BLOOMINGTON, Ind. - IU volleyball standout Katie Pollom is studying abroad in France this semester and has graciously agreed to chronicle her time in Europe throughout the semester for IUHOOSIERS.com. This is the fifth installment of her diary series.

"Right now, I'm sitting in a youth hostel called the Kabul in Barcelona, Spain. I am nearing the end of my winter vacation, and I have learned and seen so much in the past week.

Last Friday, I left France for London and spent five days speaking English again! I had to get used to cars driving on the other side of the road (leaving the airport on the shuttle bus, my heart nearly stopped when I thought we were going to be hit by an oncoming car...then I realized we were supposed to drive on the LEFT side of the road!). I picked up many British phrases and vocabulary and even made a two-page list of all the new words I learned. We were lucky enough to stay with locals in London...however, the city is huge so we still had to commute everyday into central London. We saw all of the touristy things like the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, London Bridge, the Tower of London, and Kensington Palace. We spent an afternoon at Camden Market, which made for some great people watching...I think there were more tattoo parlors than restaurants on this strip filled with some very interesting people. We spent the Chinese New Year in China Town in London and ate at a Chinese restaurant. One of the girls we stayed with was from Hong Kong and she taught us so much about the culture.

In London I also saw a British play called The History Boys, which was very funny although I didn't understand all of the British humor! I ate some very British dishes including steak-and-ale pie and fish and chips (which I learned means fries in British English...and crisps are chips). I went to a salsa lesson taught by a Cuban man who is one of the best dancers I have ever seen...then we got to practice our newly learned salsa at the club...this was definitely one of my favorite activities in London!

We moved to a different house on Monday and stayed with eight flat-mates who were all contemporary dancers at a dance school in London...they were all very interesting, creative, and artistic people and gave us (me and my two travel partners) more tips on things to see and do in the city.

Wednesday, I spent most of the day traveling (trains and a plane) to Barcelona. We met up with five other people here in Spain. The language barrier is a little difficult sometimes since none of us speak Catalan, a mixture of Spanish and French that is spoken here. We´ve been able to get by just fine though.

Yesterday, we saw the largest attraction here in Barcelona; the Temple Sagrada Familia (the temple of the Sacred Family) designed by Antoni Gaudi (as in, that´s so Gaudi...we get that saying from him!) His artwork and influence is apparent everywhere I go in this city. Today we visited a beautiful music hall called Palau de la Musica Catalana and got a tour in English. We also went to an enormous park called Park Guell, which was largely designed by Gaudi as well. Both Gaudi and Salvador Dali´s artwork is very famous in this region. The designs inside the Cheesecake Factory are in Gaudi fashion to give you some idea of what type of work he does.... it is almost cartoon-like but so interesting to look at.

Ok, I better get off of this computer so someone else can use it...there are only five computers here at the hostel. The hostel is filled with student-aged people from all over the world. In fact, the room I'm staying in holds about 12 people so we're sharing it with some strangers.... who just happen to be French! So we've been able to keep practicing our French while teaching them some English at the same time.

Tomorrow is my last day in Spain and Sunday I will spend traveling (on a bus for eight hours back to Aix...not really looking forward to that!) Have a great weekend and I'll write when I get back to France.

Adios,
Katie"