well, i am now about 3 weeks into it, and things are going swimmingly. i'm getting the hang of things, for sure. i've been hanging out and talking to my host brother more (keep in mind he speaks no english so our conversations consist of my less than perfect spanish and a rousing game of charades).
wow, i took so much time away from this, that i don't even know where to begin! i went to the picasso museum after class on thursday. it was really well put together and interesting. i guess i didnt really have much previous contact with his early works, like his social realism and landscape periods. he was an incredible print maker! his etching and prints were absolutely mind blowing. he also had some incredible pieces of pottery and some bronze work. the coolest thing was, there were 3 rooms dedicated to showing a single sequence of works. picasso, at one point, was completely infatuated with velasquez's piece "las meninas". he did like a 42 piece study, re creating parts of the piece through his own understanding. even though the subjects were morphed, stretched, disfigured, he remainded really honest to the space, volume, and tonal values in the original piece. it was just really cool. there also was a temporary exhibit set up showcasing the works of kees van dongen. i really liked his stuff! some of it reminded me of matisse, who is one of my favorites of all times, and some of it reminded me of renoir, which was weird. van dongen's fauvist expressionism stuff was really incredible too.
i went on a tour of a winery yesterday, about an hour out of barcelona. it was called codorniu. they are one of the biggest producers and exporters of cava, spanish champagne. we got to wind down and through the cellars, check out the amazingly beautiful lands surrounding the winery, and even taste a couple different kinds of the cava. we went on this trip with everyone in my whole program. i realized why i always end up being really quiet in big groups like this. mark twain said, "its better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid, than to open it and remove all doubt." and being surrounded by some of these people who truely just talk for the sake of talking, reminds me why i dont. people are so rude sometimes.
im working on booking a couple of trips, one up to dublin, one to amsterdam, and one to toulouse, france to go see passion pit! so i will keep posted on how those work out. i also got my spanish class switched. the professor said that i was doing really well and that everything seemed pretty easy for me and asked if i wanted to move up! so now im in a close to 300 level spanish, which could be interesting, we'll see. my first day of class for that is tomorrow. what sucks is that instead of having 3.5 hours of spanish 2 times a week, i now have an hour and 45 min, mon-thurs, at 9 am. fml.
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