Here he is!
The story of that mysterious green bottle (and why Kuya Adler is so happy to be holding it) will come at a later time.
Ever since we met Tyler in Japan over a month ago, we’ve been devoid of seeing anyone familiar. When we told our family and friends about our crazy round the world trip, we invited them to join us for a leg or two and Kuya Adler was the only person who took us up on that offer.
It almost felt like we were on our way home as our taxi driver shuttled through the streets of Barcelona to our apartment for the next week.We were so excited to see him and spend the next ten days running amok throughout Spain together.
Of course we got lost on the way there so Kuya Adler and Kitty, our host, were waiting for us when we arrived. She gave us a really comprehensive overview of the area and our sweet apartment (check out the view!).
Just like we were in Philly, we quickly dug into some snacks and a bottle of red wine (a gift from Kitty), and spent the rest of the afternoon catching up and mapping out the rest of our stay.
As you can see the “mapping out” part didn’t really happen as the map served as both our tablecloth and coaster. We had to stop ourselves from finishing all the snacks (but not the wine, of course) because we embarked on a quest for tapas later that evening that remained undocumented.
Why? Because we heeded our wise Kuya’s warnings that our first celebratory evening might get out of hand and we wouldn’t want any liabilities.
Smart move, but nothing got too wild that night. We learned the art of eating pintxos (tapas). Well. It’s not really an art but a pretty genius idea. Take what you wish from the plates of bite sized deliciousness on the bar or carried around by waiters and keep the toothpick connected to each pintxo. Pay when you’re stuffed. We quickly caught on to this idea and stealthily positioned ourselves by the kitchen door (it was crowded) so we got first dibs at literally the hottest offerings. Nearly 30 pintxos and several glasses of tinto verano later (another remarkable concoction: red wine + fanta!) we called it quits and moseyed back to the apartment.
Today was truly about the transformation from being “on vacation” to out “on holiday”. We were ecstatic to be in Spain because it was on the top of our “We HAVE to go there” list and we were anxious to return to a very familiar tongue considering our month in South America. The enthusiasm was even more heightened my the presence of one of our favorite cousins, despite his oft infamous ability to prompt some crazy and unwillingly forgotten nights.
This is going to be fun.