Thoughts on Spain

Thoughts on Spain

First off, Barcelona was an awesome time. It was an extremely awesome experience, lots of stuff to do, lots of partying and lots of sights to see.

The architecture in Barcelona is amazing. There's so much to see and so many different styles. Most of the buildings are your run of the mill concrete industrial mini skyscrapers. I think most buildings in Barcelona weren't taller than 10 stories. But there were some really unique and funky designs, look at my pictures (that will come up when I'm in South Africa). I was really impressed by how these funky buildings blended nature with asymmetry to produce a fusion of elegance. The stuff design by Gaudi was eye popping. His cathedral, the Sagrada Familia is unfinished but still a masterpiece in every sense. The details in it are so intricate, EVERY aspect of it is meant to resemble or mimic nature, nothing I've seen comes close to how much drugs this guy must have tripped to design the thing.

The Spaniards themselves, however, are mainly dicks. It seemed like they didn't like Americans at all from the onset; or anyone else from another country for that matter. I mean sure America's international reputation has been damaged by the Bush years, but that's no excuse for being impolite to random strangers. On the whole I feel the Spanish just weren't warm people.

Spanish food - meh. I'm not a fan of tapas really, and really don't miss it. It was kind of funny to me that the busiest places at night were McDonald's and Burger King. There were really long lines there.

Partying in Barcelona was awesome. We stayed in the hostel on La Rambla street, which is Barcelona's main touristy/ happening street. So many people walking up and down there, maybe even more than the magic mile in Chi town. As I said in a previous post, we went to a bar called Espit Choupitos (or something like that), choupitos is shot in spanish, and they were purported to have 1000 types of shots in the bar. Check out my pictures (coming later!), we did a baller flaming shot called the Harry Potter, vodka, sugar, orange, carmelized by flame. We did another shot with flaming marshmallows but I don't remember the name. The ice bar by the beach was a novel experience, it was a try-it-once thing. The ENTIRE bar was inside a big cooler, and everything (bar counter, stools, table, drink glasses) was all ice. Kind of small and expensive but awesome pictures from it. The beach 40 feet away probably made the night. Sweet sweet warm Mediterranean sea is so relaxing.

I'm just rambling now, we're off of SW Africa and in a storm of some sort, the water is so rocky and there's nothing to do on the ship. It gets real boring here real quickly. I saw three college guys doing a crossword puzzle with an old man, it was really odd for me but I guess that's what no alcohol and nothing else to do does to people.

Conclusion: Spain is cool to party in, but I wouldn't live there.

- Minh 'bobbingoffthecoastofafricalikeanangryhippo' Vo

9-26-09

Short update:

Off of the coast of Africa, left Ghana yesterday. Shaved head today for Neptune Day (crossing the equator), had lifeboat drill. I think I left off in the middle of Morocco during my last real update? Maybe later

The beginning, a little bit late

This is from an email I sent to some friends, it chronicles Canada to Spain to the beginnings of Morocco. It kind of is crap and really late, but I'm going to start here. Will write more when we leave Ghana later today!
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Anyways, we started off in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Shared a Days Inn in the apparently dangerous part of town, the cab driver told us that the gas station had been knocked up about 8 times in the last four years. Shared a room with another guy and two girls. We went and had a bunch of sea food there, went to a Canadian Wal-mart, which is the same as an American one, and they even accepted US Dollars! We went to a Canadian club at night, it was the first time I was ever frisked at the entrance. The bar had like 4 different areas and about 6 seperate bars (where you could order drinks). Was pretty sweet, met a bunch of other SASers there. There was also two stripper poles you can guess what went down.

First few days on the ship sucked since I had mild seasickness, but I got used to it and I hardly notice the rocking now. Classes are a breeze here, we actually don't have many days of class since we spend so much time in port, last week and this week we actually have 12ish days off from class. Also everythings 2-4 minutes away from my cabin so it's all easy to get to. Speaking of my cabin, it's tiny tiny tiny and I have two roommates, and I sleep on the top bunk, but it's alright since I'm not there most of the time.

So last week we docked in Cadiz, Spain. Flew to Barcelona right away. Stayed in the Kabul Hostel on La Rambla street, which is like their main shop/touristyish area. The hostel was actually alright and kinda clean, nothing worse than a dorm room. Went to a place called Espit Choupitos (sp?), choupitos means 'shot' in Spanish, and they had over 200 or 1000 shots. The famous one is a Harry Potter, which is vodka or rum, then on orange and sugar ontop. They light the orange/ shot on fire to carmelize it. Delicious! Second night I was in Barcelona we went back to Choupitos to pre game, then went to an ice bar. The ice bar was basically all ice on the inside, chairs, bar counter, table, and my drink was in a glass of pure ice. Pretty sweet place, but a novelty. The ice bar is literally on the beach so we chilled there for a while, went back to our hostel and went to a dance club that's literally right next to the Kabul. Danced-ish til 5am, lotta creepy douches there though. 2nd night was Sunday and all the good clubs were closed sadly. Btw, Spanish food kinda sucks, its nothing special. And tapas are retarded, they're a "way of eating" not an actual dish.

I'm now currently in Morocco, and gotta run out to dinner at a Chinese place and a hookah bar. Will write more later.

Hurray

I just spent enough time to figure out I can email my blog posts
directly instead of having to use internet minutes... HURRAY!

--
Minh Vo
BBA Economics, MIS
University of Iowa 2010
www.minhdvo.com
(712) 574 4060

"Relax, it will all be alright."