As many of my friends already know, I spent the last two weeks in Madrid, Spain performing with a group of guitarists and singers from my school. I know, sounds glamorous and exciting right? Well let me tell you all the things you need to know to actually be successful when traveling to a foreign country.

1. Know the language or get a translator app

As Americans, we generally expect the people who come to visit from out of the country to speak English. We are very selfish this way because we usually don’t think to learn another country’s language before heading over there. My short middle school and high school Spanish curriculum actually paid off. Also my friends all had translator apps which saved our lives. If you can’t communicate with these people in some way then odds are you shouldn’t try to go there just yet.

2. Watch your data usage

OK, so this one kinda came back to haunt me. As we all know "Pokemon Go" is one of the greatest things to come to humanity since air conditioning (#teamvalor). So of course I’m like, “YEAH GOTTA CATCH ALL THE SPANISH POKEMON!” One night I turned on my data and went to town on the Pokemon. I mean I caught over 30 Pokemon in one night walking through downtown Madrid. It was awesome. That is until the next day when I was alerted that I had used 80 percent of my data for the trip. Not the best call on my part but still worth it. So I had to be very careful with not using data the rest of the trip unless absolutely necessary, and there were many occasions which it would have come in handy. But we must live with our choices and I’m pretty satisfied with my Vulpix and Omanyte.

3. Just eat what they bring you

So ordering food in Spanish is a necessary skill to have. I could order it completely fine but when it came to reading the Spanish menus I was at a loss. You got to just learn to eat whatever comes to you. Don’t question it just eat. You’ll find that most of it is actually really great. Yes you will come across the occasional fishy ravioli that you don’t like or the gazpacho that you definitely thought was supposed to be taquitos but you just roll with it because the nice waiter actually brought you food.

4. Don’t make every restaurant seat all 20 of you

This is mostly for those traveling in large groups like we did. If you are going to have a nice dinner with everyone and you want everyone to sit at the table together you need to call the restaurant ahead of time to make a reservation. Otherwise there's a lot of table moving and annoyed Spanish people giving you the evil eye. If you are off on a spontaneous dinner escapade it’s best to travel in smaller groups.

5. Know how to route a subway expedition

The Metro is your friend. It is so much simpler and cheaper than hailing a cab for everything or renting a car. Just grab a ticket and hop on the train. In a big city like Madrid this is the way to travel quickly. It may take some time depending on how far away you’re trying to go but for the most part it is really simple to do. Knowing how to read a subway map is crucial to this being successful though.

6. Learn the area’s eating habits and times

Most places aren’t like America with their eating habits. Spain, specifically, eats more consistently through out the day instead of sitting down to three big meals (which is actually a lot healthier). Knowing this also lets you know when places will be more crowded or even open. It also makes you look like you know what you’re doing which is always a plus.

7. Research their lifestyle

So Spain has this little thing called a siesta. It is literally nap time for the entire country. NAP. TIME. America step up your game because I need this. Anyways, during the hours allotted for people to take a siesta many shops and restaurants close and cities basically shut down so people can grab some post lunch shut eye. It’s times like these where you want to embrace their lifestyle because odds are, you aren’t going to be able to do much otherwise.

8. Yelp is your friend

Yelp is the greatest resource for the hungry traveler. It will tell you if that restaurant that looks like it could be good is actually good or not. It will also alert you of places where the servers do not like Americans and treat them poorly. Yelp is also where you can go to warn other travelers of places that treated you poorly. Yelp saves lives you guys.

So those are my top tips for survival in Madrid. It was quite the adventure and I now have quite a few stories in my back pocket. I mean don’t get me started on this 506 year old Russian man we met…