TOO many people in one apartment

This past weekend made me question a lot of things. Mainly, WHY on earth did I choose to study in a place that is know for being cold and rainy year round? Why did I not choose somewhere with a pretty constant temperature of 64 and sunny with a light breeze by the beach?  Barcelona might be actual perfection. Getting there was a lot of work, though. We had to walk to the bus, take the bus to the train, then take another bus to the airport, then fly (obviously) to Barcelona, then take a bus to a central piazza, then walk to Sara's friend Chris' apartment, which he shares with Xander and Taylor. My body had never been more tired. But we rallied and went to abroadfest. Abroadfest is something like a music festival, but only random DJs play, and its inside this huuuuge room. Like I literally have no idea how big it really was because it was so large.

Anyhways, whilst tearing it up on the dance floor (not really I think I was either standing by a wall judging people or in line for the bar) one of the weirdest things happened to me: I saw Taylor Erickson. Taylor Erickson from St. Clement. Taylor Erickson from Camp Tecumseh. Taylor Erickson. It was so surreal that when I woke up that morning I wasn't even sure if it was a dream or not. A few more of Sara and Chris' friends came to stay for the weekend. Now, we were told that only a few were coming. But in walks about 7 girls who looked like they liked to say "WOO". There were 8 available beds in that apartment. 8 beds for 13 people. Sara, Elisabeth and I decided to deal with the sleeping situation when necessary (slash we secretly decided to stick to the first come first served rule and beat them to the beds).

Due to the condition everyone was in from the night before, Friday morning we decided to take the subway to the beach and relax in the sand with the sun shining down on our tired bodies. I stuck my feet in the Mediterranean and I did not even care that I could not feel my feet afterwards. Just knowing I was in such a beautiful place with such clear waters was enough to keep my mind off everything else. Barcelona truly is one of the most amazing cities I have ever been to and I was only there for a weekend. As we were getting up and desanding ourselves to go get linner, I saw a very tall person in a plaid shirt and khaki shorts walk past me. For those of you who do not know, that is the uniform of an American college boy (it makes it easier to avoid them and go for the hot foreigners (although I guess in this case WE are the foreigners...but whatever)). But this one in particular looked familiar. And GOOD LORD its DJ Valenti. He sat behind me freshman year English with Mr. Lee and I'm pretty sure we both still have the picture of Jonas White dressed up as Zeus for one of our projects on our phones.

Jonas White, everybody, in his greatest role ever. 

(sidenote: before landing in Spain, I TOLD Elisabeth and Sara that I had a feeling I would see people that I knew here) Twas a nice reunion considering the fact that I hadn't talked to him in about 6 years. After this reunion, we walked to a really interesting buurger(?) joint. It was really weird and kinda industrial, but also kitschy, but also retro, but also really modern. If you find a place that looks like this in Barcelona, I do NOT recommend getting the pumpkin soup. It will be just water with bits of pumpkin chunks floating in it. Also if you order a pitcher of sangria, be aware that these will put you back 20 euros. Before we knew this, we ordered four of them. (I should also mention that there were 13 of us before my mother accuses me of being a borderline alcoholic) The bill was so large and we were all paying with separate checks. I wanted to die. Especially when the poor waiter had to literally, LITERALLY chase us down the street waving his receipt pad screaming that we were 6 euros short.

Chris is the weird kid cheesin' WAY too hard over there in the corner

Friday night we were all set to go to this bar "The Dow Jones" which is actually amazing. The name of the game is that whenever you buy a certain drink, the price of that drink goes up, and the prices of others drop. I have no knowledge of the stock market, nor do I really care. But it was still really awesome to see people watch the screens trying to manipulate the price of their favorite drink down. I think it crashed at one point too.
Vair vair interesante. Since the three Denisonians were still exhausted from Thursday nights adventures, and because we wanted to claim our beds, we hopped in a cab and drove back to the apartment. I don't think you can understand how good that bed felt. I could have had my ear nibbled off by rats (I see you Elisabeth) and still have been incredibly comfortable.


The next day, Elisabeth Sara and I were up and running and ready to go explore. We ventured out on our own to explore the touristy side of Barcelona. Sara is an angel and figured out how to get us everywhere. Parc Guell was incredibly breathtaking. Climbing up the giant hill, I had to keep reminding myself that every other hill I have climbed since being here has been worth it. And, of course, this one was no different.

Don't be fooled. This is a very steep climb.

HOW

Now, I know some of you are going to have issues with the next thing I have to say: we did not actually go INTO the real Parc Guell. For this I am ashamed. We thought we were on a tight schedule so we had to move on to  La Sagrada Familia....which we also did not go into. The line was long and we were hot and Chris called us and said they were leaving to go to this abroadfest event and we had no money anyways so stop judging us. We did, strangely enough, have money for gelato....Back at the apartment, the group was not even close to being ready to go (not happy about that) but we changed and eventually made our way to this bar that sat over the harbor.

Again, the eating establishments in this city are amazing. We had a perfect view of the harbor and the gondola cars that bring peoples up to some mountain that I forget. While taking in all the warm I could, I once again bumped into Taylor Erikson. HOW. We had another nice chat then went our separate ways. Only my way included seeing Meg Ramette, Joe Dywer, and Gena Wendt. By the time I saw Gena Wendt, I wasn't even surprised.

The next item on our to-do-list for the night was to go a a bar called Chupitos. I would like to see this place burned to the ground. Which is actually a very likely scenario. The dimensions of Chupitos are 6ft x 30ft. And the bar juts out about 3 1/2 ft. Leaving little room to maneuver around the massive crowd of Americans that had gathered there. The Dow Jones was similar in design and number of Americans, but the difference is that Chupitos only serves shots. And most of those shots are of the setting-on-fire variety. And the bartenders have this spray that EXTENDS THE FIRE UP TO THE CEILING which is completely made of wood. After about 14 minutes I thought I was going to die. Thankfully, the rest of the group was done too. They made it out without too much difficulty. But I, being the courteous person that I am, let a couple go in the other direction past a section of the wall that stuck out into the limited walking space. This was my mistake. I was trapped. I'm not trying to be funny or exaggerate. I was legitimately stuck in a crazy fire-shot, wooden fire hazard of a clusterf@*k. Pardon the language, but I thought I was going to die. I'm pretty sure I had my hand on someones butt for about 10 minutes. And I'm pretty sure someone had their hand on mine. I'm told someone was sent inside to get me. They did not reach me. I had to physically shoved a man with both hands, not even caring if he spilled his drink. After what felt like years of struggling, I finally made it to the outside. The rest of the night was rather boring and this post is already crazy long. Somehow, though, someone decided it would be fun to stay up to see the sunrise while sitting on top of the hill next to Parc Guell. I thought I could do it. Why not? I've stayed up later for less. As I'm sure you can guess, everyone was passed out where ever they were sitting within 2 hours. Luckily for me and Sara we passed out on beds! HUZZAH!

Only a mad man could have done something so incredible

awkz cubbie hole picture

Sunday we packed up and set off to the beach for one last look. Walking along the boardwalk, seeing all the active people on rollerblades and scooters and bikes and those rollerskates that were actually shoes...heelies or something like that, made me wish that I could stay on that beach forever. But then I remembered that I wanted to go home, and I realized that by home, I meant Stirling. We stopped for some seafood under the boardwalk (cue dad singing the song) and my grilled salmon was diiiiiivine, dahling, just diiivine, and then we made our way back to the airport.

Camilas 27th birthday was Tuesday, so she and most of the Brazilians prepared traditional Brazilian snacks for us and then we headed down to the Studio (the campus bar) for karaoke (Camilas favorite thing beside crackers and cream cheese). And Wednesday I had my first exam. Polysci essay where I had to answer either a question about liberalism or conservatism. I think I did pretty well, but that always makes me nervous.

I think this is the end of the post....

WAIT MY FAMILIA IS COMING ON SATURDAY! Hopefully they have girl scout cookies for me otherwise they can just turn around and head back to America.