Adventure of the month

When the people at my hostel suggested I go check out the block party taking place in our neighborhood, I used the only frame of reference I have and imagined a couple of arepa trucks, some lukewarm beer and a bunch of stands selling random crap. Sure, I would walk over there and see what was going on but my expectations were set to low. They handed me a map of the area with about a dozen non-connected blocks highlighted. It seemed odd to me that the party would be so spread out in what looked like a pretty haphazard way. How many arepa trucks did these people have? I only got as far as the first block before I realized that I was dealing with a totally different animal. This was not the typical street fair, not by a long shot. This was neighbors coming together to throw one hell of a party.  And not just any neighbors, this was a decidedly local (read: no tourists except maybe the ones from my hostel), hip artsy area throwing down.

Frank Gehry's contribution to Barcelona's architectural bounty There are plenty of cities known for their famous museums, just as there are a few cities which they themselves qualify as living, breathing museums. Of the latter group, there are two which manage to take my breath away everytime I visit. One is Florence, which I have not been to in years. The other one, Barcelona, I got a chance to re-experience just a month ago, as was part of my Dali/ Figueres trip. I already wrote about how much I enjoyed the Dali museum (and loathed its tourist horde), but I failed to mention what a thrill it was to walk through the streets of Barcelona admiring the genius of Gaudi, a 19th century architect whose work is as much a demonstration of artistry as anything found hanging on a museum wall. It is one thing to admire a surrealist painting, but quite another to experience the wonderment of walking through a building built on a flight of fancy. This month, I have once agai...