Skipping Town

In the next few weeks, Andrew and I will move to a new apartment in Barcelona. We haven't yet found a place, but now that the landlords and brokers are back in the city after their extended August vacations, Andrew has started visiting some possible new homes. It's exciting to think about moving--a new place to call our own--and it's always nice to get to know a new part of the city. We know a lot about Barcelona now, and have a good idea of where we'll be happy. It will be fun to apartment-hunt together when I return next week--a perfect way to see the hidden parts of people's Barcelona lives, taking place beyond the etched faces of the buildings. When Andrew moved to Barcelona last August, finding an apartment was a different story. Neither of us knew the city, and Andrew didn't yet know what the neighborhood around his school was like. And we felt rushed to get settled; we were staying in hotels and spending hours in the EasyInternet cafe, looking at apartmen...

One of the best things about being back in the U.S. is that everything is so much cheaper. Barcelona isn't a particularly expensive city, but the euro/dollar discrepancy means prices are just a bit higher than they should be. Here, though, there's Target and Gabe's, which means I can pretty much shop whenever I want to and not feel too guilty. And I don't even have to do any mental conversions to figure out how much things cost in dollars. Everything's already in dollars. Then there's Lynn's, a (very) local bar/restaurant where I had dinner last night. Unlike other local places, where heads turn whenever a non-local (or a non-regular) walks in, Lynn's was pleasingly dismissive of our small family group; everyone's eyes were on the baseball game, not us. It was 25-cent wing night, but even on a non-wing night, the prices are ridiculously low: the four of us each had a dozen wings; we ordered three pints of beer and one iced tea; and we shared a gigant...

When you live in a place not many people have been, it can be challenging to find the perfect story or detail to illustrate what your life—or life, in general—there is like. “How’s Barcelona? What’s it like there?” I’ve been asked these questions countless times since I’ve been back in the U.S., and I always answer in the general—“It’s great; it’s a beautiful city.” These are hardly evocative or satisfying responses. Providing more detail—about, say, the weird architecture, the extremely late hours for eating meals, or the fact that many people don’t speak Spanish but Catalan—gives a better sense of the city but not necessarily a vivid mental image. But I’ve learned something from hearing Mom and Dad tell people about their visit to Barcelona: the perfect way to grab attention is to describe the jamon . Jamon iberico —Iberian ham—is a regional specialty, ridiculously expensive and ubiquitous in Barcelona and beyond. It’s basically a type of cured ham, expensive because of the elaborate...

Though Barcelona is now one of the most popular tourist destinations in Europe, it wasn’t always this way. Before the 1992 summer Olympics, which the city used as an excuse for a complete transformation, it wasn’t so sought after; the beautiful architecture was still there, and the sea, and La Rambla with all its sights and sparkle, but it wasn’t a place you’d necessarily want to visit. The industrial city hadn’t really found its footing in the modern world. Thanks to the influx of money that came from winning the Olympic bid, however, the local Barcelona government was able to revitalize the city’s entire infrastructure and economy. The revitalization was all-inclusive, transforming not only the area around the Olympic buildings but also the airport, train stations, city center, and harbor. Barcelona had won the hosting over cities including Paris and Amsterdam, and the 1992 Games proved to be remarkable. For the first time in thirty years, no countries boycotted or were banned from t...

I never paid much attention to the Coal Queen pageant. When I was in high school, the Coal Queen pageant lacked the excitement of, say, the run for Homecoming Queen; it was just another pageant, held in a town nearby. I’m sure, however, that I marched with my clarinet (the most hideous of instruments) in the parade for the King Coal Festival—if indeed our marching band was involved. If there was a King Coal parade, I’m sure our band was there. Notably, there are former Queens and Queen-hopefuls in the family. One aunt was a contestant in the Coal Queen pageant in 1971. Another aunt was the Scottdale Centennial Queen in the mid-1970s. And Molly herself was Queen: Homecoming Queen. (But she’ll almost certainly deny it.) Little did I know how big a deal the Coal Queen pageant actually is to other girls in other towns. This weekend, we went to a screening of a new documentary called The Bituminous Coal Queens of Pennsylvania , directed by David Hunt and distributed through a new Netflix fi...

The Boqueria market is one of my favorite things about Barcelona. It's the craziest, fullest, most interesting market I've ever seen, with aisle after aisle of vegetables, fruits, meats, fish, breads, candies, and more. Much is unrecognizable; there are lots of exotic fruits, including one with spiky skins and black-speckled flesh inside. The fish booths are indescribable: piles of shellfish of every shape and size; gigantic fish lined up in rows, their beady eyes staring at the crowds; lobsters, crabs, and all sorts of tentacled creatures moving their claws and antennae idly. In the meat stalls, lambs' heads--eyes still intact--nestle up to livers, sausages, and many other things I avoid scrutinizing too closely. I've never actually bought anything at the Boqueria, other than an occasional fruit drink, gelato, or snack, but I have dreams of putting together elaborate meals made solely from Boqueria riches. One of these days. The Boqueria is on my mind today for a reaso...

Being between worlds is creepy. Home but not home; among my things, but my things still in boxes; a few weeks to relax, but a plane ticket and passport ready for action. Andrew's back in Barcelona, in the desolate city that Barcelona becomes in late August; most people are still on vacation, so the streets, metro, and even his office are empty. He said it's cooler now, and rainy, which is much different from the Barcelona we left two weeks ago. He's alone in our apartment, and the whole image--of the empty city and the apartment, which, like any other home, always feels a bit ghostlike when it's been closed up for a length of time--makes me shudder a little. We're between seasons, and there's a nervy first-day-of-school feeling in the air, even though, for me, the only school starting up again will be my Spanish classes when I return to Spain. And we're between stages in our Barcelona life, Andrew's work and my travel-craziness winding down, with our no...

I've been in Connellsville for two days, and already an important item has been crossed off my "To Do" list: Go to Gabe's. Obviously, this was a priorty upon arriving in PA. On Saturday, I went to the Greensburg Gabe's; sadly, however, I found only two things: a Theory skirt and a pair of Blue Cult jeans. Both were good deals, but far from the breathtaking Gabe's bonanza that, now and then, befalls us all. Hopes are high for the Uniontown Gabe's in the next few days. Shopping with a luggage limit is difficult, to say the least. I need to stock up: on shoes, on beauty products, on household goods we can't find (or can't afford, oddly) in Spain. But how can I pack a set of towels in an already-full suitcase? How can I bring back picture frames without shattering the glass? If or when I buy new boots for fall, I'll need to fit them in alongside the boots I already have here, which I haven't yet moved over to Spain. The high cost of shipping th...

Our two weeks in Jacksonville have come to a close, and we were both sad to see them end. Andrew flew back to Spain on Saturday, while I have a few more weeks in the States, in Connellsville. We had a lovely vacation in Florida. We took a few trips to the beach, and saw a baseball game in Tampa; we had lots of nice meals out, and cooked a few times at home. And we spent lots of time just relaxing, reading, and watching TV. It was strange to come back, to see the abundance of products in the grocery store and other quintessentially American sights, and, now, to be back in Connellsville among the boxes I left here when I moved to Spain in April. It's a transient period, but an exciting one. For now, I'm among familiar things--touching base before heading back to Spain, and happily getting ready for whatever new places and experiences are in store for us in the months ahead.

(I’m about to write a post that, if I weren’t me, would make me hate me. Nonetheless, I’ll proceed.) I am tired. July has called my wanderlust bluff. You want to travel? July sneered. Fine—let’s see you travel. I went to Paris for three days; London for two days; Krakow for five days; and Rome for three days. That’s four countries, not counting Spain, where I’m based, or the U.S., where I am right now. Counting those, July has seen me in six countries, maneuvering in four different currencies and saying “hello” and “thank-you” in five different languages (six, if you count Catalan). The day I returned to Barcelona from Krakow, I had three different currencies in my wallet: euro, zloty, and pound. Buying a pack of gum at the airport proved to be an awkward juggling of coins. Writing this, I see that it’s a bit insane. Now, I’ve skipped town again—but this time, back to the United States. It’s my first trip home since coming to Barcelona, and I’m undeniably excited to be here. For the n...

In Philadelphia, when we finally arrived, there was an exorbitantly long wait for our bags to come through into baggage claim. Everyone was already travel-weary, and everyone had tight connections to make; yet there we were, waiting together as a group once again, all of us looking like zombies. Andrew and I stood by a cart trolley, one of those where you pay a few dollars in order to get a metal cart to pile your luggage on. The trolley had long since been empty of carts, and Andrew and I and many others idled near the empty rails. Nonetheless, an exhausted man walked wearily up to the trolley and inserted three dollar bills into the slots, just as the instructions stated: “1. Insert money.” When he moved on to the next instruction, however—“2. Remove cart”—he waited, puzzled, seemingly confused at why no cart had appeared. Andrew and I watched him curiously. Did he think a small inflatable cart would pop out from the change slot? The man eventually realized his mistake, and, disguste...

This weekend, my flight from Barcelona to Jacksonville was thirty hours late. For sixteen of those hours, I sat on the filthy floor of the Barcelona airport among thousands of other stranded, angry passengers and their thousands of hulking suitcases in the unairconditioned check-in area of the airport. On Friday, Andrew and I sent Mom and Dad off to the airport for their early-morning flight back to the United States; a few hours later, we went to the airport to catch our own afternoon flight to Philadelphia, where we’d connect to Jacksonville. When we arrived, we walked into a mob scene. The Barcelona airport often has long, chaotic lines at its check-in counters, but this was a new kind of chaos. Even stranger, there were no airline employees at any of the check-in desks, and on the departures board, we saw that every single flight was marked as delayed. “Is everyone on strike or something?” Andrew joked, marveling at the ghost-town-like expanse of counters. Indeed, we found out quic...

We became Tourists in Rome. We should have realized when we planned the trip that Rome in late July was not a good idea. But travel time is limited by Mom and Dad’s school year; and we wanted to take a side trip halfway through their visit to Spain. So the three of us set out for Italy for a whirlwind three-day trip. Living in Europe, I’ve gotten spoiled by the feeling of not being a tourist. Even when I go someplace new, there’s a sense of having a base, of belonging, of being somehow different from those who travel a long distance with pristine passports and voluminous, unscuffed bags. Rome, however, with its insanely twisting streets and unfamiliar language, rendered it nearly impossible to blend in, especially since tourists basically replace locals entirely in the summer and take over the city with maps and sunhats. I, too, had a sunhat in Rome. We waited in line for the Vatican museum one morning in scorching sunlight, and when a vendor walked by peddling sunhats, I asked the pri...

There are two layers to any city—the tourist layer and the real-life layer—and it’s hard, if not impossible, to get a sense of both at once. The first Orlando Parents visit is currently underway, and I’ve realized in the past few days that a ten-day visit isn’t nearly enough time to peel away the layers of this strange city and show what our life here is really like. A visit to a new city must involve exploring the tourist layer, since it’s underneath and around those tourist sights—the museums, the statues, the architecture—that our real life takes place. If we ignore the tourist layer, then we might as well live in Kansas or Iowa or Minnesota; the structure of real life, with its groceries and errands and other everyday tasks, doesn’t look much different from one place to the next. It’s the backdrop that changes. So, we’ve done our best to see the famous Barcelona, and we’ve done an excellent job so far. On Thursday, when Mom and Dad arrived, we walked down La Rambla—the essential fi...

Besides the salt mine, the main market square, and the Wawel castle, Krakow guidebooks and tourist kiosks feature one more excursion: to Auschwitz and Birkenau, which are located approximately an hour outside the city. On Thursday, I took a city bus to the camps. I decided against an organized tour—I wasn’t sure how long I’d want to stay—and had a minor adventure not only finding the city’s main bus station but also finding the bus itself. Nothing was in English, no one spoke English, and like a true tourist I bumbled for a while around what I thought was the bus station, only to finally be informed that it was the train station. The ride to the camps was deceptively pleasant, and even the town where the camps are located—Oswiecim—is deceptively charming. It’s difficult to imagine living in such close proximity to history—yet there were houses and apartment buildings, cars and shops, within close walking distance. I joined a guided tour when I got to Auschwitz, and suddenly I was stand...

I spent next to nothing on food in Krakow. Each morning, my hotel set out a breakfast spread of breads, rolls, cheeses, meats, jams, fruits, yogurt, cereal, and potted chicken terrine (that tin’s label required a few flips through my Polish-food dictionary). For lunch, I ate at “milk bars”—cheap Polish cafes where you order at the counter and pick up your food when it’s called. I wasn’t prepared for how cheap the food would actually be: a plate of pierogies, for example, was 4.80 zloty—less than $3. A plate of potato pancakes smothered in mushrooms was roughly the same amount. For two dinners, I had a huge, delicious gyro from a storefront—about $2. One night, I ate in a restaurant recommended by a friend of a friend of Andrew’s. I had borscht (served in a mug) and a big plate of pierogies for less than $10, in a charming atmosphere. The bread I was served before the meal came with a small pot of lard. On my last night, I ate at another charming Polish restaurant and had fried ewe’s mi...

According to all the guidebooks and websites I read about Krakow before my trip, the Wieliczka salt mine is a Krakow attraction not to be missed. So on Tuesday, after a hearty breakfast at my hotel, I set off to explore it. I’d opted against an organized tour: the price seemed high, and the estimated length of the trip was much longer than I anticipated wanting to spend at the salt mine. A woman at the tourist office had told me how to get there on my own, so I made my way to a local “mini-bus”—Krakow’s version of a city bus—and paid just 2.5 zloty (about 50 cents) to get to the mine. I didn’t really have an image in mind when I planned to visit the mine. That’s a benefit to planning a trip fast to an unexpected place—no preconceived ideas to support or refute, even in the back of the mind. At the mine, I bought a ticket then waited in a holding area with hordes of other tourists for the English-language tour. A French group entered the mine; then a large Polish group; then a Spanish g...

Tonight, Andrew and I will go to London for the weekend; on Sunday, when he flies back to Barcelona, I’m going further afield: to Krakow, Poland, for four days. I chose Krakow for a variety of reasons, most of which are visa-related and too dull and convoluted to recount. More importantly, Krakow stood out because of two dreams I’ve had over the past year or so. In both, I was traveling to Poland—a place I’ve never had any real reason to explore. In the first, I was at an airport without a ticket, overwhelmed at the prospect of choosing to fly anywhere in the world. I chose Poland. There was some distress in the dream: just before boarding the plane, I realized I hadn’t bought a guidebook; it was late at night, and the airport shops were closed. In the second dream, I was on a wooden boat, sailing toward Poland. I was on a canal of sorts rather than an ocean, and voluptuous, elaborately-roofed buildings loomed ahead. That image of the rounded turrets and deep colors of the buildings ha...

On Saturday night in Paris, crowds began gathering outside cafes whose televisions were visible from the street to watch the World Cup match between France and Brazil. Rachael and I sat at a sidewalk table to eat dinner—moules frites—and watched the French go crazy at every turn of the game. After dinner, we wandered around St. Germain, occasionally joining a crowd to check the status of the match; we were near the Pont Neuf when France finally won. The crowds charged down the streets, gathering near a grand fountain, cheering and waving France’s flag. Boys scaled the statue in the middle of the fountain, dancing with their shirts off in the streaming water and wrapping themselves in soaked flags. It was, just as in Barcelona, a happy riot (though, like Barcelona, we learned it had turned more destructive as the night wore on). A souvenir shop near the Pont Neuf did a brisk business that night selling flags to tourists and Parisians who wanted to celebrate in style. They whipped the fl...

Going back to a place I’ve left isn’t one of my favorite things to do. I always feel like a trespasser, intruding into a life I’m not a part of anymore. Once I leave, I like to be gone for good. Of course, this can’t be true for New York, since I want to go back one of these days; but I’m not ready to go back quite yet. The finality of my move away—with the boxes and the cut ties and the UHaul—made it temporarily permanent. I left, and I need to be gone for a little while. This weekend, I went back to Paris for the first time in three years. In that time, I was certain my memories had made things different from what they actually are. I couldn’t even remember the name of my favorite used bookstore, and my internet searches suggested that the store had closed or moved. As this visit approached, I didn’t think I'd recognize the city at all—it would, surely, be too different. I knew I'd be just another American tourist, but I was afraid I'd also feel like one. Paris had change...