Saturday, January 16, 2010

Life without a dryer

life without a dryer
life without a dryer
Normally clothes would be hung outside but since it's so cold out and could rain we have a make shift drying rack inside next to the heater haha. It's funny because a dryer is something I've always taken for granted when it is a luxury to many people.


Thursday, January 14, 2010

Thursday

School has been interesting, at first the teachers would all start speaking Catalan until one of the international students asked for it to be taught in Castellano... At least they all agreed to teach in Castellano or else I wouldn't be able to keep up haha. It is already hard listening to a 3 hour lecture in Castellano for some reason I think it takes more out of me to think in Spanish but I'm getting better.

My teachers all seem very adept and know how to teach a class, it was nice. I'm excited to see what the malleable materials class is like! I heard that they design a soap brand at the end and actually make the soaps!

Today (Thursday) I don't have any class so I walked around and had 2 objectives. One was to find a bakery that sold warm fresh bread and another was to semi decorate my room, which included finding another US to Euro power adapter to connect the christmas lights I brought with me haha.

On my way to the electronic shop I saw a line of people waiting outside a tiny shop and sure enough it was a tiny bakery! Fresh bread checked off the list. fresh bread
Next the power adapter, again I found the ferreteria around the corner and checked that one off the list too.
I walked around for a bit after successfully completing my tasks while munching on my warm baguette:
circle windows?
orange!
patterns
It's still cloudy... but a bit warmer! almost 60!

And another photo, this is from yesterday, we walked to the beach and found a really cute cafe with cheap good food, the best "cafe con leche" I've had! I've been getting cappuccinos lately because they don't put any any foam on the lattes here. Another interesting thing I've noticed is that since the coffees are all basically tiny espresso shots, you don't see anyone walking around with a coffee cup! They take a break from whatever they are doing and actually stop to drink coffee! What an idea! haha

walk around

I love these colors

baking

It was my roommates birthday a couple of days ago so I decided to bake some good old american chocolate chip cookies, my first step was to buy the ingredients of course so I headed over to the grocery store. I must have looked so lost in there haha I honestly went around the whole store about 10 times before sort of finding what I was looking for... Almost everything is in Catalan! How strange is that? I understood most of it but there were some things like brown sugar and chocolate chips that I couldn't seem to find. Eventually I got a hold of similar products that I figured would work.
The chocolate chips were funny little sprinkles chocolate chips?
and then when I opened the brown sugar it looked like raw cane sugar, but I decided to continue with the recipe because the box had said brown sugar. The dough looked fine and they baked well but then on first taste they ended up being very sweet and super crunchy! fideo chip cookies
Everyone still ate them haha but they weren't what I had expected...
I'll get the hang of it eventually...

Sunday, January 10, 2010

cold cold day

at the beach!
beach!
rough sand
cold
It is so cold here... 45 degree highs are no fun, its snowing in Madrid! But it was the first day it was sunny so I headed over to the beach! haha And since it was Sunday and most stores don't open, there were a lot of people with the same idea. After that we headed to the Picasso museum and after some delicious tapas! It was so good, some patatas bravas and some others involving fish and salami and bread and olives? I have now tasted an olive that I enjoyed, theres a first time for everything! It was a lovely day.

So on another note I think Barcelona might have more dogs than San Francisco, its really funny seeing all the tiny pups with sweaters strutting along the city streets. I suppose it might be like seeing dogs being walked in New York City. I really want to start riding a bike here, and they have a cool rental system that I might have to try out.