It's no secret that I have not been having the best time here. In fact, I would very much like to go home. But that seems to be impossible for several reasons. But I guess I need to continue to post updates here because I haven't been putting them anywhere else.
On September 23, I got back from a three day long trip though Spain and Southern France. I went to Empuries, Salses, Carcassonne, and Sant Miquel del Cuixart. All of the locations were beautiful and historic. Check out my Where in the World tab or my Sketches page for more pictures and little blurbs on each of the locations.
I will say though that as much as Carcassonne was beautiful and reminded me of the town in Beauty and the Beast, I did not like the French people at all. We stopped for lunch in a small town in France on the way to Sant Miquel and had the worst experience ever at a restaurant. Are all French this rude? My class had an hour for lunch. We went to a small cafe and were seated. After about 15 minutes, She took our order (4 sandwiches and 3 small order of fries). After waiting through her serving several other tables that arrived after us, we had only 15 minutes to get back to the bus. We approached her and told he we had to leave to catch a bus. She told us the food would be out in 5-10 minutes. We waited more and received a call from one of our adult leaders 5 minutes after we were supposed to be on the bus. She told us to leave because they were serving the others before us because we are Americans. As we got up to leave, suddenly our food was ready. We were told to wait for the rest of it and had to rush to get to the bus.
Is this a normal thing in Europe? To be rude to anyone that doesn't speak your language? I hope you rude people don't ever come into the US and expect people to be polite to you when you try to communicate with us. America is a melting pot. Apparently it is also the only place where people are expected to be polite to guests and give good service. It's a good thing that tips are not required in Europe because that waitress definitely didn't deserve one.
Aside from the French problems, Spain is in turmoil. I don't know if you've been keeping track of the political situation abroad, but Catalunya is fighting for independence from Spain and for those of you playing along at home, that is where I'm staying. Catalunya is a the equivalent of a state, Barcelona is like a county, and Sant Cugat like a town. So Catalunya is currently in the midst of a referendum, and if they some how become their own country, y'all may be seeing me a hell of a lot sooner than you expect because my Visa is through the country of Spain, and I may soon be living in the country of Catalunya. I may be able to add "being deported" to the list of things that have happened to me. Adventures Adventures.
My Spain wish list keeps growing. This week, I have discovered that I would like to add spicy spices, laundry color catches, and socks to my every growing list. Believe it or not, I still have not found any stores that sell socks here. That doesn't make sense, but here I am wondering where Spaniards buy socks. M&Ms are still at the top of course, but I did find one little bag at a rest stop on the edge of Spain. Yes, I paid 2.50 euros for a tiny bag of plain M&Ms. Not ashamed.
On the bright side, I just ate a yogurt and it was literally the best yogurt I've ever had. It is definitely something that I will have to keep buying. It doesn't have the weird aftertaste that a lot of yogurts has. Be on the look out for it in the US and if you see it, try it and let me know!
In other news, Sketch, Eat, and Where in the World have all been updated with my latest drawings, eatings, and adventures, so check those out!
