Many successes!

Yesterday was a VERY successful day.  After countless hours of searching for the PJFS (Perfect Jacket from Spain), Sarah found it and bought it!  It is very cute!  I don't have any pictures of it yet but I will point it out in a picture sometime soon.

Two days ago, as I was putting on my favorite brown boots ever (so much my favorites that I wear them almost every day) when it came to my attention that the zipper pull was coming off of the zipper track.  Let me just pay homage to these boots for a minute: I bought them last year.  They are deep chocolate brown with brass buckles and go to about three inches under my knee.  They make me look like I am going to go horseback riding (something I don't do but it's a nice look) and I love them.  I wore them all of last winter and all of this fall/early winter. They are waterproof.  In short, the perfect boots.

Now that that homage is done, I will inform you, dear reader, that I did not waste time with sentimentality.  No.  I had to be practical.  So I decided to get new boots.  A word about shoe shopping here: I have never seen so many shoe stores before in my life.  Rows and rows of boots.  Fantastic.  Except I have not allowed myself to look because I already have a lot of shoes. 

Yesterday after class, Sarah and I set off to find my new boots.  We stopped into one of the million shoe stores and I selected some brown boots (very similar to my all-time favorites but with snaps instead of buckles, rounded tops, slightly more pointed toe, and go to just under my knee) and asked, in Spanish to try them on.  I put them on and thought that maybe they made my feet look big (I will acknowledge that my feet are indeed quite large).  I attempted to explain this hesitation to the shopkeeper in Spanish but I slipped and said "mi feet miran muy larga" using the English word for feet rather than the Spanish one.  And that shopkeeper pounced... the battle was on!

He started speaking in English.  I was insisting on Spanish.  He started talking about how he had studied in San Diego.  In Spanish, I said that that is a really pretty place.  And he replied in English.  And so on... a battle of the languages.  This happens pretty often because everyone wants to practice their other languages.  I lost this battle.  I did not know the word for cash when I was trying to ask him if he preferred I use cash or a credit card. (Now I know that "en efectivo" is how you'd say "in cash.")

Last night, Sarah and I decided to go out to a bar near our apartment.  We weren't sure where to go when we saw that the place we were planning on going to was closing.  But we knew of a crazy little place called Kahala (a Hawaiian Bar).  We settled in amongst the cigarette smoke, locals singing English songs, and our tropical drinks.

These drinks were huge, very sweet, and very expensive.  Plus they started to make our stomachs hurt.  But the snacks were good (popped soy beans and popcorn).

My dad, Emily and Paul arrived today.  I met them at their hotel this morning and then we went to the Picasso Museum.  Up until last weekend, I had only seen Picasso's later pieces (Blue Period and cubism) but last weekend, at Montserrat, I saw one of his early pieces which was a classical portrait he did when he was only fourteen.  The Picasso Museum is really cool because you can see his whole progression as an artist.  He starts off very traditionally, following in the footsteps of his father who was associated with an art school.  Then he develops his own style.  He goes through doing prints, oil paints, the Blue Period, and cubism. 

When we were walking to the museum, we saw a parade going by.  It's Carnival here and it's also a special Barcelona holiday (I don't remember which one).

People put those huge head/torso/dress costumes on.  They are attached to some kind of frame so they can be switched between people easily.  Then the people wearing the costumes dance around and it looks kind of creepy.  Masks freak me out in general and gigantic creatures with masks are definitely worse.