It certainly is strange to be in a large metropolitan European area and be so isolated from the English language! With no phone, no internet, no English on TV or radio, very few English speakers, and only the Financial Times to read (I found it yesterday – the only English newspaper I’ve seen since we arrived), I should be speaking Spanish or Catalan in no time!
We’ve been spending most days exploring various parts of the city, and yesterday I needed a break – I’m physically tired from carrying Bebe in her carrier and all our necessities in the diaper bag. We went to the park and discovered the fountain was working!
Bebe is nearly crawling now. Her legs are doing the right thing, but she hasn’t quite gotten the feel for the combined arms and legs. She does a lot of grunting and “caterpillaring”: inching her way forward by pushing her butt in the air and then collapsing on her stomach over and over again. And she’s making quite a bit of progress this way! I suspect that by next weekend she’ll be in full terror mode. Right now I need to keep a close eye on her because she moves straightaway for the coffee table in the apartment and bumps her face on the edges when she collapses during her crawling.
Last weekend we found a street festival for the commemoration of Catalunyan history. A few photos are attached. And no, we didn't really let Bebe drink the beer, but it made a good photo!
Today Bebe and I went to the Museum of Textiles and Costumes in the old city. It was an ok collection, not great. I think that tomorrow we’ll go to the Gaudi Park in the north side of the city.
That's about it from here. We're meeting a lot of the local people in the neighborhood, and every afternoon we sit outside the school with the other children and their parents. This is clearly the highlight of Bebe's day: she bounces up and down and squeals when she sees the kids playing. We've made good friends with the other children in our building, who are very curious about the strange lady and la nina who don't speak Catalan.
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