cultura de base street art protest in barcelona.

A week and a half ago, I was in Barcelona and stumbled a protest that seemed well-organized and was immediately engaging. With my limited Spanish, I managed to pick up slogans like, “Beauty is not for sale,” and “Barcelona is dead.” It became immediately obvious that the protest was politically and artfully-motivated.

From an outside perspective, those statements seem extreme, especially considering Barcelona is known for its street art. Street art radiates practically from every corner of the city, and I’m not just talking meaningless little tags here and there. Barcelona is a storehouse of graffiti and street art pieces that actually look as though they took time, passion, commitment, and energy.

What then, caused this outpouring of anger from the art community of Barcelona?

Not many people in Spain speak English that well, so after an hour of standing around wondering, I finally decided to try my luck and ask around. In Spanish, I was told something along the lines of this. The protest stemmed from police actions that resulted in the closing of art spaces in a nearby neighborhood. The closed spaces were important hubs for musicians and artists alike, and as a result, the artistic community felt patronized and felt that bureaucratic decisions involving their livelihoods were being made without their input.

People of all ages participated in the peaceful protest, which was artistic in and of itself. A giant banner was unfurled on which visitors were allowed to scrawl their opinions. A booth tacked with, “Take off your pants!” encouraged visitors to defy the norm and take Polaroids of themselves naked.

It is only in a city like Barcelona with such a lively street art scene that such a demonstration can happen. While I cannot fully grasp the ramifications of all this bureaucracy on the Barcelona art community, I sincerely hope that it emerges from this better than before.

If you can read Spanish, head on over to culturadebase.net to find out more information about this movement. If you know more information about Cultura De Base, please share your knowledge. Thanks!

sitting in the madrid airport.

Well, right now I’m at the airport in Madrid. Spain is coming to an end and I’m onto Portugal. In Portugal, like Spain, people don’t really speak English. Even moreso, I’d guess, primarily because Spain (particularly Madrid) has a lot of overseas English teachers and it’s also closer to the rest of Western Europe. This will be interesting. I don’t even know how to say “Hello” in Portuguese, or “Thank you,” or ANYTHING. This will be a learning experience for sure.

In fact, this whole trip has been a bit of a huge learning experience. The first day after Tin-Win and Sherry left, I was a little uncomfortable. Luckily, I already had experience working the Metro in Madrid and knew the area, more or less. It certainly made things a lot more comfortable. What wasn’t comfortable was dragging my luggage through the Metros which were like a million degrees. That’s not fun. By the time I got from the previous hotel to the hostel, I was sweating and out of breath. Even worse, the hostel had a sign outside, but was locked and didn’t make it clear as to how one was supposed to get in. Turns out there’s a button you have to push. And also, once you get in, there is no immediate reception desk, and one must keep climbing up onto the third floor where one can locate the reception desk because there is a teeny tiny sign that says “RECEPTION,” with an arrow. Turns out that sign was NEW also. So initial wanderers were left to fend for themselves as far as finding the reception desk went. Lol.

The first day, I more or less holed up for half the day in my room. I was friendly and introduced myself to people IN my room, and luckily hit it off with two girls, Sarah and Bonnie. Bonnie was actually leaving the next day, so that was shortlived, but Sarah will still be in Madrid until the end of the week. It certainly made it a lot easier to find girls of my same age who were from America (Sarah) and Australia (Bonnie). They could speak English and were actually there to travel. Most of the other people (in particular, women) were just temporarily in the hostel, not seeing sites, not meeting people… because they came from Ireland, Scotland, America, Canada, etc. to teach English and nothing more. They had plenty of time to scope out Madrid later. For now, all they were doing was looking for apartments.

So I definitely hung out with Bonnie and then mostly Sarah… she’s from Atlanta and is studying for a half year in Salamanca. Twas fun because she is kinda down to do whatever… those people are always cool.

The other people met were mostly Aussies. Or at least the Aussies were most accepting and friendly of me. Most of them were on three month or twelve month holiday, and one girl told me that I should go to Australia to get a job because everyone of talent is moving out of Australia and into Dubai, and there were many, many job opportunities. Actually sounds kind of appealing, though I don’t know if I can hack the weather there or not.

Anyway. So that’s a quick recap. More to come. These are totally completely out of order, which sucks. I did pretty well in keeping the cruise shit in order, but you know what? I don’t feel like doing that orderly crap. So I’m not going to do it. So there.

(PS – There’s a “FREE PUBLIC WIFI” thing at the airport but it’s not fucking working, GRR! I wonder if they block that shite here or what? Because they have the pay WiFi (via Kube) too? Or maybe too many people are just using it? I’ve no idea…)

(PPS – A note about the Madrid airport… it is HUGE. And really nice looking. But needlessly huge. I mean really. It’s so needless. They spread this shit out like a mofo. I have no idea why. For example, from entrance, IN THE SAME TERMINAL EVEN, since there are four terminals, there are gates that take 15 minutes to get to! WTH!)

***

(UPDATED JANUARY 29TH, 2009)
So I never really got a chance to finish this post, and every so often, I get these reminders of what happened in Spain, and I feel like I need to fill them in before I forget about them forever. So these are just some bits and pieces…

* Bonnie, Sarah, and I decided to make a somewhat homemade dinner in the hostel one night, so we stopped by a couple markets to get some food. Not the best part of town that we walked through, but we went for it anyway. I bought some uniquely flavored tuna and some soup, I forget what kind Tomato or something! The tuna tasted really interesting, but I was down with it! Anyway. At the supermarket, I gave the lady a 50 dollar bill or something, and she thought I’d given her a 20 dollar bill, so she didn’t give me enough change back. I realized this and tried to complain, but I forgot how to say “pay” in Spanish, and therefore couldn’t get my message across. Luckily, someone who could speak English (a rarity in Spain, really) came to my rescue and the freaking manager had to come and then I finally got my money back. Jeezbus.

* Coming back from that supermarket (supermarkets are NOT easy to find in Spain, so we had to walk slightly far), we stopped by a fruit store closer to our hostel. The fruit was so cheap! Like, bananas for 5 cents and shit. Ridonkulous. Seriously. Avocado for $1. I don’t remember what else, but it was all fantastic!

* On the way back from meeting Francesca (see previous post) at a bunch of tapas bars, Sarah and I walked through the same shady area of town, only it was way late at night because we had stayed out for a while. Some children were out and screwing around, and one actually THREW shit at us! And talked shit to us! It was ridiculous. Then a little further down the road, a cute little grandma pulled us aside and told us that we shouldn’t be walking down that street at night as women because it was, “Muy peligroso,” and we thanked her profusely, and she gave us direct directions back to our hostel so we could get there with expediency.

* At some point, during dinner, I hung out with some Australians. There were like two dudes who were from Southern Australia, and a dude from Northern Australia who was traveling the freaking world, and his next stop was Jordan, that lucky fuck! I friended him on Facebook but I actually forgot his name. There was also a very friendly Aussie couple. Anyway, so the Northern Aussies would make comments about how Northern Aussies were much different from those in the South, who were kind of all hillbillies (from Adelaide). Haha. And judging by their demeanors, it seemed to be true. Haha. The two from the South were drunk as motherfuckers, one of them got so drunk one night when we went out to the pub that he couldn’t sit still but fucking wouldn’t go home!! And his friend, who was traveling around with him, was trying to act like he was all embarrassed, but he was friends with him, so ha ha. And the one who was acting all embarrassed had some weed, and when asked where he got the weed from, he said he went to some website (I forget the name) that basically tells people how to score weed no matter what country they’re in. So basically the instructions went something like: go to this metro stop, go down the stairs, talk to the black guy, say this. And he did whatever the site said, and actually scored some weed. INSANITY!!!

* One other night, I talked to this Asian Australian girl and she basically told me how easy it was to get a job in Australia, as a graphic designer, or even other positions, because all the good Australians and New Zealanders were going abroad to work in Dubai. I got her contact info, on the chance that I would ever go to Australia, although at this moment, it’d never happen But it was a nice thought. And people in hostels sure are freaking friendly.

yet another day in madrid.

Let me recap today. Right quick. While it’s still fresh in my memory. Since today had a lot of information. These are good sentences.

This morning I woke up a little later than usual and packed my stuff up. I was a little worried about what checkout time was because I thought it it was around 10AM and wasn’t sure if it was that time yet. Nonetheless, I took my time, and since I have gotten some things since I originally started traveling, I decided to try a method of packing that Tin-Win told me about. She told me that the key to packing was to ROLL YOUR CLOTHING!!! She saw it on TV, and we all know TV never lies. So rolling your clothing is supposed to eliminate the extra air that usually is sandwiched when we pack our clothing. Makes sense, right? Kinda.

Well, let me be the first – or fifth – to tell you that that shit works. Rolling your clothes works like a fucking charm. I definitely feel like I stuffed more shit in my bag and had a lighter load in my arms this time. Or maybe it’s cause the Metro wasn’t 100 degrees today. I’m not sure. But I think I’m right.

So after doing all that, and checking out of my room, I got to put my things in the hostel’s “bag room,” which is quite the luxury. Apparently there aren’t many hostels that have that. By the way, if you are ever in Madrid, the Las Musas Hostel is major major money. I’ve never stayed in a hostel as nice as this one, although I’d say the Lisbon one will probably rival it. We’ll see, though. The ONLY negative side about the hostel is that it’s loud as FUCK in the early morning. Garbage trucks picking up garbage at 6AM and shit. And drunk yelling people. But it’s also cause it’s hot and because of that, the doors are always open and that makes things nice and cool, but also nice and loud.

Anyway. Back to this morning. I checked out and then went to go get some breakfast, which in this case, and in the case of many a hostel, was toast. With jam. I also found some hot chocolate and mixed hot chocolate with coffee, which was delicioso. Mmmm.

After that, Sarah asked me what I was doing. I had planned to go to Toledo today but then changed my mind, and as a result, I didn’t have anything to do. She said she was going to go on a Walking Tour which is run by New Europe… it’s supposed to be really good as it is in many cities. I told her I’d go too. It was very, very wonderful. I must say, prior to today, the past five (or was it four?) days I’d spent in Madrid were pretty fun but pretty much completely devoid of history. There were monuments and squares all over, but what did they mean? Who the hell knows! We had taken that bus tour where they had given us headsets to use, but the headsets were shitty and you couldn’t hear through them half the time, and otherwise, they frankly just gave really boring information. “This building was erected by architect David Valezquez in 1900 because it was commissioned by King Ferdinand 2000,” they’d say. Boring shit no one cares about.

This walking tour, however, is generally hosted by younger travelers who have moved from the States or Ireland or Scotland or England or wherever and gotten a job as a English-speaking tour guide in Madrid. They don’t charge and work solely on tips, so the group today was fairly huge. Initially it must have been like 30, but some people got lost along the way, unfortunately. I think it was still pretty good-sized, though.

Finally found out what this statue of a tree and a bear meant. It’s a statue that Tin-Win, Sherry, and I had seen around Sol Station and wondered about, because people would always take pictures in front of it but there were no placards or descriptions about it. Turns out it’s a really important symbol in Spain, and as all freaking tourists in Spain ARE Spanish, they got a hoot out of it… I guess. It symbolizes the union between church and state, which is… good? Not good if you ask me… but apparently important in Spain. I don’t know.

At one point, he asked for some volunteers, and Sarah and I went up along with these two other guys. The volunteers were supposed to represent some individuals in the Royal Family at when-and-when time. I don’t remember the others, but I was ‘married’ to this tall blonde dude (who was there with his girlfriend) and he was a womanizer who I, something La Loca, was madly in love with. So after he died, I carried around his corpse for a while, from place to place, trying to find a holy person to revive him for me. UHHHH. I guess she was eventually deemed so damn crazy that they locked her up in a tower for 40 years until she dies. Tragic.

Then he asked for another 5 volunteers, and they were to represent the children of some of the previously mentioned individuals. When they finally got to the last guy, this short Asian dude, that dude was deemed as a person who had been a tragic product of inbreeding. As a result, he was a little retarded and spent most of his days counting strawberries. Fortunately, I guess, he was impotent, and his line ended when he died. Interesting.

From there we stopped by some other buildings and came across some royal procession. I don’t know what was going on, but there were tons of dudes on horses and a carriage. The empty carriage came by a couple times but the last time it came by, there were two dudes in it. I waved and smiled at one of the guys, and he waved back. THAT’S RIGHT BITCHES. I WAVED AT ROYALTY. I’M FUCKING FAMUZ. AWESOME.

From there, we checked out the only building in Madrid that was still representative of Moorish architecture. We also saw the Royal Convent of Barefoot Nuns. I’d passed by that the other day and loved the name, but didn’t know what it was about. I guess it’s a silent order of nuns. They don’t speak. They have visits from their families sometimes. They can see their families from behind a one-way viewing panel or something, but their families can’t see them. That’s some fucking hardcore shite. Seriously. They also walk around barefoot all the time… hence the name. H A R D C O R E E E E E.

Then we broke for lunch. Yay! The guy took us to this tapas place down the stairs from Plaza Meyor. It was $1 for everything! What we got were these little mini pieces of French bread with things inside them. I got a fried onion and smoked salmon, a mackerel and green peppers one, and a cheese? and tomato? one? Shit. They were delicious, and they only cost 1 EURO each! We sat at this table with these two other people, though, and the guy went to go buy the stuff and he took my stub… and unfortunately, I gave him 5 EURO thinking he’d return my 2 EURO change, but he didn’t, and so I didn’t ask. At the moment I’m thinking it could be pretty useful in Lisbon, though. Crap. @__@

Anyway, the girl is from Fremont and lives there right now. I tried to make conversation with her but it was a little awkward… cause I mostly just asked her a lotta questions and she answered them. Lol. The guy was a little easier to talk to. He is an architecture student from UW. I got his name and added him on Facebook to see if we know any of the same people, and I guess he knows Richard Lee, who is pretty much the last person I would have ever expected he would know… but I guess Richard IS an architecture major right now. Still, though. Weird. Well, at least one person is less disappointing that 0 persons we know mutually ^__^

They were off to the Reina Sofia after the tour, a museum which I fucking pimped out this whole trip. LOVE LOVE LOVE.

What else.

I’m missing this AWESOME language exchange right now which the girl Sarah and I met up with last night, Francesca, has been to before. Evidently the language exchange has lots of cute multi-lingual guys and about A HUNDRED people show up. There’s also one tomorrow. I’m sad. T__T Lucky bitches. I would’ve really liked to go 8[ Worst. Timing. When I left Barcelona, there was a concert there… all these things happening when I’m not in so-and-so places. BOOOOOOO.

Anyway. What else we learned about during the tour is how the guy who wrote Don Quixote (which I need to read now), Miguel Cervantes, fought in a war and lost an arm. After he recuperated, he went back to fight again. Haha.

We also learned about Spain’s Civil War, which is more recent than I thought, and a little bit about the Spanish Inquisition. It was all in all a VERY interesting tour, and loads and loads better than any fucking tour I’ve been on welllllll………… ever. Highly recommended.

When I got back, I was going to go see this movie I’d seen ads for. The movie was called “Los Extranos,” (with a ~ on the N), which means” The Strangers” in English. Turns out it as an American movie, so I changed my mind… it no longer seemed interestnig. Haha. So instead, I just hung around the hostel and surfed online and planned some Lisbon stuff.

So then it brings me to here, when I’m not doing much. Tomorrow is a day trip to Sintra. I’m SLIGHTLY worried. I don’t have an alarm clock, and I’m supposed to meet people at Rossio Square at 9AM. Umm. How am I supposed to wake up? I’m really unfortunately not too sure. @__@ It’s very hard meeting up with people here when you don’t have a phone.

Well, time to check my flight status. More later.

(PS – I am once again the only idiot American. ESPECIALLY flying to Portugal. Shite. All of the people going to the day trip tomorrow are Brazilian and Portuguese, too. I hope they understand me and I them. They all seem t/o have goodish English, though. Bah. Anyway, luckily, though, this airport is a lot more comfy and less awkward than the Copenhagen airport, so I don’t feel so bad ^__^ One pretty shitty thing, though, is that a lotta airports here don’t fucking list the gate number the airplane is at until like… 20 minutes or 10 minutes before the flight starts boarding. What’s up with that?! I’ve no idea.)

segovia, spain!

Went to Segovia today. I got ready to leave at around 10:30, and it was 11:30 by the time I got on the bus. I looked up directions online, but they were 100% not reliable. They were so not helpful. Damn you advice givers who can’t give advice. For starters, I was supposed to go to an Intercambiar, also known as an Interchange. It’s where busses and trains and metros converge in one central megahub.

Okay, so online, it said to take a bus right in front of Hotel Florida. Well, there were bus stops in front of Hotel Florida. Then when one crossed the street, there was the Interchange. It was not clear that you were supposed to board the busses IN the interchange… I went out and asked around. I asked the hotel people, who told me the bus stop was right in front of the hotel (not helpful), and the bus driver, who told me to go into the interchange. Thank GOD I speak a little bit of Spanish, or I woulda been shit out of luck. When I finally found the interchange, things were fairly easy from there. Buy a ticket. Go to a gate. It’s kinda like an airport, but for busses. The actual bus was only about half full. They had assigned seat numbers, but a few other people didn’t pay mind to the seat numbers, so I decided that I wouldn’t pay them any mind either. Sat towards the back of the bus and it was all good. Dozed off a good amount… at least more than half… and that was that. Got to Segovia and didn’t have a map, but it was pretty small and easy to figure out which general direction to walk into.

Once I finally did get a map, though, and thought I knew where I was going, I discovered I had no fucking clue. A lot of the streets there didn’t have labeled street signs, so I definitely walked into some of the shadier parts of town (well… Segovia doesn’t really have anywhere shady, so by shady, I really just mean less populated). At one point, I took a wrong turn and ended up having to literally hike up a trail with HUGE HUGE HUGE staircases so I could get to Alcazar Castle. Holy shit I was tired.

Getting lost.

Monastery of Lost Vivians.

When I finally got there, I paid 6 EURO to get into Alcazar, which Lonely Planet claims the Sleeping Beauty? Castle was modeled after. Is that the same as the Disney Castle? If so, that’s funny, because there was a castle in Germany that claimed to be the same thing…………….

Alcazar.

This knight is really just a big carebear.

Mmm textures.”

I really like this photo. Reminds me of this one photographer. The name escapes me now, but I have a bunch of his postcards.

Anyway, the castle was pretty interesting, because the architecture was slightly … Moor? inspired, and thus the patterns and textiles were different from what I had seen so much of in other parts of Europe during this trip. It was definitely a good change. The castle was FOOKING TINY though. So I dunno if it was worth 6 EURO, but still.

Then I just slowly started heading back, stopping by random little stops along the way, including the famed aqueduct. I mean, it was OKAY, but I think I shoulda gone to Toledo instead of Segovia. Oh well. Next time… maybe. I definitely need to come back to Spain, though. There is just so much to explore. Having spent like 5 days in Madrid – which isn’t a HUGE amount but is more than usual – I feel like I at least kinda know the area. It’s kind of a nice feeling.

Aqueduct!

Aqueduct!!

Random stops.

Anyway. That evening, Sarah and I went to meet up with a lady from CouchSurfing named Francesca. She’s in Spain teaching English, but is originally from Scotland. We went to eat tapas at a couple restaurants. The first was quite tasty but was mostly a buncha cheeses and random things on toast… the second place we got a black rice pudding that was wrapped in a crispy crunchy egg shell. SO DELICIOUS!!

When we got back it was around 11:30pm, so I just sat around and talked to this one Aussie dude, Scott, who was playing online poker in the kitchen. Shite, I’ve no idea.

Word.

And that was that day. Hell, now that I’m actually taking the time to write down this crap, it’s not so bad………… not taking very long at all. YAY!

just some thoughts about spain and spaniards.

At the moment, I don’t have time to write all about my trip in Spain, but it’ll be coming soon.

For starters, though, are some of my impressions on Spain. Mind you, during this trip, I have only been to the following cities: Barcelona, Madrid, Segovia, and Toledo. This is a 10 day trip, with only a half day in Toledo and Segovia (actually, Toledo is tomorrow, so I haven’t even been there… yet). So this isn’t really all-encompassing. After all, I’ve only been in the Catalan region and not any of the Basque country and other parts of the country I do not know the name of. So this is just a general opinion about Spain as I know it, which may or may not apply to Spain as a whole. Here goes.

First and foremost is this idea. It is prevalent in everyday life and basically sums up all things Spanish. And the idea is this: SPANIARDS JUST DON’T GIVE A FUCK. Seriously.

Don’t believe me? Here are some examples of Spaniards not giving a fuck.

A) Can’t speak Spanish? Who cares! They’ll go right on speaking Spanish to you anyway, like you know what they’re talking about. While the rest of the world has in the past however many years tried desperately to teach English to their residents, Spain seems like they’re just getting started. In comparison with their European counterparts, and hell, sometimes even their South American counterparts, Spain is pretty low in numbers when it comes to people who speak English. Even kids – I’m talking high-schoolers – don’t really speak English. And as far as the others, who claim to speak English, they speak English like I speak Spanish… not very well. And again, I’m talking young people.

B) They’ll light fireworks off in your face. Yup. I was talking to this Aussie chick who was at a festival in Barcelona and she was saying how fireworks were being pointed at people and lit off near their faces. Wouldn’t happen in America. Wouldn’t happen in Australia. Will happen in Spain.

C) As an Asian girl in Spain, I have been catcalled up the wazoo. Sherry and Tin-Win as well. I’m talking like… one out of five Spanish guys. Their catcalling is actually less degrading than in America, however. No whistles. No, “Hey baby!”’s. They’re mostly just, “Hello,” and the occasional, “Hola china,” (which I’m not sure if it is a catcall anyway). But they really don’t care that you’re just walking by. They’ll harass you anyway.

K, so enough about Spaniards not giving a fuck. What else do people need to know about Spain?

1) IT’S A LITTLE GRIMY. I don’t like saying that countries are ‘dirty’ because it gives people a wrong image of the country, but Spain is pretty damn dirty. It’s like Taiwan. The problem, however, is that it’s fucking hot here. So people wear flip-flops. And then they go home and their feet are black and caked with nastiness and they have to wash their feet. This is a common problem / solution, kids. More than one person has mentioned this. This is only in cities, though… I don’t think it’s the same further from the city centers.

2) SHIT IS CHEAP. Especially when compared to the rest of Europe, Spain is extremely affordable. The food is cheap. The drinks are cheap. The metro is cheap. The clothing is cheap. Every godamn thing is cheap. But no, they are not lacking in quality. In fact, generally quite the opposite. Some of the cheapest clothing and eating places are the best. Some of the more expensive… not necessarily so.

3) AVOID TAPASBARS CHAIN STORES. Spain is known for tapas, yes yes. There is also a chain store, however, called TapasBar, and let me just tell you… like most chain stores, that shit is sick.

4) FAST FOOD IS EXPENSIVE. Yet another point about food… ha. A fast food sandwich is on par with buying a gyro or a tapas plate here. about the same amount of food (more if you buy a gyro) and the quality is… mm, okay.

5) THE METRO ROCKS. The Metro here is a flat rate of 1.50 EURO a trip or 7.00 EURO for 10 trips, no matter how far you go. You can also transfer in between without paying extra. It is a fucking bargain, let me tell you. It’s also idiot-proof.

6) THE CROWD IS VERY DIVERSE. There are a lot of Asian people, African people, Indian people. Lots. Generally speaking, the African people and Indian people speak a helluva lot better English than most Spaniards. Don’t know about the Asian people, as I haven’t talked to any of them.

7) ASIAN PEOPLE MAKE SHIT DIRTY NO MATTER WHERE THEY GO. The area I’m staying at in Madrid right now is called Tirso de Molina. By chance, it’s mostly Chinese people who have settled here. They make everything godamn dirty. This whole place smells and looks like Taiwan. Hell, there are even Chinese characters everywhere. What is it about Chinese people, bringing their dirtiness to Chinatowns and Chinalands around the world?!!

7) SOME OLDER PEOPLE ARE REALLY NICE. On a couple occasions, I stopped to ask some older people some questions and then in return, as we were leaving, they would shout after us to keep our bags in front because of pickpockets. So kind, so kind <3

8) SOME OLDER PEOPLE ARE BITCHES. When I was in the Prado, I bust out my camera to take a photo and the lady came over like screaming at me to stop. I showed her that I didn’t take any pictures but she didn’t understand or something, and kept yelling at me to “BORRAR” “BORRAR” “BORRAR”. Shit, I didn’t know what BORRAR meant. She gave up after a while. Later I discovered it meant “to erase.” Bitch. They didn’t have a single sign up saying NO CAMERAS. No one said anything about it… BITCH! At another place, at an outdoor used bookstore area, I was looking through this Jane Austen book (I think it was Jane Austen), thinking of buying it because I like to translate things (books, songs, etc.) to learn languages. This old lady came over and started bitching at me for looking through it. Shit, isn’t that what people do at used bookstores? BITCH.

9) PEOPLE HERE ARE FASHIONABLE AS FUCK. And I’m not just saying this because I actually found clothes I like in Spain (a damn near impossible task in the States). It’s a common consensus. People in Spain know how to fucking dress… and they’re not even being boring about it. They all look fairly different and fairly unique. Kinda surprising, considering #10…

10) STORES HERE ARE REPETITIVE AS FUCK. Despite the fact that people here are fashionable as fact, it’s pretty much the same 10 stores copy and pasted everywhere. Granted, they’re all slightly different from one another, but still.

11) MINIMARTS, NOT SUPERMARKETS, RULE THE LAND. Finding a supermarket in Madrid and Barcelona is a fucking task, let me tell you. Minimarts can be found on like every other corner, and so can fruit and vegetable shops. And people definitely use these more than supermarkets, as supermarkets can only be found on the downstairs level of the department store El Corte Ingles and in areas that are less densely populated on the outskirts of the city.

12) SUPERMARKETS ARE CLOSED ON SUNDAYS. I was trying desperately to find sea salt and found this out the hard way. Oh, well.

13) STREET ART IS ALIVE AND KICKING. And I mean real street art, not graffiti. Street performers abound in popular part of Madrid and Barcelona, and the amazing part is… people give them money. Like. Often.

14) DISSENT IS POPULAR. Among the younger generations, dissent is quite quite visible. You’ll see a lot of protests and a lot of slogans. One art protest we came across had lots of these… such as, “Barcelona is dead,” and similar types of things. More about that later.

15) PEOPLE IN SPAIN BASICALLY JUST EAT AND DRINK AND PARTY AND SLEEP. One would think that that’s the case everywhere, but it’s extreme here. Shops really do close down for siestas. People really do eat dinner at 9PM. Shit really does stay open til like 4AM. And so on.

And in closing, the rule that is ruled above all:
SPANISH PEOPLE JUST DON’T GIVE A FUCK.

The culture here is amazing. Just make sure you know at least a little Spanish before you head on over.

barcelona, day one, part two.

Alright, so, like I said, I had to meet Tin-Win and Sherry at the hotel. The guy at the front desk said, “Are you going to live there?” and I said, “No,” even though I had a shitload of baggage with me. He obviously didn’t believe me, because he said, “If you’re going to live with them, you have to pay extra,” and I said, “OK.”

That evening after I got there, we went and walked around a little………. first stop… dinner. Appropriate. Dinner was this small restaurant. We got there kinda early, and I think it opened at 8PM, so we sat around for a bit and waited for it to open up. When it finally opened, the waitress was really nice and explained things to us because the menu was in Catalan and Spanish and we obviously can’t read the whole godamn thing. She had good English. We also asked her for some suggestions of shit to do, and she went out of her way and tried really hard to find us interesting things to go to. Very nice of her.

We had some bachalau and really rich mushroom pasta and some other stuff. It was fairly tasty and not too expensive. Not too expensive at all. Sherry and Tin-Win got a set meal that came with a whole! bottle! of! wine! and it was okay. Actually, it was gross, because wine is gross. But it is okay in terms of price, because it was a fucking bargain! Actually, most food in Spain is a fucking bargain. I am a fan. This place is definitely way cheaper than elsewhere in Europe… I mean, I think anyway.

After that, we went to La Rambla and just walked around a little. There was this famous? cafe? there and we went outside it and sat on a street bench. Didn’t buy anything although all these people had a red drink and we were trying to figure out the whole time what the red drink was. Anyway, the bench fit three people. It was divided in half. The three of us sat on the left half, and the right half was empty. At some point, a chubby dude with glasses comes and sits down next to us. He has a flyer. He wants to know where so-and-so place is. This, by the way, is like the second time someone has asked us or me for directions. When I first got to Barcelona and was running through the EXTREMELY HOT subway, some guy stopped to ask me for directions. More of those to come later in Spain as well. Apparently, we look like we know what we’re doing, even when we don’t.

Anyway, guy sits down. He has an interesting accent. We ask him where he’s from. He’s Russian. But he doesn’t have the hot Russian accent, so what good is he?!!! He’s asking around and trying to find out where the bar is, but no dice. No one knows. Everyone’s a tourist. I tell him I’ll go with him, because I can translate, because he doesn’t know any Spanish. We approach a group of people, but he insists on speaking English… it’s a group of relatively young kids from Guadalajara, Spain. Apparently, only one of them knows how to speak enough English to answer us. He tells us he doesn’t know, though, cause he’s a tourist, too. Hell, most Spanish tourists are Spanish. It’s pretty fucking weird.

So we approach an Indian dude standing near the Metro. He doesn’t speak English.

So we approach a taxi driver, and he knows what’s up. We return to the group. This Russian guy without hot Russian accent is, by the way, there with two of his friends. They work for CitiBank or some shit and are there for training. Why doesn’t he have a hot accent? He’s Russian, but lived in New Zealand for seven years. His name is also weird. It’s Maxim. Anyway, I’m really interested by all this, because, I just went to Russia, and well, he’s a random stranger and random strangers are fun. Tin-Win and Sherry, however, don’t seem to be amused or enthused at all. Maxim’s friends, Vladimir and Dmitry (nice Russian names… Dmitry joked that we can call Vlad “Putin”), were there with him as well. They didn’t really talk to us… Dmitry said a couple lines, but the other guy didn’t say anything.

Maxim wanted us to go with them but Tin-Win and Sherry didn’t want to, of course. I can’t wholly blame them, because it didn’t seem that exciting anyway, but it was just funny how much they didn’t even want to talk to them. Finally, Sherry said that we would walk with them halfway and we would part ways then.

Along the way, Maxim said that he wanted to say something to Sherry. Sherry was jokingly scared. He asked if he could be honest. What he said next is not, I don’t think, what any of us were expecting.

He started off by saying that I was cool and supportive and open and easy to get along with. He said that was the good stuff. Then he said that Tin-Win was supportive of me, because although Tin-Win didn’t want to go out, she said, “If you want to, I will.”

He said that Sherry seemed defensive and insecure. Interesting. o__O

The only (primarily) funny part was that after he said that, half an hour later, Sherry was still saying, “I can’t believe he said that!” which kind of, in some ways, proves his point. Ha ha? But yeah, kinda weird that he said that stuff to begin with.

What was also funny is that he couldn’t believe our English was so good. He’s not the only one, we would soon find out. Many Europeans are quite amazed when Asian people have good English! It’s quite funny. We said he was American, and he’s like, “But you look Asian!” How to we even respond to that?!!!!

blah blah bloorg bloorg.

lip piercing infection hath temporarily caused vacation to take a turn for the worse. off to the supermarket i go, at 9am, in hopes that they: 1) are open and 2) have sea salt for me to soak my piercing with. BLoOrG, I SAY! BLoOrG!!!

barcelona, day one.

Didn’t see much in Copenhagen… all I saw was the view from the bus… weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. Real fun. But the bus driver was talking about Copenhagen, and that was interesting, cause he was quite proud of the city. I mean, why wouldn’t he be? It’s awesome. It’s Socialist. Sign me up. He was talking about how there are like 10 million bikes there. I’m quite very impressed by Copenhagen’s biking system. The bikes have their own signals on major streets! That’s insanity! But in a good way, definitely. I’ve never seen a city with so much attention paid to cyclists. And there are all kinds of cyclists, too… from the anal kind who wear skin-tight clothing to the women who are biking with high heels on. Awesome.

Well, I took the shuttle to the airport from the cruise. Twas like a half hour ride. When we got there, Hans Christian greeted us. He said that if we had questions to ask, to ask him. So I said, “I have a question,” and he said, “Yes?” and I said, “Is Hans Christian a popular name?”

Ho ho ho.

I’m so funny.

Anyway, I got to the airport at like. 9:30 @__@ My flight was at 14:20. @__@ And boarding was 13:50. They didn’t post the gate until 13:30. Ridiculous, Copenhagen airport!

Here’s my entry from the airport:
I must say, I feel pretty freaking strange flying out of the Copenhagen airport to Barcelona. Judging from passport, I’m pretty much the only non-Danish person here. Or at the very least, non-Scandanavian. AKA I’m the only Asian person. Not even that… but the only like, etchnic non-Caucasian person, period (Spaniards being hard to distinguish).

And here’s my entry from the plane… sin accentos porque no puedo hacerlo:
Finalmente entiendo porque volando en Europa es demasiado barata! Todos cosas cuestan monedas! Por ejemplo, un jamon y queso SANDWICH es 5 Euros. Un agua? 1.5 Euros. No puedes tener mas que una carry-on. El dos cuesta 22 Euros o similar. Es 14:30. No comi nada mucho desde… 6:45. Y 6:45 comi solamente tres PIECES de WATERMELON y un huevo de tipo “sunny side-up.” Tengo muy muy hambre!!!! Y no se cuando debo usar mi espanol porque mi espanol no es bueno, pero, quien hablan ingles? No estoy seguro cual es el menor – mi espanol o sus ingles. Pues, voy a ver en Barcelona. Antes de ahora, siente muy EXCITED a ver si ya se espanol, pero ahora, estoy nerviosa porque estaran muchas anos que hablo espanol (sin cuando eva y yo tenemos los “dias de espanol” y cuando alex y yo hablamos espanol en la casa – pero en estes situaciones, siempre usamos los mismo palabras y nadie… sabia espanol muy bien… es como, “THE BLIND LEADING THE BLIND.” No es practiccar realmente, solamente es un poco divertido.) Escribando este ahora es similar, pero estoy usando palabras que no use mucho. Pero, no se si los CONJUGATIONS son correctos o no. Problamente no. Haha. Sobre una otra nota, espero que no voy a morir porque estoy sobre un vuela de Spanair, y el mes previosa, muchas personas orien sobre una vuela de Spanair. Una otra cosa. Mi padre me cuenta que en Europa, el ELECTRICITY es el mismo, y no necesito un ADAPTOR especial. No es la verdad!! Compre INTERNET en el aeropuerto por 80 Danish Kroner ($15 USD)… por cuatro horas. Use esto para dos horas cuando mi BATTERY morio. No use dos horas. El ADAPTOR cuesta $50 USD; no compre. Estaba en Europa es mucha mucha cara. No puedo lo AFFORD. Yo REGRET EXTENDING mi viaje una semana. Y voy a Japon tambien! No voy a tener monedas T__T Ayo.

So now it’s nighttime at the hotel. From the airport, I had to take the train and then the metro to get to the hotel. It wasn’t so bad, just took like, an hour. I was supposed to meet Tinwin and Sherry downstairs at 6:30 but I didn’t get there til 7:00, and they went upstairs already, and I was confused, so I asked the front desk where they were. BAD IDEA.

More about this later @__@ Gotta go to bed now! Ta ta.