January 19th, 2009 - Barcelona, Spain

It's surprising that most people in Barcelona cannot speak English, but maybe even more surprising how little Spanish I remember... I've been using my Italian, but people don't really understand Italian either here unfortunately! Some of the Catalonians understand my Italian better though because it's much closer to their language. I found this out when I stumbled into a little Catalonian cafe in town while trying to get lost. This time I actually did get lost though because it took me a really long time to find out where the hell I was... Luckily, my audacity led me pretty far west, following one of the most intensely serene sunsets I have ever witnessed. The sky was pink, blue and orange with an incredible rainbow straight through it. Along the sunset lay the famous Gaudi church on the hill that looked like a medieval silhouette stencilling the sky. As always, my headphones were in my ears, playing the perfect score to my visuals. The music was Lhasa de Sela, a Spanish woman, whose music is so hauntingly beautiful it could make the dark seem warm. At one point I saw a local woman stare into the sunset and pray. The colors of the sky were bouncing off her face and dress. The image was straight out of an Almodovar film. Obnoxiously incredible. I spent the entire day just walking around the city, getting to know the surroundings and feeling the culture. I drank a lot of espresso, ate a baguette, and got a haircut/beard trim because I was starting to look like a caveman when approaching people speaking some gibberish language. Jackie dyed her hair dark brown and looks way more European now. This city doesn't cater very well to vegetarians, but I enjoy the difficulty in finding really good food. It was too easy to find good food in Paris! Since we are only staying in Spain for a couple days, Jackie and I decided to leave our packs in Paris with our friend Negar. It's been very easy travelling with just a small backpack. The only downside is that the airport confiscated all of my new dead sea salt shower products! The whole world is so excited for Obamas inauguration, and you can feel it everywhere. I couldn't even imagine people in the states getting excited for a new president of another country... Just some food for thought...

I've got another full day in each of the countries I've been travelling through. I'm going to try and savour the time as much as possible...