height="110">Close to you - Carpenters

Wednesday, March 04, 2009

2nd post in a day. Ok I am just back from barcelona and it totally rocks my socks off. This feels more like a holiday than belgium cause more shopping and eating i guess.
I wanted to go to barcelona when i was about 15 from this meteor garden show. Ok, i was an impressionable young kid then but Sangrada Familia was my dream cathedral. I was somewhat disappointed by the fact that there are construction cranes around but Gaudi is a genius. He has irregularities among regularities. He loves contrasting features and he uses every shape and sizes in his architecture. Am i over exaggerating? Sometimes i find that certain must-see stuffs are over exaggerated by media and books such as Mona Lisa. It is interesting but i dun think it warrants a super duper big wall when it is only super duper small. I went into the Louvre and could only see it from afar cause between me and mini lisa, there was this huge sea of tourists. HAHAZ, are they wondering the same things as me? Maybe, but mona lisa is still drawing large crowds of people.
I love arts and architectures. Mona lisa is good but i think we tend to over exaggerate its value over time and all.
Talking about Gaudi, his works are highly recognisable on the streets of Barcelona. Barcelona seems to be synonymous to Gaudi. His mosaics snake like benches on top of Park Guell, mosaic-ed architectures, cemented stones that is built in a series of tabernacles like pillars that form a walkway, mosaic-ed komodo dragons and ceilings are awesome. I am biased towards him cause of Sangrada Familia.
Barcelona is so nice cause the people are so nice. I can walk along the streets of Barcelona and many spanish people will come and talk to me. One of them even lent me his headphones on the busy streets of Las Ramblas and i listened to Flamenco music there and then. So funny.
The food was awesome awesome awesome. I tried tapas at this large fresh fruit market. Tapas are small dishes of stuffs that include seafood, baguettes with toppings such as salmon, beef, calamari and chix peas and many others. I was alone in the spanish market when i just sat down and point to wad i wanted to eat. There is absolutely no menu and i just see wad i can get from not spaking spanish and pointing. I got myself a plate of chix peas cooked with something that i dunno, 4 croquettes, red wine, and some plate of squids with some beans. The last 2 items were offered to me by some guy sitting beside me who speaks bare english while i speak no spanish. It's interesting to see how pple can interact like that. So much for language is the best invention of civilisation. It is but body language works as well=)
I got my lovely espadrilles and i met a french on the way as well. I made my first french fren not in Paris but in Barcelona! Amazing thing life is.
More of park guell, the port, the shopping and eating next time.. i need to start mugging!

Till then..

Posted by Jessica at Wednesday, March 04, 2009