Pt. 9 The keyboards in Luxembourg

I planned the Luxembourg part of my trip at the last minute.  In my family history research, the oldest ancestors who I could trace to a specific location were the ones from Luxembourg. I took a quick side trip to Salt Lake City to visit the Mormon's family history library in September, where I discovered them in the 1840 census living in a small town just outside Luxembourg City called "Niederanven." That a Dutch town also has that name would create some confusion later on.

Where I left off from my last message, I found my hotel, after I eventually correlated the map I printed out from google to what I was seeing around me. For a neighborhood surrounding a train station, it looked very nice.

The person at the Hotel who checked me in spoke English, but when she noticed that I was making an effort to learn to ask for what I wanted in French, she good-naturedly insisted on hearing me try in French first, correcting my pronunciation and then switching to English. She gave me one of those "hotel maps" that they have on a pad at the front desk. She wrote on it where I could find an internet cafe and the visitor's information center. What little I had seen of food here indicated that I desperately needed to see the Happy Cows listing of vegetarian restaurants in Luxembourg or I would get very hungry very soon. As I walked across a bridge over the gorge, heading for the visitor information center, I saw a huge splash of fall colors in the trees below. I had my camera with me but the light was fading fast and I knew that any picture I might take would definitely not come out. I made a mental note to come this way again and hoped that no rain would knock the leaves down. I had not seen a full color autumn in many years.

I found the visitor's center. The layout of the "Centre" district in Luxembourg contains several large square plazas. I had limited success trying to find a way to Niederanven. But the info person did direct me to an internet cafe a few storefronts away. The internet cafe stank of cigarettes, despite the no smoking sign. Maybe the no smoking sign was new? I had a little trouble with the keyboard (again). It was different from the standard American qwerty but not different in the same way as the ones in France. Finding the '@' was an adventure in both countries. Without crying out in dismay this time I found the '@' after about 5 minutes of patient searching and trial and error with the shift and alt keys. Happy Cows came through (again) with a listing of vegetarian and "vegetarian friendly" restaurants.

On the way to the restaurant called "Mesa Verde" I walked past the Luxembourg Parliament Building without realizing what it was (I found out later). Right after I crossed another one of these plaza squares that encountered my first of what I called "medieval pockets." Luxembourg City has a very modern feel to it. Unlike Paris, many of the buildings very obviously belong to the 20th century. They have a vague resemblance to much of San Francisco in that many family homes' have brightly colored exteriors but one does not see many (or any?) mansard roofs in San Francisco.

Luxembourg City also has a "downtown" area that resembles the downtown/business parts of other cities. But it also has pockets of old buildings, narrow winding cobblestone streets that, although mostly dating from the Renaissance, has that sort of story-book appearance that many (like me) associate with the medieval period. And you can just turn a corner on a perfectly modern street, and find yourself transported back in time a few centuries. The city enjoyed some good fortune during the wars.  At the beginning of WWII the Germans raced across Luxembourg so fast the invasion force had mostly left before anyone noticed they had been invaded in the first place. At the end of the war the Germans were too busy running from Patton to slow down. Only the Northern-most tip of the country was affected during the Battle of the Bulge. That means that Luxembourg City was never bombed nor shelled or otherwise trashed. I'm not sure that a picture will do justice to the experience. But I doubled back in daylight anyway to take a picture of the "medieval pocket" where I had dinner my first night in Luxembourg.

No sidewalks and if a car comes you find a doorway to jump into. Fun!

"Mesa Verde" has a heavily dairy menu, but I did not mind. Spinach, feta and ricotta crepes with a variety of vegetables artistically arranged in a circle around the crepes. The bean sprouts had this incredible flavor to them. Just like bean sprouts in America, only more so. I also wanted to take a picture of the food the way I did the lunch at the D'Orsey but the restaurant's lighting was dark and moody and the disposable camera had a flash. I did not want to disrupt the place.

Mesa Verde was in the central part of the city. As I walked back to my hotel I suddenly realized that I forgot to leave a tip. The tipping conventions in Europe confused me a bit, as they calculate it in the bill in France. I was not sure if they do that in Luxembourg and my exhaustion along with the stress of being in a very unfamiliar place at night combined to make me space out. But I have no excuse for not turning around once I realized my mistake. I was almost back at the hotel and it started to rain again. Oh well.

My plans on Friday started with a train trip to Munsbach. I needed to go to a town called Niederanven. I did not ask the right questions at the train/bus station. I looked at a map I bought in the station's convenience store, then looked at the train schedules. It took me 10 minutes to look over all the routes. No Niederanven. But a town called Munsbach looked to be only 3-4 kilometers (about a mile) away. I walk a mile easily at home. The train ticket only cost 3 Euros RT, so it was not a big deal if things did not work out. Things did not work out. I found that a U.S. style highway divided Munsbach from Niederanven. I could not find a way across it at all. A bit cross, I walked back into town, passed the train station and up toward the church. I wanted to see if it were worth photographing. It wasn't.

On the way back to the station I stopped in a bakery. I had another apple tort. But this one was the best of all. I am sure there's a person with an apple coring machine of some kind working in the back. The apples were fresh, not twice baked as are the ones out of the can. I could feel apples had a very delicate crispness as my teeth sank into the tort. It was worth the train trip and the fruitless walk in the rain for the apple tort alone. And besides, the conductor on the train told me that they run busses to Niederanven. I was just looking at the wrong schedule in the train station.

When I returned to the city and decided against trying to go to Niederanven by bus: the station was a zoo (weekend getaways?). I bought a sandwich from a stand and then ate it while I walked around. The weather cleared, allowing me to take some of good pictures of the Alzette river gorge surrounding the city. I also took some pictures of houses and parts of the city I found interesting (such as the ones above). A visit to the internet cafe and I had some more restaurant listings. I had a "Sea Bream," a fish I had not had before, at a very nice (expensive but worth it) place called "La Lorraine" in the center Square of the center of town.

In a similar manner to Hong Kong, U.S. actors who would never sully their superstar reputations by appearing in crass advertisements in the U.S. stare out at you from huge posters in store windows. Here it was George Clooney slinging expresso (not literally, that would have looked more interesting). I also found the postcards amusing. At least half of them are of the Grand Duke of Luxembourg and his family. No one has any idea who these people are outside of this country. I don't blame them for having *some* postcards of him, but it was a challenge to find one that did not have this guy's face on it. Is there such a thing as borderline cult of personality? Look it up in the DSM-IV: "Borderline cult of personality" just like "Borderline personality disorder" but with postcards.

I did finally manage to visit "the ancestral homeland" on Saturday. I took the bus early in the morning. The English-speaking ticket seller thought I wanted to go to Holland (evidently there's a Niederanven that's bigger and more people in the Benelux countries have heard of it). Minor confusion - easily solved. I did not find any great revelations, no familiar names on any headstones. But then I did not have my heart set on finding any, so it was not a big loss. Like Munsbach, it was a beautiful small town, in a very green and hilly countryside with farms all around it. I took plenty of pictures (some even came out nicely, but none that will look any good on a small computer screen). As much as I enjoyed walking around the ancestral homeland, it was worth a morning, not a whole day.

A very nice young man drove the bus on the ride out of the city. He spoke very little English and my French still stunk. But I did manage to communicate to him where I wanted him to let me out and that I was working on my family history. He very kindly explained to me the other bus route numbers running back to the city so I knew which ones to choose from. On the walk back to the bus stop I considered trying to find a place to eat, but the one restaurant that looked good had so much cigarette smoke in it that as I walked past its ventilation exhaust vent I nearly gagged, staggering back from the vent like a cartoon character. Well, I *was* hungry and the restaurant fixed that, but not in a good way. I found myself walking toward the bus stop in the opposite direction from it's return path. I saw a bus leave the stop and started to run for it, but I was too far away. As the bus drew up closer to me I could see the driver and him me. It was the same guy who took me there. He obviously recognized me and gave me an inquiring look. I shook my head "yes" vigorously. He stopped the bus about 100 yards or so from the stop to let me in. I had met the nicest bus driver in the world.

Although I did not learn anything new about my family history, I'm glad it led me to such a beautiful place. I realized on Saturday afternoon as I explored Niederanven and the forested area of the Alzette River gorge, that except for the houses, Luxembourg looked almost exactly the same as Sullivan County New York, where my Niederanven ancestors settled. Whatever their reasons for leaving, it was not for a change of scenery.

The remainder of Saturday in Luxembourg turned out rather strangely. The guy in the internet cafe warned me the day before that it was a national holiday in Luxembourg. Maybe it was their founding day or something. [note: it was the Prince of Luxembourg's birthday]. I do not remember. The internet cafe guy said it would be "just like a Sunday." Remind me never to go to Luxembourg on a Sunday. And never visit on November 1st either. All the museums were closed. I was so bored that by the evening I took a bus to the one (count it one) multiplex theater in the city to see a movie (maybe an American one with Luxembourgish sub-titles?). What did I find but everyone else had the same idea. I could not deal with the crowd and could not find a movie I really wanted to see. On the bus on the way back, I sat amidst a gaggle of teenage girls, all chatting happily. This provided an opportunity to listen to Luxembourgish at length. I found that if you extract from German and from Dutch all of the harsh, guttural bits and leave the rest - that's what Luxembourgish sounds like. You wouldn't think it to hear them speak English (beats me why) but it does sound, if not pleasant, then a whole lot better than Dutch. But then gargling with thumbtacks sounds better than Dutch.

Lunch in Luxembourg. I do not remember the name of the restaurant. I have called it "the bestiary" in my recollections. Any kind of meat you can think of (and some you can't or may prefer not to) they have on the menu in Luxembourg. Antelope, venison, rabbit, wild board steaks, hind, and every manner of sausage. A guy sitting next to me ordered the variety plate: sausages, steaks of who knows what (Bambi?) and hardly a vegetable in sight. I enjoyed my trout. For dinner I ate at the Hotel Italia's restaurant. I had a minor communication failure with the waiter. The menu had a word for a larger portion (American sized, rather than European sized, I guess). I did not intend to order the huge portions, but that's what I received. No complaining. Having walked all day, it was probably good for me to eat more rather than less. It was also Italian food, and very good. I am reasonably sure I heard Italian spoken in the kitchen.

It was this day that I noticed that waiters in Europe do not chase you out the door when you are done eating. You always have to ask for your check and they never so much as look askance at you when you take your time or do something (like write in my travel journal) after the meal. I see that I wrote in my journal "I've been occupying my table for well over an hour. I'm not in America anymore."

Next: The South of France and the "Van Gogh" skyline.

Pt. 10 The South of France

On Sunday I left Luxembourg to go to Nimes in the South of France for a couple of days. It was easier negotiating my passage to the train, finding the right train and then compartment than I expected. I had to return to Paris then change stations (not just trains) to go to Nimes. The surprise this time was that the Gare D'Lyon was a worse zoo than the day I bought the tickets. I wrote in my journal about this: "Everyone is leaving Paris for the south of France and they're all on the same train with me." Unlike the trains to and from Luxembourg, this one had seats closer together and the luggage rack far too narrow to accommodate my suitcase. I could only stow the bag in the rack and had to ride all the way to Nimes with my knees at my chin, feet on top of my suitcase. It was still more comfortable than most airplanes I've been on.

In my travel journal I noted that during the trip to the first stop, Valence: "Much the same countryside flying by, when I could see it."  This is also the part in my journal where I noted how I saw lots of people reading actual literature. The young woman in the seat next to me read Camus' "The Stranger." I noted that in San Francisco I see people read fashion, business, best-sellers or Harry Potter.

It was during this train trip that I experienced a sense of deja vu. This, being my first trip to Europe, made that feeling all the more odd and almost dream-like. Shortly after the train left Valence I saw out the window a strangely familiar skyline. I recognized the shape of the mountains in the distance. After a few minutes I realized it was the low mountain skyline from a couple of Van Gough's paintings (I later found out that Arles is not far from Nimes).  This floored me. If anyone questions why I took the train I'll tell them this sight alone made it worth it. I do not know why experiences like these effect me so strongly. They just do.

Leaving the train station at Nimes my first impression of the place struck me as France done as a Tom Waits song. The streets were nearly deserted and the air had a heavy, oppressive feel to it. A storm was coming. The wind whipped through the streets with a low-level sort of violence. I had my mortar-boarded "trip-planner" open in my hands, the pages whipped around my fingers by the wind. The Google map I printed out and bound into the planner led me to the city's Roman arena and then to the warren of narrow streets behind it. After losing my way I did find the street I sought. Then I saw the sign for "my" hotel. I had made a reservation but never received a confirmation despite requesting one by e-mail. Now I found out why. The windows were whited out with a note explaining that the hotel was for sale. Oops.

My friend in Europe told me that there were lots of hotels near the train station, so I shouldn't have too much trouble finding one. But I did. The scant number of people on the street (hardly any) made me increasingly nervous. It's hard to walk "purposefully and with a sense you know where you're going" when 1.) You don't know where you're going, 2.) You're pulling your wheely on surfaces made to destroy it and 3.) you're going around in circles.  Chances are that Nimes just pulls up the sidewalks (like Luxembourg on Nov.1st). In reality there likely was no danger (just my paranoia that kicks in when I am under stress in unfamiliar surroundings). My bladder was full, I could not make much use of the Google map past finding the closed hotel and the storm felt imminent. I tried following a sign on the street indicating the location of a given hotel.  After finding myself on a side-street near nothing that even pretended to be a hotel, I doubled back to the main street and headed toward a big building with a red neon sign that read "Novotel." Maybe it was a hotel?

It turned out to be a 4 star hotel. It was as expensive as a 4 star but I did not mind. I rested for a few hours. The train arrived at 2:20 and I must have checked in before 3. Only then did I realize that what felt like an eternity looking for a hotel actually only took about a half hour in reality. I slept until the thunder woke me. But I fell asleep again soon, aided by the sound of the rainfall.

At 5:30 I ventured out of the hotel without the map or phrasebook. Just a scouting trip. I took a better look at the arena. I had not idea until I came to Nimes that it has the largest and best preserved Roman arena in the world. Although a bit overcast, the air had that clarity that comes after a heavy rain. I could see a beautifully clear crescent moon in the gap between the clouds. I could see the arena lit by a combination of lights set in the pavement below it and the not quite finished sunset. The sight of the arena against a two tone dark blue and darker blue twilight sky made a "mental picture" that burned itself into my memory. I doubt that a photograph could ever capture it precisely. Months later, as I write this, I can close my eyes and see it again.

I doubled back toward the Novotel to the cafe I spotted earlier. I ate a quick croque of tomato and mozzarella. It took forever to get the check as my waiter disappeared on my and a formula one race on the tv (a *really* big deal here; people actually follow these races) had everyone's attention fixed including the waiters'.

My further explorations led me to an Indian restaurant. Although I can have lots of Indian food back in San Francisco, I felt a bit full of croque and seafood. I love the name of the place: "Rajput: Restaurant and Indien Pizzeria." I guess they do not have enough demand for Indian food, they have to use the tandoori oven for pizza too? The food was at least as good as the best I've had in New York or San Francisco.

My mission for the morning was to find breakfast *outside* of the Novotel (14 euros for breakfast?! No way) and to find different hotel. I had a nice breakfast at the same cafe as the croque the night before. I found myself relaxing and feeling a bit more like I did in Paris. The strange sort of Nimes described through the Tom Waits song "9th and Hennepin" look and feel had disappeared. I could see people walking by through the window of the cafe. I could see plenty of car traffic. No traffic jams or frustrated drivers, but enough cars to make it look "normal" to me.

According the the Google map, there are 4 internet cafes in Nimes. I found all 4 of them. Each of the first three was closed until late in the afternoon. I didn't bother looking for the 4th one, but decided instead to find a Roman temple called "Maison Carée."  As luck would have it, the fourth internet cafe was right next to the temple and *that* was the one that was open. "Trip advisor" on the web pointed me to a hotel called "Tulieries." The recent posts indicated that it was under new management, which explains why I did not consider it before I left home: the reviews of the hotel while under the old management would scare away a skid row bum. I decided to investigate before checking out of the safe harbor I found at the Novotel.

The "Hotel Tuleiries" does not look like a hotel from the outside. You have to stand pretty much right on top of the place even to see the sign. It's a small, "mom and pop" operation. I immediately liked the husband of the couple. I never asked his name, so in my travel journal I identify him as "Michael Palin," the member of Monty Python's Flying Circus. He somewhat resembled Palin in his 30s. But I noticed the resemblance more in terms of personality: he also had that very kindly, soft-spoken manner that characterizes Palin when he speaks as himself (not as a Monty Python character). The owners are both bilingual Brits but the wife is the one who is really fluent in French. I hate to sound like the typical ugly American, but as much fun as it was to massacre the French language on this trip, I felt a great sense of relief to be able to have a conversation with a native speaker of English. "Michael Palin" gave me the key to a room so I could look it over before deciding to take it. I liked what I saw. When I returned to the front desk I told him if I was able to check out of the Novotel without having to pay another night I'd be back within the hour. The Novotel desk clerk didn't blink nor ask any questions when I asked to check out earlier than I had initially planned. I was checked into Tuleiries within a half hour. Hotel Tuleiries cost about half as much as the Novotel.

After this everything in Nimes looked better. I could not find a place to develop my pictures but I did find a Monoprix at which I could buy another disposable camera. I took more pictures than on any other single day of my trip. The sun came out and *stayed* out after about noon. I had really nice like and Nimes is very photogenic. I tried taking a picture from a Roman tower called "Tour Magne" in an effort to capture the "Van Gogh" skyline. Although I could make it out through the haze in the distance, the picture does not show it very well. Backing up a bit, I bought a ticket at the arena that let you into all 3 of the "big" tourist attractions in the city: the arena, Tour Magne and Maison Carée. I'll spare you all of the details about gladiators that I learned on the recorded "tour" of the arena. From the arena it's about a 2-3 mile walk to Tour Magne, a 1st century B.C. stone structure built on the highest point in the city. Signs inside the tower explain that during the Renaissance some schmuck nitwit who read Nostradamus almost destroyed the tower. Nostradamus wrote a stanza that hinted that a treasure was buried in Nimes. The nitwit thought it was under Tour Magne. (I do not recall the name and so must call him simply "the nitwit.") Mr. Nitwit received permission from the King of France to excavate under the tower on condition that the king receive half of the treasure. Neither one of them stopped to think that if Nostradamus had some sort of super-wonderful inside information indicating the location of a treasure trove somewhere why didn't Nostradamus dig it up himself? It's like the guy who asked a librarian in California where they kept the maps of the treasure hidden in the Sierra Madres. If I knew of the existence of such a map, what would I be doing standing here talking to you? Sadly, the tower required extensive restoration in the 20th century and it's about one "story" lower than before Mr. Nitwit nearly reduced it to a pile of rocks brought down on his own head.

The views from this tower, nonetheless, are fantastic. Somehow the south of France has avoided the sort of urban sprawl (or somehow managed it better) that creates an intrusive, ugly mess out of the countryside in other places. Or maybe it's there and I missed it somehow.

After Tour Magne I visited Maison Carée. There was a temporary building set up by that time, which turned out to be a theater, and it required the last of my tickets I bought at the arena to see a rather hokey movie about the history of the city. They gave us 3-D glasses. Yes, it was that hokey. But it was fun and also nice to sit for a while.

After this I photographed one of the Roman city gates (by the time I reached the other one the light was awful). I framed the picture to show some anachronisms, the ancient gate framing cars and modern store fronts.

The dinner my last day in Nimes was very memorable. I asked "Michael Palin" at the hotel for restaurant recommendations. He pointed out that the one across the street had a Prix Fix special. The restaurant's name is "La Palette Gourmande," and I would have photographed my dinner had I had my camera. The mullet provencal had delicate flavor and was served with a mild red sauce that did not overpower the fish. The arrangement of the fish and the vegetables rivaled that of the lunch at the D'Orsey or the dinner at "Mesa Verde" in Luxembourg. As in all French restaurants, the waiter did not push the check, he only cleared my plates after I finished and gave me a fresh carafe of water. I spent a little over an hour after I finished eating writing in my travel journal and relaxing. I noted that the social isolation of having very few English conversations proved a bit of a strain. It's one of those things you take for granted. In Paris I had the good fortune to spend an evening with Siegfried and Ladka, the chance meeting and day spent with Louise, as well as meeting my neighbor from San Francisco and his friends. A couple of conversations with the hotel guy helped, but by this point I was really looking forward to meeting my friend Laurel and her family.

The room at Hotel Tuleiries was very comfortable and definitely not one in which someone else had smoked. The street was a bit noisier than I anticipated in the morning, but then I needed to get up early anyway. As soon as I returned home I wrote up a glowing review for the hotel on "Trip Advisor."

Next: Barcelona, the city that never sleeps. Really.

Pt. 11, Election day in Barcelona

It was Tuesday, election day in the U.S., when I traveled from Nimes to Barcelona. I had a leisurely morning owing to the bus leaving in the late morning. I managed to spend a lot of time the the warren of narrow streets in the "Old town" searching for the "Doreé Brasserie" that sold the fresh juicy apple torts in the crush resistant boxes. I did not find it (I had to settle for apple turnovers from a different bakery). On the way back to the hotel I could not resist taking a picture of the "Cat Hotel." Best guess it's a hotel that caters to cat owners as many other hotels forbid pets. [note: I later found out from one of my friends that the hotel maintains a number of cats which you can choose from in order to have a cat in your room.] The exterior I found humorous.

I especially like the cat-shaped trimming on the door.

Somehow, I managed to get lost from the Cat Hotel to my hotel. For added amusement it was only three blocks away.

I had to pack somewhat frantically but I had staged everything the night before. I still had plenty of time as I checked out of the hotel then trundled my luggage to the train/bus station. My walk to the station felt much better than my arrival, as I could see people about and the stores and cafes showed signs of activity. I had scoped out the station the day before and found the part in the back behind the railway station itself where some semi-permanent big kiosk housed the bus line. I showed the man behind the counter my print out of my bus ticket, then by means of gestures, pantomime and my limited French I succeeded in checking in and he succeeded in telling me to sit down and wait. Very shortly thereafter a scruffy young man entered and had what *looked* to me like an easier time checking in. He had that grad student look about him (scruffy but conscientiously clean) that took me back to my grad student days in New York City. He nodded to me and asked "Barcelona?" and I nodded yes.

We had a long wait for the bus. About 10 minutes after our bus was scheduled to depart a bus that *might* have been ours started taking on passengers nearby.  I had stepped out to see if it had any helpful markings on it, like say the word "Barcelona" on a marquee (or whatever you call those things on the front of busses or trains above the driver's window that have white on black signs that tell you the bus number and, if you're really lucky, where it's going). Not lucky today. I returned to the kiosk but the counter person was gone. I looked at the scruffy guy, and just before I could point to the bus and ask "Barcelona?" he did. He evidently realized I was going to ask him because we each had this crestfallen look on our faces that said: "I thought *you* knew the way and how this all was going to work."

The kiosk guy returned, the Barcelona bus eventually arrived, and it all got sorted out.

The highway in France reminded me of highways everywhere. The suburbs of Nimes looked like Long Island, but with French signs. AFter leaving Nimes I noticed some of the sound walls had murals, rather than graffiti, and I saw a few buildings painted more colorfully than the ones you typically see in that environment in the U.S. That was about all the difference.

After about 2 and a half hours we stopped at a rest stop. Someone on the bus said we were in Marseilles, but I had come by that point to regard the other passengers as likely to be as ignorant as I am. I did not leave the bus with everyone else, as I did not at first realize this was a break and not a "stop" along the way. The bus driver, not interested in attempting to communicate with me any other way, lit a cigarette and half-rudely kicked me off the bus. I guess dealing with idiot foreigners gets on his nerves sometimes. It was only after I reluctantly left the bus that I saw that no one was actually "getting off" there - the luggage compartment doors were still closed and the other passengers had headed to a truck-stop diner nearby. Once back on the bus I felt sick for a while. Between the driver smoking me off the bus and the passengers having smoked up a storm during the break the bus stank of tobacco.

The next part of the trip took us through the foothills of the Pyrenees. I know it sounds far-fetched but it reminded me most of the road trips my family took when I was growing up in New Jersey. Hills covered with trees with a few houses or other structures now and then, and we passed through only small towns. Near the top of the pass I saw a pyramid with a modern sculpture on top of it (I wish I had sat on that side of the bus) which marked the Spanish border. Given the new rules of travel for the European Union we had no formal border crossing with the checking of passports, etc. It was the same as going from Jersey to Pennsylvania. Once in Spain I saw some ruins from the bus. I could not tell if they were Roman or medieval. It reminded me, in an odd way, of my road trip through the Southwest of the U.S., how the geological formations you see from the freeway would be national monuments and tourist attractions anywhere else, but there they are only miscellaneous examples out of many, small samples compared to giant ones. Such is the case with ruins in Europe.

We had another rest stop in Spain, this time in a city called "Girona." This time I was ready and left before the driver had a chance to inspire me with another cigarette.

The arrival in Barcelona entailed some anxiety on my part, as my friend who was going to meet me told me that the bus stops at two stations and my stop was called "Sants." Some kind and helpful passengers told me that the first one was not Sants and one made clear to me when we stopped at the second one that it was indeed Sants. I felt relief when I checked the clock in the (yet another pre-fab metal) kiosk for the Eurolines bus and saw that despite leaving Nimes late we arrived on time. Happily, after a short wait my friend showed up. We made our way first for me to check in to my hotel and then to a restaurant with a non-smoking section (somewhat rare in Barcelona) to wait for the others who would join us. At around 11 p.m. the four of us departed for a bar where there was rumored to be a TV showing the U.S. election results. As it happened, the bar had two stories, the basement level one had a big screen TV showing the election coverage (In English) but the top (street level) one was the non-smoking section. All four of us are vehement, nearly militantly non-smokers. We took turns going to the basement and all used the same tactic of hyperventilating a bit then holding one's breath before descending into the blue-clouded abyss. A bit like pearl diving but substitute toxic fumes instead of icy-cold water. I think I'd prefer the icy water, thank you.

We gave up a little after midnight. After I returned to my hotel room I tried to find a station that had U.S. election results (any language) and while channel surfing to find such a station, what do I spy - with my little eye - but porn. Not just ads like you see in on the cable channels in the U.S. but the real stuff, such as you would need to pay for in the U.S. It appeared to be a variety of different, how shall we say, preferences, including gay sex. Here in Catholic Spain. OK, *that* was a surprise. Oh, and nothing of note in the election results, I think it was 9 to 5 in McCain's favor when I gave up and went to sleep.

In the morning I found a channel with news in English that told me that Obama won. I felt an immense sense of relief (I'll not belabor a discussion of politics here, keep in mind this is November 4, 2008). It took me a while to find a place that would serve a pot of tea with a croissant, but it was great when I did.  It was a kind of brasserie-like establishment, with a number of cops (always a reliable indication of good coffee and pastries the world over) waiting in line behind me. It was also one of the few, rare, non-smoking eating places to be found. According to my research, the cops were "Guardia Civil" because they had green uniforms. There were about 5 of them, two were women and they all looked pretty happy and in a good mood, laughing and chatting happily with each other. The next day a bunch of National Police "Policia" were there instead (What? Do they take turns?). I noticed that Police in Spain were not a big presence, but were still numerous. Nothing oppressive, but plenty of them.

I took some time to explore my immediate surroundings. I noticed on one of the narrow old streets off La Rambla that the bulbs of the streetlights were "hanging" from a "net mesh" sort of "bag."  I tried taking a picture but the effect and detail do not come out in the photograph. I tried manipulating it on my Mac and produced this close-up of one of the lights themselves. As you can see, instead of coming up out of the sidewalk, it's suspended from the side of a building:

At least from the "sending" end, you can see the "mesh" effect on the upper two light bulbs.  You may also notice the greenery and flowers on the balconies. This is very typical of most of the residential buildings in the city, which gives Barcelona a "greener" look and feel than can be accomplished with gardens, parks and trees that you see in other places (like San Francisco, for example). The next picture gives a better view of this.

The second picture has an "Obama" sign which I *think* reads "you can do it, Obama," possibly in Catalan. You may notice the hanging plants as well as the flowers, mostly on the 2nd floor to the right. The tree to the left looks a bit sparse, but this is late Fall. Maybe it looks fuller in Spring? I have another of my amateur photo-retouching jobs that shows a close-up of the sign:

This was all the indication I ever saw that any of the residents had any interest in the U.S. election. The U.S. is rather distant, both figuratively as well as literally, in Europe. It's a good perspective to see now and then.

For dinner that evening we ate at an all you can eat sushi restaurant near the waterfront. I suppose that Japanese waitresses in the U.S. speaking English is about the same as Japanese Waitresses speaking Spanish in Spain, but the sight and sound of Spanish coming from a Japanese person set off some ethnocentric cognitive dissonance for me. It's not a judgement or anything like that, it just felt so weird.

I actually held back a little because Sushi tends to be expensive most places. But then one of my friends pointed out that it was an "all you can eat" arrangement. Then I turned into a pig (a fish and rice eating pig? They eat pretty much anything, don't they?). The "style" was one of those big ovals with a conveyor belt carrying plates of sushi moving by and booths arranged around it. I at first thought it was one where they charged by the *kind* of plate but had difficulty figuring out the difference between one plate and another (color, design, size? no pattern, puzzling). So, all you can eat then? There is no relationship between the price of the sushi and the plates you find it on? - good. Mystery solved. Oooh! Please pass me *that* one coming up!

I walked back to my hotel after walking my friends to a subway station. It was the first time I managed to get myself lost. It turned out to be no big deal as all I had to do was double-back. But I felt a bit annoyed with myself over it.  All I had to do was follow the water line, but the side-street I took led to a cruise ship and the buildings on the ocean side blocked my view which caused some disorientation leading me to a dead end (or board the cruise ship - no thank you).

Once back on a main street I had to look at my map frequently and it took me about 20 minutes to find two landmarks that indicated the right direction. Once I found the point where La Rambla meets the waterfront it was a quick and easy walk the rest of the way to my hotel. Even late at night (this was at least 11 p.m.) the streets are crowded, and not just La Rambla. My friends explained to me at dinner that the Spanish do not sleep. They say they'll sleep when they're dead. Evidently, they do not want to miss anything if they can avoid it. During my time in Spain I noticed (especially in Barcelona) that everyone had bags under their eyes. They do get up bright and early for work, after staying up until well past midnight on weekdays. The city has a kind and amount of noise and activity that I have never seen anywhere else. I remarked to my friends there later on that a city like New York is noisy because it has to be (subways, traffic, other circumstances make noise unavoidable) but Barcelona is noisy because the residents like it that way.

I'll conclude here for this installment. That evening in Barcelona I did begin to experience some difficulties, both in terms of culture shock as well as having pushed myself a bit hard during my "vacation" up to that point. More details in the next message.

Next, Pt. 12 - Using my superpower effectively.

Pt. 12, Night in Barcelona (like day, but darker)

[Note: my travel journal became a bit of a mess at this point in the trip. None of the dates or chronology from this point are remotely reliable]

Where I left off in the last message on November 5th, I spent most of the day exploring the city in the aftermath of the U.S. election, then I left my new friends after eating dinner at a sushi restaurant. On the way back to my hotel I had my first very unpleasant experience on my vacation. I decided to have some ice cream since I had spent enough time walking around, I had "walked it off" in advance. (Yeah, that's my rationalization and I'm sticking with it). I finished a small cup I bought at an ice cream place on La Ramblas when I encountered someone near my hotel who behaved like an overly friendly drunk. This was Wednesday, the day after the U.S. Presidential election. He asked some questions about Obama in marginally good English. I tried to answer simply and not engage him. When I tried to excuse myself and head back to my hotel he took me by the arm and tried to bring me into a crowded bar. Not Since Shinzen have I had anyone lay hands on me and I reacted as the travel-advice books instructed: you're supposed to make a lot of noise and resist any attempt, however friendly it may seem, to take you anywhere you don't want to go.

A quick digression: I have a superpower (sort of, anyway). I am loud. I mean really loud. I speak as "quietly" as I speak because I am making an effort to do so.  As a teenager my parents found that I was able to call my brother to dinner from the bottom of the stairs even with his stereo cranked up to 11. Not only did my brother know it was dinner time in our house but so did the neighbors. After I shouted the doorbell emitted a fading tone as if it had been rung. Typically I would startle everyone and my mother would drop something on her foot in the kitchen. (Then I was the one who was in trouble - unfair!). Strange, I realize, that I became a librarian, but life takes some strange turns sometimes.

Anyway, back to Barcelona on or about midnight: Mr. Too-Friendly took me by the arm. Then I pushed him off and yelled at about maybe half peak volume: "GET OFF ME!" What does "half peak volume" mean? Well, I woke up everyone who was sleeping in Barcelona (both of them) and I think that maybe someone who understood English who was taking an evening stroll in Seville wondered "get off who?"  Mr. Friendly looked insulted and gave me a disgusted look then skulked off into the bar. I continued to the hotel, feeling a little rattled. Through the night I felt a little odd, wondering if I had just screamed at someone guilty of nothing more than being an overly-friendly drunk. But the next day, when I walked to the cafe for breakfast I spotted Mr. Friendly at the same intersection where he intercepted me the night before. If he were an overly friendly drunk he would be sleeping it off somewhere. He noticed me noticing him but stood still, eyeing some Guardia Civil busily doing something across the narrow street from him. On my way back to the hotel after breakfast he was no where in sight. Best guess is that he works with pick-pockets, drawing marks into crowds.

There is no such thing as a non-smoking room in Barcelona, and perhaps that's true of all of Spain. My hotel room had a hard tile floor and evidently they laundered the towels and bedding well enough. But the drapes stank of tobacco. I had to write in my travel journal sitting on the toilet like a chair, with the fan blowing in fresh air from the outside. I tried to close the sliding door but the handle was broken - I had to jam my pen into one of the holes in the door where the inside handle used to be in order to open and close the door.

It's Thursday, November 6th and I am not feeling well. I told my friend who came to spend the day with me that I had a sore throat and felt I was coming down with something. We agreed to ride the "tourist bus" together that day. A tour company in Barcelona has three color-coded bus lines that take intersecting and somewhat over-lapping routes along wide streets past the best examples of the architecture of the city. You buy a ticket and then leave a given bus where you like and then pick up that or another color-coded line of the same outfit and continue on your way. We decided to stay on the bus for most of the day. On a blustery day in November this was better for me that walking but a was still cold and felt a bit like a cold coming on. My friend was very nice and patient (and about 5 months pregnant and therefore happy not to be walking all over the place). I would recommend that bus company for anyone who likes to explore a lot of the city. Normally I stay on foot as I feel I acquire a better sense of a place by exploring it slowly and stopping as I need. The bus covers much more ground and works better for someone with a more ambitious agenda. For me this day it worked out well enough given my state. In the morning before we met I tried to do some of the Modernisma walking tour and perhaps covered a small part of it.

We did leave the bus at an art museum that had a special exhibit of an Art Nouveau painter, Alfonse Mucha. It was the best time I had in Spain thus far. You've seen his work everywhere, but not necessarily knew who it was.  If you google his name you'll recognize the pictures immediately. I found it nice to see his work in full size. You see his pictures on small household objects, like coasters or you see small prints. The full size does justice to the intricacy and detail. The placards were in Spanish and Catalan. I was able to see some of the differences. Catalan resembles Italian - Donna for Mujer, for instance. I mentioned this to my friend who told me that there were French words in Catalan too, such as "Mercy" (as you would say it in English) for "thank you." Catalan is actually the earlier form language from which Spanish and French developed. After the museum we rode another "color" of the tour bus, one which took us up to a high point in the Southwestern part of the city. The bus had a recorded narration running - all you had to do was plug in a headphone set. Different flags denoted different languages of the narration. We wondered about one flag neither of us recognized. Mr. Know-it-all (one of my less endearing qualities) thought it was Hungary. But a moment of listening to it (hmmm, maybe you should try listening *first*?) proved it was Portuguese.

We also made plans to extricate me from my hotel and the Raval La Rambla. Reading my travel journal I see that I described it as "a circle of Hell beyond Dante's imagination." That's a bit of hyperbole and definitely undeserved. I should note here that in attempting to write an account of this part of my trip almost a year since it happened I find that my travel journal here skips and jumps all over the place, chronologically and otherwise, making it as much of a hindrance as an aid to recalling details. I think this constitutes a symptom of my having started to experience "travel fatigue" and culture shock and not really a fair reflection on Spain in general or Barcelona in particular. I'm pretty sure that when I go to Europe again I start in Barcelona, I will have a much better experience of the place. Please keep in my my fatigue and inexperience with travel as you read this and the last installments of the travelogue and do not let anything negative influence your perception of Barcelona or Spain.  On Friday morning at 11 a.m. I would leave Barcelona, The Raval, etc. and go to stay at my friends new apartment in a resort town called Stiges (pronounced "stitches" like in sewing). I started counting the hours to my escape.

On Friday I tried (and failed) to find Gaudi's "Casa Battlo" (pronounced "Bat-yo" with the emphasis on the 2nd syllable). I used my Barcelona "Street wise" map I bought in San Francisco, but it did not show Battlo's location very clearly. But I'm the one who had trouble finding the Eiffel Tower in Paris. I gave up because I wanted to make sure I did not delay my egress from the Spanish circle of hell. On the way back to the hotel I finally bought the deck of cards I saw the first day. I like to collect unusual playing cards and decided such would be my souvenirs for France and Spain. I tried to find the shop the day before, right before I crashed in my room for the rest of the day following my excursion on the tour bus. Not open at about 2:30 on a Thursday. But it *was* open on a Friday morning?? (I give up). Unfortunately, it was a tobacconist. The stench of smoggers nearly overpowered me but I managed to tough it out. Unlike the shop in France, this one did not have samples mounted on a board. I had to take a 10 Euro gamble (fitting, as these are playing cards). The gamble did pay off, as I found the deck has unusual pictures and a unique composition (40 cards, not 52). Looking at a typical one of these cards I'm reminded of the scene from the trailer for the first Crocodile Dundee movie in which Paul Hogan scares off a NYC mugger by laughing at his switchblade saying "That's not a knife" then drawing his own huge one saying " *that's* a knife."

Now *that's* a club! Not one of the wimpy little clover-like abstractions of a club that looks like a symmetrical Rorschach test.

My friend arrived right on time. She took me through the labyrinth that is the transfer point between the Barcelona Metro and the trains to outlying suburbs. I tried to make note of the path we took, as I realized I would need to figure this out on my own later on. It was hopeless. On the train to Stiges I had my first look at the Mediterranean. There was one spectacular view, including a very beautiful building and a dramatic rock formation. Then a train going the the opposite direction blocked it. My friend told me that never happened before. Great, just for me.

The area around the train station at Stiges looked like post-card material. A few narrow old pre-automobile streets led off from the conventional modern one that fed into the parking lot where I waited for my friend to come pick me up. Since I was feeling ill we decided to have me hang out in the fresh air and sunshine for a while. In my travel journal I remarked that no one at the train station "looks angry or like they're zeroing in on me - unlike the US. (or the Raval)." Once at the apartment, my friend left for a class.  I crashed for a couple of hours, chilled out with some of the DVD collection, then watched the sunset from the 3rd floor window. I wished I had a camera. Stiges is on a spit of land sticking out into the Mediterranean. There the sunset took about an hour with the light changing from reds and blues to teal in places. I saw at least two planets very clearly and maybe a third one (I tried to figure out if the iffy one was Venus).  That day I took a vacation from vacation. I realized later that the symptoms of illness I felt most likely resulted from stress of so much travel and pushing myself too hard. I felt entirely better the next morning.

For the rest of my time in Europe I either hung out in Stiges or took the train into Barcelona where I walked along the "Moderisma" architecture tour.

Next installment : Gaudi, Gaudi and more Guadi, plus a Charles Ives paradise and an uncomfortable mirror.

Pt. 13, Gaudi, Charles Ives and an uncomfortable mirror

The next day after I spent my first night in Sitges I collapsed. At least figuratively speaking. In my travel journal I made the analogy to a movie in which a character on a vacation, falling down after barely outrunning pirates, spits out some dirt and says "I've had about as much vacation as I can stand." My feeling of exhaustion came close to that.  I spent the day in the apartment watching DVDs and eating a little. (BTW my friend there has since corrected my mangled spelling and pronunciation of the name of this town, it's actually pronounced SIT-ges). 

During the remaining time in Spain I took the train into Barcelona from Sitges, visited Park Guell, Casa Battlo, and managed to get lost. One day I had lunch in a "Tapas" restaurant off La Ramblas. (First, a quick word about "Charles Ives." He was a composer who liked dissonant music, his father inspired him with among other things, having two marching bands approach each other then pass each other while playing entirely different songs.) I wrote in my travel journal: "Charles Ives would love this place. I'm in a small cafe-like eating place, there's 80s music blasting on the radio and until a minute ago a young German woman shouting into her cell phone, plus other sounds). In the dictionary next to the definition of cacophony there should be a picture of this cafe. 

I finally found Casa Battlo, but the light sucked. This was a good day to visit Park Guell (pronounced "Guey"). On the way I encountered a mural which I found a somewhat uncomfortable "mirror" (it's always a revelation to see what others think of you, even indirectly). 

Not everyone in Barcelona is enthusiastic about the tourist trade, I see. 

Park Guell started as a high-end housing project with Gaudi as the chief architect, the project fell apart with only a few buildings and common areas completed. He chose "Hansel and Gretel" as the theme. The light was pretty bad most of the time, which made my pictures terrible. The park was mobbed, even in the off season on a weekday. I walked past a what I thought was a statue which moved when I drew near it. It was a young woman in a "Gaudi Dragon" costume. She noticed me when I stopped short in surprise then walked around her cautiously, smiling good-naturedly through the "mouth" of the head of the dragon. (I did not get a picture, the light sucked). I walked from Park Guell to Sagrada Familia. The photo options were pretty thin, with the sun setting low on the southwest horizon. But I did manage to get one that's not too bad. (The picture above is the only one that needs to be in the message, so to speak. For the rest of the pictures I have put them on a flickr account, link below).

From Sagrada Familia I headed home but had my first "nightmare" experience on this trip. Let me explain. My big fear when traveling (irrational, I realize) is that I am lost and do not speak or understand the language. Of course, if I really were in trouble, I could call my friends who live there to rescue me, so I was never in any actual danger. I became disoriented when I tried to find the transfer from the subway system to the train to Sitges. I walked back and forth along a nearly half mile long corridor twice, until I found a teeny-tiny sign that led me in the right direction to the correct platform. But what I had not realized was that while I felt the stress and anxiety level ratchet up I nervously scratched an itch on my temple so hard that I drew blood. So there I sat on a bench on the platform waiting for the Sitges train with a trickle of blood down my face. A person on the platform and another on the train inquired as to whether I was OK (in Spanish or Catalan, I am inferring what they actually said). 

Monday, Nov 10. My lesson learned from before, this day in Barcelona I paced myself, ate two small lunches, snacked often and set reasonable goals. I accomplished everything I set out to do. I arrived at Casa Batllo in time to enjoy the light and take lots of pictures.  I spent the better part of a day in Casa Batllo, a mansion that Gaudi designed for a rich patron. Architecture with a sense of fun. Children must have had a wonderful time growing up in that house. I had overall success in finding non-smoking eating places, with good food. 

One Spanish waiter nearly cracked me up with his resemblance to "Monsieur Grumpy" from Paris. He had that kind of resigned patience mixed with with ill-concealed exasperation that comes from dealing with a bunch of foreigners who do not understand anything written or spoken. For example, when I was about to leave I took a step toward the door, stopped, turned around, looked for the restroom, then as my eyes found the waiter -  before I could try to ask -  he pointed (with a dour look on his face). 

After Battlo I took some exterior pictures of other buildings, either on the modernisma list or ones I found interesting. I learned to look behind me. It happened a couple of times that I stood in front of a building I was looking for with my back turned to it, looking across the street wondering where it was. 

Back in Sitges, over the weekend I managed to take a few pictures, two of which I added to the flickr set, one of the town and the other of the sunset. Sitges is where I met the Mediterranean Sea. This makes a total of 5 of the large bodies of water I have visited (the others: Atlantic, Pacific, Caribbean, South China. I think I'll skip the Beaufort and some of the colder waters). 

There were far too many pictures to include in an e-mail message, so now that I have figured out Flickr, you can see them here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sadunlap/sets/72157623367924338/

My trip back was largely uneventful. One of my friends there (and great hosts they all are) drove me to the airport. I barely made my flight to Madrid, however, because the Barcelona airport staff misdirected me to the wrong gate. The closeness to the departure time together with hardly anyone in the waiting area tipped me off that all was not well. I managed to find the correct gate and board the plane, but not without some running and stress (it's good to travel light). I was feeling a bit tired of Spain by that point. 

Despite some of my negative experiences I would recommend a visit to Barcelona and would like to go again someday. As long as you plan for delays, scout out non-smauging eating places and do not expect to accomplish *too* much in a given day, your trip should be fine. I had the good fortune to know people who lived there and who could take me around for the first few days. And I thank everyone who made this trip possible and very enjoyable.