Studying plastic solar cells at Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, learning languages at Agora, and exploring our surroundings. Stay tuned for details.
What is your favorite thing about Barcelona, I was asked. My favorite thing is the variety. I love the variety of the porches, the architecture, and the little things I see when I am out and about like art at the train stations.
This is not art but I like the idea of selling books in the train station
to raise money for solidarity.
This article writes about a lot of the art so it seems that I have more exploring to do.
The first museum we visited was Reina Sofia, or officially Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía. The building was Madrid's first hospital, but it works well as a museum.
The Calder mobile in the courtyard was moving a bit, which surprised me.
There were plenty of people, but it did not feel crowded.
On the second day we visited The Tyssen, or El Museo de arte Thyssen-Bornemisza. The line was long, but it also did not feel overly crowded once we were inside.
In the old part of the museum with a model of the expansion.
Photography was allowed and I started to photograph paintings I liked, but it was like going to an enormous all-you-can-eat buffet and taking a little bite of everything. It was too much.
Before I finished I was stuffed. But I couldn't stop! I wanted everything. I might have enjoyed the museum more over the course of a few days, or maybe living in Madrid and getting a membership.
Another long line (all around the plaza), this one to get into the royal palace.We were lucky to get in before the doors closed.
We learned our lesson for the last free museum, The Prado, and got there before the free hours began. It is much better to be near the front of a very long line!
They do NOT allow photography, but even if they did I would not have been able to get such nice shots as you can see in this video.
It would be insulting to say we got our money's worth, but I think we did enjoy the museums more since they were free. We felt like we could see only what we wanted and stay only as long as we cared to.
I am not quite sure why I got asked, maybe because she knew I would say yes? I agreed to read a book and come up with a craft for an event sponsored by the school's PTA-like group.
The first job was to find a book in English that I thought would lend itself to a craft. I narrowed it down to Eric Carle's book honoring the Franz Marc, a controversial German expressionist.
I was excited to find this video of Eric Carle discussing the book.
Shel Silverstein's Who Wants A Cheap Rhinoceros? was the other book. In the end I read both.
I thought the kids could make paper lunch bag puppets, which would allow them to do something easy (just color) or something more complex (cut, glue, create). I forgot that everyone here eats a hot lunch and have no concept of a lunch bag! Lucky for me the coordinator has been saving toilet paper tubes for two years.
I have no idea how much English the children (ages 3-7?) understood, but they seemed to enjoy the books and loved having stickers, pipe cleaners, yarn, and googly eyes to create whatever they wanted.
One thirteen-year-old came to help and also had fun being creative!
My Spanish teacher arranged for her students to take an excursion to the national museum to see the special exhibit about the Catalonian aritst Lluïsa Vidal. She grew up the daughter of a painter and learned a lot about Vidal and was happy to share her knowledge with us.
Afterward we were able to walk around the rooftop terrace
and have great views of the building and surroundings.
Most people went back to Sant Cugat at the end of the field trip, but I was not in a rush. I headed uphill and strolled around a bit.
Olympian with torch
Olympic Stadium at Plaça de Nemesi Ponsati (a swimmer!).
Torre Telefónica (in addition to other names) was built to broadcast the Olympics in 1992.
This little spot looked inviting but the clouds were rolling in.
