Cafe a llevar, el mercado y las primeras dias en Barcelona

The first evening that I arrived in Barcelona, I had a lovely little meltdown. The combination of jet lag, exhaustion and the realization that my life for the next four months would be immensely different, all hit me square in the chest. I called my Grandma which is what I always do when I can't breathe, sleep or think straight. It made me calmer to speak to her and I was able to sleep for about four hours.

Today, I awoke in slightly better spirits. The "better" mostly attributable to the fact that I knew I had much to do in order to get settled in and ready for the beginning of the semester and less having to do with not being homesick. It's not like moving to a new city or a new state. In addition to the geographic differences and living differences I am also dealing with cultural differences. This became immediately clear during the quest for my morning java fix. After stopping into a smoky bar (bar is more all encompassing of a word than in the US. It can include little snack/pastry/soda places, too.) I ordered "Cafe con Leche" which seemed a "so far, so good" exchange until I added "para llevar" (to go). It became evident that this was simply strange. The notion that one would not want to sit and nurse one's coffee along with half a pack of marlboros in a tiny, little bar was baffling to the barkeep. He realized, however, that I was not from around here and quickly adjusted his attitude and proceeded to pour piping hot coffee into a thin, wimpy PLASTIC cup. I, with hands burning had the pleasure of being looked up and down by nearly all who passed by. I was a scene unto myself.

After the plastic cups were disposed of we went into the grocery store to buy some food for the house. After shopping around the aisles, attempting to decode what it was that I was buying and lugging a rollable hand basket through the narrow pathways we quickly realized that we had to lug 15 bags uphill for about a 15 minute walk in the freezing cold. We saw an old lady who had a hideous plaid rolly bag that she was using for her groceries and asked her where we could get one as we knew that was our only hope. She told us to go down the street to a shop that "Chinese people own" and buy one. I ran down and bought the bag and we sweatily arrived at our apartment food in hand.