It seems I’ve caught an extreme case of “Hemingway” – I have been spending all of my free time in cafés, and parks and empty hotel rooms writing away about my enchantment with this foreign land. My love for writing has only gown fonder, as my life has only gotten more interestingly complex. Sometimes I can’t help but think I was born to write and photograph everything around me. Since coming to Spain, it has become second nature, and I often find myself stopping to write something down or snap a photo of yet another spanish monument.
The past few weeks have been an utter whirlwind – midterms, Fallas, friends visiting, and of course the anticipation of Spring Break. March has passed by quicker than you can say ¡rápida! and it scares me to death that my time here is more than halfway done and I haven’t even accomplished half of what I want to do. Hopefully the two weeks of Spring Break will help me complete my spanish to do list.
Before arrive in Madrid, I made a list of 20 things I waned to experience, festivals I wanted to visit and passport stamps I wanted to collect – similar to my “20 Things Before 20” list. here’s what it includes:
- Fallas Festival, Valencia Spain – DONE
- Spanish Soccer Game – DONE (Bonus – El Clásico)
- Go to a flamenco show
- Go to Italy
- Go to Czech Republic
- Go to Portugal
- Go to Barcelona, Spain – DONE
- Go to San Sebastián, Spain
- Go to Sevilla, Spain
- Go to Granada, Spain – DONE
- See a Spanish Bull Fight
- Travel by train – DONE
- Go to the Prado and see some art – DONE
- See the “Guernica” by Picasso – DONE
- Play fútbol with some locals – DONE
- Try paella, sangria and chocolate con churros – DONE
- Travel Solo – DONE
- Go wine tasting – DONE
- Ride a moped
- Achieve Spanish Fluency
And while I have achieved a vast majority of the items on this list (& so much more) I cannot help but feel incomplete and void of any sense of accomplishment in crossing things off. I feel when you’re abroad there is just so much going on that it’s impossible to achieve everything – but I’m determined (and pretty much refuse to go back to the US) until I cross off everything on the list.
Until next time (and another item crossed off)