Someone Please Ex-Spain?!

The one thing I still can't get use to is how late dinner is served for the Spanish, and by late I mean 10pm. This means that the nightlife doesn't really get under way until after midnight. So usually if you arrive at 9:30pm at a club, you'll have the place all to yourself, if it's even open. But once you're out, the night generally lasts until around 5am -- and FYI all you Brisbanites, I kept up with the Madrileños and didn't eject myself into a cab at 1am! HOORAH!

So on this one fateful night in Madrid, we decided to head out to an awesome club in downtown with the Italians. The night started around 1am. Actually the night started with 8 tequila shots and a round of free vodka lemonades.

One Tequila..

After the first three rounds of drinks, most of us were 'happy' and out came the dance moves and animated conversations.

Two Tequila..

Following the fourth round of shots, out came the karaoke, free-hugs-for-all and incoherent d & m's.

Three Tequila..

Fifth round turned out to be Jess' death of the night by tequila, she had had a little too much (actually rephrase: waaaaay too much) and so Koen taxied her home like a good boyfriend would. I heard stories about worried taxi drivers and puke on the sidewalk but these are still yet to be verified. I, on the other hand, was most definitely up for more!

Floor.

.. and oh, how I wish I hadn't stayed. As I was walking back towards the group after bidding Koen and Jess farewell, I passed a guy who was speaking really animatedly with his hands. Must be Italian. Anyway he was really excited about what he was talking about cos his arms were just flying around everywhere, it was actually difficult to get pass him. So I stood behind him for a little while hoping that he'd notice me and stop waving his arms around like a madman. Rookie error. His arm flew my way, and suddenly I felt this burning sensation near my eye.

"AHHH! MOTHERFU..!"

I stood there for a good minute or so clutching my eye trying to figure out what the hell had happened when Alessandro ran up to me to help. Crazyarms started apologising over and over again when Alessandro started getting all heated up. I had to break up an almost-fight! Grabbing Alessandro's hand I pulled him away and assured him that I was okay. I looked back at Crazyarms, and then looked at his hand -- cigarette. I got burnt by a goddamn cigarette. And guess where guys? On my eyebrow. Singed the goddamn hairs. I now have three quarters of a left eyebrow. And no, I will NOT post a photo. Thank you, Madrid - really, thank you.

Left the club at 7am in the morning - baby THAT'S what I call a night out! Despite now looking like a freak, it was one of the most fun nights out I've had since arriving in Europe.

And that's how it goes. The story of the night Madrid stole my eyebrow.

Be My Hero Anyday, Baby.

Can anyone here even contemplate what seeing a swimming pool sized poster of Enrique Iglesias was like for me?

Did I jizz my pants? Did I scream like a little bitch? Did I use up half a gig of memory on my camera? Did I stand there for a good 5 minutes wishing I had all 500sqm of him?

e) All of the above.

Possibly the most incredible moment of my life, period.

Short and Quick - 'That's What She Said'

My faithful blog readers (...all four or so of you), I'm back and blogging y'all! A week without any posting seemed strangely long for me. I may just love you.

I'm not even too sure what to include and to exclude in this post about what I did in Spain. I have a feeling it'd be completely boring too -- sightseeing, eating, drinking, travelling, touristing, etc.. I'll post a few entries later about some finer moments of the trip, but for now, here's a digested version of a reader's digest version of what I got up to:

• Took a trouble-free flight from Frankfurt into Madrid at 8pm and met with Jessalyn and her boyfriend Koen (third wheel, I know okay?) who had already been there for the past few days. Man, it was SO good to see some familiar faces again! We ventured out that night with some Italians which they had met earlier, whom insisted on showing us the Aussie Bar. Had a few beers there - for your information all you international people, we do NOT drink Fosters, and NO it is NOT "Australian for Beer". We proceeded on to do a mini club crawl and entered into a few non-ventilated, cigarette smoke filled drinking holes. Starting to feel extremely festy, we left around 1am to go home. Got to see a KKK ceremony though - oops - I mean the Easter Liturgy around 2am whilst in search of a means of transport home.

• Second day: Went to Parque del Retiro which was amazingly aesthetically pleasing, and then checked out the Palacio Real, currently the largest Royal Palace in Europe. Feeling a little thirsty, we took a seat at a posh looking place and almost paid 60 Euros for a jug of Sangria! .. Thank God I understood a bit of Spanish! Left immediately and had 2 Euro Sangrias and tapas instead.

• Second night = CCRRAAZZYY night. Got a bit of a story about this night so get excited about a blog to come!

• Third day: I woke up super late surrounded by several Italians girls (nothing suss!) in a beautiful apartment overlooking Palacio Real which was just amazeballs, unfortunately that was negated by a god awful hangover. Did a solo zombie walk through Gran Via of Madrid which is a showcase of early 20th century architecture *coughandshoppingcough*, visited some neat little markets and then got stuck in Easter crowds. Got to squish up next to a hot Spanish man though.

• Third night: We had attempted to go out but everyone was wrecked and my throat was starting to get scratchy from inhaling so much second hand smoke. It really IS that bad. Not being able to endure anymore passive smoking, we had chocolate churros, copious amounts of tea and KFC instead.

• Fourth day: Jess and I arrived in Barcelona (Koen had gone home to Holland for uni) and went to our hostel (Graffiti Hostel) only to find that it was the epitome of shit. The entrance to the hostel was via a seedy looking door, which only opened once you buzzed the even seedier looking telecom system. So there we were, walking for HOURS around the city and literally asking all the hotels and hostels in eyesight if there were any vacancies. Being Easter weekend, it had seemed that everyone in Europe had decided to come to Barcelona - and well why not. We FINALLY found an el cheapo hostel that was surprisingly nice. Ended up going on a pub crawl with about 70 or so drunken foreigners to the best and biggest club I've ever been to - Razzmatazz. Live band, 5000 person crowd, 5 different dance rooms, all-round amazingness.

• Woke up much too late and got kicked out of our room. Once again, we began looking for another place to stay and eventually found a cheapish hotel which was much more than we had expected! Started our two day bus tour in the arvo and visited the Fira de Barcelona which was just one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. Too buggered to do anything at night. Throat was really starting to give.

• Woke up feeling like death but managed to do a whole day of sight seeing and checked into yet another place to crash. Observed the Sangrada Familia which is a huge, unfinished and will never be finished, generally useless Monument of Barcelona. Viva Gaudi! Took a series of trams up a mountain and got to see the view from the top.. aaannndd it was actually quite shit. Hostel was surprisingly nice. Passed out at 8pm (no joke) and started hallucinating after intaking some strong cold and flu medicine.

• Last day in Barcelona.. BOO! Whats a better way to spend it than to shop shop shop! This would've been 100 times better for me if my body didn't ache like hell let loose - it was so bad that I literally lost my breath just climbing a flight of 10 steps (but I'm okay, mum!). Got to catch a Flamenco show though. Had to rudely wake up at 4am the next day to catch my flight back home!

Adios España - despite robbing me of all good health, you were great while it lasted!

Fake it 'til you make it.

Hola amigos, ¿Cómo estamos?

Spanish 1, German 0.

Ohhh it's begun, the slow take over of any german I've learnt and any I am attempting - and struggling - to learn by the return of español.

The previous Friday night I was invited to Karlshof for dinner and drinks by some of the Spanish (I hate putting them into such ethnic groups but I don't know how else to simplify who I'm talking about!) and instead of the room being peopled with Mexicans, it was filled with Spanish boys instead. I was starting to get a little confused as to why there were just so many boys in this city and so few girls, and it was my roomie who clarified the following. My university is the Technische Universität Darmstadt which, as the title would give away, is a technical university. It goes a little something like:

• Technical University > Engineering and Technology Faculties only
• Engineering and Technology Faculties only > Male dominated industries
• Oversupply of fish in the sea > A social perplexity

Plenty of them where I come from.

Despite the awkwardness of being the only girl for a good hour or so, it ended up being a really enjoyable night. I had the scheiße paid out of me for my beastly pronunciation of the Spanish words, most of which I just cannot for the life of me say without an Australian accent. Notwithstanding, there's nothing like a few beers out on the balcony, pretending like its summer only because the weather has picked itself up a few notches... to 6 degrees.

If Beyonce and I were a boy we'd understand how it feels to love a girl.. and probably not look so awkward in photos like these..

We played a Mexican drinking game which my version of phonics would go something like "ca-rappa-ca-choo-car", whereby each person had to say a word contained in a predetermined topic to rhythmic clapping. Say it out of tune or fail to say one at all, you had to take a shot of some god awful (and extreeemely alcoholic) apple wine. The boys decided to be tricky (trickeh trickeh trickeh trrrickeh) and chose "seasons" as a topic, meaning that the fifth person would endure a predicated death by apple wine. That fifth person was me.

Person 1: "Summer" .. clap clap

Person 2: "Autumn" .. clap clap

Person 3: "Winter" .. clap clap

Person 4: "Spring" .. clap clap

Cat: "Mid Winter" .. clap clap

Person 6: "..WHAT?! Oh uhm.. Mid summer?!" ..

Person 7: "You're OUT! Mid summer isn't a season!"

All: *Chant* DRINK, DRINK, DRINK, DRINK, DRINK!

.. How I got away with "Mid Winter" will forever be God's mystery.

Spanish speaking Italians from Brazil in Germany?

There's one thing that sticks out to me in Darmstadt, and that's the number of Spanish, Mexican and Brazilian people living and studying here. That 'Italian Party' I told you about was dominated by the hispanics, so much so that I don't think I even met one Italian sole there. The Spanish students are here in the plane-loads due to close tertiary agreements between Spain and Germany; the Mexicans and Brazilians, I have no idea. It kind of works out amazingly because I've been trying to learn Spanish for quite some time now so passively I'm learning, hooray! Need I mention the men, again?

Here's how most of the night went down..

PRE-PRE-DRINKS: Johnny and I had decided to check out the International Generations Meeting (a sit-down party for students) before heading out, arriving to free beers, wines and champagnes - oh and delicious wraps and pastries. I got to meet a few "friends of friends" which was fantastic, but on the whole it was full of older people and I couldn't understand the German conversations going on to save my life. Johnny and I snuck out, fresh beer in pocket.

International Generations Meeting

PRE-DRINKS: We headed to Karlshof* which is the only other, and much, much, MUCH bigger student housing complex in Darmstadt. We got to meet a lot of Steph's friends, who generally were - yep you guessed it - Spanish, Mexican or Brazilian. Some of the girls had dressed up as the Italian Mafia which was fun to see. The pre-drinks here had reminded me so much of my friends back in Australia - the craziness and hilarity of it all was almost identical.

There's a couple of the 'Mafia'

DRINKING TIME: The Italian Party was hosted in the most random room I had ever seen in my life. It was just that, a room. A big one though. There was no bar, no anything really. Just a whole bunch of people in the one space, dancing, boozing and having a blast. Two of the girls I was with had bought along a bottle of wine to share. In a drunken stupor, we managed to somehow pop open the plastic cork with a fork. Each taking several large swigs, we headed back into the party. I had somehow ended up holding the bottle --"Someone please take it! I look like an alcoholic!" .. "I'm already drunk, you keep it" & "I'm waaaaay drunk". To my girls at home -Laura, Lex, Rach and Rob (okay so you're not a girl but you're as good as one to me) - you guys all know my history with wine bottles in clubs. Not good! ..Yet funny.

Happy snaps

Messiness.

Amazingness.

Viva Spai.. Germany!

*This complex houses over 1000 pupils and is notorious for their wild parties and dominance of the student social life. I'm not one to shy away from parties, but the quieter, cleaner, closer and less crowded nature of Nieder Ramstadter (my student complex, which houses approximately 400 students) works for me. Sharing my dorm with 10 others instead of 4 doesn't sound that appealing to me, nor my liver.

España, aquí vengo!

"In Spain, the dead are more alive than the dead of any other country in the world."

It didn't take me very long until I would be jetting off again, did it? You guessed it, I'm off to Spain my faithful blog-readers! This is exciting on so many levels, you have no idea. As many of you would know, I've been itching to go to Spain (Germany was actually second choice for my Masters Degree) - for the love of Sangria, art, history, culture, flamenco, beaches, fiestas, bull fighting and tomato throwing. And well yeah, who am I trying to kid - for the love of Spanish men! "Hàblame en español, baaaby!"

Enrique can never escape my love...

I'll be jetting off in 2 weeks time during my week off before the craziness of Uni begins, joined by my high-school chum and fellow Japan trailblazer, Jessalyn. She's currently studying in Maastricht, Netherlands, so it worked out nicely for us both, namely with the budget airlines that route Europe. Total for airfares from Frankfurt - Madrid - Barcelona - Frankfurt ..? A measly 70 Euros! Amazeballs.

On Germany related news, I was having a hard time settling into the new surrounds this past week. QUT had actually berated me on this, saying that I was going to dip to a low insofar as loneliness and being nigel-no-friends, before peaking and possibly never wanting to leave. And it was demonstrated to us with a parabola diagram and everything, I kid you not. I guess I brushed that off a little too lightly because it's true, and it happens, and it's not nice.

I miss living in a full household and having friends there who I can irritate 24/7 and know that at the end of the day we still love each other long time. On top of that, I was dealing with a weird case of 'break-up' and leaving him was startlingly more difficult than I had thought since I had spent so much time with him over the past several months. But worry not amigos, I'm starting to find my feet as time passes by. Slowly and tediously, I'm finding some diamonds in the rough and it's making Darmstadt feel a lot more like home sweet home.

I promise next time I'll actually let you guys all know what I've been up to because there's so much I want to catch you all up on. For now, I'm tired, I haven't done my homework and my plants need watering.