Viva Barca!

Bon Soir! It's been a while since I've posted. We got back from Barcelona on Wednesday morning and I had a ton of school work to power through before we left again Friday. I had two tests and two homeworks due on Friday, a blunt reminder that I am in fact studying abroad. But enough about that... I know what you all want to hear. Since I've got two weekends to catch everyone up on, I'll split them into 2 entries. Enter Barcelona, Spain, stage left.

Friday, June 1 (Trains on Trains): After a productive week at GTL, it was once again time to set sail for an adventurous weekend. It was our second longest weekend of the summer, and what better place to spend four days than Barcelona. Plus we got to add another notch in our belt for number of countries. I think we are at 4 now. After class, Jeff and I raced to Cora (French Walmart) to get some much needed supplies before we left for the weekend. It's starting to get pretty warm here and our dorm does not have air conditioning. I'm pretty sure the idea of climate control hasn't quite made it across the pond yet. So, we each bought a fan which has already made a tremendous difference. We also got a Brita pitcher, after hearing that drinking the tap water wasn't such a good idea. Once we got back to the room, we packed our bags and got ready to head to the train station. We made it to the bus station and the next one wasn't coming for another 40 minutes so we decided to just walk downtown. With our packs filled to the brim with travel neccessitites and 3 bottles of wine, it took us about 45 minutes to make the trek. Our train left at around 8 pm, I believe. Almost every GTL student was on our train. Spain and Italy are probably the two longest train rides so most people alot the two longest weekends for those trips. We got a couchette, again, for hour 13 hour journey. Jeff and I shared a room with two other GTL students and a lonely Frenchman who went straight to sleep. We made a little couch out of our beds, shared a bottle of wine, and then hit the hay to recharge for the day ahead. zzzzzzzzz

(Here's what the couchettes look like for your reference.)

Saturday, June 2 (Primavera): I slept like a baby. We woke up just in time for our connection in Port Bou, the first train stop after you cross the French border into Spain. Little did we know, French and Spanish train tracks have different widths, so we had to stop right before we crossed the border to widen the wheels on the train. It took a bit longer that expected so we arrived at our connection late. As GTL students poured off the train, everyone was panic stricken, including myself, because we missed our next train to Barcelona. Jeff kept his Jeff cool and got me to relax and just kinda hang around and figure out what to do. Other panickers quickly made their way to the ticket line to "deal" with our dilemma. After yelling English at some poor Spanish ticket attendant for a few minutes, Pushy Girls 1 and 2 figured everything out and made an announcement that everyone needed to go to platform 2, where a small, slow, regional train was leaving shortly. We hung back as the herd faithfully followed their new leader, sort of like those little alien guys at Pizza Planet in Toy Story. One of the GTL students speaks English as his second language, Spanish as his first. We waited for him to talk to the attendant, as his linguistic skills seemed a little bit more reliable than Pushy Girl 2. Our train that we had reservations for had, in fact, also been delayed. Right as we were delivered the news, it pulled up at the station. We hopped on, proud of ourselves, and made the last leg of the trip into Barcelona. Aside from a stubborn man from Ghana in our seats on the last train, the trip there was great. As we cruised into the metropolis, there were gorgeous views of the Spanish coastline. Here's a couple photos.

Once we got into the city, we bought a 10 trip metro pass for the weekend and made our way to the hostel. We stayed at the Center Ramblas hostel right off the main, kind of touristy, road, Las Ramblas avenue. After we checked in, we went upstairs to our 8 person room and met our roommates: 2 Turkish fellows, 2 Argentinians, and a 21 year old Mexican traveler. We locked up our bags, gathered up a few things and set off for the main attraction, Primavera Sound Festival. I had known about it through music surfing on the internet, and when Jeff and I were looking through festivals in Europe this summer, the Primavera dates aligned exactly with our Barcelona trip. Too perfect. We wandered down to the port where the festival was held, right on the ocean, and exchanged our printed tickets for wrist bands and a little ID card guy. They wouldn't let people in until 5 so we went and found a little super market (spelled "SUPER MERCAT" in Spain) and bought a small loaf of bread, some ham and cheese, and a 6 pack of San Miguel. Very appropriate as San Miguel was the sponsor of the festival. We found a big grassy area near the water and had a little picnic before we hit the music. 

(Looks like an ad doesn't it. I left my camera in the room and Jeff had his which was "adventure proof" so most of my photography was done on my iPhone and later enhanced with Instagram. Made for some pretty cool shots.)

After lunch, we finished up our beers and went straight to the entrance. After exhausting a hearty portion of my life waiting in lines at Bonnaroo, I was expecting to be in line for a while to get in. Not even close. We walked straight through security to find, what seemed to me, like an empty venue. I though maybe we had come on the wrong day. More people came as the night went on, but it was pretty empty for the first few shows. We could just sit down, right in front of the stage, have a San Miguel, then just stand up when the band came on. We wandered around a bit, scoping out all the stages and planning our night, and then set in to hear some cool tunes over the babble of the ocean. I'll try and do the pictures in chronological order with captions. Here it goes. 

(Crossing the streets of Barcelona is no easy feat.)

(Walking in to the festival. Red Bull brought their bus equipped with a stage on top.)

(Couldn't believe this after 4 years of fighting hoards of people at Bonnaroo.)

(View from the Pitchfork stage.)

(Tanks of San Miguel, ready for us to drink them.)

(Taking it all in.)

(Saw some cool Spanish band while we waited for Sandro Perri. Everyone had these hats you can see two people wearing. Some Smints reps were handing them out as you came through the entrance.)

(Sandro Perri. Very jazzy guitar with a small dash of jamminitout, a very rare spice found only on the coast of Spain. One of my favorites that I have on vinyl. The highlight was "Changes".  I took a video but its not even worth posting.)

(Cruised around for a little bit before Atlas Sound. Saw Sleepy Sun and had a little beer break. Still can't get over how awesome the venue was.)

(Stopped by to see old Bradford perfom some of his crunchiest tunes. He played a lot from Logos, which is my favorite Atlas Sound album. "Walkabout", "Shelia", just to name a few.)

(Real Estate. Definitely the highlight of our night. I just saw them not too long ago in Athens... How can I say this the most condescendingly... Yes, they were much better in Barcelona. I was soaked in sweat afterwards from all the dancing. It's hard to beat a great festival anyways, but look how close we were! 

(Saw Yo La Tengo. In my opinion, one of the best trios of all time. Again, much better in Barcelona. But really, their setlist was much better than when Jake and I saw them in Atlanta last January. Heard "Tom Courtenay", "Stockholm Syndrome", "Mr. Tough", "Autumn Sweater", "Here to Fall", "Sugarcube", and a bunch more.)

Yo La Tengo finished up around 2:15. Exhausted from a day of traveling and festivaling, Jeff and I decided there was no way we could make it through Washed Out and Justice at 3 in the morning. We ambled back to our hostel, and quite literally fell asleep. Looking back, it was definitely one of those life moments. This whole European experience has been one big one, but to see some of my favorite bands at arguably the coolest festival in the world was beyond incredible. Nevertheless, there will always be a special place in my heart for Manchester, TN. Shout out to all my homies in Coffee County this weekend. Drink plenty of water!

Sunday, June 3 (Absinthe): After enjoying the complimentary breakfast of Coa Coa Pebbles at our hostel, we made our into the city to explore. We hopped on the metro and got off near the beach. We walked a ways down through some fishing ports and onto the sand. I'll comment here that everyone in Barcelona is trying to sell you something. Immigrants wander the streets and beaches selling single beers for 1 euro, not to mention other unmentionables. After we shooed away a couple, we kicked off our sandals and wandered down the beach, diverting our eyes from topless women. The water was cold but refreshing and very clear. After we covered a good chunk of distance, we went back to streets to continue our adventure. We didn't see much, just sort of wandered until we found a metro stop. We got off at Las Ramblas and stopped in an interesting looking bar, Wild Turkey Tavern, near our hostel and had a happy hour Carlsberg. The bartender was a Swedish girl, who was just working for a few months in a town then picking up and moving on to the next. We watched some French Open, half a Rugby match (remember this for later), and then went back to Center Ramblas. Voila!

(Awesome sand sculpture.)

We made it back to the hostel and took a real siesta. Seriously, I've never been more tired than I was on Saturday night and that must have carried over to Sunday. Anyways, after our nap we got in touch with the Sigma Chis, who were staying in an apartment just down the road. We met up with them at a park where there was a mini arc de triomf and free concert. We went into a Super Mercat and bought a bottle of wine and some weird flavor of Lays potato chips for dinner. Gotta eat healthy. After we put away all of that, everyone needed to use the little boys room. We ventured across the street to a small chinese restaurant who would only let us tinkle if we bought something. I went ahead into the WC, while Jeff gave a good look over of their liquor selection. When I came out, Jeff had gotten everyone a small shot. You guessed it, Absinthe. It wasn't the real stuff that's illegal, just a very alcoholic liquor. I will say it was one of the worst tastes I could imagine. Think the burn of moonshine with a strong flavor of black licorice. We all laughed it off and headed back to the park to catch some more of the concert. After hanging around for a while, we all started to realize how inebriated we were. Well, we probably didn't fully realize it until we woke up the next morning in the basement of some guys house. Just kidding. But really, we were getting pretty sloppy. We decided we would go back to the Sigma Chi's apartment, check it out, rendezvous with the girls, and figure out a plan for the rest of the night. The apartment was awesome, just as you would imagine some European loft. We decided to go out and look for dinner and found a little square, littered with restaurants. I decided to go ahead and look at where we were on the map, just to go ahead and make sure we had a route to get back to the hostel. I would like to note again for scene setting: we had not anticipated the absinthe doing that much damage. I reached in Jeff backpack to pull out the map and it wasn't there. We immediately got in a yelling match about how he lost the 6 euro map and  now we were lost. Who won? No one. We probably looked like idiots in the middle of a populated square arguing over the map. But Jeff definitely won because I had that m#%& f#$Y% in my pocket the whole time, which I didn't discover until the next day when I got dressed. "Oh shit, Jeff. I found the map..." Anyways, we decided we had probably had too much to drink to sit down at a restaurant, so we hugged it out and ate a huge bucket of KFC near the hostel. CRUMBS EVERYWHERE. Here are pictures of all of the aforementioned events. 

(The whole gang. Me, Gleber, Andrew, Jeff, Danal, Hayden, Mike)

(Looks like we had fun.)

(Mike doing a cart wheel.)

(Asserting my dominance over Jeff by tickling him. This wrestling match was good-natured.) 

(The colonel would be proud.)

Monday, June 4 (Sunburn): We woke up a bit groggy as you could imagine, and headed downstairs to drive some nutrition into us. I think I had 23 cup of orange juice. We recovered quickly in true Phi Delta Theta fashion, and then I texted the Sigma Chis to make sure they weren't dead. They weren't and they just so happened to be on their way to the beach. We gathered some things, filled up Jeff's Camelback, and hit the road. We met the guys and three girls outside of a Super Mercat (pronounce it meer-cat, it's funnier that way), bought a 6 pack and a little pizza bread guy. We set up camp down the beach, shooing away salesmen trying to give us massages, beers, henna tattoos, and towels. We enjoyed the incredible weather, soaked in some sun, went for a swim, enjoyed some beers in moderation, and laughed at our previous night. Afterwards, we all sort of realized that we did not at all apply sunscreen in the appropriate amounts. Danal and Gleber got absolutely fried. I managed to escape with just a bad pair of raccoon eyes from wearing sunglasses all day. After we picked up all of our trash like good considerate Americans, we went back to their apartment to rinse of before going out to the market and getting a real Spanish dinner. 

We got changed (everyone but me because I only brought 3 shirts) and went to the open air food market right off of Las Ramblas. It was stand after stand of fruits, fish, meat, spices, and other assorted produce, all of their aromas wrapped around each other to create a smell of Spanish culture. I couldn't let myself leave without getting something. Gleber and I tossed some change to a lady who easily had over 15 types of olives. She filled up a little bag and we snacked as we took a tour of severed chicken heads and mountains of fruit. 

We then split up, back to our respective residences, and then met back up at 9 at the market. The Sigma Chis had met some girls and one guy from Texas A&M at a bar the night that Jeff and I were at Primavera. They got in touch with them on Monday, and made plans to meet them for dinner. So now 17 of us are on the hunt for an authentic Spanish restaurant, that isn't an expensive tourist trap and can fit almost 20 people together. I'll be honest, I had my doubts that that was going to happen. European restaurants are all very small; it's not like Chili's where you can just roll in, slam four tables together, drive some chicken crispers into you, then pay separate checks. Nevertheless, Jeff and Hayden led took the reigns down some randomly chosen, sketchy little boulevard and we found our place. It'll be hard to describe how perfect this place was. Two older gentlemen waited on us and they were so patient and helpful and were excited to have  such a large group. They gathered almost all the tables in the tiny place to make one long dinner table for all of us. We shared a bottle of wine and got a hearty serving of Paella for 5 euros! All the places on Las Ramblas didn't have anything under 10. And I knew this was real deal when I was having to spit shells out  after every bite. In case you don't know what Paella is: it is a bed of Spanish rice with assorted sea food mixed in. Very similar to jambalaya, but I bet you've never had jambalaya with whole clams shells in it. It was so delicious and so fun, one of my favorite times yet. It seems like some of the best things we have done have arisen out of pure spontaneity. Chris and Jeff Travel Tip #1: "You never know what lies at the end of that little sketchy boulevard. It might be a big pile of dog shit, or it might be the best little Spanish restaurant in Barcelona." 

After we all tossed in our dues to the money pile, we said goodbye to our new friends at La Morina and moved on to the next priority, nightlife in Barcelona. The A&M girls knew about a place by the beach that did 2 euro shots, which sounded expensive to me since the 7 of us got shithoused for 1 euro the night before. Anyways, we followed them to the club where they counted us at the door and let us go in. I was still wearing that ratty old Dagger shirt, so I wasn't really in club mode anyways, but once we got inside it was dark, hot, and PACKED with people. This club was no bigger than the size of freshmen dorm room. They did have a huge menu; I made it half way through the A's and just said screw it I'll just say a word and they'll probably pour me something. Before I got the chance to order, Jeff grabbed me and already had five shots lined up on the bar. The bartender lit them on fire, handed us straws and we sucked them down before our eyebrows singed off. It was pretty fun, but the taste I think was later described as "coconut butthole." We kind of stood around for another 10 minutes or so, then decided we could find somewhere a little more our scene. One of the girls led us over a bridge onto an island where there were lots of clubs and bars. Unfortunately it was Monday night and they were all closed, but at least we got a quick tour of town and had a Coconut Butthole. We were on our way back when Jeff and I decided that we should all swing by the Wild Turkey Tavern and see if they were still open. Sure enough they were. And our Swedish bartender friend from the previous day was working the late shift. We all went in, had a Guiness, a few San Miguels, and played a game of darts. We talked with all of A&M crew, made friends with the locals, and did lots of high fiving. I've definitely decided that I much prefer a cool bar with friends than a club where everyone is just scrambling to get a drink, lighting it on fire, then drinking it through a straw. They kicked us out at 2 so they could close up shop for the night and we said our farewells to all of our friends. We slid in quietly to our hostel room and slapped one more high five for a day well done. 

(Money belt poking out, you know I'm here to party.)

Tuesday, June 5 (Sights): We woke up early and packed up our things. I got a big bowl of Cocoa Pebbles and turned in our key to get back the deposit. We met Andrew at the McDonald's halfway between our two places of residence. Jefferson booked a flight from Barcelona to Metz, because he a quiz that he couldn't miss early Wednesday morning. In exchange for hauling Jeff's giant backpack all the way back to Metz, Andrew was given his couchette reservation. After seeing Jeff off, we waited for the rest of the crew, so we could decide what we wanted to do before our train left at 4:30. Realizing that I had seen pretty much no sights up to this point, I motioned for some self guided tour by means of The Sacred Map. Half of the guys wanted to check out the Picasso museum, so we decided to split up. We locked our bags in locker 256 at the train station, and went our separate ways for the last taste of Barcelona. It was Mike, Gleber, and I on the sightseeing extravaganza. We calculated out the total number of Metro trips we planned on taking, and made a game plan: Sagrada Famillia, Cathedral, Olympic Park, FC Barcelona Stadium, Train. We jumped on a metro and headed to Sagrada Famillia, probably the most famous monument in the city. The most interesting part about it is that it is still under construction. They have been building this enormous church for over 140 years! And it's not like they are just slow; there are multiple cranes, and workers everywhere. Multiple generations of men have lived and died, building this thing, never to see its completion. 

(Yes, it's actually that  big and scary looking)

(Construction side)

We moved on to the Cathedral, where I laughed the hardest I've laughed in recent memory. There was a street performer playing classical guitar, and we came up with this involved scenario that in order to master Spanish guitar, you had to learn from the oldest teacher who lives in the greatest temple atop the highest mountain. The only way to get there is by levitating. Once you achieve full 6 sting enlightenment, you can play a song so beautiful that you can actually soar through the air. We were doubled over imagining looking out the window on our Delta flight back to Atlanta, our plane in stride with some guy in full upright guitar position, playing the most beautiful song in the universe. We amused ourselves. After we got back control of our diaphrams, we popped back onto the Metro and went West to the Olympic park. We strolled around, took some pictures, and wandered up a big hill to get an overlook of the city and see some of the Olympic grounds. Once we started making our way back down we realized that we were getting a bit pressed for time to make the train, seeing as we had no idea how long it was going to take us to get back. We consulted Its Holiness (the 6 euro map) and made it back just in time to have a cheeseburger at McDonald's. 

(Cathedral)

(Old bull fight arena)

(Art museum on the hill)

(Pretty sure I made the best shirt selection when I was packing.)

We waved goodbye to the city as we pulled out of the station. We had another long day of travel left to conquer. We had to catch our overnight train in Cerebere, the first stop after you cross the Spanish border back into France. We had a 2 and half hour layover so we decided to leave the station and see if we could make it to the ocean. We walked a steep winding staircase down into the little town, and found a little pizza place where we paired up and split a large pizza with ham, tomatoes, mushrooms, and olives. I think everyone knows I love a good pizza. We sat down by the water, ate our dinner, had a beer, skipped rocks, and shared stories of our weekend. It was another perfect example of why to always stray from the beaten path. 

(It was as good as it looks.)

We caught our train and Andrew and I made our way to our couchette. We were greeted by a young English couple who happened to spend the day in Barcelona. We chatted with them about soccer and travelling and it happened to come up that Jeff and I watched that rugby game in the bar (Remember?). Yeah so this guy was playing in that game. Didn't really phase us that we were hanging out with a professional athlete, of course until he got off the train and we never asked his name. Gleber did some googling when we got back and I'm like 95% sure this is him...

http://www.london-welsh.co.uk/rugby_squad_biography.asp?id=54

They weren't actually staying in our couchette, they had just wandered back there to find some place to rest. Andrew and I were joined by our actual roommates about two stops later. An older smiley gentleman and an older lady who did not enjoy the smell of our bare feet. 

We flipped off lights and I sat on my bed on the middle level, drank half a bottle of wine I had left and stared out the window onto the landscape illuminated by the setting sun. I listened to some Real Estate on my iPod and reflected on how amazing this experience has been so far. The things that I've seen, the roads I've walked, the people I've met, the little things: having a pizza on the Mediterranean, laughing hysterically in front the oldest cathedral in Barcelona. All of these are priceless memories and experiences that I am beyond fortunate to have. Much love to Mom, Dad, George, and Rachel for encouraging me to do this and making it all possible. I'll try and bring back the best souvenir I can find. We killed a spider in a water bottle today on the train and the lady next to us said, "Aha! Un souvenir de France!" So you all will have to rock, paper, scissors for that one. This baby took about 4 hours to write, so check back tomorrow for the write up on Nice. It'll be a good one! Bon nuit!

P.S. If there are any errant spelling or grammatical mistakes, sorry. There is no way I'm going back through and proof reading this guy. Hopefully it all still makes logical sense.