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Published: June 24th 2008
Have you guys ever met someone and came to dislike them prematurely? Like everything about them bugged the crap out of you for no reason? Then, after getting to know them a little more, you feel foolish for disliking them in the first place? That’s how I feel about Barcelona. I can’t lie, I didn’t really like it the first couple of days. However, I came to realize, Barcelona was a victim of circumstance. First I was a little bummed about my friend leaving, then the whole camera deal didn’t help. I was really beginning to dislike Barcelona. Man, was I absolutely wrong about this place.
In the morning, my first order of business was to get a camera. As I set out, I noticed stores were open again. Wow, HUGE difference from the day before. The city gained a new vibe and a completely new energy. Gone was the desolate feeling, in comes a feeling of a vibrant, thriving metropolis. So I searched around for a bit and got a pretty good deal on a Sony Cybershot. I had seen it at a few spots for 160 Euros, but ended up getting it for 111 Euros. Also had to get a memory card and I got a USB adapter for the memory card. I decided to only get a 1GB mem card, that way, I’ll be FORCED to dl my pics more often. . After everything was said and done, it was like 160-170 Euros down the drain in the whole camera affair.
After getting a camera, I went back to the hostel to charge it and saw one of the Aussies I met the night before. We both said we were gonna go to the Dali Museum, so we figured we might as well go together. It was a fun little day trip. For those of you that are not aware, the Dali museum is about 2 hours by train from Barcelona in a small town called Figeres. We basically just chilled on the train, watching the country side and talking about our respective cultures and whatnot. Luckily, the train ride didn’t seem too long.
After walking around for a while, we finally got to the Dali Museum. Not sure how many of you are into Dali, but since he’s my favorite artists, it was surreal to see so many of his quality works (you see what I did there? Haha). I spent about 3 hours in there, but could’ve spent all day. I would’ve stayed longer, but they were closing.
I can’t really define why I like Dali so much, but I think it’s the weird imaginative topics he paints about with amazing detail. Seeing some of his paintings up close, you’ll notice many of them don’t have that much detail, yet so much detail at the same time. He basically forces your mind to fill in the gaps sometimes. Obviously, in other paintings, he has amazing portions ofdetail. His art definitely requires some brain power though, which I enjoy. I didn’t have my camera (since I needed to charge the battery), so I don’t have any pics. Daniel, however, said he’d email them to me.
After checking out the museum we grabbed some tapas at a local restaurant. It’s amazing how much more calm Figeres is than Barcelona or even Madrid. The meal was delicious and then we went and caught the train.
Quick side story: So, on the train I found out Daniel is half Argentinian and half Uruguayan. Kind of different for an Aussie. Don’t recall ever meeting too many Aussies with latin heritage. So we talked about music, and I brought up Immortal Technique. Obviously, since he’s pretty underground, he had never heard of him. So I played “Point of No Return” and the “Philosophy of Poverty”. I could tell before I played these for him, he had a pretty negative view of hip hop. He basically always saw them talking about blunts, 40’s, and bitches……. A vast contrast to what underground hip hop talks about. Anyways, it kind of tripped me out, but after playing the philosophy of poverty, I saw him get up and he had tears running down his cheeks. I was like “wtf? What’s wrong with this guy?” I guess it really struck a chord in him being latin and living in the Aussie culture that’s dominated by white people or something. He seriously thanked me like 5 times for showing him such great stuff. He said he’s now a converted hip hop supporter (haha, welcome to the dark side sucka! Hehe jk jk).
Anyways, I got back to the hostel, showered and headed out. I had found out there was going to be a huge celebration on the beach for Saint John. As I headed down there, I came across this one street. Oh.my.god. It was a SEA of people. Little did I know, this was going to be one of the best nights ever.
While I was on that street, I came across a group of musicians that were kind of like a marching band. They basically played while they walked. It was absolutely fantastic. The percussion they played left you no choice but to dance. It was like the music just took over and there was thousands of people dancing in the streets. This occurred until they reached the beach. Seriously, words cannot even begin to describe it. For one night, everyone in the city was one. It didn’t matter if you were a tourist, a local, or a combination of both. It was one of the greatest experiences of my life.
In addition to the music playing, there were people in costumes running around in this one circle with all kinds of flares and fireworks and stuff drunk as hell. If no one lost an eye or burned something off, I’d be pretty surprised.
Anyways, I met a girl from Montana and two girls from Georgia. It’s pretty crazy, but hearing a familiar accent from home is so soothing when you’ve been on the road for almost a month. I kind of wandered around for a while partying and meeting all sorts of interesting people, listening to amazing music, and just being a single person out of the THOUSANDS of people that draped the beach.
Next thing I knew, it was 6am. It’s funny because the time from 11pm up until 6am went by extremely fast. I guess the saying is true, time flies when you’re having fun. All I have to say is that festival totally restored my view of Barcelona. Like I mentioned before, I didn’t get off on the right foot with Barcelona. Now, it will always have a special place in my heart. (ok, mushy mode off haha).
Anyways, I just woke up and feel like doing some more exploring, so I’ll talk to you guys later! Take care and I miss you all!
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Mz Julz
non-member comment
Hooray.....
Glad things are turning around for you in Barcelona. The festival sounds cool.