This morning I woke up and was actually productive---I wrote my 4 page Latin America paper! Look at me go. Blah I really don't want to do any more work, and it's crunch time so I guess I'm just going to have to get over it.
Christen's mom and brother came into town today, and Christen made some soup, Tina made a salad, and I unwrapped some cheese for a lunch. It was yummy and nice to meet Christen's family. Her mom brought us all these American girly magazines and treats like chocolate covered pretzels and jelly beans. Soooo nice of her. :-)
I spent the rest of the afternoon reading the aforementioned magazines and getting ready for my evening plan---a FC Barcelona game! My family friends offered to bring me along with them, and as my dad's friend used to be on the board for Barca, it was a real honor to go with them.
They picked me up at around 8, and we made our way over to the stadium. We parked in this special parking area, and we went to the VIP Platinum door. Unreal. We walked up to our seats, and then walked a little closer to see the whole stadium. It is HUGE--it seats 100,000 people. We were on the first tier, right in the middle of the field. The seats were amazing, and it was so cool to be so close to the players! Paola told me that she and her dad come every weekend, but her mom doesn't like soccer so she lets the rest of the family go. We went to get some water and Paola got some popcorn before the game. It was fun to see how the same regulars are there every weekend, and they both knew lots of people walking around in the stadium.
The match was against Getafe, another Spanish team. This was a big deal game, because Getafe was just coming off a high from a win in Germany, and everyone said they were going to continue on and beat Barca. Ya right. The game was very exciting, but the Getafe players were dropping like flies. 3 different players were taken off the pitch in the silly little injury golf cart. And the refs kept calling bad calls on Barcelona. Needless to say, the Barca fans were quite frustrated. Furthering their frustration, there were 3 different times where Barca made a shot attempt and it bounced back at them off the goalpost. THREE. So much anger, let me tell you. But the fans always clap for their team after an attempt--they don't shun them. The game ended up in a 0-0 tie, and we left a little bit before the end to avoid traffic. It was quite an experience to say the least. I thanked them profusely, and we are meeting for dinner again on Thursday night.
A few observations. It is funny to me that people here (in Europe in general) whistle to express dissatisfaction. Really loud, angry whistling. This seems hard to accomplish, but it is quite loud and menacing when done en masse. Also, the anger levels tend to rise and fall dramatically. I'm talking anger to the point that I uncomfortable being so close to them. Another is the cheers. You know the American sporting cheer which ends with "Let's Go!" Well, here they have the same lead in of claps, but instead they yell "BAR-CA!" I thought that was funny.
So now I am home, eating some ice cream and getting ready to start my last real week of classes. This week is normal, and next week is mostly just presentations and review and stuff. I can't believe this is all winding down. It just feels so normal to be here now, but I can still remember what it felt like to sit at this desk on the first night and be apprehensive about the 4 months in front of me. Now I'm going home in 19 days and I just don't know what to do with that. Oh Barcelona, how fast our time has gone!
Before I go, I want to say a big Congratulations to my Little Little Kate and the rest of her pledge class for being initiated yesterday. :-) Yay!
Muchos besos
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