What did we learn...?

This project with INS Montmeló was great. Spanish students visited us in April 2019 and this blog is about our visit to Montmeló in October 2019.

The feedback from our students:
* Everyone loved the visit to Circuit!
* We had lots of activities which was great.
* All students learnt about the cultural differences. Such as eating timetable with two breakfasts. Also food was different: meat and sausages looked strange and all Spanish students ate lot of sugar in their foods.
* This trip reminded us, that in Finland small children are taught the healthy diet.
* One said that these kinds of projects make you feel proud and happy with your own culture. Those issues you have learnt to take for granted, will be appreciated when you monitor them while you are abroad.
* Catalan people seems to have more outgoing personalities, as we heard them shouting to each other in the car or at home. We also got some information of Catalan's political situation with the big demostrations and differences in the political views.
* All the sights we saw were the best!
* Food was good.
* The sun was wonderful.
* The warmth was amazing!
* Our group had a great group coherence, it was so much fun to travel with these people!!
* Spanish are often late.
* Spanish smoke everywhere, also indoors and at school yard. This seems odd to us.
* We will appreciate our own high school more after this, because our school looks modern with good facilities.

Thursday 31.10.2019

Travelling home...
We left Montmeló at 7.34 with a train to airport. All our host students were there to say goodbye to us...

At the airport wasn't much time left for shops.. as the bus to our terminal and security check some time...

The flight was again good, we slept a little and watched the scenery.

And finally we had the bustrip to home!! 👍😊

Wednesday 30.10.2019

Wednesday was our last day in Montmelo. In the morning we visited Mons Observans which is a museum on a mountain in Montmeló. The place was built by ancient Romans but now there were only remains left.

We were taught how Roman kids use to play different games with nuts. And we tried some of these games. They were harder than you could imagine, it was not easy to win...

After that we visited local primary school were we met young students and they had prepared questions for us about Finland. These pupils had a also a prezi-questionnaire about Catalan issues.. they wanted to see what our students have learnt during this visit! 😉

In INS we saw and heard a music performance with drums. The drumming sounded very loud. After this Mamen gave certificates for each student.

 In the evening we went to La Sagrada Familia, church in Barcelona. It was really big, and on our opinion for the first look it was kind of odd and confusing but once we heard the story about it, it made much more sense. Inside the church we saw the Gaudi's masterpiece. Incredibly well made stunning details and the size of the building really surprised us in positive way. It was one of the most beautiful things we had ever seen.

It was great that we could have the audio-guide-system during the tour! That way we got good information, and surprisingly we could have in Finnish👍 Our tehcnical assistant was Mamen...😊

After the train-metro combination we arrived in Montmeló and the last evening's party could begin...

Tuesday 29.10.2019

On Tuesday we visited Camp Nou which is FC Barcelona's, Barça's, home stadium. It was really impressive. Unfortunately we couldn't go to the field because it was game day, which maked us really sad. But we saw the field from the terrace.

The museum had lots of trophies and there was five golden shoes, which Messi got because he made most goals in one season of all players in European Leagues. 

Atmosphere in the Barça museum was impressive because all dramatic music and great pictures and videos of dramatic football moments.

Then we headed back to school and had lunch with hosts. After lunch we had a discussion about Spanish educational system.

At 4 p.m. the parents us all to Montmeló Circuit!! The visit was absolutely amazing: super-great guide with good humour, great scenery from the VIP terrace  over to the track!👍 Fast cars were having testdrives, and so we saw how the system works...

Our guide told us the many occupations they have in the Circuit. About 30 permanent workers handle the managemental and economical tasks. Each car stable bring their own mechanical and engineer staff wirh them when there is a testdrive or a competition.

It was interesting to hear and experience the sounds of cars in track and feel the whole athmosphere. This was extremely fabulous visit for us. Some of us even said this was better than seeing the Eiffel in Paris... this was heaven, they said!

We felt like winners... 😅

Monday 28.10.2019 in Barcelona

On Monday we visited Barcelona!
We took the train-metro-bus combination from Montmeló to reach first the Park de Güell...

On the way we tasted hot zurros with chocolate.. that was wery sweet and heavy ☺

We did a little sightseeing. We went to see Antoni Gaudi's architecture and masterpieces and beautiful Catholic church.

The absolute best thing about Barcelona was Gaudi's masterpieces. The flowing shapes of the structures and surfaces creates fascinating and extremely calming athmosphere. The mosaic pattern is just simply beautiful to look at.

Rest of the evening was spent in a huge shopping centre.....

And here is the result of it:

Sunday 27.10.2019 in Tossa de Mar

Sunday was a day in Tossa de Mar with all the families. We playded beach volleyball, and hostparents were also playing.

We had lunch together in a restaurant. We had 4 starters, the main course and a dessert..

We took group photos up in the castle.