Oh February, where have you gone?

19 February 2009

So I got to touch a document from the 13th century the other day in our Don Quijote class. Ummm, WHAT?! Why do you trust me to touch such an ancient document! Needless to say, I was terrified I was going to destroy it. It was amazing!

I got my return flight confirmed yesterday and I wanted to cry. It’s not that I don’t want to go home, its just that I’m really going to miss Europe. And I know that I still have 3 whole months here, but it’s just weighing down on me, you know? I think the thing that bothered me most was that it said I have to be at El Prat before 7am. Oh good god, I might as well pull an all nighter then! The reason I wanted a later flight was so that I didn’t have to stay up for about a day and a half straight with the time change and everything. Oh well. At least Kelly has to be there at the same time, so we can call for cabs and head out together! Ahhhh, so bittersweet!

20 January 2009

While Amy and I were at the Boq at my usual banana stand, there was an old man who was like, “no, I want these two, not that one,” in reference to the tomatoes the woman was bagging for him. He said you’ve got to look at them and smell them before choosing. The woman asked if I wanted anything else besides my bananas, and I did my usual, “ya está,” and the old man was all “ooh, are you from here?” Haha! That’s a funny joke. I told him I was only studying here and then he asked where I was from. Chicago. “Ahhhhh, OBAMA!” and then he proceeded to make motions like a judge using his gavel. Oh man, haha. He said he still wants to go to New York, and I said, “yeah, me too!” And then he said I was still young and had my whole life in front of me, where as was 70 or so years old and didn’t have much time left. He was so cute! When we said goodbye to our new friends, he said “bonjourno” or however you spell it to Amy, rethought and said, “oh wait, no….auf vidasein” (or however you spell that one)! Everyone just assumes she’s German!

It’s carnaval weekend. Party with Carolyn’s crew tonight and then Sitges tomorrow night/morning!

21 January 2009

Barbacool was alright. The place was cool since it was a like a Euro hangout down by the beach, but the people were older and none of them talked to us. On the bright side, there was a man dressed as a chicken, another as a Scotsman who kept waggling his fuzzy orange eyebrow at people, and some people dressed as African Americans…complete with face paint. Not sure how I feel about that one!

23 January 2009

So Carnaval was interesting. Saturday day I was taking it easy, watching some How I Met Your Mother and relaxing. We went to the parade later which was cool, for a while. We got to see some bright costumes and some good music! The best set by far was from my town, Eixample Isquerra! They had about 70 people doing the Thriller dance down the street for the entire parade—it was genius! So once we got to Sitges, we wandered around and the place was PACKED! We eventually made our way down to the beach, which I had never seen at night! They had a huge stage and blow up beer bottle on the beach and everyone was dancing out there. We decided to hang out by the little shack so we could have a drink and see everyone’s costumes. Let me tell you, the Spaniards know how to bring it! Even though it was probably about 20 degrees warmer than how it would be at home on Halloween, everyone had costumes that kept them warm. I saw a herd of sheep (including a black sheep), a parade of penguins, lots of chickens and vampires, tons of pirates and Native Americans, lots of Amy Winehouses (including one we talked to and kept touching Amy’s boobs), a group of about 5 mops, and my favorite, the male synchronized swimming team in sparkley girl swimsuits and their girlfriends dressed up as football/soccer players with fro’s. So great! They had stolen a grocery kart and put all their supplies in there. They even had scubs oxygen tank filled with beer. How creative!! After getting our table wiped off by one of the mop men, we decided to walk around more and see more costumes. We got to a really crowded intersection where I decided maybe we should take one of the less crowded ones even though it went out of the way a bit. Thank God we did! I saw these 2 people dressed up as paramedics and I wondered if they had a fake person to be working on. Wrong. They were real, and they were helping Mark, one of the guys from our program. I stopped in the middle of the road and was like, “oh my god, is that mark!?” Amy looked over and said, “it’s a ninja…ITS MARK!!!!!” We tried to find the people he was with earlier in the night, but no go--they didnt have their phones on them. In the state that he was in, we all decided he needed to come back to Barca. However, since his keys were in the apartment he was staying at in Sitges, he had to stay at our place. All I could think about was if he died, it would be my fault for not taking all necessary precautions. I even considered calling Aaron or Pilar. I talked to Berta and Mita and Berta told me I should take him to the hospital. But then after more discussion, we decided it would be okay. We got him all situated on the little red couch and Ames wrote him a note explaining where he was and stuff, which actually helped the next morning, haha! I couldn’t help but worrying before falling asleep though. My mind tends to run wild with worry at night, and this was big. If he died, it was my fault. I was scared to come out of my room Sunday morning, thinking I would find a dead Mark by the fridge. All was well though! There was life! We pieced together some of the night. Apparently it was some wizards and druids who brought the paramedics to him, hah!

On a lighter note, Edinburgh and London this weekend, YAAAAAAAAAY! So hopefully the next blog will be way better than these last 2 (sorry about that).

More Pictures
Carnaval