barcelona pt.1

Just like the Berlin post, the Barcelona's post are going to be a long one.
So I hope you are not too stuffed from Thanksgiving and can handle this long post.

Day #1
Our flight was at 3:35PM, but was not in the Stockholm-Arlanda Airport. It was at the Skavasta Airport on the other side of Stockholm in the middle of nowhere. So we left Uppsala at 11:00, took an hour train ride to Centralstation in Stockholm and then hopped on a 2 hour bus ride to get to the airport. Once at the airport we had an hour and a half to kill, so we stopped and had something to eat until it was time to board.
4 hours later....we landed in Barcelona!
Taking the train to our hostel, we were officially settled in at 8pm. And of course, like the Spanish do, we went off to eat a late dinner.
A recommendation from our hostel, we went to a restaurant called Mussol, where they made Spanish food.
Now a little background story because there is always a story of everything that I do.
Going to Spain, a month before a go back to Spain to see relatives, I was excited, not only because I had never been to Barcelona but I could practice my Spanish so I won't embarrass myself when I see my relatives, because in Sweden, you barely hear a conversation in Spanish.
Fun Fact about Barcelona: They don't really speak Spanish. Well, ok, they do but it's a different form of Spanish, called Catalan which is a mix of Spanish, French and a little bit of Italian.
 The accents sound the same as Spanish, but there are big differences.

For example: (English-Spanish-Catalan)
Goodbye- Adios- Adeu
Please- Por Favor- Si us plau
Thanks You- Gracias- Gracies
You're Welcome- De Nada- De res
How are you?- Como estas?- Com estas?
and so on and so forth.
So trying to pick up my Spanish was difficult and problematic, so there were sometimes where I just spoke English because I didn't know if I was going to make a fool out of myself speaking Spanish and also, it was just easier at times.
(Spanish relatives, if you are reading this, I promise that I will do my best to speak Spanish, although it will be a bit rusty.)

Back to Mussol:
Traveling with a friend who's Spanish knowledge was high school Spanish, I had to help her translate the menu. But then again, the menu was in Catalan.
I did my best guys. I did my best.
But then I recognized the two most important words in the Spanish language.
Jamón Iberico 
If you have no idea what Jamón Iberico is or have never had it, then I would recommend to hop on a plane to Spain and live off of it.
This stuff is amazing. Just have it. And it was what I had for dinner, along with some wine.

French Fries, with a Fried Egg and Jamón Iberico

After enjoying every bite of this, I ended up with dessert that was literally called "Death by Chocolate".

I ate it.

A mountain of chocolate with a pond of cream around it.

Also, this picture of chocolate foreshadows the amount of chocolate I ate during the course of this 3 day trip.

And after filling myself with much needed Spanish food, we returned to our hostel and rested up for the next day.

baked

So as my last post described how I would continue to bake again, I did.

During the holidays, especially around Thanksgiving, my family and I always make dessert. We usually do a new dessert and an old dessert (one that we have already made), one of those desserts are my famous Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars

Now a few things to now about the process of making these bars.
Because since being in a foreign country, everything that I commonly do back home is an adventure for me here.
1. Other than the American store, there are no chocolate chips here. Also Swedish people do not know what chocolate chips are.
-The chocolate chips in the American store cost about $10 USD, and I decided to drop the Nestle Tollhouse chips and buy three chocolate bars for 90 cents each. I thought that if I took one of the bars and chopped it up into chocolate chip pieces that it would be a good substitute for chocolate chips.
2. Sweden doesn't have graham crackers, not even in the American store. So I had to settle for Maria cookies that could fill the void of graham crackers and my wanting for S'mores in the future.
(No graham crackers?/ I mean what do these people use for s'mores? Do they even make s'mores?)

Then the baking began, at 10:30PM which back in Sonoma was my normal time to bake sweets. A little something that my roommate secretly hated/secretly loved because then it became a midnight to 1AM to 2AM snack and then a 10AM breakfast snack.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars (Swedish Style)
3 cups of graham crackers (if you are in the states or any country that holds graham crackers) Maria cookies
1 cup of butter
1 cup of chocolate chips (or 1 bar of chopped up chocolate bar)
2 cups of chocolate chips (or 2 bars of chocolate)
1 1/2 cup of peanut butter

-Take the cookies/graham crackers and crumble them up, into small chunks. (Don't crumble them up too fine or it won't work for the next step).
*Back in the states, I would put some graham crackers in a big Ziploc bag and smush them with my hand or wooden spoon (hand works better) until all the crackers were dissolved in small chunks- do that if you can.
-Once the crackers/cookies are crumbled well, take butter, slightly melted, and mix crackers/cookies with a spoon until it becomes a paste.
-Take chopped up chocolate (or 1 cup of chips) and mix with butter and cracker/cookie mix.
-Once, mixed well, pour paste into 9x13 pan and spread on the bottom of the pan and pat well so surface is smooth and even.

The chocolate chunks look like chips right?
Right.

-Once surface is smooth, melt the remaining chocolate in a bowl, in a microwave and stir so chocolate doesn't harden fast.

- Melt the peanut butter.

Adventuretime

Did you know that you can burn peanut butter?

Like it turns into a dark brown color and leaves a potent smell in your kitchen, so when your corridormates come in the kitchen, they know that you are baking because it smells like something is burning.

Like really, did you know that? Or did I miss something?

See? 

I mean it still melted and stuff and it was fun, I was just surprised/confused that one can burn peanut butter.

But then again with all of the "little adventures" I have been having here, I WOULD burn peanut butter.

Back to baking

- Mix the melted chocolate and melted peanut butter into one bowl and stir well.

-Pour the mixture over the cracker/cookie, butter, chip paste and spread evenly.

- Once it covers the paste and is coated evenly, place in fridge for 2-4 hours or leave it over night for your 10AM breakfast snack.

-Once solid enough, cut into squares, serve on a plate to your corridor mates and watch them disappear. 

They will. Believe me.

Another day, another adventure for me. I swear by the time I will have gotten this baking in Sweden thing down, it will be June and time to go home. It always happens.

BREAKING NEWS

My corridor is hosting a corridor party, which is like cool and fun because Swedish parties are fun.

But there's a problem.

Before the party actually starts, there is something called a corridor crawl in which members of the corridor (like 12 of us total) go to room to room and drink and one of my corridor mates decided that each member should have a signature drink in each room for each person to have.

What? 

I have to make an alcoholic drink? The only thing I have made with alcohol is when I cook dinner and sometimes put white wine in my food or something.

I have to make a drink?

How does one make alcohol? 

The only one that came to mind was "The Molly" created by Molly Shannon in this parody of the Real Housewives of SNL (see at 3:35)

Does that work?

Also, I'm having at least 8 people in my small room and the most I have ever had in my BEDROOM is like 4, and at that time I felt claustrophobic .

Like what do I do? I know to play music but what kind of music? According to my family members, I listen to "hippie" music and by "hippie" music I mean 

Mumford & Sons

Of Monsters & Men

The Head and the Heart

and then there's

Backstreet Boys

The Beatles

Bob Dylan

Bon Iver

Coldplay

Dave Matthews Band

a little Elton John

Florence & The Machine

Jack Johnson

The Lumineers

etc.

but then I have random songs like 

The Lonely Island

Michael Buble

Adele

The Rugrats Theme Song 

One Direction ( it's from SuperCamp don't judge)

Phil Collins

songs from Toy Story 1, 2, & 3

Disney Music

Like what if that pops up on my iTunes or worse they search through my iTunes and see it? 

What if Adele's Someone Like You somehow plays on my iTunes?

What music do I play? Would it be weird if I played Swedish House Mafia? Is that trying to hard? Do Swedish people ACTUALLY listen to Swedish House Mafia? 

Or what if I played music of where I'm from? The "Yay Area" ( do people STILL say "yay area" anymore? Is that still a thing?)

Please help.

Any "how to make alcohol drink" advice and music recommendations are extremely needed.

You have until the 29th at 6pm. 

Thank you and have a pleasant tomorrow.

splurge

Before going abroad the number one question that I was asked (other than "Why are you going abroad?/ Why are you going to Sweden?) was "How are you going to get through the holidays?"
At that time, it was springtime and the holidays were 8 months away, so I didn't think much of it.
When I went to a conference at San Francisco State, the question was brought up again, to a group of students who had studied in Sweden the year before.
Each of them had a different answer,
"we had a big Thanksgiving where we each made something and had a big dinner with Americans and other people from different countries"
"I visited my family in Stockholm..."
"my parents came to visit and we traveled...."
"I had a friend also studying abroad and we got together and had our own holiday..."

Even though it was 8 months away, the thought of being away for the holidays scared me.
What WAS I supposed to do? WAS my family going to come? I think we might have a Thanksgiving..Am I going to have to cook a turkey?

Well 8 months later and it's November and Thanksgiving is in 111 days and I'm doing pretty well.
Although the other day I did get a little homesick.
With the Sweden winter coming and the days getting darker at 3:30PM, it's a little hard to keep my positivity up. So I decided have Treat Yo' Self day.
Treat Yo' Self 2013
As said before, I had taken a trip to IKEA to buy baking goods, so my treat yo' self day was a baking day.
I went downtown to the American Store. Yes, Sweden has an American Store where they sell American stuff. LIKE EVERY AMERICAN PRODUCT YOU CAN IMAGINE IS HERE.

I wasn't kidding about any American product you can imagine.

So on Thursday, I took a pit stop here and got a tub of good ol' Betty Crocker Cream Cheese Frosting to go with the pumpkin cake I was going to make. (Cuz I mean there is no better combination than pumpkin and cream cheese).

And when I returned to my corridor, I got into baking mode.

I put on an old sweatshirt, pulled out the BAKING playlist* on my iPhone, and baked.

Now side note: Temperature and measuring is completely different than the states. Everything is in Celsius and milliliters. Now I just mastered talking in Celsius but baking in Celsius and measuring water and oil in milliliters was a new adventure. 

Instead of preheating the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, I turned the knob to 100 Celsius because I thought that that was a good temperature. 

I don't know, I was experimenting. 

Now, luckily since I have baked since childhood, I didn't need to do too much thinking when it came to measuring the water and oil. I recognized the measurements by size and knew what was the equivalent to 1/2 cup and 1 cup, so I felt pretty confident in that. 

After that, it was a breeze. 

Just standing in the kitchen with my playlist going on and watching the Swedish sunset at 3:30PM with the smell of pumpkin cake batter, I was at peace with myself. 

I needed this and knew that I needed to do more of this now.

And yes my temperature conversion was wrong, I needed to put it at 200 Celsius. My cake took an hour to bake.

But whatever, the cake was delicious, I shared it with my corridor mates and it got devoured in a day plus I got compliments on it.

I'm back guys, I'm back.

*Music Playlist
The Boxer- Mumford & Sons
Dirty Paws- Of Monsters & Men
Ho Hey- The Lumineers
Hopeless Wanderer- Mumford & Sons
Let Her Go- Passenger
Little Talks- Of Monsters & Men
Lovers' Eyes - Mumford & Sons
Submarines - The Lumineers
You & Me - Dave Matthews Band
Shake - The Head and the Heart
Another Story - The Head and the Heart
Anything Could Happen- Ellie Goulding
Here Comes the Sun- The Beatles
Let The Good Times Roll- Ben Rector
Let It Be - The Beatles
Lost In My Mind- The Head and the Heart
Tiny Dancer- Elton John
Stubborn Love- The Lumineers

-Please if you have any recommendations, let me know-

fear

If you have never experienced fear in a public place, clearly you have never been lost in an IKEA.
After being locked in my room (not literally) due to a, what I call, "old man cough" I decided to venture out to the real world and take a trip to IKEA.
The last time I was in a Swedish IKEA was the first week I was here. I was with 2 other people and my experience was fine and calming, we cooperated with the store and just followed the arrows until we got what we needed.
So this trip, I thought, would be a no brainer.
Stepping off the city bus in front of IKEA at 1:30PM, I had my shopping list in mind, I even thought I would treat myself to some Swedish meatballs.

If you're wondering, that red stuff next to the meatballs is lingonberry sauce, which they always put on meatballs.

It was delicious.

After a filling lunch it was time to shop,

My shopping list

A big mug-for the upcoming cold nights

Cupcake tin- because the holidays are coming I need to start baking

Spatula

Mixing Bowls

Measuring Cups

My budget: 100 SEK

The list was simple, finding the stuff...not so much.

The mug was easy to find, spatula-simple, mixing bowls-fine, measuring cups-different metric system (i'll figure it out)-check

Cupcake tins.....??? I'm pretty sure I spent about 30 minutes in front of the baking section looking for cupcake tins.

Apparently, in my eyes it was impossible to find a cupcake tin.

There was one but they made mini-tall cupcakes and that just wasn't my thing. I wanted the big US cupcake tins that I was used to, but I guess that's just an American thing. So I just gave up and settled on what looked like a loaf pan and settled on making a pumpkin loaf cake from a pumpkin mix my mother sent me.

I was done and needed nothing else so it was time to leave.

Then it happened. I was trapped and had no idea where to go. I did what I was supposed to do and followed the arrows, but then I found myself going the opposite way.

I didn't want to go the opposite way, I wanted to get out. So I turned back and went in the opposite of the arrows; I got some looks from some IKEA shoppers.

What the hell was I doing going the OPPOSITE DIRECTION OF THE ARROWS? Do I not SEE THE ARROWS?

There was no time for people judging me, I needed to get out.

I had to read the IKEA map twice, in two different places in order to find my way out.

I started to panic, when will I ever get out? WILL I ever get out? Will I get trapped here?

But then I remembered to breathe, I took two deep breaths and thought to myself, if I ever get trapped here, it's ok, they have Swedish meatballs and comfy, stylish, too good looking for my room beds that I can sleep on.

It's going to be ok.

Eventually I found a path that lead me out, but what was more problematic was going through the path. With the holidays coming up and with IKEA being IKEA, it was like I was in another trap. There were so many cute, modern, holiday looking things that I wanted to buy. I couldn't handle myself. I had to buy everything.

And then I realized something, IKEA is on to me. They wanted me to get lost so I can buy their products.

I'm serious. I walked by a small aisle of clocks and thought to myself "Oh my god those clocks are beautiful I should get one...."

I DON'T EVEN USE A FRICKIN CLOCK! 

And then I saw some fake flowers for 5 SEK and thought to myself "Well, it's like getting dark now so some flowers should brighten up my room. And I mean if people ask, I could say that a really nice Swedish boy got them for me, but really I just bought them myself....no one has to know" I could say that I met some really hot Swedish astronaut Gustaf, I mean there ARE Swedish astronauts here...right?"

They would know....

I dropped the flowers.

And then I saw scented candles for 12 SEK and smelled one that smelled like vanilla.

I bought it. 

I have no regrets. 

My room smells like Christmas and yours doesn't.

Eventually I got out (Praise the Lord Jesus!) and paid for my purchases:

my total budget: 98 SEK (under budget..WIN!- also I could have totally boughten those flowers, I mean people would believe that astronaut story...)

When I left IKEA, it was dark. 

"Jesus Christ how long was I in IKEA?"

It was 3:30PM and I had only been in IKEA for 2 hours. That's right, the famous Swedish darkness is coming. What feels like 7PM dinnertime is actually 3:30 PM snack time, either way, I'm eating, it's just weird.

Hello darkness my old friend

There you have it, my adventure of getting lost in IKEA. 

I'm still a little traumatized, so if you see me and I seem startled, it's because I'm still coping, just pat me on the shoulder, tell me that I'm ok and then we can go out for waffles.

I think I'm going to be ok. 

inner wonderings

Ok a little thing that came across my mind while in Berlin.
I know Berlin was a week ago, but this has been dancing in my head.
As you know from my long posts, I went and saw a movie with some friends (you know that one time I drank beer in the movie theater? That time) well the movie was Thor 2. The friends that I was with had already seen Thor 1 but I did not. But I did see the Avengers so I knew who Thor and his magical hammer was, and I knew who Loki was so I guess I was better than someone who hadn't seen either movies.
If you don't know much about Thor here are the basics (any Thor fans please correct me if I'm wrong this is only my interpretation of what I got out from the Avengers/Thor 2)

There are 9 earths/universes that are living.
Thor comes from the land of Asgard with his mother, father (who was played by Sir Anthony Hopkins) and his "brother" Loki (I don't think they are related....at least I think they aren't).
Loki is a bad guy who can't really be trusted and Thor is the good guy with the magical magnetic hammer that every time he opens is right arm the hammer magically appears, no matter where Thor is.

One of the 9 earths/universes is Earth and on this Earth, is a famous astrophysicist named Jane Foster (played by Natalie Portman) who in the first movie met Thor and they fell in love. Apparently, Foster is one of the few people who know about Thor and the 9 earths/universes as the rest of the world is completely clueless about this.
Foster, finds one earth/universe and is transported to it, where she finds this magical force like thing...it's red and and black and is called a "eretha" (Rhymes with urethra, and was convinced thats what it was called through half of the movie.....).
So Foster gets absorbed by this "eretha" and has to be sent to Asgard to be protected by Thor and his family.
While Foster is being protected they give her clothes, food and shelter in Thor's kingdom while she is there.
Now comes my question....
In one of the scenes they shoot a close up of Thor's mom face and Foster's face..
WHERE THE HELL DID THEY GET THEIR JEWELRY FROM?
Like seriously, they're in space and the only building that is shown is the royal palace.
I mean do they have an outlet, an outdoor mall, a galleria or a downtown area where these people can get their jewelry?
Is there a Nordstrom, Macy's, Targét-like store in Asgard?
Do they have their own Urban Outfitters? Like Urban Asgarders?
Forever Asgard? Old Asgard? Asgard Eagle?
But I mean let's be serious, where DO they get their jewelry?
This is a serious question guys and will forever change my thoughts about superhero action movies.

BEER-lin

Ok this is the last post I swear.
Last Day in Berlin.
Our last tour began in DPA which is a news agency in Berlin and it's huge and probably my dream place to work.
Unfortunately, I couldn't take pictures due to copyright reasons but just picture a huge floor filled with desks, not cubicles, and is divided by window walls. Like people can walk over to your desk without hanging over a cubicle, you could just walk over casually at a desk sit on it like Jim did to Pam in the office. I could have a German version of Pam and Jim in real life if I work here! I COULD BE PAM AND SOME GERMAN MAN COULD BE JIM!
Ok I'm getting ahead of myself....
After a tour of this huge amazing place, we then ventured off and again went to Starbucks and went to the Paragom museum which is a famous museum in Berlin.
Unlike the Film Museum I was allowed to take pictures which was great, I took full advantage of it. I didn't post all the pictures as it would make this post too long so I chose the ones that I like, I hope you like them too.

My friend Cassie with her Starbucks

Me with my Starbucks

Sophie and Ali with no Starbucks

This is the entrance of the museum...I now know why it's famous.

The Paragom holds artifacts from over 2,000 years ago, which any History fanatic will go crazy here (so I think that tour guide will go bananas here).

Right after the Paragom we quickly walked back to our hostel, picked up our luggage and ate one last German meal, because you can't go to Germany without having an authentic German meal.

And if you are wondering I got the picked knuckle of pork Berlin style with sauerkraut and boiled potatoes

An authentic German meal

The last German meal.

After filling our stomachs with German food, we took the S-bahn for the last time, saying good bye to our best friend and flew back to Uppsala.

During the flight, we once again found another literal German to English translation.

"In a while you will feel fine"

In a while....

And thus concludes my full trip to Berlin, exciting and memorable it was a perfect trip. Berlin will always be a special place to me. 

Now next stop- Barthelona

and then a surprise place <--click here.