Birthdays and Barcelona

Well, this is my first post since I became 22 years old, and you will notice by my writing that I have changed drastically because of my age! Talia and Lauren took me out for dinner on the 24th, to Soho. I did not realize that the reason we went to Soho was so they could get balloons for me, and so I kept suggesting different directions to head then they were hoping to go. Since it was intended to be a surprise, they never made it to their balloon shop. We went to a restaurant called Bella Italy, which is a big chain of Italian restaurants in England. It was very good, and our server Flavio made the evening very enjoyable. He was so friendly and joked with us a lot, and at the end I told him that in Canada on your birthday the whole waitstaff sings to you and you get a free dessert. So, while I was busy talking with the girls, the lights started to flicker and all of a sudden Flavio was walking towards me with our desserts and birthday candles, singing happy birthday. He gave me the dessert free, but we gave him a big tip.

On my ACTUAL birthday we unfortunately had to check out of our hotel, sit with our luggage in the bar for a couple of hours and then head off on the subway to the airport. We got there nice and early, and waited for our flight by walking around the airport. The flight to Barcelona was short and I liked it that way. I had an empty seat beside me and that made me happy. We grabbed a taxi to our apartment, which is just off of a busy tourist street: La Rambla. We had a nice dinner of different tapas and paella.

Today, we walked the whole city and went to all sorts of buildings designed by Gaudi. He was a modernist architect and all his buildings are really strange: they are scary looking but at the same time beautiful. He uses a lot of wrought iron and the artwork is all very interesting looking. He began building a cathedral, but died before he completed it. Today, work is still being done on this unfinished masterpiece.

Well, for now that is all. I need to get back to my apartment to shower, and eat some fresh fruit that I bought at the market. As always, pictures will be available when my memory stick and a usb outlet cross paths.