Thursday, September 20, 2007

barcelona, spain

last weekend me, karisa, and our friend yuna went to barcelona, spain. it was our first time travelling around europe and we were very excited to plan everything ourselves and have it go so smoothly.

the first day we got there we checked into our hotel (where we smooshed all three of us into a one person room to save money) and then went sight-seeing. we mostly checked out the gaudi architecture because you can only see his modernist work in barcelona. we saw the sagrada familia, la pedrera, casa baillo, and park guell. but we also did a ton of other things like go shopping in the unique shops, walked along the beach just to say we dipped our toes in the mediterranean, and go out to yummy dinners at night. not to mention that after a full day of sight-seeing we would party on the streets of barcelona til 3 am!!! haha it's a very young city and we literally walked into a concert in the middle of the street on saturday night. it was so much fun!! i have a TON of pictures of the gaudi architecture, but unfortunately, pictures do not do his work justice and i definitly reccomend everyone to make it to barcelona sometime!

also, barcelona is a very americanized city (especially compared to paris) so everyone spoke perfect english and we actually managed to find ICED COFFEE at starbucks which is the one and only thing that we swore did not exist in europe. i'm pretty sure that karisa drank her weight in iced coffee that weekend...


our hotel. we were glad we chose not to stay in a hostel because they all looked reeeeally dirty once we saw them in person.


the bed where all three of us crashed at night.


the interesting view from our room.


beautiful plaza off of las ramblas.


viva espana!


i'm proud to say that i sucessfully navigated us on the metro.


the sagrada familia cathedral.


the light and dark is the difference between when he origianlly started the building and how they're working on it today.







beautiful stained glass windows inside.




it's so tall and spacious inside and it's still not even finished.


entrance doors to la pedrera.


i wish i had a tye-dyed ceiling.


gaudi's natural inspiration.


honeycombs.


up on the rooftop.


i love the broken glass bottles mosaic. i think k and i could make that from the wine bottles we have in our recycling bin.


incredible moderniste architecture.


the rooftop was like an awesome, but really dangerous playground.


the "i took this pic for mom" shot


"hey norma!"


cool sculptures.


yuna, me and karisa.


the whole city was filled with interesting architecture.


more weird pieces of art.


frank gehrey goldfish.


la playa!


we can say we dipped our toes in the medeterrainean.


footsteps in the sand.


then i decided to be a little kid and climb this random thing on the beach.


victory!


we were very happy to see palm trees.


random box sculpture that karisa made us hike 2 miles across the beach to see.


and then of course she finds the only surf shop in barcelona.


roy lichtenstein sculpture.


inside casa batillo.


mushroom fireplace.


spiral staircase leading to rooftop.


rooftop of casa batillo.


it looks like the building is melting in the sun.


view of sagrada familia from guell park....aka the HIGHEST point in barcelona that we stupidly hiked even though we were already exhausted.


photo of karisa at the highest point in barcelona just to prove that we made it there!!!


the payoff at park guell: more pretty gaudi buildings.


i want this mosaic.


karsia waving her bamboo stick that we found on the beach.


garisol!!! this is the concert that we randomly found in middle of the street that lasted until 3 am!


our last breakfast at starbucks. sigh, i miss iced coffee so much!

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

euro-disney

the day before school started, me, karisa, and our two friends yuna, and ali went to euro-disney. it was pretty much the same thing as disneyland in america except that all of the rides were in french instead of english. it was pretty funny though because on the pirates of the caribbean ride they had a french guy's voice, but he'd still be speaking with a pirate accent. and it was the same thing with a western accent for thunder mountain. it was weird. haah, and we learned how to say "it's a small world after all" in french!

i swear this castle looks alot different from the two that are in america.


it was pretty though.


me and ali on the runaway railroad.


all of us on pirates of the caribbean.


yuna, ali, and karisa dressed up as disney princesses.


me pretending to be a pirate.


karisa on the spinning teacups.


we were all trying not to toss our cookies...i think we're getting kinda old for rides like this!! we kept joking and calling it the hangover-simulator ride.


this is what new york city looks like in "it's a small world"...or in french i should say, "que le monde est petite!"


the next weekend we had girls night and karisa and i invited ali and yuna over to our apartment for dinner.


yummy yummy food.


karisa and i cooked, yuna brought wine, and ali brought delicious pasteries for dessert.


girls night out!