Grant Gochnauer - Blog : Technology : Foundation

The last 11 days in Spain have been a lot of fun and alas, the trip has come to an end. Tomorrow I wake up at 3am (9pm CST) to head back to Chicago and I arrive about 4pm CST. It’s about a 24 hour trip with only 3 hrs of sleep. Yay! Ever wanted to see a walking zombie? hehe

Looking back on the week, I think the most fun I had was going to the club Salvation which is a pretty sweet club here in Barcelona. The four of us danced for a few hours after bar hoping some of the local pubs in the area. It was great to see the different styles and drinks available. Sangria anyone? Also the biggest thing that surprised me was that NO ONE knew what a freaking apple martini was. I was shocked. Not even the gay bars knew what an apple martini was. Man, all that told me was that there was a huge market for a good bar here. Hehe. I’d have to say that next on the list would be walking through La Sagrada Familia and walking through all the amazing streets seeing the architecture. It’s amazing to think that the buildings are over one thousand years old. The thing that strikes me the most is the rich history stored within the walls of these ancient buildings. I think Spain’s number one attraction is its history.

One of the days, we all went to tour a cava factory for Codorniu on the outskirts of Barcelona. Cava is the Spanish version of champagne. It was amazing to see how big of an operation Codorniu runs. They have over 20 miles of storage for their cava and wine. They produce over 1,000,000 bottles a day of cava/wine. It was an impressive tour!

Traveling in Spain also makes me appreciate the United States a heck of a lot more. I honestly don’t think I could see myself living here. It would be a VERY big change in my lifestyle. There are no supermarkets per se where I can just get all my food for the week. Even if there are stores which carry many items, you’ll see a whole pig and it’s up to you to prepare it. Plus, everything is deep fried and the amount of meat people eat here is very small. Everything is bread. Additionally, no one works out here or goes to a gym so people don’t take care of themselves as much as I’d expect. Um, no thanks. I’ll take my pre-cooked chicken breasts from Trader Joe’s any day. The other crazy thing is that people don’t eat dinner until about 8-9pm and clubs don’t even open until 1am. I think it’s a little over the top. Also, everything in the city closes down on Sunday.

So while I’m very impressed with the beauty of Spain, the living standards leave a little to be desired. Another nice thing however is how there are people out walking around, talking, and just enjoying being outside at all hours of the day. I can look outside of my hotel window which overlooks La Rambla and there will be people walking around at 4am. The other amazing thing is that no one here listens to iPods. If you ever ridden a bus or the El in Chicago, you know everyone has their ears plugged into their iPods. Here, no one has an iPod. People talk to one another. Crazy concept

That is all for now. I have a plane to catch in 8 hours.