Boatgirl #9: Welcome to Spain - Barcelona, Spain

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March 8, 2002

We arrived in Barcelona with a screaming horde of English schoolchildren, but we managed to lose them in the train station. We took the train from the airport to Placa de Catalunya, and as we walked up the stairs from the platform, we were accosted by a couple of middle-aged women. They rattled off a lecture in Catalan, and eventually we understood that they were worried about our bags being stolen. My bag was strung across my back, and Darin had a bag hanging from his roller suitcase. We adjusted so that we had a firm grip and a paranoid eye on all our possessions and ventured out into Barcelona.

When we checked into Hotel Colon (No, I'm not kidding, I'll have to steal some towels to prove it), the bellhop showed us to our room. He warned us again about thieves, listing off every minority as a possible suspect, Algerians, gypsies etc. Welcome to Spain.

I was getting slightly paranoid at this point, even though London has a much higher crime rate than Barcelona. I left my purse in the room and we headed down the tiny medieval streets of the Barri Gotic, keeping an eye out for pickpockets. Our mission was to find tapas and to try sidra, the local cider. We were out quite early by Spanish standards, about 8 o'clock. There were tapas places open, but everything looked deserted. We were intimidated at first, but decided to just pick one and start drinking, then we wouldn't be so shy.

We chose a fairly large, newish-looking bar with a few customers already settled in. We ordered sangria and some olives, shrimp in garlic oil, and Pa amb Tomaquet, the classic dish. Basically, cut a tomato in half, rub it on bread and drizzle with olive oil and salt. Pretty good, but we still needed to find sidra.

We passed a couple of empty places and picked one. This was more authentic, with brick walls and legs of ham curing from the ceiling, with cups attached for the drips. The owner was very nice. He poured the sidra the traditional way, with the bottle held high over his head and the cup low in the other hand, over a wooden barrel. It's very dry, sour compared to the sweet French and English stuff, but good. We pointed to some meat and cheese behind the counter and enjoyed the place all to ourselves until 9:30, when everyone else started to pile in.

We walked through Pla�a Sant Jaume, and found a stage set up for a protest calling for a global women's strike on March 8 for recognition for all the work women do. I felt right at home, because I hadn't worked that day either.

The square was full of students and dreadlocks, dancing to music from loudspeakers. A girl came out and made a short but fiery speech then introduced Olga the Flamenco dancer. She was fantastic. Flamenco is not traditionally Catalan, but there are enough Castillian immigrants that it seems quite popular. I hope we get a chance to go to one of the Flamenco places while we're here.

The next performers were chicas de rap. They weren't bad, but as I had no idea what they were rapping about and the cigarette smoke was impressively thick considering we were outdoors, we left after a few songs. We stopped at one more bar for a drink and Basque-style tapas, where you serve yourself tiny things on toothpicks from the bar and they count the toothpicks on your plate when it's time to pay. Bars at home should be like this. They should all have outdoor patios facing onto Medieval cathedrals, with munchies on an honor system and great cheap wine. Wouldn't that be wonderful?


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