Barcelona, BABY!

Hola amigos! Yes, yes...I know what you're thinking...how could I have waited this long to update my blog?! Well, I apologize! The last week and a half in Spain was full of traveling, studying for exams, and saying my "hasta luegos." Now that I've been at home for two weeks, I've finally settled back in to life here in the good ole US of A. Honestly I felt very "numb" the last week I was in Spain. I'll explain more in my next post but I wanted to provide you all with some reasons as to why my post about Barcelona has been delayed! So without further ado, I'll recount my weekend in Barcelona! 

First of all, I've wanted to go to Barcelona for the last 6 years....or since the first time I learned about Barcelona in 8th grade. Notably, when I was in 8th grade my Spanish teacher gave us a project...we were asked to recreate Las Ramblas, a mile or so long street in Barcelona full of shops, restaurants, markets, museums, and street performers. My friend and I chose to be lip syncing street performers for our part of the project...and boy were we talented! Beyond that, I learned about La Sagrada Familia, La Casa Botlló, and more. I fell in love with the idea of traveling to Barcelona...I fell in love with the architecture...with the famous sites...and I determined that I would one day travel to this beautiful city. 

So with that, I planned out our Barcelona trip like no other! I wanted to take full advantage of my short time, so I made sure to buy tickets online to the most famous attractions and to find directions and addresses. Needless to say, I was prepared for a trip of a lifetime!

On July 25th our bus was to leave from Madrid to Barcelona at 12:30am on Thursday night/Friday morning, so we first had to take a bus from Toledo to Madrid. My host mom realized how important this trip was to me, so she packed me a "picnic" as she called it! It was perfect for our 8 hour bus trip, let me tell ya!

A sandwich, plum, nectarine, melon, and
donuts/pastries for breakfast the next morning!

Thankfully we navigated the Toledo bus station, two Madrid bus stations and the Madrid metro swimmingly! And then buckled down for our overnight bus ride to Barcelona. Before long we arrived on Friday morning at 8:30am or so. We found our hostel and then headed to La Sagrada Familia! This has to be the most incredible building I've ever been in...EVER. Antoni Gaudí, a famous architect, began constructing this church in 1882 and it still isn't finished! As you can see, there are cranes in this picture! Even when we were inside the church, the construction workers were busily at work! The amount of detail is simply unbelievable! I heard it's expected to be complete in 2016, but who knows!?

Nativity side of La Sagrada Familia 

Beautiful stained-glass windows that I'm
sure are as tall as my house, if not taller!

I find it so interesting that Gaudí dedicated his life to this building, believing that it represented his journey to salvation. As I learned in my architecture class, in gothic architecture it is believed that God is in the heavens and God is light. Therefore, everything is as tall as possible in order to "reach out" to God. Similarly, there are tons of stained-glass windows to let in light. But wait, there's more! Gaudí's architectural plans consisted of 3 different parts: La Natividad, La Pasión, and La Gloria. The Nativity facade is shown in the picture above. This was the only side that was complete by the time Gaudí died. Afterwards a committee was developed to interpret his designs in order to construct La Pasión and La Gloria. Things became more complicated when the design plans were burned during the Spanish Civil War...so the committee is vital in determining Gaudí's original plans.

Moreover, there are 2 main towers, one that represents Christ and one that represents the Virgin Mary. Then there are 4 towers for the evangelists and 12 for the apostles. CRAZY, right?! What I find most humbling is that Gaudí didn't do any of this for money; he simply wanted to demonstrate his love for God. He even lived in La Sagrada Familia in miserable conditions. My Spanish professor explained that Gaudí was staring at La Sagrada Familia in the street one day...he wasn't paying attention and was hit by a car. Based on his appearance, everyone assumed he was just another beggar--he didn't receive immediate aid and soon passed away. While his death was unfortunate...especially in such a manner...I admire his passion so very much, and his death only further demonstrates how dedicated he was to La Sagrada Familia, to his journey to salvation, and to his relationship with God.

After touring La Sagrada Familia for some time, we walked to La Casa Milà and La Casa Botlló, two very famous houses that were also constructed by Gaudí earlier in his life. Unfortunately La Casa Milà was covered up by some tarp/construction/renovation type of thing, so we couldn't see it :( but we were able to see La Casa Botlló! Gorgeous architecture!!!

La Casa Milà, popularly known as
 La Pedrera (thank you Google!)

La Casa Botlló

Afterwards we went to a delicious burger place! We were craving this...and thankfully this burger was as big as my face. At this point I really missed American food if you couldn't tell!

PURE HAPPINESS. 

With more energy after eating...or perhaps feeling more fatigued after eating too much...I can't quite remember...we explored more of the city and then hit up the beach! Sasa, a friend from Northwestern, taught me some ultimate frisbee tricks! While I nearly hit several people on the beach, I finally managed to master the ultimate frisbee skills! Well...to some extent. We had fun! But it unfortunately began to rain so we decided to do the next best thing...get gelato!

Relaxin' at the beach!

After gelato, grabbing dinner, and showering, we headed to The Magic Fountain of Montjüic! It was here that we watched a beautiful light and color spectacle synced to music! 

Magic Fountain of Montjüic!

The next day we got up bright and early to go to Park Güell, a garden complex designed by the one and only...ANTONI GUADÍ. The most popular part of the park is a sea serpent bench made out of broken tiles. It's absolutely beautiful! 

Sea serpent bench with Houa, Mary, and Hannah!

Afterwards we strolled in and out of some tourist shops and stopped to check out Barcelona's Cathedral.

Catedral de Barcelona

Then we were asked to meet up with some of our other friends who just got back from Barcelona's chocolate museum. They raved and raved about this museum...so then we decided we HAD to go too! Before we went, we had to get some real food, so we went to a Chinese restaurant! IT WAS DELICIOUS. And we needed it! Again, as you can tell, we couldn't take anymore Spanish food! It had been 5 weeks straight of nothing but Spanish food, so we were dying for American and Chinese!

FINALLY we made it to the chocolate museum where we saw tons and tons of sculptures made entirely of chocolate! Our ticket to enter the museum was the wrapper of a chocolate bar we got to eat! It was pretty cool!

Messi, a famous soccer player, made entirely
out of chocolate!

After the chocolate museum we met up with our friends again to determine our plans for the evening. First we decided to go to Las Ramblas! I finally got to live out my 8th grade Spanish project! We had a ton of fun walking down Las Ramblas and exploring the shops, museums, and markets! In a crunch for time we went to Subway for dinner...it was the best! Haha! I have never loved Subway so much! And then we decided to go out and explore Barcelona's nightlife! As we were walking down the streets at around 12am or so, simply minding our own business, someone threw eggs at us from a window above. One egg landed all over my shoe and soaked the padding. I was not too happy. I don't know why we were targeted, especially because we were simply talking and walking...not being obnoxious at all. Nevertheless, we cleaned ourselves up a bit and continued on. We were determined to take advantage of our last night in Barcelona!

In order to take advantage of our time, a friend of mine signed us up for a list to get us into some clubs for free--so long as we arrived before 1am. Unfortunately we got a late dinner and transportation took a little longer than expected (we also got hit by eggs of course), so we didn't make it by 1am. Someone gave us some free vouchers, but then the bouncer told us there were too many people and we couldn't go inside. He asked us to step out of line...but then allowed the people behind us to go in! Again...I'm not sure why, but it really made us feel bad for a little while! We just were not lucking out at all! 

After all this bad luck, we decided to walk down to the beach and just relax for a little bit. I mean, we were still in Barcelona of course! While I continued to wonder why we were more or less discriminated against, some French guys came up to us. One of my friends "fell in love" with one of the French guys...so we decided to stay at the beach and talk to them until the wee hours of the morning. Then everyone wanted McDonald's all of a sudden, so we walked thirty minutes to finally find a McDonald's...to then discover that it's drive-thru only...and we of course didn't have a car! Let me just say...it was an interesting evening that didn't end until 7am when we finally got back to our hostel. We weren't drinking...we weren't clubbing...we were simply talking to people from all over the world! It was pretty cool to meet people from England, Italy, South Africa, France, and more! And we finally had a "true Spanish night!" What do I mean by this, you ask? Well the Spaniards stay up until 6am when they go out...and we finally pulled it off! I never thought I was capable...but we somehow were still functioning at 7am. JUST BARELY. After searching for our hostel for nearly 30 minutes, and unintentionally watching the sun rise...we immediately crashed in our beds. We only had two hours until we had to check out! Funny enough, the Russian girls who were sharing our room with us had an alarm that went off at just about 7am...they were waking up as we were going to bed! 

As I'm sure you can guess, I was a zombie the next day. Thankfully we had an 8 hour long bus ride for me to catch up on my sleep! That certainly helped!

Now as I reflect on my trip to Barcelona...I must say that my expectations may have been too high. Because I've wanted to travel here since I was in 8th grade, I expected this place to be amazing and almost magical! While the tourist attractions were certainly magical--I loved La Sagrada Familia and basically everything designed by Gaudí--the people were not so magical. Unfortunately people in restaurants and clubs were rude to us...multiple times for no apparent reason. And of course the whole egg scenario wasn't too fun. There were also men from around the world who were not very respectful.

Don't get me wrong, I'm very grateful to have had the opportunity to go to Barcelona, and I truly enjoyed the majority of my time there, but it simply was not what I expected. I was sure Barcelona was going to be my favorite city in Spain, but based on what I've seen and now know, I am in love with Granada! Ironically I knew very little about Granada before my trip--I actually didn't even plan on going to Granada initially--but now Granada has my heart! It's funny how these types of experiences can generate mixed emotions and make you feel much more appreciative in general!

I think I got one more post in me--so stay tuned! Adiós for now!

Picture credits:
http://www.bestplacesinspain.com/994/casa-mila-la-pedrera-a-gaudi-building-barcelona/