Day 2

Had orientation and at the CEA global campus then walked around town. While walking we saw a park where a lot of protestors were. They were camped out and some of them had even built permanent living spaces for themselves. They were protesting the government in Spain and had been for some time now. it was a sight to see. There were mainly a lot of hippies there. No surprise. They had dreads and raggedy clothes. It was pretty surprising that Spain let them do that. They really made the square look really bad. They had spray painted on most of the statues and walls. It looked like it could have been a pretty place otherwise. 

This guy had actually built an entire tree house. Pretty impressive. He was taking a siesta when I took this. 

The statues had things added to them like signs, spray paint, and rags.

By the park I saw this huge line of mopeds. It seems like everyone in Spain drives a moped. There are constantly lines of these parked on the sides of streets any where you go. 

For lunch we were lame and got Burger King. Although the differences were interesting. Unlike america this food aint cheap. We paid 15 euro for two meals which comes out to 21 dollars. They charge an extra dollar just to get fries with your meal. Lame. As you can see in my picture the chicken sandwich I usually order in America, the number 9, is a lot smaller than it's American comparison. (Now looking at this pic though I can see I have small hands lol.) It tasted just as good though. 

First Night on the Town

Monday night was our first night to go explore Spain. We started off by taking the metro to la Playa off of Porta Olimpica. The metro is really close to my apartment so that's really convenient. My neighborhood is really pretty. We have a park and ours, like every neighborhood I learned, is fully equipped with stores, banks, and restaurants all within a couple of blocks of each other. 

Center of my neighborhood

We arrived at the beach around 9:30 pm and as you can see it was barely getting dark there. No wonder people don't go to bed early. The sun didn't go down till maybe 10 pm. There were quite a few people still on the beach which was nice and the weather was great of course. There are a lot of clubs and restaurants right off the beach but we didn't manage to go to them that night but hopefully today we will go :)

Best for last. We have a really cool bar literally right across my apartment. It's about 10 steps from my front door and the people there are really nice. The bartender kept buying us shots and the drinks were reasonably priced. Jeremy bonded with the bartender and even left wearing his shirt that night lol.

The first meal

I have arrived in Spain! Jeremy and I went on our first adventure today. Walked down the main street by my apartment and got a feel of my neighbor hood. There are a bunch of little random shops like a disco store, tobacco shop, europe store, and grocery stores. We picked a little restaurant to have lunch and were a little shocked when we looked at the menu. Everything was in Spanish of course but the things on there were just weird. Nothing sounded like it went together. The prices were very reasonable for all the food we got so no complaining there. As for the food lol. 

When we first got to the place we didn't know if we seat ourselves or wait for a waitress and the waitress didn't speak english so she wasn't much help either. Really nice girl though. She had light brown hair, fair skin, and really pretty blue eyes. She also had a marilyn monroe piercing which looked funny. As soon as we sat down we got bread and a drink. The bread was nice. Not as hard as I thought it would be. The way the meal went was. You get a drink, bread, and desert then two meals. A starter and main course. All for 9 Euro wish comes out to be around $12. Not too bad for all that stuff. I went ahead and ordered the Fideo because it's a personal favorite of mine from home but this fideo was special. It had all sorts of fish in it: crawfish, shrimp, tuna, muscle and possibly seaweed. Tasted pretty good though. Over all I was pleased. 

Jeremy got Melon con Jamon which astounds me that they think those go together. The melon was great as expected. The ham, well, look at the picture. We couldn't tell if it was raw bacon or what. It didn't taste raw but it was also very soft and salty. It just felt all sorts of wrong in your mouth. Bleh. 

Our main course was Pollo con papas fritas. Very good choice. I'm making up the papas fritas part but those things sure did look and taste like french fries so who cares. Chicken is always a safe bet. They brought us basically half a breast and a leg of baked chicken. Tasted lemony and delicious. I could barely eat it after eating my fideo though because it was all so much food! After our main course we had desert. She gave us all these choices and since I had been so adventures already I went with the safe bet. Or so I thought. I asked for ice cream. She brought it to us and it looked brown and white so naturally I suspected chocolate and vanilla. Jackpot. No. It was coffee ice cream. Not poisonous or anything but definitely a lot of flavor for my lunch. I think the first meal was a success so we'll see how it goes tonight. 

So as you can see by the picture our apartment is pretty much awesome. Besides the no air conditioning thing and tiny bedroom I could definitely survive here for a while. The entrance to our apartment is kind of hidden which is cool. You have to use this old timy looking key with the big teeth to open up the door from the streets. Once there you have to take this tiny elevator to our room which is on the second floor.  

Our kitchen is nice and fully equipped with everything so I'll be able to eat my american food I brought. Which is just 6 packs of ramen so we'll see how long that lasts. Going grocery shopping tonight hopefully. They have one of those water up the butt things here in every bathroom. Fancy. 

And finally our "dryer." No one owns a dryer in Spain I guess. Living in the stone ages. We have to hang up our clothes like poor people and hope they don't fall into the people who live below us' patio. Hope they like seeing my underwear flying free. 

Till next time!

First Impressions

Everything has gone so well thus far. The plane ride was nice and they had a lot of movies to pick from to keep us from getting bored. They served us chicken, mashed potatoes, and green beans for dinner and even fed us breakfast too. The time change hasn't really hit me yet because I slept on and off on the plane so even though it's 4am in Oklahoma it doesn't feel like it to me.

Barcelona is amazing! Weather is great and our apartment is awesome. We have a huge living room, fully equipped kitchen, tv, and a nice bathroom. We walked around a little with one of the heads of our CEA program. She took us to a small coffee shop that she said was amazing. Didn't look all that amazing to me but the orange juice I got was good. They freshly squeeze it there so that was nice. None of their drinks are cold though. I'll have to adjust.

About to head out with Jeremy and exchange our money and go shopping.