Weekend in Madrid

Currently I’m on the train. First, I got on the wrong one. Well technically speaking the first time I got on the train was to go from the bus station to the pot shop and that train, well that time I got it right. And I didn’t get lost walking to the pot shop because I wrote it down on a piece of paper and reminded myself that when I come out of the subway (it’s actually called the metro in Spain which Mercedes says is the best metro system in the entire world but I haven’t fact checked that yet…) So yeah - when I come out of the subway I should walk the opposite way of McDonald’s and then bam I got there with no problems. But then I got high and so I accidentally went to the opposite side of the correct side of the subway. The bus station, the pot shop, and my hostel are all along line 1 which is a light blue color. I did not plan it this way at all - that’s pure coincidence. But if happens to be my magnificent ass karma coming in some weird ass form again then shoutout to my karma. So clutch, always. But is it though? Because the Saturday bus schedule from Torrelaguna to Madrid says there’s a bus at noon, which I definitely didn’t even intend to aim for that one. And then the next bus says it comes at 1:30. I was there since like 1:06 and it never came. The 1:30 bus went MIA because it wasn’t until the next scheduled bus at 2:15 that I was finally able to make the one hour journey to Madrid. But what came at 1:30 instead was a conversation with a girl named Nikki, who is from the Philippines. She had asked me if she was at the right bus stop, but only she asked me in Spanish (and told me she thought I was Spanish, oh yeah!) and so that’s when I learned that she spoke English too. And we chatted a bit and both were left confused to why the bus didn’t come at 1:30. I suppose it didn’t come because we were meant to continue chatting. Nikki is working in the small village about two kilometers outside of Torrelaguna, I couldn’t tell ya the name, but aunt Cris lives there too. So we exchanged contact information and we both were happy to not be alone or thinking we’re in the wrong place because the 1:30 bus didn’t show (1/30 is also my birthday…). She asked me if I knew anyone in Madrid and I told her I did not. She called me brave for going some place where I don’t know anyone. I told her I can always meet new people in these places but also, I don’t really have any other choice but to be brave. So little does she know, her kind words really stuck with me because just because I have to be brave in order to survive, that doesn’t mean I’m not scared as well.

Anyways so, I didn’t know that I was going the wrong way on the train until we made a stop. I’m not sure if this next train was the last one too cus I saw a lady running to catch it but I walked to the other side, which I’m sure we’ve all had to do once or twice in our lives even in our own cities, and bam right when I got to the bottom step, the train was there and the doors opened. Yessss! Thank you timing!! - usually you’re trash. I’m just kidding. So, it was solid.

Now I’m sitting on a cement block because I just exited the metro at the Anton Martin stop, which is the stop closest to my hostel. I needed to find out where my hostel is on the map so I decided to pause for a second and check out my new surroundings. I literally opened up “maps” and remembered that ‘not high Jerrica’ marked the location of my hostel on the map. I love myself! I probably marked it and was like “you’ll thank yourself later for this.” LOL. So I started walking to my hostel, high as all fuck lost somewhere in a song, and dipped down an alley to pause for a second and see what was in the alley because European alleys are my favorite. Sometimes when I’m jamming to music, I walk past my destination and I’m totally okay with that when it happens. But somehow the alley way I chose at random is the alleyway that my hostel is located on. Apparently I’m right on time. I put up another ‘protect your peace’ sticker under some words that said “2 face” before checking in to my very aesthetically pleasing hostel.

When I got to my room, the lights were out and one guy appeared to be taking a little siesta so I kept them off. I looked at every single bed, I swear I did! But I saw every single number except for #8 and I’m not so sure how I could have bed #8 when there isn’t one. I must have cursed under my breath or something close to that because the kid got up and helped me find my bed. Why am I like this? Ha. He also told me that my voice sounded familiar so he really got up because he thought he knew me. He didn’t. Everyone always thinks they “know me from somewhere,” maybe that’s why strangers always be talking to me everyyyywhere I go. I don’t know. But I enjoyed chatting with him. He’s from India but lives in Germany and is some form of an engineer but calls himself “a simple guy.” He talked about not having more than he needs and is happy to stay in hostels as opposed to swanky hotels. He gets to travel Europe at anytime for free through his company though sooo apparently someone should have told me, a math whiz who tutored people in math during high school and college, to major in Engineering… but ya know, it is what it is. I asked him if he wanted to go back to sleep and that I didn’t mind if he had the light off. He told me I was a good person to carry a conversation with and so he’d rather continue chatting instead of sleeping. More kind words from strangers so thank you because again, it was what I needed at the time. He obviously can speak his native language and English because he’s from India but he can also speak fluent German because he’s lived there for so long. I asked him if he knew any other languages and he told me that he’s learning Korean and I love this new friend even more because I can speak a little Korean and everyone knows how much I love Korea overall.

The sole purpose of me taking the bus into Madrid on this weekend was to become a member at a pot shop, and I accomplished that. Members get free edibles on Saturdays so I ate mine and kept it low-key for the rest of the night, although I got invited to a pub crawl. My body’s timing woke me up early the next morning and instead of fighting it for more sleep, I got up and got ready. I was able to adventure around Madrid with no real destination in mind- just walking around and looking at some cool shit, trying new snacks, appreciating new styles of architecture, getting in tune with nature, and jamming out to music of course. It was Sunday and mornings are pretty dead on Sundays and lots of things stay closed all day as well. I didn’t start to see much human life until about 9:30AM so this was 20,000 steps worth of a solid morning if you ask me. I met up with the family later on this day and the kids were a little aggy because yesterday they went kayaking so they were tired. Of course they want to take a weekend off of construction work the weekend I choose to go away. My life, always an adventure. It’s only 5PM on Monday now and so many things have happened already, of course. But I’ll write about those maybe tomorrow or something. So, to the person reading this now, I hope your weekend was filled with adventures just as mine was. Peeeaaceeee!