ESPANA!!!!!!
PART 1

Oh what a silly time we´ve been having. First up, I met Chris, Angus and Malin in Barcelona. We went out a lot and saw Ben Harper and explored etc. We saw Gaudi´s church (henceforth referred to as ´Shit F-ing Church´. Sure, it was incredibly impressive and amazing and all that but seriously, how long til it´s finished!?! and Gaudi´s Pedrera and other houses and things and stuff were, we thought, ´heaps betterer´.

After BCN we went to Valencia, met Mon, and then headed to a tiny town called Cuence (THANKYOU EZRAY FOR THE HEAD UP - IT WAS OUR HIGHLIGHT!!). Then back to Valencia for a few days.

So, here is a summary of our time in Spain, with helpful photos and commentary.




THE FOOD
· MEAT
You know those first moments in a relationship when you start to realise that something special is there, and you think the other person is just the most amazing thing on earth? This is a photo of that moment, when Angus met ... CURED HAM. For 9 heavenly days they shared a very special time, until yesterday when Angus went a bit nuts. He spent 12 euros on dried salty meats at the markets and, well, it was a bit full on, and he and HAM are now on a break.

· CHEESE
WE have all overdosed on cheese. oh, it is so good, but it has gotten ridiculous. It has been our major food group this week. Mon even had a post cheese binge fever last night. Oh TAKE IT AWAY FROM ME I NEVER WANT TO SEE ANOTHER PIECE OF CHEESE AGAIN.

· VEGETARIANISM
Doesn´t really exist here. No, wait, they can totally serve me a vegetarian meal! I just have to take out the pieces of chicken or tuna first! hehehehe i really thought asia would be hard but no, it was a piece of cake compared to Spain where even the biscuits look like they have ham in them.

·SUPERMARKETS
I love going to foreign sueprmarkets, and the spanish ones are right up there! Especially when you can buy 5 litres of red wine in what we would call an oil containter for 3 euro!


JOSE
This is Jose. he was our bartender on the night out after Ben Harper gig. He took his own photos of us then gave Alex his business card and is eagerly awaiting an email. He was cool, in a butchery kind of way.

PARADES, FIESTAS AND PARTIES IN GENERAL

Since we´ve been here there have been two parades, three fireworks nights, one wedding and two fiestas. They do like to party. Oh my god as i was writing this another lot of fireworks started going off!!! insanely loud.

Anyways, this is a pic from this random parade we stumbled across in Barcelona. It seemed to have no real purpose. There were real horses in the parade but we preferred these ones. We also managed to spend an hour and a half watching the Valencia Day parade last week. It was hilarious - local girls dressed up as Xena acted out the Christian overthrow of the Muslims here in 12 hundred and something, and everyone in the parade stopped every few mins for a cigarette or just to look very unimpressed. Angus has some quality quality photos, hopefull you can see them soon on http://beyondmydesk.blogspot.com

SIESTA

At 2pm every day everyone shuts up shop, runs away home and sleeps. This man had siesta on the train. I mean the one on the right. the one on the left is Angus´s mate Alex, who always closes his eyes in photos by accident.

This photo is from a particularly memorable metro trip on our way to ´The Hill´. The whole time we were in Barcelona we kept seeing this amazing looking hill in the distance with what looked like a big castle and a ferris wheel on the top. From the beginning we decided we would get to the top. We tried. We failed. We got off at the last stop and realised we were in suburbia and there was no hill. WE wandered wround using the crap map from the hostel, holding out hope that around the corner our holy grail would appear. After an hour or so of mucking around Alex casually asked if a guidebook would help. YES YES IT WOULD ACTUALLY WHY DID U NOT MENTION YOU HAD ONE TWO HOURS AGO!!?? hehe. So we saw some couples having their pre wedding photos taken and we saw some houses and a guy on a motorbike and a pigeon but we didnt make it anywhere near the hill. It haunts us still, and everywhere we would go we would see it, in the distance, taunting us.

One day.

OK the computer is having a breakdown, i think someone forgot to take their siesta today.....so i will blog parts two and three (´Cuenca, alien sex and Mon´s B´day Extravaganza´ and ´Home Sweet Jesus Home - musical hostels and hens nights in Valencia´) in the coming days.

Adios amigos