Skipping Town

Now that the possibility of leaving Barcelona is growing more and more real, I feel as though I’m coming full circle—making lists of touristy things to do in the time that remains, getting ready to explore the still-unseen parts of the city while I still can. Daily life easily took over the past eleven months; and though I’ve still seen new things now and then, my Barcelona life no longer parallels the route of the Bus Turistic. As a result, however, there are gaps: the Mies Van Der Rohe pavilion, which was just across the street from our old apartment, is still a mystery. Several museums, a handful of must-try restaurants—these remain to be experienced. Until today, I hadn’t even seen the Barcelona Cathedral, with its resident flock of geese. The Cathedral was at the top of my list, so this afternoon I took myself on a touristy errand between working on a freelance article and going grocery shopping. I’d tried to see the Cathedral last summer, when Mom and Dad were visiting, only to b...

I won. Twice. Almost 100 euros. This, perhaps more than anything else, raised the hatred of the BINGO patrons for our group. And we were hated, intensely. But wow, was it fun. We met our group at a bar across the street from the BINGO parlor. Surprisingly, seven people—in addition to me and Andrew—showed up. “Aren’t you excited?!?” we asked them. They were dubious, to say the least; some suggested we just go out to dinner. The two Spanish friends repeatedly tried to warn us what we were in for. Nonetheless, en masse, we went to BINGO. Before entering the BINGO room, we had to present our driver’s licenses to a woman behind a desk, who recorded all kinds of information. This caused some problems, because our group consisted of people from Italy, Greece, England, the U.S., and Spain; it took some time for her to acclimate to each new license. I looked around the “lobby”: some neon, some horrific pictures of the food available (despite Andrew’s and my original enthusiasm for eating dinner...

For the past year, we’ve eyed them: the neon-lit BINGO emporiums that seem to be on every block in Barcelona, especially the one down the street from our apartment. BINGO. Everywhere. What’s so Spanish about BINGO? Do people really go to these places? And is it true that there’s cheap food and beer? Tonight, Andrew and I will find out the answers to these questions. BINGO is on our list of “Things To Do Before Leaving Barcelona,” and we’ve made a plan to cross it off tonight. Andrew invited a group of friends, but, for some reason, the response has been lukewarm; two of his Catalan friends seem to have warily agreed to join us, but we may very well wind up playing BINGO ourselves. Let’s hope it’s in Spanish, not Catalan. Tonight, I vow to pay off our wedding from BINGO. Victory is ours, I can feel it.

The end of Andrew’s MBA program is approaching, which means an escalation in activities, dinners, parties, and other events. This weekend, MBA students from several other business schools came to Barcelona for a series of parties and team sporting events, leading to a lot of late nights and a few rather interesting spectacles. For example, the students from a school based outside Paris wore black berets the whole weekend. And at the sporting events on Friday, a big London wealth management firm had a presence at the site. “Are they still looking for new people?” Andrew asked a friend. “No,” he was told. “They’re here to offer their services.” In other words, it's MBA graduation time. Last night, a local club hosted a party for the MBAs. However, informed that no one would come because there was a big Barcelona—Real Madrid soccer match on, the club set up two huge screens and everyone showed up right on time—10pm—to settle in for the game. And it was a great game, each side scoring ...

The trip home from Edinburgh counts as one of my most irritating and ridiculous airport experiences ever. I packed light for this eleven-day trip—just a backpack and a small shoulder bag—yet at the Edinburgh airport, just before I got to security, having passed through two checkpoints already with nothing said, a woman stopped me and said I had to stuff my shoulder bag into my backpack or else go back to the ticket counter and check one of the bags. “One bag per passenger,” she said. “Women can’t have a purse?” I asked desperately. “One bag only,” she said. There was no way to fit even a lipstick in my overstuffed backpack, let alone squeeze in the entire contents of my shoulder bag (laptop, glasses case, wallet, huge book). But I refused to check a bag—I’ve sworn off checked luggage since Andrew and I had our bag “delayed” on a direct, two-hour flight from Venice to Barcelona. I left the security area and found a chair. I opened the backpack and proceeded to put on every sweater I’d p...

On Thursday, when I told my B&B host in Galway that I was headed next to Edinburgh, his whole face lit up. “I’m from Edinburgh,” he said. “You’ll love it there. It’s beautiful. It’s—like Paris.” It was a bold statement. I was ready to see if it were true. Getting to Edinburgh—more specifically, to my B&B in Edinburgh—was the part of this trip I’d been dreading. First, a bus from Galway to the Shannon airport; then a flight to Edinburgh; then a bus—some kind of bus—from that airport into the city center; then, somehow, finding my B&B which was a little outside the center. However, all went smoothly, I found my way, and soon I was on the B&B’s doorstep, proudly ringing the bell. Then ringing again, and again. It was dark by now—nearly 8pm—and I had no cash and no cell phone. But before I could work myself up into a frenzy of fallback plans, the B&B owner came apologizing through the front gate. Then I really was inside, in a beautiful, ornately ceilinged, and very chi...