Las Fallas Festival

This past weekend was probably one of the best of my life...

Traditional Dresses

It was the Annual Las Fallas Festival in Valencia, Spain and I had the opportunity to attend! Las Fallas is a traditional celebration held in commemoration of Saint Joseph. Fallas refers to the celebration and the monuments created for the celebration. During Fallas, many people wear their casal faller dress in regional and historical costumes from different eras of Valencia's history All neighborhoods in Valencia makes one of these figures so there are maybe about 150 of them! I only had the chance to see about 25 or so.. The creators of the Fallas work all year long on these! They are oftentimes satirical and represent the events that occurred throughout the year. The last day of the festival, the fallas are all burned down. Unfortunately, I was not able to stay for this part because I had an exam that I had to take(the burning was on a Tuesday). The 5 days of the festival is a constant party and fireworks can be heard throughout the day and night! 

I took a 5 hour train ride from Madrid-Valencia... Here is the view..

The loft where I slept

This trip was my first time couch surfing! I stayed with a really awesome couple. Remy, the girl, is from Maryland and she has been traveling around the World(mostly Europe) ever since she graduated from high school. She finished her University studies in several different countries including Spain and Italy. Jake, her boyfriend, is from England and the two of them met in India. I had a fantastic time with them and they made me laugh so much! The two of them are so laid-back and they were so nice to me. They met me at the train station and we went back to their apartment. We then went out and walked the streets viewing the almost finished fallas on the streets. They were amazing hosts and I couldn't have asked for a better experience! They introduced me to a few of their friends including David and Barney from England, Matthew from France, and another couch surfer named Emma from Norway. 

From L-R(Me, Remy, Emma, Jake, Matthew)

The official start of Las Fallas was on Friday, March 15 and the festval ended on Tuesday the 19th. On Friday, we walked around the city viewing Las Fallas and the different venues on the streets. During Las Fallas, the population of Valencia increases from 1 million to almost 3 million! The streets were so full of people and at some points, it was impossible to navigate through the crowd! 

During "La Mascleta"

Saint Mary

Events of Las Fallas Festival:
8:00am: Each festival day begins with La Despertá("the wake-up call"). Bands walk through the streets and play tunes. Behind them are people throwing fireworks on the street in every direction!

2:00pm: La Mascleta: What can I say about this event..... It was absolutely crazy!! Basically, at around noon every day of the festival, people start to gather in front of the main square, where there will be a massive firework display. I attended on Saturday(but could not see very well) then one on Sunday which I was very close to the front and filmed a great video! I went to La Mascleta along on Saturday because my hosts were not in the mood to go. I showed up at around 12:30 and then I had second thoughts about staying. I was wanting to leave because I didn't want to wait for 90 minutes for the show. I attempted to escape out of the crowd, but it was impossible so I was forced to stay! Families, kids, teens, and people of all ages attend this event, although the fireworks are extremely loud(it basically sounds like bombs going off for 5 minutes). I am glad I stayed and experienced it because it was really cool to see. The ground was shaking for these 5 minutes and It was just so intense to see. 

L'Ofrena floral: In this event, the floral offering, each falla casal takes an offering of flowers to Saint Mary. This occurs all day during 17-18 March. A statue of Saint Mary and its large pedestal are then covered with all the flowers. I was not at the festival for this part, but above is a photo of Saint Mary before the flowers. 

La Cremá: This is the last night of the festival and this is when all the figures are burned down! (Like I mentioned before, I could not attend this either because I was back in Madrid studying for exams)  :


Here are some photos of a few Fallas: 

Stereotypes

Remy, Jake, and I with Xy(our pink Zebra)

Gizzy and I(Jake and Remy's dog)

The photo on the left has a funny story actually... This picture was taken in front of the bull fighting stadium and the men were charging 1 euro to take a photo with a fake bull! Well, I thought that was ridiculous, so I had Jake discretely take a photo of me in front of it. Well apparently it wasn't so discrete since everyone was staring at me giving me dirty looks because I took a photo with the bull without paying... :p

I <3 VALENCIA!!!

Valencia Nord Train Station

After Viewing Las Fallas on Friday and Saturday all day long, I decided to have a relaxing day at the beach and explore the rest of Valencia. Jake and Remy were not really in the mood to go to the beach with me, so I took the metro to the beach and took a nice walk on the boardwalk by myself. I also walked around the port of Valencia.  The weather was not very good(pretty rainy and cold) but I was stil determined to see more of Valencia since It was my last full day in the beautiful city. I spent about an hour at the beach, and then I headed over to the City of Arts and Sciences. These buildings are absolutely spectacular, having a very modern design and being the most famous buildings in Valencia.

The City of Arts and Sciences in Valencia is a unique complex devoted to scientific and cultural dissemination which is made up of five main elements: the Hemisfèric (IMAX cinema and digital projections), the Umbracle (a landscaped vantage point and car park), the Príncipe Felipe Science Museum (an innovative centre of interactive science), the Oceanográfico (the largest aquarium in Europe with over 500 marine species) and the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía (which takes care of the operatic programme). The Ágora gives the complex a multifunctional space.

After A long day walking around Valencia and touring by myself, I went back to the flat and met up with the rest of the group. It was Saint Patricks day so we went out to an Irish pub for a little while then left and roamed the streets enjoying the Fallas for one last night. We found these really awesome light tunnels! Every year, one falla is chosen to be put in a museum. The photo below was the winning Falla, so this one was not burnt down, but the rest were. It's crazy to think how these artists put so much time and effort into these works of art and then they are all just burnt to ashes at the very end of the festival!!

Winning Falla

After an awesome weekend in Valencia, I had to wake up on Monday morning and head back to Madrid. I had a train at 8am so I woke up at 7, headed to the train station, and picked my seat on the train for a 5 hour ride back to Madrid. I met a really nice English girl who sat next to me on the train. Her name is Mary and we had a nice conversation the whole way back! I had all intentions of sleeping on the train ride back, but I preferred conversing with a new friend instead of sleep. We shared stories of our experiences from the weekend and had a good laugh about a lot of the silly crazy stories. The weekend of Las Fallas was absolutely incredible and I am so happy I decided to attend! 

Take a Walk on the Wild Side

Last weekend, me, along with about 55 other Erasmus students visited the gorgeous city of Barcelona. We took a large orange double decker bus for the 8 hour ride up to Barcelona. We all met up near the Atocha metro station at 11:59pm Thursday night. Of course we didn't end up leaving until about 1 since we had to wait for everyone to show up(it's typical to be late in Spain). We started the journey and everyone was very talkative and excited for a couple hours, then it finally started to quiet down so we could try and get some sleep....7 or so hours later we arrived in Barcelona!

Big Bus!!

On the bus ride, the Erasmus leaders handed out our Itinerary for the weekend(which changed often).
The first activity on the plan was free time for breakfast. We were all so hungry so me and a few others went to a cute cafe near the hostel. We ordered some delicious sandwiches but were actually quite expensive. After breakfast, we all checked into the hostel. Some of the rooms had 8 people, some had 12 and others had 14 in one room! I stayed in a room with 14 people total! I regret bringing ear plugs considering how rowdy and loud it got at times when I wanted to sleep. But, I wasn't on this trip to sleep, I was on this excursion to explore, meet new friends, and explore wonderful Barcelona; which is exactly what I did!

Hostel

After we all settled into the hostel, we all went on a walking tour around Barcelona. The weather wasn't the best, kind of rainy and gloomy but it didn't stop us from having a splendid time on the tour.

Catedral de Barcelona

Inside Catedral

Ayuntamiento(Town hall)

Edificio de Gaudi

After the long walking tour, we had a break for lunch and me and a few other girls went to KFC. I just wanted something cheap and small since I was expecting a big dinner. After lunch, the group all met up in front of the infamous Sagrada Familia. For those of you who have no idea what that is(I didn't either) It is an absolutely magnificent cathedral built by the famous architect named Antonio Gaudi. Some pictures below of the breath-taking cathedral. 

After the miles of walking around the city, we all decided to take the metro back to the hotel since it was kind of far. We got back to the hostel and napped/got ready. Then, we went to a restaurant named Bergara 3. Dinner basically consisted of snacks and drinks. Then, we headed to a disco named Razzmatazz and danced for a little while. After that, went back to hostel and that completed the long day!

Day two started out with a handful of exhausted college students barely having the motivation to get up and eat breakfast. Most of us had the energy to get up, but a lot of people stayed in bed and slept for awhile while the rest of us took a nice long walk on the beach. On the way, we went to the harbor and stopped to watch a man play the guitar/harmonica and sing. It was such a relaxing moment. A group of about 7 of us just sat in the sun listening to his soothing voice sing some classical rock songs. Then, we went to the beach and hung out for a couple hours and ate lunch.

After the beach, we all met up along the boardwalk, boarded the bus, and headed to Park Guell. It took about 30 min to drive up there. The view from the park was absolutely stunning. You could see the whole city out to the ocean! We spent about 2 hours there. This park was also designed by Gaudi.

After the park, we headed back to the hostel. Dinner was up to ourselves this night so a group of us went to a nearby restaurant that served Paella. It was so delicious and also a decent price. That ended the night and I was looking forward to see what was in store for the following day. On Sunday, we had to check out at 10. We then headed to a picnic which a bunch of other Erasmus students from all over the country! My guess is that there were about 400 students there total. At the picnic, we there was a Castells show. Basically, it was people stacking. It was pretty entertaining. Below are pictures:

At about 3pm, we gathered up and loaded the bus. We were finally on our way home for another 8 hour bus ride back to Madrid. On the way home, I read a book and slept. I really enjoyed that trip because I met a lot of new people, experienced the beautiful city of Barcelona, and explored. The trip was amazing and hopefully I get to go on more trips with Erasmus students!