Wednesday (March 26) marked the beginning of the Barcelona trip. I got to the airport and dropped my huge backpack off at check-in. 30 seconds later, I remembered I had forgotten to take out my 5 rolls of undeveloped film. So I ran back to see about getting it back. The lady made me go downstairs to "Sala 5" (along with sinister thunder and lightning). The guard there definitely did not like the looks of me. The lady in Sala 5 said the bag was already on the plane but that she was getting it back for me. (Well, in that case, wouldn´t it already be too late? But since things were in motion, it would be better not to leave and risk having my bag not get to Barcelona.) About 20 minutes later, my backpack arrives and I take out the film. At this point she asks if she can scan it before sending it back. Well, why not? She also says I´m going to miss the flight, even though there´s still 10 minutes before boarding time. So then she decides I might just make it (weirdo) and I run upstairs and catch up with Jeromia in the café. Paulencia called all worried that I was going to miss the flight and I played along. Later she was mad about wasting phone time on me and my jokes. I had to sit next to Bentsen in the exit row so I was pretty sure we were all going to die. The lady behind Noemí was definitely on TV the night before on a hospital show Inés (my señora) and I watched. So on the bus between the plane and the Barcelona terminal (yes, it´s that kind of airport) I got her autograph. I got to the baggage carousel first because I knew our flight number. For some reason there was a sandwich partially wrapped in foil sitting on the unmoving carousel. As each wave of people from our group arrived, they all kept asking me if it was mine. Why would I leave a sandwich on the baggage carousel?? As we were leaving, they told me to make sure I remembered it. I replied that if I forgot it, it would come back around anyway. When I got my bag, the side pocket was definitely completely covered in sticky red liquid, like runny jam or cough syrup. It was also on Dawn´s, Meredith´s, and Shelly´s bags. Noemí helped us file complaints. To keep from getting more of it on my jeans, I had to carry my huge backpack by hand. Not cool. As we were leaving, there was definitely a protest starting by the airport workers against the war. There was also one in the city near our hotel so we had to get out and walk to the hotel. Lucky for me and my stained bag we were on the fifth floor of our hotel. I was with Eric and Jeromia in a triple room as usual. Jeromia´s bed was definitely a Craftmatic Adjustable type and mine was a Murphy. We had fun with that and took pictures of about 8 of us on 2 fully Adjusted beds. Lunch was on our own so we walked down Las Ramblas, the famous street vendors´ street in Barcelona (watch out for the pickpockets, I hear, though nothing happened to anyone in our group during the trip). Found a café and had fideuas (noodles with large prawns that looked at you with their eyes which were in the heads that were still attached to their bodies) and some pretty crappy fish. It was my first time to have to open prawn and I decided that I still hate seafood. Having to pull antennae out of my mouth wasn´t fun either. After meeting back at the hotel we rode to the Caves of Freixenet, a huge maker of cava, which is apparently what you call any champagne that was made outside of the Champagne region of France. Bentsen and I pulled some MST3K action on the promotional video we watched first, and then we all descended into the mossy caves of Freixenet. The guy explained the whole process of cava-making to us and we took pictures with all the musty bottles and Cask of Amontillado scenery. Then we got in this little tour train and whizzed through the loading bays and factory parts and stuff. Someone almost fell out. At the end they led us to a salón and we all got to try a glass of cava. It was a lot better than the champagne I´ve had before. We had such a great time taking pictures of the group. Kristin and Chuck said they would take Aikido with me next semester too. It was a great way to start the trip. After a rather disappointing hotel dinner, nobody had plans to go out, so, frustrated, I played cards downstairs with Andrés (like in Granada). He taught us the Spanish version of UNO, using the Spanish deck of cards [swords (espada -> spades), cups (hearts), coins (diamonds), and maces (look like clubs for hurting people or baby seals)]. We teased him about having the suit of cups because there is this guy who has been killing people around the outskirts of Madrid since February and leaving a card from the suit of cups next to each victim. Joanna made a "your mama" joke to Andrés and he got very offended. Apparently you simply do not do that in Spain. While he was whooping up on us, he called us his niños and said that he was our tartarabuelo (sp?), which is great-great-grandfather.

The next day, Thursday, we went to Fundación Miró, dedicated to the artist Joan (Jo-AHN) Miró. Once again, so pretentious. The group was divided into Students in the Art History class vs. Everybody else. The Everybody else group had about 10 people in it. The art was no better than something a child would do, primary colors and heavy black lines. There was even a set of three large white canvases, each with a single heavy black line scrawled across it. I took a picture to remind myself why art sucks in case I forget in the future. Noemí said that it was easy of course, but because he was the first to do it, that´s what made it impressive. I disagree. The only cool thing was a metal sculpture with pools of standing mercury. Then we went to Parc Güell to see some examples of Gaudí´s architecture. There was a mosaic sculpture of a lizard, two houses, and a large curved bench, the longest in the world. It was nice to see, but we were there a little too long. Then on to La Sagrada Familia, the cathedral that Gaudí started building but did not complete. The outside decorations are really pretty cool, but aside from the façades there´s not that much to see. There is nothing inside, just construction equipment. We climbed the two towers (349 steps) by foot rather than paying 2 whole euros to use the elevator but the view wasn´t that good. Kind of a disappointing morning all in all. Instead of subjecting ourselves to the hotel food, 5 of us decided to go to an Indian restaurant we were handed a flyer for (people do this all the time here: stand on the street and hand you flyers). After walking in different directions for a while, we finally found it: Restaurante Punjab, serving Indian and Ecuadorean food (why not, they go together). It was great, made me miss my mom´s cooking…got to have naan and chicken tikka. It was free time, so we walked around and found the equivalent of a dollar store so we went in and played around with the security cameras before making some minor purchases and leaving. We also walked to the museum of something and went down to see the Roman ruins below the city. In the elevator to go down to the ruins, there was a digital counter that said 2003. As we descended it definitely counted down to –12. So cheesy. The ruins were pretty neat; there were the remains of an outer wall, a guard tower, a laundry, and a winemaking facility. They had utensils and coins on display and rocks with traces of dyes used in the laundry. There were also large round pottery jars that were apparently used to make some kind of condiment with fish offal and salt. One of the other tourists told us it was like ketchup to the Romans. Later on he also said it was an aphrodisiac. Joanna and I decided that if someone offered us a glass of salty fish poo offal, it would not make us want to have sex with that person. We ended up laughing so hard I thought we would be kicked out of the year –12. Back at the hotel, there was another protest in the evening that passed by, so we took pictures from Kristin´s balcony. It was also getting to be time for our prank. Since Andrés said he was our great-great-grandfather, we bought candles of the numbers 8 and 6 and a birthday card for him from the dollar store. We told the waitress at dinner to put them in his dessert cause it was his birthday and then we all sang Cumpleaños feliz to him. He was very confused. Joanna and Jeromia were nervous before it was over that he would get offended like with the "your mama" joke but it all turned out well. After dinner, Aishah, Paulencia, and I left to go catch a concert of Ella Fitzgerald music at a bar. So we ended up taking the Barcelona metro for the first time. It´s definitely dirtier and worse than the Madrid metro, and I heard later there are rats running around the tracks, but I didn´t see them. Turned out the place was very small and since we weren´t eating, there was no place to stand. So they went back to the hotel and I walked to the port to join some other people who were having tapas. We ended up walking back to the hotel because we could not catch a taxi to save our lives.

Friday I woke up to a low battery warning on my phone and no time to charge it. After breakfast we put all of our bags in a holding room in the hotel and left to take our first walking tour of the city. Oh, and it was raining. Saw another freaking cathedral (at least it had a cloister with ducks). In the 20 minutes between that and our next tour, Chuck, Kristin, Melissa, and I found a hostel to stay the weekend (the school´s tour of Barcelona ended that day). The problem was I had already told Aishah and Paulencia I would stay with them, but this was going to be closer to the city center (10 minutes from our original hotel) and, I assumed, cheaper. The lady told us there were plenty of rooms left so we didn´t make a reservation. With doubles at 50 euros, it would only cost me 25 euros a night. Then we go to Palacio Güell, a house that Gaudí built for the same guy he designed the park for. It was a really cool house. I would love to live there. The furniture, the architecture, the interior design. The funny part was that some pieces of furniture were missing (cause the family fled from Barcelona and took them with them) so in their place there were life-size black and white photos of them. Kinda weird. The roof had a whole bunch of decorated chimneys and we took pictures of them (lucky for us the rain started up again right when we got onto the roof). After the tour Chuck and Kristin ran to the hostel to make reservations while I stayed behind without telling them in order to tell Aishah and Paulencia I would not stay with them. So since I have a poor sense of direction, I got lost trying to join Kristin and Chuck at the hostel. When I arrived, it was full of people making reservations. Since Chuck and Kristin did not know where I had disappeared to, they did not get me a room and the place had just run out of doubles, so I ended up getting a single by myself for 30 euros a night. Kinda sucky. In addition, the other students had gone to Les Quatre Gats (sp?), a restaurant that Picasso used to eat at. Since I wasn´t going to get this sorted out anytime soon, I told them to go without me. I stayed with Chuck and Kristin, who were sorry that my room situation turned out the way it did. We ended up eating an unsatisfying meal at KFC (they would not let me order Crispy Strips unless it was in a meal deal, so I got popcorn chicken instead…jerks) and we moved our stuff from the hotel to the hostel. My room was on a different floor from the others. I didn´t even know what room they were in and my phone was pretty much dead so I didn´t want to call them. Feeling pretty lonely and tired, I took a nap. Luckily Paulencia sent me a message later (and my phone was recharged) so I met her and Aishah and we toured the National Museum of Catalonian Art (ack, pre-romanesque and gothic, not my faves) and watched a pretty awesome light and music show at the fountain outside. Afterwards, Aishah wanted to try Indian food for the first time, so we went back to the Indian restaurant. Good food again. Then we wanted to karaoke. So we started walking towards the nearest karaoke place. It was night already and there were people all over in the streets chanting "no a la guerra" so we kinda got caught up in the spirit of it and yelled our heads off and banged on metal shop covers. The karaoke place (at the end of a real hike through the streets of Barcelona) was pretty dead. Paulencia and I sang Midnight Train to Georgia. Aishah can actually sing and the crowd of 4 fell in love with her rendition of Hero. I sang I Just Called to Say I Love You (this place had a huge selection of English songs) rather well if I do say so myself. By now the place was filling a little, but Aishah thought we were still the best there. To finish, the three of us sang Can´t Take My Eyes Off of You and were showered with applause.

Saturday I got up early to meet Aishah and Paulencia to drive to Montserrat and Sitges (they rented a car). I was at the bus stop to go to the airport to pick up the car at 8:00 AM like we said. They showed up at 10:00. Luckily they had warned me, so I went and had breakfast. (They got up late, then got on the right bus going the wrong way and didn´t realize it till they were almost at the Freixenet Caves.) After picking up the car (a standard, so only Aishah knew how to drive it), we promptly got lost on the way to Montserrat. We ended up having to follow some guys to the exit. Montserrat is a large mountain where hermits used to live. Now you go there to see the black Virgin, a statue of the Virgen de Montserrat (Barcelona´s virgin) that somehow started darkening until it was completely black. We took the funicular up the mountain (it was Aishah and Paulencia´s first time) and went to the church to see the statue. There was a wedding going on with lots of old-time cars parked outside. After seeing the statue, we walked to one of the other churches on the mountaintop and took some pictures. It was a good hike, but all in all, I wouldn´t recommend Montserrat as a tourist destination. Then we left for Sitges. After getting lost again, we eventually came to it. What an awesome city. It´s right on the beach, but we walked around the city itself for a little while before coming to the Buena Vida Bar, overlooking a smaller section of the beach separated from the main area. The bar was very comfy and the waiter/owner Philippe (from France) was very cool. We ended up sitting there for a few hours and talking with him whenever he came by. Had a great vegetarian sandwich that he designed himself and he treated us each to a glass of roset. It was great. We even met a woman named Gloria from Houston who had been living there for 3 years. After nightfall, we said goodbye and went down to the smaller beach, which was much nicer than the main one. Took my shoes off and ran around…it was my first time on a beach in probably years. We wrote "Gracias, Sitges" in the sand and sang and danced to water-themed songs (Brandy, You´re a Fine Girl; Sittin´on the Dock of the Bay; and the Ike and Tina version of Proud Mary). When we got back to Barcelona, we went to Poble Espanyol (an architectural tourist attraction that has houses from every province of Spain in it) and by coincidence ran into Joanna, Jeromia, and Lauren V in the ticket line. Aishah and Paulencia decided to head back to the hotel to shower and change and I gave them my backpack (with my passport and plane tickets) so I didn´t have to carry it around. They would join us later. I went in to Poble Espanyol with the other three and we had dinner and stayed until they started turning off lights and mopping to make us leave. The rest of the Poble was dead, so we left. Aishah and Paulencia still had not come back…with my backpack. After taking a taxi to another part of town and dancing for a while at a lame club and then searching unsuccessfully for Bosc de les Fades, a really cool bar Becca had told me about, I went back to the hostel.

Sunday we checked out of the hostel and put our bags in the hostel lobby. I felt bad for abandoning Kristin and Chuck all weekend, so I figured I´d spend Sunday with them. After grabbing breakfast we headed to the port and boardwalk again and had lunch and played cards in the food court. Chuck and Melissa left to catch the train to Madrid (Melissa doesn´t like flying and Chuck was nice enough to keep her company). I ended up walking around the mall by myself for a while and then walked to Las Ramblas and tried to find Bosc de les Fades on my own in the rain for about an hour. Definitely found the Indian neighborhood of Barcelona…they were everywhere. After I finally decided to stop and ask someone where it was, it turned out it was like 3 minutes from the hostel, but since I didn´t have anyone to visit it with, I stepped inside, looked around and left (couldn´t even take a picture because I still didn´t have my camera, which was in my backpack). After going back to the hostel, I played cards with Kristin till it was time to go to the airport. There was a big fuss while we waited for the girls to grab all their stuff and then in the Metro there was some confusion as to where to go. Since I had already gotten to the airport successfully one time, I slipped away with Eric and we took the bus. Ironically, the girls still managed to get there before us. Bought some gummi bears to eat on the flight and we got to Madrid. There was a Metro stop after the airport that I still hadn´t been to, so I went the opposite direction of everyone else so I could cross that one off my list (Paulencia kindly accompanied me). And that was the Barcelona trip.