Week 8.0: From Girona to Paris

Something I've been meaning to write about for a while... classes over here are not easy (or at least not a walk in the park)! I'm not sure if IES Barcelona is the exception to the rule, but in my opinion it is a misconception that study abroad classes are a joke because I have found exactly the opposite to be true. This past week I had midterms and yes, I survived, but boy was I tired when the weekend circled back around. Lucky me, I had no travel plans set in stone so for a second weekend in a row I was able to explore my own city!

On Friday morning, I met friends from IU in Barceloneta along the beach for brunch. To our dismay, the brunch place we had picked did not open for another hour and so we wandered down the street to find somewhere else. At that point, it became the morning of wandering and eating (basically nothing new for the study abroad experience). Before deciding upon FOC, a Latin place known for their drinks, we stopped at a french fry stand and another café for coffees. After maybe 3-4 hours of eating and chatting, we hopped on the subway to explore the Gracia neighborhood where I was told I could find stores other than Zara. In Gracia, we stumbled upon a strip of boutiques advertising for rebajas (month-long Spanish sales) and wandered up and down the street window shopping for the remainder of the afternoon. I was good and only bought one thing... you're welcome mom and dad :) That night I met up with a local friend I've made and finally got to see some bars that were not infested with study abroad students like me. One of my favorite parts of the night was visiting a bar that I'm now told is called a "speak easy"? Basically, the place was up two flights of stairs in a building I could have sworn housed apartments, totally hidden from the street. There we found live music, pool tables, and great drinks! Overall, a fun Friday.

The next day, I ventured outside of Barcelona by train with my same friends from the day before. We now joke that I'm an honorary hoosier because I could tell you all the ins and outs of Greek life and the business school at Indiana, but that's beside the point. Allow me, for just a moment, to rant about the train lines in Spain. Nothing is easy!! After my terrible misfortune with planes and trains on my way to Seville a couple weekends back, I had zero patience at Sants Estacio in Barcelona when some of our tickets got messed up and we were turned away from our train. We had to lighten the mood and kill time somehow so us girls found some cava and orange juice, the fixings for mimosas, and enjoyed our drinks over a shared platter of cheese (so Spanish, we know). Luckily, the next train to Girona ended up being a quick and pleasant experience so, while I was annoyed, Saturday was nowhere near as unlucky as Friday the 13th.

What to tell about Girona? Well, a ten minute walk in the direction of the cathedral led us straight into the old part of the city. There we crossed over the Girona canal what felt like a million times (literally weaving back and forth) in search of lunch. It's laughable that we ended up at the lone sushi bar in the city because we were well aware the move was tapas, but it was hard to trust the tapas menus we found with extremely average looking pictures of paella. Do you blame us? After lunch, we crossed the canal once again to find the Jewish quarter talked about on trip advisor and one or two hours later, I felt like I had seen it all in Girona. We topped off the day with nutella crepes and found a cool look out point from the city wall as the church bells rang all over town. We made it back to Barcelona in time for dinner, I worked on some internship apps from home, and the group headed back out to see what new bars we could find. Jamboree was the final destination, a bar known for its concerts and jazz nights and although my corona was 6 euro, I'd definitely go back! It was fun to try a new place.

Today has been a lazy day and I'm thankful for that! Since Barcelona shuts down on Sundays, I'm camped out at a Starbucks (the only place open for coffee) writing a paper for school. Laundry and getting myself organized for this week are high up on the list of to-do but karaoke night may be calling my name. I'm sooo excited for this coming week because Thursday I get to see Sarah and Annie again when they come to visit Barcelona. Stay tuned for tales of the TCU crew being reunited once again!

OH AND... this week ribbons traveled not only to Girona, but to Paris too! A huge thank you to Tori for snapping a pic in front of the Eiffel tower. Extra best friend points for her this week. #BeBrave

My weekend through my camera roll:

FOC tacos and drinks.

Fighting Renfe Railway for a refund.

The canal in Girona.

"Las Ramblas" in Girona.

The cathedral.

Panoramic view from the city wall.

¡Adios, Girona!

Week 7.1: The Devil Does Latte Art

If I had to pick one place to live for the rest of my life, I think I'd be quite comfortable living in a coffee shop. No really, it's true. Not only do I love coffee to the point that I consider myself an iced coffee connoisseur, I all around love the vibes of coffee shops. They make a great place to study, meet up with friends, or to simply take time to yourself and unwind from a crazy day. This week, wanting to escape my apartment and study for midterms, I've been on the hunt for a new spot with great ambiance and a killer café con leche . So what did I find?

Tucked away in a sub-neighborhood of the Gothic Quarter, I happened upon Satan's Coffee Corner. A couple weeks back, I spotted Satan's while on a field trip with my history class. We had recently studied the co-existence of Christians, Muslims, and Jews in 13th century Barcelona and had wandered into this neighborhood called el Call to see what remains we could find from the Jewish population, which once made up over 20% of the city. Today, this small neighborhood shelters the remains of a synagogue, a few Hebrew inscriptions found randomly amongst renovated homes, and Satan's Coffee Corner. In a neighborhood with religious significance that reminds both locals and visitors of Barcelona of the dark days of the Spanish Inquisition, I first found Satan's to be... distastefully placed. However, this small yet buzzing coffee shop quickly won my heart.

When I walked into Satan's yesterday afternoon, I found myself standing in front of a chalkboard that stated "no wifi, no decaf". Perfect, I thought. With 100+ pages to read for class, wifi was unnecessary and if we are being honest, so was decaf. I placed an order for café con leche and found a spot at the bar that looked out into the street. Just a few moments later, I had a café con leche sitting beside my book with an impressive design. Never before have I seen a cup of coffee as picture perfect as the one served up at Satan's. So there I sat on a high metal stool facing out into the plaza, reading my book, and enjoying this beautiful cup of coffee as classmates, friends, and couples rotated in and out of the seats around me. I loved the crowd, the vibes, the songs shuffling through the barista's iPod, the fact that dogs were welcome... yet I felt a weird guilt. I had fallen in love with a place called Satan's. I could only hope this little coffee corner had taken on its name for its devilishly-good coffee. But because the devil makes latte art, I will be back. I think I've found my new coffee home in Barcelona.

Week 7.0: Mojitos and Midterms

While having a conversation with a friend earlier this week, I realized I'm halfway through my semester abroad. Someone please explain to me how this is possible. I suppose having midterms this week, I should have put two and two together a little bit earlier but nope, I'm still shocked. Halfway through is a scary thought simply because I am nowhere near ready to leave.

In place of me writing about another ribbon this week, I'm here to tell you that Katie Stallard, my beautiful mom and constant inspiration, is done with chemotherapy. Although this is not the end of her treatment, it is the closing of a very difficult chapter in the greater breast cancer story. Any breast cancer patient or survivor can tell you just how draining it is to sit in a chair, week-to-week, for hours at a time and receive chemotherapy, a powerful medicine that goes after not only the bad cells but some of the good ones too. Over the past couple of months my mom has struggled with losing her hair, her energy, and her satisfaction in some of the simple things we do day-to-day but tend not to really think about... eating, for example. The next step will be a series of radiation treatments which we expect to be nothing compared to chemo. A quick shout out to the friends and family who have showered my mom with love, support, presents, and even home-cooked meatballs, y'all seriously rock. And lastly, shout out to you mom... congrats! I am so thrilled to see you pass by another milestone in the journey with your unwavering bravery and high spirits. How you do it all with such grace, I wish I knew.

So... what's new with me in Barcelona? In the breast cancer awareness spirit and a nice little follow up to my blog post entitled "Coats: A Way of Life", I bought a coat!! And it's pink. Every day I feel that I come closer and closer to being mistaken as a Spanish woman. I am now the proud owner of platform booties and a cool coat. Also, this week I did some additional credit card damage by booking flights back to London and to Lisbon, Portugal. Lisbon will be a nice little getaway before finals in April (praying it's warm enough to enjoy the beach) and London was a must because three days was not enough time to experience it all. There's still so much to see! And who could turn down another opportunity to hang out with your best friends? Certainly not me.

Quick peak of the coat.

What else? What else? I suppose it's worth sharing that earlier this week I paid an overdue visit to the doctor in Barcelona. Since my recent trip to London, or maybe even before then, I have been suffering from terrible congestion. As someone who seems to be constantly sick, I figured time would heal me or maybe cheap decongestant medicine from the local farmacía. Well, no, this was not the case for this time so my program helped me set up an appointment with the English-speaking Dr. Saval. Let me tell you, friends, what I would do to get my hands on an American Visa for Dr. Saval because this guy rocked. Not only did he prescribe me the Z-Pack that saved my life this week amidst papers and group projects, we also made great conversation concerning Spanish politics and his collection of 100+ Don Quixote novels. Leaving his office I had one thought: would it be wrong to adopt Dr. Saval as my second honorary Spanish grandfather? I mean I wouldn't want to offend Father Miguel from the soup kitchen...

Other miscellaneous tidbits from this week:
-Saw the beach in Barcelona for the FIRST TIME this semester (not a joke but I wish it was)
-Drank beachside mojitos with breakfast tacos
-Explored Arc de Triomf-area and pondered going to the zoo
-Showed up to a movie theater that claimed to show movies in English, found out they did not, went back home, will probably not attempt to see another movie while abroad
-Ruined a "burrito bowl" dinner with store-bought fajita seasoning
-Knocked out some midterms work with cupcakes and coffee
-Binge watched Scandal on Netflix (which by Season 3 is completely unrealistic)

Well, that's about all for this week. Wish me lots of midterm luck and I'll see you back here soon.

Week 6.0: Cádiz, Spain

I hereby declare that post-weekend depression is a real thing. I realized this after scrolling through my pictures of this past weekend for the 5th or 6th time since I got home, which would be like the 14th or 15th time overall because that's pretty much all I did on the return flight - reminisce.

This past weekend I got to visit one of my favorite places in the world for way too short an amount of time, in fact what ended up being less than 40 hours. The place I speak of is Cádiz, a small city located on the southern coast of Spain, approximately an hour and a half train ride away from Seville. For those of you unaware of the special bond I share with Cádiz, allow me to provide some background.

In 2010, fresh out of my sophomore year in high school, I headed off to Cádiz on a Spanish immersion program where I was to live with a local family for the summer. Not only was this my first trip to Europe, this was also my first time traveling alone. That summer, I fell in love with Cádiz over and over again. Not only does the small city boast some of the most beautiful beaches in the world, it also has this unexplainable charm that originates in the hospitality of the people. To sum it all up - Cádiz is a home away from home for me. Every few years, when I am given the opportunity to go back and visit, I experience a feeling of relief. Why relief, you ask? Because Cádiz doesn't change and I have a feeling it never will, or at least in my book it won't.

While this weekend may sound perfect, it did not begin that way. I've never once given attention to Friday the 13th because I'm not much of the superstitious type. However, I may now be making an exception for Friday the 13th because wow did I experience bad luck. My luck actually ran dry around two hours into the trip south when my flight was unable to land in Seville because of the heavy cloud cover. Instead, Ryanair, oh the ever-so-loved Ryanair, dropped me off in Málaga. Yeah, that is nowhere near Seville. After enough people complained however, the airlines was forced into supplying buses from Málaga to Seville so tack on two more hours that I didn't expect to be traveling on Friday. Oh wait, I mean tack on another six hours because when Tori and I actually made it to Seville, we had missed the train we had previously booked to Cádiz. During the Málaga episode, we had figured hey no problem... trains are easy enough to book. Except, oh wait, had we already forgotten this was the weekend of Cádiz carnaval? So with six hours to kill until the next available train, Tori and I called a friend studying abroad in Seville and met up with her for drinks. We love ya, Jules! I'd say the bad travel luck ended there but once on the train, Tori and I continuously got kicked out of the seats we chose because apparently seats are assigned? I ended up sitting in a luggage hold area but all was good because at 10 o'clock at night after traveling for 13 hours (once again, I reference it being Friday the 13th), we were finally in Cádiz.

Well, Tori and I made the best of the night with what little energy we had left. After checking in at our airbnb, we met up with one of my friends from the 2010 program, Maddie, and her boyfriend. Just as I had wanted to share Cádiz with Tori, Maddie was thrilled to bring Ryan to our favorite place. The four of us had dinner at a restaurant that was recommended by Maddie's Spanish home stay parents and then hit up what was "the regular" for Maddie and I, an Irish pub called O'Connell's where we watched every World Cup game including the game where Spain won their first-ever title! By the end of the night, we found ourselves in a mass of people outside of the theater in Cádiz where a series of carnaval events take place. Maddie and I vigorously searched the crowd for our Spanish guy friends or anyone that knew them but LOL... everyone we talked to was visiting from Málaga. Sweet.

Quick interjection: sorry for this post being an actual essay. I could talk about Cádiz for years, not days.

Anyhow, Saturday was the big day of this trip. In the morning, Tori and I walked around some of the main streets and saw some of the "famous" sights, such as the cathedral. Later on, we met up with Maddie and Ryan to see Torre Tavira, a tower in the old city which boasts the best panoramic views of the city. Following our visit to Torre Tavira, we wandered around the local market where my Spanish mom would buy the food for our meals daily, meaning everything was always so fresh... farm to table and sea to table. We decided upon having a picnic of sorts on the beach so we left the market with fresh bread, Iberian ham, manchego cheese, grapes and strawberries, and some Cruzcampo beers (tinto de verano for Maddie because it's her favorite). At La Playa Caleta, we enjoyed lunch with a view. I also took this time to run around and take pictures with ribbon number three. #BeBrave

After a quick siesta because siesta exists in the south of Spain, where it absolutely does not in Barcelona, Tori and I transitioned from tourists to pirates. On our way to O'Connell's for night number two, we stopped by my former Cádiz home to say hi to the 'rents. Once again, nothing will ever change in Cádiz. My parents graciously welcomed both Tori and I into their living room where we shared both updates and some laughs about funny things that had happened during my stay. Yes, my mom then revealed how hysterical she thought I looked the night I painted my body to look like the Spanish flag and went to O'Connell's in a sports bra and nike shorts to watch the world cup finals. If only she'd voiced this opinion before I left the house that night, she could have saved me a lot of embarrassment looking back on those pictures. During our visit, my dad also spoke up and said that he would recognize me if he saw me anywhere because although I am five years older, my face is just the same. That could potentially not be a compliment if someone considered me to have a baby face but thanks dad, I LOVE YOU TOO. MISSED YOU MORE.

That night, Tori and I partied in O'Connell's with some random study abroad kids visiting from Madrid and ran into the whole TCU crew studying abroad in Seville. Go frogs. As a group, we migrated from the pub to Plaza Mina, and again from the Plaza to La Punta, a strip of "clubs"... not sure if you can really call them clubs, hence the quotes. While my bearings had been all screwed up on Friday night, this time I got Tori and I smoothly home in less than 10 minutes walking. Go me!

Sadly, on Sunday it was time to leave and so we stopped by the market one last time for some breakfast churros (a personal favorite) and enjoyed coffee at a nearby café. Right before heading out to catch the train back to Seville, Maddie and I received a Facebook message from the one person we were dying to see, our Spanish friend Kiké. Kiké - if you are reading this right now via Google Translate, I hope my weird sayings don't translate into anything...well... weird and know that te echo de menos siempre.

Well, that's all folks. That was my perfect weekend in Cádiz. If I don't get to visit one more time before I'm headed home for the summer, I hope the time after that I am able to introduce my real parents to my Spanish parents. That's the dream right there.

Julia and I making Spanish friends.

The original Cádiz girls (Maggie McDon's, where you at?)

Go frogs.

AND LASTLY

A quick flashback to 2010...

Week 5.0: London, England

So I'm back home in Barcelona after spending the weekend visiting with my best friends in London and all I have to say is when can I move to the U.K.? Seriously, mom and dad, I know you've always adored London so if you ever consider moving there, count me in.

A couple thoughts I have about London and my trip. First and foremost, I love English. I love it so much. I love hearing it on the metro, I love hearing it in restaurants, I love that when I ask for directions I don't have to completely fumble over all of my words. Don't get me wrong - studying in Barcelona is a dream come true and oh how I adore Spain but London truly was the perfect amount of familiar and foreign and I miss it already. In fact, I had a crazy thought as I was participating in a bar crawl Saturday night that I should totally apply to internships in London this summer and extend my stay overseas. If only I didn't have to apply for a working visa, buy business clothes, and figure out temporary housing. Sometimes I have these crazy ideas but hey, sometimes they actually work out.

Another thought: holy hell London has good food. I feel like I ate my way through the entire weekend with everything from Turkish doner wraps to Indian food and some of the best neapolitan pizza I've ever had. Friday afternoon, our friends also took us to Borough Market where I did a good five laps around the premises before I could commit to my lunch. Basically, London is a town for foodies and Barcelona... well, if you are visiting Barcelona I sure hope you like ham. Ham and potatoes. That's more or less the diet.

To conclude my random thoughts about London, how adorable is it that London actually uses double decker buses as public transportation? You see the bright red, two-story buses in movies but never once did I think the locals were the ones hopping on and off. I could have sworn that was a sightseeing thing but hey London, respect.

So beyond eating and catching up with friends, I did in fact make some time for the famous sights. Friday morning, our friend Sarah (we call her Snewt) showed Tori and I the area around the London Eye and of course, Big Ben. Slightly sad that we never made it to Buckingham Palace but I had made a special request to see Big Ben and Tori's one thing was Harrod's so somehow we missed the palace. 

We also got the opportunity this weekend to celebrate a birthday and not just any birthday... Annie's 21st birthday! Annie, although you've been London-legal for over two years, I still have to say congrats. Hope you had an awesome night and I hope you have an even better time this Tuesday when the London crew helps you ring in the actual birthday.

Finally, you may be wondering where ribbon number two ended up. Well, ribbon number two was planted in the trendy neighborhood of Shoreditch, London (aka the British Brooklyn) where our friends are currently living. However, it wouldn't be a trip to London without a #BeBrave from Big Ben. So enjoy! 

#BeBrave x Big Ben

Harrod's reminding me I need a valentine.

Because I really don't eat enough food over here.