Aha! Only six days have passed! I haven't missed my two posts per week goal this week, despite spending all my writing time crafting my final papers. What an achievement.
However, six days have passed and, friends, they have been six busy days. I'm warning you now that you can expect posts about Barcelona even after I've come home because I have six packed days behind me and five packed days ahead of me.
One of the activities that took up a lot of my time, a full day actually, is my tour of Besalú, Banyoles, and Girona with the Voluntariat Lingüístic. I'm not sure if I've made this clear enough yet, but the Voluntariat Lingüístic has been the highlight of my study abroad experience. To hear more about how great it is, check out this video!
Yep, that's me. Albert asked me to be interviewed for this video when we visited Hostalric. It was the least I could do after the VL had offered me so many fantastic opportunities.
By the time the trip to Besalú, Banyoles, and Girona came around, though, I had completely forgotten about the video. So I was taken aback when my photographing was interrupted by a cry of, "Ohmygod, you're that girl from the video! Wow! This is like meeting a celebrity. Can I touch you?" I am UPF famous, guys. Feel free to bask in the light of my stardom.
The trip just got better from there. I learned a lot of interesting factoids on this trip. Perhaps the most interesting was about a notch we spotted next to a door in Besalú. The notch was for the mezuzah. The mezuzah is a rectangular piece of parchment on which important biblical passages are written. The parchment is rolled up and placed in the doorways of the houses of Jewish people to remind them of the divine Word and Law. To protect the parchment, it is placed in a groove (like the one you can see in my picture) and covered in glass or placed in a box.
We also saw a church that (supposedly) holds a piece of the cross on which Jesus was crucified.
For lunch, we had a picnic on the shores of Lake Banyoles. Lake Banyoles is the largest natural lake in Cataluña and was formed by the same tectonic motions that formed Cataluña's mountains. It's largely fed by groundwater springs and only about 20% of its water comes from precipitation. I couldn't enjoy the view of the lake through my itchy, watery eyes though. Every surface in all of Banyoles was covered in pollen. Friends, I ran out of Claritin a few weeks back. I spent the picnic sneezing and rubbing my eyes. So I learned to bring more Claritin on my next long-term adventure.
Albert, my fantastic program organizer and best Catalan friend, brought plenty of snacks and wine to pass around. He is truly the greatest host I could hope for. He also shared a bottle of ratafia. Albert described it as a traditional Catalan digestif of wine flavored with herbs. I would describe the sample I tasted as more similar to tea steeped in cherry cough syrup rather than water. Different strokes for different folks.
Our tour ended in Girona. Girona was covered in larger Catalan flags than those I've seen in Barcelona. I was sincerely taken aback by their number and average size. If you're a Game of Thrones fan, your visit to Girona might be different from mine; you might be too excited to see the various places where Game of Thrones were filmed to notice all the flags.
My favorite parts of the tour included an explanation of Caganers (which will be included in a future post, so stick with me), walking along the top of the city's old fortifications built during Roman times, and following the path taken by people who had been condemned to death in Girona's past. I know that's a pretty eclectic list right there. Allow me to explain.
The Caganer explanation was interesting to me because it was a cultural phenomenon I hadn't yet heard of. The walking along the wall was fun for me because it offered great views and I was excited to walk along the top of a Roman wall rather than along or through it.
The path of the condemned was great for two reasons. Firstly, there was a wall along the path that was originally Roman and has been repaired recently. This wall therefore juxtaposed the stones the Romans dragged all the way to Girona from who-knows-where with the limestone-like stones naturally found in Girona and more typical of modern construction. I love seeing how ancient history is propped up right next to modern works here. Secondly, as we walked along, we passed under an altar to the Virgin Mary. I was highly amused that they made criminals pass under Mary. The need to threaten a man condemned to death with higher judgment seemed ridiculous to me. It doesn't get much worse than a public march to your death. Just let the man go in peace.
This was my second-to-last Voluntariat Lingüístic trip. Once again, I returned to my apartment exhausted, but so happy I had gone. If you're a UChicago student reading this and considering the Barcelona programs, I highly recommend participating in the VL as much as possible. The VL is absolutely what I will miss most about Spain. Luckily, there was one more trip I was able to take with the group. You'll hear all about that soon enough. :)
Until next time!