Before i left for Spain I received a transmission. “Your mission, should you choose to accept it is to see 7 days worth of sites in Spain in 4 days. To gain a complete understanding of their culture and sites. To synthesize ideas for future work.” I was quite honestly, very poorly prepared. Due to extenuating circumstances, all the research I wanted to do before arrival was not completed. I land in Spain in complete darkness. Even at 9 am, it’s still dark. I realize all my plans to roam around in the early morning hours will not work and I have less daylight hours to complete the mission than planned. I think about my itinerary and the changes I will have to make. I meet J. in the hotel. He too is ready to go upon arrival. He has a small package of bread in a yellow plastic wrapping. Little does he know that the bread will provide key sustenance in moments of starvation over the next 4 days of intense traveling. Partners traveling with me typically go through 3 phases... hate, followed by frustration... then appreciation. Usually they are taken aback by my extreme combination of curiosity coupled with cheapness which leads me to attempt to suck the marrow out of every moment of a travel experience. My personal hell is sitting on a beach all day whereas my dream vacation resembles an episode of the Amazing Race.
With only 2 hours of sleep on a red eye plane ride we decide to start the mission. The first stop is plaza del sol. We walk uphill to our destination. I had some general things to look for first in Madrid’s urban plazas and streets. Later, correlated content like paintings, and historical artifacts housed in museums and churches will be observed. Within this framework of analysis without much research... I’m just winging it I’m left to make observations and then read the guidebooks for further understanding. Each observation is a theory. An idea. A humorous thought of inquisition. We record each theory to be proven or disproven later on with the judgment of books. On the way to plaza del sol, we stumble into a church. No pictures are allowed. Usually I take pictures when it’s forbidden, but here I decide not to take any. The church is filled with pious old people milling around and praying. I feel I shouldn’t ruin their experience, their communion with god by taking selfies of myself in front of Christ’s crucifix. A sign by the crucifix reads “no tocar”. I really wanted to touch the painted wooden statue of Christ nailed to the cross but I resisted temptation. We look up at the lit ceiling. It had a very modest feeling. The gray interior is simple, and contrasts to the red brick exterior. As we head towards plaza del sol, I ask directions. My sense of navigation is not working great. A Spaniard tells me to walk down the street and make a right. On our way my friend wants a coffee from McDonald’s to wake up. J. orders from a screen, then we wait in line for slow workers to pour a cup of coffee. Somehow the Spaniards have managed to transform the fast food American experience to an annoying unpredictable unorganized mess. We wait 10 minutes for a couple workers to pour a cup of coffee. Finally we arrive a plaza del sol with coffee in hand. It’s a crescent shaped plaza with an old red and white post office on one side, and major roads converging into the plaza from all directions.
With only 2 hours of sleep on a red eye plane ride we decide to start the mission. The first stop is plaza del sol. We walk uphill to our destination. I had some general things to look for first in Madrid’s urban plazas and streets. Later, correlated content like paintings, and historical artifacts housed in museums and churches will be observed. Within this framework of analysis without much research... I’m just winging it I’m left to make observations and then read the guidebooks for further understanding. Each observation is a theory. An idea. A humorous thought of inquisition. We record each theory to be proven or disproven later on with the judgment of books. On the way to plaza del sol, we stumble into a church. No pictures are allowed. Usually I take pictures when it’s forbidden, but here I decide not to take any. The church is filled with pious old people milling around and praying. I feel I shouldn’t ruin their experience, their communion with god by taking selfies of myself in front of Christ’s crucifix. A sign by the crucifix reads “no tocar”. I really wanted to touch the painted wooden statue of Christ nailed to the cross but I resisted temptation. We look up at the lit ceiling. It had a very modest feeling. The gray interior is simple, and contrasts to the red brick exterior. As we head towards plaza del sol, I ask directions. My sense of navigation is not working great. A Spaniard tells me to walk down the street and make a right. On our way my friend wants a coffee from McDonald’s to wake up. J. orders from a screen, then we wait in line for slow workers to pour a cup of coffee. Somehow the Spaniards have managed to transform the fast food American experience to an annoying unpredictable unorganized mess. We wait 10 minutes for a couple workers to pour a cup of coffee. Finally we arrive a plaza del sol with coffee in hand. It’s a crescent shaped plaza with an old red and white post office on one side, and major roads converging into the plaza from all directions.
On the east side of the plaza is a statue of a bear under a mandorlo tree. Apparently, there were a lot of bears in the Madrid area before... and they would eat mandorlo. Mandorlo is used to make liquor. The statue is bronze and is nice enough. Curiously, I notice the bear’s ass and left foot are nice and shiny. As if rubbed repeatedly. I have a theory. It must be good luck to run the bear’s ass. J. takes a photo of me rubbing the bear’s ass. (I later find out in online searches of reputable websites nothing about rubbing the bear’s ass. I do find there is a tradition behind the bear that if you rub his foot, you'll return to Madrid.) I guess by rubbing his ass I revealed myself to be a perverted man who likes to rub ursine asses. We walk back to the center of the plaza and gaze up the building to see a tio pepe sign. The oldest billboard in Madrid. The post office has 2 plaques. On the left, a plaque to commemorate those who perished 3/11/2004 in the atocha train bombings... and on the right a sign signifying the massacre of Spaniards by French troops on the second and third of may in 1808 when they protested Napoleon’s installation of his brother as king of Spain. Goya, who lived down the street, witnessed the tragedy and would later paint 2 paintings of this tragedy that hang in the prado museum. By the statue of king Charles iii, who ruled in 1788 and was the force behind transforming retiro park public, establishing public schools and underground sewers, there’s a conical lit christmas tree in the center of the plaza, and disheveled Gypsy looking people selling lottery tickets arranged on billboards hung across their body. The plaza a jovial and slightly humming. The people of madrid are starting to wake up and buzz. On New Year’s Eve, festive crowds jam the square and eat 12 grapes for good luck when the clock strikes midnight. I note that during Franco’s time, political prisoners would “jump out the windows”. One cannot imagine the toll of the civil war where 600,000 Spaniards perished. The history of Spain is a history of paradoxes. A lively social culture which has the capacity of extreme fascist hate... a high tech society with 3rd world disorganization and waits for coffee... a pious religious society capable of public murder as spectacle. We start walking the boulevards aimlessly emanating from the plaza. They interconnect with transverse roads like a spiderweb. We decide to head to plaza mayor. Like plaza del sol, plaza mayor is steeped in history.
Built in 1619 under the rule of Phillip iii, whose statue is centrally located, plaza mayor today is filled with Christmas market stalls. The color of the buildings is a crimson, with 10 arched portals leading to streets beyond. This was the place of bullfights, devastating fires, royal pageants and the inquisition. During the inquisition many were tried here. Heretics, Protestants, jews, muslims.. the guilty were forced to wear billboards of their sins . Bleachers were built for public audiences while the wealthy rented public balconies. The guilty were slowly strangled while holding a crucifix while a priest recited last words as their life was squeezed out of them. Others were burned alive. Given the past brutality of the square to bulls and humans and noisy Christmas markets, we had a theory that the buildings framing the courtyard were offices. Searches for residential apartment yielded many attractive abodes with views of the courtyard action. Once could only imagine the non-Christmas market activities of the courts hundreds of years earlier within the same plaza.
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