Barcelona Day Uno: Tapas & Trannies

Thank god Bryndia made it to Barcelona, considering the Easyjet flight was packed with 3 school groups, a hard-body waterpolo team who could have passed as male models, & a small excursion group from Guatemala they were quite positive the landing would be the middle of the Mediterranean. But after a round of applause from everyone on the plane (seriously, Spanish people need to stop treating there landings like the end of a Flamenco show) they found themselves safe and sound in BCN Monday the 15th of March.

Gabi, India's cousin, has been living in Barcelona for 3 months post graduation from Trinity in Dublin. Lucky for us there was an empty room in her sweet apartment, 1 block from Sagrada Familia, so the dynamic duo was able to rent it for a week & a half.

After a quick bus ride from the airport through the city, Bryndia arrived at Plaza Catalunya where Gabi met them. The sun was shining and the air was crisp as the three strolled through the old Gothic neighborhood. Gabi took Bryn & India to her favorite Cafe where they indulged in Cafe con Leche & for Bryn a giant chicken breast. This was the first time India had met her cousin Gabi so the three chatted, getting to know each other while admiring the wall paintings around the restaurant of numerous animals performing explicit sexual acts upon each other that would only excite Bear Grylls.

After a filling meal & drinks the three continued through the city, winding through small ally ways to the edge of the "rough part of town", right off Las Ramblas where Gabi's local hang out spot, Hostel Bar, was located. Here, no one spoke English, so bryndia's language skills were put to the test. (This language barrier was, in fact, beneficial as half of the patrons of said bar were tranny hookers, and damn proud of it.) Bryndia met Gabi's awesome boyfriend Israel, a Colombian who had been living in Barcelona for years, and his sidekick puppy Estrella. Take note: an amazing quality of Spain is that dogs are allowed absolutely everywhere. In bars, restaurants, shops... and almost always off leash. How these dogs are so well behaved, bryndia doesn't know. Estrella pranced around Hostel Bar all night, making friends. For the rest of the night, the group enjoyed "cañas" for a Euro, slang for a small beer, and met a lot of Gabi's friends, who were all international and really sweet, speaking Spanish slowly and using hand gestures so that bryndia could keep up with the conversation.


Early afternoon turned into late night and all of a sudden everyone was a little drunk and a lot hungry. Gabi took bryndia to her favorite falafal place for dinner, where they learned that falafal in Spain comes in burrito like wraps. Delicious. After filling their stomachs, the three headed back to Hostel Bar, and continued to conversate and consume with their new friends.

Barcelona was amazing, and it was only bryndia's first day. They prepared themselves for a great two weeks.

amiens and paris.

the week in france was, how you say, tres romantique.

amiens is a small city about one hour north of paris. not one that many visitors to france would get a chance to see. lucky for bryndia, one of their best friends majken was living there, teaching english to really well dressed french high school students. for three nights, she let the nomadic couple sleep in her bed, cooked them amazing food, and shared all of her cute international friends with bryndia. they had a great time.

bryndia was in amiens to celebrate majken's 23rd birthday. they saw shutter island. (we drool over leo no matter what language he speaks in.) they baked betty crocker spice cake with cream cheese frosting, decorated it with pink candles. went to an irish bar that was called "my goodness!" and put back "lagers" while day dreaming about living in new york together in the fall. they visited majken's school, visited the amiens catherdral, saw the skull of john the baptist, drank cafe cremes. india took advantage of the kitchen, and majken taught her how to bake potato leek tarts and pasta sauce.




on thursday, march 11, bryn and india headed to paris. the city of lights. the city of romance. the city of ASHLEY OLSEN. yes, guys. that's right. they saw ashley olsen. in the flesh. lookin' fly. so, lets recap: new york - kate moss? check. paris - ashley olsen? check. if gaga is in barcelona, by god, india's idol sightings, the trifecta of blondes, will be complete. ("gaga sucks." - bryn little.)

paris is beautiful. it is filled with beautiful people, people who are too fashionable for their own good. who wear sunglasses when it's cloudy and capes and bowler hats and flowers in their hair. there is gold everywhere. gold in the architecture, gold sparkles in the sidewalks. and there are gardens. big green gardens with blossoms who, we could tell, were just about to poke their petals out, to bloom big, just about to turn to spring.

bryndia stayed in monmarte, right at the base of sacre coeur. at nights, they would walk up the 250 stairs to watch the eiffel tower sparkle and the spanish tourists get drunk on the steps. they visited notre dame, and bryn made a lot of victor hugo jokes. they walked through the jardin de luxenburg and pretended they were louis and marie antoinette. but, you know, before the whole execution thing. they went to the top of the eiffel tower, blended in among the tourists. men were strapped to the iron beams, hanging almost upside down off of the side of the tallest building in paris, patching up the corners that had rusted away. they walked the entire champ elyssee while india talked about proust. they visited the louvre, at night, when the museum was empty and the lights were low. and, most importantly, they walked everywhere, and felt very parisian.

on saturday, majken came into paris and met them. the three went to the mosque of paris and drank tea and ate at majken's favorite kitchy restaurant, "breakfast in america", where they ordered bagels and fried eggs for the first time in over a month. and then the three trouped to majken's favorite bar, chez george, a small, secret place in a stone basement in the fifth, where they drank bottles of wine and made friends with french africans who bryn taught how to play crazy eight countdown.

on one particularly sunny afternoon, bryn and india were walking by the river, wandering. they were talking about the street performers, boys who juggle soccer balls for hours, or dress up like the mona lisa, try to stand very still and get pictures snapped of their moving eyes. as the two discussed, they saw an older gentleman in front of them stoop to the ground. he rose and looked around, searching for someone. "excuse me, excuse me!" he called after india as she passed. he held up a shiny gold ring. "you drop? is this yours?" india shook her head no. he looked at it again, back up at india's face. he demonstrated the size of the ring, pushing it onto each of his fat fingers, being obvious that it did not fit his, and he handed it to india. "now, it is yours," he said. she smiled, said thank you, and turned to go. "oh, but sir, may you spare some change for a sandwich?" india emptied out her change purse into his palm and turned, twirling the ring on her finger for the rest of the walk. hours later, bryndia returned to the same boulevard to return to their hotel and there was their friend, stooping down in front of them, a new ring in his hand, marveling at the "real gold" he had just found. india punched him in the shoulder and showed him her bling bling he had given her hours before and he cracked up as india stormed away.

paris is filled with little surprises like that. kittens curled in hotel lobbies. michael jackson murals made of duct tape. carousels that spun in circles to american pop music. curries and wines and sweet smelling cigarettes, spicy perfumes, accordion players on the subway.

but paris is also very expensive. so now, the pair heads south.

amsterdam: the coffee shops.

bryndia loves holland. they love a country that believes in the legalization of marijuana. and a country that is successful in regulating responsible businesses that are cenetered around the production of cannabis. the two of them spent much of their week in amsterdam visiting different coffee shops, making friends with strangers, taking it in. it felt good to be with people in a place where marijuana is not a taboo. it is a lifestyle.

going to amsterdam soon? these were our favorite coffee shops.

AMNESIA. it's small but never packed. the wall paper is a royal purple with shining swirls and the windows are always open. there are big blank books filled with drawings and messages by people who had come from all over the world. there are colored markers and pencils and the employees, and token stoner regulars, are incredibly encouraging of your art. they make incredible fresh squeezed juices and the door opens right on to a canal. when the weather is nice, you can sit with your feet dangling over the edge and smoke in the sun. be careful. there might be a dutch rap video being filmed out front.



DAMPKRING. where george and brad smoked pot in ocean's 12. the waitresses are gorgeous, they stomp around in their cowboy boots and big hair and call you "baby". and there is a cat that roams around but doesn't let you pet it. fresh mint tea tastes like a dream. the weirdest part? the walls are covered with anti-smoking posters. http://www.dampkring.nl/

GREENHOUSE. the floor is a giant aquarium. below your feet swim orange and black fish that are as big as your arm. the walls are adorned with hundreds of pictures of celebrities who have visited the shop. (this includes a fresh picture of 50 cent rocking a Blazers throwback while lighting up a fatty.) two levels of seating and lots of internationals. induldge in the chocolate spacecake. yum. http://www.greenhouse.org/index1.htm



ROKERIJ. what tarren calls the most well known and established coffee shops in amsterdam. (a coffee shop chain!) amsterdam hosts four of them. feels like you're transported to morocco. the tables are low and the seats are small wooden stools or big cushions. the chocolate muffins are huge and bomb. just ask caitlin about them. an easy place to go and spend hours. especially after a dave matthews band concert. http://www.rokerij.net/

COFFEESHOP MILLENIUM. the small shop that tarren and dani live right above. the cheapest bud we found, probably because it's not in the center of the city. you can buy prerolled joints. and the guys are nice. there is a pool table. but we never played.

finally. our warning.

DO NOT GO TO LE JOLLY JOKER. the waitstaff was rude and short tempered. the people were boring. the drinks were way overpriced. that is all.

the best thing about the coffee shops is the people watching. the tourists and the locals. older married couples who are traveling to amsterdam to partake in a little ganga together. it's romantic. the college kids. the hippies. the brits. the homeless. vagabonds. we all share an appreciation. a plant unites us. it's wonderful.

amsterdam.

Upon arriving to Amsterdam after a 10 hour bus ride from Berlin, Bryndia are greeted by a friendly cabby at 5a.m. who zips them along the canals to Mr. Dani Bruens & Tarren Wilson's apartment. "You guys want to smoke weed?" he kindly asks, "Don't worry the shops will be open in an hour and a half."

Tarren & Dani had just moved into a new apartment, so Bryn & India had no idea what they were in for, but any place with a blow up mattress sounded good at this point... & if all else failed Bryn knew he could just wonder over to the Red Light District to lay down real quick.

"INDIA!!" yelled Tarren as we arrived. "Memur!!" responded India. Bryn thought to himself, "Thank god she is awake considering we don't know which apartment is theirs & don't have a cell phone number." Things have been working out quite well for Bryndia this trip.

(this is the truest statement. how bryn and india have been able to survive so far is based mostly on divine luck. like how david knowles lived two blocks from our hostel. berlin is a big city. and two blocks away? come on! or how we thought we were going to have to spend three hundred euro on train tickets but then met a nice guy who got us cheaper ones in first class. ooh la la.)

Amsterdam is beautiful. The canals lead you in a cresent moon around the city. Bryndia walked in circles and loved it. The houses are crooked, stacked on top of water and cement, some sag to the side, look like they're melting.

Tarren took Bryndia to markets where they ate fresh falafel and hummus and warm cheesy pastries and white chocolates and pomme frites and bought fresh produce for pennies. Tarren and India cooked feast upon feast for Dani and Bryn who passed the time by indulging in xbox360. (Dani is weak at Soccer games on Xbox360 & Bryn is the truth. Watch out Conor & Connor when Bryn gets back.)



Bryn and India were lucky enough to catch Dave Matthews while he was in town on his Euro Tour. What can we say? THE SHOW WAS UNBELIEVABLE. Dave spoke a lot of Dutch and the audience raged. He played our favorite song and prefaced it by saying "This is my favorite song to play." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgrYbMguzvM (A video of him performing at the gorge since there aren't any on youtube from the HMH yet.) Seeing music that is familiar and comforting in a country that is new to you is strange. In a wonderful way.

Bryndia met up with Chrissy & Caitlin (friends from U of O teaching in Spain) who were also in town for Dave. they drank fresh mint tea and ate pizzas with olives and walked through the Red Light.

let's talk about the RED LIGHT. it is, in a way, amsterdam's main attraction. (does legal marijuana count as a "main attraction"?) the district is centered around a small canal. foot bridges zig zag across it, presumably to make it quicker for the anxious clients to run from window to window. because that's what the red light is: window after window of prostitutes that shake their shoulders, bat their long lashes, wave their pointer finger at you. they draw you in like a fish on a line. "come here daddy. you like what you see?"

every girl is different. tarren pointed out the "sections". the building filled with blondes, the building filled with asians. different parts of the district for different desires. big women. huge women whose silhouettes take up the entire frame of the window. women who are next to girls a fourth of their size. girls who look too young. the pretty ones don't even try. they sit on their stool, twirl their hair, smoke cigarettes. men come up to their windows, knock, they let them in and draw the curtain.

each window has a different colored light to let you know who you are looking at. a red light for women. a blue light for gay men. a purple light for transexuals. the lights help. sometimes, you just can't tell.

Amsterdam felt like a recouperation period after Berlin. The Dutch are a slow moving, relaxed people. You don't "chill out" in Amsterdam because your whole life is chilled out. Leaving such a laid back country is hard. But Bryn & India want to make it to Majken in France for her birthday.

berlin. part II. (an afterthought.)

on our second day in berlin, bryn and india did what they do best: wander around looking for a really great place to eat lunch.

they found one. it was a long restaurant/bar (as all of our favorites are) covered in old mirrors and dark wood. the dishes were vintage and didn't match. the seating was on olive and chocolate couches, a small dog in a vest wandered around the tables, licking toes. they served us a big basket of different breads as an appetizer, and then gave us german menus which made us feel very local and cool.

india has gone almost completely veggie again. foreign meat scares her. ("that's what she said!" -bryn.) she got pizza with goat cheese that burned her tongue but tasted like a cloud. bryn was adventurous and awesome and ordered something off of the "traditional german" page.

something that bryn thought was going to be a salad with some sliced sausage on it turned out to be a literal pile of cold meat processed through a machine that made it resemble pasta. (or a baby pig's intestine. depends on how you looked at it.) little trooper made it a third of the way into it before admitting that it was DISGUSTING, eating half of india's pizza, and then longing aloud for some mcdonalds.



fear not: amsterdam next. plenty of weird food to try there.

berlin.

we shouldn't even try to describe berlin. we should have just snuck a camera into that club and taken a picture of those people having sex in the middle of the dance floor and posted the picture and just wrote the caption: 'berlin'. that would have been easier.

bryn was, in a way, brilliant with this idea. berlin was that kind of crazy. a chaotic crazy party swirls of color and light and different accents and lots of smoke and bucchus, really, is what it was.

when bryn & india were in london, they met their friend echo's amazing boyfriend david. it turned out that david was going to be in berlin with a group of his boyfriends the same weekend that bryn & india would be passing through. because, apparently, berlin had such a nightlife, it had turned into a weekend destination spot for hard core house music loving party goers. david and 20 of his friends were going to be dancing all around berlin and they wanted to give bryn & india tour.

even more of a surprise: india got a message from david knowles, an amazing friend from high school who she hadn't seen since about then, saying he was living in berlin and would love to hang out. for obvious purposes, from here forward, the blog will specify friends by saying british david and american david.

bryn & india stayed in a hostel recommended to them by girls in prague. the wombat was really modern. their window looked out onto the spiking t.v. tower and a wall of detailed graffiti. bryn & india met up with british david their first night. white trash fast food was decorated like a chinese restaurant and served greasy hamburgers. there was a bizarre band playing; a handful of older guys in pleather short shorts and vests strummed electric guitars as sexy middle edged german girls in matching corsets sang back up off key. the weirdest part: the crowd went wild! loved them! cheered them on, screamed in adoration! bryn & india didn't get it. so they laughed and drank and then went to a smaller bar where a guy played bob dylan on the guitar and bryn talked to british david's friends about techno music and so forth.

the t.v. tower framed by the wombat's window.

modern architecture dots the sidewalks.

the next day, bryn & india walked towards the center of the city. they were looking for the holocaust memorial. after walking for awhile, they found a pile of large wooden white crosses hanging posted to a fence. confused, they soon realized it was a homemade memorial to men who had died attempting to escape east berlin's communism in the 1960's. it was a strange realization for them. here they had been, searching for a memorial for one war, and here they were, accidentally finding one for another (more recent!) war that had taken place in the same city. this sort of awful shock had a lasting impression with bryn & india in berlin. for some reason, the dark history of the city held a serious cloud throughout the entirety of their stay.

impromptu memorials surround the icy parks.

the memorial to the murdered jews of europe.

the holocaust memorial, or the memorial to the murdered jews of europe, was difficult to say the least. the modern history of berlin is so rough. bryn & india talked about how bizarre it must be to go to middle school there and learn about your city's history. in your grandparents time, we really messed up, and let a lot of horrible things happen. and then in your parents time, we really messed up again, and let a lot of other horrible things happen. they guessed they must find some way to glorify it. (after all, they did learn about horrible stuff in american history class, too.)

at night, they met up with american david. david was in germany getting his mfa in public art. it was so exciting to be hanging out with a real american artist living in berlin in a real german apartment, trying to start a life there. to see their young friend become a hard-working expat was exciting and great - and american david was both of those things.

american david took bryn & india to an amazing dinner spot where the three mused about opening their own business. communal pasta bowls and help yourself bottles of wine got them ready for the late night that lay ahead.

because berlin's nightlife is not like the life that one lives during the day. it is a completely different, totally separate kind of life. your day life and your night life don't even necessarily need to get along to coexist. they can remain totally disconnected. perhaps, actually, that's the right way to do it.

american david took bryn & india to some amazing bars that first night. they were all packed full of beautiful, tall people who smoked cigarettes and drank gin and tonics. one neighborhood they went to had a large housing complex in it, and right next to someones front door, was a sort of secret bar, tucked in among the apartments. they party hopped around the many bars that were built into said housing complex for a few hours. in one, they crashed an argentenian birthday party, and american david made friends with a xylophone player. there were bands at every bar. they took the subway home when they got too tired. that wasn't until around six am.

german graffiti will you keep you warm.

backpacks grow heavy with collected glow sticks.

the next morning, bryn & india took american david's advice and walked to the west side of berlin. they walked along a mile stretch of the old berlin wall that had been restored and turned into a sort of public canvas. a group of artists had painted murals down it - bright graffiti and big portraits and very lose but gorgeous interpretations of the violence that had brought about the wall. what's funny is that american david, the public art major, mind you, wasn't that into it. oh, you could go see that if you want, but it's not that cool because it's not the real berlin wall, it's just the same height and where it was standing. you can't see the history of the wall behind the paint. bryn & india did like it though. the bright paint in the grey city made them glow. they walked to a big park where there were puppies and babies and kids biking through the snow and skateboarders jumping on the rails and it felt so sunny and wonderful and really great in berlin for the first time. they ate burritos and bryn found india some clunky combat boots in a second hand store and they felt so good.

the berlin wall, decorated. 

a frosty park in west berlin.

that night, their last night in berlin, cannot be spoken about. at the clubs they went to that night, watergate and the panorama bar in berghain, bryn & india were patted down before they entered. they were forced to check their cameras into a separate coat room to ensure they didn't snap shots in the club. as mentioned previously, they saw things in these clubs that they cannot even begin to describe.

they watched the sun rise. after that, they went to another club. around noon, exhausted, grumpy, they decided to give up. they went to the bus station and bought tickets to amsterdam. just like that. goodbye berlin. 

prague.

from london, bryn & india flew to prague. india watched a couple say goodbye to each other, kiss each other's cheeks for about an hour outside of the security gate before their four am. she was happy to not be leaving bryn like that.

prague could only be described as magical. there was something so romantic, so magical, about the place. it cannot be explained. their friend from home had tried; emma had lived there for a semester in college. and india's mom did too, as she had visited for the first time in the summer of 2009. but bryn & india didn't understand how cool of a place it really was until they arrived there themselves.

india had found an incredible deal for a hotel room. so cheap that the two opted for that over a hostel. the catch: it was on a boat. (A BOTEL!) on the hotel albatros almost every room on the ship was empty. bryn & india's was sweet and small and had a big window that slid all the way down and looked out over the river. they threw bread and stale potato chips at the swans who would come flap their wings and wag their tails right in front of their botel window. the women at the front desk were friendly and let them drink beers in the lobby where the the sole television sat. they watched winter olympic sports after all of the bars had closed down.

our home, botel albatros, on the vltava river.

bryn feeds swans out the botel window.

prague was filled with castles. and churches that looked like castles. india felt like she was playing beauty and the beast. (though not with a beast, obviously.)

their first night in eastern europe, bryn & india walked to the main square in the old town of prague, about a ten minute walk from where their botel was. they bought hot spiced wine for 20 czech koruna, or about one dollar, and kicked around snow and watched the old clock chime. since they realized, hey, we can drink outside, this is tight, the two went to a grocery store and bought czech bottled beer for about 5 czech koruna, or 25 cents, and sat in the cold and got giddy about being in eastern europe. this is it! this is it!

downtown prague at night.

their days were leisurely. bryn & india would wake up when they woke up and take their time bundling up for the snow. they ate breakfast in little coffeeshops, bakeshop prague. one morning, they walked across the charles bridge where bryn went crazy with his new camera. they walked up to prague castle, watched the changing of the guards, freaked out over the view that showed them the world. all the spiral peeks of cathedrals swirled for them alone. they were a connect-the-dots of prague. another morning, they visited the ancient jewish cemetery and museum, saw dramatically simplistic synagogs and learned the traditions of a jewish burial. another morning, they went to a district across the river and visited the contemporary arts centre. it was beautiful and bizarre and huge and filled with great things. they debated modern art and decided, perhaps, the pieces were best shared in silence.

the view! the view! the view!

the best breakfast in prague is at okie dokie.

during the evenings, bryn & india would walk in circles throughout the cobblestone alleys. they paid a lot of attention to the lonely planet guide that their dear friend emma had circled her favorite things in. after they had explored emma's notables, they started to just wander, and ended up finding some cozy places on their own. pizza and a bottle of wine for ten bucks in a place where they cheered on the czech rupublic's hockey team with winter olympic fanatics... a middle eastern place where they smoked flavored hookah and drank mint tea. they found some really wonderful small bars that would serve them cheap drinks for hours. they could sit and talk and write and read and drink and think.

smoking hookah in the old square.

we are not tourists.

then india's immune system failed her again, and a disgusting case of the sniffles came in. coughcoughcough. constantly. predicated apologies for the folks who will be sharing her hostel room in berlin...

also, we hate each other.