Photo Link:
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My first stop in Spain was Madrid, where I spent a few days. Took a couple of day trips to start off, first to Toledo and then to Segovia. I had been to Madrid (with a day trip to Toledo) plus Granada with my family way back in Middle School, so this was almost like my first time here, though I did remember some stuff here and there. Toledo was a decent enough stop – nothing noteworthy but still a good use of half a day to a day. Toledo (along with large parts of the rest of Spain) really really reminded me of the colonial cities of Mexico and Guatemala – namely, San Cristobal in Mexico and Antigua in Guatemala. And even the Spanish church architecture was effectively identical to that of Mexico, which I suppose is no real surprise. It’s definitely a step below Italian Baroque and French Gothic for me, but it was still enjoyable to visit the towering cathedral in Toledo. They actually had some cool artwork by the likes of Raphael and El Greco in there as well. Besides the primary cathedral, there were a few smaller churches that were converted from Moorish mosques, and in one of them you could see some 1000 year old Kufic inscriptions outside which was really cool. Another old church had a Visigoth column present with carvings, which I really enjoyed since I haven’t really seen much from that post Roman/pre medieval era in Europe. There were also a couple of old synagogues that had since been converted and are now under the jurisdiction of the Catholic Church, but one of them had some old preserved stonework from when it was a synagogue 500+ years ago so that was also really neat. Toledo apparently had a thriving Jewish quarter that all disappeared when Spain expelled all of its’ Jews in the 1500s…most of them were subsequently welcomed in by the Ottoman Empire. It was also the old capital of Spain before it got moved to Madrid, and you could definitely see the traces of grandeur and wealth when walking around the narrow Old Town streets, with the nicely built up exteriors of the buildings.
The next day trip I did after Toledo was Segovia, which also reminded me a ton of Latin America. The cathedral here wasn’t quite as nice as the one in Toledo, but was still cool to see. The highlight here was definitely the Alcazar, which was an old Moorish castle that got converted to a Spanish style castle/palace after the Spanish forced the Moors out (the Moors made it as far north as Tours just outside Paris where I visited, which is crazy to think about). The exterior of the Alcazar was a bit like the Disney Castle and Neuschwanstein in Bavaria with the conical blue towers. The interior maintained some traces of its’ Islamic past, with some blue tilework in some of the rooms and intricate arched doorway designs between the rooms. And of course, there was a really impressive well preserved aquaduct in town which was also a cool sight, as it towered over the entrance to the old town area. Given Segovia’s Roman history, there were a handful of 1000+ year old churches which had some old carvings on the columns and walls outside, but all of these churches were closed (probably due to siesta?) when I was in that area of town.
Madrid itself was a surprisingly nice city. Not really that great in terms of sightseeing, but just a very enjoyable place to wander and walk around, taking in the grand architecture. In a way, I would say that it was like a better version of Milan, with regards to the somewhat generic “grand European” architecture. I think that after Baghdad, it’s probably been my favorite walking city that I have been to in 2021. It definitely seemed like it would be a great place to live in. My friend Brad studied abroad there like 8 or 9 years ago, and his top rec, El Tigre, was thankfully still in business. It’s this awesome dive bar where for 5.50 EUR you get a pint of beer or a pint of sangria combined with a massive serving of tapas. So 16.50 EUR was enough to both be ridiculously stuffed and get a decent buzz. In general, it seemed like every bar in this country serves you with a decent portion of tapas for every drink you get, though El Tigre definitely had the largest portions by far. It’s a really cool local custom that I can totally get behind.
Madrid, weirdly enough, is probably the most decked out for Christmas city I have ever been to. Tons and tons of street lights everywhere, massive light up plastic trees in all the plazas, a giant Christmas market in Plaza Mayor. It’s also probably the most crowded city I have seen since my friend Kris’ bachelor party in Nashville back in June. Basically shoulder to shoulder along all the major thoroughfares at night as people gawk at all the Christmas lights. But on the flip side, the mask usage while outdoors was easily over 90%.
Went to a couple of art museums in Madrid – the Prado and Reina Sofia. The Prado was primarily Renaissance era art, and I was surprised to find that it held up versus the Louvre, Uffizi, and Vatican Museums. The definite highlight for me was the Garden of Earthly Delights by Bosch (no pics allowed so I was only able to sneak a few mediocre pictures in here). It’s a very proto Monty Python or Salvatore Dali painting but from the 1500s, and basically had all sorts of ridiculous, exaggerated characters and actions in the painting to depict sin and Hell. Can definitely see the influence this would have had on modern art. And the Monty Python bit for me was because of all the random anthropomorphic enlarged body parts, like noses and ears, that were present in the painting. But the general absurdist nature of the painting was very much in line with a Dali or with Monty Python’s sketches. There was also a great section of Raphael paintings, including what I thought might be his best one that I’ve seen yet, a super realistic portrait of a Cardinal. Beyond that, I would say the other major personal highlight for me was the small section on turn of the century art, a lot of which seemed to focus on proletariat issues like workers strikes and the struggle of farmers, all done in that impressionist style of thick brushwork which I personally love and for me really fits the theme and look of that era.
The Reina Sofia was a cool museum as well, though to be honest I’m not sure how I completely feel about it. There was a really cool exhibition that was sort of anti capitalist/anti consumerism with cool juxtapositions of photographs, photoshops, TV clips, and audio clips (the one cool thing about modern art for me is the total audiovisual experience). I probably spent like half of my time at this one exhibit, and of the small number of modern art setups I have been to (Singapore, Cape Town, the small bit in the Vatican Museum before the Sistine Chapel) this was probably the best along with the Vatican one. But the rest of it was just, I don’t know, a bit too much? This was the first “big” modern art museum I had been to and I found myself getting bored in the other exhibits, but maybe modern art is one of those things where I only like it if the exhibit itself has an interesting theme. Not sure. I do know that the previous modern art installations that I have enjoyed all had darker themes that had to do with modernity, as opposed to historical themes, so maybe that’s it? Anyways, believe it or not, there were also a few paintings interspersed in this art museum, the most famous of which is Picasso’s Guernica. Looked at it for a solid five minutes and honestly, I don’t get it. There were a couple of cool Salvatore Dali ones here and you could really see the Bosch influence in them. I managed to sneak a picture of one (with my jacket sleeve blocking a small sliver at the top of the painting) as they also had a strict no photo policy here as well.
From Madrid, I took a seven hour bus ride to Barcelona. The first thing I did in Barca was take a day trip out to Girona, which is a small little historic town where a few Game of Thrones scenes were also filmed – most notably Cersei’s Walk of Shame. It’s about 100km northeast of Barca so closer to the French border, and was a nice picturesque town to walk around – it wasn’t quite as historically significant as either Toledo or Segovia were. Overall, I do think that directly compared to France, the day trips in Spain were still enjoyable but definitely a bit lacking. French towns in the South of France, Alsace, and Normandy for me were just a lot prettier and more photogenic than their Spanish counterparts. But that said, Girona was definitely my favorite of the three towns I visited. The two primary churches here were quite similar to the Gothic churches of France, but it was interesting because here it was just one giant room, as opposed to having the flying buttress’d hallways on either side of the “main” room. One of the churches had this grand outdoor staircase leading up to it, which is where the famous Walk of Shame GoT scene was filmed. There was also a cool little museum attached to this church, where there was an awesome 1000 year old tapestry that depicted the different seasons and months of the year, along with scenes from the Book of Genesis. Was a very unexpected find, but cool to see a second 1000 year old tapestry after the (more famous and more remarkable) one in Bayeux back in Normandy. Girona definitely had the most medieval feel of any place I went to in Spain, with the narrow streets that actually felt alive and grey colors everywhere. The medieval old town was seperated by a small picturesque river from the modern town of Girona, where there was a cool little bridge built by Gustav Eiffel that edges along the boundary between ugly and pretty. The alleged best restaurant in the world (or one of like the top 5), El Cellar de Can Roca, is in Girona, and while it was obviously way out of my price range, they do operate an ice cream shop next door where I got a pretty-good-yet-overpriced-5 EUR cup of vanilla ice cream with almond shavings, hazelnut, and butter cookie chunk toppings. And much like Barcelona, there was a distinct Catalan culture here where many of the signs and storefronts were written in Catalan as opposed to Spanish. I never realized quite how strong Catalan pride was so that was interesting to see. To be honest I think the reason I enjoyed Girona more than Segovia or Toledo was primarily because Girona seemingly had the least amount of touristy stuff – it seemed far more catered to locals and had almost zero english signs anywhere.
The night after Girona, I met up with my friend Alejandra and her friends – she’s a Honduran who I met in Utila while scuba diving (making this my second Central American reuinion after seeing Alice in Lyon). Her friends were mostly also from Honduras, but it was super interesting because the group also included four Spainards, one of whom grew up in Malaysia, another who grew up in Hong Kong, a third who grew up in Senegal, and the last who grew up in Cambodia (we bonded over our shared love of Cambodia). Was definitely interesting to meet such a diverse group in Spain, in an Irish pub while drinking pints of overpriced (by Spanish standards since this country is relatively cheap) Guinness.
Anyways, Barcelona. To start, I actually didn’t mind the city. It’s definitely not a place like Varanasi or Yellowstone which I actively disliked. That said, I was in constant awe at the dissonance between my opinion of the city and the general public perception of it. It is in no way, shape, or form a “world class city” and I would go as far as to say that it is a thoroughly forgettable city. Fun cities are a dime a dozen so that doesn’t really make Barcelona special, and in terms of the tourist sights…I have never been more underwhelmed. At least other places that I thought are overrated like the Colosseum have historical significance. I don’t know if it’s just me, but I feel like architecture should serve some greater purpose, whether it is “glorifying God” or the rulers vanity (at least these have historic significance), or serving some common good. All of these turn of the century buildings, most by Gaudi, all just seemed like vanity projects, and didn’t really make sense as you have a few funky Dr.Seuss like buildings scattered about a generic European city, so the architecture doesn’t even match and it just makes his houses look like weird, funky overpriced (20+ EUR a pop!) “museums” where you see some random interesting hallways. And these houses never served any purpose either. It’s almost as if it was built and then immediately transformed to a museum, which frankly is ridiculous. Though I did fork over an outrageous 26 EUR (same overpriced value as the Doge’s Palace in Venice) to enter the Sagrada Familia, which admittedly was very cool. But it is crazy, that for such a famous architect, every building has just become a museum to talk about his designs. It’s like all he did was jerk himself off while doing this, none of the buildings have any utility besides the tourist revenue they bring in (most of which gets cycled back towards these same Gaudi buildings). Honestly, I am convinced that Messi playing for Barcelona played a pivotal role in the elevation of the city in public opinion over the past 15 years. I really do think that if this city was anywhere else in the world, it would be a quirky and small find that was worth no more than a day trip for the Sagrada Familia, not some “must see” destination. Even in terms of the cool architecture, I have seen just as cool stuff in places as varied as LA, Chicago, Baghdad, Bombay, Delhi, and Singapore while randomly walking around. And none of those cities hype up some random building exterior as a “must see” tourist sight the way Barcelona does. Whoever led the PR campaign to elevate this city as “world class” in the public consciousness can probably get any single politician in the world elected. If I was some far right autocrat that person is absolutely the first place where I would look to hire. And again, it’s not that I disliked Barcelona. It’s just that there is *literally* nothing of value or note to see here (besides the Sagrada Familia). It’s like the entire world thinking that celery is the most delicious food and me just questioning my sanity for going against the grain.
Park Guell was like a shit Islands of Adventure with a few “weird” Gaudi sculptures that serve no meaning besides looking cool. And to boot, it cost a ridiculous 10 EUR to enter. There are thousands upon thousands of cooler parks in the world, all of which have just as weird sporadic architecture. On the bright side, I did visit one of the two ~world traveller~ places, if you go by Bumble in Chicago (or any other US city probably)…all that is left is *that* elephant sanctuary in Thailand. And the Sagrada Familia was interesting, to say the least. Did not feel religious at all while in there, but I suppose that’s because I have never been to a Church like it at all. Like everything else Gaudi built, this had strong Dr. Seuss vibes, but the interior of the church was actually kind of cool and I dug it. Just a really eye catching design with these almost alien looking pillars reaching high up to the top. It almost looked like a Hollywood spaceship. And the Gothic quarter was nice but forgettable…in a weird way the coastal area reminded me of Izmir in Turkey. I guess I have been in Europe long enough now where I need a little more oomph to grab my attention.
I was here for Christmas Eve and Christmas day, and went to a party that Alejandra hosted with her Honduran and Spanish friends for Christmas Eve. Barcelona had just implemented a 1am-6am curfew, so we were stuck there until 6am. It was a fun party where we were screaming karaoke for most of the wee morning hours. Honestly surprised she didn’t get a noise complaint. I actually met a Dutch kid (who now lives in Barcelona) here who played on the Ajax U18s as a striker, and he showed me pics of him hanging out with Hakim Zayech and Donny Van De Beek while younger – he was 26 so squarely between those two players age wise.
After Barcelona, I headed over to Andalusia, which was easily my favorite part of Spain. Probably because it was the “least European” part, with the heavy Moorish influence still present. My first stop here was the city of Cordoba. It was filled with narrow cobblestoned streets and bright white houses, which was a new look for me in Spain. Also orange trees galore lining every courtyard and small street. The highlight here was obviously the Mezquita, which was a grand mosque that was then converted to a cathedral once the Castillans forced the Moors out of the Iberian Peninsula. The interior was probably the most unique Church I have ever seen…there were preserved facades of Islamic calligraphy and artwork, while the entire building was filled with these colorful orange and white arches that were there for the Mosque. And built around this was a pretty stunning Cathedral in its’ own right, with the typical ostentatious decorations befitting a Spanish Catholic Church. While this church/mosque was really the only “tourist thing” that I saw, as a whole Cordoba was a great town/city to just wander around in and take the fusion architecture.
After Cordoba, I went over to Sevilla. If anything, I actually enjoyed Sevilla slightly more than Cordoba. The highlight here was definitely the Alcazar. In addition to being a film location for Game of Thrones (for the forgettable Dorne scenes), it was a beautiful palace largely built in the Moorish style. Honestly it is really cool to see how the Castillans took after Islamic architectural influence when building in Andalusia. I think that Islamic architecture on the whole is more visually appealing than Christian architecture, so this is obviously a pro for me. The Alacazar was jam packed with tourists, but not to the point where it detracted from the experience. Beyond the Alacazar, the other main highlight was the ginormous Sevilla Cathedral, which was probably my favorite gothic cathedral in Spain (still behind the French ones though). The most interesting thing here was seeing a decked out masoleum/tomb for one Christopher Columbus. The weather in Sevilla, like in Cordoba, was fantastic, where I was wearing sandals for the first time since Athens and not wearing a jacket. Also like Cordoba, the streets were filled with orange trees, though not quite to the extent of Cordoba.
My final stop in Spain was the Andalusian city of Granada. Like Madrid and Toledo, I had been here already with my parents back in middle school. The main reason I came here was obviously to see Alhambra. Definitely the best thing I saw in Spain, and it was basically like a cooler version of the Alcazar in Sevilla. The Alhambra was originally a Moorish palace/castle, and is yet another example of something that the Castillans thankfully did not tear down after reconquering the Iberian Peninsula. Like the Alcazar in Sevilla, this really reminded me of Rajasthan and Delhi/Agra in India, with the stately courtyards, gorgeous arched architecture, and incredibly precise and elegant patterns in the stonework. And I really like the whole Islamic design of having a pool in the center surrounded by lush greenery, with the architecture harmonizing with the natural aspect here (almost like a Chinese garden in this sense). Just an incredibly picturesque place. There were also three other parts to the Alhambra complex besides the Moorish palace, but the other three were a bit bleh, especially after seeing the palace first. And Granada itself was a nice little hilly town – reminded me a lot of the hilly colonial towns in Central America with the architecture and narrow, winding cobblestone streets. And much like Cordoba, the buildings here were all shades of off-white. One weird thing was that they still maintained a lot of the bazaars at the foot of the hill, but this just felt like a bad and off-brand version of the souks that you see in the Arab world. Don’t think Europeans are cut out to run those since it’s far too orderly over here.
Overall, I would still place Uzbekistan first, India second, and Turkey third in terms of Islamic architecture, but Andalusia is definitely next up, right alongside medieval Cairo for me. Alhambra itself was magnificent – I’d go as far as to say that it was my favorite thing in Europe these past few months after Rome/Pompeii/Herculaneum. Honestly, Andalusia is great, but the rest of Spain (as much as I did enjoy Madrid) is a bit eh – still enjoyable, but definitely one of those places that I would only recommend visiting if you have time and are in the area. Going along those lines – the food in Spain is decent, but definitely the least good (as opposed to “worst”) that I have had in Europe so far. Definitely more on par with Georgia/Armenia, so it’s still good. Paella is like Central Asian plov, so it’s good but nothing noteworthy, while as good as ham is, they have jamon everywhere in this country. I’m convinced the Spanish obsession with jamon was a strong self-correction by the newly converted Muslims when they were forced to convert to Christianity, because there’s no reason I can think of why Spain should obsess over pork far more than any of her neighboring countries. Honestly, the best part about Spain for me might have been the prices…especially after France, the whole country felt incredibly cheap.
My plan to kick off 2022 is to spend a little over a week in the Balkans – Croatia, Montenegro, and Bosnia. Tentative plan is Split and Dubrovnik in Croatia, Kotor in Montenegro, and Mostar and Sarajevo in Bosnia. Will then wait and see if England is good to visit because that remains my top option to go to next, but if not, I’ll figure out next steps.