My Time in Barcelona: The Bad

Welcome back! Today I’ll be talking more about my time in Barcelona. In Part One I mainly spoke about the good things I experienced living there. Unfortunately, not all of it was rosy, although it certainly led to a more authentic experience living there. Here’s the bad stuff:

The August heat

People warned me that Barcelona gets quite hot during the summer. There’s nothing like actually experiencing it for yourself. Keep in mind that I was living in a student residence for two months, complete with AC. I had to move out at the end of July as my friend was going back to Trinidad. I quickly found my new apartment through an app called Badi, selecting one that came with air conditioning. However, once I finally got there, I learned that while the apartment had AC units, they preferred not to use it because it would greatly increase the electricity bill. As an alternative, there was one fan which they kept in the living room in case anyone needed it. Yikes.

Well, it was too late to do anything about it now. I had to make my bed and lie in it. A hot bed, mind you, as my first night there was a rather hot night. Unfortunately someone else took the fan before I could. I kept the windows open and slept without a bed sheet covering me for as long as I could until I could no longer take the mosquito assault. Then a few days later came the worst night ever. That night it was incredibly hot. We’re talking in the 30s (degrees Celsius). The breeze was non-existent. I slept poorly that night. I was prepared to use the AC and pay whatever I had to pay extra for the electricity used. Unfortunately, I then learned that the remote was locked away by one of the roommates when she went on vacation back to her hometown.

FML.

In the end I purchased a small little fan that took quite a while (hours) to assemble as I had trouble screwing on the fan blade. But once that baby was on the frustration was all worth it.

The strike

That first week at the apartment was also the week of my solo project. On the day that I moved in, it was incredibly hard to get a taxi to move my things as the taxi service was on strike. They were protesting against ride-sharing services like Uber and Cabify. Because the taxi drivers had been attacking the Uber and Cabify drivers, those services were also unavailable. That day I was only able to bring my carry-on with me as I had to take the metro.

Ah yes, I remember that day. It was a Sunday. After bringing my things to the apartment, I went to Codeworks to continue working on my app. I then took the metro to get back home and get the rest of my things, only to discover that it wasn’t going all the way back up to Maragall. I had to stop off at Barceloneta and walk for approximately 40 minutes to get to the stop from where the service resumed.

The next morning, I was fortunately able to get a Cabify so that I could take the rest of my things to the new apartment. At the time, all the Cabify drivers had a backup car following them with security. That’s how real the situation had gotten. Then, later that night, I stayed in Codeworks far longer than I should have. I mistakenly thought that the metro worked up to 2 AM during the week. However, by the time I got there, I learned that it only worked up to 12 AM, and I had already missed the last metro. I learned that there was a night bus that I could use, but I didn’t have cash and wasn’t sure if I could use my metro card on the bus. I tried to get a Cabify but it seemed like my luck from that morning had run out. The taxi service was also still on strike. Sadly, with no option left, I walked alone in the dark for about 42 minutes to get to my new apartment. I got home around 2 AM.

On the bright side, I was glad that I was able to get there safely. I was pleasantly surprised to see people out in the parks at that time, making out or on their phone or whatnot. Nevertheless, you can rest assured that for the rest of the week I was careful to not have any more metro issues.

The dating scene

After having worked so diligently for the past three months sans ‘distractions’, once Codeworks wrapped up, I was quite ready to jump into the dating scene there. I re-downloaded apps like Tinder and OkCupid, and quickly went to work finding potential matches. While I (unexpectedly) matched with quite a number of guys, I barely got the conversation going with most of them, some saying that they were busy travelling or didn’t use it much, something like that. In the end, I only went out with two guys. I didn’t date either of them for long.

Both guys happened to be in the tech industry. One was a web developer while the other was a quality assurance manager. Both offered to help me find a job in their company, funny enough. It’s Tinder, not LinkedIn. Still, I took them up on their offer. They both seemed rather nice in the beginning and quite interested in me, which was good.

Web developer guy was from Morocco, had a love for music, and spoke about his love of travelling to different places for their music scenes. He took me out for tapas, followed by drinks, followed by dancing. I had a lot of fun with him. Our banter was effortless and ever-flowing. While in this really cute Aztec (or was it Mayan?)-themed bar drinking these strong but sweet cocktails in these funky chalices, the guy kisses me. It was very unexpected. I was intrigued. At that point the tone of the night changed. We kept making out as we finished up our drinks, took a taxi and headed to a club to go dancing. After that night he texted me once but that was it. There was no love lost, however, as at some point I got the feeling that he reminded me of my ex in some ways, and soon lost interest.

Manager guy was from Madrid, was a bit older and seemed to be more settled in his life. He spoke of his love of riding motorcycles and playing padel. Compared to web developer guy, he seemed to be a bit more serious, or a tad stiff. But I still liked him. At least, he didn’t remind me of my ex. He reminded me a bit of the last guy I had dated and had quite liked. With this guy I wanted to take thing slow. We went out on only two dates before he started to show his true colours and intentions. Once I reiterated that I wanted to take things slow, I barely heard from him but saw him active on OkCupid. I was disappointed when I had to block and delete him.

Near the end of my stay I learned that Barcelona probably isn’t the best place to be looking for love, as it’s such a major tourist attraction with so many people coming and going. It made my leaving Barcelona hurt a slightly bit less.

Bleh, this post needs more photos

I felt like this post was rather photo-lite. I also didn’t want to end on such a bad note. So here are some more fantastic moments from my trip:

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To be continued …

In the next post, I’ll talk about the ‘ugly’ side of Barcelona due to some of the things I went through, and wrap up this tale. Catch you in the next one!