OOTN: Catalan Food - July 23, 2016

Hey everyone! I know it's been awhile since I last blogged. Summer has been very busy for me, but I have been taking lots of pictures of what I've been doing and plan to post about it soon. On July 23, my family went out to the Lower East Side of Manhattan for some Catalan food (oh how I miss Barcelona :( ). I took some outfit of the day and food pictures to share with you all.

My outfit is a Brandy Melville dress that I bought two years ago and recently found in the bottom of my closet. If you have been reading this blog for awhile, I was wearing this dress in a post I did in 2014 ( here ).

For my makeup, I used purple eyeliner and lined my upper eyelid. I didn't use any foundation that day because I wanted my skin to clear up a bit. I am wearing a Kate Spade bracelet and a hair tie (I always have one on my wrist).

Catalan Food

For dinner, we went to a restaurant called 'Boqueria'. There are three locations of this restaurant in the city and it has authentic Spanish-Catalan cuisine. This restaurant serves the food as tapas which means are small servings that are shared family-style.

Patatas Bravas - Potatoes in a sauce

I am not sure of the catalan name for this food, but it is cooked dates stuffed with blue cheese, wrapped in bacon, and is in a sauce.

Pan con tomate (bread with tomato). This is my favorite Catalan food to eat. When I was in Spain, I ate this food almost every day. It is very simple to make. It is a french baguette with tomato rubbed onto it with salt and oil.

Tortilla Españoles - The word tortilla means different things depending on what spanish speaking country you go to. In Spain, a tortilla is a food made out of eggs and potatoes. Another commonly used word to describe this food is fritata.

                                                         Cooked Shrimp in a sauce.

                                                                Octopus with salad

Crema de Catalana - This dessert is very common in Barcelona and translates to 'Catalan Cream". I love this dessert because it's solely cream, but shown below it has cooked sugar on it.

Churros con Chocolate - Churros with Chocolate

I have been missing Barcelona so much, and this restaurant made me so happy. If you ever find yourself in Manhattan and want to try authentic Catalan food, I recommend 'Boqueria'.

                                                                        xx
                                                           Christina Madeleine

NEW VIDEO: MY TRIP TO BARCELONA

Hey everyone! If you have been following my blog, then you know that I went to Barcelona and I have been telling you guys about it. Well, while I was there I took a ton of photos and some videos (surprise!). In 2014, I created a YouTube channel but I became very lazy and got a bit ridiculed (just a bit)and stopped uploading videos. I decided to start fresh with it and post something new, 2 years later. I filmed on my camera some of my excursions in Spain thanks to the influence of my friend Cathy. Last weekend I cut the clips and set music to them and decided to post it online. The video contains clips from Montserrat, Costa Brava, La Pedrera, and some pictures.

I hope you like it! Please give it a thumbs up and comment on it :)

                                                                         xx
                                                            Christina Madeleine


* I couldn't fix the thumbnail, so please excuse it until I can get a picture of me*

My Trip to Barcelona: Excursions

Hey everyone! I am back for part two of my six part series about my trip to Barcelona. This post is about some of the excursions I went on while in Spain. Since I was at a school for two weeks of my exchange, I got to go to on some trips with Spanish and American teenagers. On weekends, I would go to places with my host sister and her friends.


Montserrat - March 18

On March 18, About 58 students (both spanish and american) took a 40 mile bus ride to a mountain called Montserrat. In my previous post, I have some more pictures of this mountain here. We spent the day sitting on a plateau in the mountain. Located on this plateau was a market (my friend and I bought a chocolate pastry with out lunch), a church (one of the holiest places in Barcelona), stores, and benches to enjoy the view.

 Since the school I was at is Catholic, there was an arranged mass at Montserrat which I thought was very nice. The only downside was that I could not understand any of it due to the fact the priest was talking in Catalan, and I was there to learn Spanish. The churches in Spain are beautiful and are so detailed.

  A thing I found funny was the different ideas about temperature in weather. I was bundled in my host sister's jacket because it was supposed to be very cold. In America, for the most part 50-60 degrees is Spring weather, but in Spain everyone told me it was freezing out. In this picture I was wearing long sleeves because I was told to dress warm for being on the top of a mountain, but it was surprisingly warm. I know that story was very random....

 

My friend, Cathy, and I at Montserrat.

     I took so many photos because I thought it was amazing that I was higher than the clouds.

 PortAventura - March 21

On March 21, I went to an adventure park near Valencia, Spain called PortAventura. I went on an hour long train ride from Barcelona to Valencia that had the most beautiful seaside view.  PortAventura is divided into four parts based on different places in the world i.e Far-West America, China, Mexico, and Polynesia. In 2017, there is going to be new part of this amusement park called Ferrari Land.

The entrance to PortAventura reminded me of Disneyland because it was so cheerful and when you walk in there are fake balloons on the ceiling.

I was at this amusement park for 8 hours, but at one point my friend and I laid on a hill and took a nap out in the sun because we wanted to take a break.

This amusement park also contains Europe's highest rollercoaster which I went on three times.

                                 The entrance to the China section of the park.

Eventually, I bought ice cream with strawberries and nutella (i.e one of the foods I had almost every day while I was in Spain).

Some pictures of my host girl, Ana, and some new friends (Duna and Silvia).

 La Sagrada Familia & La Pedrera - March 30

On this day, all the American exchange students went to visit La Sagrada Familia (The Sacred Family) which has been under-construction since 1882 due to the replacement of the main architect, Gaudi, and financial problems. This cathedral is planned to be finished in 2026.

Since there was a change in architects over the years, each side of the cathedral looks a bit different because of the influences from different cultures and ideas.

This side of the cathedral was designed more recent and depicts the new testament of the Bible.

 Gaudi designed the inside of the cathedral, but he did not live to see it be complete. The pillars are supposed to resemble trees and reach high to hold up the ceiling, while keeping a nature-y feel.

The stained glass windows are absolutely stunning, and since the inside of the cathedral is white there are colorful shadows everywhere.

There is a section of La Sagrada Familia designated to artists to make models of ideas for the completion of the cathedral. There are models upon models showing different designs of what the future construction should look like.

La Pedrera, also known as Casa Milà is a house that was designed by Gaudi and is the last known building designed by him. The house use to be sold to the most wealthy people in Barcelona, but over time the first, fifth, and roof became a museum. There are still people who live there, but they don't usually stay in the building while people are walking through it.

The roof of the building is covered with creations done by Gaudi. At the time he was designing it he claimed to have seen demons and in doing so showed them into his art. The roof has a beautiful view of Barcelona.

The building makes the shape of a circle and opens up in the middle. It was one of the coolest building I saw because the exterior and interior differentiate so much. 

The fifth floor museum recreates rooms from the 20th century where families would live in the huge apartments that this building contains.

I hope you guys enjoyed this post. There is definitely more parts to my trip coming!

Have you ever been to Barcelona or Spain? If so, leave a comment telling me about it. 

                                                                      xx
                                                         Christina Madeleine 

My Trip to Barcelona: Views and the City

Hey everyone! Some of you may be wondering where I have been. From March 12 to April 2, I was living in Barcelona, Spain with a wonderful host family. I went to school there for two weeks, and traveled around Costa Brava and Spain for a week. My next few posts will be talking about the trip because it was the best experience I have ever had.

This post will show some pictures from the sights I visited in Barcelona.

On my first day, March 13, I arrived in Barcelona around 10 in the morning. My host family picked me up from the airport after a seven hour flight. Myself and five other girls from my school went on this exchange program to Spain, and we stayed with the six girls who came to my school last fall. After a quick trip to drop off my things at the house, my host family took me to a path to a mountain that overlooked the whole entire city of Barcelona. The path is called the Carretera de les Aigües and people jog, walk, and ride motorcycles and cars up this path to see the city.

On my first day, Ana (my host sister) and I also went to a market in Barcelona, but I have no pictures of it. I saw so many markets in Barcelona, so there will surely be more pictures of them. After taking a two hour "siesta" or nap (I only slept for 2.5 hours on the plane), Ana's friends came over and all of them took me around to see Barcelona at night. We walked past La Pedrera, Plaza Catalunya, and so many other places. I can't think of anything that would have been better because I got to meet many people the night before my first day of classes at their school. I came to Spain to improve my Spanish, but many people there speak English so talking and communicating wasn't a problem at all.

Ana, Duna, and I in front of a founta in Plaza Catalunya on my first night.

La Pedrera at night.

My first day of school in Barcelona wasn't as scary as I thought it would be. I didn't have to do any work in the classes except for listening. The school has about 3,000 students and it's co-ed, which is probably the exact opposite of my school which is 700 students, but all girls. My first day I had castellano (spanish class), empressa (business class- I had this class twice a day), economica (economics), and audio visual class. After school, Ana and I went to a senior citizen home for community service.

The third day at the school, the Spanish teacher took all six girls from my school around Sarria, which is a neighborhood in Barcelona where the school is located. We walked around the area, and would stop at buildings to talk about the importance, and we went into markets and offices.

In my first week, all of the exchange students from America (almost thirty people, but different schools) went on a excursion to a mountain called Montserrat. This mountain is about forty miles away from Barcelona. Since this will be a series about my trip to Barcelona, I have another post to talk about the day there. But the plateau where I went was above the clouds.

Park Güell is a park that contains the art of the architect Guadi. The park that contains his work is free after six o'clock, but since I went in the day I went to the part that was free all day long. This park also has an amazing view of Barcelona.

Later on that day, March 23, all of us went to the beach of Barcelona, called La Barceloneta, which is on the opposite side of the city from the park I was previously at.

I think I am going to post about six posts about my trip to Barcelona. This was the best way to make a comeback post from not blogging in about a month. I tried to live in the moment while in Spain, so I stayed off my blog for a bit. Now I am back, and oh how I missed writing!  Stay tuned this month for the rest of the posts about my trip. 

                                                                           xx
                                                               Christina Madeleine