Back Tracking

I know a few people were aware of our situation before arriving in Barcelona, but not everyone does... So the story begins....

         I flew into Germany to meet Jannik, stay for a few days while he wrapped things up, and then we would fly down to Barcelona together since he knew the agent and where the agency was that had found our apartment. It all seemed to be lining up perfectly, and then two days before leaving Germany we found out we no longer had an apartment, regardless of the paperwork and deposit that Jannik had taken care of months ago. Long story short, "supposedly" the owner listed the apartment with two agencies, then rented it with the other, and didn't tell our agency. So we arrived with one bag each, containing clothes just enough for seven days if that (our other bags following in a week). It just so happened that this weekend, the weekend in which we arrived in Barcelona, there was a festival occurring. Now let me tell you, "La Mercé" is only celebrated in Barcelona. No where else in Spain. Because of this festival there was no hotel cheap enough, no hostel left, and no apartment to rent by day that could take care of us that weekend. Consequently, Jannik and I spent two semi awkward nights in the home of our... dun dun dun... AGENT! This agent just happened to be gay, which I have no problem with, and if he (and his dog, which hated me!) weren't in love with Jannik, then we would have been homeless. This is not the reason for the semi awkwardness, the semi awkwardness came from the fact that he and his married partner didn't seem "so in love."And we often kept quiet on comments made in front of us that we literally had no words for hahaha. However, we were very lucky to have a place to stay for the weekend and the guys were very welcoming toward us.

     Thus began our next obstacle, find a place to live, or find a new place to stay until we found the former. At first we were both very stressed and disheartened because our first apartment was so cute and affordable. As the cliché  goes, everything happens for a reason, and about the time we were looking at our fourth apartment we found the apartment that was soon to be the one. This apartment was fated to be ours. It was in a much nicer and safer neighborhood than our original apartment, with two rooms big enough for our bedroom and an office, and two blocks away from Jannik's business school. To top it off, the little old man who owns it fell in love with me and had the whole apartment repainted and upgraded some of the fixtures. Finally some one who loved me! A little side note, getting an apartment here isn't easy, first you have to pay 4 times the first months rent on the first day, then you have to sign a contract for about 5 years but allowing you to cancel after one, and then they don't even have to clean it before you move in! Plus they can take anything they want, which meant that we moved into an apartment with no light fixtures and we even had to purchase light bulbs for the hanging wires from the walls. Which meant that getting moving into an apartment with fresh paint was a miracle indeed. That's not saying we didn't still have to do a ton of work. We could either have a maid come, which would cost 100 Euro for only the bare minimum, or we could do it ourselves. Seeing as we moved into a completely empty apartment that still needed furnishing, we opted for saving the money and cleaning ourselves. We cleaned for about 5 days straight, tired as balls every night, we slept on an air mattress that deflated half way mid-night, every night, for the first week since we would rather live like "gypsies" as the old man called it, than pay to live some where not our own. Needless to say, now we have a very clean, very cute apartment, furnished by IKEA lol. (Pictures to come soon on apartments' completion)

As for our remaining clothes, they came about a week later than they should have, because Spain and its people do what they want, when they want, on their own time. We had them delivered to our agency because we had to ship them from Germany before we left, and had no apartment at that time. Well, the agency has been for the last month, and still is, remodeling. So they sent our bags to their storage unit to get them out of the way, I didn't find out until I went to the agency to ask if they had come in yet. Thanks for the call guys! So Jannik and I went across the city to meet the workers at 10 am, which is the beginning of their "early" day to get our bags. Mine came, Jannik's didn't. Two days later his came. One day later our shower broke and we were washing ourselves by holding a bucket under the faucet in the tub and dumping it on ourselves. Oh and let me tell you, our furnace goes from Antarctica cold, to the fiery depths of Hell HOT. Ooooor, once we finally figured out how to finagle it, you can take about a 10-15 minute shower at medium warm until it turns back into Antarctica.  Did I mention we have no oven? And the apartment doesn't come with a standard built in microwave or dishwasher like American Apartments, I see so clearly now, we really are spoiled! So we have a stove top, which we bought pots and pans for, then had to return because we have an INDUCTION stove top which takes a certain type of pan. FIRST! Every time a problem occurs we have to walk to the agency and report it and it takes about 2 weeks to get it fixed even though they always promise one or two days. So once we got all our bags,  we bought a washing machine (FIRST), line dry our clothes since no one really has a dryer here (plus no room for it), the shower is now fixed, waiting on the oven to be fixed supposedly tomorrow and we are slowly buying electronics for our kitchen and art for our white walls! However, every day there is improvement and our apartment (or piso, in spanish) is starting to come together nicely. I do love our little apartment.

OOOOK

Next part: Short Stories & Info

Second week/Weekend there was a riot here, all I know is that the common graffiti slogan on the buildings was "vaga" something something something, and in spanish something about it's not a crisis it's capitalism. The people were striking against how much compensation they would receive after being fired, which was being shortened from several months to about 3 or something. I know I know, I should know this but I don't really care. Is that bad? I have my own problems right now! Haha... Anyway, we couldn't get home for a while because the main street we needed to cross to get home was where all the burning trash cans (which are actually dumpsters) were. People were acting like idiots, setting fires in small trash cans, burning down large dumpsters, and vandalizing large well known chain stores.

You should all know The Office is one of my favorite shows (along with Modern Family)
So it's "Dwight Fact Time"

Fact: Spaniards don't even start their day till 10 am
Fact: They take a siesta from about 1:30/2 pm to 5 pm
Fact: They close shop around 9
Fact: They eat dinner around  9/10
Fact: They stay up super late, and if they go out they stay out all night, and that means 6 am

Fact: Everything you want to get done will take at least 4 times the amount of time you think it should to get done, until it is actually done.
Fact: If you are foreign in Barcelona you will be hated on at least once... in the first 3 weeks.
Fact: Catalan is a mix between Spanish and French
Fact: If you don't at least try to speak Spanish you will be hated on, but if you do speak Spanish and don't try to speak Catalan, you will be hated on even mooooooore.
Fact: Coffee is an addiction here, every one does it.
Fact: You will spend more money in Spain than you can earn.

End of facts for today

Picture Story Time!

                                                                         10/2/10                  

Birthday Flowers! 

Beginning of Birthday Night @ Champagneria w/Max

Night progresses and a random couple adds to our group and pays for all our Cava! 

End of The Night = Success 

Castle at the top of the mountain that is now attached to a theme park

The beach here is perfect

That ends this post, Sorry it was so long but I had to catch ya'll up on a lot! Love you