I Won't Let It Happen Again

I swear. I have abandoned my poor blog and its readers, and it won't happen again. But really, I haven't done that much in the past month worth posting. Like, nothing extremely extraordinary. So I'll try my best to entertain and enlighten you.

I guess the biggest news of all is that I moved apartments. While the people at the other place were wonderful, I needed more space. And I kind of felt like a visitor, not that I actually lived there. Like I was always in my bedroom because being in the living room felt weird. And it was kind of filthy. I like to be able to walk around without shoes on. In my new place, I have lots of space and it's much cleaner. It's also closer to school and I can have visitors over. It's in Eixample, which is the biggest district of Barcelona, and there's an awesome market nearby with fresh everything everyday.

So what else have I been up to? I go to class 4 days a week. Mondays and Wednesdays consist of a class on the history of Barcelona in a cultural context followed by Linguistics. The Barcelona history class is really interesting, and we get to read books by authors from Barcelona (in Spanish of course). And linguistics really helps me understand why things are said the way they are. Tuesdays and Thursdays are for Composition/Conversation and Literary Analysis and Commentary. I have conversation with Mireia (of ILP fame) and Sofia for literature. The conversation class helps with speaking colloquially and writing and the literature class improves my reading, although the commentary part reminds me of junior year AP English. In general, classes are very manageable. And I have plenty of free time for my favorite activity: studying for the GMAT! I'm scheduled to take it on December 10, 2009 at 10:15A. Get excited.

I've also been quasi working on grad school applications, although that is about to get pretty serious. I'm applying to at least 4 schools. Hopefully one of them will welcome me with open arms (and some sort of way to pay for it like an assistantship or something).

Other than class and grad school stuff, I hang out with friends (most of whom are American, but I'm branching out). It's hard to not hang out with Americans because I'm only taking classes with Americans right now. I've gotten a good taste of the nightlife, including the local club scene and bars and such. There's a bar that's actually right near my new place called Dow Jones. The way it works is that drink prices function like the stock market, and every half hour the market crashes and drink prices reset. So if everyone in the bar wants Tanquerray (as everyone in the bar should), the price of Tanquerray goes up and all the other gins go down. Market crashes are great, too. They last for like 5 minutes and you have to scramble to get to the bar and get cheap drinks.

Another thing that is of interest is Halloween. Really, truly, Halloween is an American holiday, somewhat imported to Spain. People don't really dress up, and children almost definitely do not go trick or treating. But there is plenty of American influence. There are Halloween stores, and bakeries and restaurants put up decorations, but not like America. One of the girls in the program is here with her son, and she took him trick or treating around the city, which must have been exhausting, and I saw some kids in costumes. But it's really not a celebrated holiday here. Either way, I was feeling much better after battling the flu all week, so we went to an Irish pub that had decorations and drink specials for the occasion. I didn't dress up, though.

Oh! The weekend before Halloween my former history TA, Jason, was in town for the weekend which was awesome. I love when people visit because it's a really great excuse to eat really, really well and explore and flaunt my (somewhat little) knowledge of Barcelona. Jason and I had two nights of tapas and drinks and I got to meet some of his Catalan friends from when he lived here for a few months, and they were so nice and had some hilarious stories. It was also really great to see a familiar face, someone I knew before I came here, since we are entering prime homesickness period, but if you read my schedule below for prime homesickness period, you'll understand that I probably won't have time to be homesick, which is good.

So the last 6 weeks or so haven't been busting with abnormal excitement (I do live here after all, and if it's super exciting all the time, I will not make it through the year), the coming weeks will be more exciting. For example, on Tuesday I will be attending a FC Barcelona Football game! Which I'm excited about. They're playing someone unimportant (it's not the Real Madrid match), so tickets were reasonable and a group of us are going! Then, on Friday I will be traveling away from Barcelona for the first time since I landed here, off to Saragossa (o Zaragoza en castellano) which is about 3 hours north of here, for a 2 day trip set up by the program. I'm excited to see a part of Spain that I haven't seen before! I'll report back most definitely.

Next week is midterms, which should be interesting. There are only 2 exams per class in all of our classes, and they count for quite a bit. After midterms is Thanksgiving (November 26th)! The program sets up an elaborate and delicious feast for us at some hotel in Barcelona. I'm not sure what will be making an appearance, but I'm hoping there is some green bean casserole and mashed potatoes with gravy, but really, I'm not picky. Then, after I take the GMAT on December 10th, I'm jetting off to PARIS! PARIS! PARIS! for my first out of country trip!!! I'm going with Jenny (from the program), Isabelle (of lifelong friendship), and John (also an old friend, who will be in Europe for a month). Then, John will be coming back with me and visiting Barcelona for a spell. Then! It's Christmas break! The plan right now for Christmas is to go spend some quality time with my Uncle Dan in Gothenburg, Sweden. I haven't bought tickets yet, but I'm hoping to spend a week or so with them, and I'm so excited!! I never get to see Uncle Dan or his lovely family, and Sweden will be amazing at Christmas and a totally different experience than I'm used to. I haven't quite figured out what to do for New Year's or my birthday (January 7th) yet, but that should come soon. Then, shortly after Christmas, all my applications are due. So things are about to get really busy and really exciting, and I'm excited! Again, I apologize for the lack of posting, but I will try to be more frequent and do more interesting things (without exhausting my reserves). Bona nit i fins aviat!