MaureenB

My daughter will have her semester abroad in Spring 2006. Her top two choices are Florence, Italy, or Barcelona, Spain. Both are comparable academically for her needs. Any recommendations based on safety, proximity to other places of interest, public transit, general lifestyle in each area, cost of living, etc.?

Kate_W

Not one of your listed factors, but one thing to consider would be how important it is to her to develop a facility in a foreign language. On the one hand, Spanish is probably more useful (because it's spoken in many more places than Italian is). On the other, many of the residents in Barcelona don't speak "Castilian" (what we call Spanish); they speak Catalan. Many residents in the city are bilingual, but it might be a bit confusing for a novice Spanish student - she won't be as consistently surrounded by Spanish as she would be consistently surrounded by the sound of Italian in Florence. (Of course, if her friends and roommates are American, she probably won't learn much of anything at all.)

MaureenB

That's a really good point. She has taken Spanish classes since elementary school, but will she not understand Catalan? Her school will be a branch of her American college, so I assume mostly English-speaking students and professors. I guess half the fun of it is learning to get along with the language differences. She will be getting some humanities and creative writing credits, so the experience will feed her creativity!

suec1

We were in Barcelona in May - most written information is in Spanish and Catalan - I spoke my limited Spanish and never had anyone respond in Catalan so I really don't think that is much of a factor. Barcelona is more of a BIG / cosmopolitan city. Either would be a wonderful place to spend an extended amount of time and would be convenient for traveling to plenty of wonderful side trips. From Barcelona its not hard to get to parts of France - Florence might limit her more to Italy. It might just come down to her personal preference for the culture - my daughter loves Italy and HATES Spain - the food has alot to do with it for her. You are making plans to visit her where ever she goes, aren't you? SueC1

Kate

They're both fab places for students, so she really isn't going to go wrong. They both have LARGE young student populations and get their fair share of young backpackers. Florence has more in the culture stakes (remember that 60% of the world's most famous art apparently lives in Italy, and 90% of that in Florence), whilst Barcelona is a BIG party town. Very popular for weekend parties of hen and stag nighters from the UK (what you would call Bachelor parties) mainly because the nightlife only gets started at 10pm and basically goes on all night.

So she'll never get bored...

I'd say Florence has more interest for seeing other famous Italian cities (easy, cheap trains to Rome, Venice, Milan etc). Florence is 'probably' safer, but neither place needs to be a major concern. They're comparable cost wise. I'd say 'good' cheap food is more available in Florence, but then I'm not a major fan of Spanish food.

leahinsc

Dear Maureen, I lived in Barcelona in the early 80's as an au pair and visited about 10 yrs ago (early 90's). The city was magical in the 80's and even more so in the 90's after being cleaned up for the Olympics. It has become more Catalan-ized as the earlier posts observed and while your daughter will understand some of it, it is a different language altogether. I would go back to Barcelona in a heart beat and have found everyone who spent anytime there says the same. Having never been to Florence I can't really say how the 2 compare. Barcelona is and always has been a very sophisticated, artistic, literary but fun loving big city. My vote is for Barcelona!

MaureenB

Thanks for the helpful, informative replies!
Yes, we'll probably go over to meet her at the end of her semester-- that seems to be our preference (and hers).
I think Madrid is also a front-runner. How is it there?
It seems like a long way off, but she needs to commit next semester, and get her credits and budget pre-planned.
Wish I was still 19!

leahinsc

I'm still voting for Barcelona. Madrid always seemed like it was in the middle of nowhere to me. From Barcelona you can go down the coast, into the Pyrenees, into France...not to mention to the Baleric Islands.

MaureenB

Thanks again. Barcelona does sound like a much better location than Madrid.

flanneruk

This surely has to be a no-brainer.

First, let's be clear that on your criteria, they're almost a wash (but only if you regard Barcelona's closeness to beaches on a par with Florence's proximity to the few bits of the world's greatest art that aren't actually in the city already)

On the one hand, THE single most important city in the world for the history of Western art. The place that through the de Medicis spawned French cooking, through its banks single handedly invented Western capitalism (probably nothing else invented outside NW England has influenced our world as much as double-entry bookeeping), and through its early literature invented modern politics (where would Bush'n'Blair be without Machiavelli?).

On the other, a place that's currently modish, has played virtually no part in anything except the development of Spanish commerce since the Phoenicians landed, and has a few jolly nice buildings and works of art. It has added more to the world in the past 2000 years than Athens (as have 99.9% of Europe's cities). But only just.

Barcelona, however much fun it may be, really is in the third division compared to Florence. It may be more fun - but some people (Heaven knows why) would say the same thing about Las Vegas.

If you want your daughter to acquire a real knowledge of Western culture, send her to Florence and hide from her the fact that you ever considered anything else. If you want her to be a cheer-leader when she grows up, Barcelona's just fine.

PS. Forget Madrid. All of Barcelona's disadvantages without the nice food, pleasant climate, the Sagrada Familia or proximity to France.

TopMan

Would it be too much to ask what your daughter wants to get out of this?

OK, Florence has a lot of great art, etc., etc., etc. the Renaissance, the Duomo, the flea markets, the fast trains to OTHER cities but is all of that important to her (whether you think she realizes it or not)?

I suppose if YOu are paying for this that, among many other factors, gives you a certain amount of "say" in the issue.

I'm amused about the Barcelona-Madrid thing....kinda like the Milan-Rome thing and the Los Angeles-San Francisco thing. Madrid may be "out in the middle of nowhere" but for a city in the "sticks" to have one of THE greatest art collections in Western Civ..well, that's something to think about.

Hard decision to make I know but I'd love to hear what SHE has had to say about this.

miguelgcuadra

Wish I were going.... Both cities are beautiful
As a native Spanish speaker, Spanish is widely spoken in Barcelona. I never had a problem and hardly heard any Catalan.
If she has been taking Spanish for years, for sure she will be able to practice it in the everyday world.
Buen viaje..nice party town too..

cf5657

I consider Barcelona to be a party city and Florence to be much more serious. I'm sure you'll find more European students in Barcelona than Florence and a college kid will like Barcelona better. Personally I like Florence better but I'm not 18-22.

shellio

There was a recent European film about a French graduate student who goes to Barcelona to learn Spanish. I can't remember the name, having had a recent birthday and lost even more brain cells.

While the movie looked like fun, I think Florence will be more worthwhile from an academic point of view. You just can't help learning about art and history there, even if all you want to do is have fun.

paula1470

I would definitely recommend Florence. My daughter is 21 and spent 5 weeks in Italy this summer through a college program. She was in Verona and Rome but was able to visit all of the cities in Italy on long weekends. She absolutely LOVED Italy. After her college program, she traveled some more throughout Europe but Italy was still one of her favorites.

She is a drama major but her class included humanities, culture and fine arts. I don't think there is anywhere else to be if you are studying those subjects. I think one of the reasons she loved Italy so much was because she was able to learn about it in class and then go out and see the real thing. She also loved the culture, the food and had no problems with Italian men (as some people had suggested). There were a lot of students in Florence when she was visiting there.

The other point about being based in Italy, as Kate mentioned, is the ability to take the train or bus on the weekend to so many other wonderful cities. Since your daughter will be there for a whole semester she would probably even be able to take some long weekends to Switzerland, Austria or take the ferry over to Croatia. The spring would also be a great time to visit the Amalfi coast and/or Cinque Terra.

I have been to Barcelona and have to say that while it is a bustling, lively city and the art there is good, it was not one of my favorites. I agree with another poster that I wasn't crazy about the food in Spain. Another thing to consider is that Spain is further away from other European countries with the exception of France. One of my daughter's friends spent the summer in Spain and every time they visited another country, they flew. This can add up after awhile and travel from Italy would be cheaper especially if you get your daughter a Eurail pass. The train system in Italy is great.

As someone mentioned, talk to your daughter and see what her interests are but I don't think you can go wrong with Florence. I don't think it is necessarily true that a college student would like Barcelona more. My daughter also studied Spanish for many years but she had no difficulties in Italy as they speak English and with her background in Spanish, she was good at picking up Italian.

Kate_W

The film that Shellio mentioned is called L'Auberge Espagnole. I've spent some time in each of Florence, Barcelona and Madrid and my first choice would be Barcelona. However, it should be noted that I'm not as big a fan of fine arts (e.g. painting, sculpture) as I am of "applied arts" and cultural/social history. So, while I was duly impressed with the concentration of art (and sense of history) in Florence and Madrid, I preferred the living art which is Barcelona's extraordinary architecture - exemplified by Gaudi. I found Barcelona and Florence to be more walkable than Madrid. One of the things you'll want to check out is where (in terms of proximity to the centre of the city) are students typically housed. In my Spanish course in Madrid, it seemed that the students were billeted quite far out in the suburbs, while in Barcelona and Florence they were staying closer to the historical centre (and lively part) of the city.

degas

Florence wins by a mile.

ira

Hi MB,

Aside from its art and architecture, Florence is only a few hours by train from Rome, Venice and Bologna, often considered to be of some cultural importance.

"Young Person Railcard" is available through www.trenitalia.com/en. It provides a 20% discount.

MaureenB

Thanks again for everyone's thoughts. Keep them coming, please. It helps to get a few perspectives on it.
The final decision, all things being equal, will be my daughter's. It's her education budget and she's a very motivated student who always uses sound judgement in decision-making.
All these recommendations make me want to get on a plane tomorrow! Any other things we should consider?

paula1470

MaureenB - Your daughter sounds a lot like mine. Has she had any of her friends that have done a semester abroad in either Italy or Spain, or traveled to these locations while studying abroad? They could give a good perspective from a college student's point of view. Just curious, is one location more appealing to her than the other based on feedback she has been getting? Let us know. She will a great experience either way.