June 17th-23rd

Sorry I haven't been keeping up, but we have been very busy with school. I can't believe today is my last day in Barcelona. I'm so sad I have to leave but extremely thankful I got to come. This has been one of the best months of my life and I just wish everyone would come here instead of me coming home! Now that I'm looking back on it, I am also very lucky to have met the spaniards, because I would not have had near as much fun or near as much of a cultural experience. They have been the nicest and best hosts and hopefully they'll come to America so I can introduce you all to them. I still can't believe I got to live here for a month and that I'm lucky enough to have parents who let me do this. I'll never be able to thank them enough.

This weekend was a lot of fun! I finally got to see the FC Barcelona stadium, Camp Nou. It is the third biggest stadium in Europe I believe. It is absolutely massive and it is so cool. I was only somewhat a fan of FCB before coming here but I am completely and totally devoted now! The stadium tour is amazing and we even got to go down on the field!

Also, we went to a bullfight on Sunday, finally. They're being outlawed in Barcelona after this year, so I'm glad I got to go see one, but they're very gory. If any of you didn't know, they kill the bull in front of the crowd. We got into a debate about it in my class, and it was very interesting. I still think that it is a cool tradition but a lot of people didn't like it. Here are the pictures, enjoy! And if I can I'll try to update since I'll be here another week in Munich and Paris with my parents.

Here are the FC Barcelona stadium pictures.
Here's a general sign. The "Ç" has a th sound and it's Catalan.


This place is like a complex. I can't imagine how much fun this is on game days.


Here's the Olympic torch from the 1992 Barcelona Olympics


Here's me on the field. The seats say "More than a club" in Catalan. Yes, they're very proud to be catalans.


Here's another picture of the stadium. It is just gigantic


This is a part of the Barça museum. It's about 200 fans singing the FC Barça hym. It's amazing. Look it up on YouTube.


Here are the bullfighting pictures.
That's a girl in my program named Amanda, and a dead bull in the background. The matador stabbed it so hard it threw up blood. And it all happened right in front of me.



Just a cool picture of the matador taunting the bull. The capes are red to disguise the blood, not to make the bulls angry. Bulls are color blind. They respond to the matadors movements, not the colors.


This is a banderillero about to throw two sticks in the bulls back. I would never want this job but as you can see he has help. The matadors assistants all have pink and yellow capes.


As you can see the stadium isn't very full. It's because catalonians don't like bullfighting and want it gone. They succeeded.

Casa Batlló and Parc Güell

Sorry for another delay again, here are pictures from Casa Batlló and Parc Güell. I've been very busy and had my final today!

Here's the ceiling. This entire house is unbelievable I couldn't believe I was actually seeing it.


Here's me in the house


Just an elevator from a house built in the first decade of the 20th century.



Here's part of the roof


Here's me on the roof



This house is amazing


This is the view from the roof. That's Paseó de Gracia (Passeig if you're speaking Catalan) it's a very nice part of Barcelona


Here is Parc Güell

June 14th-16th

Hello all. There won't be any pictures this time but I'll try to get them up tomorrow. Over the past few days I've been to Casa Batlló and Parc Güell. Both are Antonio Gaudi creations, and they are both unbelievably beautiful. Casa Batlló is a house on Passeig de Gracia, and it is one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. But so is Parc Güell. We took the metro up to the Parc and then hiked for 15 minutes uphill to get to it, but it was well worth it. I really can't do it justice until I put pictures up. I hope everyone is doing well at home, and I can't wait to see y'all in a few weeks!

June 7th-9th & 13th

Here are a few pictures from last week. We don't do much during the day besides school and a little sight seeing. Note: There is another recent post below this one.

Santa Maria del Mar:





Here are my roommates. The one on the left is Lisa and she's from the University of Michigan, and the one on the right is Amy and she's from San Diego State.


Here's the Catalan flag next to the Spain flag. Catalonia is very separatist from Spain, and it's the region where Barcelona is.


Here is the Gran Vía in Barcelona with the Arc de Triomf at the end of it. Yes, Barcelona has its own Arc de Triomf just like Paris, but this one is red.


Here is a view from the top of the Catalan Museum on the harbor of Barcelona. The view is unreal.



Here are two OU girls that went with me to the museum.


Here is a monument to Christopher Columbus. He is pointing towards America.



Here's the view from the top of another famous church. The Sagrada Familia is in the background.



Here's the Catalonian Congress:


Here's part of the view from the middle of the steps leading up to the congress building.


Here's the view from the top.


We walked even further up the hill and saw the olympic stadium


Here's olympic park, the basketball stadium is to the left, and the track stadium is behind me.


Here's me inside the stadium.


Here's a Catalonian festival from today. The red and yellow stripes are the symbol of Catalonia. The catalonian festival and the olympic stadium were today, the 13th. Everything else is last week.

June 10th-12th: Valencia

Sorry about the delay in posts, I've been very busy with class and a trip to Valencia this past weekend.

Valencia:
Valencia was very cool, but not nearly as fun as Barcelona. On the four hour bus ride to Valencia on friday everyone slept the entire way. We all tried to go out on friday night but we were all too tired, but I did meet some future OU freshman, one of whom is my Dad's friend's son. On saturday, we were up bright and early to get on the bus to go to Océanografic, the biggest aquarium in Europe. It was unbelievable! We even saw a dolphin show where all 25 of us felt too old to be there but we still had a great time! After the show we all got dropped off at the beach and spent the entire day there. It was a very relaxing day Here are a few pictures from Valencia:
Here's the city center where we were staying. There were more protestors here and they were much more active than the ones I've seen in Barcelona.


Here's a castle in Valencia, with the Valencian flag.


Here's inside the castle. We went on a two hour walking tour with a tour guide who didn't speak very good english...


Here's part of the aquarium. It felt like it was bigger than disney world.





That's a seal

June 5th-6th

I hope you're all doing well in the US! Spain is still unbelievable! Yesterday (sunday) we went to the beach and had a great time hanging out together. Although we got approached every five seconds for a massage (always from an asian lady), a henna tattoo, a beer, a mojito, or "fresh" coconut (all middle eastern people) we still had a great time. The highlight was when the police would walk by because all the solicitors scatter like cockroaches. It's illegal to sell anything on the beach. Having a day to go to the beach and relax was unbelievable. We also visited the Basilica de Santa Maria del Mar. It is a very famous and beautiful church, and I would put up pictures but I'm feeling a little lazy today (Spain is having an influence on me).

Today was another great day of class, and I figured out I can walk to class with two people from my program since the direct metro line is so far away from my apartment. The walk is about 20 minutes, but getting to walk around the city is worth it. I just got back from a catamaran cruise provided by CEA, and it was very beautiful but we didn't do very much besides go down one part of the shoreline. I will say that pickpocketing is made out to be a much bigger deal than it actually is. You have to be essentially be asking to be pick pocketed.

I may not move back home because I love Barcelona so much!

June 2nd-4th

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with the blog, I have been very busy taking siestas. My class is going well, and my teacher is very cool even though he speaks broken english. It has been mostly cloudy the whole week, but when it isn't cloudy or raining it is beautiful! I am loving Barcelona! Just the first week has been better than I could have imagined. Hanging out with the locals is easily the best way to experience the culture. The one Spaniard that I met in Oklahoma, Magin, is a great host. He has been taking other people from my program and me out around Barcelona. I'm also fairly certain his family is very rich, because they own several wineries around the world, and Magin and all of his friends have motorcycles and cars in a city where the majority of people use the metro. Their winery is called Codorniu and it is the biggest and oldest winery in Spain.


¡Me Encanta a Barça!

June 1st

Today was a gorgeous day in Barcelona! I love being able to walk by La Sagrada Familia every day on my way to class! I woke up early in order to go get school supplies, and made my way to the metro with a couple of people in my class. The class is very interesting, and the professor somehow relates everything back to soccer. Whether it is the spanish civil war or Francisco Franco's regime, everything gets related to soccer. After class, a couple of people went with me to Las Ramblas, a very touristy but cool part of the city. Right by Las Ramblas there are people camping out and living in a square because they are protesting the Spanish government.

Here is the Sagrada Familia. Pictures don't do justice to how amazing this building is, and I get to walk by it every day.


Here are pictures of protestors in the square.
People are literally living there, and this is in the middle of a very busy and famous square in Barcelona.


Here are a couple of signs that the protestors have put up around the square:
I don't know what this sign says because I think it is in Catalan or its Spanish slang.


This sign says "Barcelona, brutal police zone" this is also Catalan but it translates very easily.

May 31st night

Since I didn't get a chance to write about my night I am going to give y'all an update before I head to class. Before I start, if anyone wants to read an older post, just click the older posts link below the posts.

After taking a four hour nap from 3-7 and finally catching up on sleep (although I missed an apparently boring city tour given by CEA) some other CEA folks and I met up with the Spainards again. The one I met in Oklahoma, Magin (pronounced Maheen), brought some more friends and they took us all to a local place to eat tapas. The only one I recognized from last night was Xavi (not the soccer player), and the others who ate tapas were Javi and Luis. They took us to what was probably a very local place, but it was very good! We all drank sangria and the tapas were amazing! No doubt everyone knows I'm a bit of a picky eater, so I have been trying to go outside my comfort zone on this trip. If I remember correctly we ate 7 different tapas, and they were all very good. The best was easily the ham on bread with a sort of tomato paste spread over the bread. Apparently that is a favorite among Spainards, and for good reason too. They're very proud of the ham. It looks a lot like bacon, but its more flexible and much much better. Also, the place we ate dinner was near a famous symphony hall in Barcelona. It did rain starting around 5pm, but it really didn't bother anyone. It's much more fun to hang out with the Spainards than Americans, because they all know what is safe and are giving all of us tips on how to stay safe in Barcelona, and it feels a lot safer traveling around the city with locals (mom, that's for you).

After dinner, we proceeded to go to the same club from the night before (Shoko), and I did my best to stay up to see the mavs game, but I missed the end. It's actually really funny to hear the Spainards talk about basketball, because they love Dirk Nowitzki and Pau Gasol.

I said it yesterday, but Barcelona is amazing. Everyone here is extremely nice and not snooty like other Europeans. They actually love to speak english because they love practicing it, but this is a problem since I want to improve my Spanish. I also found out yesterday that my class is one block away from Las Ramblas, a very touristy but exciting part of Barcelona.

¡Hasta Luego!

May 31st

Barcelona is unbelievable. By far the best city I have ever been to. I met up with a local that I met in Oklahoma through one of the SAE board members, and he showed my roommates and me around the city (yes my roommates good). He took us up in the hills where apparently a lot of tourists don't go, and the view was awesome. He then took the 3 of us to his house in the hills above Barcelona. His house is absolutely amazing. His family owns a winery outside of Barcelona and another in napa valley. There was wine everywhere at his house, and they have a personal cook who wears a uniform and cooked us a 3 course meal. We were at this guy's house for several hours, and some of his friends came over while we were there. They're all really cool and they spoke to us in English and Spanish. After all of this, we all went to Shoko, a club on the beach in Barcelona. It was a ton of fun!

Needless to say this morning was a little rough having to get up at 7am for an orientation, but this city is amazing. I've never been anywhere as unique as Barcelona and I love it! My first class was today, and everything is about soccer! Our teacher finds ways to related everything to soccer!
Here are pictures of the view we saw yesterday: