2 posts tagged “spain”
Now that I've had a chance to get organized again, I thought I'd post some photos from Barcelona. Enjoy!
One thing I love about visiting foreign countries is noticing the little things that indicate what a different perception they have... for example, you'd never see a beer vending machine in the U.S.
I took this photo from the Fira (Barcelona's convention center), where the show was being held. The building is the National Art Museum of Catalonia.
View of the city, from the steps of the museum. As you can see, Samsung took over the city in advertising. They even had little Smart cars wrapped with their advertising.
A sampling of Barcelona's fine food. If you like ham, this is the place to be!
Bicycles are everywhere and easy to rent.
Here are a couple photos showcasing the ironwork I saw.
It is really difficult to properly catch La Sagrada Familia on film. But if you go to Barcelona, this is a must-see -- it is a heartbreaking work of staggering genius (I really mean that). Clear at least a few hours to explore it - it's completely worth all of your attention. I liked exploring it alone, with the audio tour.
And finally, here are some photos I shot when just strolling around town. The first is Las Ramblas, the touristy pedestrian walkway. It is pretty central, but I could skip walking the street on my next trip. You kind of get the feeling of an upscale Tijuana there. The sencond and third photos are 2 different apartment complexes designed by Gaudi.
These were taken in the Born district (one of my favorite neighborhoods to hang out in):
Parting shot, a view from one of the towers in La Sagrada Familia:
Howdy ho neighbors,
I've returned from my 9-day excursion to Barcelona, Spain. What a ride. I went for work -- to attend and work at my company's biggest trade show, Mobile World Congress.
MWC was a unique show to attend. Everyone in the industry attends. Which means that at any given time, there are about four languages being spoken in our booth. Pretty cool. You really meet people from all over the world, which to me (a former anthropology major) was the funnest part. I got to hang out with my co-workers from France, Germany and Finland. They always teach me a few phrases in their respective languages so I'm building up quite a vocabulary. We also did 2 major annoucements, including a hardware device we released. It's about the size of a matchbox, and it turns any Wi-Fi enabled phone into a mobile TV phone. You just put it in your pocket, and it receives and transcodes mobile TV signals, and sends them wirelessly to any WiFi device (laptop, PMP, phone, etc.). We demonstrated it on an iPhone.
The trip was also a terrific chance to bone up on my Spanish. I was a Spanish minor in college, and took 7 years of it. I have lost a lot of it, but by the end of the week I was holding pretty decent conversations in Spanish. I would love to go live in Spain for at least a few months some day.
I'm planning on posting some photos later on once I've got them off my camera. Here are some trip highlights:
- La Sagrada Familia -- The single most amazing thing I've ever seen. I've never seen a more inspired piece of architecture, something that draws forth so much emotion. Increible. I spent hours there and could have spent all day, just absorbed in it.
- Coffee -- it's hard to find a bad cup of coffee in Barcelona, even in places like the airport.
- Speaking with people from all over the world
And finally, coming home to my honey was nice. He's a real romantic. He planned a spa day for us yesterday... complete with couples massage, champagne and chocolate-covered strawberries. It was soooo nice.
Trade show season is soon, thankfully, coming to a close. I've got one more big show in Vegas in 6 weeks, and then we get the summer off and I can return to my normal pace of work. Ah. And then maybe I can actually see my friends!
