Monday, August 18, 2014

Barcelona Part 1

So it's not the first time.

However, it seems like a different experience this time.

This time I wasn't young, and I wasn't getting off a crowded bus in Las Ramblas having slept fitfully the night before, but it didn't matter.

The excitement was still there, in as much as I can muster excitement at 39.
As we dropped our bags off at our apartment, headed downstairs in our creaky two-man elevator and stepped outside through the heavy door, the surreality set in.



There was a calm; a sense of 'what do we do now?'; the kind you get when you realize the event you've been waiting for these past few months is in reality a non-event, and adjusting your expectations accordingly.

We walked around a couple hours, acquainting ourselves with our neighbourhood. We passed through Passeig El Born, our temporary main street that looked under and overwhelming at the same time.

I was right. This was no Woody Allen movie, no, this was more like a Miyazaki dreamscape, complete with fantastical creatures in beautiful costumes. It dragged me in, I wanted to be one of them.

My bare spanish proved to be a burden in Spain, and not just for my mediocre pronounciations. Catalans do not in fact speak common Spanish, which impacted me in the most direct of ways. I did not find out until the end of our trip that coffee with milk was in fact two entirely different words in Catalan than it was in Spanish. This was not held against me as a Spaniard, but it did out me as a foreigner, which is an entirely different 'ism.

After all that, the coffee was almost entirely awful. If not for the fact that we lived around the corner from the crowned kingdom of Catalan coffee 'Cafe El Magnifico', I dare say I may not have drank coffee for several days (a record by several days).

'Cafe El Magnifico' was not only rare in it's coffee quality, it was also one of the few genuinely friendly conversations I had with retailers in Barcelona. That's no dig, Barcelona has the best service I've encountered anywhere in the world, it's just that service comes at the expense of friendly banter. 

The Picasso museum beckoned us, but only in the way an unchecked to-do list beckoned you to pick up some extra onions from the shops. We weren't here to get stuff done, we didn't have to do anything, so we didn't. In that way we were free to do everything, at our own pace.

The weather was hot, but not hot in a way that made you want to strip down to near nothing. You couldn't anyway, it would appear, because civilization was all around you, and stepping outside was an invitation to be judged on the Catalan catwalks.

Catalan's dressed to the nine's and ten's, and heat would not deter this. Taut, light fabrics were tailored to the summer sun, allowing the locals to maintain a conservative and European cut to their cloth.

We followed suit (pardon the pun). The best way to deter pick-pockets was to dress like a local, which we took as an invitation to shop. The clothing was indeed light and somewhat prudish, however it was never less than stylish.

My search lead me to Espadrilles, a shoe which I had been trying to buy for at least 12 months, with no success. Here they numbered in the hundreds. The appeal is simple. A light summer slip-on that covered the foot and looked stylish? Sign me up.

The beach was a like a sandy Las Ramblas, with tourists claiming a stake in almost every square inch of real estate. We sat on deckchairs that were surprisingly empty, only to find out later that they were owned by the council, and inspectors would come around from time to time and collect fees for sitting on them. Obviously they're not as diligent as our parking inspectors, as we sat undisturbed for at least a couple hours.

The beach sand was the mid-point between sand and dirt, and therefore was not as soft or pretty. Not pretty could also describe the multitude of local octogenarians who felt it was their duty to walk up and down the beach completely naked.

Sure, a few girls were morbidly curious enough to want a picture with them, but what about the rest of us. The sight of their sun-scarred, low-hanging dried fruit was enough to make you run for the nearest bar, which we did. 

It was a much better view, and the heat subsided under the shade of the restaurant. A cold pint of Estrella went down well with the lap of the beach and a balearic house DJ as a soundtrack. If it sounds idyllic, it was.



Of course, then you had to walk all the way back to apartment, some 15 minutes walk away, but there was never a dull view, and so a stroll went quick.

The city looked so unfamiliar upon our return. Even spots I knew I had walked on seemed different, as though I'd shot a film and come back 14 years later trying to replicate the camera angles from the home movies of my memory.

Montjuic castle, where we had spent an exhaustive evening back in 2000, sitting on our bags while an orchestra played in time with its namesake fountain, felt new if unexciting. Perhaps I was letting my brain convince me that the castle was not beautiful or breathtaking. In fact, the 'moment' of that visit was the old man and his lovable dog that doted behind him. He was forever calling it to catch up, and we tailed behind too, until we got close enough so that Kirsten could interrupt and be allowed to have a hold of the furry puppy. We laughed as he struggled and licked, as only a puppy can, and his owner conversed with us in his native language.



No coins for the train, getting a 50 euro note turned down at the Organic grocers. We had to buy pepsi's from a chain restaurant to get home.

This is not chronological, but I like it like that. I'm sure at some point I will sit down and mark dates and activities and food, but for now I like that it doesn't track the way it usually does. Every day feels like a dream.