Pleasure and Pain in Catalan Spain

A note for the gentle reader: When the time came to commit these scribblings to posterity; I thought of framing this post as a message in a bottle; wrapped up and stoppered and cast upon the waves; awaiting chance discovery at a later date.

But then, that would be too dramatic.

Instead, I’ll recall 1995, the year before I got onto this thing called the internet; and though the primitive writing instrument called a “pen’ had all but vanished from my life, there was still really no means of instantly publishing my thoughts.

Dark, primitive and superstitious times.

And it has come to pass that they are upon me again, for although the events described herein occurred in fair Barcelona, it is in remote Es Grau, on the island of Menorca that I type into my laptop – not in the sure and certain knowledge that they are being shared with the world instantly, but aware that their distribution may depend on the whim of a sinister and terrifying force from humanity’s distant past – the beast known as “dial-up internet”, and that I am a castaway, cut off from the world. Only the pre-dawn cool Mediterranean air and an excellent Jungpana Second Flush Darjeeling stand between me and brute savagery.

Of our last two days in Barcelona, the first was to dawn like every other – hot, lively and kicked off with breakfast at Caffe de Francesco.

We had acquired the same table on every visit but on this one – destined to be our last one there, though we did not know that at the time – we sat in a little table further toward the rear of the establishment and plotted our day.

We had decided to entrust our day to Barcelona Bus Touristica, a service that means that every five minutes buses move between popular sites of tourist interest.

We ordered breakfast – every day, we tried another mysterious Catalan word from the menu that turned out to be some form of delicious ham and cheese on some form of delicious bread. After working through the masses of brochures and discount coupons that this entails, we caught the bus alighted somewhere near the Musea Egipcio.

After a little kerfuffle we found it, and spent a really excellent hour perusing their collection. I had woken up really unwell and was trying my best to ignore it, and in the cool of the exhibition I at last started to feel slightly better. This is good, because when I have a migraine, I am a disturbing sight; prone to mumbling and indecision.

From there we once again caught the bus; and from the top deck we enjoyed great sights and sounds as we wound our way toward the Plaça d’Espanya.

This is a former bull-ring, with its magnificent façade retained, and an incredible observation deck now atop it. It has been hollowed out, and the insides have been replaced with exactly the same over-priced, designer-label soulless shopping mall you can see on any city in the world.

Of course the tea there was not great – Alma is a brand of plastic teabags that is often seen as the pinnacle of tea by cafes here, and it’s a very low pinnacle.

And that was the best option. I did enjoy a brief visit to the supermarket here, though. I love supermarkets, especially where I don’t speak the language. I really, really do.

The whole area looks incredible, with a massive fountain in a massive roundabout, but the magnificent palace we could see from the front was our prime destination for the day, so it was back on the Bus Turistica for the last pre-palace stop, the Poble Espanya.

When Barcelona hosted the World Expo in 1929, this was a centrepiece – a complete village constructed to replicate typical buildings across Spain, with many different cities and centuries represented. The idea was that it is now filed with cultural and artisan workshops and great opportunities to immerse yourself in the whole experience.

Culture in this case means overpriced souvenirs, FC Barcelona jerseys and Coca-cola, and so after a brief dalliance in an on-site art museum that had quite a few Picasso pieces and was a large collection of modern art – or it may have been mostly paintings by children at the local kindergarten, it is impossible to tell, we decamped.

The replica buildings themselves were disappointing after spending so much time previously with real ones.

Back on the bus. Getting cranky. Bad food and drink options. Poor sites to visit.

The major destination of the day was ahead.

The  Palau Nacional on Montjuic is magnificent, and houses the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya

.If you ever go there, here’s the advice: Get out. Take in the breathtaking views of Barcelona. Buy a cheap mojito or sangria in a plastic cup (first clue) and just look at the building and the views again. Look toward the magnificent frontage, where the ticket office is (second clue).

Then leave.

The collection is a fake. It is reproduction of art. The Gothic collection is reproductions of Gothic Church art. The Baroque collection is a collection of reproductions of Baroque church art. The “Roman” Collection is the most disappointing of all, as here in Spain when they say Roman, they mean post-Christian conversion Rome until the Visigoths, not actual Romans as I would see it.

Basically, it’s Jesus, Jesus and Mary, Jesus and Joseph, Joseph and Mary, Jesus Joseph and Mary and the odd goat. Wall-to-wall Jesus.

Wow, they can’t get enough Jesus in Spain. But then, this is a country that made it illegal to not name your children from the approved Catholic names list until the mid-1930s. Forward thinking in architecture , design and construction for 1000 years, but at a price of a social mindset that was liturgical and dogmatic and primitive.

From this art we learn that Mary wore a crown at all times-unusual for basically a peasant I would have thought- and that Jesus was born not only with a full head of hair, but one that was tied back in the Spanish manner. His birth, death and subsequent sequel were also surrounded by medieval Spanish Knights it seems.

Really frustrating.

As we passed the Olympic Stadium, played “Barcelona” by Freddie Mercury and Montserrat Caballe. Not, you note, the absolutely shithouse Andrew Lloyd Bloody Webber piece of fluff that was the official song of the Barcelona Olympics. But they love Fred here. You see statues of him in shops

By this time, Lady Devotea was flagging; but my migraine was gone and so I was feeling a million dollars. We decided to take the bus back to near the hotel.

There were interesting sites along the way; but the bus was on a go slow and it was frustrating. We needed some food and a rest; and the rest seemed to be receding, so I suggested we jump of at Port Vell.

Magnificent surroundings; and a restaurant that translates as “the Clown”.

And what a bunch of clowns they were.

Here’s the thing:Virtually anything you have to pay for in Barcelona is not worth it. Virtually every establishment alongside anything you have to pay for is crass, crap and expensive.

In our first four days, we spent less than two days’ worth of our budget. In half a day, we spent more than a day’s and it was terrible.

I gave into the inevitable and flagged down a taxi.

Back at the hotel I could not have a siesta – I was too upbeat from my now clear head and so I filled a few hours with blogging and various tasks whilst Lady D. snoozed.

So, we are now firmly on Spanish time. It was 9pm when we left for dinner, heading once more to La Rambla and more specifically to Plaza del Reial, a quadrangle of eateries in the Gothic Quarter.

We ate at a crowded and quite ok place – the sights and sounds and food were all unique. We watched the thieves looking under tables they walked past for bags they could snatch. A pair of dancing buskers turned up and produced a wonderfully Spanish experience two metres from our table – a combination of flamenco, acrobatics and simulated foreplay. At one point she stood on his head. On one leg.

After the meal, I pulled out a scrap of paper with scribbled instructions, and took Lady D by the hand. We strolled down main thoroughfares and narrow Gothic cobbled streets, squeezed past poor immigrants picking over bags of rubbish left out for collection and eventually arrived at Caj Chai.

This place had been recommended by Cosmin, a tea friend on Google +.  And at last we stood before it.

And it was shut.

We wandered out over the sea on the boardwalk known as Rambla del Mar, and then headed home. As a very long day finally started to catch up with me, at 1 am on a hot morning in the throng of La Rambla, I realised that Barcelona had had its inevitable effect on me.

I was irritated, but disappointed , but accepting,  that Caj Chai had not been open for business at midnight on a Tuesday.

I think I have just become Spanish.

-Intermission-

Our last day. Much packing. Leave the bags at the hotel, we have until about 4 pm to return to collect them and head to the airport.

Despite the fact that they are very cheap and plentiful, we have not used many taxis in Barcelona, preferring to walk everywhere. Today, with much ground to cover, we decide we just might save our aching feet a bit.

The last thing to see today is the Sagrada Familia. If you don’t know what that is, then it combines Barcelona’s two most favourite people ever – the local lad Gaudi of Barcelona with popular import Jesus of Nazarth. In years to come I suspect they may manage to work Lionel Messi in as well.

Anyway, look it up on Wikipedia. It’s part insanely big church, part insane Willy Wonka, partly just insane.

First though, the breaking of the fast, and we have elected to grab a taxi to L’Hora del Te  (Tea Time), a tea shop of some renown.

We drive there past the Sagrada Familia and “Tea and Coffee World” , both excite me, but the latter is shut and we arrive at our destination.

Upon alighting from the taxi, we find that L’Hora del Te is closed for three weeks for “Vaccaione”.

One of the hardest things for us foreigners to understand is that Spaniards usually close their shops up for a few weeks and go on holiday, at the height of the tourist season. It’s both admirable and detestable.

So, I peer through the iron gates at jar after jar of tea, a metaphorical tear running down my metaphorical cheek, and we decide that we will just have breakfast somewhere else.

We walk down toward the Sagrada, and we find La Boulangerie, which sounds French but is really Spanish. Due to a mixup involving not just bad Catalan and Bad Spanish but also bad miming, we end up with two completely different kinds of Ham and Cheese sandwich. And also a palmier – OK, that’s French. So, time to share a mini-buffet.

I refuse to speak of the tea, but the probable panet and the likely flauta were both lovely and the palmier was incredible.

We leave La Boulangerie and pass a shoe shop; I tactfully remind Lady Devotea that there is scant room in our stuffed suitcases for more shoes. We cannot fit even a wafer-thin mint in them.

This was a strategic mistake as, across the road, Tea and Coffee World is now open!

It’s a bit T2/Teavana. The labels are all in Spanish, and not Catalan, which is unusual, and to be honest, I’m like a drunken sailor in Rums’r’Us.

I took a few pictures before the pleasant young lady in there told me it was not allowed (why?) and we bought Jungpana Darjeeling,  Ceylon Evening Blend, a gunpowder  with Champagne and Strawberries and “1001 Noches” another tea of this name but this time green and black mixed with roses and jasmine.

Also a really stylish deco-style tea tin.

Ok,Sagrada Famillia. If this were an architecture blog, a can’t-get-enough-of-that-Jesus-guy blog, a big-arsed building blog, a so-this-is-what-an-acid-trip-must-be-like blog, or even a “lovely Iranian Americans we have met in queues” blog, I’d add another 2000 words, but let me just say I’ve never been in a longer queue; a more impressive building or a starker example of the Catholic money making machine in my life.

It is one of those things that is not to be missed but seen with your eyes open.

Outside, it’s hot and we grab a taxi.

Without a destination in mind.

I suggest ‘Market’. He looks blank. Lady D throws in “Mercado” which mysteriously solves it for him. He suggests La Bocceria off La Ramba. We need no persuading. Gothic quarter, here we come. And WE WANT TEA.

La Bocceria turns out to be a food market of incredible size and vigour. I buy Lady D some Coconut and Blackberry juice, because this is my sort of tourism. I wander from stall to stall. Magnifico!

Half an hour later and tea is on the agenda. Rather than settle for just any, I promise Lady D I can find Caj Chai again; and that I can do it within 15 minutes. I set a timer to prove it. If I don’t deliver, we go to the nearest place when the timer goes off.

And so, with 30 seconds left in the clock, we arrive.

It’s open.

And then?

In the next blog, I may have to invent a whole new rating scale to review Caj Chai.