One last perfect day.

    

bit·ter·sweet

  

[adj. bit-er-sweet, bit-er-sweet; n. bit-er-sweet]  

–adjective

1.

both bitter  and sweet  to the taste: bittersweet chocolate.

2.

both pleasant and painful or regretful: a bittersweet memory.

       I don't know if I've ever had a moment in my life that I've felt more mixed on.  I'm extremely excited to go home and see all of my friends and family, but at the same time, I'm going to miss Barcelona immensely.  

       We were supposed to be out of our apartments by noon on Friday the 15th, but I didn't know that when we booked my flight, so I wasn't scheduled to leave until the 16th.  Because of this, most of the people in my program left sometime on Friday morning, it was just me and my friend Amanda left in the city.  At first I was a little upset that I had to get a hostel for my last night and I wished I had booked my flight for Friday, but in the end I'm really glad I stayed. I had a great day yesterday saying goodbye to the city.  

       We started out at the Labyrinth Park that I last went to back in January.  Amanda hadn't been yet and she really wanted to see it.  I think we were both tired or something because even though I had done the labyrinth before, it took us over an hour to figure it out!  I also got to see some gorgeous purple flowers in bloom that I hadn't been able to see during the winter.

       We decided to have a fairly traditional dinner at a cafe of tortilla española (An omelette with potatoes on a baguette), croquettes, and patatas bravas (Fried potatoes with a spicy sauce).  It was a great last meal to have in the city!  After our dinner we went to see what is called the Magic Fountain.  Towards the center of the city there is a fountain that they use to put on a show every Friday and Saturday night. I somehow had not seen it yet, but it was something I had been meaning to do so I was really glad to finally be able to fit it in.  They play music and the water shoots out in designs to go along with it and they also use colored lights to turn it different colors. Because I don't have a camera anymore, I googled a picture of it so you could still see what it looks like.

  

It was absolutely gorgeous and the perfect ending to a great semester here in Barcelona.

       Now I just have a metro ride, bus ride, two plane rides, and a car ride separating me from Appleton, Wisconsin!!

Thanks for the sendoff, Barcelona.

Every time I tell someone I'm studying abroad in Barcelona they tell me to watch out for pickpockets.  Barcelona is legendary for their petty crimes.  During our first day of orientation we were told that about a third of all the students that come through this program are pick-pocketed at some point.  Those numbers seem to be about right as I do know a number of people that have gotten things stolen during our time here.  I'm guessing you can see where this is going. Even though I've been ridiculously careful my entire time here to not get anything stolen, today someone took my wallet and my camera out of my purse without me noticing.  Let me tell you the tale.

As I told you in my last post, the weather here has been absolutely incredibly and I've been taking every opportunity to lay out on the beach. I've done tons of relaxing, listening to a book on tape, and homework.  I've even discovered the secret to get the ladies that come up to you and say "Masaje, massage? Cinco euros for massage!" to leave you alone (you just completely ignore them).  I didn't have Spanish class today so after my morning class I decided to go to the beach to do a little relaxing and study for the last day of my Spanish final tomorrow (it was a three day final). I was laying there for a while and I got thirsty, so I took a drink of water out of my bag, put it back, and closed my eyes again.  My bag was sitting right next to my head and I wasn't really worried about it. About fifteen minutes later I opened my eyes and saw that my bag looked as if someone had gone through it.  I frantically opened it to see that both my wallet and my camera had been taken.  I was so upset, I had two debit cards in my wallet that I knew I had to cancel right away, plus a bunch of personal things that I always carried around with me.  I had a quote in there that my dad gave me on my 18th birthday and the Beyonce diva license my best friend Hayley gave me when she took a trip to Florida our senior year along with many other things.  And my camera! I've only had this camera for about eight months and I absolutely loved it.  I had to buy it last summer when my old one broke and I hadn't been planning on buying a new one any time soon, but I'm the type of person that always has their camera on them, constantly taking pictures.  The only thing I can be grateful for is the fact that I am leaving here in five days, so at least I have pictures of pretty much everything in Barcelona that I wanted to take pictures of.  Because my metro card was in my wallet and I had no money, I had to walk all of the way back to my apartment which took about an hour.  Once again I was so glad that it was nice out so the walk wasn't horrible, but I still would have preferred not to have to make it.

I was able to cancel my cards before the thief could use them and luckily I had another debit card from a different bank in my room so I'm still able to have access to some money before I get home.  I was pretty upset when it first happened, but I've definitely calmed down.  It'll just be a pain having to replace everything I lost and missing the things I can't replace.

Perfect weather for a perfect week.

     Before my semester in Barcelona began, I made sure I checked out what the weather is typically like here during the winter so I could pack accordingly.  It looked like it would be nice, but still jeans and a sweater type weather.  It has been anything but that for the past week or so.  It has been absolutely gorgeous and I can't get enough of it!  The forecast for the next couple of days is sunny and in the 70s.  Absolutely perfect.  Unfortunately I also have a ton of homework as it is the very end of the semester for me, but I plan on taking what homework I can with me to the beach this weekend.  We'll see how much work I actually end up getting done.
     The good weather has seemed to bring out all of the tourists as well.  Barcelona appears to be a popular spring break location for many European countries. I feel like I've heard more French in the past couple of weeks than Spanish or Catalan!  Part of the reason I think I've heard so many tourists in the past weeks or so is because I've been doing a lot of touristy things as my friend Mara from McDaniel came to visit me as part of her spring break from her university in Glasgow, Scotland!
     She came last Friday and was able to stay until Thursday morning.  We were able to fit in so much in such a short period of time!  As much as I enjoy getting to know new people here, it is really nice to see someone I've known for a while and to catch up on our lives and learn new things about our study abroad experiences.
     One of the first things we did was go to the Boquería, the huge market on Las Ramblas, the touristy street in Barcelona.  No matter how many times I've been there, it never fails to amaze me how much food they offer and how cheap it is.  We ended up buying a whole kilogram of strawberries for only 1.30€!  That's over two pounds for under two dollars!  It is actually a good thing that I don't come here more often, they have so much delicious looking chocolate and candy everywhere I'm sure I would waste away all my money.  We also bought a dragon fruit just so we could try it.  They're sold in halves with little spoons attached so that you can scoop out the insides.  The best way I can describe them is that they're a little like a flavorless kiwi.

These candies looked like beads! They were silver and metallic! 

Overall, I'm glad I tried it, but it's not something I'll ever buy for myself again.

     On Saturday night we went to a photography exhibit that I had heard about.  It was a collection called "Women Are Beautiful" by a New York based photographer from the 60s and 70s.  They were all candid shots done around the streets of New York and they were great!  It was such an interesting concept for a photography exhibit.  We also had a pretty good time giggling over the fashion choices back then.
     On Sunday we were planning to go to a town a little south of here to lay on the beach, but it ended up raining all morning so we changed our plans and decided to make it a museum day instead.  Luckily most museums in Barcelona are free after 3 o'clock on Sundays, so we picked the perfect day!  The first one we went to was the Barcelona History Museum that has the Roman ruins under the city.  I've actually been to that one before, but Mara really enjoyed it.  After that one, we went to the Picasso Museum.  This is probably one of my favorite art museums that I've ever been to.  It has tons of his works showcasing his growth throughout the years.  It's amazing to me that he started out looking very impressionistic and turned into the abstract painter that we know him for today.
     One of my favorite parts of the museum was seeing all of his renditions of Velazquez' Las Meninas.  I can remember studying Las Meninas in my humanities class sophomore year of high school and loving the complexities of it then.  Then just a few weeks ago when I went to the Prado in Madrid I was able to see the real thing up close.  Now I've seen it completely redone in a million different ways. Picasso was really obsessed with it for quite a while and the museum has all his different takes on it.  This one looked to be the most complete.

Apparently we weren't actually supposed to take pictures of the artwork, as we were yelled at right after taking this picture. But there weren't any signs and I wanted to be able to remember this!

      On Monday we went to Parc Guell, the famous park designed by Gaudí.  I went to Parc Guell one of my first weeks in Barcelona and as I think that Barcelona as equally pretty, less touristy, parks to offer, I wasn't planning on going back.  I am definitely glad I did though!  Springtime really brings out the beauty in the park as there are flowers blooming everywhere.  Unfortunately I forgot my camera so I don't have pictures to show you guys, but they have these gorgeous purple flowers everywhere that are extremely fragrant.  They make everything around them smell wonderful!
     On Tuesday we made time for Mara to get some authentic paella by the beach as you can't go to Spain and not get paella!  The quality and quantity of seafood that Spain offers is something that I'm really, really going to miss when I leave.  Before the paella, I got a first course of mussels in some sort of yellow sauce. I'm not sure what was in the sauce, but it was absolutely delicious.  I've eaten more mussels in the past four months here than I ever have before in my life.  They've quickly become one of my favorite types of seafood. The ones I've had here are incredible.

I'm still not used to having lunch be the big  meal of the day! We were so stuffed I thought you were going to have to roll me onto the beach.

     On Mara's last day in Barcelona we made our way up onto Montjuïc so she could see the Olympic Stadium and the rest of what Montjuïc has to offer.  We ended up going to the botanical gardens, which was really cool.  They have different sections all devoted to different parts of the world that have Mediterranean climates.  It's just exciting for me to see all this different vegetation as I don't get to see too much variety in between Wisconsin and Maryland!

They had the most beautiful varieties of tulips that I've ever seen.

This flower looked like it was made out of tissue paper!

     It was great to share my beautiful new city with someone from school.  Now when I go back I'll at least have someone who has some sort of idea of what I'm talking about!