It wasn’t planned to visit Spain at all, but after I have given it a deep thought, i found out that within nearby -from Switzerland- European countries I’ve already been to 10 cities in Switzerland, to France & Germany, Italy is not an option since I promised mum not to go without her, and Austria I have a feeling that I’ll get bored if I go there alone on a 4 days trip. I thought about going to Croatia since I daydream of hiking at Plitvice national park but flights were insanely expensive and by train, it was a 14 hours journey in addition to approximately 8 extra hours to get to Plitvice, torturous it is especially that I’ll be alone. My sister suggested that I go to Spain, everyone I know who has been to Barcelona told me that it’s a super cool city, flight tickets were cheap, accommodation as well, I’ll get to visit Camp Nou, my friend Urs telling me Do it, do it, life couldn’t be any better…Barcelona here I come!!!

I decided to go to Basel to spend the night there, then take a flight to Barcelona the next morning, after being offered to stay at a colleague’s place in Basel, I decided not to accept her invitation as we are not close friends, though her house is big and she lives next to the airport i felt that it was inconvenient as she gave birth to a new baby boy only a few weeks ago.

Booked a night at YMCA hostel 5 minutes walk from the main train station from where I should take the bus to the airport. Arrived safely to Basel, the hostel was pretty nice, one of the tidiest and cleanest hostels that I have ever been to, situated in a very calm area. The owner was named Hassan, I could tell from his looks that he is Turkish or Kurdish, or from somewhere near this area, there was a big lounge with LCDs, wifi connection and tea & coffee served free all day long. I headed directly to my room, but once I stepped in I highly doubted that I was at the females dorms, since there was a sound of snoring that sounded very high, strong and manly to the extent that I stared at the sleepy creatures’ bodies to identify whether they are males or females.

Two other ladies entered the room; an Asian -probably Chinese- and a European -probably german- also stunned at what they were hearing, staring at me with a “what the fuck?” look on their faces. We couldn’t stop ourselves from laughing hysterically, it was crazy the snoring was insanely intense. I had a cup of tea, got my clothes ready for tomorrow  and read a bit about things to do in Barcelona in my “Europe on a shoestring guide” by Lonely Planet, but every time I tried to focus a lousy snore would distract me and make me laugh hysterically, had a hard time to get myself to sleep, and from that day on i decided to never sleep in a shared room without having earplugs on.