PORTUGAL lisboa
the discount spanish airlines (vueling and clickair) are absolutely fantastic. not only are the standard flights already cheap, but this last minute flight with vueling was a 2 x 1 deal! we only had the weekend, so we settled on lisboa and off we went!
although lisboa is the capital and largest city in portugal, it had a really small-town feeling similar to sevilla. for example, there were a lot of people in the street but it was missing the busy and hectic air that surrounds barcelona. a lot of wandering around was done through the side streets and we even eventually found a sushi restaurant to eat at! (yes, we really did go all the way to lisboa to eat sushi haha) we also went to an irish pub one night mostly because we couldn’t find anything else open in the area and the live music was calling us in.
the santa justa elevator is worth going up because it gives you a 360 degree view of the town. i can’t really describe it but to say it is made of lots of metal and it is quite ugly, actually. but the view from the top is pretty great and its location in town gives you a different perspective than from the castle. i liked that.
SPAIN barcelona (magic mushroom tortillas)
you know you’ve developed a good relationship with your students when they tell you about their weekends without holding anything back. especially when these people are over 40 and the boss of a company.
there are two students in this class (held in one of the offices), alfonso and eva. i start mondays off by asking about the weekend because it gets everyone talking. imagine my surprise when alfonso was like, “oh, it was crazy, the police came to my party!” i figured it was for a noise complaint because the walls here are so thin. well, it was, but that is not why it was bad. alfonso said it was because everyone there had eaten tortillas (spanish omelette) with magic mushrooms in it. according to him, the party was up on the top floor of a building with no elevators, so by the time the cops reached the top they were able to hide everything. i don’t think the cops would suspect anything at a party with local adults, and they couldn’t come in anyway. but he said everyone was uncontrollably laughing and drinking whiskey (his favorite)…and kept the party going after the interruption. he even insisted that eva try it one day. at the end of the story, he was like, “no i change my mind, it was a good weekend!”
FRANCE perpignan
i love how close everything is in europe. my friends here go home pretty frequently (well, once a month is frequent when you consider it is a different country), and at first it sounds excessive but then i realize they only have to fly for a couple of hours! i took a weekend trip to perpignan to visit annie, and the roundtrip train ride was only 3o euros! this isn’t bad considering some nights out cost more…
we didn’t really do anything (sight-seeing wise) but that left us time to catch up and chill, which was alright by me. it was enough to just get away from the city. i mean, i like it here but i really do miss trees and fresh air! actually, annie did host a”tropical sangria” party one night which was awesome…and included random conversations between all of the foreign teachers there. annie’s friend even graduated from interlake high in bellevue! small world…
SPAIN barcelona (catalan traditions!)
one of the really cool perks about barcelona is that the catalan city celebrates a lot of special holidays. a unique tradition is the “caga tió.” it is basically a small log with sticks for feet, a drawn-on smiley face, and its rear is covered with a blanket. kids have to feed it daily until the night of christmas eve. but the presents don’t appear like they might under a christmas tree. the family gathers around and watches as the kids sing a song telling it to poop out presents (caga means poop in catalan)…all the while beating it with a stick. after it gets beat enough, you lift the blanket and what do you know, there are presents!
the “three kings day” on january 5th is also special because catalonia celebrates it with a massive parade. neighborhoods also hold their own parade, but the main one starts at port vell and goes through the city centre. this event is really crazy because a billion kids and their parents come out to see the kings who greet the crowd and pass out candy. if they haven’t done so, the kids can give their wish list to the kings or their helpers, and then on the morning of the 6th wake up to presents. this day is like our christmas and the naughty ones here get a lump of coal as well!