Barcelona, Flamenco, and More...

So, Amanda and I did quite a bit of walking over all of Barcelona, so we kept things pretty low key the next day. We started with a late lunch then rambled down La Rambla. This is a major pedestrian thoroughfare.

There's an amazing market right off the street. So we wandered around. Then we continued our walk. My goal was to get to the big mass of water. It's not an ocean. Even though it's connected to the ocean. It's a sea. I don't really understand that. Because it's connected to the ocean. But I guess rivers are sometimes connected to oceans, and they are still rivers. This is just confusing for a poor little girl from a landlocked state like me.

Of course, the other major thing to see that day was the Columbus statue. Since we're in Spain, it's not vandalized the way it could be in the USA. I love that Americans are bold enough to vandalize Columbus statues, even though I don't support vandalism. The main thing is that people are aware that Columbus did not truly discover America, and that when he arrived, the original inhabitants of this land just suffered.

Down on the boardwalk, there were some pretty legit public art pieces.

After this, we went to a restaurant called "Cheese Me." Everything had some form of cheese in it. It had a really delicious fixed menu, and there was much enjoyment. As you can tell, food was super important for me in Spain. This was probably due to the fact that I was traveling with Amanda. I hardly spend that much time or attention on food when I'm traveling alone.

The next night, we went to a Flamenco show (with tapas and sangria). Flamenco is not native to Barcelona. Rather, it is native to southern Spain. It was a pretty interesting show. It kept Amanda and I wildly entertained, even if we were just mocking certain aspects of the performance.

The coolest thing about the flamenco show (for me) was that it was located in the Spanish Village, a whole area full of buildings that replicate different styles through all of Spain. The complex is divided into regions. So, while we saw flamenco in Barcelona, technically, we saw it in the southern Spain section of the Spanish Village.

The Spanish Village was built for... dun dun dun... A WORLD'S FAIR!!! Spain really rocked that way.

Anyway, the next day, Amanda and I braved the Air France strike and managed to make it back to Warsaw. Where it was much chillier than it was in Spain. However, it was much warmer in Warsaw than it had been.

I'm glad I chose Barcelona. While I'm sure there were awesome things to do in Lisbon, Barcelona was shockingly different than any other city I've been to in Europe. Not that they're all the same, but many of them have similar features. Thanks to Gaudi architecture, Barcelona was nothing like, oh let's say... Brussels or Budapest.