Barcelona: The city that never sleeps

Barcelona claims to be the city that never sleeps. If you've been there you know this is absurd. To their credit Barceloneans do stay out late, but they also siesta for much of the day. That's okay, so did we. Despite sleeping until 2pm and 5pm on our first and last days respectively, we did manage to see and do some great things. In no particular order here are the top three:

1. Sagrada Familia: SF happens to be the number one tourist destination in BLona, it was also two blocks from our apartment and a wonderful sight to come home to each day. After admiring it from a far for three days we finally paid the 9 euro entrance fee and 2.50 euro lift fee (except for Sarah, who got in for free after presenting the ticket lady with her police report- see below). We discovered a massive construction sight inside- not too unlike the rest of Barcelona- but the views from the top of the towers and the informative write up on how to build a modernist church made it all worthwhile.

2. Park Guell: We are still unsure if the reason we enjoyed Park Guell so much was because it is another Gaudi masterpiece or if we were actually just relieved to sit down after Julia-now the ruthless-led us on 8 non-stop hours of touring (note: this was the only day on the trip to date that we have left our lodgings before lunch, seriously). Upon arrival, we "poked around" briefly before collapsing onto the world's longest bench.

3. Food and Drinks: Chorizo, jamon, seafood paella, bakeries on every corner, 3.50 euro liters of wine, St. Joseph's Market, Latuka's (ask Courtney)... let's just say we didn't go hungry.

While we have previously reserved "lessons learned" as a way to include somewhat random stories, our experiences in Barcelona necessitate that it take a more prominent role.

Lessons Learned:

1. When every person you encounter tells you to watch out for pick-pocketers, you should really watch out for pick-pocketers. While enjoying a snack at a cafe in the Barri Gotic we all absentmindedly put our bags on the ground. It didn't take long for a troupe of druggies- one flute player, one sketchily dressed woman to distract us, and an unseen third man- to steal Sarah's purse. Luckily her passport was locked away safetly at home and after filing a report with the police we were able to salvage the day. Because we couldn't find the troupe to exact our revenge, Sarah created the following haiku to express her pain, shame and frustration:

F-you flute player!
You stole my purse you druggie.
Western Union works!

2. When shopping at the local 24 hour mart and faced with the choice between 1.80 euro wine and 3 euro wine, splurge the extra 1.20. The difference is worth it. Every time.
3. Sarah and Kara learned that it IS possible to make "cookies" in a frying pan. Everyone else learned that you should probably just buy something packaged.
4. If you're out celebrating dia de St. Juan the night before your 10am flight, make sure to set more then one alarm. To Heidi's credit she told us many times, "guys I'm definitely NOT going to wake up to my alarm tomorrow," but unfortunately her ability to prophecize didn't do anything to stop her prediction from coming true. Luckily with the aid of a taxi and sympathetic women at the counter she made her flight anyway.
5. It is a good thing that fireworks are illegal. Barceloneans celebrate Dia de St. Juan by setting off fireworks everywhere, all day long. For us this meant being scared by random booms and cracks of exploding fireworks throughout the day and trying to dodge bursts of flames along the beach at night. None of the revelry makers care if you get in the way of their tiny bombs and if your not careful about where you step or you could easily lose a limb, a fate that Kara avoided by about 2 inches.
6. Make your desposits in check rather than cash. Still too raw to get into this now.

Despite the tough love, Blona stole our hearts (along with Sarah's purse) and we will miss its bakeries and cheap internet cafes as we continue on to Greece.

Shout out to H. Kim who is surely dominating 745 AM in the morning negotiations and scorpion bowl races at 745 pm at night. We love and miss you!!!!

bona nueta,
Courtney, Julia, Kara and Sarah

Nice was N.I.C.E.

To our faithful followers (cough cough Mr. Kelley and Mr. Moore): we apologize for the long gap between posts-vacationing has turned out to be quite consuming.

Only a week later Nice already seems like a long time ago but everything important can be said with the following acronym:
N-No sandy beaches. We thought the pictures that we had seen online of rocky beaches were perhaps isolated to a few small sections. That's not true, but also not as uncomfortable as they looked.
I- It only takes a few bottles of wine, Kirstyn Knox and a sketchy park to make a great night.
C- Crepes with nutella and banana go well with anything.
E-Eze was another great recommendation from Mrs. Kelley. We boarded the bus skeptical but were delighted by the views up the mountain and even more excited when we finally found out what this "eze" place was all about and why Mrs. Kelley gave it three highlighted stars.
Lessons learned:
1. Swimsuits, beach dresses and rainbows don't qualify as "dressed up" in Monaco.
2. If you plan to gamble in Monte Carlo its weird to only play 20 cent slots. (So we're told.)

Significantly tanner,
Courtney, Julia, Kara and Sarah

Quick Shoutouts

1. To Mrs. Jan O´Brien for purchasing Courtney the best luggage ever for this trip. Those 4 wheels saved me on many walks to and from train stations and airports, as the roller on my suitcase broke in Dooley McFiat.

2. To our DADS: HAPPY FATHER´S DAY! WE MISS YOU!!!!

With love, From Barcelona.

These are the things you notice when you are semi-conscious thanks to swine flu and being propelled around Belgium by well-meaning friends.

1. Brussels is a real city. It’s not one of those cute European towns like Amsterdam or Toledo or Paris where people pretend to get work done but actually just sit outside and smoke or eat ham. I could tell this by the cleanliness of the streets. Cleaner streets are correlated with shorter hours worked, in my scientific study based on exhaustive case studies. This is why New York is filthy. Brussels is on the dirtier side of clean, indicating that people probably work at least 35 hours a week.

2. Brussels’ status as a real city is further cemented by its New York-style prices. Did you know you can pay seven euros for a smoothie? You can.

3. Guidebooks sometimes mention the bizarre species of besuited ‘Eurocrats’ who fulfil a sort of dark matter role in the Brussels universe (dark matter, according to Wikipedia, is ‘hypothetical matter that is undetectable by its emitted radiation, but whose presence can be inferred from gravitational effects on visible matter’). A Bruxellian may never see a Eurocrat in a restaurant or a park, but you know they’re there. Maybe it was fever-induced delerium but I think I could sense them.

4. Bruges is almost too beautiful for words, and Brussels isn’t half bad either, at least what I managed to see.

With everyone's help, I hauled my diseased self to the Eurostar to London to crash at my aunt and uncle’s, where I am still recovering. The comfort of the familiar in no way makes up for the loss of these wonderful women’s company. As soon as I can swallow again, I’ll raise my glass of lukewarm English ale to the classiest Eurotrippers of 09: have fun, Kara for goodness’ sake put on sunscreen you will never tan, watch out for gypsies in Barcelona, love you all dearly.

- Gillian ‘the Plague’ Morris

If it’s Tuesday it Must be Belgium*

(Yes, we were actually in Belgium on a Tuesday)

*For lack of creativity… or because we are such film experts… we have chosen all our titles and subtitles for this blog posts from movie titles. We suggest you watch these films as a way of thinking of us, since you miss us so much. That is not a presumptuous assumption at all.

In Bruges

Whoever said love was hard to find was wrong. We’ve all fallen in love in just the week that we have been on our trip. So in love are we, that upon our arrival to the picturesque Bruges, we sat down for a romantic candlelight dinner. Waffles were consumed, drinks were had, and great conversation flowed with ease.

Since Let’s Go warned of the dead nightlife, we planned to complete our perfect evening by watching In Bruges—together, in Bruges. We convinced our hostel owner to lend us his personal copy, but despite his generosity, we never ended up watching it.

Instead, after meeting three young British students at our hostel, we went for a midnight stroll clad in Harvard sweatshirts and carrying bulky bags. We were shocked at how empty the streets were. At the dark and nearly deserted “markt”, Gill spotted a few young locals. After exchanging names, she convinced the rest of us to follow them for 1 euro drinks at the nearby Café Pick. This “café” turned out to be a raging disco-tech, complete with strobe lights, a smoke machine and Belgian navymen. We were absolutely shocked. Clearly no one was on the streets because they were all packed into this pub. Of course, Heidi, Kirstyn, and Kara could not resist taking photos with the sailors and their DG anchors.

The next day, Gill was bed-ridden (hopefully not swine flu) and the rest of us went sight-seeing for a few hours (there is not a whole lot to see in Bruges). The highlights of the day were touching a phial which supposedly contained Christ’s blood and climbing Belfort Tower’s 366 steps.

Lost in Translation

Then we were off to Brussels. After eating nothing but sugar for the previous 24 hours, we reluctantly chose a restaurant which offered some of the other food groups. Halfway into our meal, the cute French-speaking waiter who had previously called Kara a celebrity (we think?), flipped over a coaster that he had placed on the table near the beginning of our meal. Apparently we had failed to find the cryptic message scribbled on the reverse, which read “You wont drink some thing for me this night but I have my friends for me.”

Pardon? When did he even ask us to drinks? At least he has friends to console him? We soon realized that our high school French was better than his broken English, and agreed to meet up later that night. Cheers to our second night of free Belgian beer!

Lessons learned in Belgium:

1.) A Belgian Waffle can cost 11 euro. But Kara says it’s worth every cent.

2.) Check whether hot water is included in the price of your apartment.

3.) Avoid being overly friendly with Belgian immigrants. They WILL invite themselves to visit you in America within 5 minutes of saying hello.

4.) When jumping in public, watch the length of your skirt.

Love,

Kara, Kirstyn, Heidi, and Courtney

It's A Small World After All

We stepped off the plane in Amsterdam and caught the train to the historic center of the city. From our first step out of the station, we noticed a remarkable thing. The multi-colored, white gabled houses were incredibly cute. Friendly tour operators offered us scenic canal rides. Stands sold ice cream, an assortment of fried delights, and beer. There were lots of tourists. In other words, we were in Disney Europe.

But before we get to Amsterdam, we felt we should add to Sarah and Julia’s account of our time in Ireland, which thematically could be described as ‘It’s a small world after all.’

Our first night in Ireland was spent in Galway, and in our attempt to be “culturally sensitive” and relate to the local people, as all mature travelers should do, we just had to go hit up the pubs. One of our first stops? The King’s Head Pub, showing close likeness to our very own Queen’s Head Pub at Harvard (brought to you by Senior Gift… wow, that seems a long time ago). Along our drive from Galway to Cork, we stopped in Limerick for a bite to eat at Molly’s Sandwich shop. After parking Dooley McFiat (props to Julia for parallel parking stick shift on the ‘wrong’ side of the road), we all stared in disbelief at the large red and yellow sign across the street, which read “The Hong Kong.” Heidi got so excited she almost had a heart attack. For non-Harvard blog followers, the Hong Kong, or the Kong as it is more affectionately known in Cambridge, is one of the most frequented Harvard bars. (Hello to Noodle, who still needs to have a scorpion bowl). Later, we stopped at both Temple Bar and Grafton Street in Dublin, though we humbly acknowledge that the names of these Cambridge hot-spots were undoubtedly stolen from the Irish originals. It seems that our fears of leaving college and the familiar weren’t necessary after all.

Not only did it feel at times as if we never quite left Cambridge, we had a number of chance encounters that made it hard to believe we were all the way on the other side of the Atlantic. First, on her morning run in Cork, Courtney found that the scenic running path along the river ended unexpectedly at Shandon Boathouse. After a friendly rowing coach named Cathy gave her directions, Courtney, in typical Sarah Moore fashion, inquired whether Cathy knew Harvard’s most notoriously incomprehensible Cork native, Breffny Morgan. She did. In fact, Cathy had grown up rowing with Breffny. After realizing their weak connection, Cathy, who was also an elementary school history teacher, insisted that Courtney come on a driving tour/history lesson of Cork. During the tour, Cathy revealed that Courtney’s ancestors, the McGraths, were a very well-known family in the Cork area.

Of course, this was neither the first nor the last time that we were impressed with Irish hospitality. Gill found no place in the packed-to-the-rafters Dooley McFiat, so caught a bus to Dublin and re-met up with the girls at the Marlborough Hostel. Four and a half hours of sleep on the bus were apparently enough to cure her of jetlag, and we headed out to the streets of Dublin in the wee hours of the morning. After a harrowing experience at Gogarty’s Bar with company whose average age was over 40, we found our way to Temple Bar, where Sarah and Julia struck up conversation with two charming men who invited us to a house party when the bar closed. Heidi met a man named Ronan Maloney who mentioned he had once lived in an obscure town in Connecticut named Old Greenwich. Gill, who grew up in neighboring Riverside, traded stories with Ronan about going to Ada’s candy store. Though strangers, they soon bonded over their love of the late Ada, who would quite lovingly cough in her hands then proceed to dip her clean fingers into the candy bowl for Ronan and Gill to enjoy.

There were certainly many more incidents that led us to title this blog post, “It’s a small world after all.” Julia and Sarah ran into a former Harvard women’s hockey player in the streets of Dublin. Kara saw a rather attractive man on the streets whom she had seen the previous night at a pub. An extremely well-dressed pregnant woman at the train station in Amsterdam, who convinced us that you can in fact be hot while carrying an extra person, was sited again on the other side of town, hours later dressed in another equally fashionable outfit.

Thus, we bring you to Disney Europe, properly named Amsterdam. Upon our arrival to this new city and country, we caught a tram to our hotel – shout out to Hermitage Hotel on Nieuwe Kriesvagoiwejr;lakmdfo (Dutch is unpronounceable) for beautiful rooms, great location, and rock-bottom prices… and to Kirstyn Knox (who joined us on our flight to Amsterdam- welcome Kirstyn!) for finding and booking it – and rented bikes for the day. We concluded bikes were the absolute best way to get around Amsterdam, as long as one manages to remember to no longer “stay left, look right,” and to avoid the trams which zoom around the city with alarming stealth. The phrase, “silent but deadly,” must have been made first to describe these trams.

Our 24-hours in Amsterdam were action packed, yet relaxed. And filled with many lessons.

1. A croquette is a traditional Dutch dish filled with hot meat and lard, then deep fried, which can easily burn your mouth and clog your arteries if not careful. Thank you to Kirstyn who took one for the team to teach us this important lesson.

2. It is entirely possible to make prostitution and marijuana look classy, if you put them on beautiful historical canal streets that look like the rest of quaint Amsterdam. Welcome to the Red Light District.

3. It is “not possible” to: get olives on only ½ of your pizza, to get tap water, and to get a pizza at the same time as the appetizer- in some restaurants. Sidenote: if you Italianize your Spanish by changing your accent, your friends will think you are very smart and fluent in another Romantic language.

4. Haagen-Daaz tastes much better in the Netherlands.

5. Van Gogh created close to 2000 works of art (800 paintings and 1000 drawings) in his 10-year career. He also had a religious beginning, though he later came to reject his faith. Hello, we are Harvard students- we had to include an educational component :)

6. Biking through Amsterdam is really fun, albeit slightly dangerous/exhilarating/fill-in-the-blank, and should be mentioned more than once in this blog, in case a reader is not reading every single word of this amazingly intriguing blog, Euroclass09.


In sum, Disneyland is right. It is a small world after all.


With love,


Heidi, Courtney, Kara, Gill, and Kirstyn

Day 5: Farewell to the Emerald Isle

(Dublin, as told by Julia and Sarah)

We're blogging now from Marlborough Hostel in Dublin. Since our last post we have traveled roughly 500 km, been to four cities, over a dozen pubs, and by last count we are all still friends.

After half a day in Galway the five of us packed ourselves back into our rental car, "Dooley," and trekked 198km to Cork via Limerick singing along to our Saw Doctors CD (a famous Irish band that I was introduced to four years ago) the entire time. We found that there was not a whooolllle lot to do in Cork although we all liked it for its entertaining night life, including a memorable bartender named Kane and its proximity to Blarney. Blarney is less than 15km from Cork and even after getting horribly lost and unintentionally touring the city and surrouding areas we were able to make it there in half an hour. In Blarney we met up with world-traveler extrodinaire Gill Morris and did the only thing to do in Blarney... kiss the Blarney stone!! Apparently it is suppose to give you the "gift of gab," but I'll let our readership be the judge of that!
After Blarney it was on to Dublin where we have been enjoying oursevles for two days now. Yesterday after an exhaustive day of touring, guided by Courtney-the-Ruthless, we all convened at the Pavillion, what we assume to be Trinity's equivalent of the Queen's Head Pub. At the "Pav" we met a pair of nice (re: attractive) and polite (re: entertaining) Irish soldiers, Angus and Liam, who we met up with again later last night.
This morning Kara, Courtney, Gill and Heidi departed for Amsterdam (expect posts from them shortly!) and Sarah and I have stayed behind awaiting our flight to Nice tomorrow!

AWARDS:
Best purchase: Saw Doctors CD, 10 euro. Sustained us for hours in Dooley when leg room and air was hard to come by (so I'm told -- there was actually plenty of space in the driver's seat) and stone walls and green grass stretched endlessly in front of us.
- Here's a link to our favorite tune, "N17": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlRhzRsAHQw

Favorite Pub: Howl at the Moon. Not really a pub, but a Dublin favorite nonetheless.

Thing we most need: An Alarm Clock. At first we were scared when the hostel workers banged angerily on our door to wake us up 30 minutes after we should have checked out, but that has become the norm by now, much to our hostels' shagrin.

Most heard from new Irish friends: "Why the fook would ye come to Ireland?"

That's all for now! Until next time...

Julia (edited/censored by Sarah)

Day 1: Dooley McFiat

We are operating under the pressing constraints of interent cafe minutes so this will be relatively brief. A short timeline of events,
7:10 PM EST, we take off
7:11 PM EST, Sarah falls asleep, everyone else curses her, orders from the drink cart, and reads about Ireland.
5:55 AM Ireland Time Zone (ITZ): Get first view of Irish countryside, Kara thinks we are crash landing in a field, Sarah awakens in time to marvel that the landscape fails to conform to the egalitarian Jeffersonian grid, characteristic of the American midwest. ahhhhh Professor Krieger would be proud! (No else has slept more than 40 minutes.)
6:45 AM ITZ: After initial rejection from every respectable car rental company at Shannon International, we encounter Dan Dooley car rental who gives us the keys to our gorgeous chariot (since renamed Dooley McFiat). We stuff all of our luggage in (barely) and set out on the open, windy, narrow roads of the spectacular Irish countryside.
2:00 PM ITZ: After napping in McFiat for two hours we visit the Cliffs of Moher and then continue our cicuitous drive up the coast to Galway.
6:00 PM ITZ: Check into "Snoozle's'"hostle and get ready for our first night out on the town!


"Seriously?" Moment of the Day: Julia mistakes a tourgroup of senior citzens for an angry mob of striking workers and urgently screams for us to lock the doors -- of our moving vehicle...

Irish Mantras/ Wisdom of the Celts (thus far):
1. "Never admit liability!" -- rental woman at Dooley on the first rule in case of an accident.
2. "Look right, stay left."
3. "Be the tortise!!" -- backstreat drivers as Julia careens around hairpin turns in the first 10 mins of driving stickshift with the wrong hand, on the wrong side of the road. Slow and steady wins the race... or gets there in one piece.

Cheers!
Julia, Sarah, Kara, Heidi and Courtney (as told by Julia and Sarah)

Bus to Ireland

Currently, I'm on a bus to Ireland. Well, sort of. Finally on my way to Boston, to meet up with my now-graduated friends, to get on a plane to Ireland. I've graduated too, or so I've been told. Only difference is, I didn't get my diploma. Thank you, Student Receivables Office (and thank you, library fines).

Though a Euro-trip post graduation may seem cliché and easy, such has not been the case. Here's a recap:
June 4: Graduation. Fun times, but too many cases of swine flu. Recipe for disaster? Get 1600 college seniors to drink more than ever before then not sleep, ruin their immune systems, then get in as close proximity of each other as possible every night to share many hugs, kisses, and viruses.
June 5: Move out. Harder than any final, hands down.
June 6: Therapy sessions to help get over the fact that we have been kicked out of fantasyland: land of ready-yet-uneaten hot breakfasts and parties where all sketchiness has at least passed the screen of the harvard admissions process.
June 8: Courtney "loses" her passport and fears she will have to miss out on Ireland.
June 9: Courtney finds her passport but Heidi misses her bus to Boston due to poor maneuvering by her cab driver, which leaves a 2 feet dent in on the side of the pretty yellow cab.

Having overcome all these obstacles (and we pray there are no more), we are off to our first post-grad adventure! Hope you all enjoy the blog, EuroClass09*.

*Classy, not Trashy... and Classy, but also in the Class of 09... get it? get it? Oh, we are so clever. There probably was no need for me to provide this explanation.