On Thursday while everyone in America remembered 9/11, Catalonia also looked into the past, but the commemoration of this day is not somber like the U.S. El Día Nacional de Cataluña is meant to celebrate the past and is also used as an opportunity for the people of Catalan to express their desire to be independent from Spain. All day people were in the streets with flags for Catalan independence. Along some streets people wore red and yellow and lined up to form the stripes of their flag. Later that evening the people formed a giant "V" to represent the victory that they will have when Catalonia is finally independent. Rather than stick out like a sore thumb I figured I had better get myself a flag and so I did. For 5 euro I bought a flag that I wore as a cape for the rest of the day. Probably not the best idea because of the heat and humidity but after a while you get used to being sweaty.
Besides the chanting and flags it is also a Spanish tradition to build castell's or human towers at festivals. It is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. There is a large cluster of people below serving as support. From there each level is formed by people simply climbing up. Generally, those at the top are children so that the tower doesn't get too heavy. The ones I saw were about 4 stories high! Towards the end of my stay here my program is putting on a castell workshop. Should I choose to participate and be a member of the human tower I am fairly certain that I will be doing most of the climbing up since I am so tiny.
The next two days (Friday and Saturday) was spent relaxing at the beach. A few hours in I realized that I was swimming in the Mediterranean Sea! How amazing is that! It was a perfect day. We got to the beach around 12:30 and left a little before 6. The waves at the beach were perfect and constantly rolling. The only downside; salt water. When the bigger waves came they would pick me up, set me back down, and then I would hover for a few seconds as the water went back to a normal level. I never quite got the hang of this so every time the wave would set me down I would try to touch the bottom and realize I couldn't. This sent me underwater and spluttering and trying to spit out as much salt water as I could. Both were still wonderful days, although Saturday was considerably colder and cloudy.
In the evenings we headed to Placa Espanya to see the Font Mágica, a beautiful fountain show that uses colors and music. Directly behind the fountain is the National Museum of Art which is a beautiful building especially at night when everything is lit up. Also near the placa is a shopping mall that used to be a bull fighting arena, bull fighting is illegal in Barcelona. You can go up to the top of the arena and have a beautiful view of the placa, fountain, and museum! My host mom kept telling me the view was spectacular and she was right! Barcelona just keeps getting more and more beautiful every day!
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