Bienvenidos a Barcelona … I mean Badalona! Same thing, right? WRONG

Ladies and gentlemen I am in SPAIN! The “patria!” What a feeling!
Ok so I’ll stop with the exclamations now and tell you how I really feel.
But first, a little break down of my trip.

I’m here as an au-pair, meaning that I am living with a family and I teach English to their kids while the parents are working. I’m pretty much an international babysitter. It’s a pretty sweet gig if you like (or at least, don’t mind) children. Here’s why:

I live with a family for FREE (couldn’t get more culturally imeressed than that.)

I have my own room and bathroom.

I get more than 3 free meals a day.

They pay me 50-60 euros weekly which actually pays for a plane ticket or train ride to           go to other countries or other cities in Spain on the weekend. Since I don’t pay for                   room or board.

If you’re convinced by now as you should be, here’s the website I used to book everything and meet the family : aupairworld.net  One of my students is currently doing it also!

But of course my friends, there was/ a catch.

So the family told me that they live in BARCELONA. But we left the airport and drove through the actual city of Barcelona and continued on for another 15-20 minutes and arrived at a town on the outskirts of Barcelona called BADALONA. I was a bit upset because I’ve heard so much about Barcelona and I wanted to be in a place that screamed “cultural richness” with amazing architecture and history. But instead, I ended up here – a residential area on the beach that’s “family friendly” yet somehow littered with graffiti.

That’s how I felt this morning. Like ‘woe is me.’ Yet, after going on a run through the city this evening I discovered that there’s much more here than my first impression let me believe. Walk just a mile down the road and you’ll find small family run shops, homemade ice cream joints, old churches (the architecture I was craving), outdoor bars lined with those cozy christmas tree lights and much more that I am sure I haven’t discovered yet. Also, there’s an H&M in walking distance sooooooo.
Also, I asked reality to slap me in the face because I was being such a brat and ungrateful for this experience when a lot of  people don’t ever get to leave their home town. I live on the beach AND we have a private pool for our complex and private restaurants (that aren’t expensive) as well.

Now that I’ve tasted a bit of what this city has to offer put my bratty pants away, I can’t stop planning excursions to discover more. Another sweet little bonus is that our house is located about a 5 minute walk from the metro and bus stations that can take me to BARCELONA in about 15-20 minutes, and my host mom was awesome enough to buy me a metro card with 25 trips on it. So, Barcelona. Here. I. Come.

Next up: Paris for the weekend. Bonjur!