Thursday the 8th of November, written by all of the teachers in this project =D

Greetings from Barcelona!! "Short" summary of all the things happened so far:

Monday (arrival day):
The British pupils who had arrived on Sunday spent the day with their Spanish friends at IE Jacint Verdaguer School while pupils from Hungary, Germany, Slovakia and Finland flew in from their countries, had a little walk around the center of Barcelona and finally arrived by train at Sant Sadurní D'Anoia at 7 pm and almost 11 pm. We had the most fantastic and warm welcome at the station. All the host-families and the Spanish pupils were waiting for us and everyone was so happy to start the project by getting to know our new friends. Many of the students already learned about the Spanish way of life because they were taken for a walk into town by their new friends. They found out that Spanish families dine very late and tried the first typical Spanish food...

Tuesday:
For some of us it was an early morning ... because we met at 8.30 at the train station to go on a trip to Vilafranca and learn something about making wine, cava and the jobs connected to this most important industry of this area. Most of the information at the wine museum was given in Spanish and Catalan and that was the first opportunity for shared work: the Spanish pupils translated for their new friends and answered any question as best as they could.
When we arrived back at Sant Sadurní D'Anoia later and rounded up the information about wine making by visiting the CIC Fassina Center of Cava Interpretation. Using interactive tables, looking and touching the big heads used for the important fil-loxera-festival on the 7th on September and watching a film we realized how important the wine industry is for the town and area. This was also emphasized by the mayor who told us that in one way or another 70-80% of the population of Sant Sadurnï D'Anoia depends on the cava industry.
The pupils were free to spend the afternoon and evening with their new friends while the teachers were able to visit a famous cava cellar.

Wednesday:
An interesting day in Barcelona which included a visit to Parc Güell and Sagrada Familia - both famous works by Antoní Gaudí and a walk through some of the most interesting streets of Barcelona. Everybody was impressed, exhausted and ready for some time with sports and friends by the time we took our return train to Sant Sadurní D'Anoia at a quarter past five. Many were watching the Champions League match between Barcelona FC and Celtic Glasgow - a sad night for all the Barça fans.

Thursday at school:
We had all been looking forward to this day at the Spanish school. After the official welcome by the headmaster we listened to a very interesting speech by a local person - talking about his own life he focused on the advantages of growing up speaking and learning various languages.
The Spanish pupils had prepared very interesting presentations about the school, town and vine industry. We were able to visit all the rooms ... we were really impressed by the amount of computers and technology the Spanish students are able to use for their work - even the preschool children were already working with a Smart Board! How we would like to be able to work like this ...
Now it was time go through all the information received during the last days, to write down results, prepare posters and  and to formulate questions. The pupils worked in mixed groups, coming up with great ideas and the project is moving on ...