Barcelona

This is a story about my journey to Barcelona for 3 days, from 24^th to 26^th of December 2007.

I thought it would be a bad journey, since most of my friends backed out and didn’t want to go. I was supposed to see another friend in Paris, but I canceled that one because I could only see her for one and a half days and considering the cost to go there, I decided that our meeting can be postponed. My best buddy here, decided to go to Germany for the whole two weeks to visit his sister, I can’t follow him, I can only spend my holiday traveling in the first few days because for the rest of the days, I need to get prepared for the coming big exams.

Travelingto Barcelona seems to be the best choice, but after I knew that they had booked a hotel, and it would cost me 75euros per night (I’m the fifth person who’s going, so I have to take a single room) really gives me a twitch in the stomach every time my head thinks about it. It was too late, I already bought the bus ticket (which cost like 70euros, return ticket), and I don’t know if I can make a full refund out of it if I canceled like the train ticket I bought for Paris. I try not to think much about it; it’s my bad habit to always think about something. I thought to myself, It’s the only way for me to spend my holiday elsewhere & with my friends, it is just 3days, then I can get a fresh start, get new wisdom, new spirit, to start preparing for my exams. I can’t fool anyone, my marks before were going down for this semester.

We decided to hack me in, together with my two other friends in a double bedroom. I pray to God everything goes smoothly, I don’t want to lose too much money.

I will put in the summaries of my holidays. I don’t like to write in details, because it would be too boring, even for me, to read this again sometime.

This holiday, thought me a lot. It gave me what I’m looking for. Everything turned out good. The hotel management didn’t found out that there are three people in one of their double-bed room. I can’t forget how each time I go in and out, I have to hurry up, hide behind somebody, and avoid looking at the receptionist.

Barcelona is all about art. Statue-like people were everywhere in different costumes. And the buildings, designed by the great Antoni Gaudi were just amazing. La Pedrera, a building, more like an apartment to me, where Gaudi lived in (I think). That guy was amazing, how he could get the ideas on creating and designing fantastic work of art and he make his place of living a piece of an art too. It stroked me in the head; he makes me realize the important of having a wonderful surrounding to influence you in your daily lives, thus affecting the way you think. It gave me the idea to make my little room in Aix, where I sleep, eat, study, every single day, a place that is beautiful and can inspire me in my studies and also in the pursuit of my dream. It is really important; to make something you see every day, a beautiful scenery and good to watch, because those are the things that inspire and also influence how your mind works. You want your mind to work wonderfully; you have to feed it with wonderful things too.

Everything, the five human senses, is the food to your brain. What you give, (like data to a computer), is what you get. So you have to take care of these five ways you’re feeding your brain.

Other thing that I’ve learned in Barcelona was to trust myself more. If I was too afraid I wouldn’t had the chance to visit other interesting places on my last minute in Barcelona. It was about 9pm and I have to be ready for the bus at 9.45pm. I want to visit more places, I’ve spent most time in Hard Rock cafés with my friends, which is good but not my main target in traveling. I want to see places and I know there are more places to go. So, on that last 40minutes, I encouraged myself, took time to read the maps and understand it, try to find a good place. Cause before, we only depend to Syamil to guide where to go. And, because of my last minute action, I manage to visit a castle and some places which is famous in Barcelona, alone, during that last minute.

I have proven, again, that I can trust myself. That’s all I need to do. No need to be afraid or lack of confidence on oneself. Trust myself, a person who’s capable of doing anything, and there’s an infinite number of doors open in front of me.

And I want to say here that I met a few Malaysian over there. One I’ve made a friend of. Her name was Amy. She was just graduated from UM and found herself a job somewhere in Europe. Like a contract or something. She’s kind of helping somebody. I saw a few Malay girls too. The first encounter, they seem to be in a hurry. Maybe because the day was getting late and the place they’re going is closing. (For they were heading to a place where we’ve been) I felt funny coz it was us who were most excited to see other Malaysian, for they didn’t even stop. After that we saw some more Malaysian girls (we thought coz they were wearing hijjab the Msian way) but we were too shy to just go and salute them. We were planning to make the encounter happen by coincidence, like we were walking in front of them and wala! What a great coincidence. We manage to do that, but when they didn’t even respond to my friend when he said the name Malaysia out loud in his casual conversation to me when we pass in front of them, we concluded that they were Indonesians. Another encounter with Msian students occur later but failed miserably when we lost trail of them. But before that, I swear to God one of the girls saw me, and she quickly turns her head off. Maybe she was shy. But all I can say is, we thought that Msians are friendly overseas, particularly between the Malays, but instead, a Chinese Msian who greeted us, and was casual enough to change contacts.

to view my photo album, click here.


Dis is a cool video showing a person playing an amazing musical instrument called 'Hang'.
i founded him in 'parc guell'(on the top where there's an open space for people to hang around)

i found the science of it (how it works), the melody, the method to play it, even the name to be very interesting. the name widen my eyes more because it is similar to the word 'you' in my region dialect. =)

A hang, similar to a steel drum. It was the result of many years of research on the steel pan and the study of the diverse collection of instruments from around the world. The hang was developed in 2000 in Bern, Switzerland. Its name comes from the Bernese dialect word for hand. To obtain a Hang prospective customers must send a letter to request an invitation to the workshop in Berne. Worldwide offers for used Hanghang are rare, and prices in Internet auctions have been very high.

source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hang_(instrument)