The Road
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The Road |
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Spain[Shamelessly copying the idea of one of my friends, I sent the following travelog to my friends and family in little snippets] In the fall of 1997, I spent 2-1/2 weeks in sunny Spain doing the whole American Tourist bit (specifically Madrid, Granada, Nerja, Mijas Costa (Costa del Sol), Gibralter, Fuengirola/Mijas, Cordoba, Morocco, Seville, Toledo, then back to Madrid). And although I did so in the company of some of my relatives, I still have to say that Spain is very cool and if you ever get a chance to go there, do. I'd love to go back there some day.
Here are some random observations about Spain (the touristy sections of it, anyway), in no particular order:
I. HALF THE FUN IS GETTING THERE or LET THEM EAT CAKE The journey began at the TWA ticket counter in SeaTac. Although it was 5am, we still had to wait in line for about 15-20 minutes before we could get checked in by a woman with little patience. The attitude du jour was "snooty". From SeaTac, we flew to St. Louis and caught a connecting flight to JFK (NY). These trips were made notable by an elderly Spanish woman named Pilar who sat in the seat next to my mom between SeaTac and St. Louie. She and my mom hit it off pretty well. During the layover at JFK, we met up with my aunt & uncle. Meanwhile, Pilar described a delicacy in Spain: roasted piglet. Apparently the head and feet are the best parts. The flight from JFK to Madrid was exciting. There was a lot of confusion while boarding as some people were unable to find their seats and others found that their seats had been double-booked. As it turns out, my mom's seat and mine were among those that were double booked. As a result, we got bumped up to first class. I don't know what first class is like on other airlines, but on TWA the difference between it and coach is astounding. The seats were wider and spaced further apart, they recline almost all the way and have folding foot rests; the tray tables are these funky fold-away jobs like desktops in a college auditorium; and each seat comes with a blanket, pillow, slippers and one of those mask things you wear over your eyes when you try to sleep. Also, as soon as we sat down, there was a flight attendant offering us glasses of champaign and orange juice. After they took our coats (and presumably hung them up somewhere), they served canapes (black olives, roasted garlic, marinated caperberries (whatever that is), and spiced cashews) with more drinks. While we were gnoshing on these, the cook came around and asked us what we wanted to for dinner. Soon after, a flight attendant came around with a hot towel, a mini tablecloth to go over our hide-a-desks, and a cloth napkin and silverware. We were then served a bread roll, then a choice of appetizer (I chose the seafood plate which consisted of scallops, grilled marinated tuna, smoked sturgeon and a creamy mustard sauce with dill), then a salad with red olives and pine nuts (I chose the tomato & cracked pepper dressing). Finally, came the main course. I had the chef special, which was a variation of cordon bleu with some kind of curried potato, long-grain rice and steamed veggies. My mom had the chilled salmon with mango relish. Not wanting to gorge myself, I skipped desert. I slept most of the way to Madrid, feeling a little guilty about leaving my aunt & uncle behind in coach while we lived it up with the bourgeoisie (but not enough to trade with them!). Breakfast consisted of orange juice, coffee, fresh fruit, yogurt and choice of breads (croissant, banana-nut muffin or danish). So, let's just say that the trip to Madrid was not a problem at all. But, now I fear I'll have to do at least a dozen 'Hail Lenins' before I can consider myself a self-respecting commie again. Viva la revolucion! We reached Madrid around 8am, local time. As we flew in, we soared above a seemingly endless sea of white clouds. It was quite the breath-taking sight made even more spectacular by the sunrise. By the time we retrieved our bags and left the airport, the clouds had burned away leaving behind sunny blue skies. Pretty cool, huh?
II. DRIVING ALONG IN OUR AUTOMOBILE... Day 1. Caught a taxi from the airport to the Hotel Ingles near the Puerta del Sol (the center of Madrid). Like the other hotels we stayed in, the Hotel Ingles was tucked away inconspicuously in a narrow one-way street somewhere. After unpacking, we spent the rest of the day wandering around the Puerta del Sol and the Cortes Ingles, a massive department store chain. The Cortes Ingles in the Puerta del Sol occupies several large multi-story buildings. One building holds the book department, another its music & electronics departments, etc. Another actually had a supermarket in its basement. This area of Madrid seemed to be a thriving metropolis. There were hoards of well-dressed people. Seattle grunge hasn't made its way to Spain yet, it seems. In many ways, it reminded me of Manhattan. People say that Manhattan feels very claustrophobic because the buildings are so high and so tightly packed -- as though you are still inside a larger building with no ceiling. Madrid (the area around the Puerta del Sol, at least) is like this too. Although the buildings aren't as high, the streets are narrower to make up for it. But, the architecture is much more interesting than Manhattan. Madrid also has a really good public transportation system. Taxis are, I think, government owned and are pretty cheap. There are a number of places where unoccupied taxis queue up along the street, waiting for passengers; so, they're easy to find. And there seem to be a lot of them. In addition, Madrid has a very clean, organized subway system. And, to top it off, it has a system of autobuses which can take you around Madrid and to neighboring cities. But, despite all this, there is also horrendous traffic. To combat this, it seems that many people take to scooters and motorbikes. We were still on American Tourist time on our first day. So, we ate dinner when everyone else was just waking up from siesta, and went to sleep when everyone was just getting out for dinner. We ate at a not-very-good restaurant near the hotel. The meal was only made remarkable by the hazelnut liqueur they served as dessert. Yummy. Day 2. We rented a car (a 5-speed Opel Vectra!) and headed out of Madrid to Granada -- a 4+ hour drive. My uncle started the trip, and I drove the rest of the way (having gotten my international driver's license at AAA). They drive on the right-hand side of the road too, in Spain. So, that wasn't a problem. The trip was much like driving on I-5 in Northern California and through the Oregon pass: lots of wide open, undeveloped spaces. The main crops we saw seemed to be grapes and olives. At one point, you could see olive trees stretching to the horizon in all directions. Much like Kansas must seem like with its corn fields, I imagine. Driving on the Autovia in Spain was not a problem at all. The Spaniards seem to have internalized the axiom "slower traffic keep right" in a way that we Americans can only dream of. But, I have to say, they do have a bewildering assortment of street signs. I think I figured out the important ones (like Speed Limit and No Passing); but there are a few that I still don't understand. Perhaps the hardest thing to get used to is the fact that they don't use yellow lines to divide oncoming lanes -- they use white lines. But, they do conform to the solid-means-no-passing/dashed-means-pass-at-your-own-risk idea. This meant that, when on a stretch of highway where passing in either direction was allowed, the line between the lanes would be a white dashed line (like we use to divide lanes going in the same direction). And to make it even more confusing, they also use a white dashed line to divide lanes going in the same direction. Maybe the "keep right" idea is just a survival mechanism for habitual motorists (if you're in the right lane, you know you're okay). Eventually, we reached Granada and the Hotel Anacapri -- also tucked away in a side "alley". Getting to the hotel was a real chore, requiring us to drive through impossibly narrow streets, dodging pedestrians and construction. But, the rooms at the Anacapri were actually very nice. After getting settled and parking the car, we took a taxi up to some plaza (whose name I forget) near the San Nicholas church. San Nicholas is a popular tourist hang-out. It sits on a hill that overlooks Granada, and gives you a really good view of the Alhambra, a moorish fortress, and Granada in general. We walked back to the hotel, marvelling at the architecture and quaint atmosphere of the surrounding area. If it weren't for the tourists and ubiquitous motorbikes, it would be a great place to hang-out. Day 3. We woke up early so that we could visit the Alhambra, an enormous fortress & castle complex. The castle was a BIG tourist trap, renovated for maximum impressiveness. Still, it was pretty cool, although I kept wondering how much of it was original and how much was reconstruction. The fortress part (the Alcazaba) was also quite amazing. The design seemed extraordinary -- I couldn't imagine anyone successfully storming and overtaking the place. Unfortunately, there wasn't much information to be had about how the fortress was built, the political atmosphere at the time, whether or not anyone actually attacked it at some point, and so forth. It seems like the military nature of the place has been ignored/lost, and that it's become just another place to ooh and ahh over. Or, maybe that's just how we saw it. It would be interesting to walk through it with a legitimate historian to get the real scoop. After Alhambra, we hit the road again and I drove the distance to Mijas Costas where we had a timeshare condo. The leg of the drive along the Mediterranean coast was a lot like the Pacific Coast Highway (101). On the way, we stopped at Nerjas and visited the cave system they have there. It was interesting; but, you see one cave, you've seen them all.
It occurs to me that I forgot to mention in the last installment something about geography. Madrid sits close to the center of Spain. There is a plaque somewhere in the Puerta del Sol that represents the 0 mile-marker. That is, all mile (or kilometer) markers along Spanish highways are measured from that spot, as legend has it. Granada is south of Madrid, and Mijas Costas lies on the southern coast, near the Costa del Sol. All of the places we visited were south of Madrid. Okay, now that we've gotten that out of the way, here we go again:
III. HEY, HEY; WE'RE THE MONKEYS... Night 3. I didn't sleep much this night for some reason: chronic insomnia, probably. There was a thunderstorm over the Mediterranean, most of the night, although that wasn't why I couldn't sleep. So, I spent the night reading and watching television. The condo we shared was apparently equipped with some kind of satellite dish or cable system as most of the channels sported a "Sky TV" logo in the corner. Channels included BBC, CNN "World Edition" (Ted Turner is everywhere!), a movie channel in English, a few Spanish channels, a French channel, and a German channel. Most notable among the late night broadcasts were some kind of Spanish talk show (made more bizarre by the fact that I couldn't understand what they were talking about) and a German music video show called Viva, or something like that. The talk show ran for at least 2 hours and seemed to consist of two parts. The first part has a panel of what I think were "psychics" who predict the answer to the night's questions. The psychics are all distinguished by the object(s) they use to predict the future. The two panel members I remember are a guy with a thick patch of sod, and a woman with extremely large breasts and a bowl of fruit. The second part of the show is more like American talk shows where the host interviews some people. This night, they were discussing the Kama Sutra with some "sex experts" and had some models perform a couple of live demonstrations. Yow. The music video program was also interesting in that it played videos from English, Spanish, German and American bands. While the American videos it played were mostly contemporary stuff (Puff Daddy, the Rolling Stones, etc.), it would also play the occasional "oldie". Perhaps the best thing about it was that it actually played more videos than commercials. MTV, eat yer heart out. Day 4. Mijas Costas, where our timeshare condo was, was not what I expected. I thought it'd be a crowded seaside town filled with little touristy shops, like Pikes Place Market or Venice Beach. In fact, it's neither. It's filled with hotels, apartments, country clubs and golf clubs, and just enough commerce to support it (a few restaurants and souvenir shops, one or two supermarkets, etc.). in fact, there didn't appear to be any kind of boardwalk along the beach, even though it's very close to the Mediterranean. There was at least one small beach that I found, but it was crowded by domiciles and was not very big. So, instead of hanging around there, we drove to Marbella -- supposedly a more "upscale" resort town. After a few hits and misses, we found a stretch of beach that rivals Venice. The boardwalk as about 10' above the beach proper and was very wide and not very crowded (very good for me who hates crowds). Along the boardwalk were a number of restaurants, small boutiques and souvenir shops. The beach itself appeared to be subdivided into small private sections. There was a "Candy's Beach", for example, and a "Beach Europe." Each was only a few hundred yards wide, but seemed to be "owned" by a particular restaurant or bar. You could rent a lawn chair under an umbrella for 400 pesetas a day (about $3) and be served food and drinks by the restaurant/bar that owns that particular section. I don't know if you had to pay anything if you didn't use one of the chairs. There were a few stretches of beach that looked unfranchised, but they were not nearly as popular as the ones you had to pay to use. Go figure. Every now and then, there would also be these artificial oases: islands of palm trees planted in the middle of the beach for God knows what reason. One had a couple of elephant statues that functioned as showers. The day we went to Marbella was gorgeous: blue skies, sunny and warm. About a block away from the beach, there was also a park of some kind, where one could go and sit in the shade. Me, I preferred to be on the beach. Given more time, this would be a very good place to relax, I think. I also think we went at the right time of year (October) as there weren't that many people around. I can imagine the place would be teeming during the summer months. Of course, if you're into the meat market aspect of it, maybe this wouldn't be a bad thing (most of the beaches seemed to be "top optional", if you catch my drift). Day 5. Gibraltar was actually rather disappointing. The trip there was kind of like driving from Seattle to Vancouver, BC. You drive for a couple of hours, and then wait in traffic for an hour or so to cross over the border (Gib is owned by the Brits, ya know). We went in search of the "top of the rock" and "Michael's cave", which were a couple of the main attractions. In the process, we stumbled across the southernmost tip of the peninsula. Here you could get a real good view of the Mediterranean, and make out a hazy outline of Africa on the horizon. There was also a completely incongruous whitewashed arabic mosque nearby, but it was closed. Later, we found another smaller tourist site: the 100-ton gun. This was a really dinky place, tucked away amidst industrial and military-looking buildings. It was, in fact, the original bunker wherein the 100-ton gun was stationed to protect the bay formed by Gibraltar and the rest of Spain. After a short walk through a tunnel lined with explanations of the gun and it's history, you climb the steps to the outside where the massive gun is mounted. It reminded me of the movie "The Guns of Navarone." Eventually, we found our way to the Upper Nature Preserve on the rock where all the popular attractions were. First stop was Michael's Cave. Yup, another cave system. Better than the one at Nerjas, but still, just a cave. Next up was a place where you could go and feed the monkeys (right in front of big signs saying "Please don't feed the monkeys"). But, they were all very friendly and hungry! I think I made a friend for life with a packet of crackers. Hey, it's not what you know, but who you know that counts! Last stop was an artificial tunnel that was carved out of the rock way back when. Walking through the tunnel was interesting (if a bit damp), and the view out the other side was incredible. After the rock, we went in search of the town proper to do some shopping. The main drag of Gibraltar was, perhaps, the most disappointing of all. It didn't exude British culture (whatever that is) like I hoped it would. Or, perhaps it did, if British culture is cheesy. There was supposed to be an "Irish Town" someplace, too. But, all I saw was a narrow street filled with pubs. Heh. Basically, Gibraltar was hard to figure out. I'm not sure what the main industry is to support the people living there except, perhaps, tourism and the military. Afterwards, we drove back to Mijas Costas, waiting for another hour or so at the border.
IV. WASTED DAYS AND WASTED NIGHTS... Day 6. After having spent the last week in the continual presence of people (specifically my family), I had to break out and go my own way for a day. In this case, this meant going nowhere. So, while the others went off in search of Fuengirola and Mijas (not to be confused with Mijas Costas), I stayed home. I wandered around Mijas Costas, walking along the freeway from our large apartment/country club/condo complex to the next exit (only a few hundred meters away), and checked out the little strip mall they had there. In one of the stores, I bought a genuine British tabloid (the Daily Sun or Star, or something like that) to satisfy my curiosity, having never seen one close up. I guess it compares to the National Enquirer (although, I've never seen one of those close up, either). Mostly stuff about Spice Girls, football players, royalty and Euro politics. If I had to choose, I think I still prefer the Weekly World News. At least there you get stories about things like the love-child between Elvis and a two-headed monkey. I spent the rest of the afternoon catching up on much-needed sleep. [One other thing to note about Mijas Costas is that there is a really good restaurant there. Right in our little community/complex was a restaurant called Riviera Del Sol. It was a relatively small place, and was usually crowded. But, of all the places we ate, they had the best gazpacho and a really good hake in cream sauce, all served by a cute jovial waitress clomping about in 2" platform sandals.] Later that afternoon, the fam came back and decided we should eat dinner in Mijas, so we drove back out there just before dark. Mijas is a quaint little town up in the hills just North of Spain's Mediterranean coast. Neat architecture, great scenery. They also have this large collection of shops and restaurants. We ate at a pretty good restaurant, marveling at how good a deal the "menu del dia" is. Apparently, in Spain, every restaurant is required to offer a menu del dia. This is essentially a combo meal. However, their combo meals usually consist of two courses (choose an appetizer from column A and a main course from column B), bread, drink, and dessert. So, for about $10 you can get a decent meal. After dinner, we wandered around the stores a bit and found an interesting antique shop. Among other things, they had a couple of very interesting clocks powered by elaborate pendulum-esque contraptions. They also sold these small ceramic fetishes called "colgantes defensivos", I think. Made, I think, in Galicia (a province in Spain), they supposedly ward off evil. Different shaped fetishes supposedly do different things, and are often hung from rear-view mirrors, apparently. None of them were shaped like fuzzy dice or pine-tree air fresheners, but I got a couple anyway. So, if any of you were planning on casting any evil spells on me, I'm protected! Day 7. This day, we drove to Cordoba (a 3-4 hour drive from Mijas Costas). We got there and eventually found the Mezquita (a famous mosque). We were ushered to a parking spot by some guy who wanted 1000 pesetas (about $7) for the service. He _looked_ like some kind of official guy, but who knows. In any event, we were glad to have the parking spot which turned out to be just across the street from the Mezquita. We parked right by a small table with a couple of people asking for signatures and a donation to help fight AIDS. Having worked in an AIDS service org. for so long, I felt compelled to give a donation. Of course, for all I know, this could have been a scam, but I only gave them a few hundred pesetas (a couple of bucks). From the outside, the mosque was not very impressive, partly because of the drab, ugly wall that surrounds it. On the inside, however, it is astounding. The inside is more-or-less one big open room with a high ceiling, like a large warehouse, filled with a forest of decorative pillars and columns. Here and there were the occasional wall holding impressive pieces of art, engraved stone plaques, and the like. Along the perimeter were cages which held the more valuable items (a lot of things looked to be made of gold). Then, smack in the center of the thing was a cathedral (tell-tale sign of the competition between Christians and Muslims, I think). While fabulous in its own right, I'd have to agree with Therese and say that it was very out-of-place and intrusive. All-in-all, the Mezquita was one of the more overwhelming things I've ever seen. There was just so much to look at (if you are attracted by decorative stonework, tiling, and so forth). I tried taking a few photos of the inside, but quickly felt the futility of this act -- there was simply too much to see to get into a photo, or even series of photos. Perhaps a video camera would be better for something like this. Afterwards, I took off on my own for a couple of hours, and wandered though the streets of Cordoba that surround the Mezquita. Like a lot of the places I saw in Spain, the streets in this area were all very narrow and one-way (just wide enough to let a car and maybe a pedestrian pass). The buildings filled every inch of space -- there were no "yards" to speak of, even though it was clear that people actually lived there. There did appear to be a number of restaurants with open inner courtyards, however. I also found a place that sold impressive leather things (leather-bound books, leather belts, leather handbags, etc). It was all pretty cool, but too expensive for my tastes. After having done this, I decided that I liked roaming around the towns in Spain. The architecture was beautiful in places, and just seeing how people lived was interesting. And although the streets were narrow, I felt them to be cozy rather than crowded. I mention the architecture a lot, not because it is so extraordinary (although, in places it is), but because it's so different from what I'm used to seeing in Seattle. Granted, I'm also just talking about these specific areas. The city centers in Cordoba, Madrid and other large cities were very "modern" with little to no old-world charm. After a couple of hours, I returned to the car to meet my family and found the car to be missing. I figured that either the others had decided to go see something that was too far away to walk, or we got towed. Either way, I figured there was nothing I could do about it until the others got back. After waiting around for awhile without seeing my family, I wandered off again and walked across the nearby Roman bridge (Puente Romano) which spans the Rio Guadalquivir -- a lazy, stinky river. On the other side was a medieval tower (the Torre de la Calahorra). Inside was a historical museum, but I figured I didn't have time to do that, so I jut wandered around the outside. When I returned to the place-where-the-car-was, I met up with the others. Apparently, someone told them that we couldn't park where we did, so they had spent the past two-and-a-half hours looking for another parking spot, and had just returned when I did. Ironically, when we met up, there was a car parked in the space we had originally. Hmmm... After looking at a couple of shops near the mosque, we went to the car and drove back home. Oh well. _I_ had a good time, anyway. Day 8. This day started early as we had to drive to Tarifa to catch the only ferry to Morocco, having purchased tickets for a guided day-tour of Tangier. The ferry ride itself was only remarkable inasmuch as it took about 1-1/2 hours, there seemed to be a number of people chain smoking all the way (did I mention that everyone in Spain smokes?), and a long line of passengers had just finished getting their passports stamped when we arrived in Tangier. I slept most of the way. We disembarked like a herd of sheep and were met by an old guy who spoke English, German and Spanish. He took us on a walking tour of the town just by the port. This tour consisted of
After the walking tour, we were led to buses for a short bus tour of the surrounding areas. The guide on the bus (not the same as the walking-tour guide) had a tendency to tell us about things that there were to see just as we were passing them. Points of distinction on the bus tour included:
The bus returned us to the port just in time to catch the only ferry back to Tarifa (Spain). All-in-all, this was not a good experience (although it was a learning experience)! The best thing about it was lunch (soup, cous-cous, chicken kabobs. Also, the price of lunch was included in the tour, but drinks were not. Interestingly, they sold these cute little bottles of Coca Cola). The walking tour consisted of no explanations about what we were seeing, nor any time to stop and visit the market or other shops that we passed (clearly, the guide wanted us to spend our time and money in the shop he led us to). Nor did we see the most interesting parts of Tangier, I'm sure. Plus, we were hounded by vendors every step of the way. A number would walk along side you and try to sell you cheap jewelry and stuff. Perhaps the most amusing part of this was that someone in our tour actually bought something from one of the vendors, and from that point on was swarmed by them constantly. Ultimately, I think we all felt swindled (a number of us bonding on that score on the ferry ride back) and were happy to be leaving. This is not to say that there is nothing to do in Morocco. But, if you're going to Tangier, do not buy a tour from a company called Africatours (or was that Tourafrica?). You're better off buying a map and wandering around on your own, I think. Part of the problem with doing a one-day tour is that there is only one ferry going to and from Tangier, with about 5 hours in between; so there's not much time to do anything. Anyway, on the ferry ride back, I stayed above deck most of the time taking in the Mediterranean, which was pretty cool.
Day 9. We left Mijas Costas for the last time and drove to Seville where we would spend the night before heading back to Madrid. We stayed in the Hotel Fernando III, which was a nice place but also very hard to get to. It was as though there was only one way to get to the hotel, as it was tucked away in a labyrinth of narrow one-way streets. After we arrived and got settled in, I decided that I didn't want to see any more tourist attractions. Instead, I wandered off to do some random sight-seeing, as I had done in Cordoba. The area Seville that I saw had a much more modern flavor than Cordoba, only slightly less metropolitan than Madrid, perhaps. The layout was similar to the other towns we had seen -- filled with narrow streets, none of which seemed to be parallel or perpendicular to each other. Yet, as bewildering as this was, it made the city that much more interesting to me. There were a number of streets that were pedestrian-only, lined with shops of all kinds. Scattered here and there were plazas or squares where a number of such streets would converge. Each plaza was interesting in their own right: one had a central park area in which a number of booths selling crafts were erected, like in a street fair or public market; another was dominated by a large ornate building (I think that was governmental in some way); another was ringed with cafes where one could sit and watch the passers-by, etc. There were also a number of what I think were church fronts, located in the residential parts of the town. These were usually located in the middle of a narrow street, taking up most of the block. The facades were very non-descript, being mostly bare stone fronts, except for the doorway which would usually have some kind of carving or statuary. The doors themselves were the huge things: wood reinforced with metal. The kind of doors you see guarding forts. Indeed, if the city were ever invaded, these churches would probably be one of the safest places to be (the doors and the narrowness of the streets would make it very difficult to penetrate). I wonder if that's why they're designed that way. I started my walking tour just around the time that stores were closing for siesta. During this time, the streets were more-or-less deserted. I walked around for a few hours, finally reaching the cathedral (another impressive structure) where, ironically, my relatives went to sight-see. I didn't feel like going inside, so instead just walked around it. After that, I was ready to head back to the hotel. By this time, however, the stores had all re-opened after siesta. The once barren streets were suddenly packed with people. I guess I should mention something about commerce in Spain. If I had to describe Spain in two words, I think those words would be "shoe store." Holy frijoles, there were a lot of them. There seem to be a greater density of shoe stores per square foot than Seattle has espresso machines. Unbelievable. If you're into shoes, clothes and leather goods, you'd die of excessive variety. Actually, they could all have sold the same merchandise for all I know, but there were a lot of them, nonetheless. This reminded me of a scene in the movie Pulp Fiction where Bruce Willis was trying to teach his girlfriend (I don't remember the actress's name) how to speak Spanish. The phrase he chose was: "donde esta el zapateria" or "where is the shoe store?" Of course, now I know the answer: EVERYWHERE! Another thing that is mildly interesting was that book stores seemed to be simply that: book stores. No videos, no magazines, no newspapers. Periodicals and newspapers, as far as I could tell, were the purview of the newsstands that seemed to be stationed every few blocks or so (and certainly in every plaza). Another store that I found amusing was the Corseteria (corsets! corsets! corsets!). That has to rank up there with the Liquor Barn (courtesy of So. California) and the House of Lamps. I also found a Virgin store. Thinking/hoping I could pick up a couple of virgins there, it turned out to be a big record store (Virgin records, ya know). This store was like American music stores -- packed with CDs and teenagers -- and had multiple floors: the second housing a bookstore, the third containing videos and software. The bookstore, in particular, had one of those fan/tourbooks for The Cramps. Written in Spanish, I thought it would be a great item, if only for its novelty; but, since I don't speak Spanish, it seemed of limited value (so I didn't get it). In a lot of ways, the music stores that I saw in Spain were better than the stores in America. This is because they have a huge selection of "national" (Spanish) music, but also have large sections for international music (including American bands). Most American stores, by contrast, will have a large section of popular bands (mostly American, Canadian or English bands) and tiny sections containing so-called "world" music. Out of curiosity, I decided to get a couple of CDs from Spanish rock bands. It was difficult to decide what to get, so I went for appearance. There was a band called "Kthulu" which instantly caught my Lovecraftian eye (readers of HP Lovecraft will know what I'm talking about). But, it looked like heavy metal, which I'm not a great fan of, so I passed on it. Instead, I picked up a CD from a band called "Siniestro Total" and one from a band called "Seguridad Social", which I think means Social Security. Having listened to both of them now, I'd say they're both okay. The Siniestro Total album seems to be a compilation of live performances. The Seguridad Social album, which sounds a lot like an American rock band singing in Spanish, is a little bit better, in my opinion. In one of the tracks, they do a sort of reggae cover of Pink Floyd's "Wish you were here". heh. Eventually, I was ready to head back to the hotel. That's when I realized I was lost. Actually, I recognized a lot of the places, but those darned plazas threw me for a loop. I'd reach one, where I knew I'd been, take one of the streets leading away from it, and wind back at one of the other plazas, where I knew I'd been before -- sometimes winding up back at the same plaza. It was kind of like being in some weird spirograph from hell. Or that town in the movie "In the Mouth of Madness" which Sam Neill couldn't escape from. Finally, I admitted defeat and decided to take a taxi back to the hotel. I approached one and in my best pidgin Spanish/English (Spanglish), tried to get back to the hotel. Unfortunately, I mispronounced the name of the hotel (calling it the Hotel Fernandez instead of the Hotel Fernando) so they said they didn't know where it was. One of the taxi drivers asked me what the name of the street was. I was sort of proud of the fact that I understood what he was asking, but felt completely dense because I couldn't remember the name of the street. And I didn't think "the narrow one-way street near the cafes" would be much help. Eventually I found a taxi driver who figured out which hotel I wanted and made it back without more ado. Whew! Day 10. The next morning, my uncle went off to tour the Alcazaba (the fortress) in Seville that was closed the day before. I went back out and revisited some of the stores that I had seen before, this time making very sure that I knew how to get back. I checked out a couple of places that sold comic books and picked up a couple of books/magazines similar to Heavy Metal or Epic. There are a number of publications that are like this in Spain. Comic art, I'm told, is taken much more "seriously" in Europe than in the States, where it is marginalized as a "kid" or "geek" thing. As far as traditional comic books go, The Phantom seems to be one of the more popular heroes in Spain. In fact, the masked vigilante seems to be more popular than the superhero genre, although there were Spanish versions of the X-men and so forth, as well. Later, I also bought a magazine from one of the newsstands. It turns out to be similar to Esquire and came shrink-wrapped with a CD of 60's music. A lot of magazines were shrink wrapped with one thing or another, although I'm not sure what the two things have to do with each other. Probably just a marketing gimick. Hey, it worked on me! In this case, the CD is one of those interactive things you play on your computer. "La Gran Enciclopedia del Rock", it has some trivia about groups that were popular in the 60s, a jukebox with some songs like Wooly Bully and Wild Thing, and a "games" section with games like "find your way to the Licor 43 bottle: Licor 43 is the most popular liquor in Spain". Guess who sponsors the CD? Afterwards, my uncle and I split the driving between Seville and Madrid -- a good 6+ hours on the road. We found our hotel in Madrid without much hassle (hoorah!) by evening. This time we stayed in the Hotel Europa, smack in the heart of the Puerta del Sol. Despite it's location, the hotel is pretty good and fairly reasonable. We wandered around a bit after dinner. The place was packed because it was a Saturday night and the day before a national holiday (I don't know which one). An amateur band (named Alturas, I think) set up near our hotel and held an impromptu concert. They actually sounded pretty good, each of the seven band members playing a number of different instruments. In one of the songs, one of the musicians played a pan flute while pounding on a drum at the same time. Anyway, I bought their CD which was, apparently, filled with traditional music from Spain, Ecuador, Portugal and Chile.
Day 11. On Sundays, Madrid has a huge flea market near the Plaza de Mayor. It sprawled through several blocks and contained booths that sold just about everything, including cannabis. One plaza seemed to be dedicated to books, magazines, software, videos and, yes, comic books. I spent about an hour or two there. Also that day, in the Plaza de Mayor, there was also some kind of coin/stamp collectors' fair going. Lots of people had set up tables displaying collector items. The monetary unit in Spain is the peseta. The exchange rate was about 140 pesetas to one dollar, when we were there. There were 1, 5, 25, 100, 200 and 500 peseta coins, and 1000, 2000, 5000 and 10000 peseta bills. However, most places round any change returned to the nearest 5 pesetas (so we never saw a 1 peseta coin). Later that afternoon, we went to see a bullfight. We took the subway to the Las Ventas (aka Plaza de Toros) and marvelled at the number of people they could pack into a subway car. A little reminiscent of New York. The arena was an open-air, circular stadium, like a miniature coliseum. There were rows of narrow concrete benches circling the ring. Nearer the ring, the bench was divided into individual seats (also concrete); and there was a royal/VIP balcony near the top of the stadium. Prior to taking your seat, you could rent a seat cushion, if sitting on concrete for a couple of hours didn't appeal. Before and between fights, vendors would walk around selling potato chips, bottled water, Coca Cola, and Cutty Sark (whiskey). The place was packed by the time the fight started, promptly at 5pm. There were six fights in all: three matadors fighting two bulls each. Although some details of the fights differed, they all conformed to the same format, more-or-less.
One of the bulls that came out was a raging maniac. It rammed against one of the horse-with-spear-guy combinations for a long time, ignoring the stabbing it was getting with the spear. It managed to push the horse against the ring wall, and looked like it might actually topple it. The crowd didn't approve of this, so the bull was eventually led out of the ring. After that, everyone else left the ring and six cows wearing cowbells were led into the ring. They stood there looking stupid for awhile, and were eventually led back out. Your guess is as good as mine. The replacement bull wasn't any better. This one wouldn't charge at all. It just stood its ground and watched the matador for a long time. When it finally charged the horse-with-spear-guy, it would screech to halt just as the spear was coming down, and back away. I heard one of the spectators near me describe this as being "loco". Hmmm... seemed pretty smart to me! But, in the end, they killed it anyway. Ultimately, I guess I don't much care for bullfighting. I could appreciate the artistry of the olé bit -- one of the guys was really good, dropping to both knees just as the bull reached him, and doing the olé that way. But, I guess the rest of it just seems too unfair. I think I'd be more accepting if it were just one guy against the bull (no guys on horses with spears, no extra matadors to distract the bull, etc). This would give the bull a fighting chance, I think. I also wondered what happens if a bull kills the matador -- does it get to live? Day 12. I started to suffer some stomach problems this day -- possibly from some bad gazpacho. So, while the fam went to check out the Palacio Real (royal palace), I wandered around the Puerta del Sol a little more (staying close to the hotel). In one direction, I found a book/music/video store called FNAC. Another department-store sized shops, it had four floors of stuff. The fourth floor was the bookstore. In particular, it had a little reading room in which people could go and sit and read books (presumably books that the store was selling) and listen to music. A schedule of the music that would be playing was posted outside of the room (classical pieces, operas, etc.). It also had a good collection of comic books, graphic novels and role-playing games (like Dungeons & Dragons). Interestingly, Call of Cthulhu, Cyberpunk and Shadowrun seemed to be the games of choice. Anyway, I bought up a comic called 'Zona X' which is reminiscent of 'Lupo the Butcher' (which you twisted-animation fans might recognize), and a couple of comic mini-series. They look interesting. Now all I have to do is find someone who can translate them for me! In another direction, I found a shop that sold these... things. They are made of clay or ceramic or something, and shaped like a mythological god's face. They were really cool. I bought one of Tut (Egyptian god of practical knowledge) and one of Bast (Egyptian god of magic and cats). In a third direction was the Museo de Jamon -- a restaurant with rows of hams hanging on the wall. Past the Museo de Jamon, the quaint part of the Puerta del Sol gave way to the more modern section of Madrid. I walked past some kind of government building, in the front of which was a couple of guards armed with semi-automatic machine guns (Scorpions, I think they're called). I tried to look as touristy as possible as I walked by! That night we ate at the Museo de Jamon. It was very good. I should mention that, although a lot of restaurants have hams and other foods out in the open, there didn't seem to be any flies around. I can't figure how they managed that! While we were eating, we asked the waiter about the 1 peseta coin (we hadn't seen any since coming to Spain). He gave us a handful of "old" coins which were, apparently, worthless (they had re-issued new coins, I guess, making old ones obsolete). |
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