January 21st, 2009 - Barcelona, Spain

Well I'm on a bus headed towards the airport now. Barcelona was great, but way too short... Our friend Nikki is heading back to Paris with us. We met in the hostel and kicked it at an Indian restaurant. She's from Sydney, Australia, and is pretty cool. She's been traveling for a while and just living life to the fullest after graduating from school and before starting her new job. We saw the entire city of Barcelona yesterday from the top of Parc Guell, which was a steep climb, but well worth the view. We saw the Gaudi church that has been in construction for over a hundred years. He was apparently run over by a Trolley Car during it's initial construction! Ever since, it has been quite a controversial topic in the city and art world. To finish the church or not... A religious sect has been furiously working to finish it. It really is a fantastic piece of work, but I wish someone had warned me not to pay 13 euros to see the inside. It's empty! Biggest waste of money on my trip so far... The Spanish coffee was pretty good, but nothing compares to Parisian coffee. Not even Italy. Barcelona had some ok food, but after eating in Paris, I'm pretty sure I'll never be satisfied again. The layout of the city is wonderful. I walked everywhere with ease (except for the steep climb to the park.) The people are attractive and very nice. It really seems like a great place to live life... I'm happy to return to Paris for one more day to do things I wasn't able to do last week. Things I want to experience before leaving Paris: try a street cart waffle, go to the Musee d'Orsay, have drinks outside the Louvre on a clear night, watch one more episode of Spongebob Squarepants in French (the most hilarious thing ever.) This leaves the rest of my day (and a half) to buy everyone gifts with the little money I have left! Jackie and I booked our private hostel room again. Ah... Luxury. These Ryanair flights scare the hell out of me. Wish me luck.

I've included a picture that Jackie took of me after our last French adventure... I was seriously exhausted.

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...