French road trip.

This past weekend, I went on a road trip with David and Sheila (my Spanish friends). We started on Friday, driving ELEVEN hours to Poitiers. Poitiers is historically very important because the Moorish invasion of Europe was turned back there many centuries ago. The three of us went to see Futuroscope, the theme park of the future....

Basically, it consisted of many 3D movies, some with moving chairs that thrash their occupants. It was a fun park to see, though I don't think I'll ever make the trip back.

After leaving Futuroscope, we decided to split up the drive home between Saturday night and Sunday morning. Due to our budget, we ended up driving around Southern France until 3 AM looking for a cheap motel with space for us. Needless to say, it wasn't the most fun thing I've ever done.

On Sunday, we stopped by Carcossonne, a smaller French city close to the border with Spain. It has a magnificent castle:
Inside the castle walls is a small city. Seeing it made the trip worthwhile - it's a beautiful place.

Semana Santa

Semana Santa just came to an end, and so did my ten wonderful days of vacation. For the first six days, my family came for a great visit. We took it easy, but still got in plenty of sightseeing and hit a couple spots that I haven't been yet.

I actually entered Sagrada Familia for the first time, and it was quite amazing. It was designed principally by Gaudi, who is the cock-of-the-walk as far as architects go - I mentioned him in my entry about Parc Guell. He had a style that's completely his own - no one can replicate it. The Sagrada Familia, a cathedral, was started at the turn of the 20th century and is still being worked on today (due to funding problems, it still has a ways to go).

Here's a picture of the Nativity facade:
This side was completed first, and really shows Gaudi's brilliance. Everything square inch is covered with detail.

We also ventured up into the towers, which is really neat because narrow walkways way up in the steeples.

We also went to La Pedrera, which is an apartment building Gaudi built that has really neat structure - the outside surfaces are wavy. And not just the sides - the roof has tons of curves too. Here's a picture:
Those aren't scultures - the small columns are chimneys, and the large towers allow access to the stairwells.

Other than that, we made it to a couple of parks, though our inability to find trams ('funiculars') made it difficult to see everything we wanted. We also stopped by the Joan Miro foundation. Here's one of his greatest works:It's called "Two Forces" and explores the interplay between sensibility and chaos. Cool huh?

Actually, it's called, "Something Matt Made in Thirty Seconds." I hate to mock someone's art, but look at a real Miro (below) and tell me I couldn't have my own foundation:
Sure, there is a lot of creativity behind it, and it was very innovative art when he did it. However, the whole building was filled with paintings very much like this, and it would take several doctorates to begin to appreciate any of it.

Other than that, we hit the Picasso museum (my second time), saw some other typical famous places, and played a lot of cards.

Life

It's been a while since I have posted, and nothing incredibly extraordinary has happened since my last entry. Life has descended into a wonderfully calm, simple routine. Most days I spend at least a little time at the beach.

Ann Marie visited for a week and we had a wonderful time together. We saw some tourist attractions that I've been saving for visitors - the Picasso Museum and the Cathedral, for example.

Midterms have come and gone. I actually prepared more than a day ahead of time, and saw some pretty good results (who knew?!). I have 3 final exams, which don't concern me that much because two of the professors will choose the higher grade (between the midterm and the final) and the third will only test me over the second half of the course because I did well on his midterm. Besides that, I've got two papers to complete before final exams.

Possibilities for travel have started coming up. My friends and I are considering going to Morocco during the end of April, and then I will be going to Germany to visit friends studying there the last week I'm in Europe.

My Spanish, while not as good as I had imagined it would be, is still getting better. I can put complex sentences together fairly easily, using (what I think are) the right verb tenses. Here's one impressive example (translated) that shows just how much I've been applying everything I learned in the classroom:

"Robi - last night Chester ran into my room and was making a strange noise. I have heard it before, so I just thought it was another hairball [yes, I know how to say 'hairball' now]. But, it wasn't. The cat vomited twice on my floor."