our final story
something to chase away the cold of winter...
(Originally posted on Discovering Diamonds)
Read the story
guess the song |
| clue... hola! |
As my plane touched
down, I realised what it felt like to be completely alone.
The landscape was alien,
dry, arid, flat and yet not; mountains ringed a city set into a bowl that
tipped into the sea; the sun beat down on a row of palm trees that waved in a
long line outside the airport.
I knew no one here, the
apartment rental arrangements had been handled by an agency, and my grasp of
the language was rudimentary at best. That was why I was here, after all.
A taxi cost more than
the Aerobus, but the taxi would take
me where I needed to go whereas the bus left me somewhat short.
‘Trenta-cinq
pesetas,’ the driver said. What? That was not in my lessons. I forced
myself to relax and my French popped up and helped. Thirty-five. I handed over
two of my two thousand peseta notes and left him with the change. I heaved my
suitcase out of the boot, unaided, and as he drove away from me I looked around.
The sun scorched what it
touched. Window shades that were attached like flags to the outside of every
building were a uniform pale yellow, their stripes a mere memory. On the
opposite side of the street the shade was deep and dark and I wished I was
there, instead of here in the full force of the violent sun.
My apartment was at
number eight, and it was, thankfully closer than I had expected.
Press the button for
number four, my instruction from the landlady on how to use the lift. ‘Only use
to go up,’ she had said, in Spanish. Sólo
arriba, like to a child. But I was a child.
Around me was Spanish
and a language that I was told was Catalan. It sounded like Portuguese, but was
written like French. The TV was in both. The radio blared out Catalan. I
understood none of it, not a single word. The books in the apartment were in
Spanish, some in Catalan, their titles looking familiar but on closer
inspection, meaningless to me.
The supermarket my
landlady had directed me to, after some blank looks from me and a hastily
scribbled map of a street system that was entirely on a grid, was filled with
unfamiliar things – they looked right but the names were wrong. Shopping was
anxiety-ridden, an attempt to buy what I thought I needed without asking any
questions. I could ask but I was certain I wouldn’t understand the answers.
I carried my purchases
in white carrier bags with a strange name printed on them. They were heavy with
pasta and Spanish biscuits, a long loaf like a baguette but shorter, thicker;
coffee; teabags that had appeared apologetic on the shelf. I threw them in the
lift and hauled them out at my door. Closing that door against the foreign
world beyond was a relief. I had done it, bought food, and I was exhausted with
the mental effort it had required.
I was a loner. I was a
stranger, adrift in a world that seemed familiar but that I couldn’t grasp, like
a dream where nothing is quite how it should be. The language escaped me. I was
cut off. Alone.
For several weeks I
walked everywhere. I had absolutely no idea how to use the buses, and the
instructions on the ticket machines on the Metro were a confusion of multiple
languages, none of them English. What did it cost? What did I press for a
single? Which side of the barrier did I put my ticket? Did I go to Espanya or Catalunya to get the red line?
The first time I used
the underground system I felt a sense of achievement akin to gaining my place
at uni. Now I could use a ticket machine and I could negotiate myself to the
right place, heading on the train in the right direction.
But I realised that I
liked to wander. I liked to explore this new town of mine. Underground was the
same: London, Berlin... wherever – tunnel walls were the same the world over.
But the sights here were, I was discovering, unique. And each time I
saw them they began to feel normal, they welcomed me back with their familiarity.
I walked from my
apartment at Poble Sec (each location
measured by the nearest Metro station as in every city with an underground
system) to nearly Passeig de Gracia,
up to Casa Batllo, that dragon-backed construction of a house that glittered
when cleaned, glowed when filmed with traffic pollution. A few blocks up was
the Correo, the post office, and a few down was that stationary shop with the
greetings cards and ‘carpetas’, folders, with the Disney figures.
The Ramblas, on the
southern end of the Passeig beyond El Corte Inglés - that magical department
store that didn’t need translation - a meandering street leading from the heart
of the town to the sea, the path of a once river, pausing at Liceu, the opera
house set where the Ramblas begins to flatten out, the Joan Miró artwork set in
the pavement. The bank that had once been an umbrella shop, the decorative
umbrellas still delightfully in place, the dragon of Catalunya still adorning
the wall.
I trekked up Montjuïc, from the Placa D’Espanya and the Palau Nacional and its automatic escalators that were only in motion if someone was on them, stopping as one must to examine the view from the diving pool.
 |
| Montjuïc |
I trekked up Montjuïc, from the Placa D’Espanya and the Palau Nacional and its automatic escalators that were only in motion if someone was on them, stopping as one must to examine the view from the diving pool.
From there the city was
laid out, bathed in the sun. Flat-roofed tower blocks rose at a thousand
different heights, the square buildings, cream and white and yellow faded by
the unrelenting sun to beige, square black windows, a child’s Lego city, the
cactus spikes of the old cathedral tower in the foreground, and reaching into
the sky the elongated pine cones of the four towers of the Sagrada Familia
further away; and beyond that, mountains, misted and hazy. It was familiar, a
view I recognised, and the force of being here hit me.
Before I came here
the city was a name, a joke from a 1970s sitcom. Now it was this, this vista,
this panorama, this iconic cityscape. And there, down there, a few steps from
that long straight road, the Paral.lel,
that is where I now lived. That was my address. Carrer Parlament. I lived there now. This was my home, this city.
And for the first time since I boarded my plane at Heathrow I smiled.
I followed the winding
road up to the top of Montjuïc, all the way to the fortress that was carved
atop, a crown set on a dark green hill. I could have waited for a bus, or
hailed a cab, but I paid my pesetas and climbed aboard the cable car, drinking
in the view, revelling in being suspended above such a marvellous city,
watching for my apartment, my road, the market of Sant Antoni, clambering out
at the end of the trip in the port district.
I walked back to my flat
with a new purpose, a spring in my step, eschewing the bus or the Metro, not
because of fear, but because this place was mine and I was going to enjoy it.
Half an hour later, much further than I had estimated, really not caring, I
came to my front door. My front door. I checked my mailbox and then got into my
lift to the fourth floor. My apartment, my balcony overlooking the street
below, the sirens, so different from those in London, now my sirens, part of my
life. The lottery ticket vendor on the corner, the bakery that opened so early,
the little souvenir shop with its sombreros and flamenco dresses for
five-year-olds hanging forlornly either side of the door. The grubby
supermarket down the road, the oddly flat vowels of the language shouted across
the street. Poble Sec, the Metro
station at the end of the road. Each formed a part of the patchwork quilt that
wrapped itself around me as I watched life go on below me. Each tiny scene a
splash of colour on the canvas that was the city. Each one was now a part of
me, and me on my balcony, I was a part of it, in my corner of Barcelona.
My Barcelona.
© Nicky Galliers
about the author
song: Barcelona by Freddie Mercury and Montserrat Caballe - I hope they are both singing their hearts out together with great joy on the other side!
The only thing Nicky ever got in trouble for at school was reading under the desk during Physics class. It was probably a Sharon Penman…
Once it became clear that Life (and excess height) was determined to prevent her from becoming a ballerina, after dabbling in the world of motor sport, she returned to her other loves – history and books. A graduate of History, medieval with a bit of pre-historic archaeology thrown in for fun, the Normans and Domesday Book are her specialism, Edward III her passion and the bits in between her essay content.
The image is of Nicky practicing for battle at Crecy...
Note: There is copyright legislation for song lyrics but no copyright in names, titles or ideas
images via Pixabay accreditation not required
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