His turned out much better than mine because it was bigger. I just wanted a big one! This seemed to be a problem throughout the whole trip. I didnt see a plain coffee or cafe on the menu, so I thought espresso might be their form of coffee. Yeah, coffee in a shot glass. We sipped our caffeine and went back out to the bus stop. 29 Euros for two days on the bus, we thought it was a good deal, so we joined. The bus was complete with headphones and an english information channel at each seat. We tuned in to hear random bits of information about what we were driving by. I would say that it was a great way to spend the first two days! You can see the top of the bus and a neat fountain in the picture to the left.

I was beginning to realize just how much I was not used to cold weather. Bangkok posts degrees above 80 every day, and I thought we were below freezing in Barca. Really, we were probably like 40-50 degrees, but it felt soo cold to me. I had recycled my airplane blanket as an effective scarf (who says Im not resourceful) which gave me a bit of warmth. Also, I couldnt have done it without T bringing me a few goodies from home (jeans, a jacket, girl scout cookies from mom). Each of those served to keep me warm during the week by adding extra layers to me. We decided to hop off at La Rambla (a famous street in Barca, everyone says you JUST HAVE to go there). We began walking around and warming up our hands. Cute story: Trey would reach for my hand as we were walking around the city, he was good at keeping his hands in his pockets, but I wasnt. He would reach for mine and grab it. Then he would say 'cold bunches!' Within 30 seconds he would drop my hand and put his back into his pockets! lol, I thought it was really funny, and i didnt start catching on to him doing this until the 3 or 4 day.

Here is a picture of the "face of barcelona." It was a great landmark on a map when we needed to orient ourselves. This was when we noticed that barcelona is full of art. Everything is artistic. Really, everything doesnt have to have a purpose (and it doesnt even have to be pretty), it just has to be art. Light poles, benches, bridges, subway stations, buildings... everything has an artistic value. It was completely overwhelming for a while, then it was comforting. By the end of the week I began to question the purpose of it all. It seems like an inefficient use of money. Unless someone could prove that people in barcelona were happier than people in a city without random art. Do you think that is feasible? Do you think it makes the people happier than people in another city? I dont know, but I would sure like to know the answer.

art? Giant lobster. And palm trees. You can see the face of barcelona in the background.

Columbus monument. He is pointing, but not to the new world directly (according to the random trivia on the double decker bus which you can see in the lower left hand corner). The colombus monument marks the start of La Rambla. We started walking up it.

We stopped to eat about halfway up, and it was quite an experience!

Here is Trey eating his frankfurt baguette. haha, he wanted to order the one that sounded most like turkey, but they informed him that they only had one meat per day, and today was frankfurt. He agreed. They came out with a hot dog on a bun. I thought it was really funny.

I was tired of walking in the cold, so I ordered "hot (thick) chocolate" from the menu. I didnt know that my hot chocolate was going to be a melted hersheys bar, and I swear it was THAT thick. I had to eat it with a spoon, and luckily Trey was there to help me, although I didnt put down the spoon long enough for him to get much. He used his fork to eat it. It was delicious, but I couldnt help but think how horribly fattening it must have been... it was just a cup of melted chocolate!

Pictured above was my lunch, a bikini! Just a plain ham and cheese sandwich, the bikini seemed to be the national meal of Spain. We saw them everywhere we went! I was satisfied that I was finally getting to eat cheese at every meal, and the ham was okay too. My mouth is almost watering looking at it now.

After the meal, we continued down La Rambla (here is a picture looking down the street from the subway station). There were distinct sections of the road, a flower boutique section, a people dressed as statues section, a section full of HOLA! tourist shops, and a section full of outdoor restaurants full of people having their morning beers. The street was gorgeous, just like all streets in barcelona, with building eye-candy everywhere. There was always something to look at while walking around.

 We continued into the Placa de Cataluyna (sp?), one of the most famous placas in Barcelona. Here was a set of steps in front of a fountain. definitely art.

Here is another picture of the placa with pigeons! Trey was embarrassed that I wanted to run through them, but I did. Adults chase pigeons too! We also picked up a bottle of water here because we couldnt find anywhere to get water. I have been spoiled with water being everywhere in Thailand and with the constant 7-11s, but Spain doesnt work like Thailand. We had to grab water when we could find it.

bahahahah! Did I mention we were jet-lagged?

We got off at Monjuic, a park on a mountain, and climbed the stairs to the top where the MNAC (National Museum of Catalan Art) sits. In this picture you can see the wonderful view from our seat on the steps, the gorgeous statues, or art, placed around the site, and the awesome guitar player who entertained us as we snuggled away from the cold.

We walked into the MNAC just before it closed and snapped a few pics. Hey dad, how would you like to play this organ? The buildings here are fantastic on the inside and outside!

This is a park right outside the 1992 Barcelona Olympics Stadium. In the background you can see the sculpture donated for the olympics (as a model of the olympic flame). We are still on Monjuic now, so the skyline is visible in the background too. Oh yea, and Trey is in the foreground. He's awake now!

Here is the 1992 Olympics stadium. Holds 55,000 people. Carter Finley (NCSUs stadium) also holds 55,000 people.

I prefer the Red and White of NC State, personally.

The next day we hit up La Sagrada Familia! A famous architect, Gaudi, is from Barcelona, and you can see his influence throughout the entire city. The cathedral pictured above was his capstone work, and he died long before today, so he never got to see it completed. He did, however, leave meticulous designs and paperwork on how the cathedral should look. As you can see, it is still under construction today and will be for about 20 more years making it a 200+ year construction project. Trey's major is construction engineering, and he was like a kid in a candy store the entire time. We paid the student price, because T was smart enough to bring his NCSU ID, and we got walking guides (headsets) to explain the cathedral to us. The walking tour was one of the best purchases ever (we really enjoyed hearing about the history and meaning of it all). I think this was both of our favorite places in Barcelona. I wouldnt mind going back when it is all finished.

I wont give you the whole lesson, but here is the crucifixion facade on the cathedral. There are about 10 scenes across the front of the facade that tell the story of Jesus' death. You can see him hanging on the cross under the point of the facade. Gaudi intended for this work to be "bony" and cold, and I can say that he succeeded. The detail was fabulous, we sat in front of the church for 20 minutes before going in to check out all the work. The towers that you can see above are to symbolize the apostles who followed Jesus. They are going to build two more, one for Jesus and one for Mary. The one for Jesus will be the highest, but not taller than Monjuic, because Gaudi used nature as the first inspiration for his work. He had an interesting design scheme dealing with gravity and nature for his architecture.  Make sure you check out the gold Jesus on the bridge between the two middle towers. Ill show it to you in a minute.

We climbed one of the towers for a small fee and enjoyed the view from the top. My camera stopped working just after this (I was super sad), so we dont have many more pictures from the church. I think this is one of our best pictures from Barca, even if the background is really bright. Im wearing the toboggan I bought on La Rambla to cover my head and ears from the cold and the airplane blanket scarf.

Here is the gold Jesus as promised. He symbolizes Jesus as he ascended into heaven after the 40 days after his Resurrection. He was actually really big once you got up to see him, and he has a fantastic view of the city!

The next day we went to La Pedrera, an apartment building that Gaudi built, and pictured above is the terrace on the roof. He had a lot of interesting designs up here, and we enjoyed walking around it. We had slept in this morning and were getting a late start to the day, but luckily we had found full cups of cafe to wake us up!

I look like a man with no hair, but he still puts up with me!

A view of the streets from the top. Wow, I LOVED the streets of Barcelona. Give me a warm hand to hold, and I will be in heaven!

This is a small version of La Pedrera. Like I said, there is always something to look at in Barcelona.

We got to tour on of the apartments in the building, and I saw this wonderful doll house! Too bad I didnt have a doll house like this when I was growing up. Trey brought his phone to take pictures on this day, and he was taking pictures of everything! It was a running joke all day that he would take a picture of anything (like a bar of soap).

Such a majestic door. How is that for ART?! You can see a really neat building in the background. It looks almost like water flowing. I think it was one of Trey's favorite buildings in Barcelona!

La Pedrera!

Another really neat building called Casa Battlo. We didnt spend the money or wait in line to go into the building, because we were both pretty tired of looking at things for the time being. This is also another Gaudi creation.

Wonderful Spanish streets! ahhhh, I miss them!

Free kisses! haha!


We walked to the sea and to a mall on the pier to continue our tour. We ended up in a brickyard which reminded us of NCSU. The bricks were shaped conically around the trees, weird.
Guess they call that art?

We kept walking and made it to the Arc de Triomf. I thought the street light was really neat, too.

We went out that night and got some tapas at a local bar. Trey got a Moritz (a Spanish beer) and I got some red wine. This pretty much sums up our preferences for the rest of the trip. Earlier in the week, we went to a pizza place that was nearby, and we lucked out with such a great waiter. Trey called him Paco, but Im not convinced that was his real name. He helped us navigate through the menu and order a pizza, his recommendation. We also ordered a bottle of pink wine (vino rosado I think). That is one of my best memories with Trey, we sat and ate the pizza and drank the wine and had conversations like best friends. We werent under any time constraints or viewing each other through computer screens, we were really together again. Wow, I still think about that night and smile. It really is awesome to be in love with your best friend.

Here is one of the tapas we got, I think it was an empanadilla (but Im not sure). Oh it was really good. I really like flaky bread.  Who am I kidding, I really like BREAD!

After we left the bar we ended up heading toward a popular exchange student hangout called Chupitos. We randomly ran into two people that Trey went to high school with (how RANDOM is that) and tagged along with them for the rest of the night. It was really weird for me to be out and hear all exchange students around me speaking english. I was almost in a culture shock from the side conversations that I could listen to. We had a great time that night and really enjoyed seeing other people our age out at night.

The next day was St. Patricks Day, and we headed back to Monjuic when we woke up. This is a really neat sculpture on the hill. Trey tried to pick me up like this, but it didnt look as picturesque.

This was a neat building in the Spanish village of Poble Espanoyl on Montjuic. We visited an art museum on the way up the mountain and then hit up Poble Espanoyl for a look. We walked around for a bit, but the place was less like a museum and more like a collection of spanish shops. We were very interested in buying traditional spanish items, so we quickly found a place to eat.

We ordered chips and cheese dip and paella with fish. The chips were not crunchy as one would assume after ordering chips. They were wonderfully soft and addictively good. The cheese dip tasted like cream cheese which wasnt what I was looking for, but it was still very good. The paella was my spanish meal with rice (Ive been eating it almost every day since January). The fish was pretty good (Barcelona is on the beach), and the rice had a tiny cheesy flavor. There was a lot of rice to eat, and I think Trey was full by the end.

I got a glass of cava (the spanish equivalent of champagne, I think). We did go on a wine tour, but I read that cava is very popular in Spain, and Spain is known for their cava. We met a girl from Jersey later in the week who told us about a great cava place (she just had loads to say about cava), but we didnt get to try it out. This cava tasted much like champagne, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

After we finished eating, we finished up in Poble Espanoyl and continued walking around Montjuic.

Old Spanish men playing cards in the park. Awesome statue in the background. Just another Wednesday morning...

 Oh yeah we are cute.

I love this picture of us. Thats my hat with the tassel!

Our next stop was the Olympic Museum. We actually had a really great time at the museum, it talked about each of the different olympic sports and their important players. 

Did you know all of these were sporte? My favorite is "Skittles and Bowling," although "Pigeon breeding" is noteworthy.

Different Olympic torches. Trey and I came to the conclusion that these are the actual torches, not fakes. Pretty awesome!

The rest of the day was spent around Montjuic. We got a guided tour of MNAC and learned a bit of history about the art. We also learned some science of the art (like pulling paintings off of walls) which was a great way to tie me into listening. We headed back to the hotel and went out to an Irish bar to celebrate St. Pattys. We walked in and got blasted with smoke. The bar was so crowded that no one could hardly move, so we decided to ditch the place and hit up another. We ended up in a not so crowded bar where we got a beer on tap and had a great conversation. I could just sit and talk with this boy for hours.

We found this wonderful bakery just a block from our hotel! We had gone to another branch of El Moli Vell earlier in the week when we had a sweet craving. Trey bought a large loaf of bread, and we snacked on it for a few days after. This morning we picked so many things that the lady packaged them for us... I guess she thought we wouldnt be able to eat all of them right now, but we did!

This was my favorite. I dont know exactly what it was, but you can see the sugar flaking off of it. The dough was fantastic. I could have eaten a box of these!

We continued to walk around the city after breakfast.

If you are stunt riding a bicycle, you may cross now. lol!

From here we went to Picasso's museum, where this picture on the right was taken. I was just tall enough to stand in the arch, but there wasnt an inch to spare. Picasso's museum was interesting, but we were honestly all museumed out by this point.

So we went to the chocolate museum! It smelled delicious, and the entry ticket was a bar of chocolate. Many of the creations in the museum were outstanding! I was sooo full from El Moli Vell that I couldnt bear to even eat the entry ticket. Im not sure if Trey ate it or the maid did, but I never saw it again.

Chocolate awesomeness!

From there we went to the maritime museum. The stuff was pretty neat, but we were happy to make this our last museum in Barcelona! Here is a picture of a REALLY big ship they had. Im pretty savvy with propping up the camera on the rail.

That last step was a doozie!

We walked back to the hotel after our museum filled day and picked up a cheeseburger on the way. Trey got an egg on his and ended up having to eat it with a fork and knife because it was so messy.

We rested for a while and then went out for Trey's birthday (which was the next day). He was turning 21! Although it wasnt as eventful as a 21st birthday in NC, I would like to think that he still had a great time.

Here we are eating patatas bravas while celebrating his birthday. Patatas bravas are translated to mean spicy potatoes on english menus in Spain. They are a combination of fried and baked potatoes that literally melt in your mouth. Every single one of the potatoes is cooked to perfection! They put a (kind of) spicy sauce on the potatoes, and it is a delicious duo! We tried to get patatas bravas at every single place we could during the week. This was the best picture of them, thats why I waited so long to tell you about them!

Here is a picture of the bruschetta that we could get in Spain. Every single time it would come out looking like tomato jam on bread. I swear it was tomato jam, because there were NO chunks (which is really disappointing).

I got a great big cup of sangria (which was delicious, but very sugary). Trey drank beer, and we had fun chatting over our potato consumed meal (we got two more potato dishes unknowingly, since we couldnt read the menu).

I told our waiter that it was Trey's birthday, and when Trey went to the bathroom, he brought out cake and champagne for us! I didnt even ask him to do it, but I probably should have tried to do a cute-girlfriend-thing such as this. Luckily, he saved my tail! The cake was good, but pure, gooey chocolate on the inside. We hurried up to down the champagne so we could get to Chupitos in time for 12:00am!

Chupitos was a really fun place where we met many exchange students like Trey's friend earlier in the week. We spent an hour or so here, then we went to Opium which is a dance club on the beach. We had a great time dancing in Trey's birthday. The next morning was already off to a rough start.

When we got moving on our last day in Barcelona, we made it out to the beach. This was a giant jungle gym made of stretchy rope. very bouncy! It was a lot of fun to play on for just a couple of minutes. Balancing was actually really hard, and it was cold outside!

We made it over to the giant fish on the beach! Trey is wearing my scarf and trying to be european...

We found an Audi stunt course further down the beach. Can you see that the back left wheel of the vehicle is off the ground? It had a crazy re-balancing mechanism! We would have stayed to watch longer but we thought it was about to rain.

We headed toward Monjuic for the third time this week to catch the fountain display at 7:30pm. We stopped to pick up a snack at a local restaurant (the first one we came to because we had to potty). We ate a quick bite of pizza and a coke before we headed off to the fountains. I thought it was funny that cokes always came with a lemon slice and a short glass. I tried it, and the lemon doesnt make much difference.

Then we headed off to the fountains to see the show. We found a cozy spot on the steps and got comfortable. The fountains started spitting out water and Trey said "Wouldnt it be awesome if they put this to music." Less than 30 seconds later, music was blasting! It was soo loud, but we were just getting a kick out of what Trey said.

Here is a picture of us in front of the fountain. MNAC is in the background, it is quite an impressive building, especially at night! The fountain works were awesome, set to light and music. It was quite a masterpiece, and a must see in barcelona!

There is MNAC in the background. The fountains lined the walkway (you can see them on the right) all the way up to the main fountain which looks pink in this picture. We stayed for one fountain show. We had tickets to go see Manuel Carrasco in concert! The concert was Trey's idea, and it was very entertaining!

The building was incredibly beautiful on the inside. We were seated on the second row of the top level (great seats). Although the lyrics were in Spanish, we could make out some of the words. I really enjoyed the crowd, they were like a choir for Manuel. He could stop singing and they would finish the entire song for him, better than I have ever experienced during a concert!

This was our last night in Barcelona, and we stopped for Japanese on the way home. We were really bummed that we had to get up and leave the next morning. We woke up in time to pack and make it to the airport, but Trey's flight was delayed and mine didnt take off until 3pm, so we were able to get a few extra hours in with each other during this time. It was a really hard time for both of us, but I dont think it really hit me until I got back in my Bangkok room. I wouldnt have traded a second during the week, and I couldnt have asked for a better vacation with my best friend.