the last few days/ La Merce part uno

so, the last few days have been fantastic. first of all, i fixed my class schedule. i switched out of my internation events class into travel writing and unfortunately had to swtich out of my communications class but it was into contemporary spanish film, which also sounds interesting so it works out. also, i was able to have my computer fixed (por libre!) so that is good.

thursday night, a few of us went out with a couple of local spanish guys. my one friend, christina, met the one guy, artur, on the plane on the way he and he offered to show her around Barcelona. So christina, piyal, margaret and I went out with artur and his friend sergi, who were absolutely hilarious. first we went to dinner, and we had them order because they knew what everything was and we were all like "we will try everything and anything, but you guys know your stuff so pick it out and we'll eat it". needless to say we had a delicious feast. literally, the whole table was covered in food. we had everything from salchicas con beans from barcelona to squid, to peppers to foi grois to these little fish that still had their heads. and yes, i tried it all and i liked it all except for the little fish. they were too fishy for me plus i was a little freaked out that i could see their eyes...

after dinner, they took us to a few local places where we tried spanish drinks. of course, i cannot remember the names of them, but at least i remember what they were. the first place was pretty good and there we had a drink that was rum, sugar, lime and crushed ice. it was delicious. after that the guys wanted to take us to dry "panther's milk". at first we were a little leery of this because i mean, panther's milk doesnt sound too enticing at first. well, let me tell you, this stuff was AMAZING. we went to this little dive bar and there were only a few other customers so that made it a lot more fun since we essentially had the place to ourselves. this drink comes in what looks like old wine bottles and is served in a large shot glass, but you just sip it. it is milk, gin, sugar and i believe cinnamon. like i said, delicious and fun because the bartender liked us. we went to another place after the panther's milk but i didnt particularly care for it, it was a shot bar (gross) and was crowded and hot. im excited though because we are getting together with these guys again this weekend (tonight actually) for the big festival and they will show us the places to go.

so this festival. it is called La Merce and it is the biggest festival in catalunya and it is in honor of the virgin of mercy. basically starting last night until wednesday, there are crazy things happening everywhere. in every plaza there is a stage set up with free concerts happening everywhere all night. then during the day, there are different festivities going on. for example, the dancing of the giants, which is a traditional thing here from way back when when people thought that giants lived in the mountains. i am very excited to see the dance of the giants. then there are fire-dancers and fire-runs that are happening tonight inbetween 5-8:30. after that there is more partying and concerts, so there is always something interesting to do and see.

tomorrow they will have the castells, which are human towers. these guys are in teams and they practice this because it can be very dangerous and there are certain techniques. i believe the record for the highest castell was 10 stories high. the festivities go on until wednesday, but i believe that after this weekend, most of what is going on is the concerts. either way it has been a blast so far and im sure will continue to be fun. i will try to put pictures up as soon as i can.