De Nada, Granada

Located in the southern part of Spain, Granada is a unique Andalusian city filled with Moorish influence. Similar to Bilbao, the tourism of Granada is single-handedly made possible with the existence of one architecture, the Alhambra. That is not to say that the city is nothing without the Alhambra, but the palace alone is a strong reason to take the trip.

We were there for 2 very full days, the perfect length to soak up everything interesting about the city. Due to its proximity to northern Africa, Granada is a blend of both southern Spanish charm/laziness and Moorish exoticism and exquisiteness. Without further “travel brochure-ing”, top 3 here we go.

Walking around the city

This might seem like a filler reason, but the old part of the city really looks like the backdrop of a movie. Winding roads, pebble pavement, old houses, and scatters of vibrant colors are what makes this city so entertaining to stroll through. However, the bumpy surface did make climbing uphill extra painful.

Our tour guide took us on this journey that cut through streets filled with Moorish teas and garments into narrow alleyways with old houses while getting sneak peaks of the Alhambra between rooftops, and ending at a terrace plaza right next to the river. We were very disoriented to say the least, but it was a nice change from the orthogonal Cerda grid of Barcelona.

Everything seemed more organic, and the size of the city was comfortable and real. Also, unlike Valencia or Barcelona, there were very few cars within the old parts of the town, perhaps because the roads were just narrow and bumpy enough to exclude automobiles.

At night, the same winding roads got us lost on our way to the dinner several times, but each time there were some compensations for our mistakes. We got a night view of the city and the Alhambra, and stumbled upon a hippie/gypsy festival that had a mime show, a giant teepee, fire breathers, and dogs getting intimate. It was bizarre and slightly smelly.

Tapas y Flamenco

Food, drinks, and entertainment. What more can you ask for. On Saturday night, we all went out to dinner at this tapas restaurant. What could’ve been a feast turned out to be a somewhat painful experience because i made the unwise decision of eating couple hours prior. However, to my defense, i had the best mango milkshake ever.

In any case, we had about 7 different types of tapas and a bombtastic desert that reminded me of the molten lava cake from Chili’s. While we loosened our belt buckles and gulped down vino blanco, 4 performers were on stage performing the flamenco dance. It was said that this dance was so beautiful that it brings people to tears. Although it was good, it did not bring me to tears.

It’s always cool to see something where the performers are so passionate and absorbed into what they are doing. At first I thought their expressions were cliché and laughable, but then i realized that they are not trying to be over-the-top. It’s a very multi-cultural dance, and it is very different from what i expected (i don’t think i’ll group it with tango anymore).

LA ALHAMBRA

The Alhambra is a palace and fortress complex constructed during the mid 14th century by the Moorish rulers of the Emirate of Granada.  Occupying the top of the hill of the Assabica on the southeastern border of the city of Granada, the Alhambra offered a breathtaking panorama of the city.

Word of advice: if you want to visit the Alhambra, you have to make an appointment ahead of time. Although the day started out hazy, white clouds and blue skies decided to make an appearance around noon.

Our tour guide wasnt the most interesting person to listen to, so i cant offer you an in-depth historical background and significance of this place. But walking through the gardens and courtyard, you get a pretty authentic feeling of a unique culture and their traditions. Having visited numerous palaces from different regions, it always fascinates me how various societies show off wealth and power differently.

The Moorish rulers liked to keep everything on the inside, like a surprise. The opulence and craftsmanship for the interior dramatically contrasts with the bland and fortress-like exterior.

My favorites were the decorative reliefs. All the stone carvings were intricate and geometric. As a fan of symmetry and detail, the Islamic carvings hit the spot. From hall to hall, i could almost feel the lavishness of the past when the rulers and their close subordinates occupied the palace. Each courtyard was perfectly kept, and each window framed a perfect view.

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BRB

Life is getting busy, and i would rather spend time living than writing about it. So my posts will be more erratic and delayed from now on. However, to get a visual (and punctual) idea of my travels without my annoying commentaries, you can go here. OKBYE

LA MERCE (sat&sun)

Saturday night was one of the scariest and funnest experience of my life called correfoc or fire runs.

In the correfoc, a group of individuals dressed as devils and lit fireworks. While dancing to the drums of a traditional gralla, they set off their fireworks among crowds of spectators.

Yes, set. off. fireworks. right next to your face. I have no idea what this even signifies other than Spanish people are crazy and really know how to have a good time.

While i wore jeans and a hooded jacket, i really wish i had listened to our director and wore a scarf and sunglasses and gloves. Some of my friends that decided to take the instructions lightly did retain some bodily damage from the fireworks.

To see hundreds of people crowded around a firework that is about to start, with excitement across their face, must be mind boggling to scientists that study evolution. From people wearing tshirts, to parents with their babies on their shoulders, to elderlies who looked unfazed by the sparks, the correfoc was something everyone should list on their bucket list. (no, you are never too mature for it)

Sunday night was the finale to a weekend of festivities. As thousands of people gathered at Plaza de Espana, a 30 min long firework spectatular concluded La Merce.

From “Girls just wanna have fun” to Queen, the firework show had this ridiculous but funny soundtrack that included english songs, catalan songs, and english songs in catalan (ie. the beatles).

The firework show knocked 4th of july fireworks out of the park with 10 times the variety and twice the duration. And it beat the disneyland fireworks with its beautfiul location of the Spanish pavilion and having a cool fountain as the backup dancer.

All in all, the weekend was not as crazy as i had expected (probably because it was built up soo much since we first got here), and i won’t know what i have missed at oktoberfest, BUT it definitely had moments that i will never forget and I would recommend this weekend to anyone.

LA MERCE (thurs&fri)

Last weekend was the Catalan insanity that has come to be known as La Merce. It is the most popular annual festival for the city of Barcelona since 1871 and it is aimed to celebrate the Roman Catholic feast day of Our Lady of Mercy. Starting thursday, there were activities all over the city including free concerts, castells, parades, traditional dances, correfoc, fireworks, etc. We were told that it was one weekend that we cannot afford to not be in Barcelona, and I’ll tell my honest evaluation at the end.

The celebration began on thursday evening in the city hall square. With a live band, there was a parade of gigantes y cabezudos (giants and big heads).

These huge and slightly creepy paper mache figures  are omnipresent in festivals in Catalonia as each town is suppose to carry a set of them. The kings and queens took turns “dancing”, and each character acted out some sort of skit on the platform as well.

We really didn’t know what they were doing because the host explained everything in Catalan. Some of the figures are creepy as hell, and apparently they are used to scare little children?

On Friday we went to the Castell (human tower) competition. From pictures, i thought it was just a huge group of people doing something that looks completely primitive. However, there’s so much physics involved in building these towers.

From the techniques to formation to their attire, every element is key to the success. The tower can only be count sucessful if the small children raise a flag at the top and everyone can methodically disassemble the tower.

In other words, you fall, you lose and you could die (fact). It was quite amazing to see so many people work together for something that is ridiculously useless. I would like to see this become an olympic sport in the near future, in the same group as trampoline and curling.

Iron chef

On Monday we went to a cook and taste session and learned how to make a four-course spanish meal

I expected that each of us would get our own stove, so i can pile in as much food as possible. But we just had to sit around this martha stwart kitchen counter and watch. I was a little disappointed at first, but each one of us got a chance to participate and the end results compensated for the initial letdown.

Appetizer: CHUPITO DE SOPA DE TOMATE AL ROMA DE IDIAZABAL (Shot of tomato soup flavoured with idiazabal smoked cheeese)

This was actually my favorite out of the 4 dishes and not because i helped making it. I normally don’t like cold, raw tomato soup like gazpacho because it always tastes kinda sour. However, the pesto sauce with crushed walnuts and hazelnuts really complemented the flavors of the tomatoes. I will definitely be making this in a bigger portion later. (5/5 stars)

First course: TORTILLA DE PATATAS Y PAN CON TOMATE (potato omelette with tomato bread)

The bread had garlic and tomato juice on it, and i ate about 4 pieces. The omelette was really good also. Because the potatoes were fried first, it didn’t taste like a big lump of mashed potato, but instead kinda had this creamy pie texture. (5/5 stars)

Second course: Vegetable Paella

Paella, probably one of the more famous Spanish dishes, apparently the perfect day to get a paella from a restaurant is on thursdays. This dish definitely looked way better in the pan than how it tasted in my mouth, mainly because the ingredients reminded me more of fried rice. Paellas are a lot better when they are made with seafood, but i’m still glad that i learned how to make it. (3.5/5 stars)

Dessert: CREMA CATALANA (Catalan cream)

Spanish creme bulee. I was a little on the fence about the dessert when we tasted it before putting in the fridge because it was too sweet. But after 40 min of cooling down and this fire show, it tasted a lot better. The heated sugar on top formed a layer of glaze that gave it just the right of crispiness, adding depth to its original creamy texture. I will probably be making this in a smaller portion just because there’s so much sugar in the recipient and it gets kinda tiring towards the end. (4/5 stars)

Mamma Mia!

After the Cava tour, we were taken to the resort town an hour away from Barcelona called Sitges. Between the hills and the sea, it is known for its much-frequented beaches, nightspots, and historical sites. After a quick lunch and 3 pitchers of Sangria, we started our walking tour of this quiant little beach town. While it was definitely a bummer that the sun decided to take a break on saturday, we probably would’ve just sat on the beach otherwise instead of walking around.

the church of San Bartolomé y Santa Tecla (17th century). It houses two Gothic sepulchres (1317 and 1322), belonging to the an older church located on the same site. (wikipedia)

Everything looked very greecian to me, although my only reference of greece was from the movie mamma mia. There was a wine tasting, sand sculptures, a wedding, and a whole lot of people doing absolutely nothing. It’s hard to capture the atmosphere of this town in pictures and words, but it’s a place we would all love to come back to for a weekend getaway.

from sitges to barcelona, from cava to rum coke, from day to night, from this:

to this:

Razzmatazz is a discoteca that looks like it was converted from a factory. It has about 5 different dance floors with each floor playing a different genre of music (although that does not include hyphy music). It had 1/10 of the people when we arrived just before 2 am, but it got very crowded after 3 am. General consensus: we miss american music.

vino!

CIEE has planned a trip for us for almost every weekend, some are day excursions, others are overnight trips within Spain. Yesterday, we went on a Cava tour and visited the beach town Sitges.

Our first stop was the vineyard called Cordorniu. Cava is basically Spanish champagne, because technically champagne only comes from France. It was here, in 1872, that Cordorniu cava was born, and now it has become the biggest proprietor in the cava region. This place really reminded me of napa, everything was very tranquil (minus the 30 american tourists).

Our tour guide told us that this place is the biggest underground wine cellar in the world, and majority of its exports every year goes to the U.S. and the U.K. But about 60% of it remains in Spain, spaniards do love their wine.

It was cool that even though a lot of processes have been mechanized since the ancient times, they still preserved most of the equipments to give you a sense of the history that comes with the art of wine making.

Once the wine has been bottled, it undergoes a second fermentation and is transformed into cava. This process involves long ageing process which ends in the removal of the sediment or addition of liquer d’expedition to adjust the degree of sweetness. (academic source: brochure)

There are three or four different floors underground. And on each floor, the glass bottles are tilted differently to extract the sediment and the temperature gets colder as we go down. The smell of wine is so strong in these underground spaces the people can probably get drunk off of it.

We even got taken on this disney-like ride to get an idea of the size of this factory. These bottles are actually empty, and the thick layer of dust on them indicate they are probably way older than me.

At the end of tour, we got to taste two different kinds of cava: red (rosado) and white (blanco). I personally liked the white one a lot, the red one was good also but it was a little too sour for me. When it was time to go, most of us hadn’t finished our second glass. and like typical american college students, we didn’t waste alcohol, so we chugged it. Not only is Cava way better than Franzia, it is also a lot stronger. Needless to say, the tour made all of us very happy.

you think you know?

This is what a typical weekday is like for me:

In the morning, i try to wake up early (this has only happened once) to jog to the sea front around 7: 30 AM. Breathing the morning ocean air is more effective than coffee at wakening you up, trust me.

At 9:30 Am, I take my classes at the CIEE center located on Passatge de Permanyer. The program rents out two houses in this private gated street in the heart of Barcelona. Our director told us that this neighborhood is prime real estate, where a lot of exclusive social clubs and rich people live.

The classes are nothing like the ones in the states, because i am learning about barcelona while in barcelona, the most logical solution is to take a lot of field trips. Usually, we have a lecture one day and a site visit the next. (These are roman column ruins preserved inside of a building that replaced the original forum.)

Instead of looking at slides in a giant lecture hall, we see it with our own eyes and touch it with our own hands (St. George slaying the Dragon). Education does not get more real than this.

After class ends in the afternoon around 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm depending on the day, we start exploring the city. The program gave us a long check list of things to do in barcelona before we leave, and we try to check off these things one at a time.

Sometimes, exploration requires the use of our feet and an adventurous mindset. Even if we have no agenda, we are always bound to find something of interest within 10 to 20 minutes of walking.

This is the universitat de barcelona. We chilled in the cloister and imagined what would it be like to go to school in a an architectural relic while paying 1/10 of the tuitition in the U.S.

Sometimes, exploration requires an empty stomach. Chocolate suizo with churros. try it before you die.

Other times, we take a break from exploring and go to the beach to take a siesta or do some readings. And when it gets too hot, we take a dip in the Mediterranean to cool down. Between swimming, sun-bathing, reading, and people watching, going to the beach can be quite overwhelming (and please, pardon her tits).

At night, i make myself some meatballs and spaghetti and finish my homework in about 30 minutes. And then the same old thing happens all over again.

I can really get used to this.

Que tal? Muy bien.

It’s been a week. It’s been a good week.

Barcelona is a hodge podge of everything that makes Europe so different and sought-after.

The buildings in the inner city all have beautiful French and Roman balconies and alcoves, but the blocks are also punctuated by houses designed by traditional Catalan architects that are too totally insane.

The boulevards are wide and straight, but they take unexpected sharp turns once in a while that make you feel disorientated but also pleasantly surprised. The people here are always relaxed and smiling; I’m generally the fastest walker on the street. The shops close from 2 to 4 so people can take a break in their not-so-busy day, and the concepts of “open 24-hour” or “overtime” are nonexistent. The men are always accompanied by beautiful girls, and girls are surrounded by more beautiful girls.

The food is very declicious, they are full of flavors, textures, and colors. Catalans really know how to make their potatoes and the hint of tomato in a lot of dishes makes me a huge fan of this cuisine. With a pitcher of white wine or sangria, in a restaurant where water comes in glass bottles and waiters change your silverware after every course,  food has never tasted so good.

Remember everything you’ve heard about Barcelona? Well, they are pretty much all true. Life. is. good.