Saturday, March 9, 2013

The night went pretty well in the hostel. I heard doors and other noises a couple of times but nothing too bad. I woke up early because it seemed to be getting light out. Later it seemed to be getting darker so I was expecting more rain but when I finally got outside, it was again bright and sunny.

I checked my mail when I woke up and found a message from Lola (written about 2 hours earlier at 11pm  Minnesota time) that said she was home again.She said the trip was mostly uneventful except that she got searched by security after she had gone through the checkpoint and had been waiting at the gate for a while. We are not sure what that was about. It felt funny to have seen her off at the airport in the morning, passed the whole day and slept the whole night and then have had a message from her sent two hours before I got up saying that she had just arrived home. Time travel!

I walked to my new neighborhood this morning and found a medium sized grocery store within a block of where I will be staying. That will be very handy. I spent most of the day outside walking around or sitting along the street people watching. It just feels so good not to be in the Midwest in March. One thing I would like to point out, however, is that I have not been lost since Lola left. When we were together, we got lost just about everyday. I think the reason is that I have been in a different part of the city and have stayed away from the main plaza with its radiating streets. I could not figure out which streets ran parallel or at right angles because, of course, they didn't.

So, to sum up, I did not accomplish much of anything today. I have been reading email, reading electronic books, listening to podcasts, listening to people speak Spanish/Catalan, and walking around. It will be nice to move into a more permanent place tomorrow and actually unpack my things and get into some sort of routine.