Saturday, September 3, 2011

It's a Beautiful World I See --minus the bed bugs

I've come to the conclusion that I don't get along with doors very well and I think this feeling is mutual.  It's been the 3rd day and I still can't open my own door to get into my house.  I can't even lock it, can't even turn my key so some burglar can come in anytime and completely wipe out all my possessions.  Thank God I have Vicky because the doors like her better than me and she opens it and locks it like it's nothing.  So my goal by the end of the month is to learn how to work the stupid door!
Yesterday night, we made our first "home-cooked" dinner.  I brought spaghetti sauce I bought from back home and we just had to buy the pasta and some ground-beef.  I thought cooking would be easy but apparently Vicky and I have different preferences.  I like my garlic cut into tiny pieces and she likes it whole, I like my onions cut into little half-moons and she just cuts a chunk of it out, I like to put a lot of salt in my food and she just likes a little pinch of it, I like more sauce than meat and she likes more meat than sauce.  We're just going to have to put up with each with our cooking haha!
After dinner, we decided to walk down our street because we live REALLY close to Font Magica (Magic Fountains) and this museum that looks like a huge castle.  I Google imaged it and it really looked magical so I was so excited we lived literally 3 minutes from it.  It's like a water and lights show, kind of like a cross between the Bellagio fountains in Vegas and Disney's World of Color.  We got there an hour early just to explore and already it was packed with people waiting for it to start so we found a good spot and waited.  It was kind of funny because they played really random American songs by Destiny's Child, Seal, and Sonique and some other ones I can't remember.  It was cool but I was expecting some classical music.  Once it ended, it started again after 10 minutes and classical music was on and I think it's a lot better that way.  It was a pretty romantical place, there were old couples and young couples, tourists, locals, just thousands of people and it was just a lot of fun being around so many people.
After the fountatins, we walked down this other street and we came to a square that had this huge building across the street all lit up so we went across the street to see what it was and it turns out it's a mall!!!  I didn't get to buy anything because I still need to pay off my rent, but I did get gelato!!!  A scoop of strawberry tart and a scoop of cookie gelato in a waffle cone for 2.80 euros which is only like $4.  Back in San Diego, a scoop is like $5, so that's a deal!!  I really love the location of my flat.  It's close to the fountains, the museum, the mall, the grocery store, restaurants, the bank, everything.  There are some minor problems, okay, make it a big problem with our flat.  At first, it was just some small problems like dirty floors that looks like it hasn't ever seen a mop, 2 broken drawers in the kitchen, nasty ass food still left in the kitchen, but the biggest problem we found as of yesterday night were bed bugs in Vicky's room and in the 2nd room but not my room, thank you Jesus.  I still feel really bad though because she's been sleeping on the couch.  It's a leather couch and it's comfy but still, she needs a bedroom =(  We've been trying to call our landlord but the fucker won't pick up, he just sends us straight to voice-mail.  Once we get a hold of him, we're gonna ask him niiicely if he can replace the mattresses or if he can give us a discount on our rent, because right now, we're each paying about $610/month and it's not really worth because of the damn bed bugs!  We're still staying positive because our neighborhood is really nice and the people are really nice and we both love it here.  I think we'll love it much more once the landlord fixes up our place.
This morning, we decided to head to Las Ramblas.  It's this longggg street filled with shops, restaurants,  and street performers.  It's also a tourist trap because there were hotels everywhere.  We took the bus for the first time and I was a little worried because I haven't been on a bus in years and was afraid it'd be like buses back in San Diego: dirty, smelly, full of people.  But boy was I wrong!  It's SO clean, it's got nice comfy chairs, and there's AC!!  It was about a 20-25 minutes bus ride from our flat, which isn't bad because there's so much to see along the way.  On Las Ramblas, we went to La Boqueria, which is one of the biggest markets here.  It's got mostly fruits, vegetables, meats, fish, and cheeses.  Then we took a walk down the Ramblas, which was really nice and clean, did some shopping (got an uber cute navy blue polka dot silky shirt at Zara for 10 euros!), went into this building that had little cafes on the first floor, an electronics store on the 2nd floor and a book store on the 3rd floor.  After about a half hour in there, we went outside to people watch an that was when I realized I didn't have my sunglasses on me.  I was getting ready to burst into tears because 1) they were my Ray-ban club masters and 2) I didn't want to spend on another pair of glasses.  Vicky suggested we go back and check, so we did and I asked the girl at the counter and she handed me the glasses!  God is watching over me and Vicky after all!
We were getting a little hungry so we went into a random restaurant on the street and finally had our first little Spanish meal.  I ordered my first glass of sangria, but too bad I had to drink it all by myself because Vicky can't drink or else she'll die.  Seriously.  She has to undo her liver disease somehow, you hear me Vicky??  It was 5.50 euro for the glass of sangria which is close to $8.  Ridiculous!  I could get a pitcher during happy hour back in San Diego for $10, but it's ok because I had some authentic Spanish sangria, yeahhh!!!
We got back to our flat and went in search for bowls for our cereal because we've been eating out of plastic cups for the past 3 days.  We've been trying to look for bowls in the supermarkets but none of them sell any bowls!!  Do the Spanish not eat out of bowls or something?  We went to Bazaar Lu, this little shop owned by a Chinese guy that speaks Spanish very fluently that it just boggles my mind, and he had bowls!!  So we now have bowls to eat cereal and everything else out of woo hoo!!
Going to do a little cleaning now, maybe finally mop the floors, do some laundry, cook some food and eat it out of our little bowls, upload some pics and get ready for bed.  We found a church just a minute walk from the flat that has an 11:00 service, so that's what we're going to do tomorrow and maybe do some more exploring in Sants-Montjuic where we live.  Have a good day/night!


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