11/4/10 Finally Done with Midterms!

This morning I had to take my last two exams.  I had Literatura del Siglo de Oro and Guerra Civil.  They went pretty well.  Both were essay tests.  After I finished my last exam, I was so relieved to be done.  I was also waiting to hear from my friends Amie and Erin.  Amie and Erin were two of my roommates freshman year and took this semester off to bike Europe.  I was expecting them to arrive in Barcelona today.  It was hard to make plans with them though, because they did not have a cellphone and their internet was limited to what the hostel provided.  I brought a lunch to school, because I was expecting to meet them right after my exam, but when I checked my email I still hadn’t heard from them.  Since I hadn’t heard from them, I was finished with my exams, and hadn’t eaten my lunch already, I had nothing to do.  I decided to walk home with Lorenzo.  Even though it was a forty minute walk, I had nothing better to do.  The weather was beautiful and he always walks up Passeig de Gracia—the Newbury street of Barcelona.  It was so warm, I didn’t even need my sweater.  When we got to his apartment, which is right next to La Sagrada Familia, we saw the preparations for Sunday.  On Sunday, the Pope is coming to give a service in La Sagrada Familia.  They had set up tons of barriers and chairs in the street.  Within a one block radius of the Sagrada Familia was the VIP section (which they pronounce in Spanish as “beep”).  Many churches had a limited amount of tickets to this section and got to choose who would be able to attend the mass.  Within a four block radius, they had set up screens for viewing the service, even though the large amounts of people wouldn’t be able to see the Pope, they would be able to watch from the screens.  Also, my friend Lorenzo had access to the VIP section because his apartment building was within the one block radius.  This special privilege that he got was not without vain.  Apparently for the last week, there have been police officers in his building.  They searched all the apartments for things that might be used to blow up the Pope.  Only those people who lived in the building were able to enter for a week or so leading up to the event and they had to show identification to get in.  I thought it was pretty interesting how they went about securing La Sagrada Familia for the event and how they went about their security measures. 

            Anyways, I took the metro home there and checked my email again, but I hadn’t heard anything from Amie and Erin yet.  I decided to go out with my friends for happy hour to celebrate the end of midterms.  I met a big group of people and we went to a tapas bar near the beach.  Here we got tapas and drinks and I had some amazing chorizo which is like sausage.  We stayed in the bar for a while and eventually left a little after 6 to just chat in a park.  It was here in the park that I got a phone call from Erin!  We planned to meet around 9 pm, so I went home for an early dinner, so that I could meet up with them.  I felt bad getting home, eating and leaving, especially now that I was done finals I actually had time to spend with the family.  I think my favorite part of the time I spent with the family this week was dinner time.  I would eat earlier with Neuz and Sergi, but their dad would usually get home from work in the middle of our meal and talk with us.  

            Amie, Erin and Erin’s friend McKayla were staying in a hostel in Plaza Reial, which is right off Las Ramblas.  It was really easy for me to get to, since this was kind of in the central part of the city.  It was great to see familiar faces in Barcelona.  I took them to the forest bar that I had been to a few weeks before.  It was pretty calm inside, since it was early in the night.  We sat at a table and caught up on each others’ lives.  I talked all about my homestay and they recounted their adventures throughout Europe.  We left around 11 and I planned to meet them at 1:30 the next day at the metro stop for Park Guell.