The Alhambra.gypsiesincaves.tapacrawls.ohmy!

Grenada is just... awesome. There are essentially two areas duelling for attention. On one, sits the ultimate significance, the Alhambra. Built hundreds of years ago and under a state of renovation and improvement for most of that time, this palace seems to be the Versailles of Spain. The architecture is unbelievable, the gardens unmatched, fountains everywhere. The fountains were really valued by the Moors because they originated from Northern Africa, where water was at a premium. Therefore, these sultans put as many fountains as they could in the Alhambra. Furthermore, each Sultan was trying to outdo his father (kind of a Skywalker syndrome, his empire has to be fancier than the last) so from the core buildings there are more buildings that were added on later, and therefore have different architectural stylings.
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You meander through the gardens, and all you can smell is flowers, all you can hear is water, and all you can see is some of the finest architecture Spain has to offer.

Forgive me if I am being cheesy. I blame it entirely on the audioguide, whom Amelie and I named Wilhelm Archibald the 4th of Canterbury and Wessex. His commentary was hilairious - Amelie listened for about a minute and a half then announced she couldn´t handle it anymore and went to find a bench to pass out on. The script this guy was reading... I think was written to be enjoyed by a Mormon grandmother. I´m not sure. Here are some gems:

´Now you are entering the garden courtyard. Imagine the horses entering the courtyard, carrying noblemen on their backs? Can you see the guilded saddles? I can.´
´Notice the two doors on either side of the façade. In the middle would sit the great ruler. Go now and stand there, and reflect upon what it would feel like to be this great sultan, the world resting on your shoulders´
´This is the staircase of water. Can you hear the laughter of the fountains? What a place this must have been 500 years ago...´

Amelie rolled her eyes when I would recount his commentary, but I was completely immersed. Somebody got paid to write this, and thousands of tourists listen to it everyday. I truly doubt anyone complains. I saw people moving to these spaces and reflecting, holding the speaker to their ears. And some of them did indeed look like Mormon grandmothers.

Before we went to the Alhambra, we hiked up the opposing hill to find the gypsy caves. Gypsies definitely still live there, and some of the more enterprising among them have opted to allow tourists to stroll around their barrios for 5 euros a head. Apparently one woman has dug a pizza oven in her hovel and runs a bustling business for these strollers. I didn´t see that, but at the top of the hike I was definitely pressed by a gypsy woman to dole out the cash to tour around. We opted not to, and Mandi and I walked through the old Moorish neighborhoods after Amelie peaced to sneak in a siesta before the Alhambra tour. These neighborhoods are built so closely together that in some of the walkways there is only a sliver of sunlight for a minute each day. Tricky Moors. All of the churches in Grenada (until 2003, when a new one was built) are actually converted mosques.

See, the Moors were Muslim, based out of North Africa. The reason why Spanish people aren´t as dark skinned as Arabic though has to due to the fact that the Sultan shipped in so many girls from Scandanavia to add to his Harem. One Sultan had a harem of 6000 chicks. That´s like... ANTM to the max. So these genes got in the pool, and thus there are many Spanish people with blue or green eyes and pale skin. Go figure. I am just kind of wondering if the Scandinavian rulers even noticed that their beauty queens were being kidnapped by the dozens. Something to ponder on a rainy day.

Back to the mosques. So eventually Ferdinand and Isabella of Castille think that Grenada looks pretty good to them. So they attack it for a year, and eventually, they claim it for themselves and Christianity. Well, the Sultan in power actually opened the gate for them in exchange for a guarantee of his and his family´s safety. Douche. He also asked that the gate never be opened again, of which it wasn´t, and is still closed in Alhambra today. Nonetheless, Ferdy and Izzy are not down with these mosques, so they convert them all the churches. On the top of mosques are these three balls, all lined up like billiards, and the rulers elected to skewer them with a cross to symbolize the domination of Christianity over Islam. And they are all like that still today, with the exception of a mosque that was built in 2003, apparently to huge protest amongst the hardliners. Apparently one old lady had a sign that she picketed with that read (in spanish) ´This mosque should not be built because it is not what Isabella would have wanted´. Not sure how sympathetic the resident Muslims would be to this appeal, but you never know til you try?

The only time the Alhambra has been attacked was by its own people, after they discovered the douchebag Sultan had sold them out. Sultans changed on a regular basis, they were constantly assassinating their brothers, and there was a huge pool to choose from due to the 6000 harem arrangement. Therefore, there wasn´t a lot of loyalty to the Sultan in power nor deep respect for the regime to begin with. So when the people heard that their Sultan of the week did this, they stormed the streets the mob gained momentum until they finally attacked the palace.

Now this hill is called the Albaçin, and it is teaming with gypsies and hippies. It reminds me somewhat of Christiania in Copenhagen. You walk around and are acutely aware that you are far too nice smelling to be actually from this side of town. Legend has it there was a Mormon investment banker who came to Grenada and gave it all up to become one of these dreadlocked peace loving dudes. I doubt this story, but it seems like there is definitely a unusually high proportion of professional hippies in Grenada. They are everywhere and it is sort of awesome. They have their own neighborhoods, on the same hill as the gypsy neighborhoods. The two are not the same. To be clear. But they nonetheless congregate in this area of the Albaçin, where there are markets that have been in the same place since the golden age of Grenada (1300?).

Most of the history I have absorbed is not from Wilhelm, but instead from an amazing walking tour we did the next day. A young American named Eric came to Grenada, educated himself, and runs these tours everyday. I said I would give a shout out here. Ridiculously funny guy, really well informed, well run.

That night though... I went on the ill-fated tapa crawl. Another reason why Grenada is awesome: you get a free appetizer with any alcoholic beverage purchase. Another legend has it that the government had to approve it because people were getting too drunk on empty stomachs. Everywhere else in Spain you have to pay for these babies... but not here! So the hostel organized a crawl of sorts. Lots of great food, new friends, interesting tapas. Unfortunately I was not prepared for the actual departure of the crawl and ended up wearing my shower flip flops out. And if you have ever been to Grenada, you will be familiar with their very perilous cobble stone streets and staircases. The stairs I fell down were small, but I managed to get a scraped up knee that sent me and my escort crew back to the hostel in search of band aids and polysporin. My knee is still really stiff but I am fine now - I managed to do the walking tour the next morning. I like to think that I fell like the Moors did to Fredizzie. And if it does leave a little scar... then that´s still a pretty cool story.

And thus, with a pair of retired shower flip flops, a slightly better Amelie, and a new respect for that fun loving hippy next to you on the bus, we departed for the next city on our pilgrimage: Valencia.

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Part of trip: Back to the Mother Continent

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