Barca!!

First: Don't pronounce Barca like Bark-a.  It's embarrassing (Sadly, I would know).  Obviously, it's a shorter version of Barcelona so you keep the "c" soft.  I said Bark-a once without thinking and the 7 year old boy I take care of laughed at me.  Therefore, to show that you know the slightest amount of knowledge concerning football (not soccer) whatsoever, never say Bark-a. Ever.

As the au pairs and I have come to realize, we are not going to be in Igualada forever.  There are a limited number of weekends so we have made a list of everything we want to do before saying goodbye to the wonderful country of Spain.  One of these was going to a Barca football game.  Tickets were expensive and so was the jersey but it was COMPLETELY WORTH IT. Walking into any big stadium I am always amazed at the size.  It is actually slightly smaller than Neyland Stadium but for some reason it seemed so much bigger.  As we were walking into the stadium, saw the sky above us surrounded by thousands upon thousands of seats, and were at least 5 stories above ground, one of the au pairs said "this must be what it's like to go into heaven."  Let's just say I hope heaven is a little more exciting than that but you get the idea.

In our giddy excited states we took many-a-pictures and were obviously tourists attempting to get every angle of that enormous stadium.  Even though we were closer to the clouds than the players, we could see the players surprisingly well.  Throughout the game, the fans would erupt into a barca (clap clap clap) barca (clap clap clap) chant but seeing as it's difficult to maintain a simultaneous chant between 70,000 people, it tended to only last around 10 seconds.  While I didn't realize this at the time, at 17 minutes and 14 seconds, the crowd starts to sing a song of Catalonia Independence.  This is because on September 11, 1714, Catalonia lost to the Spanish army in a siege during the War of the Spanish Succession.  While it may seem odd that Catalonia celebrates a day in which they were defeated, they interpret this celebration as a continuing desire to be independent, even after 300 years.  I didn't know much about football and absolutely nothing specific about Barca players so during half time I attempted to memorize some facts from my wise au pair/english professor friends.  Messi is the favorite of many in Barcelona and ended up scoring one of the two goals of the night for a win against Liga España (2-0).

The Crew at Camp Nou 

Panorama! 

Next adventure was to explore the Barcelona nightlife.  We decided on a nightclub on the beach and it was quite the experience. Full of strobe lights, loud music, and lots of people.  After a short time, we felt relieved to go out the back door and hang out on the quiet beach for a while.  If it had been a few degrees warmer it would have been absolutely perfect, but even so, we enjoyed sitting on the cold sand talking under the star-filled sky with the sound of the waves in the background.  To make it more interesting, there was a blinking green light in the distance and I couldn't help but think of the Great Gatsby.  Movie coming out in May!!

We started the next day with none other than a hearty McDonald's breakfast.  It was fancy in terms of Mickey D's because I finally was able to try the infamous macaroons! While they are more typical in France, the only opportunity I had to try them there was at the Versailles gift shop, for 30 euros (a box with 10 macaroons).  My desire to try fancy sugar-filled treats did not stretch as far as 30 euros.  McDonald's had the great price of 0.70 euro per macaroon, so you can imagine my excitement.  Better yet, it was worth it! Essentially it was pistachio flavored sugar with a little bit of crunchy macaroony wonderfulness but that was definitely my kind of dessert.

Pistachio, Vanilla, Carmel…toma lo que tú quieras!

What's better than exploring Barcelona on a Sunday?  Exploring Barcelona on a Sunday when it's sunny and warm!  While it's still officially winter, the weather said otherwise, causing people to flock the streets of Barcelona.  La rambla was full of tourists (spring break season) and locals enjoying the first days of spring-like weather looking at multicolored jewelry and scarves from the kiosk shops, getting their caricatures drawn by one of the many artists, and buying flowers for their loved ones from stands along the rambla.  I talked with a friend over a coffee in one of the many squares tucked away in the city.  Later, I explored Barcelona with a local friend who knew quite a lot of history regarding the monuments, cathedrals and Barcelona in general.  Spain is a little more strict about when stores can be open and for the most part, stores must be closed on Sundays.  Depending on the type of shop and the season, there are less restrictions but those with the freest rein are tourist areas.  It can be difficult to get this status, especially in Barcelona, but one area intended to be a port for cruise ship was deemed "a tourist hotspot." The builders in charge of this area received all the necessary licensures to obtain this status and receive less restrictions regarding taxes and to allow Sunday shopping.  It wasn't until later that they realized the port was not deep enough to allow a 100,000 ton cruise ship to enter.  Better luck next time I guess.  Lucky for the stores already established in the enormous shopping center as they can open on Sundays with no restrictions and pay less taxes due to their inaccurate "tourist" status.

Only downside of this weekend was the amount of money I spent but, no pasa nada (it doesn't matter), because I'll probably only be living in Spain once.  I carpe diem-ed! You can call that Latinglish.

Coming up is Semana Santa-what they call Easter week here.  Happening next week! Hasta luego!

A Little Catalonia History

After traveling to Bell Munt and hearing about the Spanish Civil War (1930's), I decided to look a little more into it.  At the time, President Azaña ruled over Spain.  He was democratically elected to rule and was of the Republican party (the Loyalists), which consisted of the working class, peasants, communists, and socialists.  Franco, a fascist-leaning general in Morocco's Spanish Army deemed the Nationalists, rose up against the Spanish government.  They were supported by fascist Germany and Italy, while the Soviet Union and European Democracies supported the Loyalists.  Due to internal arguments within the Loyalist party between socialists, communists, and anarchists as well as other factors, the Nationalists won the war and overtook Spain.  The government became a dictatorship and Franco became the longest ruling dictator in European history.  Spain was expected to help in the Second World War on the side of Germany since Germany had contributed to Spain's win in 1939.  However, Spain was in no state to provide weapons nor people.  They did provide a small volunteer army called La División Azul, however.  To be frank, Franco wasn't a warm and fuzzy type of person.  In order to keep his hold on Spain, he was ruthless with his political enemies or potential enemies.  While his policies were said to increase the economic development in Spain post WWII, he implemented heavy prison sentences and concentration camps immediately following the end of the Spanish civil war. It was a time of heavy political oppression.  Any form of art or cultural expression was censored by the government and suppressed if it was not considered "Spanish." The Catalan language was officially forbidden and any writing of it was illegal.  While many still spoke the language and studied it in secret, it wasn't until 1960 when Catalan could be found in writing, even though it was still officially illegal until 1975.  The government also had a strong affiliation with the Catholic Church, so contraceptives, abortion and divorce were forbidden.  For a period of time, working was banned on Sundays so if work needed to be done on a farm, for example, it was done in secret.  Up until the 1970's women could not even have a bank account without a co-sign from a father or husband.  After Franco's rule, Spain started a transition to a democracy, through a constitutional monarchy.  Now, the government is simultaneously trying to put that time of oppression behind them while also attempting to rectify what little they can.  The government provides funds to families of the Republican party who were forced into exile.  In the future, they hope to transform the Valley of the Fallen, Franco's concentration camps, into a place of remembrance and learning, similar to Auschwitz.  Interesting Article on Franco

Now on to Catalonia.  I recently downloaded a book called, What's up with Catalonia?  This book consists of essays from political figures, translated into English, geared toward english speakers.  This book obviously supports Catalonian independence and while it claims its purpose is more informative for those living outside Catalonia rather than a persuasive call to action type book, it doesn't really show both sides of the story.  With that in mind, it is still a very interesting collection of essays.  The opening essay is written by the President of Catalonia, Artur Mas i Gavarró.  It describes in a very politically correct manner why Catalonia seeks independence.  Like I have heard from many Catalonians, this desire is mostly based on money.  Essentially, Catalonia is contributing more to the economy via taxes than it is receiving in benefits.  During a time of a huge recession in Spain with unemployment higher than it has been in years, this is particularly concerning.  "(We are) a Catalonia that suffers, like the rest of the countries in Europe, the harsh consequences of the financial crisis, that suffers the consequences of having to drastically reduce its public spending to meet the deficit objectives that are disproportionately, unjustly, and disloyally imposed by Spain, and that suffers the consequences of having to shoulder the return of a debt of massive dimensions" (28, What's up with Catalonia?).  They seek to be separated from the "Spanish State" and want to live by their own means, have their own tools as a separate country would, and have the ability to decide their future.  The next essay is written by a University Professor who is also the president of the Catalan National Assembly.  She describes the year leading up to Catalonian's National Day 2012.  On September 11, 2012, the ANC, the Catalan National Assembly, organized a peaceful, unified, and democratic march in Barcelona in support of independence.  It consisted of a fifth of the population of Catalonia (1.5 million people).  Many consider this march to be a historical turn of events, the largest protest in Barcelona's history, and a great decider in what was the come next for Catalonia.  Before I go any further, it is interesting to point out that September 11th, the National Day for Catalans, is actually the day of their defeat.  300 years previous, Catalonia's independence was taken away in the War of the Spanish Succession.  September 11th marks a day when Catalonians can show their pride and strong desire to become independent, despite the fact that it has been hundreds of years since liberty.

At the end of the march, the ANC had organized the President of the Parliament to meet with them to discuss a referendum.  Within two days, they met with the President and discussed the future of Catalonia, including a long disputed fiscal pact, which would provide Catalonia with more funds.  The following week President of the Spanish government refused to negotiate a fiscal pact in Catalonia's favor, leading to the election that commenced on November 25th.  Originally, I was a little confused on who was being elected.  I discovered that Atar Mas whose term was between 2011-2015, supported the election (or re-election of himself) in order to show the rest of Spain that the majority of Catalonians supported independence.  Now is an exciting time in Catalonia as many see this as a chance to "recover the freedom that we lost almost 300 years ago" (46, What's up with Catalonia?).  "The Spanish Sate has said that we cannot hold a referendum, that we cannot decide our own future because it is illegal, because the Spanish laws don't allow it.  Indeed, many of these Spanish laws, the Constitution included, were made expressly so that catalans could not decide our own future.  They were created to suppress the minority" (46-47, What's up with Catalonia?).  They feel as if they are being suppressed, initially economically, which has in turn, suppressed their culture, freedom, and public service to their people.  They want the laws to change in order to become an independent state.

I still don't necessarily have a stance one way or the other on Catalonian independence.  It's not that I am indifferent, I simply do not think I can separate the extremely biased and exaggerated viewpoints from those that are actually true.  So I am reading everything with a grain of salt and attempting to make sense of it little by little.  Even though Catalonia claims that their desire to become independent has been strong and steadfast since they were striped of their liberty 300 years ago, I believe that the financial crisis has really put into perspective for the Catalonians what independence could mean for them economically.  It is as if independence is a distraction about the current economic crisis and I think people mistakenly believe that independence will quickly solve all their problems.  I do not know who is correct and what is best for the country but I will continue to read about it.  It takes a lot to run a separate country, even if they have been their own culture for a number of years.  One has to also consider international relations based on their relationship with the EU.  Many of these details within the EU I do not understand but it is definitely something to consider and read up on.  I think another problem they are having right now it unity amongst themselves.  While they all agree on independence, they bitterly disagree on who and how they should run the country.  Therefore, independence may be farther off than the march on September 11th, 2012 suggested but, in reality, I have no idea.

Bottom line: While Catalonia has always had its own culture, the financial crisis has demonstrated that Catalonians pay the Spanish State much more in taxes than it receives in government services.  The extent of which may be exaggerated, however, I do not know the official numbers.

Catalonia -Article on why Catalonia should stay a part of Spain.  Since I cited a source about why Catalonia should be independent, here's another article on why they should stay a part of Spain.

Let's take a step back.  I keep referring to September 11th, the Day of Catalonia.  One of my english students explained a little bit of the history.  Present Spain was split up a little differently back in the day.  In the latter part of the 15th century, the region was divided into the Crown of Aragon and the Crown of Castille.  The Crown of Aragon consisted of eastern Spain (including Catalonia), the bottom part of France, Italy, and some islands in the Mediterranean.  These components were very autonomous under the King and acted almost independently.  The Crown of Castille included the rest of current Spain.  In 1469, the King of Aragon married the Queen of Castille resulting in one large region, the Kingdom of Spain.  While the King and Queen were happy enough to be united, the two separate territories desired to remain separate.  As a pair, they went on to conquer the Canary Islands and the Empire of Granada.  The year was 1492 and if that year brings you back to lower school days, it should (In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue).  During this time, the Spanish Inquisition was in full gear, forcing Jews and Muslims to convert to Catholicism.  The Kingdom of Spain was quite enormous and as they were destined to be, became a world power through trade and wealth and had their fair share in European colonialism.  So, many other things happened during the next few hundred years that I'm not going to go into so we'll skip over to the first part of the 18th century.  Charles II ruled over the Spanish Empire until 1700.  It was the largest European empire at the time stretching over present Spain, East Indies, and parts of the Americas.  He was not fortunate enough to bear a son, therefore, war broke out over who was to rule over this extensive empire.  The empire was to be ruled by the France Bourbons or Austrian Habsburgs and after a decade, they ended up splitting up the empire amongst themselves.  Let's bring our focus back to Catalonia.  Catalonian troops were fighting against the French but they were defeated in 1714.  This day marks the end of Catalonia's autonomous rule and since then, Catalonia has desired to be independent yet again.  Therefore, while marking a day of defeat as the "National Day of Catalonia" seems ironic, in their eyes it shows their persistent longing to be once again independent.  In many ways, they have reason to because during Franco's rule, their Catalonian culture was severely oppressed and currently, they claim they are suffering unjustly as a result of the financial crisis.

I am attempting to make sense of this but I may get some of it wrong so if you would like to research it for yourself: Crown of Aragon, Kingdom of Spain, National Day of Catalonia, Charles II of Spain, Crown of Castille.  Right now I can sense disappointment from my college professors since all of my sources are from wikipedia and therefore unreliable.  I apologize so I'll go ahead and make a disclaimer: all of this may not be true.

Can't Be a Parade Without Feathers

It was Feb 9th and I'm not going to lie, I was a little nervous.  I was about to do a choreographed routine in front of hundreds if not a thousand people.  Not too nervous per se, just unsure on what to expect and if I was going to be judged by officials of the carnival on my quality of dancing, because let's face it, Faith is no professional dancer.  The streets of Igualada are normally pretty quiet.  There is  always someone walking around the narrow streets but it is in no way a "hopping" town.  Carnaval is a whole different story.  We took our spots in the long line of floats.  Each float was blasting their own music and let me tell you, they love gangnam style here.  Our tractor equipped with our own stereo was situated between two very different floats.  In front of us was a board game float with 200 people behind it dressed as board game pieces and dice.  I think this was a school related group because there were many middle school aged children dressed as various colored parcheesi looking pieces with larger parent pieces.  They even had dice the size of large TV boxes that they were tossing around like beach balls.  Behind us, there was a much smaller group dressed as zombies.  Baby zombies, children zombies, and adult zombies were practicing their zombie routine before the parade started.  Then, there we were in the middle, looking fabulous in our white tool with sequins and feathers, white pants and shirt, and of course a colorful mask.  The downside, we did slightly resemble chickens but the fact that our voluptuous sleeves looked magnificent as we did our dance made up for it.  In reality, I was expecting a parade similar to 4th of July Farragut parade.  Come to find out, it was much larger and only got better as we made our way through the streets.  The streets are so narrow that you could high five people as you went along if you really wanted to.  More people than I realized even lived in Igualada lined the streets.  After realizing that Igualada has a population of almost 40,000 people, however, I take that back.  Everywhere was packed and the kids were all lined up in front to see the action.  I kind of felt like a rockette with my poofy arms and everyone watching as we did our routine.  I also realized how tiring smiling and dancing for 2 straight hours is.  Let's just say, while my experience with entertainment dancing was fun for a night, becoming a rockette will not be my plan B as a career.  The other au pairs were in the crowd and ended up getting some lovely footage of our dance.  My "host aunt" was in the crowd also and called my name I walked by.

Large Parcheesi Board float in front of us

Feather sleeves galore!

The crew!

In action!  We had two lines with the kids dancing in the middle 

Other examples of costumes.  Everyone eating dinner post parade.

Post parade exhaustion

The parade ended at around 9pm and for a treat, all the paraders got a free dinner.  It was funny to see egyptians, trees, fish, and all other sorts of costumes standing around eating dinner in the plaza.  Come to find out, we were being judged.  The prizes were announced and although we did not win one of the top places, we did win 200 euros!  At this point it was around 10pm but the night was still young, especially during carnaval.  Therefore, I joined some of the other au pairs at a bar.  This bar happened to be owned by a couple who swims with me each week at the gym so I was forewarned that there would be karaoke.  I came prepared, singing voice ready, and the au pairs joined together to sing, "Dancing Queen" by ABBA and "Wannabe" by Spice Girls.

The bar tweeted our wonderful karaoke! We're famous!

The very busy and fabulous day was followed by the most unproductive day I've had here.  Maybe one of the most unproductive days I've had in my life if you don't count post-op days.  It's one of those pajama days where you only move to eat.  Instead of allowing myself to be upset because I could be doing something productive, I fully embraced my laziness and had no regrets.  The family was gone for the weekend, so I slept in, made myself some meals, and watched movies.

It was great to have a lazy day but I was ready to get back to real life.  Who am I kidding, living in Spain isn't really real life either, just a great way to spend 6 months.  I love it here so really just back to a little more structured life and normal weekly schedule: work with the kids at night helping them learn english and playing, teaching english classes, going to dance and swim class, going to intercambios (speaking spanish half the time and english half the time with a local), and volunteering at a local school.

One weekend, I traveled to Bell Munt with my host family.  Bell Munt, sounding awfully similar to Bay Moon when spoken quickly in Catalan, is an extremely small town of around 200 people, consisting of around 30 families.  I had the opportunity to meet the entire side of my host mom's family and they were extremely welcoming.  We drove around and I learned about the Spanish civil war in 1936.  It was difficult to imagine the beautiful town with characteristic spanish buildings and rolling green hills as a war zone.  I studied more about this and learned that after they lost this civil war, their Catalan culture was extremely oppressed.  There will be more information about this in my history post.  Stay tuned.

I've started teaching english conversation classes at a local bakery.  While they are not formal classes, I do still need to prepare my lessons.  Though most are not sure exactly where TN is in the US, they certainly know the state.  In case you're wondering about TN's stereotype in Europe it is: full of cowboys, the home state of Elvis, and it is the proud owner of Jack Daniel's whiskey.  Therefore, what better way to start my first class than with some fun facts about my home state.  You should have seen their reaction when I showed them an advertisement for Dolly's one and only Dixie Stampede.  Racing ostriches, eating without utensils, and climbing large logs as fast as you can seemed very far off.  Since then, I've taught classes on differences in food and holiday traditions.

Within the first few weeks, I had noticed certain customs concerning food.  While out to eat I never know exactly what I'm ordering, especially if the menu is in Catalan, so I just make an educational guess and hope for the best.  I've found some of the best food this way and there hasn't been much I haven't liked (but who am I kidding, I'm the least pickiest person in the world).  Tapas are very common here and often, a large group will go out to eat, order tons o' tapas, then dig right in.  Patatas bravas can be described as wedge fries with a spicy mayonnaise type sauce.  There's also green peppers boiled in oil with salt, which are delicious.  Today, I had a pretzel coated in white chocolate with coconut.  I'm hoping to put some recipes up here soon but these will be Faith-level recipes, i.e. soups and simple things.

Back to food.  Don't attempt to drink coffee black.  In the US, I like to think that I am hard core for drinking my coffee black, but in reality I am weak.  Our black coffee from the US is simply watered down and may have some extra flavoring to it, like vanilla.  In Catalonia however, the plain coffee is served in a teacup meant for Barbie sized people and is stronger than anything you've ever tasted.  So, as most everyone does here, I order cafe con leche.  It is half concentrated coffee and half frothy whole milk (notice, not cream) with a packet of sugar (VERY necessary).  So, not the healthiest thing in the world but it is definitely fantastic.

Other lists of foods I have enjoyed: white rice, tomato sauce, with a fried egg on top.  Bread, olive oil, and tomato.  All sorts of vegetables soups! Basically just cut up a bunch of vegetables and boil them.  Omelets cooked with potato wedges (very popular).  Croquetas (a fried doughy type round thing filled with porky creamy stuff, tastes much better than I made it sound).  After cooking a pizza in the oven for a few minutes, crack an egg on top and let it seep into the pizza slightly.  SO GOOD. Let's not forget the incredible amount of pastries they have here, usually a variation of a croissant.

The pastries here are WONDERFUL.  Desserts aren't extremely popular here but if you're craving something sweet after a meal, you can go to one of the many bakeries around.  You can buy one croissant with chocolate or any other filling that your little heart desires: esponjas, which are fried dough that taste like homemade donuts, eclairs with coffee cream and much more.

Breakfast is when you wake up, Lunch (their dinner, the largest meal of the day) starts around 2pm, and supper is around 9pm.  It is extremely normal to eat about 2 or so hours before you go to bed.  When I went to talk about my experiences in Europe and my life in the US to a group of 10th grade girls, I mentioned that we usually ate dinner around 6 or 7pm.  One girl's eyes widened and she stared at me in disbelief.  She then asked if since we ate dinner at 6, do we all go to bed at 7pm?  It's as if we should be starving by the time we wake up because we wait 5 hours after we eat before we go to bed.  Eh, it's what you're used to I guess.

While many of these things I noticed within the first few weeks, I noticed something new within the past week.  While I was at a school for English day, each of the teachers were taking a snack break and having fruit.  The fruit was on a plate accompanied with fork and knife.  I watched as each teacher used their fork and knife to carefully cut off the skin and cut off appropriate sized pieces before eating them.  A banana was no exception.  The knife cut along the edge of the banana peel and then the banana was cut in bite sized pieces.  I have never seen such a formality with fruit but I respected it.  In the US we tend to rush eating and are quite informal, eating a bagel on the way to class or eating lunch while walking around.  If there's a stereotype about US food here it's our inclination to eat fast food.  While I have not gained the patience necessary to eat a banana with a fork and knife, I have come to appreciate time spent while eating.  It is based on quality not quantity and enjoyment rather than convenience.    Rumor has it that Spanish meals can last ages and that can be true.  Meals are a time to enjoy the food slowly while socializing with friends and family.  This is mostly true for meals outside the house on the weekends or special occasions when life is not so busy.

You may notice that I have been using US instead of America.  I was talking to one of my students and he mentioned in the politest way possible, that it is a little strange for the US to refer to themselves as America.  Not even considering South America, the US is only part of North America.  I simply have never thought about it that way before but he is right.  He said, if someone from Brazil said they were from America, that would sound completely normal.  For example, before the new pope was selected my host mom predicted that he would be American.  Indeed, as a native of Argentina, he was.  In the US we are taught that there are 7 continents, 2 of which being North and South America.  In Europe however, many students learn there are 6, with North and South combined as "America."

The first Sunday of every month, many museums in Barcelona are free.  While many of our friends were on a skiing trip in Andorra, we decided to travel over to Barcelona and take advantage of free things because let's face it, money should be spent on important things like cafe con leche.  It was a gorgeous day to be in Barcelona.  We could feel spring approaching and I couldn't wait for it to get here.  I only brought one winter coat abroad and am ready to put it away for a few months.  We decided to visit the museums, MNAC and the Placa del Rey.  As true with many museums, the architecture of the building can be just as impressive as what's inside.  This is no different for MNAC.  As you approach the museum from a quarter of a mile away, you can see it sits on top of a hill and is magnificent.  It's a gorgeous castle with trees and fountains lining the hill.  The MNAC looks over all of Barcelona and has an absolutely gorgeous view.  It comes with a price though and that is the stairs to get up.  Have no fear oh lazy ones, escalators are provided if you so desire.  At the top, we looked out at the grand city of Barcelona while listening to a typical spanish genre of music from a guitar.  There's something about street music on a beautiful day that I just absolutely love.  It's kind of like living in a movie.  The music from the soundtrack of a movie always adds to the emotions of the characters and really relates to what they are feeling.  Ever wanted to be an actor? Just go down the streets of a big city and…BAM automatic soundtrack to your life.

Walking up the steps to MNAC

I apologize for the randomness of ideas that I have thrown at you but I've learned bits and pieces of information as I've been living here and want to share it all!  One interesting fact: within the last year, the city of Barcelona has started to regulate who is allowed to play on the streets.  Each musician must apply for a musical street license and if they are deemed to truly be musically talented, they are allowed to ask for money on the streets.  It seems like a strange idea, but apparently it was necessary because the amount of musicians was causing quite a hubbub of sound for the tourists and it was not pleasing to the ear.  Now, walking through the subway or in the park, you can hear full bands, people playing/singing rumba, and others and it is quite enjoyable.  Many are in the plaza so you could be having a nice coffee outside when all of a sudden a man with an accordion comes up and serenades the whole restaurant.  If you want to get a taste of rumba, typical spanish music, you can download a free album here: La Pegatina Free Album   In order to download the free album you have to share them via some social media outlet, let it be Facebook or twitter.  Completely worth it.

More about musicians.  If you want to be a local musician, it seems that Catalonia is the place to do it.  When you go to a bar to hear a band, the entire bar becomes quiet once the music starts.  In the US, the music is more of a background however, here, you are expected to stay silent and enjoy the music.  A little inconvenient if you came with friends but very respectful toward the musicians.

Even though I've been here for 2 months, I still learn something new every day.  While the rebajas (sales) had been going on since I arrived and just recently ended, I didn't realize that they were government regulated.  It is illegal for a store to have sales outside of the official sale period.  They can give discounts, but large sales are prohibited and this is to protect the small boutiques as they are an important part of Spain's culture.

Alright so sorry this post was all over the place but hope you enjoyed.  More to come later!