Looking for Paella in All the Wrong Places
The COVID-19 pandemic put a cramp in my travel habits, as it did with everyone. The last overseas trip that Evelyn and I went on was to Poland in 2016 for a wedding and the last one that we actually planned was to Greece in 2015 (and, my God, it's hard for me to accept that Greece 9 years ago). We've been to a handful of relatively local destinations in the interim (Vancouver, New York, PEI) but nothing particularly foreign.
And while I do remain part of an increasingly small minority of people who still thinks about the pandemic in the present tense, I also wanted to finally visit someplace a bit more exotic.
So...with our vaccines topped up, we choose Spain. Or rather I choose it, and I dragged Evelyn along.
I wanted to avoid a repeat of the madness of Greece. We managed to pack a lot into 10 days for that trip, and it was all great, but the trade off was that we were constantly on the move, never staying more than a couple of days in one spot. I wanted something a bit more stable this time so we settled on 6 nights in Barcelona, 3 nights in Seville and 1 night in Madrid since we were flying out of there the next day.
The trip was planned just as locals started protesting mass tourism in Spain and other parts of Europe, and while I'd hoped that travelling in September would spare us the worst of it, I also got some advice on how to blend in...or at least on how to avoid walking around with a giant neon arrow pointed at my head flashing "tourist". Mostly this involved dressing plainly and not being obnoxious.
I started making inquiries. What was Spain like? What was worth seeing? What wasn't? From the very few people I talked to, the consensus seemed to be that:
- Barcelona was amazing
- Seville was amazing
- The food was amazing
- Madrid was...not amazing
Were we attacked with water guns? Was the food indeed amazing? Exactly how disappointing was Madrid? Read on to find out!
(Or rather, read on to find out more about Barcelona! Seville and Madrid will be dealt with in a future blog entry since this one is getting quite long).
There is No Barcelona Syndrome
Our first stop was Barcelona, our home for the next few days. Before we get into it though, I want to take a small detour and talk about another famous and tourist-laden European city: Paris. In particular, I want to talk about something called Paris Syndrome.
Paris Syndrome is the cognitive dissonance felt by many tourists when they visit a legendary city like Paris. It's the contrast between knowing in your heart of hearts that Paris is the very epitome of European high-culture and the fact that, when you visit, there are rude people and dog shit everywhere. It's particularly common among Japanese tourists, who tend to put the city on a pedestal and who tend to come from places where, I can only assume, people are more polite and tend to pick up after their pets.
One interesting twist to all of this is that I didn't actually experience Paris Syndrome when I first visited the city 20 odd years ago. I wasn't very well-travelled, and Europe was still so new to me back then, that every street, every back alley, no matter how mundane, took on an air of the exotic for the simple reason that it wasn't home. It's not that I didn't notice the dog shit - I most definitely noticed it - but rather that it lent an "interesting" texture to a place that was already bearing down on me with the weight of its history.
Or maybe part of it is that I come from Montreal, a city with its share of grime. The dog shit didn't faze me as much as some people. Who knows?
So, with that in mind, I would like to point out that there doesn't appear to be such a thing as Barcelona Syndrome - at least, not according to Wikipedia. Everyone I've talked to raves about the place. Madrid? You can skip it. Barcelona? Don't you fucking dare. The food, the architecture, the beaches - by all accounts Barcelona walks on water in a way that Paris does not.
Why is this? Is Barcelona that amazing? Or is it that it doesn't have quite the same lofty reputation as Paris, and so people's expectations are lower? I don't know, but I'll say this. When I was discussing with Evelyn how long we would stay, she expressed concern that 5 days would too much. She was genuinely concerned that we would be bored after day 3.
Since Paris, of course, I've been back to Europe several times and while many parts of it are indeed achingly beautiful, I've now "been there" and "done that", so to speak. I'm no longer impressed by something just because it's different or "exotic" and I can safely say that it takes more than just a slightly foreign looking alleyway to engage my sense of wonder. And dog shit, no two ways about it, is a blight on society.
So, given that this isn't my first rodeo, but also that everyone really, really seems to love Barcelona...how was it?
Less Vibes, More Sights, and Gaudi All Around
Let's start with the Airbnb. It was located in the Barcelona Sans district, right near the train station, and only a 5 minute walk from the metro. While our accommodations were modest, our hostess was legitimately one of the friendliest people I've ever met in my life.
Here's where I learned that Duo Lingo is a lie. Our hostess spoke Ukrainian and Spanish - but not much English. No problem, I think to myself - I've been Duo Lingo-ing Spanish for a over a year and we should be fine, right? Right?
Hahahahaha! I don't know if I'm just bad at this but my Spanish was rough, y'all. As in, non-existent. We desperately ended up relying on Google Translate here. This linguistic problem actually cropped up more than you might imagine given that we were tourists in one of the most heavily visited cities in the world. You see, our attempts to blend in actually worked - kind of. Random people would stop us to ask for directions, in Spanish, only to be met with a laughably broken "No hablo espanol". Devastating.
Still, our room was decent enough and very well situated, so it was hard to complain. And while no part of Barcelona is completely tourist-free, this area wasn't completely overrun with them, so that was a win. The neighbourhood felt...lived in. Pleasant enough, but I didn't get the impression that everything was there for us.
Our first touristy thing to do was booked for the night we flew in - a tour of Casa Batllo, by all accounts a "must see", and so we decided we "had to" see it. It's a building designed by Antoni Gaudi, a name that comes up again and again in connection to Barcelona - it sometimes feels like he designed half the city. For what it's worth, it's an impressive structure - the thing looked like it was made from bones; indeed, I later discovered that the locals sometimes call it the House of Bones.
This feels like a good spot to point out something that immediately sets Barcelona apart from Paris in my mind, either because I'm less of a wide-eyed traveller nowadays or because of something intrinsically different between the two cities. Paris, to me at least, is the type of city where you can just kind of...soak up the vibe. Obviously, there are a ton of specific things to see and do, but it's also possible to just amble along aimlessly and still feel like you're experiencing something special and unique. There's less of that in Barcelona. The city feels grittier, and lazily strolling around is a less interesting experience. Don't get me wrong, there's a ton of cool things to see and do, but it's less vibe and more sights, if that makes sense.
Despite being so crowded, there isn't much dog shit or trash in Barcelona and that night, in bed, we discovered why. It's because the city empties out the garbage bins every single night. We were woken up to the sounds of glass bottles being crushed in a garbage truck around 2 am. Good thing we brought earplugs. I was prepared the next night.
(Interesting philosophical question: if this had happened while I was in Paris, would I have chalked it up to the "texture" of the city? I don't know but I can tell you that I was certainly not impressed this time around).
The next day we toured the Sagrada Familia, another Gaudi special. Nominally a Catholic Basilica, I can safely say that the Sagrada Familia was one of the top things I'll forever remember about Barcelona. As one starts to experience more of Gaudi's work, you begin to notice similar themes. The guy was really into making his creations look organic - grown rather than designed. Sometimes that meant making them look like they were built from bones, and sometimes it meant making them look like they were crystals jutting out of the ground. In the case of the Sagrada Familia, it looked like both. I was surprised to learn that it's not the official Cathedral of Barcelona (that title goes to the much more aptly name Barcelona Cathedral - by all accounts a much less impressive structure) but given that, due to Gaudi's untimely death, it's still not finished after 150 years, I suppose it's not surprising.
Later that day we visited Park Guell, yet another Gaudi creation (this guy is everywhere in Barcelona). Not quite the jaw dropping spectacle of the Sagrada Familiar, Park Guell still looks like something out of Dr. Seuss.
A Brief Culinary Detour
We obviously had to eat that night and so now might be good time to talk about the food. It's definitely one of things people tend to comment on when they talk about Spain. People seem to love it. When questioned on the subject, a friend of mine remarked: "Two words: jamón ibérico". Another friend won't stop talking about the paella and yet another friend raves about the tapas, which is weird because tapas aren't really a recipe, right? More of a...portion size?
So I'll get this out of the way: the food was...fine. Tasty, but not mind blowing. Just okay.
Maybe it's because I've visited France and Italy where the food was, indeed, mind blowing, but I found the food in Spain a bit lackluster. I'm honestly not sure what the big deal is about paella; I tried it three times and it was certainly good each time but people treat this dish like it's some kind of religious experience it just...was not that for me. To be fair, it's possible that we simply picked the wrong spots - I'm pretty sure at least of them was a tourist trap - but it's hard for me to imagine even a professionally prepared paella changing my life. I'm willing to be corrected here!
And the jamón ibérico? People will yell at you if you call it prosciutto, so I won't call it prosciutto, but it's definitely prosciutto adjacent, you know? It's delicious, but I've had similar stuff before.
One Spanish culinary item that did, in fact, stand out for me might not be what you expect: it was the vermouth. Vermerterias, bars that specialize in vermouth, are everywhere in Spain, many of them with their own house blends. Vermouth gets a bad rap in North America - it's the stuff you grudgingly mix into a Martini or a Manhattan - but good vermouth is criminally underrated, and Spain is awash in the stuff. It was great.
Oh! And the cheesecake. I actually really, really liked the cheesecake. It's definitely not like the firm, dense, almost crumbly cheesecake you get here, which I also love. Spanish cheesecake is less cake and more creamy custard. You almost eat it like a pudding. It's amazing.
El Born and the Gothic Quarter
On the advice of a friend, we booked a free (sort of - these people work on donations) walking tour for the next day. While the walking tour was extremely informative, and our tour guide was very knowledgeable and very nice, I know that years from now the only thing I'm going to really remember about it is that the tour took us through the Old Town of Barcelona.
The Old Town, consisting of two areas called El Born and the Gothic Quarter, effectively constitutes a giant exception to my idea that Barcelona doesn't have much of a "vibe". The Old Town is all vibe. The entire neighbourhood is bursting with charming little cafes, restaurants, side streets and alleyways, many of which date back to the medieval era, but I can't think of a single thing that stuck out more than the neighbourhood as a whole. It's very easy to get lost here, and it's very easy not to care.
And there's a whole set of Roman ruins underneath! You can buy a ticket to see them at the local History Museum. They were discovered relatively recently; there's a black and white photograph of it in the museum. Fascinating stuff. Evelyn and I spent way longer looking at old garum factories than I thought was humanly possible.
How To Visit a Beach in Barcelona
Barcelona actually has a city beach, in the Barceloneta district, that dates back to 1992, when the city hosted the Olympics. It's serviceable but is nonetheless not the one many people think of when they want to take a dip. No, the town that crosses everyone's minds when they think of "Barcelona" and "beaches" is Sitges, which isn't actually in Barcelona.
In theory, getting there should have been easy for us. We were right near the train station. It's only a 45 minute ride. This should have been a cake walk.
Alas, we...did not fully understand how the train ticketing system worked, and ended buying a ticket to someplace completely different. Luckily, Evelyn discovered our mistake before we got too far. Still...28 Euros down the drain and we only got to Sitges around 4pm.
It was worth it, though. The town itself is pretty, sports 17 beaches, none of which were crowded at that time of year and all of which were beautiful. The Mediterranean waters were choppy but warm, and became much less choppy the more you swam out. I can only imagine how pleasant the excursion would have been if we had, you know, actually gotten on the right train.
So that's the lesson I took from that day. Take it from someone who's been there: make sure you get on the right train! Words to live by.
Final Thoughts
Barcelona definitely feels like a place that would reward repeated visits. I can imagine spending months or even years looking for that one hole in the wall that serves up the best paella you've ever had, or that one underground cavern with the secret vermouth barrel that will become the gold standard by which you will judge all other vermouths.
And it feels more real than Paris, like people actually work and live there. I think the city isn't burdened by the weight of expectations, and it lets you have more fun. I definitely want to go back.
Maybe with, you know, some actual Spanish under my belt this time.
As I mentioned, Barcelona was the first part of a longer trip to Spain. Stay tuned for my thoughts on Seville and Madrid.