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Buying Water in Barcelona

April 6, 2005—Just as I was getting decent enough at recalling my high school Spanish education for it actually to be of some practical use in Madrid, I was off to Barcelona. If you’ve never been to the capital of Catalan, here’s a tip: the language is so confusing to outsiders, even outsiders with a good comprehension of Castillian (which I have never, and will never claim to have), that the Catalonians label nearly everything in both languages, and even throw the ugly Americans a bone by often including English.

Looking back from my journal from this trip, I was amused to find that it only took me about 3 hours to transition from writing “I can say that this city has a very different energy than Madrid. I’m not sure that’s good or bad, just different,” to “Okay, I’m sold – Barcelona is rad.” But, I won’t bore you with a travelogue--though if you’re interested in A.K. Gold's Favorite Spots in Barcelona, follow the link—because this story is about stopping to buy a bottle of water.

After an action-packed first day in town involving an art museum and a recently-excavated synagogue, I walked around the Barri Gothic, continuously getting turned around in the neighborhood’s labyrinthine streets. The flight, the heat and the walking left me parched, so I ducked into a bodega to buy an enormous bottle of water.

As I walked toward the back of the store, where I could see the refrigerators over the tops of shelves, I noticed that the music emanating from the store’s speaker system was not in Catalan, Castillian, or anything resembling a romance language. It sounded like Urdu.

Now, I’ll give you that most 25 year old white, Jewish, middle class women raised on Chicago’s North Shore (which, at least when I was growing up, was largely devoid of Pakistanis) are not known for their skill at recognizing the national language of Pakistan. But, clearly, I pride myself on not being the average product of my upbringing.

I found the largest bottle of water that I could, and walked up to the register where I saw a man who was so clearly Pakistani that I’m pretty sure Britannica uses his photo in their “P” volume. The store was empty, so after he told me the price, and I paid and thanked him, I pointed to the air and said, “Es Urdu?”

He looked at me and smiled while saying “Si.”

I couldn’t pass up the opportunity, and asked “Aap kaha say hay?” (Where are you from?) To which he smiled more broadly and said “Pakistan,” and asked me—in Urdu—where I learned to speak Urdu.

I once read that all the languages you are fluent in are stored in a different part of your brain than all the languages you are not fluent in—as such, Spanish, Urdu and the bit of French I know are all stored in some very poorly-developed part of my brain. That being said, I pieced together the following, “Mai, doh sal say, kalag ma, Urdu likti ti.” Which was my attempt to tell him that I had studied Urdu for two years in college (but, actually, I think means that 2 years ago I studied Urdu in college—darn post-positions).

The man seemed very impressed, and turned his attention to something I couldn’t see behind a shelf on the other side of the store. “Beta, beta. Ghori larki Urdu bolti hai.” Now, I knew exactly what this meant as his son came over to see the whitey girl who speaks Urdu.

Up to this point, mind you, I had only spoken in a poor mix of Urdu and Spanish. The store owner’s son, however, must have had me pegged. This 18 years old walked up to me and said in perfect English, “Are you from London?”

I replied, “No, I am from the United States.”

To which he said, “I didn’t know people from the United States could speak Urdu.”

I’m not really sure how one is supposed to reply to such statements, since by-and-large it is true. So, I told him that at least a couple of us can speak Urdu, and he seemed satisfied. I bid farewell, and they encouraged me to 1) go to Pakistan—because I’d love it, and 2) come back and see them again on my visit.

I tried to go back and visit the store a day later, but I got lost in the maze of streets, and never managed to find it again. Who knows, maybe the owner and his son would have forgotten I was the ghori larki Urdu bolti hai, or they wouldn’t have been working at that moment. I like to think it was one of those strange and fun interactions that could only happen when you’re traveling solo in a foreign land. The type of experience that happens by chance, and can’t be manufactured at will, and is all the more memorable for it.

A.K. Gold’s Favorite Spots in Barcelona

Insane, but true, I saw all these spots (and others) in less than 2.5 days in Barcelona.

• Museu Picasso--I contend that this Picasso Museum is better than the one in Paris. If you are visiting Madrid before going to Barcelona, go to the Prado and see Velasquez's Las Meninas, and then see Picasso's 50+ studies of the painting when you go to Barcelona. So freakin' cool. While it was a temporary exhibit, I credit this museum with introducing me to the amazing painter Jean Helion.
• Mercat de la Boqueria--as a Philadelphia resident, I have deep, deep love for Reading Terminal Market. The only place that rivals it in my mind is La Boqueria which is aesthetically beautiful, and where i bought the best chocolate covered almonds I've ever eaten.
  
• Sinagoga Shlomo Ben Adret--It was only in the last 10 years that archaeologists unearthed a couple rooms of the Synagogue which stood across from the town center until the 14th Century. It's fascinating from an archaeological, theological and social (in light of the inquisition and how modern-day Spaniards react to it) perspective. Definitely worth getting lost in the Barri Gotic to find. (If you pay attention when you're nearing the Sinagoga, you might notice Hebrew letters carved into the walls.)
  
• Park Guell and Sagrada Familia--Even if Antoni's architecture doesn't appeal to you in photographs (and yes, the term gaudy does come from his name), go to Park Guell and La Sagrada Familia. They are tremendous in person, and the history, urban planning theory, and aesthetics are totally fascinating.
  
• MACBA, Caixa Forum and the Fundacio Miro--Do you like art? Clearly, I'm really into it, in fact in 8 days in Spain I managed to see something like 12 museums. Needless to say, the MACBA, Caixa Forum and Fundacio Miro were three of my favorites with great exhibits--at the time--on photography, Miro, Joesph Sert, and Joseph M.W. Turner. If you're not quite as into art as I am, and only have time to go to one, make it the Fundacio Miro. The architecture is amazing--Sert designed it for his good friend Miro at Miro's request--and set in the beautiful Parc Montijuc.
  
• Museu du Xocolat--Yep, the Museum of Chocolate. Learn the history, smell the confections that are sold at the gift shop, but the real reason to come is to see the stand-outs from the annual chocolate sculpture contest held annually around Easter time. Ben Hur's Chariot Race, and La Pieta are the two that have stuck with me years later.
  

5 Years Later...Anecdotal Evidence Begins Anew

It's been 5 years since I wrote the second (and essentially last) issue of Anecdotal Evidence. I say essentially, because there were some notebook scribblings and ill-conceived attempts to draft Issue 3 that never panned out quite like I hoped they would.

Reposting these stories was sometimes fun, sometimes painful, and occassionally enlightening. I was amazed to find that some of the anecdotes I remember having spent hours and days crafting five years ago, had completely slipped my mind until I re-read them as I set up posting them to the blog. Heck, I had forgotten about the French Kicks' cute bass player, and the gas man on the New Jersey Turnpike.

Some things have changed a lot for me in the last five years--my age, geography and work are the most obvious. I'm now firmly ensconced in my late twenties and after five years in DC, I've been in Philadelphia for 6 months. Right now, as I sit in my backyard listening to Calexico (some things haven't changed), pecking away on my laptop on a sunny, 78-degree July day thinking about then and now and everything in between, I get the sense that I'm right where I'm supposed to be (for now, at least). That photo at the top of this post is my vegetable garden and the view from my backyard, and if you could see through the rooftops and powerlines, you'd see the Philly Skyline.

For about three and half years, I've been been doing regional economic development and social problem solving--trying to make Greater Washington, DC and now Greater Philadelphia more prosperous and better run communities for all who live and work in them. The work is challenging and frustrating and interesting and creative and meaningful and slow, but I'm one of the few people that I know who can honestly say, "I love my day job." And, I'm glad that I do work that I believe in.

In my non-work life, over the last five years, I've spent many an hour, day, week engaging with other people's stories--in real life and through books and plays and movies and records. But, as I reread the old issues of Anecdotal Evidence, I was reminded of how fun it is to be creative and write my own stories with others--even if it only is a small group of others--having the opportunity to engage and respond to them.

I'm not so deluded as to think that I'm so tremendous or worthy of a biography. But, many of the stories that I love the most, and certainly the ones I relate to the most, are not grand ones. Most of us will never have the narrative arc, well-crafted oratory/prose/lines or depth of impact of a Michael Bloomberg or Charles Darwin or Lorelai Gilmore (and I realize that I am probably the only person who would list NYC's Mayor, the father of evolution, and a much-beloved, albeit fictional tv character as my examples--but I'm an onion, baby). Most of what connects us are little experiences that happen in-between major life events--the conversations, the images, movies, books, songs, trips, thoughts, dreams, experiences--the anecdotal evidence.

So, going forward, I'm going to build off the history of Anecdotal Evidence the zine, and attempt to turn it into a living, evolving blog by sharing one new anecdote each week, a tidbit from the past or present that's rattling around in my head. I'm going to attempt to do this, not because I think it will have some long-lasting impact on others (though it's lovely to have such narcissistic aspirations), but because, at the end of the day, it's fun and challenging and interesting and frustrating and a little bit scary to tell stories, to share pieces of myself. And thus far, I've found when something is fun, challenging, interesting, frustrating and a bit scary, it's usually worth doing.