It's Been A While...

So! It's been a while since i've updated, and there's been a lot going on. The Expressa't exhibition opened with my installation in it, and an image of it was used on one of the promotional postcards, so that was really exciting. I presented my minimalism project, which went over very, very well - some people really loved it and some people were really offended. I don't have any images of it yet, but i am cleaning it up and adding to it to hang in the exhibition. I've been working on a bunch of sewing projects, i've finished a very fancy dress and a bag using materials i salvaged from a dumpster, finally got the hems done on the first pair of pants that i made, and am planning on working on a couple more things before i lose access to the sewing machine. My classes are over now, and i have my "exit interview" tomorrow, then we set up for the exhibition which opens on Friday.

Ethan got here about ten days ago, and i am so, so glad he is finally here! We have been hanging out at home a lot but also have been to two art exhibits and the beach, and have walked around the city a bunch. We have been through the Gracia neighborhood, where much of Gaudi's work is, and to Santa Maria del Mar, a gothic cathedral that is, in my opinion, one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. We also saw a great collective street art project. Pax and Hawina and their son Willow (who's almost 7) got to Barcelona last Tuesday, followed closely by Sky and Kassia, ex-members of Twin Oaks and good friends. So, this group that we are calling "Framily" (friend-family, as opposed to biological family) is almost complete - Angie gets here on Wednesday!! We are all orbiting around Willow to some extent, though i am pulled away by school. Last night we all piled into the big bed in the room that Pax and Hawina are staying in and watched "Stardust", this great kids' movie with Robert de Niro and Michelle Pfeiffer. Loved it, and loved the feeling of all being together, much better than being on my own all the time.

However, Pax, Willow, and i all have colds. Sick again! Hopefully it is something in the air in Barcelona and it will get better once i leave... one good thing to look forward to about leaving.

Ethan and i are hoping to go to the Dali museum in Figueres, but it is a good train ride away, almost to France, so maybe we will do that this coming weekend, or sometime in the week between the exhibition and when we leave for Amsterdam, on the 21st. My time in Barcelona is winding down quickly!

Mara, a classmate of mine, took this picture of the opening of Expressa't.



Here's Ethan looking at some boats. We thought they were - or at least one of them was - battleships.



When we went to the beach, we sat by the sea for quite some time, and Ethan made this nice sand sculpture:



This is my favorite painting from the street art thing we saw, though there was lots of really amazing work out there:



Sunday we all went to Can Mas Deu, the community nearby that i've been to many times. This is where Sky and Kassia are staying:

A Spanish Sunday

Left to my own devices, with no work schedule or meetings on the weekends, it amazes me how fast i'll switch to a nocturnal rhythm. Friday night i was up until 4 AM, Saturday until 5 AM. This isn't helped by the fact that the people i really miss and want to talk online with are around, because it's a reasonable hour for them. Anyway, despite my late night last night, i was able to get up by 1 PM and out of the house to do something by 3ish.

The first Sunday of every month, the Picasso museum is free, so i went there. I loved it last time i was in Barcelona, but this round, i was rather disappointed. As a general rule, i think Picasso is overrated, but i love the Blue Period stuff, and he was quite a skilled portraitist, before he got into Cubism. And of course, it's flooring that he produced so much exhibition worthy work before he was 15. I love Cézanne's version of Cubism, but Picasso's is so flat, it's like looking at a math problem. Which, of course, works for some people. Anyway, i think they rotate their permanent collection, because i didn't see any of the portraits that bowled me over before, and their representation of the Blue Period was quite small. That's not how i remembered it, i wonder if they have stuff out on loan as well. Anyway, i'm glad i went, and i'm glad i went on a free admission day!

The museum is in one of the oldest parts of the city, in the area of the Barri Gótic and El Born. It's extremely intriguing there. The streets are impossibly narrow and the buildings are tall, so it gives a real sense of being in a maze. I even passed some frustrated American exclaiming, "How do we get out of this rat trap?!" I spent a couple of hours wandering pleasantly around, enjoying first an espresso, then a peach twice the size of my fist, and then vegan gelato. I sat on a corner on Via Laietana, between El Born and La Rambla, enjoying my ice "cream" and watching people and pigeons. Then i hopped on the metro and went to the beach :)

It just hit me today that i can go to the ocean whenever i want to, and how good for me that is. I spent most of Saturday sleeping or online, and when i did go out late in the afternoon, i felt tired and lost. I was missing Ethan and Angie in particular and woke up in a funk today also. The caffeine, the sugar, and the wandering helped a lot, but as soon as i put my toes in the ocean and felt the pull and release of the tides, i really felt myself relax. It's still warm enough to swim, and will be for a while, so i intend on making the most of it while i can. I went to a different beach today, not far from the one i visited before, just on the other side of the port, Port Vell. It wasn't far, but it was a lot different! The sand was coarser and had more rocks, and the water was cloudier. After i swam, i sat there, listening to the seas around me - one (obviously) of water, the other of myriad languages and voices. Sometimes it amazes me that i made it here. It seems almost like a dream that i sat for hours and hours in JFK and flew to Iceland and was in Paris - yet here i am. I'm quite proud of myself!

I'm not doing a very good job of keeping a consistent practice. My yoga practice flares up every now and then, i'm eating kind of erratically, sleeping odd hours. I know good and well that it's important for me to have a consistent schedule, and that it's probably the most important thing for me to take time every day to get into my body, whatever form that may take - yoga, dance, poi, and to meditate regularly and eat mindfully, and i'm just not doing it, and it's showing in my volatile moods. I know my art will be better, too, if i can keep a consistent practice. Hopefully it will be easier with only a 15 minute commute to school.

Which i'll be making again tomorrow! They're introducing the first theme - The Tower of Babel - though i've already decided what theme i'm working with, which is fine they said for "more mature" artists. Tuesday i have my welcome interview, when i'll get assigned my personal tutor.

Someday i'll write about the art exhibits i saw at the Museum of Contemporary Art. Also, interior apartment pictures coming soon, as soon as i clean my room. Er...

The Mediterranean, Simón, and El Corte Ingles

Today I was supposed to meet up with other students from Metafora, but I was late. This will come as a great shock to those of you who have ever had a class with me, scheduled work, or anything to which I was supposed to be on time. Anyway, we were going to go to the beach, but I underestimated how long it would take to get there on the metro.

I can't explain how much I love the ocean. When I was a little girl, I believed that I was a mermaid, and I once told my mother on a vacation at the beach that I was going to go home to my real family. The last time I saw the ocean was well over a year ago, in Hawaii. Before that, it was in Barcelona in March 2006, when the sea blue and beautiful and FAR too cold to even think about getting in. Today, the beach at Barceloneta, near the Ciudad Olímpica, was packed. I stashed my stuff where I could keep an eye on it while swimming, strategically placing it near some other folks so it looked like it was with their stuff, and gratefully got into the water. It was hot today, and by that time I already knew I was getting sunburned. The water was clear and cool, the bottom was clear of shells and other things that cut one's feet, and there weren't very many critters, just some small minnows. It was incredibly lovely. There's a beach that's closer to my house than school – tough decision.

I wasn't swimming long before I spotted a Spanish guy on a pink raft giving me the eye. Oh great, I thought, and cracked up in spite of myself. He took that as an invitation and paddled over to me, introducing himself as Simón. He was very friendly, and flirted with me in a not obnoxious way, so I talked to him for a while. He didn't speak much English, so the conversation was pretty simple. He tried very hard to persuade me to go dancing with him tonight, but I politely declined, several times, until he got the picture. When he finally realized I wasn't single, he said, “But do you have a boyfriend in Barcelona?” “No,” I replied. “Well that's me!” Yes, exactly what I was looking for my third day in Barcelona. (Is it my third day? I'm having a hard time keeping track of what day of the week it is.)

Yesterday after I went to the library, I stopped at a Vodafone store to see about getting more minutes on my phone – this has been an epic struggle. I have a prepaid British phone that my dad gave me, that came with a card that was supposed to be used to add more minutes, but apparently it doesn't work for adding minutes unless you're IN England, and it took forever to establish that. Anyway, in the store, I went round and round with this friendly woman who didn't speak a word of English to establish that she couldn't do anything with a prepaid phone like I had and I had to go to El Corte Ingles to get what I needed, which was to switch it to the Spanish Vodafone network and get more time put on the card.

El Corte Ingles is a huge high-end Spanish department store, it's a chain and they have them all over the country. The thought of it kind of leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth; I had a a bad experience there when I was in Sevilla last time I travelled in Spain, over spring break during my semester abroad. Somehow, I wandered off the map after getting groceries, and got horribly lost in the dark in this city with winding streets. I'm the type to navigate by landmarks, and I kept seeing this huge green sign for El Corte Ingles. Then I would walk a little bit, and see it again, so I would turn around and then see it again after a minute – it was like being in the twilight zone, and I couldn't find my way. I was exhausted, and starting to feel panicky. Finally, somehow I escaped, and the next day I realized there were like FIVE separate buildings with that same sign, which I couldn't tell in the dark.

I knew there was a branch in Plaça Catalunya, a major square in Barcelona, which is at the beginning of La Rambla, the big touristy pedestrian walkway with flower sellers and El Mercat de la Boquéria, the famous Barcelona market. Some of the fruit vendors there have more items I can't identify than ones I recognize.

So the store there is absolutely enormous. I was a little unsure if they would really have what I needed, and my doubt increased as I went up the escalators. I kept going up and nothing on any of the floors I came to had anything to do with cell phones. Finally, on the 7th (and not the top!) floor, I found the cell phones. It was so crowded you had to take a number and wait for them to call you. The first counter I waited at was the wrong thing, so I went to the right one, took a number and waited. And waited. And waited. Finally about half an hour, they called my number, and I told them what I needed. Immediately I asked if they spoke English, because I'd been in the store an hour already, and rather than educate myself I wanted to expedite the process. The woman helping me did speak English, of course, and got me a new SIM card. I was so relieved! I grabbed a charger for the phone, since I had a charger with a British plug, and a car charger, neither of which were doing me any good. I paid, and decided to put the new SIM card in right then and there. And what else but... SIM Card Not Valid. So I got another number, back in line. Instead of sitting around, I went down a couple of floors, found an adapter for my computer plug, and came back. Still 8 people in front of me, so I went down all nine floors to the basement and got a snack (a peach – lots of lush, locally grown peaches in the stores around here), and came back. I'd missed my turn, of course, so I took another number, and thank goodness, only had to wait a little bit to discover that before I could use the new card, my phone needed to be “liberated,” which she couldn't do, but I could have it done “at the Pakistani places, you know what I mean?” Luckily I did, there's one near my house. They're these places that have international phones, internet, phone cards, etc; but after catching the train back to Sant Boi, I found out that for whatever reason, they can't do it until Monday.

I'm in cell phone purgatory.

Next entry: The Puking Guy and Gladys Kravitz (both featured across the street) and soon, pictures!