Barcelona

My trip to Barcelona rocked so hard that I have been recovering for two days. I cancelled my Tuesday classes and took off for Spain on Saturday. On the train from Montpellier to Barcelona I encountered my first truly UGLY AMERICAN since I have been back to Europe. His name was Randy and he was from California. He proceeded to question every North American looking person on the train as to their origin and formed a little American clique that I hate to say I was a part of for a brief time. Randy (what an awful name) only knew how to use a drunk ‘outside’ voice and proceeded to insult French culture for three hours at top volume. As he would (very loudly) as my opinion on this or that I could only reply in a proper ‘indoor’ voice and hope to god the train would go faster. When we arrived in Barcelona Randy screamingly demanded the origin of some Americans in the metro in front of a platform full of Spaniards. To the reply that they were Alaskan he hollered “That is almost American.” I hoped for one of them to push him on the tracks.

The two other cool American dudes and I agreed to ditch the UGAM, as we called him from then on, and head out on our own. We got into our hostels at midnight and headed to the nearest pizza joint for a slice and a European-style 40 oz. bottle of beer. I was in heaven. The three of us proceeded to party hard till 5 o’clock in the morning. We mostly drank at the hostel as beers were only 2.50 euro for a liter. We skipped around to other bars in the area but ended up on the internet at like 4 in the morning drunk emailing... never a good idea.

Sunday we headed up to check out Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia, a massive church in the middle of the city. We climbed the towers and tripped out on all the cool architecture. They have been building his original plan for over a hundred years and still aren’t finished. The church mixes like 10 different kinds of architecture and uses methods of measurement that Guadi invented. That guy had serious inspiration.
After some time we headed up to Park Guell and looked at Gaudi’s house, his mosaic lizards, and rock sculptures. There is a great view of Barcelona and the ocean from up there. Sunday night we proceeded to get wasted yet again in the hostel. I met a bunch of cool travelers from all over the world and played cards and pool. This was much more interesting than going to some loud dance club, especially since I was looking more like a tomboy than a pretty girl. I got so drunk at one point that I refused to speak English and the only people who could understand my French were the Belgians. To my delight they said I spoke the best french they ever heard an American speak. Oh la la.

Monday we rented sweet-ass Schwinn beach cruisers and rode around Barcelona a few hours. We rode along the beach and around the ports, around some parks and back up to Las Ramblas. The water was so blue it reminded me of home. I wanted to strip off my clothes and run into the water, but it was only 13 degrees Celcius.

What do you think we did Monday night? That’s right, got totally wasted in the hostel bar. After all that cultural crap one must conserve funds. I woke up in at 7am and had to go back to my room, get my bag, and head to the station for my 8:45 train. I forgot my freakin towel.

So all and all Barcelona was superb. It was great to be around travelers and people who are open to meet people. I traveled alone, but wasn’t by myself for long. I never felt threatened and was always laughin. My homey Matt from Seattle walked me back and forth to my hostel so many times I gotta just say thanks dude.

Gotta stay local for the next few weekends. Next month I have to entertain myself for two weeks over Christmas and New Years. Might go to Nice with some Aussie chicks for New Years. That would ROCK!

Shout out to Jimmy from OZ... you rock!

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