"What is our life?!"

I really should have wrote this immediately after the events of last weekend so bear with me as I try to hash out as many details as I can remember. I'll start with Saturday. My friend Casey, probably my best friend here, and I woke up early (for once) and headed to Playa San Juan which is the nice beach here in Alicante. Basically it's nicer because it's HUGE and the sand and water are cleaner than Postiguet, the beach closer to downtown and my house. We arrived around 10:15 AM, posted up in a quiet spot by the water and passed out for 3 hours. When I finally woke up I realized it was 1 PM and I was sweating. My friend Olivia who was also there, and I swam for about 10 minutes and then I passed out again...until 4 PM. There is nothing more peaceful than falling asleep in the sun, listening to the waves crash on the shore. We finally decided to wake up and head home since we were starving and realized we had been sleeping literally all day. After lunch and quick nap, my friend Sara asked me if I wanted to go out to dinner with her and her Spanish friends around 10 at one of my favorite restaurants "100 Montaditos." It serves "montaditos" which are mini-sandwiches and they have my favorite drink, a jar of tinto de verano. Sara, Casey, Natalie and I headed there around 10 and met her friends, 3 girls and a guy, who were extremely welcoming and personable. I really enjoyed practicing my Spanish with them and then seemed really interested in us as well. They taught us some Spanish slang which I enjoy learning, it helps me blend in with the Spanish youth. One of my favorite parts of the conversation was when Stefanie said, "I want to go to the US because you guys have more famous people, like Katy Perry." They had just purchased tickets to a concert in Madrid for another musical group and said that a lot of famous people don't come through Spain. I was like, "Yea, but you have Shakira!" They all stopped and stared at me. I started nerviously laughing and asked, "Don't you like Shakira?" To which they replied, "Yes she is okay." It was so funny. We also taught them how to shotgun a beer but the word for "shotgun" in Spanish is "pistola" which sounded hilarious to them. Speaking of guns, we had a big discussion on the difference in gun control laws in Spain and the U.S. It is impossible, or almost, for a young person to get their hands on guns in Spain because carrying firearms is illegal and people just don't do it. Contrary to the US where people think they have a right to carry an arm to defend themselves. Why is it then that innocent people end of up getting hurt? I don't know the logistics of it, but last night I found out from my brother that a high school student committed suicide in Winterset. Hunter ran cross country with him and apparently he didn't seem like the kid who would do that, then again, they never do. My first thought was how did he get the weapon? Thankfully no one else was hurt. I am a full-blooded American and believe in the Constitution, however, something has to be done to prevent young people from getting their hands on firearms and using them to do harm. A school shooting is in the news for a few days and then we forget about it or everyone thinks "that would never happen here." It's time to stop being naive and start facing the facts.

After our intense discussion about differences between the States and Spain, the Spanish students left to go home because they had exams this week. Sara, Sylive- who came to meet us later- and I had just finished exams so we were looking forward to going out. After dos besos to all the Spaniards, we headed to our favorite bar, Goa. We know the bartenders here, Sergio and Claudio, but unfortunately we d0n't get any free drinks. Thankfully, everything is literally 1 Euro. Sylvie and I are tired so we decide not to drink because I am going hiking with Sara, Casey and Lindsay the next day. We move on to Havanna Barrio which is another one of our favorite hang outs. However, this night all we wanted to do was use their bathroom (it's nice and actually has toliet paper). Walking out was the second time Sylive and I looked at each other and said, 'We should probably head home soon." Just then, a woman asked us if we wanted to ride in a limo. We asked, "¿Cómo?" She tried speaking in broken English which was actually harder to understand her than Spanish. She said they were promoting a new magazine, gave us wrist bands and told us to go stand out in front of KFC to wait for the limo. Sara was like, "OK!" I was like, "Eh this is sketchy but we'll check it out." And Sylvie said, "Guys, no this is weird and sketch." Just then Sara saw her "friend" Pierre who I guess she met literally one time before that. She was convinced it would be fine since she knew him and he was working for this campaign as well. Before heading out of the barrio to find our limo, we were asked to get a picture with the mascot bunny. See below:

Sure enough after about 20 minutes of waiting and meeting new Spanish friends who assured us it was safe, we were in the limo with an open bar. It was awesome! We drove around Alicante for about 45 minutes saying out loud, "What is our life?!"

Sara, Me, Sylvie and our new friend Natalie in the limo

After that, our new friends, Natalie and Stefanie invited us to come out with them. This was the 3rd time Sylvie and I tried to leave and go home, but in reality, we were having a blast and didn't want to leave. We went to a few clubs before they finally took us to one I had never been to before called "5 Avenida." It was actually on a side street on the way to my casa. We were there until about 4:30..yes, AM when Sylvie and I FINALLY decided we needed to go home, if we were going to be in any shape at all to go hiking. We literally turned around to leave the dance floor and a guy offered us two champagne glasses and a bottle. He was like, "I have too many so you guys can have this one for free!" Are you kidding me?!? How does this night keep getting better. We stayed for another half hour and finally headed home around 5, both of us laughing about the events of the night, completely in love with Alicante and the Spanish lifestyle.