Last Post!

Phrase of the week: “We have to do the blog.”
Observation of the week: We don’t have enough time to do the blog. Although it was a great idea, we unfortunately ran out of time and let the blog slip. Sorry!

Our last 3-4 weeks here have been busy, but fantastic. We spent a long weekend in Paris in early March, and Tim liked it just as much as I hoped he would. Even though it was cold and raining the majority of the time, it was perfect weather exactly when we needed it to be. Tim got the speed tour of Paris – Musee d’Orsay, Eifel Tower, Rodin Museum, Luxembourg Gardens, the Louvre and Versailles. We stayed on the left bank on Rue Dauphine, perfect location. We ate street crepes everyday because everything else was so expensive, but a lot of great food as well.

After Paris, we flew back to Barcelona for Tim’s final week of class. Here are Tim’s final impressions of his classes:

• Creative Problem Solving: Our teacher must have liked our ideas, because we got an A on our final presentation. I had the opportunity to role play the part of a 20 year old heroin addict in front of the class – maybe I should be an actor…


• Sports Marketing: The class did turn out to be pretty interesting and I can confirm that I will use nothing that I learned for my job at Dell.


• Consumer Behavior: This class was taught by a great professor. I think I was the first person that completed the final. Although I haven’t received the grade back yet, I will be surprised if it’s less than an A+.


• Management of Cultural and Creative Industries: I still don’t know the point of this class, but our final presentation was pretty good given the fact that I missed our 2 team meetings, attended a wine conference with Alicia and our friend, Myles, the morning of the presentation, and presented my section after 2 hours of drinking. Actually, I think I did better than usual given the impressed grin on my teacher’s face while I was discussing innovative advertising techniques to the class.


• The Impact of Culture on Business: I ended up enjoying this class. I didn’t enjoy the 2500 word final paper, but I couldn’t think of a reasonable excuse why I deserved to be exempt. Oh well, it’s finished.

One of the things that Tim really wanted to do while in Barcelona was see a famous DJ. While walking around the city, a promotional poster said that Erick Morillo would be performing at Pacha that weekend. After a couple emails were sent out, Bart and his friend, Richard F, came through and got us on the VIP list. The music was great and it turned out to be fun night on the town, especially because we had a table and didn’t have to deal with the massive “general admission” crowds . . .

Karen, Alicia’s step-mother, arrived around March 15 for a week. We took it easy and enjoyed the city with her – she discovered her new favorite restaurant, El Quatre Gats (4 cats), the first place to sell Picasso’s work when he was a teenager. We were also able to finally visit Sitges with her, a little beach town about 30 minutes south of Barcelona. Loved, loved, loved it – had great paella at a restaurant on the beach and walked around the town. Hotel Romantic is a fantastic hotel to get a drink at and/or stay if anyone ever goes.

Our friends Kristin and Jen arrived around March 21. We had so much fun with them, did a few repeat trips including Sitges, played lots of Uno in our favorite wine bar, and walked probably every street in the city at least 3 times.

We leave on March 31 for Thailand for 2 weeks, one overnight stay in London for our connecting flight back to NY, and finally back to the states on April 17. We hope everyone enjoyed reading the blog as much as we’ve enjoyed writing it. Can’t wait to see everyone in a few weeks!

Alicia & Tim

Karole's Visit

Phrase of the week: Sorry, we're behind on our postings and can't think of anything clever to say . . .
Observation of the week: See above. However, it is worth noting that we love, love, love Southern Spain vs. Northern Spain - people are generally nicer and the weather is warmer!

Tim’s friends Brian and Jenny came to visit a few weeks ago – weather was great on Saturday, so we hung out at a paella restaurant near the ports for the majority of the day. Before they arrived on Friday, we took a day trip to Figueres to see the Theatre that Salvador Dali designed and is now his museum. Building was amazing, the artwork inside was a bit disappointing because none of his major works were there. The town had a cute square off their “Rambla”, so we sat outside and had sangria and lunch before heading back to Barcelona.

Alicia’s mom got into town on Feb. 27 and hit the ground running (ok just walking A LOT) from day one. The first day we introduced mom to the menu del dia, then walked around the La Rambla area and down by the ports. Tried to have a glass of wine at one of the paella restaurants outside but they wouldn’t let us because we weren’t eating, regardless of the fact that they were all completely empty. Spaniards and their rules. Visited Gaudi’s Casa Batllo, which was amazing. He was so ahead of his time and literally designed every aspect of the homes he built, down to the ventilation. We went to dinner at our favorite place, Cerveceria Catalana, which is now one mom’s favorite places too! The next day we went to Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia, the work for which he is best known for and spent the majority of career working on, even though it is yet to be completed. We discovered a great place for dinner in the Mercat Santa Caterina in the Borne called Cuines Santa Caterina – so good. Great mix of different types of food and not a tapa in sight. The next day before leaving for Granada, we continued our Gaudi tour of the city and went to Casa Mila. I think we all thought Casa Batllo was more impressive, but this one had some of the furniture from the decade it was built to give a sense of what it looked like when people lived there. In the temporary exhibition space downstairs, a retrospective of the artist Zoran Music was on view – amazing exhibition.

Ok, so off to Granada to see the Alhambra. Alicia has wanted to go here since she was backpacking in Europe 10 years ago, so it was a bit like Christmas. We stayed at a charming place on the hill near the Alhambra, Carmen de la Alcubilla del Caracol. Manuel, the owner, was the perfect host and helped us plan our time while we were there. Granada is a fantastic town, completely different from other areas of Spain we’ve visited. There is obviously a large Moorish influence on the architecture, especially in the old town. The best thing about Granada – free tapas! Every night restaurants and bars have one or two tapas that they serve when you order something to drink. Again, the tapas are regional and completely different from the Catalan and Basque regions. After tapas bar hoping, we went to a great place for dinner, Puerta del Carmen. So good! We spent the majority of the next day at the Alhambra – pictures can’t really do it justice, but we tried. Had a great lunch near the river – finally Spanish food that we’ve been waiting for, gazpacho and good paella. We only made it to a few tapas places that night and headed back to the hotel for an early night.

The next day, off to Sevilla via a 3 hour bus ride through olive country. It was an absolutely perfect day, so we had a long lunch outside at Modesto's near our hotel, Hotel Alcantara, and then walked around the city for the rest of the day. Sevilla is what most people envision when they think about Spain – flamenco music and dancing, lots of orange trees, bull fights, sangria, Spanish-style homes, etc. We saw a flamenco show at Los Gallos, which we highly recommend. The performance was absolutely mesmerizing – again, pictures don’t do it justice but we tried.

The next morning we headed back to Barcelona and went up to Parc Guell (see previous posting) and toured the Palau de la Musica, had mom’s last dinner at Cerveceria Catalana, and called it a night. We had a great time while she was here, but it went by too quickly, she was just starting to get used to the time change! I think we all slept for the next two days straight.

Budweiser Budvar prosim

Phrase of the week: Budweiser Budvar prosim = Czech Budweiser please. Although there is plenty of Budweiser in Prague, it is not the same Anheuser-Busch beer that it produced in the US. Apparently the founder of AB was from the region (Germany or Czechoslovakia) and wanted to make a beer that reminded him of home, used the name of a beer that was already in production, and the problems began. There are on-going legal battles around the world, but there is no clear winner thus far.

Observation of the week: As one of the largest drinkers of beer per capita in the world, Czechs believe that it cures all ailments, including colds, an upset stomach and insomnia.

This weekend, not only were we able to visit Prague, but Tim was able to meet other Emr’s and see where his great grandfather was raised in the small town of Zirovnice. When planning our trip, we received help from Vaclav Zeman, the boyfriend of Jarka Emr (a distant relative). They set up the visit to Zirovnice, met us at the airport, and would keep us on busy the entire time we were there if they had their way. Until Vaclav learned that we were in our 30’s (and not teenagers), he thought that we shouldn’t be left alone in a foreign city. Needless to say, we ended up going out every night after they thought that we were in bed at the hotel (they must think that we sleep 14 hours every night).

We flew into Prague Friday afternoon and Vaclav and Jarka took us to Hotel Union. The hotel was perfect for what we needed: clean, inexpensive, and close to the tram. They took us on a walking tour of the city and gave us some history of the country. After about 3 hours of walking around in 10 degree weather, Alicia caught a chill and almost had a heart attack on the sidewalk. Luckily, there was a café nearby and we were able to warm up. Vaclav had the “hot wine,” which is a local favorite for the area. For dinner our first night, we found a nice restaurant in old town and grabbed some pizza (it was excellent).

On Saturday morning (8:30 a.m. to be exact . . .), Jan Emr and his girlfriend Marcela picked us up to head to Zirovnice. The drive took about an hour and a half through the countryside. It is a beautiful country, and it would be great to visit again when it’s a little warmer. We were met by Jan’s parents (Cestmir and Helena), his grandmother (Cecilia), and brother (Cestmir). Cestmir and his wife, Hana, have three children: Cestmir, Lucie and Vojta. In order to keep the Emr family tradition alive, Alicia has already agreed to name a son Cestmir. Although you wouldn’t know it from looking at the outside of the house, they had a chicken coop, hares, and a small garden. Alicia enjoyed playing with dinner. Ariana warned us that we would be overfed and told that we were too thin. She was right. The Emr’s made us a great lunch and even sent us off with some Czech vodka and their version of moonshine. Here are some pictures of how my great grandfather's house looks today. On the way home, we stopped at another town, Telc, which looked like a Hollywood set. When we got back to Prague, Jarka and Vaclav had a big evening planned with traditional Czech music and dancing. Check out Alicia’s moves on the dance floor. Not to be outdone, see Tim here. Maybe the waltz isn’t our strongest dance.

On Sunday, we met up with Jarka and Vaclav at the National Theatre to watch the play, Cyrano de Bergerac. Although Sunday performances are typically in English, unfortunately, the performance was in Czech. It was still very entertaining, and the inside of the theatre was beautiful. After the play, we ate some Mediterraean food at a great little restaurant (who knew that we would have to come to Prague for some spicy food?)

On Monday, we saw the Prague Castle and ate some authentic Czech cuisine at a restaurant overlooking the river. That night, we went to a touristy restaurant in the old town, but it had great food, music, and even had a TV playing some local entertainment. Hah!

This weekend, Brian and Jennie Pastor were in town visiting from London, so we will have some pictures of them to put up soon.

P.S. Tim wrote this blog entry – notice all of the food references? I think we’re both over jamon y queso . . .

“Oh, Porto”

Phrase of the week: “Oh, Porto”: The phrase used many times to explain the less than optimal situations that we encountered when travelling around Oporto, Portugal.

Observation of the week: We realized that we like Spain a whole lot more than northern Portugal.

For this trip we teamed up with our friends from Duke, Myles and Jason. Another friend from Cornell, James, had left a couple days earlier, but we were able to meet up for a day. We arrived in Oporto on Friday morning and took the train to the city center to check into our hostel. It was raining, and the city looked completely depressed, but we still stayed positive.

Unfortunately, Tim didn’t confirm the specifics of the room in the hostel, because when we checked in, there were 8 bunk beds and a shared bathroom. We quickly left the boys and found another place to stay down the road. It had a hand-held shower and no heat, but at least we weren’t sharing it with strangers. We had a dinner at a local seafood restaurant – Alicia had one of the region’s specialties, grilled octopus. Everyone decided to skip the tripe. We went down the river that runs through the city for drinks after dinner, the only redeeming part of the whole city. Sat in a bar with heat lamps (they have something against heat in this town) then called it a night. James, Myles and Jason had Port tours lined up for the day, but we didn’t meet up with them until lunch time. After two tours and realizing that we’re not big port fans, we decided to sit at one of the outdoor cafés along the river and people watch. After an early night following a McDonald’s dinner, we couldn’t wait until we left for Santiago de Compostela the next morning. Needless to say, we don’t recommend that anyone visit Oporto. If you want to learn about Port, head down to your local liquor store.

Santiago de Compostela, Spain, was a bright spot on our weekend. The hostel where we stayed was spectacular. All of the rooms were recently renovated, so everything was new and clean. There was a small bar on the first floor and the staff was really nice. The smaller city has an “old town” similar to the one in Barcelona, but it is much less seedy. It is the final destination of the pilgrimage and one of only three cities deemed "holy" by the Vatican. There were plenty of small shops to walk around and check out. The restaurants were all pretty nice and an Irish pub even played the Superbowl. Tim lasted through the middle of the second quarter before exhaustion kicked in and he called it a night.

We were in town this past weekend and saw the Font Magica (Magic Fountain) in Montjuic on Friday night. It was spectacular. The fountain was lit with different colors and was programmed to complement a mix of classical music. It was nice to be able to walk around the city and get a weekend off from travelling. We are both looking forward to visiting Prague next weekend!

No es posible

Phrase of the week: no es posible = it’s not possible, or “no”.

Observation of the week: Aside from having a more formal culture, the Spaniards take their scheduling/appointments very seriously. Drop-in’s are not welcome and scheduled opening times/tour times are always subject to change, especially if you’re looking for a tour in English.

This past weekend we took a trip with our roommates to the Basque region of Spain and visited Bilbao, San Sebastian and the La Rioja region (for anyone looking to make a similar trip, look for Maribel’s guides on-line – fantastic resources). Similar to the Catalan region, they speak a different language and are consistently trying to separate themselves from the rest of Spain. We are starting to think that each region is not so different from Texas. Bilbao was surprisingly a wonderful town. We stayed a great little pension in the old quarter called Iturrienea Ostatua, recommended by Alicia’s friend Kate who lived in Bilbao for a while. We spent the majority of the day at the Frank Gehry-designed Guggenheim museum. Great new additions to their permanent collection, including works by Jenny Holzer and Richard Serra. We treated ourselves to the “menu del dia” at the restaurant in the museum too! Basque country is known for their “pinxtos” or tapas. Everyone starts around 7:00 p.m. and goes until about 10 or 11. You start at one bar, order one or two items and a drink, then move to the next place. It’s very social, everyone congregates outside – unlike anything we’ve seen. There were some great places right on the street where we stayed (Santa Maria) including Bar Gatz, and of course the main square in the old quarter. We weren’t quite sure what we were eating, but I think we had blood sausage and kidney inadvertently . . .

The next day we rented a car and drove to San Sebastian, one of the best beach towns in Spain. We stayed with some of Nic’s friends, Maria and Benat. They were so incredibly nice and showed us true Spanish hospitality! They took us to a place that I cannot even begin to describe – during cider season, these “cider houses” open for about 3 months. They are literally in warehouses with huge cider barrels and tall wooden tables. Everyone gets a glass and runs back and forth to whatever barrel the “pourer” is to fill their glass up (only a little! We later learned why – cider is a bit strong . . .). The food comes out on big platters – salt cod tortilla (Tim’s favorite), grilled salt cod with peppers, huge slab of meat (Alicia had a special one cooked bien hecho – well done), and walnuts, cheese and quince preserves. Fun night out in the town afterwards.

Woke up the next morning to make the drive to the La Rioja region. Our recap of the visit will be brief – it was nearly impossible to schedule any of the tours, much less tours in English. They all require you have a reservation, but when calling, they were never sure if they were having certain tours for the day, asked us to call back. “Can we just stop in for a tasting and not take a tour?” “That is not possible.” “Do you offer tours in English?” “Today, that it is not possible”. “So can we just visit the facilities for a tasting as we won’t be able to understand the tour?” “I’m sorry, that is not possible. You must go through our hour tour that is just like every other vineyard you’ve visited in order to taste our wine.” Needless to say, after visiting the vineyards closer to Barcelona a few weeks ago and after our first English tour at Marques de Riscal (hotel designed by Frank Gehry), we can all recite the various phases of wine making in almost perfect Spanish by the time we finished with the Ysios, Cune, and Muga tours on Monday. We did stay in a “quaint” little town, Elciego, at the Casa Rural la Cueva. The entire town was closed on Sunday, so we ventured to Laguardia nearby, an old town surrounded by the original fortress wall. No cars are allowed inside because the entire underneath of the city is comprised of wine cellars and caves. Headed back to Bilbao to fly home Monday night. I think we are all in need of a hiatus from our beloved vino tinto.

As a side note – we visited the Fundacio Joan Miro last week and loved it. We were lucky to see their temporary exhibition, “Un cos sense limits/A body without limits”, a retrospective of nudes from 20th century artists like Matisse, Picasso, Chagall, Giacometti, Antonio Tapies, Miro and more. Tim had class the next day, but Alicia went to an opening there for a Japanese artist the next night, fun times.

We think our internet is officially gone from our apartment now, so the full postings will be a bit more sporadic. However, Tim will keep everyone updated from his postings at school. We are headed to Portugal this weekend, should be fun!

Internet in Spain is terrible

Hello everyone. Alicia and I aplogize for not keeping the blog up to date, the Internet in Spain is terrible. I think the person who manages the Internet signal that we were ¨borrowing¨finally blocked our computers. We will try to make the posts from a smoky, overpriced, crowded internet cafe from an IBM PC Jr. or I can try to steal time from my school´s computer lab.

Off to Portugal!

Raccio pernil ibéric

Phrase of the week: Raccio pernil ibéric = very expensive ham
Observation of the week: Don’t order 2 of something if you don’t know the price. This weekend, we decided to check out the cava region and visit a few vineyards. (“Cava” is the name given to Spanish sparkling wine after the French mandated in the 1970’s that the only “champagne” that could be called “champagne” had to come from the Champagne region in France . . .). So on Saturday, off we go to Vilafranca del Penedés as per the guidebook to find the tourist office and get a list of the area vineyards to visit that day. Lovely little market town, known for the Human Towers they build during one of the 1000 festivals Spain has (the tallest one in this town is 10 people, a little boy is always the last one to climb on top for obvious reasons.) Anyway, back to the ham. In typical Spanish fashion, the tourism office was closed when we arrived. Of course it was, it was 1:30 and they needed a lunch break until 4:00. We went to have lunch and take advantage of the “menu del dia and vino casa tinto” (please see previous blog post), or in this instance, “cava de casa” and discuss our options for the day. We ordered a variety of tapas, and loved, loved, loved the ham. We ordered another round of jamon, queso y pan. It was too good, and really, how much could it be? We were in a little town eating ham, bread and cheese. Surprise, surprise, I guess the waitress really liked us because she gave us the best jamon de casa. $100 later ($50 of it was for the 10 slices of ham), we realized that everything was closed for the day and that we would have to come back. More on that later.

A few other observations about the food in Spain: it’s much better than its reputation; pig legs with the hooves still on them are considered a delicacy and are EVERYWHERE; the local markets have some of the best produce and cured meats we’ve ever had; ditto with the restaurants that specialize in seafood (yes, Tim had a full seafood dinner at one of the best restaurants outside of town and never complained, even when the lobster was trying to escape from the glass case); the burgers are fantastic and are typically served with a fried egg on top (Ariana swears that it’s the Aussie influence); tapas are a bit much, but we might be spoiled by the restaurant we went to our first night here. Every region in Spain is known for a different style of cuisine, so we’ll keep you posted as we continue our travels.

For anyone who is planning to visit Barcelona on a modest budget, here are our favorite restaurants so far: Cerveseria Catalunya (tapas in Eixample), Bo! (tapas in Gracia, see burger picture above), Moon (food is so so, but it’s 2 blocks away, they play great American music, and show VH1 and CNN in the background), O’Vall d’Ouro (lunch spot in Eixample where we discovered vino casa tinto), Mosquito (Asian in El Borne), Los Choqueros (a seafood restaurant outside of town where we took Oliver, the distant relative of Nic who helped us find our apt, see seafood pics above) and last but not least, lentils in cocina de Alicia . . .

On to our activities of the week – it will be short and sweet. Alicia loves yoga, Spanish class is a bit of a chore, and she and Ariana decided to skip Friday’s class after an in-depth discussion over tapas and sangria at Cerveseria Cataluyna. Work is going well, but the internet is still proving to be a problem. If only we knew the password to the bank’s connection across the street, things would be much easier. Tim’s early morning class is finally over, so he’s able to sleep until 2 (ok 1). Finally experienced the Barcelona club scene at Catwalk near the port. We think the area bars are better, but again, when in Spain. Because everything is closed on Sundays, we decided to visit another park (Sagrada Familia was on the way – we’re waiting to go inside until Alicia’s mom comes to visit) – Parc de la Ciutadella – completely different than Parc Guell, but reminded us of a mini Central Park in NYC, and we loved it.

To continue from our cava story from above, we returned to the town on Sunday with another friend of Tim’s from school (Myles, Duke MBA who just happened to be a the 1998 Rolling Stones concert in Prague that Alicia and her friends Dawn and Heather were at – random). We visited two places, Torres vineyards and Cordineu caves. Torres was a bit like Epcot center at Disney World, but fantastic. Cordineu was a more traditional tour, and our guide was the most enthusiastic guide we’ve ever experienced. Plus, for 2 euros, you could get a 1.5 hour tour and drink all the cava at the end that you wanted (they produce more cava in a year than they can sell I guess). Fun fact! Freixenet, another cava producer in the region (the one in the black bottle that sells for about $3 in the US), sells more cava each year than the French sell Champagne.

We’re going to Bilbao, San Sebastian and the La Rioja region later this week/weekend, so our next post will be a little late. Happy early MLK day.

Vino Casa Tinto

Phrase of the week: Vino Casa Tinto = house red wine
Observation of the week: Spaniards love their red wine. On our third day here, we went to a little restaurant around the corner from our apartment that offered an enticing set price menu (lunch typically starts around 2 p.m.). We noticed that 75% of the people in the restaurant were having a bottle of red wine with their lunch, so of course we decided to partake – when in Spain! We later learned that one of the only positive things the scary Spanish dictator Franco did for his country was to reinforce the lunchtime habits of the people by enshrining in law the “Menu del Dia”. So the working class could get a good priced lunch without having to go all the way home, bars and restaurants were forced to offer an all-inclusive (i.e. with wine) cheap set menu. The tradition still continues today, so we will of course take full advantage! A side note – you can still order bottles of Vino casa tinto for about 3 euros . . .

We arrived in Barcelona on January 1 and have spent the last few weeks getting settled. Our apartment is in the perfect location in Eixample near the Passeig de Gracia where all of the Modernista buildings are (Gaudi, Gambus, Cadafalch). Our roommates Nic and Ariana are fantastic and lots of fun – I think we’ve gone out every night since they’ve arrived . . . Nic is South African, Ariana is Australian/Croatian. January 5 was the Three Kings Festival, “Cavalcada deis Reis”, which is similar to Christmas Eve. We went to Placa de Catalunya at the end of La Rambla to watch the parade that went through the city – packed! After the parade, the children are supposed to run home to put their shoes filled with hay on their balcony for the three kings (literally every building here has balconies) – if they were good, the three kings will leave them presents, if not, coal . . . Sunday everything was closed, so we went to Parc Guell – favorite day so far! It was first designed by Gaudi to be an upscale residential development in the early 1900’s, but funding and interest fell through, so it’s now one of the most unique and impressive public parks in the world. What did we do – more vino casa tinto in the square of course!

January 7 – back to reality. Tim started class, Alicia started work again. Here are Tim's initial comments on his classes:

• Creative Problem Solving: We are split up in teams and we have to use some creative problem solving techniques to help solve a problem of our choice. We came up with trying to figure out how to reduce teen drug/alcohol addiction. After meeting at 9:00 a.m. every day for a week, luckily this class is over on 1/15.


• Sports Marketing: Our professor used to work for the futbol club FC Barcelona. I think this is going to be one of my favorite classes even though I will use nothing that I will be learning about.


• Consumer Behavior: The first class was like an introduction to marketing. I think that I can skip all of the classes, show up for the final, and get an A.


• Management of Cultural and Creative Industries: This is another team-based class and our topic is advertising. After the first 3-hour class, I still don’t know what we are supposed to be learning or what we are supposed to hand in by the end of the semester!


• The Impact of Culture on Business: Doesn’t start until next week, but given the content of my other classes, I am not expecting much.
  

The lack of internet access is proving to pose problems for Alicia’s work schedule, so she and Ariana signed up for yoga classes (in Spanish, muy tranquilo . . .) and a 4-week intensive Spanish class.

Feel free to leave comments/questions. We miss everyone and will try to update this once a week!

Roommates

During our time in Barcelona, we will be sharing an apartment with a couple that we met through a Facebook group of ESADE exchange students. They are from South Africa and seem fun.

Finally started a blog

Alicia and I figured that a blog would be a good place to capture our experiences in Barcelona and give us a chance to document our trip to Europe. We'll do our best to keep it updated.