The night of the day we went on a walking tour of the main thoroughfare called Las Ramblas, which has all kinds of stores, shops, and vendors (including pet shops with everything from live chickens, birds, turtles, fish etc.) Later that night we saw real camels in the Three Kings Day parade which is part of their biggest holiday, "Bigger than Christmas". The second day while exploring I decided to take a "private/ self-guided tour" of a medieval castle. AKA, I got lost, this really made me have to learn the city armed only with my mini map and a broken compass i trucked through a roman castle, numerous little markets, and down countless ally ways, or i found out later that they may be ally ways to us but to the Europeans they are main thoroughfares which cars and everything travel down. All the while trying to find "Parc de la Ciutadella" which is Barcelona's version of central park; because i over heard thats where the group was going to go explore for that day. After arriving to the park i quickly realized that this was no ordinary park. No this was something you'd see in some TV movie made in the 60's and 70's, there was a HUGE AMAZING waterfall in the center of the park, a pond with row boats, and more hippies than 6 seasons of the Brady Bunch. Oh but no group and after being in the park for about three hours i decided to go back to Catalonia Square where i eventually met up with my friends. But honestly i enjoyed the experience and loved being on my own schedule exploring this amazing city. On my way home i went to the grocery store to pick up groceries to make the first communal dinner (which by the way was a feat in itself) so being that im pritty much spanish retarded i decided to buy all the groceries all on how they looked i mean different can things be? well after about 45 minutes i went back with enough groceries to cook that meal and basic food for the rest of the week. So for menu 1. some sort of marinated pork, carrots, fresh rolls, and a garlic lemon butter pasta. well after opening the meat i learned quick that my trick of buying things on how they look quickly failed. oh i had pork alright, pigs feet anyone?? so needless to say we ended up having hotdogs instead of the main course. Wow Spain's a little different than i realized. hmmmmm

The next day was just some more basic exploring but mainly recovering from jet lag, That afternoon on our way to learn more about safety in the city from Christi, we learned that she herself had fallen victim to an elaborate ATM scamming plot about 12 minutes prior, where the thieves had managed to steal everything from her account but $1 in 45 min. That night was also the first night of the Absynth...where we were all "touched on the hand by an angel" or so it said on the bottle. everyone may not have been touched by an angel per say but we played charades and some of the funniest lines came out from people. Ask me sometime!