Week 3 Recap

Hello!

Hope you all enjoyed the post about my wonderful trip to the Costa Brava.

Since my schedule is so jam-packed Mondays-Thursdays, I'll be posting either Thursday evenings/Friday mornings with a recap of my week. Perhaps I'll also do weekend wrap-ups on Sunday evenings if I have time. We'll see. But time is absolutely flying - I don't know where the days go!

This is my 3rd full week here in Barcelona so I'll just do a quick summary and some highlights of the week.

WEEK 3
Classes
School has been going really well. We're now just starting to get into actual class content since last week we focused mostly on the class schedule, projects, class expectations, etc.

Internship
This was my first week at AmChamSpain and like most internships, it was a bit dull the first week in terms of busy work. However, I was invited to their members2members event titled "The impact of the internet on the Spanish Economy." The information was quite interesting (especially as an aspiring economist!) because they talked about how the internet has opened a lot of doors for Spanish businesses yet a constant problem for Spanish companies and businesses is incorporating more IT so that they increase efficiency and productivity in the workplace. I had a picture take of me with the other girl who is interning there as well but she hasn't sent it to me yet. Next week, I'll post it.

Dinner with Isabel's granddaughter Clara 
Sunday night, one of Isabel's grandaughters, Clara, came over and we chatted for about 2 hours out on Isabel's terrace. The three of us (Bianca, Clara, and I) hit it off so well we decided to have dinner on Friday night. Clara took us to a delicious crepe restaurant just a flew blocks from the house. I wish I'd taken a picture of my food, but it was soo good! I definitely plan on going back. My savory crepe came with tomatoes, chicken, ham, and cheese and the sweet crepe had bananas and nutella.Here's a picture of the three of us though!

Clara, me, and Bianca after having crepes!

Trip to the Chocolate Museum
No trip to Barcelona is complete without a trip to the Chocolate Museum. Since it rained all day Saturday, my friends and I decided to check out the legendary Chocolate museum! The admission ticket was a bar of a chocolate... now THAT is my kind of my admission ticket. Check out the photos below for cool sculptures made of chocolate!

My chocolate ticket!

Chocolate figurine of Gaudi's art

Chocolate Sagrada Familia...gosh I'd love to eat  visit that!

Another chocolate sculpture!

Me standing next to my favorite...a chocolate Chicken Little!

La Merce
From Thursday, September  22 - Sunday, September 25, Barcelona hosted the annual "La Merce" Festival.
Since 1872, this annual festival in Barcelona has honored Nostra Senyora de la Merce (Our lady of Mercy) in a week of concerts, masses, and dances. But in 1902, Catalanonians added a cultural twist to it by adding events such as the correfoc (a parade of fire-breathign dragons, giants, and monsters), sardana dancing (traditional Catalan dance), castellers and falcones (human towers) and the piro musical (fireworks set to music).

My friends and I did some activities on Thursday and Friday but it wasn't until Saturday and Sunday that the real festivities began. Unfortunately, it was raining on Saturday, so all the outdoor events (so pretty much all of them) were canceled. But, Sunday was absolutely divine and we enjoyed the festivities all day long.

Pouring rain on Saturday...but still smiling! (Lily, Jessica, Alysse, and I)

Bianca, Bonnie, Jessica, Alysse and I at Castle Montjuic

People dressed up as devils for Correfoc!

Crazy correfoc...people were dancing under the fire sparklers!

Castellers - human towers! They're incredible

For more pictures of my adventures please check out my Barcelona 2011 Album (I have TONS of pictures in there I didn't post!)


Off to Switzerland this weekend! 
Yup - you read that correctly, I'm off to Geneva, Switzerland with some new friends, Jessica and her roommate Lauren. I literally bought the tickets last Friday the 23rd because there was a good deal (about 115 euros roundtrip). We'll be staying at a hostel and the wifi's kinda bad there, so I'll post when I return. Any suggestions/tips for Geneva?

Officially Sick

This sums up how I feel (and look) right now.

Feeling Under the Weather...
It's about 10:30 pm here and I'm officially sick - I have a sore throat, I'm congested, and overall feel very weak and lightheaded. I don't know how I could have gotten sick, but now that I think about it, during my econ class on Thursday, I shook hands with my neighbor to introduce myself. Shortly after we shook hands, he informed me that he was leaving class early for a doctors visit because he was sick (Why did he not tell me this BEFORE we shook hands?!) Either way, whether it was this kid or germs I caught on the metro, I'm miserable. However, I have been taking some medicine for congestion that I brought with me and almost every hour, drinking 1 tablespoon of honey and lemon juice to coat my throat. I have noticed a difference, but I've been lying in bed all day (which is very rare for me) so I feel utterly lazy and unproductive. But then again, resting is the only way to feel better. I'm just happy I'm getting sick now as opposed to later in the semester when things get very busy (e.g. classes, internship, field trips). I really hope I can get over this soon. Any suggestions for getting better?

Oh, and another not so lovely thing happened to me today: I stepped in dog poop. I noticed a lot of Spaniards have dogs and walk them quite often around the neighborhoods, but I would say almost everytime their pet has a little accident, they clean it up. But today, someone did not and it certainly didn't make my day any better, especially considering I was semi-conscious walking down the street to the corner store (I've been very dizzy and lightheaded today) for some lemons.


Free Trip to Montserrat
On a happier note, I mentioned in my post from last weekend that I participated in a Scavenger Hunt with a group of other IES students. I got an e-mail today from IES saying my group won the Scavenger hunt, so we are all getting a free trip (worth $40) to Montserrat on October 8th. I've been so bored today that I've been filling in my agenda with the trips and I'll have 3 trips in October! Considering I've been homesick, filling in my agenda has made me feel better because it helps me realize that today may be going slowly, but before I know it, I'll be packing my bags to go back home.

Montserrat

Observations of Spanish culture
I've been here about 10 days now but I have noticed several interesting things about Spanish culture. I've been talking so much about what I AM doing, I haven't talked about what OTHERS do. Here are some things I've noticed/observed:
- Spaniards eat breakfast at 8/9 am, a light snack at 10/11 am, lunch around 1/2 pm, another snack around 4/5 pm, and a dinner at 9/10 pm.
- Spaniards love their coffee! (e.g. cafe solo, cafe con leche, cafe americano, cafe cortado, etc)
- Spaniards really enjoy their meals. Meals are the opportunity to connect with other people and relish the subtle and potent flavors of the food. They're not nearly as rushed as Americans. In fact, lunch is generally an hour and a half to two hours.
- The work schedule here is generally 9 am - 2 pm (then everything closes from 2 pm to 5 pm) and 5 pm to 7/8pm.
- Catalan food is very simple and flavorful, but depends on high quality ingredients.

I'll keep working on this list. I'll see if I can add more observations as I go along in my posts.