hiiiii!
-Barcelona (actually, its BarTHElona...don't you feel silly?) was so fun! Turns out its my favorite city in Spain..for sure. Sorry Madrid...you just got beat. It was just like, bright....if that makes any sense. A lot of young people...really funky and trendy...everyone pretty much spoke English...clean...modern. Loves it.
-Barcelona is in the north west part of Spain on the Balearic Sea coast. It has about 1.5 million people and is the 2nd largest city in the country...the official language is Catalan (which is a mix of French and Spanish) and if you can't speak Catalan, they prefer you speak English. There is a lot of tension between Barcelona and the rest of Spain---it started a long time ago (Spanish Civil War) and is still going strong....they just have a deep need for independence...and its pretty much a competition between them (the area of Catalunya) and the rest of the country...
-Ashley, Jessica, Tory, and I got there on Thursday...two of Jessica's friends, Marteen (the one from Florence..remember?) and Garrett (he's studying abroad in Germany) met us there. They were great guys...and all of us together could speak English, Spanish, German, Italian, and Chinese. Crazy, right?
-We walked around on Thursday...went down "Spain's Most Famous Street"-Las Ramblas--its this long street with little booths, flower shops, street performers...it was fun, especially at night. We did some shopping...there was a lot of really cute local jewelery stores..That night, our hostel arranged a "night out" for anyone who was interested....we went to an Italian restaurant and then to a couple of bars...it was the 6 of us, plus 2 guys from Kentucky (weird, yeah?), 2 girls from DePaul (even weirder), an Australian, and a guy and girl from Slovakia. It's so weird throwing random people from around the world together at a dinner table...really cool though. I learned some Australian slang and got to talk about my favorite things to do in Nashville with the Kentucky boys..haha!
-On Friday, we did one of those bus tours of the city...we lucked out with the weather (just a litttttle chilly..but sunny) so it was great...It was nice to just ride through the city...we saw the the Olympic Stadium, rode a cable car to the top of the city for a good view, we saw the Gothic Barrio, Pueblo Espanol, and the National Art Museum of Catalunya. We were standing outside the art museum in this huge plaza and this guy walked up to Jess and Garrett and asked them to be extras in their student film..haha...so they were pretty famous for a while. We got lunch at a cute tapas place.....and rode the bus some more. That night we went to an Italian restaurant for dinner...it was delicious.
-Saturday was my favorite day...We had a 2 day deal for the bus...and we got to see all of Gaudi's works. Antoni Gaudi was a famous Spanish architect who was based in Barcelona so all his work is there...I didn't realize how much I liked his stuff, but it was really fun and weird...all of his buildings look like they belong in candy land...colorful, bubbly, over-the-top. We saw Casa Botillo, this huge house that looks like you can eat it....we went to La Sagrada Familia- a huge cathedral that he started building in 1882. He worked on it for 40 years before he died, and they are still working on it...they expect it to be finished in 2020. We didn't wanna pay to do a guided tour or whatever, so we went to mass in it for free..which was really cool. The only parts that are really finished inside are the stained glass windows..pretty pretty. After, we went to Park Guell...a huge park with colorful statues, monuments, walls, and sculptures by Gaudi..he also built his house there, which was cool to see. The park was beautiful...a lot of people...and ladies selling funky jewelry and stuff...We saw the Barcelona futbol stadium and ate dinner at Hardrock Cafe...wahoo.
- Ashley, Jessica and I had a lot of good talks on this trip...at the airport, we talked for hours about everything...like how relationships change over the years...and how you learn throughout your life which qualities you need in someone...how big of an influence your family has on your relationships and the way you treat people/ let people treat you...They are just solid girls and we always seem to end up talking about things that matter...we get eachother thiiiinking...and I like it.
- John gets here on Thursday and I'M SO EXCITEDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD!!! I can't believe its here already...I remember being like, "ahhhh 4 more months"...and then "we made it to october!"...haha..and now its THIS WEEK. I'm beyond excited.

pictures are up :)
hope you're doing great.