08, 09, 10 APRIL 2009 ...I think someone's playing The Melvins

APRIL 8TH, 9TH, & 10TH.

There is a surreal shock about being on foreign territory that simulates a “wonderland” feeling. Everything is different; the language, gestures, physical terrain. I am a very audio-visual person and am drawn to media such as billboards, magazine ads and television commercials. En route to our hotel (about 10 minutes away in traffic) large billboards littered side of highways in a neat-looking chaos; everyone wanted to get their message across but still had respect for other people's space. Colour is a major factor in drawing attention to department stores, auto shops, even insurance companies.
The Barcelona Rennaissance hotel is located in an industrial park that in the States would be more fiting for sleazy motel. However in Europe, or Spain anyway, industrial parks are clean, well kept, and fairly atrractive, even the expected odor of broken backs, inferior products and flimsey paychecks is replaced with sterile air, ass-kissing service, and happy employees, all shit-eating grins toward the stupid notwithstanding.
Across the street was a building so new one could tell that the only thing missing was a visible factory sticker. It obviously had not been used yet, still in the bubble wrap with that fresh, unweathered smell. It was red, with black trimming, and resembled something you would find in a gradually gentrifiying neighbourhood of mid-america; that hardened aluminum foil prefered by cheaper landlords everywhere.
Across the highway is the Estrella-Damm Brewing company, makers of such fine products as Damm Beer, and my personal choice, FREE DAMM. A non-alcoholic beer that was enticing in concept, but for me still a dangerous reality.

On the grounds of its military-style, fenced-off campus, the main building looks like someone bought a bunch of silos, spraywashed them silver, and then stacked them all side by side in a pattern resembling an case of Sapporo Beer cans, noted for their tall silver and characteristic shape. Just the look of it could make anyone want to hit the bar. It's a constant reminder, and monument, to the universal need for an after-shift cold one.
At first glance inside it doesn't look too special; the music is horrible, but at least the tunes aren't recognizable and are played at a volume such as not to reach my ears. Everything is in redwood...actually, I can't really say that, and what's worse is I forgot to ask. I guess I was too busy assuming I knew what it was that when it came time to explain what it was I was too embarassed proving myself an idiot to ask. My point is that all the wood had a reddish quality; well stained, and well taken care of.
Our receptionist was a Dutchman named Jasper. Thinking that in Europe I can be “more international”, I decided to try my Dutch in front of Janette who was tired and could have cared less. But my yen to show off took control and I needless to say I fucked it up royaly. Jasper, handsome, about 6'4” (characteristic, but not typical Dutch features); he looked like a gameshow host, especially in a suit, one too pretty to be anything less than manequinesque, smiled and reminded me that it was all good. We switched to English, Janette was happy, we finally got our access cards and headed up to our room.
A beautiful spacious room it was. Got lots of light, with a great view of the swimming pool, and further in the background, several man-made hills that from our view were roundabouts, or maybe they were contrived to disguise the unused dirt from nearby construction sites. If that's the case then someone with an actual thinking brain is in charge which is another reason to favour Spain over Washington.
I needed some food, but I admit the one thing on my mind was to test out the information I received from friends about finding hash. Janette would scream bloody murder if I so much as suggested the stuff. We had a conversation about it before we arrived in Barcelona and I agreed that I would leave it alone for the term of the cruise. There were legitimate reasons citing international entanglements for me, to career complications for Janette, whose entire existence is maritime. That would fuck up her prospects to get advance within the Ship hierarchy...or something like that. In any case she was right. But as the time passed and the day of departure got nearer I rethunk my position on it. Not fair of me, but after all for me pot is not just a recreation, it's also a vital medicine.
I just casualy asked if it was OK for me to go to La Rambla with 30 euros. Should she ask I'll just make something up. It can't be that hard to convince her that I wanted to get a dress in La Rambla, and when I came back, I'd say I had a lovely meal and bought you a refridgerator magnet instead.
Then came the near medical emergency. I broke out into shivers and a cold sweat on my way downstairs to have a cigarette, and didn't stop until long after the sudden drop in energy level forced me to do a turn-around. As I reentered our room I was visibly clammy, pale and sopping wet. Janette didn't know what to do; even contemplated calling the ambulance. (speaking of ambulances, Richard Pryor always preached that when in an emergency you should never call an ambulance, “you call [your] ass a cab...[you don't want to] bleed to death waitin' for no ambulance.”) But I don't know how that works here in Spain. Europe is famous for its generous health care; always has been and will be, but does it apply to foreigners on holiday? It should, but taking the chance only invites complications that could be costly both for the pocket, and the cruise. It should be noted, if it hasn't previously, that I have both diabetes (type1), and Hypertension, formerly known as 'High Blood Pressure'. How I still can't live without stress in my life is an endless conundrum.
Janette sat me down on the bed and helped to find my towel, meds and a fresh shirt. I stripped down to my boxer shorts because I'm past the age of wearing Y-fronts, drank some water and relaxed. I was obviously coming down from the medicine I smoked Stateside. As with any medicine all have side-effects, and cannabis is no exception. My sweating fit lasted 10 minutes at the most. My heart rate came down, the sweating abated, my sense of humor came back. Janette was relieved that I wasn't going to need much more attention than that.
It was around 5pm. The shuttle that takes you from the hotel to Las Ramblas was due to arrive at 8pm, and I was due to be on it, but was simply not in the mood. The Jet Lag and the lack of herb – who knows? Perhaps insulin, hydorchlorothyazide, and cytalopram all hit you differently at 38,000 feet thus setting you up for a big crash (pardon the pun) once you're on the ground.
I lay on the bed, watching TV, seeing what's on the real Spanish Channels. I found TVEspana and a spanish movie channel, but the rest of the features on the set highlighted English and American action-dramas (T.J. Hooker, Heroes, Lost), sit-coms (Friends, Friends, followed by Friends) with your choice of which channel to watch it dubbed in (I didn't check out the porn options. Doesn't interest me too much). I settled for CNN, which used to be a reputable news organization in the grand scheme of the cooperate info-distribution field, but now has opted to administer sensationalism tactics via the likes of Mike Galanos and Nancy Grace. The latter stiring up such anger in me I just can't justify wasting any more digital ink on the bitch. Such unforgivable programming rightfully inflicts shame on CNN, and frightens me when I think there could (and probably will) be more to come.
Janette expressed her dismay at the tv being left on and I acknowleged it, but not without explaining that it's something I do in a foreign land. I also find it comforting. “It's like the night light kiddies have to keep the boogie man away,” I weighed in. “You never know. My Israeli friend told me to watch out because Torqarmada could rise from dead anytime.” She didn't get the joke which, no help from the fatigue, was poorly delivered anyway, so I turned the TV down as a compromise and driffted to what was questionably sleep.
I woke up at 3 in the morning from a dream that took place on the first leg of the flight. I dream a lot about a school, more like a building, but all my worries in life that come with me to slumberland are formatted to fit a scholastic structure; housing, classes and all. Assignments are never completed reflecting my obvious tendency to fear completing anything I'm writing for fear that it will be read and rejected (harshly) by each of its' readers. It's not that I'm afraid that it's bad, I'm afraid people will laugh at it the same way they laugh at anyone willing to play the fool, the crazy idiot who put everything at risk including public reputation just for a few lousy words on a piece of paper. The “general public” who reinforces the notion that to dare at the age of 40 is to continue to cling on to an adolescent belief system that is dwarfed by your contemporaries' unwillingness to venture outside of their own ralm. Enough of that.
I had no idea where I was, and literally thought I was kidnapped. After that wore off, I went outside for a cigarette and looked around. Stella Damm's beer factory stood out like a display of sabers, gleeming under the clear night's moonlight. You could still see the attractive reds of the surrounding buildings, and the hue of Barcelona's Auroras not too far down the road, or maybe the headrush was getting to me. Which was probably it because I felt faint and went back inside to the miserable reveries I'm more used to.

THURSDAY 09.APRIL.09:
I guess I needed the rest because I woke up at 10am; two hours before needing to get on the shuttle to go downtown. I couldn't find Janette, who as it turns out was at the gym on the basement level. We found that it was best to shower before we left, but didn't give much thought into why. Let's just say it was a good idea we did.
On the shuttle downtown I kept thinking what a rip-off it was that we could have taken a bus there and saved 9 euros each. For several reasons not worth getting into too much detail here, let's just say Janette doesn't get around much by herself. I won't go into how much it pisses me off considering she's very preachy to me about being independent. And yes, I am aware she's talking about a different kind of independence, but her personally imposed security measures are so extreme, (for instance, most nights she will not step outside of her house without an escort, even to get bread from the place across the street) that for what it's worth, it takes away from her overall credibility as an expert in the matter. I, on the other hand, just need to get off my ass and get a second job. My point is no one is perfect, so go figure.
We first started down the industrial highway leading into town. Nothing special.
I am drawn into the veins of rush-hour traffick leading to everyday life. The main boulevard running through the heart of the city is enormous, full of shops on the first floor of classical architectural wonders. People are waiting at busstops and, unlike in Seattle, taxi drivers aren't harrassing them with creppy drive bys. People are hanging out in front of their cafes drinking, walking their dogs, chatting; while others pass them by, most chatting on cell phones, jogging, reading the paper, looking at their watches, or trucking their brief cases and backpacks through the general flow with headphones on, allowing them to create their own bubble with which to escape the mundane I call paradise. I had the same reaction when I first strolled through Paris in the back of a taxi three years ago, when life had just woken up and had the same blind optimism that making breakfast on a warm spring day can have.

We were dropped off at the Plaza Espanya near Montjuic; an open square featuring a not-so-large arc-de-triomphe wannabe surrounded by construction cranes in the exact center of a circle playing roundabout to a host of speeding cars. Fortunatly, we didn't have to cross that road, everything was on our side of the bus. It was 12:15 and the sun was just about to do its worst. I can never sense when a rainstorm is coming, I just deal with it. I don't mind getting wet so much as I hate direct sunlight. It burns and causes me to sweat the toxins out of my body I'd much rather leave in and save for escape during sleep. Nothing is worse than a conscious detox. On the other hand, Janette was used to this. She works in Hawaii and has a great, comfortable life when she can get off the ship zapping under the sun. In Seattle, we don't have that luxury and in fact consider sunlight itself to be a luxury, certainly more than a natural comodity, but the reputation that we only have two seasons, cold and wet, versus actually sunny, Seattlites tend to go into shock whenever there's a succession of nice days in a row. We can't appreciate it because we know it's going to end sooner than later, and even then we don't know when. We can have a picnic one day with a forecast for sunny skies and two days later it'll be 44 and raining, with mass wind coming from just north of the Cascades. Some call it global warming, and I don't disagree, but I think it really has more to do with when we went and fucked over those indians.

Where was I? It was sunny when we got off the bus at Plaza Espanya where we were met with a large roundabout across the street and a nice open space to sit and/or lie down for a while on our side of the crosswalk. I had one thing on my mind: Las Ramblas. For one, the talk of it made it seem like that's the kind of place I wanted to go to anyway, and two, I needed to score some medicine. Pardon the terminology, but traveling with Janette that is exactly how I felt. So we looked at a map and tried to read it figuring after staring at it for a while that it was a better thing to take pictures of rather than try to decipher its contents. We had a continental breakfast that cost the two of us together almost 45 euros, and we ate so much that we didn't feel like doing much of anything...especially me, in the sun, so I didn't even try to read that map. Figuring the best place to start would be at the Magic Fountain of Montjuic, built for the Great Universal Exhibition of 1929. It is apparently one of their hugest tourist traps, and rightfully so, but we didn't see water coming out of the fountain, or a light show, which was probably for the best because from the picture on the brochure it didn't look like something I wanted to be a part of anyhow. Janette is a different story, she would have gobbled that up like candy. She's not used to seeing architecture dating farther back than 1973. Neither am I, but I watch films a lot, so it almost seems like I do...oh, who am I trying to kid. I love stuff like that, but not when it's put there to draw tourists to a spot like moths to a flame.


From that moment that Janette and I had problems with the camera. Talk about two pleasant, well raised children fighting over a 'thing' was a sign of things to come. But after a few tense words she forced me to concede when she reminded me that it was she who borrowed the camera, meaning that she is the one responsible for it, meaning she is the one in charge of it, with additional attitude inferring that if I continuted to bitch about it much longer she could just not make the camera available at all. Fine.

We walked up the stairs past the fountain, in front of which were from what I understood recently carved escalators; one side going up the other downstairs. This made no sense I thought, because, for one how is the person who needed the assistence up the first flight of stairs going to get to the level with the actual escalator, and why have they not of that? On top of that it looked pretty corny. I didn't think it had any aesthetic to it whatsoever, but if you want functionability...

The view from the top of the stairs, however in front of the museum is eye-popping:

We walked from Placa Espanya down Av. Maria Cristina, past the Magic Fountain of Montjuic, passed a nice little courtyard where we bought a cafe and a couple of bottle of water at the Passeig de les Cascades, eventually making our way to the MNAC-Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, or the National Museum of Catalunyan Art.
Inside the MNAC was divided into two parts, three if you include the main section under rennovation. (here's an aside: each time I've visited a major European museum there'a always been some part of it that's being renovated. The worst example being three years ago, when, no our field trip to the Chateau Versailles, The Hall of Mirrors exhibit was mid-face-lift, completely unbeknownst to both our profossors and tour guide. The first time happened in Amsterdam around the same time.) Of the two remaining exhibition halls, one you could go see for free and the other required an 8 euro entry fee, a pitty for us, on a 'just-in-case' budget because “the [D.'s] money hasn't arrived.” We had to think carefully about all of our purchases; a dissappointment of sorts because I wanted to actually see museums, even if I was in a hurry to find some hash to smoke.
We opted to try the free tour and it was pretty dull. We figured the 8 euro difference would have been about an hour worth of time. I always kept on to Janette not to get sucked into thinking that just because you see the number '8' doesn't mean it's still dollars, and this is by far, NOT monopoly money. Try as best you can to tack on 20 percent to everything. She looked at me as if to say directly the things she'd do to me if I were so rude as to assume that she didn't already know that. Y'know, that look.
We took pictures of just about everything that the free part of the musum had to offer and that wasn't much. On the ceiling of the upper eschalon there were paitings done by whom we don't know depicting ancient Greek heros and figures all in various poses. It's amazing how much the greek middle aged portraits always feature younger men with them - both, or at least the hero-figure striking a pose that is less than heterosexual. Among the characters were Pegasus, Hera, Dionysius, and a few others I don't remember. Janette insisted on getting each of the perrifforated squares on film, a project that I was going to have no part of, but she talked me into it adding that Isaac would enjoy the pictures so much, and we take every opportunity to expose him to as much art and culture as we can. So I put up with the neck crampness and uncomfortable back pains (the damage from the futon I [still] sleep on certainly didn't stay in Seattle), fearing it would pain me more for her to bring back shitty photos of the whole thing to begin with.
I'm sorry, that's mean. It's not that I don't trust her photographer's instinct, I don't trust her eyes. Neither should she. Our mutual friend, Lectra swears on a stack of trannie mags that without glasses, the woman can't see ten feet in front of her face and should be deemed legally blind by the state. Bless her for continuing to work with this impairment, for we both know how much that would destroy her chance at a shot of achieving all her goals; both immediate and long-term, like seafearing school. As a friend I'll do what I can to make that easier for her, and to make sure no one stops her. But the point here is, why am I trusting a blind woman with a camera to take pictures with. She doesn't have an eye for the daring, but an appetite for the safe, Hallmark-brand rubbish that puts its very recipients to sleep. Janette explained that D. wants some pictures from the trip. What she didn't communicate was that was the way D. wanted them. (By the way, not to dump on Hallmark too much, I had a friend who made himself a near identical copy of a famous Hallmark card while in art class. The cover depicted a serene mood (a waterfall with nice trees in the background) and inside it read, “I'm sorry I got you pregnant.” I thought it would have been a hit had he submited it.)
The pictures came out OK. Mine came out better. Were the camera on manual she may not have fully gotten things in focus. I'm not ragging on her, I'm just saying.
The Ethnological Museum was next door. I tried to get the full sign in focus, but Janette yelled at me for walking on the grass. She told me that it's all about being polite, but looking at the grass one could tell it was well travelled. Additionaly, if a place called the Ethnological Museum, which looked like it was hurting for visitors, was that barren I'm sure if calling attention to it meant some of the lawn got lightly trampled then let that be such a small price to pay.

Down the hill, the Arts Hall on Carrer de lleida was playing not the Catalan, but Spanish version of Disney's Beauty and the Beast, based on the Jean Cocteau film/story 'La belle et la bette' (and the Hugo classic before it FACT CHECK) that because of Disney is impossible for me not to hate no matter how hard I try.
There were also a host of shops exposing owners and their employees appearing to be in the middle of downtime. I was almost 1:15 and I saw a few of the shops were closed and some persons just looked from their tables all surrounded by friends, their peers squinting at us talking amongst themselves in not Catalan, not Spanish, but Arabic. More of the street signs were in Catalan, though. Passers-by with everyday business to atend to were of a much older population. I went to out to go play next to an orange tree facing a playground. Janette got some pix of me trying to get some of the goodies off the tree. I would have gotten one of the oranges but didn't know what the local laws were on that plus I couldn't remember how to climb a tree anyway, so it didn't matter much.

One of the shops advertised for razor blades and body soap. I deliberately didn't buy any in America because I wanted the excuse to bring back a European bottle; preferably one with the most obnoxiously macho ad campain on its bottle. A hefty cash-flow destroyed that dream so we got a boring bottle of Panteen and I got a standard pack of blue Gillette razors, the tag lines all in English. The shop owner, a Beber man proudly bearing the weight of the world on his tiny shoulders, looked at us with a fake humbleness before charging us an arm and a leg for such everyday items. I made it worth my while with the purchase of a Monty Burns superball, then thought of Isaac and got a bart simpson one for him. They don't have enough air in either of them to bounce more than a food and a half off the ground at maximum 9 year-old's velocity. There was an old-fashioned gumball machine in front that instead of giving out gum, was oversized and for one Euro a piece, despensed superballs featuring Simpson's Characters. We bought two, neither of which seemed would survive your average nine-year old's pitching arm, narry a foot off the ground at maximum velocity.

We took pictures of just about everything in our path that would hold still for a shot, and so it's only expected that we worried whether or not there was enough memory left in the camera.This was in fact the first time I had to use a digital camera, despite having been around so many of them before, I was pretty much unaware of anything beyond point and shoot. Janette knew that we had two 2-gig memory cards and had a maximum of upwards of 3,000 pics to take, but somehow lost track and thought we were closing in on that number.
“Impossible.” I said.
“But how do you know?”
“I don't know, I just know that there's no way we could have blasted through that many photos. We've gone through a maximum of two-hundered, maybe three.”
“How do you really know if you haven't been keeping count?”
We would find out later on that we just had to press a button on the camera and find out, but at this point the only thing left to do is change the subject. Finally after explaining that there was more 7/8ths left of gig memory, I added that I wanted to head straight for Las Ramblas. I thought there would have to be an argument in which I was finally prepared to say, “y'know what? I'm takin' off and I'll see you at five.” But at this point she was just as anxious to see it as I was.
This meant taking the subway but until this point Janette had never been one, and naturally comes the concern that we'd get lost. Subways are daunting, and in Boston you never want to accidentally get on the Mattapan section of the Green Line, trust me, but when you look at it as a whole, the international language of subway maps is designed to be easy enough for a deceased relative to figure out. Even if that were to fail, there would be surely enough functional Spanish and common sense between the two of us to find our way back to Plaza Espanya before the 5:15 pick-up time, right?
How hard could that be?
We had to take the metro the TMB-Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona, from the Espanya station, that much I knew. The rest was all a matter of asking. I can't remember who, but I was told that once you get in the city, ask anyone who looks the slightest bit hip to guide you in the right direction. That sounds great on paper (come to think of it, no it doesn’t; it sounds kind of lame), but in practice, not so. Approaching strange people and asking them things in languages that aren’t native to our own can realy remind you how shy you can be. Seeing nothing for it on the metro maps themselves, and giving up thinking I was in too much of a hurry, or too dumb to see something right under my nose, I convinced a growingly impatient Janette to see if we could get information out of the information kiosk. We asked the kind woman behind the bullet-thick glass if she spoke english, and she said a little, so I was once again, dumb enough to use my spanish. You could see it was a struggle for her to withold the laughter, and through a series of pantomimes, I enouraged her to laugh, and we got the information we needed. It was pretty simple. We had to get from the ESPANYA station, and get on the Green line (L2) headed towards CANYELLES, and get off at the DRASSANES or the LICEU stop. We thought the latter was the better choice, I liked it because I like the sound of the word Liceu. It's obviously either Spanish or Catalan for Lyceum, but it's not as pretty sounding in English. And it doesn't make sense that it's on this end of the Green Line because the L2's final stop at the other end of the line is at the Zona Universitaria. Inside the subway were cars that were painted that shit-ass graffitti-wash-out-residue-white; the lame cover up job. Some cars were well painted; ours was a regular car.
I go through all this because Janette hadn't riden on a subway car until this point. But she was too afraid to tell me. At least that's how I remember it. But it wasn't until we got to italy that she announced her railway-virginity.
Janette was clueless about how to buy tickets, as in she didn't know you were supposed to buy tickets. My problem was overcoming the language barrier, relying on the tiny little countries' flags on the ticket dispensers’ touch screen interface to make the purchase. Here's another thing you notice - even though you have all the time in the world, because you're in a subway tunnel surrounded by everyone who seems to know where they're going and are on the go, you still feel compelled to rush at a rockets' pace. There were plenty of dispensers for other people to use. There was no queue behind us. Nontheless we rushed through the entire process, and thank goodness we didn't buy the wrong tickets. Thinking we werer going to be zipping all around the city on the metro system, I suggested buying a “10-pack” of tickets (in the Paris Metro they're called a “carnet”, and they're Barcelonan counterparts' has slipped my mind), but Janette brought me down to earth suggesting that it would be unnecessary, and if we need to buy another metro ticket then so be it.
The metro itself was nice and clean and much wider than I had expected. The cars were openly connected and articulated; same as in Jerusalem, or Seattle, so there is no opening the door, risking a drink-related injury to get to the next. We always expect to find the underground in another country to be populated with splashes of culture for “our” (the tourist’s) entertainment, as if the metro doors will open to a crew of Conquistadores dancing with their mejores to Iberian skirt-twirling music. Of course not. I saw people who looked like they just followed me off the Seattle Metro and were now on their way to Las Ramblas to hang out, shop, score, look, pick-pocket, what-have-you. I couldn’t stop the double takes because at least half looked like people I knew.
What else should I have expected?
If you've ever taken the subway, ever since the early 2000s automated voices have been installed to announce the stops along the way. On the TMB the voice is easy to understand, and is bilingual in both Spanish and English, and surprisingly not Catalan. Or at least not on this line.

We got off at the Liceu station, but not without a nudge first from Janette asking me to make sure we knew where we were going, what stop we get off of, are we sure. She finally calmed down a bit, but not enough for me to be on the other side of her habit learned from the ship: when getting other people's attention Janette made a high squaling voice, saying look, look, while hitting me on the shoulder, or the arm. She often did this while my mind was elsewhere like concentrating on a building, or a shop window, or cars, or trying to eavesdrop on other people's conversation knowing full well that I wasn't going to understand a word. And where was the need? The the frustrated tones of over-stressed mothers is a universal idiom, and I enjoy then as a collective whole, these fresh sights and sounds; to me that amounts to one of many “experiences” only enjoyed in sporatic moments here and there.
On the other hand, Janette wants to go “sightseeing”. I respect her wanting to and I feel guilty that I don’t. It sucks for both of us in that respect. If I weren’t sober we could have drank our way out of caring one way or another, for sure.
There were shops galore everywhere you went, for those who are familiar with Seattle, it was similar to the Pike Place Market on one end; the odor of fresh fruit and vegies wafting down the street left me with a tingle of home, and the ensuing homesickness was welcome. Janette hit me on the arm to get my attention. I let it go, but it was apparently an attempt to get me more psyched about buying cheap souveniers for our cheap-ass friends. I was incorrigibly selfish at that moment. I had two things on my mind (three if you count the newpaper). First, I wanted to buy a pack of cigarettes, maybe two or three. I remembered my old roommate in Paris, Jasper, telling me that cigarettes are cheapest in Spain. He went to boarding schol here so he oughtta know.
Inside the first shop featuring a GO CAR THE TALKING TOUR CAR, and right on it's hood is a the number 29 and the inscription, “Officially the most fun way to see the city”. It's in quotes so it must be true.
The pipes and chess sets and watches we saw in the windows were enough to allure us inside, where we were treated to a feast of more pipes, and chess sets, and watches, and lighters and (jackpot!) cigarettes. There were all sorts, the brands were endless and I wanted to try them all. I thought about getting a carton, but that would have left me without hash money. (On the other hand, I braced for the potential nightmare that I'd get ripped off and have no hash, and would have to rely on the carton of American Spirits that I bought at the Duty Free shop. Why didn't I buy some other brand? Why didn't I wait? I'm on Janette's dime, and she's the boss.) So after taking my time and rushing through a selection that I coudln't have possibly given much thought to, and fearing that I may be stuck with a brand I hated, I decided on a pack of Marlboro's, but they weren't your ordinary red pack, but a limited edition package in a black tin box. The Health Ministry's warning labels are what truly attract me, and this Marb case came with the insignia FUMAR PUEDE MATAR on one side and EL TABACO ES MUY ADICTIVO: NO EMPIECE A FUMAR on the other, in large unmistakable letters. Was this by order of the Health ministry, or an insurance requirement imposed upon the European Liason for the Big Tobacco companies (so under no circumstances can you sue claiming you “saw no warning label on the bloody box.”)? But I was hesitant at the last second, thinking that Marbs, at the steal-cost of €3.80 for a pack of 20 in a flashy tin fuckin box, would be too predictable, so I asked for 555's, and then thought about it again! Panic had taken me over RainMan-at-the-airport style and the millions of micro-beads of sweat on my bald-spot and forehead were taking their usual places at the start line. I wanted to hurry up and make a decision, but without medicine it was hard to think. So what was it? Marlboro's, or Dunhills, Marlboro's or Dunhill's? What was the big deal about this whole argument in the first place? And wait, wasn't I all set to get anti-smoking medication not 48 hours ago?
We left to check out some more store fronts. You can't miss them and they won't snub too much at our not-so-allmighty dollar.
I had to get this hash thing off my chest. So I figured the best way to get the money off of her (that she had previously offered to me last night for my trip to Las Ramblas, until my big sweating fit) was to make sure she had something that made her feel special and take her mind off the stress of it. It didn't seem fair that I should have fun and she shouldn't. If that didn't work I'd just remind her what a stabbing-thorn in her side I could be. Having envisioned this cruise as us being happy with our respective poisons (whatever those poisons may be, so long as mine, according to her “don't involve drugs or alcohol”) I figured the only solution go to a bar. European bars aren’t pesky American drunk tanks, by general comparison. There’s more light, and an emphasis placed on coffee and aperatifs that allows an almost family friendly atmosfphere. Point is they don’t bother me as much.
We went to a place called the Patagonia bar. It caught my eye because it was situated on the second floor, where one could see all the foot trafic and people watch, and it was on a corner so there were multiple views; both of Las Ramblas' main, tree-lined drag; at the point where Ramblas dels Estudis and Rambla de Sant Josep meet. The downstairs entrance is also a gelato stand run by a hot Colombian guy standing next to a sign warning against patrons under the age of 18 from entering the bar part, which was upstairs and was cosey enough to hang out and do my homework in, or at least pretend. It was a tight squeeze and the tables were all situated so that it made it too easy for the nosy to eavesdrop. It's also hot on the Mediterranean, and much like as with anywhere heat rises, it gets worse with each unairconditioned flight up. Two was enough. I was sweating like a squeezed sponge, this time it wasn't because I was jonesing it was because my blood sugar wasn't where it should be. For those with diabetes it's beter to have a high blood sugar as oppsed to a low one, and we can't always feel it when we're hyperglycemic, but we can alwas feel hypo-glycemia. You have no energy, you sweat, shortness of breath, and to me it reminds me of the days I drank malt-liquors in alleys for 8 hours; I’d crash and wake up after the all the stores were closed, only to suffer a wave of the DTs (a rapid, unsafe detoxification – unsafe in that it can result in a lethal drop in blood-pressure from the shock) so servere I wouldn't wish it on my own worst enemy. I needed a coke, or a danish, or something. The woman working behind the counter saw that, and offered a glass of water. I couldn't place her accent. I tried to speak in Spanish, but she just responded in English. That was very nice of her. It turns out she was from Italy. She was tall, very pretty in that I hang out at the Cool, ‘Tough-Chick-but-not-a-Dyke’ bar after work, and could lay you out flat in a half the length of an exhale. For some reason I'm having this tittlating image of her beating the shit out of some deserving frat boys.
The view was pretty cool. As I said, this is the kind of place I could hang out in for hours on end, unless the alcohol gets to be too much towards the end of the evening. We mentioned something about wanting to sit by the window just to people shop but there was a couple of people alerady at the one we had our eye on. Somehow they overheard us and offered us their seats. We couldn't accept, especially Janette, but they insited saying they were on their way somewhere anyway.
Funny, how does everyone know to speak English with us? The one indication that gives us away as an “American Couple” is that we’re both overweight, don’t know where we are, and are clearly bothered by it. When separate from her I don’t give off any hint of it. When I’m lost I look like I know better, explore and discover without stress. Some have mistook me for French, Dutch, Canadian, or even Belgian. People know I’m not from Africa, and apparently I’m “too friendly”, or “intelligent to be American”, and draw from a list of the “progressive”countries I live in.
I admit, I don’t go out of my way to correct them.
“Where are you from?” They ask. “I live three hours away from Vancouver.” And that’s all, not misleading them per-sé, but not telling them where three hours away from Vancouver really is in relation to my residence.
We looked at the menu, and before ordering I said, “Look, why don't you get a drink, and I'm going to work on getting what I need. Can I have 30 euros?”
“What do you need it for?”
“C'mon...”
“I thought we decided you weren't going to do that.”
“We're in Barcelona. It's not like we're on the ship. I”m not going to bring it with me.” I actually looked in this woman, the woman who I'm planning to have kids with, and lied right to her face. Most of me felt bad for that, but the other wrote it off as practice for the future.
“That's not the point. You made a promise.”
“I did no such thing, I said I'd try.” More precise was that I gave her my word, and she knows better than that.
“If I give you money for this then we're going to have less for other things, so I'm not too sure about it.”

Fast forward two drinks, a real cappuccino, and several pictures later.
These two are the view from THE PATAGONIA Bar and Cafe.


And here's one of me on my way to score some medicine, which you can do, provided one is just as cautious as one would be anywhere. From what I'm told, if you're a foreigner caught trying to procure, you'll get a fine, if that. But beware, if they catch you again, you've insulted them to the point of wanting to persue matters further. Just do what everyone else does. Try to only buy in 10 euro incriments, and don't stay long. The best part about being at the scene of a “crime” is leaving it.
Reluctantly she gave me some cash, not even the 30 euros I was promised yesterday, it was 10, but I'm not going to complain because she’s not the one who didn't come with empty-handed, like a dumbass. I took off down one of the off streets off the main drag. Pardon the cliché, but there really was a “calling” in the air that said wonder off that way, like it was instict or something. Shops lined both sides of the narrow way, all Gay clubber/ metrosexual themed with the imperative “Can you take me higher” house music blaring from the speakers at each doors’ entrance. As you come towards the end of the sidestreet there is a wide open space with what I think I remember to be a church in the middle. I sat down and notice the many Rasta Fari, street musicians and performers. I opened my tin of Marlboro's lit one and scoped out the place, sitting next to a scraggly looking guy. Against all better judgement, I'm going through all the Spanish I know putting together sentences that will best serve my communicative purposes regardless of how bad the syntax is, or how stick-up-my-ass stuffy it comes across. The sound of a crowd’s applause could be heard from the other side of the church I was sitting on. I was just about to go and check it out when suddenly this homie showed up. He was standing in front of the visitors center across the courtyard. He took off, evidenttly circling the building, stood there a while again and that’s when we esatblished eye contact. I smilled and nodded, and he nodded back. Then I gave him the international “do you smoke?” gesture which consists of holding you thumb and forefinger together to make it look like a roach, and then taking a pretend hit from it while leaning back a little bit to simulate a lung full of puff. He casually nodded. I walked over and asked him in Spanish, introductions aside, “Me nessisito un poco de hasjisj. ¿Tu puedes me ayudar?” Turns out he was from Cuba, and by coincidence one of the big news items of the day conserned the loosening of both the Castro and Obama administration's political and travel restrictions. It seemed the feeling in the air that the embargo restrictions could be lifted anyday. It was cool that I found someone willing to help me out who not only was tollerant of my bad Spanish, but was willing to discuss politics as well.
“Un dia Cuba y los estados unidos seran amigos commo...antes los años séisentas.” I would have asked him how to say “soon” but he made it clear he didn't speak english, so it was either Espanol, or pantamining, which defeats the purpose of trying to do something discreet. With what little english he could muster up he offered me his mobile number and his reassurance that it was genuine shit.
“Tengo solemente diez dollares.”
“Es no problema.”
He looked around as I chose to keep my eyes fixed straight ahead to give the impression that we were nothing special to see. He opened up his wallet and pulled out a square piece of paper looking like it was a wad of gum. There were phone numbers writen on it and I could see clearly one of the names written on it was Vanessa. Too bad he liked girls, he was too cute for words.
“This is my personal. I give you from my personal.”
I thanked him, handed him the 10 euros, and while he was preoccupied with something in front of us, I quickly took a bite of the stuff to make sure it wasn't a toffee-like contraption which I'd gotten used to telling the difference between in France, but I wasn't all with it, and so, with this rotting brain that is eager to perceive what it will with whatever tangible thing there is in front of me, I couldn't tell if my senses were correct of it it was another CNS-brain connection gone rogue. But by all accounts it was the real thing.
He quickly jotted down his number and gave it to me then we parted ways; casually but quickly. I retraced my steps and frantically tried to sense which of the side alleys (of the original side alley I was already in) on my way to the cafe could I step into roll a fatty, smoke it, and get back to Janette all without getting lost. This place was a cool enough establishment to tollerate some open air smoking from what I saw later on, but I didn't know that then and was still afraid of being denied entrance on a cruise ship because of something as stupid as getting caught for being stupid. So I chanced it by finding an alley with dumpsters. They're clearly marked and easy to identify. I found an alley with a curve and either by glory or by grace of the other schmoe who thought of it before me, the dumpsters were situated just at the right part of the arc in the alley so one could easily hide behind it. I opened my Marlboro case and took out a butt, licked it down the middle like a fine penis, then broke it open emptying the tobaco. This was the first time I really got to look at the size of the chunk. It was MASSIVE. For 10 euros, it was more than generous. For this I easily would have paid 30 or even 40 just because of the urgency of the situation. I bit a chunk off of it and stuck it on a toothpick I thoughtfully pocketed a dozen of this morning. After lighting it on fire for about 10 seconds and blowing it out with extreme care so as not to get burned by the smoldering embers inside, I crumpled it up into flakes onto the tobacco waiting on the empty side of the cigarette tin. I took some rolling papers, rolled it all up and let it dry, while I took another public risk, I peed against the rubbish bin, grabbed my shit and casually strolled down to the end of the other side of the alley.
Once I lit it, using a bit of drool to keep the joint from “running” to one side, it hit me: not only does this shit work but it's powerful, too. I may have sprinkled the stuff on too liberally. I always forget that I'm not using this so much as a recreational drug anymore but as a pain and stress reliever, and you can over-medicate yourself if youre not careful. All drugs have side-effects and all users are suceptible to abuse; a construct unknowingly born from the idea on behalf of the patient that they think they’re doing the body good. It’s a tricky line. Back to what I was talking about, a big headrush, an award-winning headrush, fucked me up like a car-crash. Walking slowly, smoking the joint finally put me in a peaceful place. I had never felt like I was in a foreign country and away from home. Janette reminds me of that 24-7. So it's the moments when I can go explore and be inside my own head that made such a huge difference in the end. The 20 minutes I spent in that alley, an immaculate one by American standards, allowed me to separate myself form “home”. I finally got to do something I wanted to do, instead of constantly having to look at the world through Janette’s eyes.
I still had more than 2/3rds of the chunk in my tin and said, there was no way I am going to throw all of that away, it has to come on the ship with me. As I smoked people walked passed me, out of a handfull I'd estimate that half minded their own buisiness, and the other half nodded as if it were another insignificant daily occurrence. Thankfully, no one walked by with their kids, I have a personal commandment forbidding myself to smoke anything of any kind in front of kids, if I can help it. I figured that at a time when marijuana has finally started to lose its' bad reputation as a “gateway drug”, or as just simply “evil”, and more Americans are still making up their minds and reevaluating what pot is and what it isn't, by not smoking it in front of children and showing the parents that there is an etiquette and the morals therein that are upheld are in-common with that 90% of “straight-edge” society, the more tollerant, or at least less fearful mainstream society will be of it. At least that's the hope.
I didn't want to go back to the cafe and have to negociate my way though Janette's imperious, moral macrocosm, but as I ran up the stairs to our table, she was already giggling. Feeling good in the moment, I wanted to go out and do some shopping, or in this case some pretend shopping. I had €5 left. Probably not enough for a burger and fries.
The main drag in Las Ramblas is blocks upon blocks long. Kinda like Seattle's Univeristy District Street Fair, only everyday (season permitting). We didn’t have much time but still wanted to take in as much as possible and unfortunatly stumbled into the same traps everyone else does the first time they are there: we paid more attention to the newspaper kiosks that were selling trinkets, because trinkets are cheap and small enough to transport, and you can get enough of them to pass out to all your friends you were too stoned to remember to put on your list, so no one feels forgotten.
Each kiosk had different brands of the same shit to sell. For example, each one had sports magazines, but carried ones different from the other booth you saw. One kiosk had much more than its fair share of refridgerator magnets, nothing more than nasty-pastel-assembly-line spit-up. I made sure to eye all the books and dvds in each kisok we went to, nothing special, really. Some dvds I would have liked just to have the spanish version, but nothing I wanted to beg Janette for. All the books I saw were useless too, except for one. It was about, and called ‘Cannibus’. As I picked it up and started to flip through it (all in Spanish), Janette gave me the 'don't-think-about-it' look. I wanted to explain to her that this is something I would much rather give as a gift to someone, like Pretoriah, but Janette wanted nothing to do with that. “No.” She said, which confused me because the book cost 5 euros and she'd just given me a five euro note, so on top of the other five spot I had left over from the Cafe I could have picked it up, but then she took it right back from me and made me buy a momento of the city. I can even imagine giving it to our dear old friend, Pretoria, now.
“Pretoria, I wanted to get you this book I saw in Barcelona about Canibus' mystical properties, in Spanish, because I knew you would like and appreciate it, but Janette said ''no” so I got you this beautiful refridgerator magnet instead.” Accompanied with a wide, sarcastic grin of contempt.
Why coudln't I have bought it with the other five? Metro money...which we didn't even need, either because we had the equivalent of transfers, or no one checked when we boarded. I forget which.
Further down the street, there was a father and pissed-off, older son selling and raising families of various types of birds. I'm not used to seeing that because we're not known for outdoor petstores. There were also a couple of rabbits. I find them cuddly and cute, but Janette hates them with a passion. The details I still can't remember, but the overal reason was she thinks they’re dumb and a hinderance. I agreed they weren't the smartest of animals, but few of those all-trusting and cudddley woodland creatures are. It's just something to accept. She has a more practical look at things, “I just...hate them. C'mon!” Then we have street performers, but not the kind most grew up with in the States. Instead of doing a trick, singing a song, or just straight up mugging you, these performers dress up in wild costumes including face paint, and display themselves as Vikings on a horse, or flute-playing witches, or as faries. They are moving statues, and the idea is to drop a couple of euros into the bucket and they will do their little dance, or the witch will play her flute, or the horse will move his front feet, jumping up and down while his torso activates the ass end of it. It was pretty wild, really. And the costumes are very impressive.


And here's the Goth chick. I like how she looks anyway.

The Minator looking dude was detailed.

And if these two guys aren't still living out their D&D fantasies, then they should get more in tips for being so convincing.

No matter what I personally think, the costumes are great pieces of art in and of themselves. I thought of my nephew, , who would be inspired by this display of fantasy. It's almost like being on the set of 'Where the Wild Things Are', if they actually looked like that.
Janette bought some neclaces, and magnets, we both wanted post cards and the ones she picked out were as good as they got. She has an eye for that sort of thing.
I'll confess right off the bat that bad music one of my weaknesses. Not the “good” bad music that’s so bad it’s good, but shit like the ‘Alans Parsons Project’, Kenny Rogers and/or Loggins, or fucking worse, ‘Linkin Park”. If the FBI wanted information out of me, they may physically do their worst, but get nothing. Put on an ‘Effervescence’ record and, I'll tell them whatever they want to know before the end of track one, just as long as they don't play that shit. And I even go so far as to find out before hand the kind of music that's played at a job I might want to work at. I'm thinking of one specific incident where I worked for a telemarketing company that was noted for hiring anyone with an addiction problem so long as it didn't interfere with their overall job-performance, and showed up on time. Telemarketing is an unglorious job to begin with, but the musical selection was so bad it made it worse. As if I needed another reason to hate the Red Hot Chili Peppers!
So it was as unwelcome as ever to hear a Native American musicians “add to the culture” of Las Ramblas from two blocks away. I thought I was deaf, and I thought following My Bloody Valentine for 9 dates back in 1991 took care of that, so why is it that I can't hear people talk who are right in front of me, but can hear the people across the highway in front of my house playing Ann Murray? It's a curse.
I have nothing against Indian, or Indiginous cultures, or people's, I hate all music. Some more than others. If something doesn't ring right in my ears I just don't like it. Pink Floyd's 'The Wall' is my least favourite album ever, but that doesn't mean it's not a brilliant record, it just means I'm not as dedicated to misery as Roger Waters is. (Acts like Nickelback, Bush, Pearl Jam, those bands are just awful.) For some reason I can't stand that sound. And being as arrogent about music as I am, I took it as a personal afront. “Why are these guys here? Did they have to follow me all the way from Seattle, and why aren't they there now? What, are they doing this to me because of something I did? What? What?!” Janette got me to calm down, even though we were stuck at a pedestrian light where not only were they playing directly in my left ear, but also brought a McDonalds and a Burger King with them.

I don't understand the cuture of fastfood, nor do I understand it's compelling need to spread it's anti-nutrition everywhere. Starbucks doesn't insult coffee, it's just hated because good coffee shouldn't be capitalized upon, itsn't that why America runs on Dunkin'?

Why is there a FNAC here? FNAC (Fédération nationale d'achats des cadres, or National Purchasing Federation of Managers) is a French company, but as it turns out they've gone international. Their stores are located in Belgium (of course!), Brazil, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, and Taiwan. Why hasn't anyone taken the big leap and set out to become the first chain to open up a branch in Albania? In these hard times, I'm sure Downtown Tiranaë could benefit greatly from a new Bed, Bath and Beyond. When I lived in France I used to go to the one on the Champs-Elysees either for kicks or to get something they call cheap. I thought, like a naïve dumb-ass that they were only a french-practicing company: i.e. they only operate within its borders.
Funny, I hate department stores in the States, but I love them in Europe. The neat and colourful products that are on display, and the books are cool. The dvd section is my favourite because I get to find-out the French-titles of trashy American films. I talked Janette into taking a little peak inside the place, trying to sell her on its differences to their counterparts back home. We leafed through magazines, and looked at the overpriced menu at the FNAC cafe. It reminded me of the Wallgreens cafe my grandmother took me to as a kid in Chicago's Hyde Park neighbourhood. This one had better wallpaper and was filled with happier people, and judging by the prices on its menu and the clothes on their backs, they could afford to be.
We moved on. We didn't have money for happieness.
On the upper level one found the security guard, the check-out lines, and all the expensive stuff, CDs, DVDs, PCs, MACs et al. It was amazing how the cashiers and checkout lines occupied such a tiny amount of space, and the security guard had the right to check your bag on the way out. That's once you got passed the tag detectors. If your receipt doesn't match with your items they prosecute you for shoplifting on the spot. I can image the number of naïve American shopers who get caught up in that. We throw receipts away for big purchases in some cases, because we don't want the gifts’ recipients to know how much we paid for them. But I suppose that can be sorted out if the security personel notices shoppers who come in with bags.
I was dissappointed, but not surprised, that the books weren't on the upper level as well, in some -most- cases they're just as expensive as dvds, if not more. We immediately headed to the DVD department. Tons of stuff was on display. I had my eye on the new YOUNG ONES re-release. Too much remastering is a not a good thing, but that old series could desperately use a makeover. It's so old and the sound is so putrid that the videotapes were a shame to own. I don't know what Janette was looking for, but she found 'EL JOVENCITO FRANKENSTEIN' (!La comedia mas divertida de todos los tiempos!) YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN. “The most ...something...comedy of all time.”
I couldn't make up my mind what to get. It had to be good and it had to be equal or less than the 7 euro dvd Janette was getting. I looked for Almodovar's movies, but didn't find the one I wanted, “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown”. I also tried to find other movies, but somehow left behind the Hal Hartley for 'CALIGULA'. You know when you're under a lot of pressure and have little time to make a decision in a store and you simply can't decide between two good things and so you go with the one that grabs your eye most and it turns out to be something you later regret, remembering what you passed over, then when your friends look at it like, 'what is this', you justify it with words like “crazy”, “unique”, and “camp value”, when it's really not that at all, it's trash.
I'm not saying that Janette influenced my choice, I'm saying that her sudden and urgent need to get out of there gave me less time to think about my selection. But I was more conserned about Janette, I thought she was going into a panic, or having cabin fever. Thankfully it wasn't any of those ailments, it was her simple intense hatred of shopping malls of any sort. Ironically this began just before we tried and failed to access our respective email accounts from the Technology Department's desktops. Janette needed to check her monitary status and I needed to check my emails. She couldn't negociate the language barrier and I was stuck too. Plus (a major confession here) I'm pretty much MAC-illiterate. None of my friends have one, which tells me what kind of tech-nerds I have to start hanging out with, and of the two most tech savvy people I do know, the most bareable one is a Linix-lifer, won't use anything else, except when doing work on other people's projects, or working on my shit.
Here's something I thought was cool: Janette didn't notice, but the Franco-African security guard, noded at me but gave her the up-and-down glance. I don't know if it's because she's White, or was just all frantic looking from needing to get out of there. Honestly, for that panicing minut, she fit the profile of a shoplifter.
I didn't want to leave. Not because I have a dedication to FNAC, but because it was Air Conditioned inside so I would not to sweat out all the coffee, nicotine, and cannibus toxins, allowing me to keep them where I want them to be. Outside it was just hot enough for me to be uncomfortable, having just come from the piss-rainy and damp Pacific Northwest. I didn't have much time to get my body used to it and there wasn't much warning. I just hoped I woulnd't get sick.

When we got outside I literally thought I had stepped back on to Seattle’s Broadway. A bunch of kids who all donned the fashion sported by Seattle's Bike Courriers. Janette wanted their picture and asked for some cigarettes to offer in exchange. They were all very handsome except for one. It turns out she was a girl. People like this, who are so cute you just want to eat them up, make me feel uncomfortable partially because I have thoughts like that and I'm 31 and risked creeping these 20-somethings out (I have explicit facial expressions and no matter how hard I try I can never hide what I'm thinking; another reason why don't play cards, I have no poker face.) We talked to them and stuff, asking where they were from, and what they were doing here. They were more than accomodating. Even though they speak the same language as their host country (a couple were from Argentina, I've seen a lot of folks come from there. The girl was from Hungary and became fluent in languages just to get out of there. I identify with her!) they were still outcasts because of their lack of the years of domesticity for which Spaniards hold a visible, everyday disposition. They blend from a distance, but not up colse and personal.
They were standing right next to a pannel of bicycles, about 20 in a row on a bike rack resembling the side of a pigs' trough with tiny, thumb-sized holes drilled in it . The holes are designed for making sure that the handle bars' “elbow-ends” are fastened and locked down into place, neatly lines them up using sufficient and equal space; kind of like the actors in A Chorus Line. I had to take a shot of it because it...well, because I'd never seen anything like it before. We waited a little for someone to come around and use it, but after a couple of minutes Janette wanted out of there. It was time to move on.
With nowhere to go and getting hungry, we hit a side street to look for lunch. Janette had to find an ATM and look at her account balance to make sure everything was copaceitc. It would have been just one thing to grab some cash and go. Getting 40 euros out of an ATM is universal in any language. All what she had to do was find the word 'Ingles', or like earlier, an icon of the Union Jack, and she was in business. I assume she had it down, but I was wrong. She had to over complicate things by insisting on checking her balance. I am not giving her any crosstalk here per-se, I'm just iterating that when she asks for my help and then chastizes me for being incorrect without being given the benefit of having tried I get angry, but I can't because my stomach and blood-sugar is resting on her laurels. She eventually said fuck it, opting to check back at the hotel and hope she didn't overdraw. The “nasty looks” returned which meant she wanted to hold the carton of cigs over my head, plus the 20 euros for hash and more cigarettes. I would have been just as happy had she said “No”. Well not really, but I’m man enough to have accepted that as an answer.
At this point I was curious about the finances for the remainder of the trip, but kept those queeries to myself. Janette’s description called for spending money. There’s really no reason for me to worry.
We ate at an outdoor cafe run by Bombay Posse. The name of it will not come to me (through the power of memory it was in fact the Cafe de la Radio, on Carrer de Casp), but it was a sufficient tourist trap . You could tell because of three distinguishing marks: The ready and fluent English over Spanish. There was not one Spaniard working in the place. Two, they advertised almost solely in English and there were nothing but non-Spaniards there (on the left side of me there were a Scottish mother and daughter duo who were not impressed nor amused with my excitement at being in Spain. They just looked at me funny, so I ended that conversation by discussing the ending to Twilight sensing she hadn't read or seen it. (She hadn’t!!) Once they left, they were replaced by a Danish couple, and on the right side of me, a French trio, later joined by another who had the nicest bubble ass I've ever seen!), and lastly there was a large sign in English warning of the “professional” bag and purse snatchers who frequent the place looking for prey just like us. So as not to get into an argument later about who was, or wasn't observant when our stuff got heisted, I made sure Janette read the sign as well and went on with our lives.
I had an artichoke heart salad -a very, very bad choice! I took some photos from across the street, sometimes risking almost certain death by standing in the midle of it to get a shot of the Agbar Tower at the far end of the boulevard, way out of walking distance. On that other side of the street was a clothier sporting the best antique mirror that made for some good vanity shots.
I honestly didn't know I was so narcissistic. Not that I ever thought much about the legendary character, but it turns out that I do identify with him more than I had first thought. As usual it has more to do with needing to concoct something better to look at than your run of the ill Hallmark, or tourist brochure picutre. Nothing is more boring than looking at slide shows of people having a good time standing in front of monuments, looking stoic and stale. Forced to smile by standing still and plunging the last happy pour from your skin. People look dehydrated, not from the sun or lack of water, but from an overdose of artificiality. Even so, one's options are limited, and in proportion to the mind's expectations it's always a disappointment, but when you don't give a fuck, or just point and shoot you get something more interesting. When you try to frame something differently it has more potential to hold the viewer's attention, make them laugh, or vomit. But one thing's certain, they won't just sit there. I'm not claiming to have that kind of physical charm -I'm one of the most un-photogenic people I know, and much like a singer who knows they can't sing, but sings anyway, it's all about understanding, accepting and and happily working within one's limitations. First to one’s own advantage, then to one’s own personal and artistic growth.
She may not have that same “vision” with the camera, which Janette repeatedly reminds me that she borrowed and not I, but she is a good photographer in her own right. She's good at capturing unpretentious purity whereas I'm all about pretentious impurities. We're both bound to have conflicts about what's good and what's horseshit. I like Sonic Youth, she likes the Indigo Girls. I like John Waters movies and she likes Tyler Perry's shit. If she and I had identical tastes I'd be so bored around her it's not funny.
The salad was terrible. It was too vinagery, and I thought I was getting something else, lets just leave it at that. I'm tollerant of chewing on things that don't eventually kill me in the long run, but this was not was I expected. At home I'm the garberator, I'll eat anything leftover on my roommies plates if they're not going to eat it, and I have a rommie who loves american cheese on his hamburgers, mayonnaise on his fries, and other disasterous combinations that shouldn't be tried by anyone, but this was the mother of them all. There was a good side to it however, I was sitting right in front of a radio station, Barcelona Cadena Ser. It was decked out. It was a news-radio station, or a public radio station, only here cool people walked out of the building instead of the usual NPR fare that always slant their heads sideways when they nod with you in agreement (or even when they're not in agreement). In short it looked like the kind of place where I'd want to do all of my broadcast training, if only I spoke Spanish.
I had to get out of there, or rather Janette was keeping an eye on time. She's good with that, even though she proposed heading back two hours before we were due to arrive. I had a back-up plan just in case we missed the shuttle. I noticed buses ran straight to the hotel's complex. It would be easy to find once we got there. Just look for the 12-pack Silo-shapped cans of Estrella Damm and follow the Red-Stained buildings from there. We could go to an internet cafe and look up the bus information and just get there. Janette doesn't think that way. For somereason when all hope is lost we take a cab, but that's a waste of money if you can do it on the cheap and just bus it.
But we were in no danger of that. After lunch we travelled further up the street towards the infamous, but ugly-from-a-distance Agbar tower. We never got up close to it, but based on the photos I saw later on the ship from passengers who had gone to check it out it's an ultra-modern beehive for people to live in. Not too honeycomb like, but it's the first description to pop into mind.
Janette got worried and insited we find another ATM to check her balance. I was not going to stop her, but finding one was a bitch. By the time we needed to find an open bank that could assist us, they had all already closed down. So we asked someone at a newspaper kisok, and at the point when I got smart and opted not to use my Spanish it had to come up anyway because the kiosk owner spoke as much English as I did Castillian. It was a tight fit, but we managed to hammer out comprehensible directions, but not after a little attitude. Then Janette told me, “He said your spanish was bad. 'Malo'”. I didn't want to hear this because for one I already knew it was bad, and secondly, how the fuck is a hard-of-hearing woman going to justify that's what she heard when I was listening to the same conversation and didn't hear a trace of it. Surely, I wasn't that stoned. The only reason I didn't say it outloud was that I was indeed not sure I didn't hear it. I think he explained where the bank was and 'Malo' was one of the words that came up...who knows? He probably did say it only I blocked out what I didn't want to hear, as usual. I would have let it go, but Janette can make that difficult, sometimes.
The hash started kicking in because I don't remember what happened afterwards. Suffice it to say those were some cool and spacy 20 minutes.
I came to because it was really time to get going back to the meet-up point. I almost told Janette it would be worth it to stick around a few more hours and take public transport back, but I started getting hungry and we didn't have the kind of money for dinner that tourists in a foreign country should be able to spend on an average price meal.
Back at the rendez-vous, a major drop-off center for all local public transport, any number of could have been waiting for us. The driver's english made my limited spanish a welcome addition to his passenger list, just to give you an idea of what his skills were like, so I entertained the possibility that he was resisting going outside to let the others in our group know where he was for this very reason. As I said, it was only a possiblity. And the only reason I thought of it was because of Janettes' paranoia that we'll miss our ride. That’s justifiable, right (?!?)
As we waited, sitting on the steps leading to both the monument behind us, and the subway station to the left of us I saw the same kinds people I know from home. Homemade clothing chickly assembled to reflect an anti-style. Two types of coiffs; perfect, or perfectly slopped together. People are meeting up with their connections. It's the time when night lushes and devoted drinkers assemble over a fifth to discuss why they can't stand each other during the remaining 18 hours of the day. Kids and the elderly rush home for curfues, dinner and the consumption of the type televsion my buddies back home could give a fuck about. Out here generates that same human attitude (duh!) Espresso cups morph into pint glasses. It's the Heinekin before the High-ball. Barcelona's night life was beginning to crawl out of hiding for another night's kitten mischief, and what little of that I saw made me want to take the emergency $50 in my pocket (surprise, Janette!) and tell her to get lost. But I couldn’t do that to her.
The homogonization of urban and so-called “alternative” subcultures is a phenomenon that has changed massively over the 30 years. Local chapters had a flavour all their own, but based their ideas off of what was seen in magazines and music weeklies. (In my mid teens, the circle of friends I associated with all took their cues from british music tabloids like SOUNDS, and most important to me NME, which featured not just informative UK band and band-fashion insights, but incorporated intelligent and well-crafted journalism that was inspiring to read and was so witty I split my sides on crowded and silent buses.) It was the manner in which information travelled that allowed time to set in to create something artistic out of fashion, or that allowed the statements to be made in full before moving on to whatever the next idea was. Since the advent of the internet that's all changed of course. This rapid connection allows for ideas to make it around the world before the first coffee break, opening a gateway for fashion to litterally be cut and pasted on by the next day. In the past when I travelled each town, state, country and province had its own underground identity, but now it seems that it's the same wherever you go.
It isn’t typical in every case, but overal this is the way things are. The fact that people have adapted to this (or in some cases born into it) means this is good progress.
The shuttle ride was the best. Air-conditioned. Rush hour traffic really pumps some life into this place. I have to admit I was somewhat dissappointed I didn't see the city's infamous road rage. Perhaps big-brother's internet has something to do with that, too.
Back at the hotel we got some food, but were kind of bored afterwards and decided that because we were leaving early in the morning and wouldn't have time, that it would be best to take the pictures Janette's benefactor expected to see now rather than wait until later.
We weretalking about what the ship was going to be like, and I was stoned enough to nod along with her, and then the subject switched over to my father.
“I can't wait to meet your father.”
“You'll get to see where it all comes from. But there's something I want to say about that. Look, my father's a great guy and all, but he might give me shit about you.”
“What makes you say that?”
“He's going to ask me, 'Son, what are you doing with her?'
“What do you mean?”
“Well...you're not Harvard material.”
NEVER SAY THIS!!! It's like telling your girlfriend that she still looks fat after the abortion. I don't know where it came from...which is actually a total lie, the thought of saying this had been on my back burner all day. What do you mean you have no sense of direction? What do you mean you can't process what's right in front of you. What I wanted to say was to get my frustrations off my chest with her. “There are times where your aren't as observant as you should be.” But I don't know why I didn't say that and opted for the other, most fucked up, unglorious and simply the worst comment possible.
“What do you mean by that?!”
I had no choice but to hope that damage control would come through.
I recalled a story she told me about a book she was reading in which she didn't like the actions of a certain character so instead of just rolling with it she decided “to punnish the book by not finishing it”, which when it was run by me the first time echoed the voices of airheaded bimbos past. She could have just put the book down and decided not to read it because she thought the book sucked overall, or she didn't like it, but to “punnish a story” is missing the point, and so much more.
“What you're saying is that I'm not smart?” She asked. Sure, I wanted to confirm that, but she'd miss the point I was trying to make that it's a different kind of intelligence, and some people have it and some people don't, and it doesn't matter to me. Thing is, I can be very deriding of people, and it's a reflection of the obtuse demands I ask of myself, but Janette's is not an issue of booksmarts it’s ….other stuff.
“So what you're saying is he's a snoot.”
“No he's not a snob. If anything I'm the one whose the snob, but it's only because I was raised to appreciate the finer things.” Another sentence I can't believe I spit out.
“Wow Saad. I'm on vacation. And I wanted to bring a friend with me on vacation. But instead I brought a pompus ass, and had I knew I would be bringing pompus ass, I would have left that pompus ass back in Seattle.” Uttering one sound would have meant certain death, and the ensuing 2 hours of unbearable silence left me wishing I was.
Finally I asked her, “I'm never going to play this one down, am I?”
“Not a chance!”
The next morning after a shitty breakfast we theoretically couldn’t afford, while Janette was working out I met with a very charming lady from Texas. Her name was Bev, and she was a glorious, elegant woman who reeked of regality, Winstons and White Wiamonds perfume. She was traveling with her two sisters who were avoiding her poorly chosen habit. (I rarely meet people with the kind of money and stress-free access to health care who smoke cigarettes. Especially, women. And especially over the age of 65. It's like AARP Platinum Level 101: Quit Smoking! It's right there in the manual just after 'Give us all your money!') I had been taping myself talk around the hotel and the surrounding industrial park with my a-far-cry-POD (my cheap Sansa, iPOD-a-Wannabe), but just didn't bring it with me that morning. I missed the chance to record a woman's telling of a fabulous life (her words) that even when the bad times rolled in, still put up enough bravery to tough it out. She was traveling to Egypt to see the Pyramids, primarily, just because she “wanted to see them.” On this cruise that's pretty much the apex. And she felt the obligation to bring and pay for both of her sister's tickets and spending money; the two of them, reportedly sweet lushes. Bev quit drinking because she wanted to, and she didn't use AA, or go to therapy. She was old school. Probably didn't have, or believe in the healing properties of, marijuana which admitedly can neutralize all sense of autonomy and empowerment if abused.
But she didn't seem like a person-of-excess. I sensed she was a woman who always did her best to do the right thing. The details of our conversation have long since evaporated. Long before I smoked pot I never had a memory for conversation; a torture for someone who enjoys good dialogue, but can't write it. Bev told such a wonderful story about her life that I can't do it any justice by attempting to reenact it here. Should she have exaggerated a little, or a lot, it would not have mattered because it was presented realistically enough, so either I didn't notice, or didn't care.
The only thing that seemed to turn her off was the mentioning of my homosexuality. I admit use to bring it up a lot for no reason, but tend not to so much anymore. However, I still have a policy where if it works its way into the conversation; say if discussion of our domestic lives were to include the airing of spousal grievances, I'll contribute what I know about the subject, allowing time for the idea to sink in, but not too long to dwell on. I want the subject to be just as everyday as walking to work. Besides, 8 out of 10 people have already figured it out, and telling those 8 only leads to their intelligence being insulted for having to be told the obvious, or, more likely, lead them suspecting you of being an asshole. Anyway, either it was time for her to go, or “time for her to go”; either coincidence, or planned. Somehow I felt like I said the wrong thing. It's probably just me.
They squeezed us into this petit modernization of the VW Bus, but after the luggage was plopped on us suddenly we were a third-world driving hazzard. Sure, we were fine on the road, but it was around lunch time in a culture where traffic has it's own culture. And traffic's mind-of-its-own, blatant disregard for the laws of physics turns any road into a game of chance. We were simply ripe, and right there. One blown tire, one asshole dialing on his cellphone going 80 km/h, a careless motorcyclist and we could have tumbled and incinerated in a compact doubling as a human microwaveable dinner. I have an irrational fear of automobiles.
After a stunning view of the ____________ mountain in which graves and mini-statues have been carved, (and of which I took a shitty picture) we saw the main port, the open sea, and the image of a slab of crap under construction. It was the boat…