I’ve officially been in Mataró for two days. Jet lag is kicking my butt. During the day, my family is either working or at school, so I have the afternoon to myself. Yesterday, I decided to venture out of the house to see if I could find a little café for breakfast. Since I don’t have my phone plan here active yet, I had to wing it. The first day I decided to stay close, so I mostly circled the block and then walked straight down to the beach.
I headed home to meet Ingrid (my host mother) for lunch. We picked up Adriá from school since Ona is camping until Friday, and headed towards the fair. The fair is like most week-long events in the U.S. except I saw a lot more skewers of meat. We met Ingrid’s parents, niece, and nephew there and walked around while the kids went on different rides. I only went on El Látigo (the whip) and decided to save the rest for Friday.
Once again, I managed to stay up until 3 a.m., which I am paying for today.
Today, I put on jeans. Apparently the 75 degree weather was still too cold for the sundress I wore yesterday because I was receiving some pretty puzzling looks. Ingrid explained that it’s still considered spring here, so most people wear sleeves and pants, saving the shorter stuff for when it’s super hot. Jeans were definitely helpful, but I still need to work on my Spanish if I don’t want to stick out.
Even lugging my camera around, I managed to blend in without any strange looks. I also snapped some pictures of my short walk around town. The town is aesthetically interesting with so many colors from the buildings, flags, graffiti, and tile.
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| Catalan flags in the breeze. |
I laced in and out of some clothing stores all the while being greeted by American music blasting on the speakers.
The smell of baking bread blows around with the wind.
Finally, I snagged a quick cup of coffee and realized how badly I needed to improve my Spanish after using sign language to order.
Chasing Spain 
A basic necessity of life like coffee deserves a little proper Spanish! Beautiful pics. Being in Catalonia territory you may want to read A Homage To Catalonia by George Orwell someday for a little history of the ongoing contention there. – Amanda
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Thanks, Amanda! I will definitely check it out. I've been meaning to go into the book stores and library.
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