I’m a very bad blogger (lazy; that’s the word). So I’ve just finished with all of my academic activities at Institut d’Études Politiques de Paris a.k.a. Sciences Po Paris as an erasmus mundus exchange student here. Now I’m literally having massive free time, let’s see if I really could write as if I’m a good blogger.

I would start to share my trip experiences first (yeah that’s what I actually do in here :p)

October 20-23, 2011

Aussie (my exchange mate from UGM as well) and I booked the tickets for our very first trip while we’re in Europe. We took Vueling Airlines (a Spanish airline) to fly to Barcelona from Paris. I would say that it’s like Air Asia, they have low prices but quite nice facilities are provided. We got the tickets for €45.49 (Paris to Barcelona) and €35.49 (Barcelona to Paris), those were the cheapest ones we found according to www.skyscanner.net (the website I usually go to to find cheapest tickets for the whole year!) Since our flight from Paris was around at 8 or 9, we decided to stay overnight at…. the Paris-Orly Airport! Ok that was quiet spontaneous decision since we actually were supposed to stay at a friend’s flat who lives in Antony (close to the Orly Airport) but I randomly proposed to stay overnight at the airport, knowing that it would much safer for us to avoid being late, and I thought it would be cool (no?) to stay at the airport just like what the US’ Amazing Race reality TV show’s contestants do in most of the episodes :p We took the RER (Paris commuting train) to Antony station, and changed to OrlyVal (the shuttle automatic train to the airport) which I found fuking expensive for the distance that wasn’t too far! It was €8.30 for one single trip. Voila, we tried to sleep at the airport, found some other passengers who were likely to have an early flight as we had there. At 23.00, we were cool, like, “Oh this will be just fine, it’s not too cold, we’re gonna get a good sleep..”, the first 30 minutes were okay, the next one was like “Oh ok, I think we need to find the best position to sleep at this bench (since it has separators which made us unable to lay on the bench)”, the next 2 hours..we didn’t really sleep, but then on the next (about) an hour, I felt like I was really sleeping until there was a moment when Aussie and I were woken up by.. the cold temperature! Brrrr… I was so unprepared for that since I thought the heater’s supposed to be on. Ok enough, that was fun, eh? 

We didn’t queue on the check-in counter, we did that online, so we just straightly went to the boarding gate. It was my bad to bring shampoo and soap which were more than 100ml (I just stupidly brought the new ones for the trip), and those were all taken by the officer -___- but still didn’t get the point why they took my toothpaste as well! We argued but that didn’t work, so I literally just bring my toothbrush for my self-hygienic over the trip.

Around 10.30, we arrived in Barcelona! Hola, bienvenida! The Barcelona-El Prat airport has more modern look than what Paris has. This might be because they just renovated it. In Barcelona, all of the flights are centered to this airport, while in Paris, most of local flights and cheap airlines are centered in Orly, while Charles de Gaulle Airport is more to the international and first class flights, and for the most-cheapest ones are centered in Beauvais Airport, which is much further than the other 2, and took an hour from Paris.

We were waiting for Putri (an exchange mate from the same program in UGM) at the airport while she was processing her resident permit at the police office. Aussie and I went around the airport and it was really cool to see so many official Barcelona FC’s stores!

Our first destination after having a little brunch at the airport and lunch at the McDonalds near to the city center was Camp Nou Stadium! It was a breath-taking experience to be able to go to the Europe’s no.1 team’s stadium. Though I’m not a really soccer fan, it was still a moment I had much goosebumps of! The tickets to go inside of the stadium was actually around 20 something, but Putri asked to the ticket counter officer that we’re still students and he allowed us to purchase the reduced-price ticket for €15 

We couldn’t hide our enthusiastic feeling, we were super ecstatic over it!

The first part of that legendary stadium was the museum. We could see the journey of the team’s history from the beginning up to now. 

[The Vuvuzela from the last World Cup]

After the museum, we had nothing in mind but to see the soccer field! So we directly went to the tribunes where the reduced-price-tickets visitor got the access.

While the recorded-sound of supporters were playing, we ran out to the tribunes and….

I gotta honest to myself, I was fully amazed! I used to see Messi kicking off the ball at this field, and now I see it directly!

After taking pictures at the tribunes, we decided to go back inside to enjoy more of the museum. But wait, we thought it wouldn’t be a bad thing just to try our luck to go inside again by going through the full-price visitors’ access. Fingers crossed and, woohoo! The officer just checked our tickets like nothing and we were allowed to go inside while we didn’t even purchase the full price ones :p that is luck hha.

It was really great feeling we

had to see the conference hall where the players do the press conference, their shower rooms (with the jacuzzi), their prayer room, and even the commentator’s room!

[The conference hall]

[The player’s jacuzzi]

[The player’s praying room]

[The player’s bench!!]

Visca Barça!

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Sagrada Família was our next destination! The church was designed by Gaudí, who was died before the construction completes. The unique thing of this UNESCO’s world heritage is that it is still under construction. This is projected to complete in the cennetial of Gaudí’s death, which will be around 2026 if I’m not mistaken.

To be continued, bed time is coming, just keep refreshing on this page, will continue it again tomorrow hha