Monday, March 1, 2010

Wow.

So it´s March 1st. I have been up to some pretty fun stuff the last 2 or 3 weeks. 2 weeks ago my english teacher comes to me and says, ´´Hey Nathan, I have a friend who is a Spanish teacher in Alabama and he would like to skype with you so you can skype with his class.´´ Since then I have skyped with all his Spanish classes and it was very nice for me to talk to some real American teenagers in English. I also realized that there are jokes in the U.S. that everyone raised in the U.S. will understand. Like, ´´Can you hear me know?.........good!´´ and various Wizard of Oz jokes too. That also means that I will never have those in Spanish. The past few weeks I have realized that English funny is way funnier than Spanish funny........nobody here understands English humor. Example: I was flirting with this girl and I was flirting wih her like I would if I was in the U.S. I got the response once or twice ´´Nathan eres soso (y algo más que no me acuerdo ahora mismo).´´ Transalated: Nathan you tasteless. But she also said something else that I don´t remember but was like she said I was so cold. I didn´t know what to do.....but let´s just say It did work. Last weekend of the 21st. I went to Cordoba with my family which I know dread but we went with about 10 other families from Huelva and it was fun hanging out with them and going to some museums and stuff. Last week I went to Barcelona. Barcelona is an amazing city. We got there Monday morning and we stayed in a 4 star hotel in the España Plaza, and went to see the Gaudi houses (modernish slightly abstract houses), and the ramblas (main tourist street with street performers). We also went to the Gothic quarter and saw some castle-ish thing. That night at the hotel was pretty interesting. There were 60ish students and 3 teachers that didn´t care what we did, and on top of that, all the kids were Spanish. So that means, they smoked and drank in their hotel rooms. I don´t get why people smoke, and as for the drinking........there is no need to get sooooo drunk. So many people ended up completley helpless........I don´t get it (don´t worry Mom and Dad I did drink but I´m smart enough to control myself). Tuesday we got up and everyone was half alive after like 3 hours of sleep and the hangovers, we went to see Park Wells (if that´s how you spell it), The Barcelona Soccer Stadium, (I didn´t see that cause it was 14 euros). Then we went to La Sagrada Familia, which is a church designed by Gaudi and they have been working on it for a century and probably need another to finish it. We also went to a Picasso museum that day, and went down to the harbor. That night almost everyone just slept to recharge their batteries and Jon (my roommate who is half-british) and I cooked a pizza using hair-dryers, and it worked! The next day we went to a few more museums and at mid-day my friend Andrew Kerr (who is from California about 5 minutes from where I was born, and is doing exchange with AFS in Barcelona) and Emil (a Finnish boy who speaks 6 languages, is learning to break dance and be a DJ, lives in Downtown Barcelona, and is a total ladies man, seriously one of the most badass kids I have ever known) came to meet me for lunch so I went out with them and a couple of other friends. That night we went down to the ramblas to do some shopping and I just tried out my flirting in Spanish. Thursday we went out and just hung out then I said, ´´Bye.´´ to my friends, and I met up with Andrew. We then went out in Barcelona, he showed me a few things and we met up with Emil. On Friday I went out to a small town called Vic to visit my friend Mack Tully, who is another boy from Oregon, I stayed the night at his house and we just chilled and went to bed early. Saturday morning we got up at 7 took showers ate breakfast and we got to the train station to watch our traind pull away as we were running after it. So we waited another half hour and got into Barcelona a little late (but so did everyone else). We (Mack and I) met up with Emil, and Andrew in the metro and then we met up with some other Catalonian AFSers, Charlie (New Zealander), Aimee (New Zealander), and Jade (French-speaking Canadian). So everyone in that group also knew English perfectly....this group was AWESOME they intertwined perfectly.....and I fit in perfectly it was great.....So saturday we went up to this monastery in the mountains of Barcelona called Monserrat, It was amazing (I partly say that just because of the people). It was interesting the first day (Thursday) I hung out with Andrew my English was horrible! But by Sunday it was back to normal again. We went up to Monserrat took some pictures, and then we climbed up to the highest point we could, and since Mack and I were there the testosterone levels were high, so all the guys climbed to the top and we took out shirts off to be manly Haha. We then got back into Barcelona and walked to Emil´s house. On the way there some Drunken Irish guys came up to us, and asked us if we knew where their hotel was. Mack said, ´´Oh hey, we are going that way come with us.´´ That immediatley got the response, ´´What? Your not gonna mug us are you?´´ So we led them to their hotel laughing and joking the whole way (everyone loves the Irish). We then regrouped and went to a Mexican restaurant, and met up with Kayla Williamson (AFSer from Alaska who´s best friend´s brother´s roommate was Chip (my brother). SO YES CHIP YOUR LEGACY HAS OFFICIALLY REACHED THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD. We also met up with Arthur (AFSer from Florida who is really Brazilian). Anyway we all got some alcohol and we went down to the beach (of the Mediterranean). Since it was my first time there Mack, Arthur, and I went swimming. Mack and I were pretty happy that within one day we stood on top of a mountain and went swimming in the ocean....both shirtless. We then were walking home, and we run across another English speaking group, among them was a girl who said she has done AFS Thailand. So that was cool. Andrew and I got on the wrong bus to go home and ended up getting home and 7 in the morning so it was a 24 hour day for me. I loved hanging out with that group, It´s a little sad that they havn´t really learned the languages here but it was so much fun. It was hard saying goodbye even just after knowing them for a day. It was good for me though, to have people laugh at my English humor and being able to flirt without the other person getting upset, and without the culture barrier. I also learned some silly New Zealand terms too haha. So that was a lot of fun, but know it´s Monday and tomorrow reality starts again. However, I think after the week in Barcelona I have some better school friends....so school should be better, and this weekend I will be going snowboarding in Granada. So more AFS people!!!! Then maybe during Spring Break I will go up to Galicia and do some religious walk with a bunch of AFS people!!!! Which makes the price worth it to hang out with them. So until next time, I love you all. LOVE YOU MOM AND DAD.

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