Mazie

I am not a fan of flying. In fact, I really don’t like flying and am continually annoyed by how takeoff puts half the plane to sleep while it only ever seems to jolt me awake out of fear. That is why, when the flight attendants buzz the classic “enjoy your flight” message over the loudspeaker as the plane is approaching 10,000 feet, I don’t expect to actually enjoy it much.

But my flight back from Paris was different. To start off, we were the last flight out of Terminal 3 for the night which was equal parts fun and depressing. The people on our flight were pretty lively, which made the airport feel fuller than it really was. I noticed a few people sporting Disney Paris merch! Soon after we finished boarding, the pilot gave a full blown speech over the loudspeaker. He talked about many things, notably how two of the flight attendants had just gotten married (to each other, I think?) and how handsome they both were. He had the entire plane laughing and clapping.

He then went into a little section about how aviation is the safest mode of transportation nowadays but why many people are still wary of flying. I’m not sure a pilot should joke about the safety of their passengers, but there were plenty of jokes sprinkled in. At one point during his explanation of airplane safety, he said: “Well, we’ll see about our flight tonight. Hope for the best!”.

And then he repeated an abbreviated version of the same speech in English and French (actually I’m pretty sure all he said in French was “Welcome aboard, we value your safety…. I really don’t speak French”), meaning he was talking for close to 10 minutes. Definitely the most connected I’ve ever felt to a commercial pilot! Aside from the intense turbulence storm as we came into Barcelona, he did a great job flying the plane as well :)

Remy (our adorably hilarious mouse friend from Ratatouille) invited us to dinner at his restaurant. He himself prepared us a delicious three course meal and, because he has a special place in his heart for our family, reserved us the best table in the house. Hardest part was figuring out how we were going to fit in the mouse sized door as very much as not mouse sized humans.

Disneyland Paris: The second leg of a wonderful weekend with some wonderful people!!!

Hashtag our family is reunited in Paris! City of ❤️- We really planned that well :)

Después de la misa salí de la Sagrada Familia para encontrar la calle llena de gente gritando. Tuve suerte de estar en el lugar perfecto al tiempo perfecto para ver los corredores del Maratón correr al lado de el Sagrada Familia! Entré en el muchedumbre y empecé a gritar y animar a los corredores con los demás. Fue divertido simplemente mirar mientras tantas personas pasaron. Había un letrero que dijo que los corredores habían ido 14km (8 millas). Casi un tercio del maratón!

Decidí que debía caminar hacia Arc de Triomf, donde completó la carrera, para ver algunos de los corredores élites terminar. No llegué a tiempo para ver las atletas mas élites, pero vi muchas atletas muy buenas (porque cada participante era buena!) cruzar la linea de meta. Entonces encontré otro calle donde continuó la ruta (todavía estaba relativamente temprano en la carrera; la gran mayoría de las atletas no habían terminado) y decidí seguir los corredores en la acera para sentir mas como una parte de la carrera. No aburrí de caminar y tres horas mas tarde, crucé la linea de meta con las ultimas corredores (quienes que, a este punto, hubieron transformado en caminantes también).

Pienso que caminé las ultimas 7-8 millas de la carrera al lado de los corredores. Al fin estaba sudando y motivando a mi mismo para seguir adelante. El calle siguió haciendo curvas y virajes, pareciendo como nunca iba a terminar, pero estaba intenta en llegar el Arc de Triomf usando mis propios piernas. Lo poquito de triste que había sentido al principio por no estar participando había desaparecido y fue reemplazado con un sentido de asombro por todos los corredores: si mis piernas me dolieron como resultado de caminar una sección de la carrera, como fue posible que ellos estaban corriendo todavía?!

No obstante, experimentar el maratón de manera tan intimo me hizo completamente seguro de que voy a hacer un maratón un día. Seguramente estoy idealizando la experiencia de hacerlo, pero quiero experimentar lo que estaban experimentando los corredores hoy y poder decir que lo hice. Podías sentir la energía del muchedumbre en cada calle, validando la lema del carrera y patrocinador oficial, Hoka: “Barcelona te hace volar”.

Hola! Para los que no quieren practicar su español, pueden usar el Google Translate :). Mientras que estoy en España, parece que debo escribir algunas blog posts en español!

Hoy fui al servicio de Misa Internacional en la Sagrada Familia. Es una oportunidad especial por does razones: Puedes atender una misa en unas de las iglesias mas famosos de todo el mundo, y puedes entrar al iglesia sin pagar (aunque no están felices si intentas sacar fotos o explorar fuera de tu silla). Aprendí de mis errores la ultima vez que intenté ir (no había espacio porque llegué en un espíritu optimista 5 minutos antes de que empezó) y llegué a las 7:45- mas que una hora temprano. Me admitieron, pero fue bien que no llegué mas tarde porque solo admitieron 20 o 30 personas mas después que yo.

Fue una experiencia muy bonita y estoy feliz de haber despertado tan temprano en un domingo para ir. La única parte desagradable de la experiencia fue sentando en mi silla para 50 minutos esperando para que el servicio empezara. Nos dejaron entrar unas pocas minutos después de las 8 pero el servicio no empezó hasta las 9, así que quedó mucho tiempo para mi sentar y leer mi libro de Kindle. Hubiera explorado el interior de la iglesia y sacado fotos pero las guardas se pusieron enojados cuando salías de tu asiento.

Jamás había visto el interior de la Sagrada Família; solamente he podido imaginar lo que pudiera tener basado en el extravagante que es el exterior. No me decepcionó! El altar fue decorado y iluminado con velas, había estatuas por todas partes, y el techo tan alto y intrincado fue muy impresionante. Pero mi parte favorito, sin duda, eran las ventanas. Eran tan grandes y muy, muy altas- casi llegan del suelo al techo- y de todas las colores del arcoíris. Los diseños fueron suficiente impresionantes, pero cuando filtraban la luz según el arcoíris fue una belleza de otra planeta. Tomé todas las fotos que podía antes de que las guardas me empujaron por la puerta.

And… a taste of what I’ve been up to since Switzerland! I’ll give a bit of context:

• Photo 1: Me in a shop between classes. I don’t remember which shop.
• Photo 2: I’m pretty sure this was later that same day. I randomly stumbled across one of Gaudí’s iconic houses while walking around el Barrio Gótico!
• Photo 3: To give you a sense of just how magical it is to walk into El Desván Bakery. Pictured front and foremost are the Linder Bueno and Nutella cookies/mounds of joy. I snapped this one during the HOUR I ended up waiting for my lemon pie cookie (I was told it would be 20 minutes until they were ready…)
• Photo 4: Me with my Turkish kebab at Parc de la Ciutadella on Wednesday. I like this one because I just look so happy!
• Photos 5-7: More from Parc de la Ciutadella. I’d been wanting to go for a while, but finally did it on Wednesday afternoon to finish an assignment for my sustainable development class. As you can see it was so, so beautiful and I must return.
• Photo 8: A street.
• Photo 9: My 99 Cheesecake pic from this week, of course. Sauces were Lotus and Kinder Bueno, toppings were Lacasitos (basically m&ms).
• Photo 10: Me leaving my house this morning prepared for a day of who knows exactly what, but something that was going to include running and walking.
• Photos 11, 12, 14: Sights I saw on my run/walk. I managed to exit Barcelona proper and got to see some of Santa Coloma de Gramenet and Badalona, which are two immediate suburbs.
• Photos 13: Special for Friday the 13th! Ooooo! An ancient cool looking ship I passed that seemed photo-worthy.
• Photos 15-16: Streets of Santa Coloma de Gramenet (At least I think that’s where I was).

A few aesthetic Switzerland photos! My friends thought I was crazy for photographing my Lindt chocolate ball so intensely 😆.

I really don’t like sausage. Like, not at all. Maybe I’m the crazy one, but something about chunks of leftover meat and fat collected from factory floors and stuffed into a clear intestinal casing just doesn’t sound too appetizing. Most of the time things I sweep up from the floor go into the garbage, so by my logic it would be fair to call sausage another form of garbage. I bet the Latin word for garbage was something like “saucsus”. Well anyways, guess what I spotted on my plate when I sat down for dinner tonight? Three long glistening (the intestinal casing makes for a really nice glimmer) speckled sausages. To add insult to injury, my roommate Natalie is currently on a week long trip in France so my plate was the center of attention; I had nowhere to hide and no other option (other than break my host mom’s heart, make the situation real awkward, and waste a poor pig’s life) than to eat the sausage.

The longer and the larger they are, the worse they are. These were probably 3-4 inches long and on the skinny side, so I had hope that they might be manageable if I really just dove in and embraced the garbage-loving part of me that surely had to exist somewhere. The moment I cut into the first one, however, I knew it wasn’t going to be that easy. I had to saw at that casing to get it to snap and I didn’t notice the giant fat blobs until they were bouncing and squeaking between my teeth. But I put on a smile and tried to focus on how good of a blog post this experience was going to be. When the inevitable “do you like it?” came a few minutes later, I nodded and responded enthusiastically, speeding up my pace and controlling my face to make sure I didn’t accidentally resemble Emily Hobbs eating maple syrup spaghetti for breakfast in Elf. I was sawing, stabbing, and chewing like a lumberjack turned racecar driver. In fact, I probably looked like I’d been craving some good old sausage and no doubt my host mom made a mental note to serve it again soon.

I made a pact with myself that I only had to eat the middle of each piece. I could cut the ends off and leave them to the side (that would be weird, right? It would be like cutting the crust off of toast). Although they looked slightly more flavorful, that was where I assumed any extra casing would be hiding and I wasn’t about to take any chances. I discreetly shoved any fat bits I could spot into the same pile and covered it with my napkin when I finished. After washing my mouth out with the rest of my dinner (the beans, veggies, and bread I had all ‘saved for last’), I walked my plate over to the the garbage and returned those sausage bits back where they belong.

Well this one is super after-the-fact, but better late than never and I don’t want to make the first day of our Switzerland adventure sad by not giving it any recognition.

• 3:30am: Alarm goes off. Once again, Mazie must get up even as everything wants to drag her back into bed. Throw the last items into my backpack.
• 3:50: Out the door
• 3:53: Catch the night bus to Plaza Espanya.
• 4:15: Catch the A17 bus to Airport Terminal 1.
• 5:00: Arrive at airport.
• 5:30: Through security, meet Mya and McDonald’s and wait for Gracie. Eat breakfast (whether that’s McDonald’s or the random snacks in your backpack)
• 6:15: We realize that we should probably head to our gate because the plane is boarding.
• 6:40: Make it to the gate just in time!
• 6:55: Flight leaves.
• 8:55: Arrive in Zurich
• 9:15: Linger at the airport while we figure out a plan. Decide to buy the Zurich card which allows us free public transportation, free or discounted access to many museums around the city, and discounts at select restaurants.
• 10:00: Catch a train into the city center.
• 10:30: Visit the National Museum which was conventionality located right outside the train station and was such a cool museum! I’m really glad we went. The design was very Swiss- simple but effective, hands-on but clean, and they had some really niche exhibits like fans and accessories, a whole bunch of crazy rings from different places around the world (that one was a group favorite), and exhibits covering the historical and current political and environmental landscape in Switzerland.
• 11:30: Walk over to the old town. Walk along the main street in search of a coffee shop. Natalie, Mya, and Gracie got iced lattes at this one place where we (sort of) made a new friend, and then we went to a second coffee shop where Mya, Gracie, and I got a feta and spinach quiche kinda thing for lunch. Of course we forgot to use the discount from the Zurich card- oh well.
• 1:30: Mya left for a tour at the Lindt House of Chocolate (I was tempted but tickets were quite expensive and I have already had the privilege of sticking my spoon under their chocolate fountains). The rest of us continued walking around the old city and shopping.
• 2:30: 30 minute trek by train to our hostel. Free access to public transportation was great, but no one ever checked our tickets anyways :)
• 3:00: Check in to hostel. The room took a little adjusting to as there was nowhere to lock anything up and no curtains. I guess Switzerland is just a very secure place.
• 3:45: Bus to the Museum Reitberg. Free access again thanks to the Zurich card! Was cool to walk around and see art and sculptures from all over the world, and we got to make our own Japanese postcards!
• 4:50: Walk over to the FIFA Museum. Mya rejoined us :) The National Museum was really cool, but the FIFA quickly stole the prize for my favorite museum of the day. Their exhibits were beautiful, really cool, and highly interactive. I set a new high score for this soccer dancing battle thing, and the last room (which we very sadly only had like 10 mins to play around in) was basically a human-sized soccer arcade! They had mini games like soccer pinball, shoot out, dribbling, hit the target, and once you created a player you could go around to the different stations and try your hand at the games. There was a line for everything so I didn’t get to try all the games, but it was a lovely set up and I could’ve spent much longer in there.
• 6:00: FIFA museum closes and we head to the big park overlooking the city. I remember catching our fondue ride here last time (I think)! We watched the water and these adorable ducks as it started to get dark.
• 7:00: Wandered back into the city towards the Pandora store so Natalie could take a look at the charms.
• 7:30: Randomly stumbled across this pretzel sandwich street vendor on the way which ended up being the perfect dinner, and for a much cheaper price than we were going to find anywhere else! I got a lettuce-mozarella-tomato sandwich and it was genuinely so good and inspired me to look into pretzel sandwiches in the future.
• 8:00: Natalie ends up buying a cute box of chocolates charm!
• 8:15: We end up in a Swatch store which makes me remember my old Swatch and marvel at the really fun, chunky ones on display in the store. Gracie caves and buys a pretty green swatch!
• 9:00: After some more aimless wandering, we decide to grab a bottle of wine (consumed by all but yours truly) and head back to the park for some deep conversation.
• 9:30: Although it was really dark and really cold (especially sitting next to the water), the deep conversation we had on the park bench was one of my favorite parts of the trip and was a great bonding moment.
• 10:30: Caught a bus back to the hostel because we (mainly Gracie and I) were freezing and extremely tired.
• 11:00: Back at the hostel, got water (sooo thirsty), and got to bed as quickly as possible. We got to listen to the dad who was also sharing our room talk to his kids on face time which was really cute.
• 11:45: Legit go to bed (destined for a night of about 4 hours of sleep, but that was at least an improvement from the night before!)