Every year the NYU Tisch Center honors all Sports Management, Hospitality and Tourism scholar students with over a 3.7 in the junior year by taking them on a research trip somewhere in the world. Last year the group ventured to London to study the upcoming Olympics, but this year they chose Barça. Luckily for me, my advisor, Billy, invited me and two of my fellow Sports Management classmates to dinner in Barcelona and I couldn’t pass up the offer – I had friends on the trip, couldn’t pass up a free dinner and had yet to travel to Barcelona.
Friday morning I awoke at 6 to catch the 8AM train to Barcelona. Everything was smooth sailing, until halfway through the trip we stopped on the tracks for an hour – talk about scary stuff. Granted, I was asleep the majority of the trip so the tardiness of the train didn’t really affect me. When we
finally arrived at the Barcelona-Sants train station, I was lacking euros and the walk to the hotel didn’t seem too far (according to my iPhone) so I began my long day of walking. Six hours, two museums, two churches, and a lot of parks later, I made my way back to the hotel on Ramblas de Catalunya. For dinner we went to this cute Italian restaurant where I indulged in this delicious granna salad and pizza de cuatro queso sprinkled with raisins. It was great to be back in the realm of sports as I found myself discussing various issues in the athletic field today with my classmates. The group was accompanied by Billy, my advisor, and Bob Boland, our academic chair and truly one of the greatest professors I’ve met.
Although Perri and I had originally intended on going out, the rest of the group decided to stay in and catch some of the March Madness that was on because a) they had to be up at 6 and b)we’re sports fanatics. Hours later, 4AM to be exact, we retreated to bed only to wake up two hours later to say our goodbyes. Once the group left, I took to wandering the streets and found myself at the train station some hours later. Barcelona was stunning – great weather, tons of art, and very relaxed. I cannot wait to go back this weekend to see Camp Nou and the rest of the city.
One of the many pieces of art
Sagrada Familia by Gaudi
Arc de Triomf
