Last Day in Barcelona / Last Day of this Trip

We are now almost ready to go home. Today we take a two-hour train ride to a small town called Figueres (feeg-YARE-us) to the Dali Museum. A fitting end, I guess – some wild and crazy art in a wild and beautiful country.

Going to another country is, I believe, good for one’s soul and good for one’s outlook on life. My cousin Jill, who just returned from a family trip across Europe wrote that she is “Grateful for life and love and beauty and kindness and a big world worth saving.” That is a good summation.

There is something about the experience of disorientation as one adjusts temporally and spatially to another place, another culture, another group of people that is healthy and mind-opening. There is an odd sort of beauty in the dazed moments generated by travel. In those moments I gain empathy in the frustration and joy in working things out. Then too, there is the joy in all the beauty and art and architecture, in the helpfulness of people with whom communication is limited, in the wonders of experiencing a different way of life and a different perspective on the world.

On this trip we experienced the places where Christian and Muslim cultures have met throughout history, often with disastrous results. It makes me more aware of who I am in this world and what my history has been. It makes me appreciate other cultures, whatever their flaws – and more appreciative of my own culture, whatever its flaws. There is beauty everywhere.

Perhaps the only photo and last comment is this: In both Barcelona and Madrid, the city hall buildings had large banners reading “Refugees Welcome.”

That’s all and perhaps that’s enough. We'll be home in Reedley soon.

On Barcelona's Placa de San Jaume 

Montserrat and the Sardana Dance

We took a day trip to Montserrat, a Benedictine monastery in the mountains to the northeast of Montserrat. It is nestled into a dramatic setting of serrated mountains, hence the name of Montserrat. Although it was foggy in the morning, it cleared off and was a beautiful day. Montserrat has an 800 year old black Madonna in the basilica which was found in a nearby cave in the twentieth century.

On Sunday we wandered through the oldest part of Barcelona, the part that was once the center of the Roman settlement founded here around 50 B.C. Barcino, as it was called, was a type of retirement location for Roman soldiers.

In front of the cathedral on Sunday noon we were privileged to see the Sardana dance being performed. It is a Catalonian circle dance that is significant to the people here in the northeast part of Spain known as Catalonia. It appears to be a little un-dramatic when first seen, particularly when compared to other dances in Spain such as flamenco. But it has some interesting connotations to the Catalonians who see themselves as different from the rest of Spain and who want political separation, too. There are aspects of community that are signified by the dance, such as the way they always place their belongings (coats, purses, etc.) in the center of the circle. So, despite its mundane appearance it was good to be able to catch the Sardana by the cathedral.

A small sardana dance took place beside the main dance circle. This one included a Catalonian flag.

Likes / Dislikes

There are things I've enjoyed about Spain and things I will leave behind with a wee bit of joy.

Things I like:

1. Tapas -- this is simply a great idea. Getting small bites or plates of food means you can try a few more things. I wish this idea caught on everywhere.

2. The beautiful tile work -- it turns the most mundane wall, building, or bench into a work of art.

3. Plazas -- the idea that everyone gathers in central places, spaces that are created specifically for that purpose. Makes one more neighborly and keeps people in touch. It might get to be too much at times, but my instinct is that it is a good community builder.

In this square in Granada a theater group started performing rather unexpectedly. People sat on the cathedral steps to watch or continued to drink and eat at the restaurants on the other side.

4. The layers of history and culture, particularly in the south of Spain. Those reminders of all the life that has gone on before us, and being able to see it all around continues to move me.

Things I don't like:

1. The idea that dinner is at 9 and everyone (children too) stays up until all hours of the night. And are pretty loud about it. I say go to bed. Get some sleep. There is not much to be proud about in not getting enough sleep. One young person I know (unnamed) even has the theory that some of the economic problems could be better and more quickly solved if the people weren't so sleep-deprived. I don't know, but it sounds logical.

2. Along with the late nights is the excessive amounts of noise that goes with staying out late. I had to wear earplugs to sleep in a few places. Enough said -- I can be a grump if I don't get enough sleep.

3. No good coffee until Barcelona. For sure Spain is not Italy or France when it comes to coffee. We even broke down and went to Starbucks today. But still, in Barcelona we've found a few good places.

Dancing Eggs

Doug's nephew Marty joined us last night. He was studying in Budapest, Hungary this spring and is now on his way back home to Indianapolis. Marty is Colleen and Ron's son. Today we walked the area of the Eixample where there are some more funky buildings by Modernisme architects. These guys who designed the buildings had some kind of fun or were some kind of crazy -- or both. In any case, the buildings were fun to see. Between the sites, we stopped for coffee and then for lunch, and we had a good time catching up with Marty and his time in Europe. In addition to studying, he traveled a lot, north to Estonia and Finland, east to Istanbul, around parts of Austria and the Czech Republic, Hungary, Greece, Romania, and Amsterdam. He is ending the trip with northern Italy, southern France, and now with us in Barcelona.

Today is Corpus Christi, a big celebration that comes about 60 days after Easter. One of the things that they do on Corpus Christi is this dancing egg thing. Everything we found about it says that the eggs are carefully drained and the holes are plugged, then it will dance and spin on the top of a fountain of water. Marty is quite skeptical, certain that there is some trick to it. The fountain itself was beautifully decorated with lots flowers and everyone gathered to watch the eggs dance on the water.

I'm sad to hear that Uncle Ellis (my mother's brother) is not doing well. He's 94 and lived a long and good life. Still it is hard to think of the world without him. He's been a good storyteller in the last years and I have enjoyed hearing about his years in Civilian Public Service and working at the Case store and more. He's a special uncle. I wish his family peace in these days.

Bread and Barcelona

After a day in Palma on the island of Majorca, we are at our apartment in Barcelona. Doug's nephew Marty will join us about midnight tonight. If we walk out of the balcony of our apartment we can see the Sagrada Familia, which is the cathedral that was designed by the architect Antoni Gaudi. It was begun in 1882, but Gaudi took over in 1883 and continued to work on it until his death in 1926. Its a bit funky, to say the least.

The other wonderful thing about the location of our apartment is that directly below us is a little bakery with bread and pastries. It was the smell of baking bread that woke me this morning. When I went down to buy a loaf for breakfast the woman said it would be eight minutes before the bread would be out of the oven and ready to sell. It was hot and delicious with some butter and jam.

I think I'll join the people of Spain in a siesta this afternoon, although Barcelona doesn't seem to slow down in the afternoon as was the custom in other cities we visited. It is, afterall, a large and cosmopolitan city. But I'll take a nap and dream of baguettes and surreal cathedrals and riding the Metro. Then we'll go out on a walk to hunt down some good coffee. Good coffee hasn't been easy to find but perhaps in this city that is more like Paris than Madrid, a city that has good bakeries, we will find good coffee to finish off our afternoon.

Meditation on Water

We’ve been in Granada several days now, with a grand tour of the Alhambra and an olive oil tour/tasting. Granada was the last place in Spain to be reconquered by the Christians in 1492. The city is more multi-ethnic than many places and it has a definite North African flavor to it, at least in parts. There are remnants of the Silk Road marketplaces while the Alhambra (the Moorish fortress) sits on a hill overlooking it all.

The conquering Christian king fortunately did not tear down the Moorish palace. He built his own and kept the Moorish one. That makes the palace at the Alhambra a wonderful remnant of the Moorish world, a place to see the elaborate architecture of a different time and culture. In much of Spain the story has been that the Moorish mosques were torn down and the cathedral built in its place, leaving mere remnants of Moorish architecture. Here one gets to see it in all its glory.

A tour of the palace is a walk into a different world. And a major component of Moorish architecture is how fountains were built into the living structures as well as into the gardens. Water was an important part of Islamic culture. They were, after all, originally from the desert and water was an important symbol of life. All the fountains and pools in this palace give it a particular peacefulness as you step from a courtyard into a living room with the two spaces connected by narrow little channels of water in the floor, water that is flowing from a fountain in one area into a fountain in the next.

Sometimes there are pools, sometimes fountains, sometimes little canals. And always the water is running quietly giving it a particular peacefulness and creating a cooling effect in the process. In the gardens where there were a number of water spouts pointed into the air the effect was quite different, it was much noisier with splashing water. This type of fountain was a nineteenth century Christian addition to the place. The Moors preferred the quieter effect of water running down gently or standing still, at most a low gurgling.

My favorite spot in the entire place was the staircase in the gardens called “Escalara del Agua.” At each landing of this long flight was a small fountain and the banisters doubled as small channels for water to flow downward.

Perhaps this is all more noticeable and meaningful to someone from a drought-stricken place like California. It seemed simultaneously extravagant and peaceful and beautiful. Whether it is listening to the rain on the roof or hearing it gurgle in a brook or standing under a stream in the shower, water is a wonderful thing.

Now for Something Completely Different

After days of art and cathedrals and beautiful medieval towns, we did something different. We took a hike at Caminito Del Rey. Only this path is not quite like any other path I've been on. There was something close to this on a smaller scale near Lake Bled, Slovenia, but this was a bit more extreme. Of the 7.7 kilometer trail (about 5 miles), 2/5 of it was a fairly normal mountain trail through the woods and along a beautiful turquoise river. But the other 3/5 of it was on a board walk hung on the side of a cliff. It was well built -- I checked the large bolts and cables that were drilled into the rock.

Actually, it sounds (and looks) worse than it was. There was only one small stretch where I looked straight ahead so that I didn't get a little dizzy with the height. It was a great walk and we chose to walk the canyon from north to south, which happens to be the mostly-downhill direction. And at the south end we could catch a bus back to our car.