Points of View

I told myself I’d blog every week, and my fans (Mom and Gina-Maria) are probably wondering if I’ve been taken. I’m in Madrid now, having left Barcelona behind yesterday. I’m really going to miss it. It’s a great city, and I’ll be going back in 2026 with my hypothetical future family to see La Sagrada Familia as a finished product. To say goodbye I’ll give a brief recap of the final few days in pictures. We went to Monserrat, where I went last year after the dialogue and blogged about my struggles with my fear of heights. This time, I decided to branch off from the group and push myself to the limit, which resulted in this photo.  It was worth the view.   Then on our last night in Barcelona, our host family’s son Jordi drove Alex and I up to Mt. Tibidabo. I was excited to go there after we saw its mountain-top Ferris wheel from across the city while we were at Park Guell. Some people speculated that it was haunted and it honestly might be. I mean look at this:

That’s pretty creepy.

But it was well worth the drive, as we got the best view of the city possible while taking in some cervezas at a bar on the mountain. We could see Montjuic, Park Guell and La Sagrada Familia, even at night. It was the perfect way to say goodbye to Barcelona, looking out over it and pointing out all the places we visited. I’ll leave off with a picture of the view, which my iPhone unfortunately did not do justice. Until next time Barca.

Tour City

My fans (Mom) are concerned that I haven’t blogged in a while, so here we go. This week has been pretty busy, especially for everyone who has to get interviews and get their stories together. I feel their pain; I was in their shoes last year and it’s not easy. But it’s well worth it when it inevitably comes together and you realize you’ve written a story in a foreign country. We’ve also had a tour nearly every day, which has made it even more difficult to have time to write (and for me, edit) the stories. Still, we have two up on the site and at the very least three will be done today.

We went to the beach one day, the next day saw La Sagrada Famillia’s inside, which I had seen last year but still blew me away. My favorite tour this week though was led by my dude Stuart, who took us to Plaza Espanya and then Montjuic fortress, which is on a hill that overlooks all of Barcelona. The view was incredible, and I was shocked how much La Sagrada Familia shoots out of the surrounding area. You can sort of see what I’m talking about in this photo.

Red circle added.

We then walked to the Olympic Stadium, which was cool because I didn’t get a chance to visit it last year. Stuart knows a ton about all of the buildings and the famous architects that built them (sidenote: either I need to study architects a LOT more, or Stuart is throwing the word ‘famous’ around a little bit too much). I need to get back to getting the blog populated with stories, so I’ll end with the rest of the pictures from that tour.

Plaza Espanya

Cats hanging out in the stadium

Ethan scoping out Africa

Bullfighting ring turned shopping mall

Olympic Stadium

Plaza Espanya

Olympic Stadium

Fortress of Montjuic

Arrival of the Man with the Man-Bun

I’d have to describe the first weekend of round two in Spain the same way I describe my daily dinners to my host madre: muy bien. Our first excursion was to the Dali Museum and then to Girona, a city about an hour north of Barcelona. Both of them were special in their own way–Girona with its floral displays and panoramic views and Dali’s museum with its surrealist paintings, sculptures and god-knows-whats.  And when I say Dali’s museum, I mean it really is all his own: he chose the site, designated the location of all the artwork, and is even buried in the lower levels. I’ve never been to a museum like it and I doubt I ever will. I could have done without the pollen in Girona, but other than that it was awesome. Pics to prove it happened:

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This weekend was also great because my man-bun sporting childhood friend Greeni came to visit me while on a four-day weekend off from his work in Switzerland(he works for a company that makes a machine that turns these special K-Cups into tortillas–yes its a real thing). We went out a couple nights, and finished off the weekend today with a solid beach day, something I didn’t get a chance to do last time around. We’re both lobsters now, but it was well worth it and I’ll be going back next chance I get.

It’s Protest Season Again

First of all, it’s great to be back in Spain. I’m not going to say that Spain is a better country than the United States, but, it’s definitely better to look at. I mean even the first terminal of the airport looks like it could be the inside of art gallery.

Spain wastes no time showing off.

Beautiful sights are commonplace here, and apparently so are protests. Just like last year, in my first week here I stumbled upon a protest happening right outside our school. Actually they pretty much marched right down our throats, and myself, Maria and a bunch of the students came along for the ride. They marched down to the Arc of Triumph, which made for some pretty cool pictures.

Besides being more commonplace, the protests here are much more organized and passionate than the ones I’ve seen in the U.S. We learned that the students were protesting the government’s law that instead of doing four years of college, they must now do three undergrad and two for a masters, which is more expensive. Maybe the stereotype that Catalans are cheap has some merit, because there were a LOT of them. Proof is this time-lapse that I took while the procession walked by. If you look closely you can actually see their “what the hell is this kid doing” expressions.

Gaudi and Out

We spent our last day in Barcelona yesterday in a fitting way, taking in the most iconic site of its most famous architect, Antoni Gaudi. Park Guell is a park designed by Gaudi in the 19th century to be a place for events and recreation for Barcelona’s citizens. You can see Gaudi’s distinct style and imagination around every corner, and the park truly does shape itself to the landscape around it. There were bright colors and twisting patterns everywhere, and I could see a lot of similarities between the architecture of the park and La Sagrada Familia, Gaudi’s other major work. It also provides a great view of the entire city, including the ocean beyond it. It was a beautiful place, and a great way to spend my last day in the city, even on a partly cloudy day. Here is my final gallery from Spain, and I think I picked a good one to end on.

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Now its back to the United States after a one-day layover in Madrid. It will be nice to see everyone back home and get back into a more normal routine, but I can’t say enough how much I loved this experience, and I’d like to thank everyone who helped me with my articles and who read this blog to keep up with me. I’ll never forget the times I had and the sights I saw here in Spain, and if you ever quieres ir (want to go), I recommend you do it.

La Sagrada Familia

Yesterday we visited Barcelona’s number one tourist attraction–La Sagrada Familia. It’s a cathedral that was designed in the late 1800’s by Antoni Gaudi, who is nicknamed “God’s Architect.” I will say this: it deserves all the praise it gets and Gaudi deserves that nickname. I’ve seen quite a few cathedrals in my life, especially during my vacation to Rome, but this was unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. The architecture is incredibly different(Gaudi said he wanted it to look like a forest) and the colors pouring in through multicolored stained-glass windows added another layer of beauty. I can’t do it justice with words, so this gallery will have to do it for me.

 

Madrid Revisited…and Hola Barcelona

My mom landed in Madrid on Tuesday, and we stayed an extra night in the city before heading out on the train to Barcelona. This meant that I had to give her the world-renowned Danny Mortimer Madrid Tour on Wednesday. It was actually pretty cool being able to show someone else around the city, because it made me realize how well I got to know it through my journalistic travels over the course of three weeks. Plus, it was a nice day and Retiro Park was looking a lot better than it did during our rainy trip there a few weeks ago.

The Crystal Palace

Retiro Pond

View of Retiro Park

The tree we sheltered ourselves under during the first visit

 

Also, I got to check out some things I never got a chance to during our stay, including the Prado and Reina Sofia museums. We visited the Prado first, and it was incredible. There was room upon room of masterpieces in painting and sculpture from artists like Rubens, Velazquez, El Greco, Goya and Titian. There was also one Rembrandt. It really is amazing to be able to walk into a new room and be blown away by at least one painting or sculpture contained inside. It was easily the best art museum I’ve ever been to. I managed to sneak in some pictures of some of my favorite parts.

Tapestry by Rubens

Saturn or “Man eating another dead man” by Goya

Man copying a painting

The Prado’s Cloister

The Reina Sofia, on the other hand, was not one of my favorite museums. I will preface this paragraph by saying I know nothing about art, and its more than possible the museum’s exhibits went over my head. But, wow. The Reina Sofia held some of the creepiest, strangest and just straight up dumb pieces of art I’ve ever seen. The first floor was called the “New Playgrounds” and was filled with the sounds of little kids running and screaming, along with pictures and slideshows of playgrounds. One room literally had a pile of wood, a pile of chains, and a suspended two-by-four–that’s it. My mom and I found ourselves laughing out loud at some of the “exhibits,” including one that was just four pieces of metal in an open room. Some of the drawings on the upper floors looked like they could have been done by a four-year-old or someone in the midst of a narcoleptic episode. One room had an endless “film” playing that was one tree swaying on a loop with the word “tree” being repeated over and over again in the background. I can’t say enough how disturbing and frustrating this museum was. The one redeeming quality was Picasso’s section, especially the Guernica, which lived up to its hype and was an awe-inspiring painting. I couldn’t take a picture because it was guarded on both sides by grumpy-looking security, but here’s an image from the Internet.

Finally, we arrived in Barcelona. After being here for a day and half, I can already tell its a completely different city than Madrid. Whereas Madrid felt like a real city, sort of like the Spanish version of Boston–a few really cool sites, but not exactly a paradise–Barcelona seems tailored for tourists. There are huge open walking areas, and every street has something beautiful to look at. Its filled with monuments, and some of its more famous attractions are truly jaw-dropping. We visited La Sagrada Familia today, and it deserves its own blog post, coming tomorrow. Until then, enjoy some pictures from my first day walking around Barcelona.

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