More Thoughts on Study Abroad

After my last post I've been thinking even more about what I will get out of my stay here. Everyone told me that if nothing else I’d appreciate my life at home better. Generally, I think of myself as disillusioned with American society. This hasn’t changed; I still think my country is horribly plagued with huge problems that aren’t going to be mended by a simple change in administration.

Despite this it pisses me off when my roommates make fun of how many illiterate people there are in the US. (I think the reason for this is that there is no word for literate in Spanish so they think that Spain is higher than the US. They study physical education and aren’t Spain’s brightest future scholars. They have had a lot to do with why my experience has not been the greatest.) It still makes me angry when people here talk about stuff they don’t understand – especially when it is something I connect with. I’ve gotten ask if I lost weight here because I don’t eat fast food everyday like they assumed I did at home. In actuality, I gained weight and eat much healthier at home and can exercise without the fear of getting run over.

Connecting back to what I was saying earlier about appreciating my life in the US, I definitely do. My life at home is great. This I guess is a sacrifice people need to make. I’d rather have hot water in the morning than seeing Gaudí’s masterpieces on the way to class. I’ve always valued practicality over looks. I’m still not sure why IES treats us like we are in high school. IES has made me appreciate so much more how smoothly Macalester runs. After only two years, that institution makes up a huge part of how I define myself. I worked for Residential Life and it took coming here to understand why creating a community in the dorm space is so important. I used to complain about how many resources get wasted on international student, but now I really understand that people need to belong… something that I have yet to feel here. Maybe it was because I was here for such a short period of time, or because I didn’t really bond with too many people, or maybe I just came here with the wrong mind set. Whatever Macalester is doing there are doing something right. They can get students from all over the world to fall in love St. Paul, Minnesota, while IES cannot manage to do the same with Barcelona.

I just spent $334 changing my plane ticket home eight days earlier. When booking my flight to Barcelona I planned to stay in Europe for another month after classes ended. Now, I’m dying to get home and everyone is talking about how excited they are to leave, when I still have three weeks in Europe after they all go home. This time should be amazing traveling first with my family and then with high school friends. IES has left such a bad taste in my mouth, I just want to leave. I know I’m incredibly fortunate to have this experience, and I have done a lot of amazing things. An interesting concept is how we relate happiness to the value of an experience. I have learned so much and seen things that I have wanted to see all my life but, on a daily basis, I’m much happier at home. This I think has a lot to do with how big of part relationships play in my life. I hear people talking about leaving a significant other at home, while I can hardly handle a semester without my close friends. Often I’d rather spend the night talking to friends online than going out. This makes me more optimistic about my three weeks of traveling with familiar people after everyone else goes home.

Overall I have learned a lot in Spain, and can better appreciate my life at home. My major is international studies and I wonder what this will all mean. I have spent my college life learning about other places in the world dreaming of getting out of the Midwest and the first time I spent a significant amount of time outside my home state, I feel so disconnected I sometimes can’t stand it. Really, I think the people have a lot more to do with it than the place. I need good strong relationships with people and its takes me longer than four months to create them. I knew this about myself coming going into it, so I came the assumptions that I was going to be a loner for four months. Moreover when I got to IES no one really seemed worth getting know, reinforcing my assumption. The best moments I have in Europe are when I was with either Seva or Mandy.

How will I remember this experience? I’m almost positive one of two things will happen. The first option is that I will regret feeling so out of place, and just didn’t enjoy myself more. The second is that I will only remember the fun I had here and ignore all the anxiety I felt. Nonetheless, I hope I will come out of this experience with something positive that I did not have before, and at the end of the day that is what really matters.

Museum Madness and Random Thoughts on Spain

I the past few weeks I’ve been on a bit of museum kick. Part of the reason is that my free pass expires December seventh. Another reason is that my days in Barcelona are coming to an end and it be unfortunate to miss something. I'm still working on going to an FC Barcelona game, but I'm not sure if that is gonna happen. Leaving should be a little bittersweet, but there isn’t too much I think I’m going to miss about this place.

Let’s see … there is the weather. I am not looking forward to going home to the cold, but snow should be nice. People knew what they were doing when they settled the Mediterranean. I guess that also explains why so many people live in southern California as well. Quality public transportation is really nice, but on the other hand there is something about driving that gives you a sense of control. My roommates are convinced that I’m one of those Americans who thinks the only place worth being in is the US. I try to convince them that Spain is different from Europe in a lot of ways, and being home sick to some extent is legitimate. Moreover, things are just so much easier in the US. Being obsessed with the bottom line has a lot of advantages – primarily customer service. Spaniards work longer hours than other European counties, but are notoriously inefficient. Obviously, I support the welfare state, but that doesn’t mean that you need to go to the hospital the day you have a cough. I have heard people say that they go to the doctor as a “pasa tiempo.” Compared to the rest of Europe the welfare state is relatively new and Spaniards are still getting use how to use these services properly.

My RA and I have bounded in recent weeks, because my roommates have been pissing me off. He is really well informed in global issues and is also quite critical of the Spanish government. He has taught me a lot about his country from his own biased standpoint. He always says “Europa acaba en los Pirineos” or “Europe ends at the Pyrenees.” Thanks to the thirty plus year dictatorship, this is still true even despite incredibly rapid modernization funded by the north. I’m really looking forward to seeing northern Europe and how it differs from Spain. Don’t get me wrong; Spain is good; it just is in a really precarious position compared to the rest of Europe - especially now that is not the poorest part of the EU. Every day, I see how this country has no idea how to deal with the ridiculously high rate of immigration, because it has never had it before. Basically, what I’m getting at is that is summed up well by another Spanish idiom – “España es diferente.” I feel like my option of Europe might be more meaningful than that of other Americans, because, if you are reading this you probably know, I’m quite critical of the US, and just about everything else as well. Well, that is enough rambling for now.

Back to what I intended to write about: the museums. Since I last wrote I went to four museums/galleries. The first was the Fundació Antoni Tàpies – a gallery designated to the Barcelona’s own (along with Joan Miro) superstar in contemporary art. I’m not a huge fan of this style but it was interesting to see the photography exposition by Bahman Jalali, an Iranian who documented Iranian history, through photography, focusing on the Revolution.

Next was the Dalí museum in Figueres, the artist’s hometown. It meant taking an hour and a half train ride outside the city. It was nice to see a small Catalonian city and get out of the hustle and bustle of the big city. The museum itself was crazy because as you may have guess, it was designed by the loco himself. The artwork was awe-inspiring, but his most famous works are scattered around the world.

Then we have the MACBA or Barcelona’s contemporary art museum. There were three exhibits. The first one on the suggested itinerary was by far the best. It recounted how during the Second World War, the modern art capital of the world moved from across the Atlantic from Paris to New York. The exhibit did an excellent job of mixing European and North American works to show the devastation of the war, as well as the somber state that followed. The other exposition focused on New York based performance artist: Joan Jonas. I didn’t get it, but talked a Spanish art major who felt the same way and said that even he needed to do a lot of background research in order to appreciate it. I pretty much felt the same way about the permanent exhibit and felt like it was lacking any type of theme or organization – but as an IS major what do I know.

The last of them was the National Museum of Catalan Art. This is a huge, gorgeous building that has been immaculately well maintained. It argues having over 1000 years of art, but as the name implies, only really has Catalonian art. It was interesting, but way too much to see in one day. This was really my only encounter with pre-Renaissance art, besides quickly glazing over some at the Louvre.

I am probably going to take a break from art museums for a while. This way I will be reinvigorated to see the Prado and Reina Sofía in Madrid. On the other hand it is the last free day at the Museum of the City before I leave so I’m probably going to head to that this afternoon. I has has excavated Roman ruins that lie under the city.

As a closing note, opposed to Mac my finals are pretty test based this semester. I have two papers left – both of which are well on their way. But after that, I have five exams in a week. I haven’t done that since high school. I don’t think that they will be difficult, but five is a lot. There is still no doubt that there it is nothing compared to what I’m used to at Macalester, but I’m still not looking forward to it and am not quite sure how to really prepare for it. On that note, good luck to you all on your finals and papers as the semester winds down. I hear it is suppose to snow today in Minnesota and I want to see pictures. Keep up the good work, only three weeks left.

Prague

I have been witnessing all my program-mates going on these weekend trips and I never thought that I’d be worth it to go to a city for just a few days. After going to Prague this weekend, I confirmed my hypothesis. For the price of the plane ticket, it was not worth only spending two days there. However, I had a great time and it was wonderful to see Seva for the third time this semester. Usually we only see each other once a semester; hence it has been great to hangout every few weeks around Europe. The down side of it was by was the way the flights worked out we really only got spend one day together.

I arrived to Prague on Friday at 11 after leaving my dorm at 4:15. To avoid paying 20 euros for a taxi, I took at night bus to the airport. This was worth it, but however made a very tired Ben. After arriving in Prague, I figured out very quickly that everyone in Eastern Europe speaks English. I also quickly remembered what it is was like to live in a cold climate again considering Prague is a good 25 degrees colder than Barcelona. I eventually made it to the hostel after following the crazy directions they gave me. After I settled in I went out on the town and took in the city. This place was amazing and so different than anything I had seen before. In Europe, I so far have had a Mediterranean (Barcelona and Marseilles), Western (Paris), and Eastern. Obviously this is generalization, but it’s insane how unique different areas in Europe are. After a couple hours of roaming, including seeing Wenceslas Square, I returned to the hostel because I was freezing and needed to warm up. Prague has really sweet trolleys, by the way. As usual, I asked the receptionist at the hostel where to go to eat. She suggested a bar where they also serve cheap Czech food. I ate there, and it reminded me of the food Seva’s family usually serves me. Later, I wondered more and then returned to the hotel to sleep/warm up until Seva arrived. After Seva got here we hit up a bar and went to bed soon after seeing it was already 2 AM.

The next day we got up decently early and walk around. The first place we visited was the Jewish Quarter (Josefov). There were gorgeous synagogues everywhere, but everything was closed because it was Saturday. Next, we worked our way back to Old Square looked at all the major tourist stuff on the way including St. Charles bridge, the astronomical clock and the Stone Bell House. Seva had made plans to have lunch at a girl’s (Kami) apartment who studied at Minnetonka High School. He was smart enough to realize that we probably should bring a gift. Long story short, we were half an hour late after we finally found a place that had flowers. Afterwards, Kami showed us around the old city. The Petrin Tower and Prague Castle were amazing. We also went to a house of mirrors. Afterward we went to a bagel place and tried hot wine … I was not that impressed. Then we took Kami out to eat, but we couldn’t find the place. We ended up going somewhere else and had to drag Kami in, because she didn’t want us to pay for her. After dinner, we made our way back to hostel and talked for awhile before getting to bed. Then it was up early on Sunday to get my flight back to Barcelona. In sum, Prague was amazing, but spend more than two days there.

Back in Barcelona, I returned to find that my room was a mess and my some of clothes were missing. There was a crazy party and the dorm went nuts. Someone had borrowed my suit coat and silk shirt from India without asking. My roommates are driving me insane at this point. I actually talked to my RA and he is going to talk to the program about my options, but it is very unlikely that I could move at this point. Moreover, I’m really not feeling m,y classes. I’m pretty much trying to pull through the last five weeks of classes and dorm life while attempting to enjoy being in Spain as much as I can. I am also getting really excited for my j-term trip. So far Mike, Andru, Nick and I plan on traveling to Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Dublin and London, after spending Christmas in Spain with my mom and sister. I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving before we get to crunch time.

Fall Break in France

It’s been a busy past few weeks. Since I last wrote Mandy came to visit me in Barcelona. That was a good time, but we really only got to spend a few hours together, because she was only in the city for a few hours each day. After that, came midterms that really weren’t that bad. One exam, two take homes and a paper. The rest is in the coming weeks when I have two exams and two presentations. But after that it’s Prague and then not much until finals.

I spent the last week in France visiting Seva and Mandy. This was lots of fun, but also super expensive. After taking Ryan Air and two busses, I arrived Paris only to realize that I know no French, making life rather difficult. After figuring out how to take the metro walked up the stairs to street level to see landmarks in every direction. One side was the Eiffel Tower, while on the other side was the Arc de Triomphe and the Champs Elysees. The Seine was gorgeous with statues by every bridge. I spent the afternoon wandering around until Seva got off work. We met under the Arc de Triomphe … it was very romantic. After dropping stuff off at his dorm we didn’t waste any time seeing it was the free night at the Louvre. After the Louvre we went out to eat and I ate snails. Afterwards, we went to a bar and hung out with his friends. Being the good Jew that he is, Seva went to Synagogue the following morning and where he was invited to eat lunch with a family. We spent all afternoon eating lunch the French way. That evening we wandered around looking at historic sites including Notre Dame and had dinner at an Indian restaurant that was unimpressive, but I did eat with my hands. Sunday we went to the Musée d’Orsay, Sacre Coeur, and a bunch of other places. Monday Seva had work so I traversed the city in the rain. Paris is beautiful in the rain, but also very wet. That night we were super tourists and went up in the Eiffel Tower. On Tuesday I made it to Versailles and like everyone says the gardens were much more impressive than the inside, especially with the fall foliage. I even go to see a rainbow.

Wednesday morning it was off to Marseille. Mandy met me at the station, meaning I didn’t need to speak any French. We dropped our stuff off at the hostel and climbed a mountain to see Marseille’s version of Notre Dame. The next day we also went on a boat to see the Château d'If, the prison where the Count of Monte Cristo is based. In Marseille, I took it much easier, but still walked a lot. We didn’t realize until our last day that South Marseille is where all the beaches and the ritzy part of town. We also didn’t realize how far away we were but managed to make it back before Mandy’s train. Unfortunately I didn’t have my camera that day, but I have plenty of pictures of everything else. There are way too many pictures of this trip to put on the blog, so if you are interested check facebook.

Becoming a Barcelonan

Since I wrote a lot has been going on. The night after I last posted was the “correfoc” in the Merce. In Spain there apparently no lawyers because as part of this festival there are people dressed as devils running around with giant sparklers spraying sparks onto crowd. People would were goggles and bandannas and would go and dance in the flames. It was nuts.

The next day Seva Rodnyansky came to visit me in Barcelona. His visit was awesome despite the fact that I hardly slept the entire time he was here. During his visit, we visited la Pedrera, Picasso Museum, and Joan Miro museum, not to mention two more fireworks shows.

For the closing night of the Merce there was a “piromusical” or musical fireworks. The theme was “a tribute to rock and pop” so the majority of the music was in English, which sadly enough I enjoyed.
There were fireworks and a fountain that corresponded with the music ... best fireworks show ever.

It was an intense week, but unfortunately I do not have many photos of this span because I camera died and Seva accidentally reformatted his camera memory card without backing up the files on his computer first … it’s all good. Initially, I planned to go to Madrid with him the following weekend but credit card issues inhibited my plans.

Instead of Madrid, I applied to for to Chuck Green Fellowship, so hopefully I’ll have an interesting job next summer. I also went to a “discoteca” with a bunch of people from my dorm; I was the only American, which was pretty sweet. Whenever a song in English came on I bleated the lyrics and encouraged all the Spaniards to sing along. Not surprisingly they knew more of the lyrics than me to a lot of the songs. But the best part is when they played “Such Great Heights,” which apparently was in some advertisement so people recognized it. Also, for some reason Spaniards love REM and I have no idea why, but it still made me happy to hear “Losing My Religion.” Last weekend I also went to in absinthe bar in La Raval – the immigrant district. The absinthe was really bad and according to some nice architects I we met, you need to go to Eastern Europe to get real absinthe (although I really don’t have much interest). But the people we met were really interesting and told us a lot about the city.

The following week I didn’t do much - kept up with work and reconnected with people from home. Unfortunately, on Thursday my messenger program freaked out and stopped working on me, so I’ve been spending way too much time trying to get that sorted out, because I’m highly addicted. As of now still no luck, although I can still fake it sometimes. Also this weekend I visited the Gracia barrio – a hip neighborhood separated from everything else. A friend of mine really wanted to find a street that one of the architects from the previous weekend had told us about. We had to ask at least five people to find, but when we got there it was pretty sweet. Today I’m planning on going to the Contemporary Culture Center of Barcelona for a film festival and to just check out the museum.

Now, I want you to keep me updated on your lives. If you are reading this you obviously have at least some interest in my life (or just really, really bored), meaning that most likely I have some interest in yours as well. Whether you are in St. Paul or Paris or Timbuktu - I want to know what’s up with you all? Feel free to post on Facebook, comment on my blog, email me etc.

Learning Wasn't Part of the Deal

I've been kinda lazy, so I haven't posted in a while . I didn't get a chance to write anything about my trip to Galicia yet because I got back a one in the morning the night before I started classes. The trip was okay. We spent a lot of time on the bus visiting different little fishing towns. It was nice to see a different part of Spain. The highlight of the trip was the Cathedral at Santiago de Compostela mainly because I wrote a paper the Camino last year.

Since I got back I've started classes. I have 16 hours a week shoved into 4 days starting at 8:30 everyday, so that's a bit intense, but the course work seems pretty relaxed. This weekend is also a La Merce, the biggest festival in Barcelona. Yesterday Andra walked all over the place. We saw 8 concerts, a couple performances, and the ridiculous opening ceremony. Also this weekend the freshmen were hazed in my dorm. That was honesty the weirdest experience of my life. We all had to run around the neighborhood in garbage bags while the upperclassmen yelled at us in Catalan. On top of it all I've been a little homesick as well. thank you all for the encouraging messages. And yes I know that Mac it isn't nearly as exciting as Spain, but I miss you all, as well as: warm water, my single room, and sadly enough Cafe Mac.

La Diada de Catalunya

September 11th is a Catalan national holiday because in the eighteenth century Catalonia was almost an independent state. On my day off I decided to go and see what this whole Catalan thing is all about. Anyways, it was really cool to see all the emotion evolved in a separatist movement. In the center of Barcelona by the Arc de Triomf there was giant Catalan flag in the center. The whole plaza was filled with the little kiosks selling Catalan memorabilia and handing out literature on the the issue, but I couldn't read any of it because it was all in Catalan. I ended up buying a shirt the said "independencia" with a red star, but my favorite was as shirt that said in English, as well a Catalan, "Make no mistake - I am Catalan therefore not Spanish." There were also groups from all over supporting other separatist movements. The people in the kiosks were so happy to see people form other places (I went with a Japanese friend of mine) interested in their cause. Moral of the story is I'm a nerd and had a great time.