Thursday, April 30, 2009

29/4/09 Barcelona, Figueres

I got up around 8:30 and had a quick breakfast and checked out before getting on the train to Figueres. We got there with a good amount of time to spare.

The train ride was good, I slept nearly the entire way listening to my Spanish music. When we got off the train Dr. Schmidt and Monika were waiting for us at the top of the stairs. They both called me Steve and I felt too awkward to correct them.

We got in their Mercedes and we drove to the Dali Museum, where Dr. Schmidt came with us and Monika went somewhere else, parking the car or something, but first he bought himself and I an International Herald, like he would in Budapest.

The Dali Museum was terrific.There is just artwork after artwork from Dali, in all sorts of styles. It's incredible to see it all in one place and to think that one man made all of it.

But as Dr. Schimidt said, "I think he was a little crazy." And he was. I have no idea how he thought up many of the things he did. They were more than just bizarre, but absurd, such as the face made out of various huge parts in a room.

But there was a lot of good too, ranging from more classical sculpture and painting to the face of Abraham Lincoln made out of number other parts.

We spent maybe an hour there and came then he took us to meet Monika at Dali's favorite restaurant, with his drawings and such all over the place, given to the restaurant.

I was very nervous for this part, especially after last year when I had to pull a 'Seinfeld' when I ate with Dr. Schimdt at the fancy Hungarian place and he ordered meat.

We sat down and Monika asked us if there were foods we didn't like. I said meat. She said something about how the meats here are very different and I should try them and ordered something in Spanish. I figured I was in trouble again.

The first dish that was brought out was a tiny plate with some meat on it. Not a big deal, I popped some in my mouth and spit it out in my napkin.

The second thing that came out looked like a brownie, I was pumped. Not a brownie, definitely more meat, so I did the spit out routine agian.

After six courses of meat, and me spitting into the napkin as well as chipmunking meat in my cheek (at one point I pretended I forgot my camera in the bathroom and spat it out there, another I just excused myself to use the restroom, terrible) finally a desert came.

It was nice to see them, Dr. Schmidt was a little quiet, I talked to Monika much more. He seemed to be moving slower as well, but still was very sharp. We talked about travelling and the economy, he asked about General Motors at one point. He was also impressed that I worked for the Tribune, saying that Sunday in Chicago used to be the Tribune. It could have easily been because I hadn't seen him in a year (and I remember him taking a while to warm up to me at first back then) but he was noticably quieter than I remembered. But also last time I was basically getting him to talk to me for 20 hours, so it would be easy for him to be quieter.

They drove us to the train station and I slept the way back too.

We went out to get some food for me, two pastries, the chocolate one particularly good. We went into one of the parks which had a big Miro statue.

From there we climbed up a ton of stairs to the top of their castle thing which had a great view of the city. A guy was playing Spanish guitar up there, he was really good. We stayed there for a while and hung out before going around the back to the Olympic Stadium from 1992 (which was built for the 1936 Olympics but was canceled because of the civil war).


We went back to the hostel and changed since it was getting chilly and then started out on a walk to nowhere really. We had to find a Barclays for me to get money out and it turns out the closest one was right next to Casa Batlla. At ngiht, it is a completely different building. The colors on the facade are much more visible, as well and the coloring of the stained glass. They have it lit up very well. We sat on a bench in front of it for a while and just looked it it. It's probably my favorite building in the world.

We then went to the other Gaudis, not nearly as impressive as the Casa Batlla. On the way to the Sagrada Familia we stopped for dinner. We had tapas (I had potatoes with garlic sauce and Greek salad) and we split a four cheese pizza because Heidi wanted to try the fancy French cheese on it. It was all good. But the most interesting part was the hot chocolate. I had a chocolate with coconut. It was basically like drinking pudding, pretty great.

The Sagrada Familia was different at night, but since the facade was mostly uncolored, it wasn't that much different, but still worth seeing at night.

We then just walked back to the hostel, exhausted, and waited around until it was time to leave for the bus to the airport.

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