# 27 I'm back in Madrid

Hello again. Sorry but I fell off the planet for a few days. I was staying at the Spanish Ashram of the Indian Group I know and it was an excellent experience. Like the Camino, it was very disciplined, wake up at 6:00 a.m. for prayer, breakfast at 8:30, volunteer work on the Olive Grove Farm until lunch, then lunch at 1:30, rest until 3:30, then a second session of volunteer work until prayer and meditation at 6:30 or 7:00. Dinner was at 8:30. The days went flying by. Now I just got back here from Barcelona. I was there since Friday, 8/10. I enjoyed it - a walking tour (very good), a night bus tour (not worth the money I paid), got taken by making an "online reservation" for Sagrada Familia (it turned out to not be a reservation with the actual cathedral using the headset for the tour but through a travel agency and it cost 29 Euros instead of 17 and I had a live tour guide with a thick Spanish accent giving us the tour) but I did love seeing the basilica, and I also went to Monserrat - spectacular. It was the logistics that pushed me over the edge. I bought a return ticket Madrid to Barcelona by bus with an "open return". When I went to set my return date, they would not do it by telephone nor could I do it online. So I had to make it in person. Yesterday - Sunday - I checked online and it looked like there were 13 seats left spread over 3 bus trips, 1/2 hour apart - 11:00. 11:30 and 11:59 p.m. But when I get there they tell me there are no seats available until 5:00 p.m. today. I found out that my passport with the Indian visa was ready for pickup at the Indian Embassy and I needed to get back to Madrid. So I decide to take a taxi from the Bus Station to the Train Station (the driver wanted 5 Euros more than it should have been) and after I get there I find the Information Booth is closed, I cannot buy a ticket until the morning...AND they close the station so I get kicked out on the street. I decide I'll just play "street person" for a night and go to a bench and sit there next to a woman also with two small suitcases. I am so blessed that this woman became like a sister to me. She is Slovenian, works for the European Union in Alicante and was on her way back home from a vacation in Slovenia. We talked all night and had a great time. One of those suitcases was her dog, that's why she was stuck in Barcelona. She tried to find a hotel for the night and the only one who had a room was 120 Euros and she decided it was not worth in for 6 hours. She has been living in Alicante for 3 years now and spoke Spanish. This morning the saga continued with the 6:00 a.m. train sold out, the 7:00 a.m. had 3 seats and I could not buy the stupid ticket with my credit card and I tried all my cards. Meanwhile the seats are disappearing and when it got down to only one left, my "sister" offered to buy mine with her card and I paid her cash. Thank God, I got the last seat and I made it to Madrid this morning. The funny thing is there were several vacant seats on the train. It's Spain. They are just messed up! I know there were seats on those buses but their systems don't work. My "sister" agreed, that she has 6 years left to work here in Spain and she said she has learned not to fight with the taxi driver who cheats her, or get angry when there is so much noise she can't sleep. She says you have to accept it. So now I have to wait until August 27th when I fly from Madrid to Athens, Greece. I got that ticket already. I have to book a flight out of Greece or I think I may have a problem when I arrive there, it will be over 90 days since I arrived in Europe but if I can show I just want to see Greece for a few days, I should have no problem. Let me attach a few photos and I'll keep you posted on my next flight plans when I make them. Love, Marie