Sara, Lindsey, Barcelona...

This last weekend I went to Barcelona!!!! The plan was to stay for about a week with one of my old host mom's family members, but unfortunately things changed and I had to shorten my trip. Turns out that five days in Barcelona is enough to hit up all the main stops though.

I was soooo excited to see Sara again. We have become great travel buddies :) In case you don't remember, Sara was one of the girls that originally studied with me in Granada in 2006, and I also visited her in Calatayud at the beginning of the program. So this time we met in Barcelona along with her two roommates, Emily and Karli. Barcelona is HUGE. There is lots to see and do, and considering it was Semana Santa this week, there were LOADS of people there during the weekend.

I was disappointed to find out (after my unfortunate incident in Berlin), that there were yet again no way to lock up our things in our hostal. At least this time there were lockers, although there were no locks on them. So first things first, I went searching for a store that would sell me a lock. Not wanting to leave my things unattended, I lugged everything with me up this six story building (of course the locks and other hardware were on the top floor) and finally found a lock that would work. But it was all worth it in the end; at least I could be sure that I wouldn't get my things stolen this time :)

So that first night we went to a tapas bar with a really original name: La Cervecería... heehee. The tapas were really good though. The restaurant was really full so the waiter asked us if we minded sharing a table with three Italian guys. We soon came to find out that these Italians spoke no Spanish nor English, so we spent the rest of dinner trying to get our point across in three different languages. It was hilarious, and I was really surprised how much we were able to communicate with them! Quite the experience, and a great way to start off our trip.

It was Emily's birthday the first night we got there. After dinner, Sara and I met up with the others and decided to go to a local Irish Pub to celebrate. Emily knew one of the workers there, and he gave us a deal on a few drinks. We also brought along two guys from New York that the other girls had met on the first leg of their trip in Cadiz and Sevilla. It just so happened that these two were planning on going to Barcelona too, so they had planned to meet up with them. We hung out there for a while and then decided to move locations. Karli knew of this underground bar that looked like it was built in a cave... It was soooo cool inside. They were known for their sidra (hard apple cider), and rightfully so, because it was delicious. There's a mime standing at the entrance that tells you to be silent when entering, but as you get further and further into the bar you find that the silence doesn't last long :)

The next day we did lots of touristy stuff. We went to the cathedral first. Then we went to visit the Sagrada Familia (one of Gaudí's most famous buildings), and we walked along Las Ramblas (the main avenues there). La Sagrada Familia was amazing. It was soooo elaborate. It's a shame that it has been under construction for so long, but its no wonder why because it is such a big job to finish and no one seems to know how now that Gaudí isn't around to help. We wanted to take a tour of the inside, but there was at least an hour and a half wait! We thought we'd pass and go do other things instead.

So we grabbed some snacks and headed for the park. We met up with the others, talked, and climbed trees. It was a perfect day to people watch in the park.

Later we decided we would all meet up to explore Montjuïc and its castle. Montjuïc really stands for "Mountain of the Jewish people", whereas many Jewish people as well as those who were against Franco's regime were held there.... and many were executed. We got to the top and entered into the castle/fortress. It was really interesting. You could tell why the location was chosen for such a place, as it was very secluded and had a view of the entire city. We climbed onto some of the old cannons to get an even better view....

After Montjuïc we went in search for what was apparently the "best kebab in the world" (according to Karli)... and wow it waaaas delicious. I got this Adana Kebab plate that had this spicy mystery meat on skewers. It was really tasty. We decided to call it a night after dinner (we ate at like 11), because we were tired from the full day of walking.

On Saturday Sara and I went to Parc Güell, an entire park designed by Gaudí. His work is simply amazing. I was impressed with all the detail in the mosaics that lined the benches in the main square, and the buildings were no less impressive. Sara and I brought a picnic and some cards and found a park bench to play. Hadn't played gin rummy in a while... not a really common Spanish game :)

On Sunday we went to a labyrinth hidden in a park! It was sooo fun. I couldn't help but think that there were going to be creatures popping out at me like in the movie though... heehe. The place was gorgeous, although unfortunately it had rained the night before and so the paths were all muddy and full of puddles. But oh well, a little mud never hurt anyone. The experience was well worth it.

Barcelona is definitely a place to see. I would recommend it to everyone. Unfortunately, our trip had to come to an end. On Monday I had a flight that left at 7 am... so I had to get up at 4:30! And now I'm back in good ol' Palma...

Playas y Papayas :)

So I had soooooo much fun while Tyler, Drew, Chris and Chasen were visiting. It was great to see familiar faces from home, and it reminded me of how much I really miss all of you :)

Where to begin??? We did quite a bit...

So when the guys first got here we were kind of in a hurry. I had to be in class in a hour and we still had to take the bus and drop off all their luggage at my place. But we actually made it in time, although I don't know that they were too keen on sprinting right away :)

Taking the boys with me to class was quite possibly one of my favorite parts of their visit here in Palma... not to mention the kids loved it too! They got really excited when they asked questions, and were more than eager to practice their English with them. We played an ice breaker called "two truths and a lie" (which is pretty self-explanatory)... and the kids were pretty good overall at guessing the boys' lies. So after one class, Joana (the teacher I work with) took the boys on a quick tour of the school and then set us loose. I was expecting to have to finish out my classes that day, but I guess it wasn't necessary. They are pretty flexible with me at my school :) ... I was really grateful for that during their visit.

So that first night I took the guys to the crossointerie that my teacher owns and they gave us free snacks and hierbas (a typical Mallorcan liquor). Then we went to one of my favorite local hangouts (which is about a block from my apartment) called El Sarao. I call it the "bruja bar" because the entire inside is decorated with brujas (witches). It's really pretty interesting. We played some UNO and had a couple drinks and then we decided to call it a night. The guys were pretty tired after the first day of traveling.

The next day after class we decided to hit the main spots in Palma. We went to the Cathedral and walked through the old part of town. I showed them the town hall, the main plazas, shopping areas, and of course, the beach. We took lots of "Faith plus one" pictures where all the guys posed as if they were taking a picture for the cover of a Christian Rock album :) It was hilarious, and only suitable while in front of the Cathedral.

Later that night we went out for some Kebab at this place by my house. Got a great salad with loads of meat.... delicious....and the boys were pretty happy with their meals too. Later that night we went to a bar with over 100 types of beer (including a gluten-free option for me and Chasen!) Anthony had told me that he had seen one on the menu before when he had gone there, so I thought we should check it out. We met up with Anthony and Pablo that night too, so we could finally put the names to the faces we had all been talking about. We didn't get too wild and crazy that night, as it was in the plan to go to Soller in the morning.

Soller was great. I decided to show them the tourist route by going on the old rickety train. We had fun yelling in the dark tunnels and looking down at the ground as it passed us by while standing outside the cars. About an hour and a half later we got into town. We took the trolley down to the port (which I had never done) and looked for a place to eat. We found this quaint little restaurant that served paella (papaya to you Drew) overlooking the pier. It was fantastic. The food. The company. The weather (for the time of year). Everything.

After lunch we walked up to the top of the hill to go look out off the rocky cliffs nearby. Wow there were some great views. We were really high up there :)

Next stop: the women's Soller basketball game. Carly and I have gotten to know a couple of the players on the team and we had promised one of them that we would go (and bring more fans). Unfortunately, the girls lost the game. It was still fun to watch, but talking to the players after the game was depressing. I guess that game was a deal breaker and they should have won it. So we didn't stay long to hang out with the others. While all the buses stopped running to Palma after like 8 o'clock on the weekends, we caught a ride with our friend Miguel. I layed on the boys lap; it all worked out in the end.

When we got home we started thinking about the night ahead of us. Encarna and Helena had planned to have people over for dinner and I had invited a few others too, so in the end there were about 25 of us or so... lots of fun. We sat and played cards at one table with all the Spaniards ate dinner and conversed at the dinner table. It was kind of awkward seeing as how the guys don't speak Spanish and only one of the Spaniards spoke English. So yeah, there was a lot of translating going on.... :)

Then we went out. We went to a couple of the places I like best on Paseo Marítimo, the main strip down by the port. It was a good time, although with such a large group of us it was hard to keep track of everyone. So we stayed out until about 5:30 or 6 in the morning (which crazily enough is early for people here) and took the Bus de Nit back to the center of town.

Then there was Valldemossa... and ancient town hidden in the mountains of Mallorca. We grabbed some food from the market and sat down on a bench and had a picnic when we got there. The guys tried some typical foods from Mallorca, some panadas and some coco rois. Then we walked around town a bit. We hit up lots of souvenir shops and grabbed a few drinks at some local cafes. We sat down at one of my favorite spots and the guys ordered some cocos de patata (or sweet potato rolls covered in powdered sugar) and some chocolate a la taza (like hot chocolate but thicker)... I snuck a bite too even though I wasn't supposed to because of the gluten :)

We also went to the Real Cartuja, which is an old monastery that was known to have been home to Chopin some summers. With the views you got from some of the rooms, it was no wonder how he could have been inspired to compose some of his music. It was simply gorgeous.

I wanted to show the guys the Bellver castle up in the mountains, but unfortunately by the time we had gotten there the inside had already closed. But it was still cool to show them the outside and the views from up the mountain. We hung out in the garden and the moat and took lots of pictures. Still well worth the trek up there.

OOOO! Another cool thing we did, which I had never done before, was hit up the aquarium! Palma has a really big aquarium out by Arenal, which is a really beautiful beach, and so we decided to kill two birds with one stone and go see them both. The aquarium was awesome. There were all different types of exhibits, from "the Jungle" to "Deep Sea Creatures" to little critters like seahorses (which were some of my favorites). I really liked the turtles too... they had these spiky scaley parts of their shells that stuck out like armor. It was pretty cool to see, especially because its not every day you see a giant tortoise. The sting rays were pretty awesome too though. We got to see them feed... I thought they looked like Kirby from the old video games.

It was a great day to go to Arenal. Too cold to swim though. But we did have a great time walking along the beach, skipping stones and collecting shells. Then we searched for the best place to grab a glass of sangria :)

Thanks guys for such a wonderful week. I really had a great time! I can't wait to see all of you again :)

CARNAVALES!!!

Last weekend was Carnaval here in Palma! Carnaval is like the Spanish version of Halloween, where everyone gets dressed up in the street, there are activities each day in all the schools, and there is a HUGE parade with elaborate floats and dances. It was simply indescribable!

First off, we had to plan our costumes. Encarna and I had been looking up ideas the whole week and trying to come up with something original. SO.... I bought some suspenders, a bow tie and some white gloves and went as a ventriloquist's doll! Encarna bought some black fabric to attach to a white skirt of hers and went as a zebra, and Raquel want as a leopard. We had some friends come over to the house and hang out first: a cowboy, a basketball player, and a carton of milk... heehee. Then we all went out to a discoteca to dance and see all the other costumes... Wow some people really got into it! It was really fun...

When we got home it wasn't as difficult to clean up for Raquel and I as it was for Encarna. We went to sleep and found out in the morning that we had no water!! Thank god Encarna got to shower and rinse out all the hair die the night before! We were worried she would have had to sleep with all of that on! ¿Menos mal, no?

So that was Saturday night... On Sunday there was a huge parade that passed through all of Palma with decorated floats, elaborate costumes, and different dances from Spain as well as South America. I went with my friend Paul, who is actually from Peru, and he explained the significance behind a lot of the South American dances... it was really interesting. There were also people on the floats that threw out candy and roses (considering it was on Valentine's Day too). It reminded me of the 4th of July Parade in Steilacoom... man do I miss that :)

San Sebastiá

Hey everyone! Sorry it has been so long since my last post... I always want to put some pictures on here and considering I no longer have a camera I waited until I could upload some of my friends' pics onto my computer :)

Just a couple weeks ago Palma celebrated its patron saint, or San Sebastiá (Saint Sebastian). I found out that this saints day is a lot "darker" than many of those I have been around for here. People traditionally dress up in devil/demon costumes and there are concerts in just about every plaza. Kids had school off in the middle of the week so that they could go celebrate with their families the night before. On that Tuesday I went out with some friends to the "torradas", which are basically barbeques in the streets. Palma sets up fires all over the place next to live music and you can bring your own meat and cook your dinner while you meet with friends in the street. The music was great. In every plaza there was a different type of music, and as the festivities went on the entire night, you could be sure to hit them all up if you wanted.

The food was delicious. Some of Encarna's friends picked up all the meat for us, which included all different types of chorizos, lomo de cerdo, and some long "bacon-y"-looking meat. Wow it was good... but a LOT of meat. Before I could finish one type someone was already throwing some other type at me. Yummmm!

So before the big show that came later we went to la Plaça de Cort (where the town hall is) and we got to see this incredible projected light show. They lit up the main building while telling a story.... and we got to see all over the world! It was amazing how good the technology was! There was this part where they "took us" to Africa and there were people beating on drums and all of a sudden it looked like the building was the inside of the head of a drum and there were hands beating on it... it looked sooooo real! The music that went along with it was really fun too... I can only imagine how much money they spent on all these festivities... and they were all free! This picture is of the cathedral here in Palma as it was projected on the town hall.. you can only imagine how cool the other parts were!

On Saturday (because San Sebastiá is more like a week-long fesitval in Palma), there was a huge performance/spectacle in front of the cathedral. There was a woman singing opera while fireworks shot into the background along with the music and men playing "gaitas" (or bagpipes) in deep, dark, ominous tones to represent los demonios. There was lots of fire and red lights everywhere, and men were hired to throw firecrackers in the streets to scare people. It was INTENSE! To this day though I'm really surprised that the Catholic Church would celebrate such a "devilish" holiday... but it was really worth seeing!

While Encarna and I had mentioned dressing up in devil costumes for the festivities, I think we saw enough people dressed up to make up for us. It was really cool to go out in the streets later and see everyone out celebrating. On Paseo Marítimo there must have been hundreds of people all dressed up, eating, drinking, and talking. I dont think we do anything comparable for the patron saint of Tacoma, do we? Hee hee. People really come together to celebrate here in Palma... or maybe they just really like to party! Haaha. Anywho, las carnavales are coming up here this weekend, which is like Spain's Halloween, so I'll be sure to post pictures of costumes soon! Hope all is well back home... Miss you all!

La Nochevieja

New Years Eve was a blast in Palma! It was really fun learning about all the different traditions they have here... It's quite different than in the States. Here they call it Nochevieja (the old night)...

Encarna invited a lot of her friends from work over for dinner at our place and at about 10 we ate. We had "cochinillo asado", which is a roasted suckling pig. We ordered it from a really well-known carnicería here and warmed it up in our oven again before eating it. It was quite the endeavor trying to re-heat this entire butterflied pig because our oven really wasn't big enough for it. We had to bend the snout of the pig towards the top of the oven in order to make it fit, and then the nose started to catch fire a little bit! I don't think our oven is equipped to cook a pig for 10 people :) In the end, we situated the pig enough so that it wouldn't set the house on fire and it all worked out. Along with the pig there were these delicious roasted peppers and potatoes... Boy were they amazing! We also had a bunch of different "pinchos" (or appetizers), like olives, tuna paté, crackers called Quelitas, pa amb oli (typical Mallorcan bread rubbed with tomatoes from the area, salt, and olive oil and then topped with Mallorcan cheese or meats), prawns, stuffed dates and some other things. It was delicious.

After dinner we turned on the TV to see the countdown like we do in the States. However, in Spain they have a different tradition for the countdown. They don't kiss when the clock strikes 12... Instead, they eat a grape for the 12 seconds leading up to 12, one for every month of the previous year. It was a lot easier this year than when I was in Granada because we had all the grapes prepped (with the seeds taken out and the peel removed)... I hear that New Year's Eve is one of the busiest days of the year for the Emergency Rooms here; I guess a lot of people choke on the grapes! It's really not that easy to do... a grape every second may seem easy but trust me it isn't.

After the countdown we hung out at our place for a while and danced to music and took pictures. Wow the time flew by... We didn't go out until about 3:30 or 4:00 in the morning! Then we went out to a club to dance a little more, and at about 8:30 we headed to the Croissanterie Mallorca, a restaurant chain here well-known for their breakfasts. It was really cool because there was a photographer there taking pictures of the "after-party" and we ended up in the paper the next day!! We had a large picture in color too! It was pretty awesome, and I made sure to grab a copy of "Última Hora" in the morning for a souvenir :)

I'm back to school now. We started back up on a Friday (only for one day) and now it's the weekend again. But I'm looking forward to getting back to work and hanging out with the kids. There's so much vacation time here because they also celebrate "Los Reyes Magos" (the three wise men). They actually give gifts on this day more than on Christmas. There was a big parade on the 5th of January with floats of each king that was really fun to see too. But now it's time for everyone to get back to the grind; you can tell that all the kids are still in "vacation mode", but after this next week I'm sure that will all change. Hope all of you had a great Christmas break, and I'll make sure to keep you all updated about any upcoming adventures here in Palma. ¡Hasta luego!

Berlin

So.... Berlin was quite the adventure. I went a few weeks ago with four friends of mine here: Becca, John, Bradley, and Anthony. We flew into Hamburg and then took a train to Berlin from there. I had never experienced Germany before so as you can imagine I was very excited to be there.

We finally made it to Berlin after all the traveling and we decided to take a taxi to our hostel, which was a quaint little place called John's Cozy Little Backpacker's Hostel. It was late and three of the people we were traveling with were getting over being sick (one was on antibiotics, one had just gotten over the swine flu, and one had sinusitis!) so a few of us grabbed a drink at a local bar and then we al decided to call it a night.

In the morning we were set to see all the tourist sights. On that first day we saw the Brandenburger Tor and the Reichstag which has a beautiful glass dome as a ceiling. In between the sight-seeing we made sure to stop at some of the German Winterfests to try some new type of wurst (which were all amazing by the way) and some gluwhein (hot mulled wine mixed with fruit)... Germany has got some good food!

In the afternoon we met up with a friend of John's that lived in Germany named Torsten and we hit up another Winterfest with him. He showed us some places to go and helped us order the best things to eat and drink. It was really nice having a guide there to help us. I even learned a few phrases in German to get by.

The next day we dicided to venture out of the main part of Berlin and go see Potsdam, which was the residence of Prussian kings until 1918. We visited the largest palace there and took a tour of the inside. It was gorgeous! Then we went outside and got some more food and hot drinks at the Winterfest there.

We went to the Sachenhausen concentration camp just outside of Berlin too, which was a very tough site to see. The camp was HUGE, and I couldn't believe how many people they were able to cram in there at one point. While it was very interesting to read all the history behind the camp and to take a guided tour, it was honestly really rather depressing.

We also went to the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, which was close to the Brandenburg Gate. There were hundreds of stones which when separated created curvy paths that went up and down. The entrance to the museum was hidden within the stone sculptures and was all underground. Again, the museum was very interesting, yet sad.

We also saw Checkpoint Charlie, which was really interesting. There was a museum that explained everything about East and West Berlin and about the Berlin wall and the methods used to sneak people from one side to the other and all that jazz. It was really fascinating, although sometimes disturbing.

Things took a turn for the worse for me toward the end of the trip....

We went to this club one night called Matrix (Ill never forget the name) and I decided to set my purse down for a second and within NO time at all I turned around and it was GONE! While there was no place to lock up our luggage in the hostal I decided I thought it would be safer to carry all my important documents with me while we were out... That means my passport, my Spanish residency card, my camera, my IPOD, and all my credit cards we stolen at the same time! I couldnt believe it! And this was the night before we were going to leave so I knew I wouldnt have enough time to get a new passport in time to catch my flight back to Mallorca! While the others had tickets planned to go back to the islands too, I decided to stay back by myself and get things sorted out. The owners of the hostal were really understanding though and they let me stay for a couple more days. I made it to the US Consulate in Berlin the next morning and by late afternoon I had a new temporary passport. I was surprised at how easy it was to get things sorted out.

Caimari and Bike Trip

Hey everyone!

I went to this really cool festival in Caimari, one of the pueblos outside of Palma this last week. Caimari is really well-known for its olive oil, and they had the festival to show all of the products they had there. There were booths set up all over the place where you could taste different olives, olive oils, wines, and hierbas (a type of liquor that is typical in Mallorca). It was awesome! My favorite olives were these ones that were pickled in some spicy juices and stuffed with peppers! Wow they were delicious. We also went inside on of the factories where they had an old olive press and we got to see how the oil was made.

We also saw a prize winning sobrasada (Mallorcan blood sausage) that was enormous! I can not even imagine how many pigs it was made of... kinda gross. Although I'm not gonna lie... It doesn't taste all that bad!

But overall the trip was really fun. Helena's mom has a house in Caimari and she let us hang out there and meet some of the other family members. We really appreciated it.

The other day when I was at my gym I saw an advertisement for this bike trip called La Pedalada in which you could go on a tour of some of the older parts of Mallorca. We only had to pay 3 euros to rent a bike and we got a free T-shirt and some other goodies. It was super fun. We stopped with the group to take pictures toward the end, and in one of them we got a pretty good shot of the famous Cathedral here in Palma. It is soooooooo beautiful, and even more amazing inside.

As for the rest of my life right now... Things are great. I cannot believe that two whole months have gone by; the time has just gone too fast since I have gotten here. School is good. One of the student teachers and I are going to have tryouts for a Christmas performance of Grease soon! We are also having auditions to sing some Christmas songs in English in the middle of December. I really like the kids I work with as well as the teachers.

I'm starting to take Salsa lessons here too! Every Sunday there are free lessons at one of the bars along the water, and Sunday was my first time there. It was really fun, although I know I have a long way to go.. heehee.

Other news: I'm going to Berlin this weekend! One of my friends here wanted to go somewhere for her birthday and we found plane tickets for a total of 30 euros! I'm really looking forward to it and I will make sure to put pictures up when I get back!

Hope all is well with you! Love you all and miss you!