Hello everyone! I’ve been mapping out my thoughts on how I wanted to lay out this blog for a couple of days now. This past weekend, my housemates and I headed to Barcelona, which makes this our second weekend away from Sorrento. I have gathered many observations on how Americans are treated abroad, especially women. Over the last two weekends, the group I have been traveling with has been solely females and I will admit, I love nothing more than the spontaneousness of booking a last-minute trip and experiencing everything the city has to offer, but the cons of traveling to somewhere new so impromptu are often overlooked and not spoken about enough. My friends and I are guilty of not doing a ton of research before going and facing the challenges head-on. I would suggest exactly the opposite. Take the time to research restaurants, hostels, Airbnb’s, areas of popularity, and areas to stay away from.
Before we arrived in Barcelona, we didn’t do much research on the best places to stay so booked a hostel that cost the cheapest and looked somewhat close to the city center on a map. Little did we know, the city was over 10 miles wide and had many different pockets of areas to explore. We ended up so far outside of the inner city we were going to have to uber EVERYWHERE if we stayed there, which in turn would have cost as just as much as getting a place closer to the city. We decided to go ahead and give it a shot for one night, even though the initial impression was not the best. When I tell you I have never been so uncomfortable and scared in my entire life. First of all, there were many added fees upon arrival we were unaware about, including towels and “hidden” taxes. The sheets were given to us at the front desk, aka, our beds were bare mattresses on steel bars. It was extremely dirty and I ended up sleeping with shoes on… We were abruptly woken up at 6am to banging on our doors from unwarranted visitors, and lastly, in the morning as we were walking to our uber, my roommate got her phone stolen out of her back pocket. All in all, the point in me explaining all of this is to be aware of your surroundings and do your research!
Locals seek out any opportunity to scam people that look lost so it is really important to have some background information on where you’re going and what you’re doing! Travel is a beautiful thing and it should be shown in its amazing light! There are so many positives that come alongside traveling and seeing the world. 99% of people in the world are GOOD but that doesn’t take away from the 1% you have to be careful of. I am so grateful to live these experiences and learn from them as I go through my next stages abroad. Below are some pictures I took in Spain! Barcelona is filled with beautiful architecture designed by Gaudi including La Sagrada Familia, Park Guell, Casa Mila, and Casa Batllo! We were fortunate enough to see all of these.
At night we got to meet up with some other USC students who are studying abroad in Barcelona! You have no idea the comfort seeing a familiar face brings when you’re abroad. It was so lovely to reconnect and explore their host city with them. I would 100% recommend Barcelona on the list of weekend trips for anyone studying abroad.
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