Back in the US and Blogging about Barcelona!

So, as I’m writing this, I’m actually no longer in Spain! I’m back at home in Texas! The end of the semester was incredibly busy, and between final exams and trying to see all of my friends before leaving, I didn’t manage to sit down and do any blogging. But, have no fear, dear reader, for I do plan to write about all of my trips, and possibly write some general “summary” posts so I don’t forget any of the details about my experience!

After my long Semana Santa trip, I had one free weekend, but then the very next week my friend, Maggie, and I left for Barcelona! We left Thursday morning and came back Saturday in the early evening. This was my first experience flying out of Seville’s airport, and thankfully things went smoothly. We met at the train station in Seville to take the special airport shuttle, and then we braced ourselves for the experience known as “Ryanair.” Ryanair is a budget Irish airline that is known for having cheap fares, but also for being incredibly strict about their rules. Basically, they have cheap flights, but they look for any other excuse to take your money, and they spend the entire flight trying to sell you things. (Seriously, they sell lottery tickets in the middle of the flight! And they play this subliminal message-esque recording of a woman pouring a drink to try and entice you into buying some of their snacks. It’s very weird.) However, we had no problems and didn’t have to pay any fees, and soon we were in Barcelona!

Visiting Barcelona was fun because it’s such an iconic city. In fact, when I was applying to study abroad programs, I considered studying in Barcelona. I later decided against it because I had heard that the Catalan language is very commonly used in Barcelona, and that this could get in the way for someone trying to learn Spanish. Catalan is another romance language that (to me, as a non-expert) sounds a lot like Spanish, but with some French elements. Barcelona is located in the Catalonia region of Spain, and many people there feel very proud of their culture and language, to the point that the phrase “Catalonia is not Spain” is very common. There’s a fierce independence movement in Catalonia, and many people strongly believe Catalonia should be its own country. The entire time I was in Spain, every so often on the news there would be reports of a vote taking place regarding Catalonian independence, or regarding some kind of protest or demonstration related to this cause. In fact, when we were in Barcelona, my friend and I saw a protest in favor of Catalonian independence that we heard had turned violent later on in the day (luckily we didn’t get caught up in any of that!)

After checking into our hostel (Backpackers BCN Diputació, probably one of the best hostels I stayed in throughout the whole semester), we did some exploring in the downtown area. We went to Las Ramblas, which is one of the main avenues where tourists congregate, and managed to not get pick-pocketed! Barcelona is known for pickpocketers, and statistically-speaking, we were pretty lucky to not get anything stolen from us. Before our trip, I had heard so many stories of people getting things stolen from them in Barcelona, so we were extra careful. And I think it paid off! We also went to the Plaça de Catalunya, the Passeig de Gràcia, and the “Block of Discord”.  The Block of Discord is a city block that has buildings designed by four of Barcelona’s most famous Modernista architects, including the Casa Batlló by Antoni Gaudí. These buildings all have a very unique style, and really exemplify the kind of architecture Barcelona is famous for.  Further down the street we stopped to see Casa Milá, another one of Gaudí’s works that forms part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and were disappointed to see it was undergoing renovations. Not only that, but they had placed a huge Versace ad over the scaffolding, so hardly any portion of the building itself was visible at all. Talk about adding insult to injury!

We walked through a large portion of the downtown area and made our way to one of the main attractions: the Sagrada Familia (full name: the Basílica i Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Familia). One of Gaudí’s best-known works, the Sagrada Familia is an enormous Roman Catholic church. However, what I think is most interesting about the church, besides its unique architectural design, is that it’s not yet done being built! Construction began in 1882 and continues to this day! Gaudí designed the building and devoted many years to it, but he died in 1926 when less than a fourth of the church was completed! However, construction has continued and the site is a major tourist attraction despite the fact that it’s incomplete. Estimates for when the church will be complete range from 2020 to 2040! I thought this was fascinating, as I recalled the Seville Cathedral, which took over 100 years to build. I wondered what it would have been like for people at the time to see this amazing structure being built but knowing they would never see the finished product. Just as they saw a masterpiece in progress, I was seeing one, too! Perhaps if the construction estimates are correct, I may be able to go back to Barcelona someday and see the completed Sagrada Familia!

We spent some time looking at the outside of the church, enjoying the different façades that include sculptures of Biblical stories and unique details. The design of the church includes a lot of symbolism. For example, the church will eventually have a total of 12 spires to represent the 12 Apostles. After snapping some photos, we then got in line to go inside. Thankfully we bought tickets in advance online, because the line to buy tickets apparently took 2-3 hours!! We made it inside, and got to experience one of the most unique churches I had ever seen. The interior is mostly colored with neutral tones, but there are beautiful, colorful stained-glass windows that make the inside feel almost magical. They also play classical or choral music over the speakers, so the “religious” mood is omnipresent. I thought the Sagrada Familia was definitely worth all of the hype, and it was another one of those places I was really excited to see after having studied it in class many times over the years.

My friend and I had dinner, and then walked over to the Montjuïc area of Barcelona, where we had heard there was a “Magic Fountain” that had a lights and music display. We had heard it was pretty cool, but it definitely surpassed our expectations! Hundreds of people turned up for the light show, and the fountain was HUGE and located on a giant hill with museums and other fountains that overlooked the city. (There were even some columns that reminded me of Mizzou’s Francis Quad!) We enjoyed the views and the fountain show, and then got some frozen yogurt to eat while we walked back to the hostel.

The next day we had tickets for another one of Barcelona’s main attractions: Parc Güell. The park was originally intended to be a housing community, created by Count Eusebi Güell. He commissioned Gaudí to design some buildings and a terrace area that could serve as a public square/marketplace. However, the project didn’t gain enough interest, and so today the rest of the land that was intended for houses is now a public park. Up until recently, the area with the Gaudí architecture (called the “Monumental Zone”) was also open to the public for free, but due to overcrowding (and probably to make some good money) they started selling tickets and limiting the number of people who can be in the Zone at a time. However, we had our tickets and were able to enjoy the beautiful mosaics and buildings! The only difficult task was trying to take pictures of the sculptures without having a bunch of random people in your pictures! My friend said that avoiding people was like a sport, haha.

For lunch, we went to the Mercat de La Boqueria. This is a big, open-air market located near Las Ramblas where there are tons of stalls selling all kinds of food and drink for very reasonable prices. We were each able to grab a couple of items and make a good meal of it! One of my favorite things was the juice. Several stalls sold lots of different flavors of juices, and we found which stall was cheapest and tried tons of different flavors.

We did some more exploring in the downtown area and saw lots of different plazas and churches, including the Cathedral of Barcelona, the Passeig del Born, and the Plaça del Rei, where King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella received Columbus after his first “New World” journey.

We went to the Parc de la Ciutadella, and then to the Marina of Port Vell and the Passeig de Colom to see the Columbus Monument. We had a very difficult time finding a place to eat dinner that wasn’t too expensive and wasn’t too touristy, but we managed in the end!

On our last day in Barcelona, since we had seen all of the sights we wanted to see, we took it slow and went to the beach. We went to the Barceloneta beach and relaxed in the sun while people walked by trying to sell us alcoholic beverages and massage sessions (all part of the experience!)

Barcelona was a very fun city! I understand why it’s so iconic and why it’s such a popular destination. However, after visiting, I was glad I had decided not to study there. Besides the fact that Catalan is spoken so commonly (and is used in a lot of the signage), I observed that English was also very common. While that’s great for tourists, I was glad to be in a slightly less touristy city like Sevilla, where I was able to practice my Spanish more often. I also don’t think I’d want to have stayed in a city as large as Barcelona. In Sevilla, I was lucky enough to live in the historic city center, and was able to walk pretty much everywhere I needed to go on a daily basis, whereas in a city like Barcelona, I probably would have been staying outside the center and would have had a much longer commute. However, for a vacation, Barcelona was beautiful and enjoyable!

Stay tuned! More blog posts to come.