Reflections

Thank you for all of the kind comments about the blog. It sounds like it is a good way to preserve memories, so here is my proposal. I want to invite all of the students to write in. I will post the responses and it will serve as a way to finish off the blog. If all you want to do is a brief comment, then it is easier to just comment directly through this blog page, but if you include pix, then email me, HJarcho@hamiltoncentral.org or email me a Word doc. That way you can include favorite pictures as attachments that you want to share. We need some pictures from the plane flight home for sure, but I invite you to add any pictures you want to publish.

I'll keep checking for the next week and adding as we go. Once we are done, we can figure out a way to preserve a copy in case the blog becomes inactive.

Mr. J

Last Post??

We are on the bus home!! The flight was smooth and we made friends with a high school Spanish club from Connecticut that was returning from Barcelona with us and also took the same Madrid to NYC flight. Spirits are high and the energy is too, especially considering that it is 2:30am our bodies' time. Iberia Airlines was very congenial, but airline food still s**ks. We ate like kings all week, but I can't wait to sink my teeth into a cheeseburger. Hope you all enjoyed, we did.

Dear Mom - Send Money, we aren't coming home.

This just in, we took a vote and decided we're having too great a time. We're not coming back. Hamilton is nice, and we love you, but gelato is forever.

Thrusday - Another Day, Another great one.

Hola!!

Today was a really full day. Not everything went according to plan, but it all worked out beautifully.

We started the day by taking a bus to the monastery Montserrat. The monastery is at the top of a mountain which is unlike any other we have seen in Spain. It has very curious and interesting features. As tall as the mountain is, some of the students found ocean fossils at the top - score one for Earth Science.

Our tour guide was from Poland and talked nonstop for the hour it took us to get there. We learned a lot about the history of Barcelona and the monastery. Spain is a really interesting country in that it is not really one country at all except for purposes of taxation. Barcelona is part of the Catalan region and the residents have their own distinct language, culture and basically have never forgiven King Ferdinand for marrying Isabella of Aragon, which led to the domination of the Castillian culture in the newly unified Spain. The Catalans and the Basques are, more than 500 years later, still pressing for independence.

We all toured the church, then we broke up into groups. Some took a walk looking for great views, some started at the museum which, in addition to a collection of Catholic iconography and Catalan art, has a very nice general collection, including several works by Joan Miro, one very interesting Salvador Dali, and more than a dozen sketchs and lithographs by Picasso. Most of us also took the funicular (cable car) to the top of mountain. The view was spectacular and I have included a brief video.

From Montserrat we travelled to the Gaudi park, which contains some very fanciful works in mosaic by Gaudi. I have included two pictures of buildings as well as some of our students kung fu fighting.

Next on the agenda was a bus drive to the chocolate museum. It was actually pretty tacky in my opinion, but we didn't really care, because we really just wanted to buy really fine chocolate as souvenirs to bring back home.

After returning to the hotel to freshen, we took off on foot for dinner and the Magic Fountain. Apparently two email confirmations is not sufficient because when we arrived at the restaurant, not only did they deny any knowledge of our reservation, the cook had already gone home for the day. Time to improvise.

Today happens to be a major Catalan holiday, St. George's Day, as in the one who slew the dragon. The streets and the Metro were the most crowded we have ever seen and the prospects of finding a restaurant that could accomodate 41 seemed quite slim. We took the Metro to the Magic Fountain (packed like sardines) and spirits lifted considerably because the fountains were a ton of fun. Still not place to eat.

After some fast footwork by Frank and our hotel concierge, we secured reservations for 10pm (still the Early Bird Special by Barcelona standards) to a restaurant, "Danzarama" about 10 minutes from the hotel. It is a pretty modern, hip restaurant and dance club. Unfortunately, the dance club didn't open until 12:30am, so no dancing.

Dinner was great - a tapas experience. A tomato/onion/carrot/tuna starter, followed by a salad, followed by a tuna on toast dish, followed by a variety of croquettes (potato, fish, basil, cheese), and then the entree, either cuttlefish or lamb. Dessert was a cream/custard cake for students, and a somewhat more interesting cake with a fruit glaze and dark chocolate for the chaperones. For those of you who have been following the blog, I had a much lengthier description of the meal a half hour ago, but the internet crashed and I lost the entry and I am too tired to give you the full story again.

That's all for now. It is past 1am and I am ready for bed. I am going to publish the text and then try to add the pictures. We are scheduled to leave for the airport at 10am and will be back home in Hamilton sometime between 2 and 3am on Saturday (really Sunday).

More Adventures in Eating

Food has emerged as the dominant cultural phenomenon of this trip and I am happy to report that we are ambassadors with a seemingly unquenchable capacity to consume.

First of all, the internet connection is very, very slow tonight, so I will be saving this with text only and adding pictures after the fact. If you read it without pictures, come back later and it may be updated with pictures. I will also provide pictures of the other minigroups' day, but it is almost midnight and we have sent the students to bed, so I have no one else's pictures or stories to tell yet.

We walked to dinner, about a 15 minute walk ending in a dark, dank alley. Behind graffiti cover walls we entered a restaurant in lurid red, looking like a cave or the bowels of hell. We entered through the bar which had numerous couples ensconced on cushy sofas. We were escorted to the restaurant side of the establishment and, sadly, told that all of the tables, but none of the sofas, were reserved for us. Let the dining begin.

Our meal began with a Caesar salad with chicken. That was followed by a series of tapas - a chicken kabob served with a spicy sweet and sour sauce, a bread with garlic/olive spread, and goose liver pate topped with figs. OHMYGAWD!!

Our choices for entree were a tuna dish, a risotto, or curry chicken. I didn't try the tuna, but the risotto and the curry were amazing. Students were laughing and having a great time, as were the chaperones. Dessert was strawberry soup served with lemon sorbet.

We then walked back home after convincing our tour guide that we would rather walk off dinner than ride the Metro again. It will come as an enormous surprise, I am sure, to learn that about a dozen of our fine culinary ambassadors decided that they needed to have gelato before we ended for the night. Eventually I will have pictures of dinner and the gelato. We have now found the best gelato by everyone's agreement. The servers are the best looking (enhances the experience, apparently) and they shape the serving into roses. John A. decided to celebrate his second or 3rd gelato of the day by ordering the 8 scoop serving. Eight scoops, you say? Why eight? Apparently because they didn't offer anything larger.

That's all for now, I'll post this and then try to add pix.

Thursday 1st Report

Ola!!

After a very full Wednesday, we decided to chill a bit today. Each chaperone took a group giving kids a few options. Some groups went shopping and some did some sightseeing. I will report on my group's day and get back with reports and pictures from the other groups once we are all together again.

I took a group of ten who wanted to see some art. First we took the Metro to Joan Miro Park, to see one of Miro's most famous works, Woman and Bird. The sculpture is in a park which had a great climbing structure and the students got a kick out of getting some climbing exercise. We then took the Metro to the Contemporary Museum of Art. It was very interesting, extremely avant garde. It didn't have modern masters, as I hoped, but very contemporary works, a lot of video installations, a lot of photography, and paintings. I think that everyone found it interesting, many parts were definitely witty and thought provoking, many other parts flew past my understanding.

For lunch we broke again into three groups, Ms. West took a group that didn't want to go to the beach (it is overcast and only in the 60s). Ms. B and Mr. Rossi took a group that signed up for a formal French lunch, to make up for our lost Paris trip. Ms. King and I took a group that wanted simpler lunch, to visit the amazing open-air market on La Rambla, and then on to the beach. We had lunch at a place called Que Pasta, a fast food joint with fresh pasta that you choose a topping for. Pesto, 4-cheese, and tomato were popular, I think Ms. King hit the jackpot with a carbonara sauce - a white cream sauce with bacon. There were 17 of us and everyone loved their own choice.

We then walked to the market. It is amazing. Impossibly fresh fruit, meats, cheeses, breads, and fresh seafood so fresh that the shrimp, prawn, squiddy things and more were still alive on the ice - I am not making this up. Some had (of course) gelato. I got a half of a pineapple because I am such a health nut.

We then boarded a bus for the beach. Some of the boys bought a soccer ball and they got their blood pumping by playing beach soccer for about 30 minutes and then jumped into the Mediterranean for an icy dip. They all declared it heart-stopping cold. I will take their word for it, I played lifeguard from the shore.

We have a formal meal tonight. I will try to post again after dinner, reporting on the meal and on the day for the other groups. Adios!!

Best Day Yet!!

What a day!! We started the day with the choice to take a walking tour or a bicycle tour of Barcelona. Fifteen students and three chaperones took the bicycle tour, led by our fearless and hysterical tour guide, Buddha. He is from Sydney, Australia, living in Barcelona trying to make it as a chef, and running tours, I guess, to pay the rent until the chef thing happens.

On top is a group shot of the walkers, as well as the statue of Christopher Columbus. I can only take their word for it, but the walkers had a great time. They toured the gothic cathedral of Barcelona as well as many other sights.

The bicycle tour was fantastic. It was great to get some cycling exercise, and it was a ton of fun cycling on city streets. Everyone follows the rules of the road, and there are separate lanes for motor and nonmotor vehicles. Above is a group shot of the bikers in front of the Arc de Triomphe. After riding to a park we rode to the beach for lunch. A few brave souls actually went for a dip - most of us were content to order lunch and lay back in lounge chairs.

After a brief return to the hotel to freshen, we took the Metro to Gaudi's Familia Segrada, a church which was begun in the 1860s and is still only about half complete. It is impossible to describe the enormity of this church and Gaudi's ambition, which was to tell the entire story of Christianity from the birth, to the Passion, to the Resurrection of Christ in one building. The detail and design are mind-boggling and almost every student bought something, so you can either Google it to see right away, or you can wait until we get home.

Back to the hotel to change from sightseeing clothes to dinner and a show togs. The girls all looked spectacular and the boys went from scruffy to nearly presentable. Dinner was at a flamenco dance theater. Dinner itself was a seafood paella and almost everyone was great about trying this authentic Spanish dish, which contained shrimp, mussels, and prawns. Dessert was a flan in a strawberry sauce and it was great. Then the flamenco dancing began.

The show consisted of two singers, two flamenco guitarists, one violinist, one percussionist, plus the dancers, two men and four women. We didn't really know what to expect, but it was fantastic. We saw a variety of flamenco styles and all of the students danced their way home. Needless to say, we stopped for gelato and some of us rambled on La Rambla until we dragged ourselves back to the hotel and began planning for the next two days.

Getting funky now, I'm trying to upload two indie videos taken by our own Ms. West. In one, our students show off their language skills - your tax dollars at work; in the other, Ms. West throws caution to the wind and videos the bikers while riding.