As of yesterday I have exactly one month left in London, and cannot believe it in the slightest. As much as I have loved my time over here, I have missed a lot of things back in the good 'ol U S of A. Such as:
-Looking right when stepping into the street
-The variety of fast food - it would pain me to tell you how many times I have had McDonald's while being here
-My own room - I share a room with two other people. It's been an experience. I'll just say that.
-What feels like unlimited hot water. Living with eight people cuts the amount of hot water we can use by a lot.
-Normal sized pools - when I want to work out with swimming I swim in a 25 yard (or meter) pool, and the gym I joined has a pool that is only 15 meters. It is really awkward to swim in.
-Working - Yes, I am working over here, but I am not getting paid, and in one of the most expensive cities in the world, I am missing a regular pay check like crazy.
-Warm weather - Today it was about 57 degrees and I took my sweatshirt off, what is happening to my Californian blood?
-Quality television - London's play reruns of Friends like it is going out of style, I think I have seen the entire series while being here already. Seriously, I think they play it for about 3 hours a day.
-Normal classes - the classes I take here are set up extremely different, I can't take notes on my computer which I would much rather do.
-My car - as much as I love not having to pay for gas, I do miss being able to just grab my keys and go somewhere. Just today a girl was standing in front of me and I missed a train, and after that train left they stopped the line that I had to take, so I had to go figure out what bus I could take home.
-Everybody - last but not least, I just miss everyone at home. I have made plenty of friends here, but I don't think anyone could ever replace the people I have back home.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
Spring Break Continued - Granada & Spain
So after a 5 hour train ride south from Madrid, we made it to Southern Spain and were ready to gallivant around Granada. The day we got there it was beautiful and sunny. We could see the mountains covered with snow in the distance which was a little sad. My roommate Sean and I were kicking ourselves that we didn’t know you could snowboard there because we totally would have taken advantage of it.
That afternoon, we decided to take a nap to catch up from the lack of sleeping we had been getting that week. That night we decided to go on a tapas tour. In Spain, they have what are called tapas, basically appetizers. In the old days, the king of Spain didn’t want his citizens getting drunk and embarrassing the monarchy so they passed a law that said any alcoholic beverage must be served with some sort of food. Typically they just bring you any random tapa that they have, but the bars our tour guide took us to had menus of tapas so we were able to choose from a selection. We went to two bars, one with some of the best calamari that I have ever had, and then we went to a bar for the remainder of the night. They had a pool table and a foosball table so we took advantage of that. We had a little ASU vs. Pitt tournament; Max and Sean vs. Skyler and me. After three games, Skyler and I won. It may have been by a eight ball getting knocked in, but hey, a win is a win.
They next day we got up and went to the palace, Alhambra. It is one of the coolest places I have ever seen. All of the walls had more detail than anything else I have ever seen. We spent a couple hours there just walking around and headed back into town. After that we came back to our hostel and asked about going on a hot springs tour. They usually do it at night but made an exception for us because that was our last chance to do it. We drove for about an hour and then spent an hour and a half at the spring and just relaxed for really the first time all week, so it was highly welcomed. On the way back, I was looking at pictures that we had taken that day, and set my camera down. I then proceeded to leave it in the van, and wanted to die when I realized it. I got a hold of the company and asked them to send it to me, and it should be here this week sometime and that is why I have not included any pictures in the past two posts. That night we met up with some of Max’s friends who were studying in Granada to go to a club. Considering the club was free entry and free sangria for an hour and a half. After that we went to another bar and then decided to go get some food and take the other girls home. After that, we decided that it was just too late to even go to sleep, so we went back to our hostel and waited to catch the bus to the airport for our flight to Barcelona. One of the longest nights I have ever had but we still had a lot of fun, probably because we were so delirious for being tired, but it was still hilarious.
Once getting to Barcelona, we checked in our hostel and then slept for about 5 hours. One of the most magical sleeps I have ever had. That night we decided to go to a restaurant on Calle las Ramblas, the major Barcelona Street. We had traditional Spanish paella, which consisted of rice, vegetables, and steak. It was pretty good, but not the best food I had had in Europe so far. After that we went out for another night out, with some friends studying in Barcelona. They took us to a bar called Espit Chupitos, which is a shots bar with over 500 different shots with all different kinds of names; some favorites were Harry Potter, Boy Scout, and Monica Lewinski. The fun part about this place was that they lit almost everything on fire. When taking the Boy Scout, we took the roasted a marshmallow on the bar then took a shot, and chased it with the mallow. Like I said, awesome. After some time there, most of the group went to a club on the beach but Sean, Deanna, and I went back towards the hostel and just went to a pub for a pint, which is much more of my style so I was pretty happy about that.
The next day, as it was our last full day in Spain, we went on a walking tour of the city. We chose the Antonio Gaudi tour, which took us all around and showed us the different buildings that he built during his time. He was one of the most unique architects I have ever heard of. The pinnacle of the tour was his crowning jewel, his church, la Familia Sagrada (the Sacred Family). It was easily the most amazing thing I have ever seen. It is a giant church with 3 different facades representing the life of Jesus. The first side of the church is very gothic which is called the nativity façade, which represents the birth and early life of Jesus. There are giant engravings in the side of it that depict the various moments in his life such as the birth, marriage of Joseph and Mary, and him going to school. The other side was the passion of the Christ, the time leading up to his ultimate death. This side was a lot less detailed, but at the same time it was a lot easier to see the various stories played out on the wall. It showed him on the cross, the betrayal of Judas, and him being whipped by the guards. The last façade is still under construction, which is the Glory façade. This side is the main entrance and it is still under construction, even over 100 years later with at least another 16 years to go. It is going to show the glory of Jesus and the salvation. It is also going to say, “Father give us our daily bread” in 50 different languages which will represent the unity of religion which I thought was really cool. All in all it was absolutely amazing, including the inside. It looked like a cathedral, but at the same time it was modern and didn’t feel as cold as Notre Dame did. There are so many windows that it lights the whole place up, and it is beautiful with all the stained glass. It is also one of the tallest buildings in Barcelona and it is still only about half of the way there. Gaudi, being very religious designed it to be 1 meter shorter than a hill in Barcelona because he did not want to create something larger than his creator, God. It was easily the most amazing thing I have ever seen and want to go back one day when it is finished and would recommend it in a heartbeat to anyone who has the option. It also kills me that I didn’t have my camera for Barcelona because if there was one city that I wanted it in, it would have been there.
That night we went to a club on the beach which was really cool, but as clubs are not really my thing, I decided to leave with Max, Sean, and Deanna. We went back to the shot bar and had a great time. The next day, our flight wasn’t until about 6, so we had a nice and easy day of exploring. Of course, for really the first time all week, we had AMAZING weather, I felt like I was back in California. We went down to the ocean and walked around the harbor for a few hours. I wanted to go to the beach, but it was just too far out of the way, and I will have plenty of time for that this summer, so I was ok with passing on that. All in all, it was one of the most amazing spring breaks I have ever had, and cannot wait for next year to see if my last spring break ever will be able to top it.
In conclusion, Good Luck Spring Break 2012, you have a hell of a lot to live up to.
PS. Sorry it was so long, I only have a month left, so I am going to try and do this more regularly, which means they will be a little shorter.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Spring Break pt. 1 - Madrid
I am sorry I have been slacking on this, I really wanted to do better at it but I don't know what happens. Anyways, here goes Spring Break. Last week, 5 of my roommates, and one of the girls from next door, Deanna, went to Spain for 7 days. It was amazing. We went to Madrid for three days, Granada for two, and Barcelona for the last two. The only downfall was, I left my camera in Granada, so I have no pictures for this post at the moment, and no pictures of Barcelona what so ever. Someone found it and is in the process of mailing it to me though, so that is great news.
We had to wake up extremely early for our flight to Madrid. We got up at 6am and caught a cab to the airport. Once we got through security, we stopped by duty free to take a look at what they had. We were wandering around and looking at some Patron, deciding that we would splurge. How many times to you get to spend Spring Break in Spain? Not many, that is the answer. While we were looking, a girl who worked there came up and asked if we would like to sample the Patron to see if we wanted silver or gold. Umm... yes? Yes, if you are keeping track in your head, it is only about 8:00 am at this point. Stop judging, it is Spring Break.
We end up buying the gold, and take off to Madrid. We got there in the afternoon, dropped our stuff off at our hostel and took a walk around the city. It was very different from London, and awesome. After a quick lunch, which wasn't the greatest because I was probably the most efficient in the language, except for the fact that I never took the time to learn the details of food. Oh, well. After that, we went back to our hostel and decided to take part in the Spanish culture of ciestas (naps). We got up later that night and met two of the girls from our program who were also in Madrid for dinner and to go to the club Kapital. We ended up at this Beatles bar that played really awesome music and was quite nice. After dinner we headed for the club and it was almost midnight at this point, Spaniards are crazy with how late they stay out. The club was one of the coolest I have ever been to, seven stories tall, different style of music on each floor. Only problem was drinks were 12 euros each, so the complimentary drink I got upon entry was the last one for me. Still stuck around til about 4 am and then walked back to our hostel. Even after the hour walk, there were still hundreds of people around. Like I said, they're crazy.
The next day we went on a guided tour of the city which was also awesome. This company puts on free tours in a lot of the major cities in Europe, so we obviously took part in it. It was three hours long and pointed out all the historical places in the city and I learned a ton about Spanish culture. Later that night we went on a pub crawl with the same tour guide from the afternoon. We went to four bars and then a club. It turned out that one of the girls that was on our tour actually went to Chapman University in Orange, and we had 2 or 3 mutual friends. This world just keeps getting smaller. We started at a bar where we had free beer and sangria for about 45 minutes until we left for the other bars where we had a free shot upon entry at each one. It was great. The first bar we went to everyone was dancing and having a great time. I am not sure if it has become big in the States yet, but there is a techno song here called Barbra Streisand that is HUGE here. They play it absolutely everywhere, probably in each of the bars we were at that night. After that bar we went to another bar which actually turned out to be a salsa bar. A girl that was on the tour turned out to know a little about salsa so she spent the about 45 minutes we were there teaching and dancing with me. If I didn't have two left feet it would have helped a lot, but it was still great. After the four bars our guide took us to this awesome club where we danced until about 5 am again. When we left, the club was still jam packed, with no signs of slowing down. These people are crazy, I'm telling you.
The next day, Deanna, Sean, and I decided to get up relatively early and head over to a convent where they supposedly sold delicious cookies. It was an adventure to say the least. We got there and were trying to figure out how to get the cookies and there was this crazy Spanish nun yelling at us in Spanish what to do, but we obviously weren't understanding. Supposedly you were supposed to put your money on a shelf that spun around and there were cookies that would spin around to you. How could we have not know that? Stupid Americans. But anyways, the cookies were stupid, it was a box of little lemon cookies that you probably could have bought from any grocery store in the area. Oh well, gave us a reason to wake up and an adventure. Later that afternoon we took about a 40 minute train ride to Toledo. It is set upon a hill surrounded by a river so it looks amazing walking up to it. I would love to show pictures, but like I said before... Ugh. But we walked around for a few hours and had some laughs. The city was pretty dead because the day was ending so we ended up just finding this nice little cafe for some wine and sandwiches. We made our way back to Madrid later that night and thought it was going to be a relatively mellow night because of our early bus ride to Granada the next morning. How wrong we could have been.
We got to the city and decided we were going to go find this bar that had shots in chocolate glasses with Spanish liquor called Madroño. It is made from the fruit of the madroño treem which is the symbol of the city. It was easily one of the most delicious things I have ever had. We ended up having a couple and bought two bottles of it. That night we decided to walk around and went into a bar and it turned out to be one of the bars on our pub crawl the night before that we loved. So we spent some time there before we decided it was time to head home. Some people said they didn't want to leave which was fine with me but I wanted to get sleep so I and some others were leaving. But everyone seemed to follow for some reason, I am not sure why. As we were walking we were approached by a bar promoter telling us to come to their bar, we kindly declined saying that we were going home. He offered us a free drink upon entry. "Well, I guess we'll come for one drink." After our drink and hanging out for about half an hour, we were on our way home again. Another promoter stops us, "No thanks, we have to get some sleep." "Free drinks?" "Ughhhh." That happened to us four or five times, so I guess I can't complain too much. It was great. We ended up at this Irish bar, where we ran into two other friends from our pub tour. We danced there for about an hour or so, where Deanna and I actually ended up on top of the bar at one point. Maybe it is good I don't have any documentation of that for this. But after that bar we headed back to the city center again and one last promoter comes up to us and we ended up back at the first bar of the night. There we were talking to random Americans that we ran into and met a girl who was in Madrid for the weekend but was headed back to Granada the next day, where she studies. "We are going to Granada in the morning! Or who are we kidding, in like 3 hours." We hung out the rest of the night and all exchanged numbers and decided to meet up while there. In the end, Deanna and I decided to leave and get at least some sleep, I would rather have an hour than nothing. The rest of them stayed out all night and we went back for some much needed rest. An hour later, we were up and on our way to the bus station for a five hour bus ride.
Overall, Madrid was my favorite of the three cities in regards to nightlife. So I am going to end this one right here and write about Granada and Barcelona sometime this weekend probably. If you made it all the way through this post I appreciate it. Sorry it was so long. Just so much happened in those three days so I didn't know what to cut out.
We had to wake up extremely early for our flight to Madrid. We got up at 6am and caught a cab to the airport. Once we got through security, we stopped by duty free to take a look at what they had. We were wandering around and looking at some Patron, deciding that we would splurge. How many times to you get to spend Spring Break in Spain? Not many, that is the answer. While we were looking, a girl who worked there came up and asked if we would like to sample the Patron to see if we wanted silver or gold. Umm... yes? Yes, if you are keeping track in your head, it is only about 8:00 am at this point. Stop judging, it is Spring Break.
We end up buying the gold, and take off to Madrid. We got there in the afternoon, dropped our stuff off at our hostel and took a walk around the city. It was very different from London, and awesome. After a quick lunch, which wasn't the greatest because I was probably the most efficient in the language, except for the fact that I never took the time to learn the details of food. Oh, well. After that, we went back to our hostel and decided to take part in the Spanish culture of ciestas (naps). We got up later that night and met two of the girls from our program who were also in Madrid for dinner and to go to the club Kapital. We ended up at this Beatles bar that played really awesome music and was quite nice. After dinner we headed for the club and it was almost midnight at this point, Spaniards are crazy with how late they stay out. The club was one of the coolest I have ever been to, seven stories tall, different style of music on each floor. Only problem was drinks were 12 euros each, so the complimentary drink I got upon entry was the last one for me. Still stuck around til about 4 am and then walked back to our hostel. Even after the hour walk, there were still hundreds of people around. Like I said, they're crazy.
The next day we went on a guided tour of the city which was also awesome. This company puts on free tours in a lot of the major cities in Europe, so we obviously took part in it. It was three hours long and pointed out all the historical places in the city and I learned a ton about Spanish culture. Later that night we went on a pub crawl with the same tour guide from the afternoon. We went to four bars and then a club. It turned out that one of the girls that was on our tour actually went to Chapman University in Orange, and we had 2 or 3 mutual friends. This world just keeps getting smaller. We started at a bar where we had free beer and sangria for about 45 minutes until we left for the other bars where we had a free shot upon entry at each one. It was great. The first bar we went to everyone was dancing and having a great time. I am not sure if it has become big in the States yet, but there is a techno song here called Barbra Streisand that is HUGE here. They play it absolutely everywhere, probably in each of the bars we were at that night. After that bar we went to another bar which actually turned out to be a salsa bar. A girl that was on the tour turned out to know a little about salsa so she spent the about 45 minutes we were there teaching and dancing with me. If I didn't have two left feet it would have helped a lot, but it was still great. After the four bars our guide took us to this awesome club where we danced until about 5 am again. When we left, the club was still jam packed, with no signs of slowing down. These people are crazy, I'm telling you.
The next day, Deanna, Sean, and I decided to get up relatively early and head over to a convent where they supposedly sold delicious cookies. It was an adventure to say the least. We got there and were trying to figure out how to get the cookies and there was this crazy Spanish nun yelling at us in Spanish what to do, but we obviously weren't understanding. Supposedly you were supposed to put your money on a shelf that spun around and there were cookies that would spin around to you. How could we have not know that? Stupid Americans. But anyways, the cookies were stupid, it was a box of little lemon cookies that you probably could have bought from any grocery store in the area. Oh well, gave us a reason to wake up and an adventure. Later that afternoon we took about a 40 minute train ride to Toledo. It is set upon a hill surrounded by a river so it looks amazing walking up to it. I would love to show pictures, but like I said before... Ugh. But we walked around for a few hours and had some laughs. The city was pretty dead because the day was ending so we ended up just finding this nice little cafe for some wine and sandwiches. We made our way back to Madrid later that night and thought it was going to be a relatively mellow night because of our early bus ride to Granada the next morning. How wrong we could have been.
We got to the city and decided we were going to go find this bar that had shots in chocolate glasses with Spanish liquor called Madroño. It is made from the fruit of the madroño treem which is the symbol of the city. It was easily one of the most delicious things I have ever had. We ended up having a couple and bought two bottles of it. That night we decided to walk around and went into a bar and it turned out to be one of the bars on our pub crawl the night before that we loved. So we spent some time there before we decided it was time to head home. Some people said they didn't want to leave which was fine with me but I wanted to get sleep so I and some others were leaving. But everyone seemed to follow for some reason, I am not sure why. As we were walking we were approached by a bar promoter telling us to come to their bar, we kindly declined saying that we were going home. He offered us a free drink upon entry. "Well, I guess we'll come for one drink." After our drink and hanging out for about half an hour, we were on our way home again. Another promoter stops us, "No thanks, we have to get some sleep." "Free drinks?" "Ughhhh." That happened to us four or five times, so I guess I can't complain too much. It was great. We ended up at this Irish bar, where we ran into two other friends from our pub tour. We danced there for about an hour or so, where Deanna and I actually ended up on top of the bar at one point. Maybe it is good I don't have any documentation of that for this. But after that bar we headed back to the city center again and one last promoter comes up to us and we ended up back at the first bar of the night. There we were talking to random Americans that we ran into and met a girl who was in Madrid for the weekend but was headed back to Granada the next day, where she studies. "We are going to Granada in the morning! Or who are we kidding, in like 3 hours." We hung out the rest of the night and all exchanged numbers and decided to meet up while there. In the end, Deanna and I decided to leave and get at least some sleep, I would rather have an hour than nothing. The rest of them stayed out all night and we went back for some much needed rest. An hour later, we were up and on our way to the bus station for a five hour bus ride.
Overall, Madrid was my favorite of the three cities in regards to nightlife. So I am going to end this one right here and write about Granada and Barcelona sometime this weekend probably. If you made it all the way through this post I appreciate it. Sorry it was so long. Just so much happened in those three days so I didn't know what to cut out.
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