Published in BCNWEEK
Issue # 13
September 15 - 21, 2006
I’ve been kicked out of bars by bouncers, kicked out of stores by managers, kicked out of the house by my mother, and kicked out of class by teachers. But I’ll bet not many mediocre rebels like me have been kicked out of their beach chair in Bogatell by a software engineer. Who’s the man? Yeah, that’s right.
Even you may have been kicked off one of the many lounge chairs, or hamacas, that litter the Barcelona beaches. You sat down, set up shop, and played stupid when someone, mysteriously, came to ask you for money. But you could only play dumb for so long, and then he gave you the boot. But you’ll never know if you were booted by a software engineer, a former professor, or a biochemist, because you didn’t stop to ask.
Left of Pizza Hut, Juan Luis, made his presence known. He’s a short and extremely brown little man. He was wearing shorts, a t-shirt, a cheap cap and sported a fanny-pack slung across his chest from shoulder to hip like a bandolier. A fine layer of dust the ayuntamiento of Barcelona likes to advertise as “sand” covered his entire person. He tried to kick guiri number 4,619 off of an unpaid-for lounge chair. That guiri fui yo. I fought back with a barage of questions, buying myself as much time as I could, like that time I held my position in an unoccupied first-class airline seat for a grand total of 43 seconds. A ver if I can last a little longer this time . . .
So, Juan Luis, how much do these here hamacas cost? "4 euros for the whole day." But it’s late, do I get a discount now? "No." You mean there is no price fluctuation at all? "None." (Damn . . . these one-line responses aren’t gonna keep me on this seat for long. Running time = 00:22). Are they yours? "No. They belong to the business." Oh, there’s a business? "Si. It’s a family business." Is it your family. "No, I just work here." Where are you from? "Bolivia." And how long have you been here? "I’ve been doing this for one month but I’ve been here for five. There’s no work in Bolivia. I was studying before and when I finished there was no work. So I came here." (He’s talkin’ now! Time = 01:13) What did you study? "I studied software engineering. I’m a software engineer. After I finished studying, I gave classes for a while but they payed me next to nothing. So I came here." (01:58) So you’re going to go back? "Si, si. I’m going back to start a business. I’m saving money here like crazy. I make good money. They pay me 1,100 euros a month." DAMN!!! "And when people ask me if I want to go out to eat I say, stay here, I’ll cook for you, and you can pay me. Do you know Bolivian food? Do you like picante?" (03:34) Love it. "I don’t have amigos. I’m single. No se ligar. And it’s hard to be here at the beach with chicas lindas everywhere when you can’t talk to them." Just be yourself, Juan. "The lifeguards are guapas too. That one up there is Spanish and the other is Argentinian. I like the Spanish one more. She has better legs. (04:49) Can you get up now? I have to finish working." (05:03)
Who’s the man? Yeah, that’s right. 0.0419 centimos worth of free lounge chair chillin.
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
International Stew-dents (The Legend of Don Erasmito)
Published in BCNWEEK
Issue # 13
September 8 - 14, 2006
They come every, every spring, summer, and fall. They come in droves...in packs. They come from France, Iceland, Germany... Europe. They come from the Americas — North, South, and Central. They have a few things in common: they’re all students, they’re all here temporarily, and they’ve all been given a free folder with their program name proudly plastered on the front. Erasmus — WHAM! — here’s your free folder, welcome to Barcelona. Erasmus is just one program — the most famous perhaps, but there are more: Institute for the International Education of Students (IES), Leonardo, Pioneer, Cultural Experiences Abroad (CEA), in addition to general masters and doctorate programs — SMACK! — bienvenido, temporary guiri! Each year, these programs bring more and more and more foreign students into Spain. Since 2000, the number of Erasmus students in Spain has climbed steadily from just over 17.000 in 2000/01 to over 23.000 in 2004/05, and that’s just counting students from the European 18 which are nations that enjoyed full EU member status at the time of the survey. Erasmus’ fields stretch even farther, however, including crops of students in many other countries such as Russia, the Czech Republic, Poland, and more, pushing the totals for Spain up above 25.000 students per year. Inevitably, a large portion of these traveling academics fancy a tour of duty in Barcelona. It seems sun, beaches, cosmopolitan diversity, and, of course, fiesta are major pulls. Erasmus graphs estimated the total number of students in Catalunya in 2005 at 3,371.
In the quite recent past, the exponential growth of tourism from the USA has been matched by similar growth in the numbers of American students studying abroad in BCN. When IES, a program specializing exclusively in American students, began in the fall of 2002, its first group totaled 83. This fall they have approximately 300 students enrolled. As we speak, these gringos are getting off planes, making sad faces as their dollars turn into fewer euros, and looking for that big blue airport bus. In winter, 500 more will come. In spring, 200 more. IES alone brings 1,000 americanosthrough every year, and that number continues to grow. According to Xavier Purificacion (vaya nombre, hombre!), who is currently working on a still unfinished study in conjunction with Turisme de Barcelona and the BCU (Barcelona Centro Universitari) on the economic impact international students have on BCN, approximately 5,000 Americans are coming to this city during this school year.
Exact totals are impossible, as not all students that come to study are censurados. According to El Pais, 12,500 foreign students were studying in Catalunya in 2005. This year, if growth trends continue (which they seem to be doing), Catalunya will be called home by, por lo menos, 14,000 foreign students, the large majority of whom will be in Barcelona. That’s a lot of new people to meet.
Why they choose Barcelona differs from student to student. The most common responses are those you would expect. The lovely Lily, a Parisian wrapping up her time here in BCN after her Erasmus year, said it was like a pequena Paris. I took minor offense, but her point is valid: Barcelona has culture, music, cinema, and cosmopolitan diversity. If you’re looking for variety and options, it’s a good choice. Other responses add in the beach, the nice weather, the siesta, the fiesta, and the generally laid-back attitude. Combine all these and you have generally satisfied students abroad. Very few foreign students have harbored bad feelings for the city itself, and while some found it expensive, none found it boring.
The appeal of the city seems to overshadow, however, a rather important truth apparent to all those who have lived here for even as little as one week. We are technically in Spain, but we are also in Catalunya — KAPOW! — benvinguts, guiri amics! The language classes are conducted in depends largely on the university. At the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) the majority of classes last year were taught in Castellano, although a significant number of Catalan classes were also offered. At the Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya (UPC) half of the classes were in Catalan and half in Castellano. Other schools are predominantly Catalan. Lily and Mateo, who is from Italy, did not find classes taught in Catalan to be particularly difficult. Nor did they find making friends with Catalans to be overly troublesome. However, their countries of origin and their native very-Latin based languages give them an obvious advantage with regard to their Catalan comprehension.
Students from northern European countries or from the States found it more difficult to cope with their encounters with the language and with Catalans themselves. An Icelandic student who studied at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona (UAB) and who will remain anonymous warned future students that “this is Catalonia, not really Spain. Therefore the official language of the UAB is Catalan, not Spanish, so many courses are taught in Catalan, and some teachers and students don’t respond to anything but Catalan. Also, all forms and info regarding the courses are in Catalan.” That would be hard enough for someone who had lived here for a year, let alone a BCN rookie. In student reports published on the website, http://istudy.iagora.com, students responded to the prompt, “I wish I had known...” with, for example, “that Catalan is so widespread. That some classes at university are only given in Catalan! I would have taken some classes before!” This is hardly excusable. Not to blame the students entirely, but even mediocre research would inform them that in Catalunya, people speak... wait for it... CATALAN! Surprise, surprise. However, some blame must also be placed on the universities and the different study abroad program representatives who fail to point out to students interested in learning Castellano that their classes and course info will be in Catalan. “Oh... gee, I forgot to mention that...”
There seems to be a prevailing opinion that Erasmus and other similar programs are more like an extended vacation than a period of genuine study. Of course, the amount of truth in this depends on the student. How much you get out of something is directly proportionate to the amount of effort you put into it. According to Lily, many of her fellow students rarely went out, spending the majority of their time in the libraries of their universities, studying. They were perfectly content with their time here, doing what they wanted to do. They should be commended — but Lily’s academic story is a more common one, with a fairly negative view of the Spanish/Catalan educational system.
First semester, September to January, she went to most of her classes and passed easily. The classes, however, never really sparked her interest and during the second semester, from February to June, she “almost never went to class.” The classes, Lily? “Fatal.” As we should hope, her Spanish professors here were more knowledgeable when it came to teaching Spanish literature, grammar, culture, and history than their French counterparts at her university in Paris, but, according to Lily, professors here never made efforts to engage the students. It was pure, boring lecture, she said, in amphitheater classrooms. "Every day I would go to class ready to take notes, but I would be so bored that I would put my head down and go to sleep. After a while, I decided to just sleep at home instead of going to class.” Towards the end of second semester, before exam time, she asked a fellow students for a copy of the notes, studied them, and passed the exams. Did she study a lot? You have to study “un poco, un poquetin.”
My Icelandic informer felt similarly that it was “mainly just lectures, given by the teacher with a silent class. Very little class participation, and no practice seemed to be done in many classes. Often just 100% exam with no other work to do.” The educational system here is notoriously exam based. Mateo didn’t disagree, but then again, he wasn’t in class that much anyway. “I went to class about half the time, o menos.” Did you study? “Bastante poco.” How much is bastante poco, Mateo? “Two weeks per semester.” Did he pass? Damn right he did. “When you don’t speak Spanish very well they don’t expect too much from you,” noted Alec, an American who just finished his program. “Even though I came to study, I could have gotten by without learning a damn thing.”
Like Lily, Alec, and Mateo, most students who come through BCN spent more time out and about, absorbing all the newness that a foreign city and language has to offer them. They also participate in trips organized through their programs exploring more of Catalunya, though they mostly stick to repeated expeditions into the cosmopolitan center as opposed to the Catalan mountain. Basically, these students do what we all do: they live here. They speak Spanish and even some Catalan in shops, on metros, while playing basketball or flirting on the beach. And so they learn. Poc a poc. Because they are young and relatively carefree, perhaps they party a bit more than the rest of us perma-guiris. After all, their time here is limited and they seem to grab life by the cojones. It’s this attitude, this energetic presence combined with indisputable diversity and love of partying, all laced with a time limit, that has a distinct effect on this city. Exactly what that effect is, though, is difficult to pin down. Do they have a significant cultural effect? Xavier Purificacion shrugs that off. “In a city the size of Barcelona, not really.” Mateo agrees. “If you are with Erasmus, and you go out a lot, you affect your neurons more than anything. You don’t affect the culture much.”
Mr. Purificacion does agree, however, that there is definite economic impact. He insists that an entire submarket has formed in Barcelona that caters to student needs. One google search of “erasmus” shows him hard to prove wrong. From apartments and single rooms for foreign students, to guided tours of the city and its surroundings, to special fiestas, to jobs distributing flyers, to minor drug deals, to simple tourism, foreign students contribute considerably to the current economic boom in Barcelona. According to an IES study, the average American student studying in BCN in 2005 spent 1,700 euros. Multiply by 5,000 students and you get 8,500,000 euros. There are at least just as many Europeans spending their money as well. And South Americans. BCN sees euro signs!
That leaves us with the last effect, the fiesta effect. “Where there are students, there’s fiesta,” says Lily. “It gives a youthful feeling and cosmopolitan coolness to the city.” “The people always change here,” adds Mateo, “it forces you to meet new people.” Who could argue that Barcelona is an incredibly easy place to meet new people? And most of these new people gleefully partake in the nightlife while imbibing the shit out of some beer, wine, sangria, green absinthe stuff, vodka red bulls, y mas. Maybe they smoke porros. There isn’t much more to say about young foreign students partying. A list of specifics would fill this issue and more, and would likely delight and disgust you. While this behavior might seem one-sided, irresponsible, and juvenile, Mateo, Lily, Andrew, and countless others we haven’t interviewed agree that they learned more outside class, while speaking and socializing, than they did in it.
Being here gives students from other countries the opportunity to see different ways of doing things. In some cases it allows them to step outside the only “truth” they’ve ever known, in order to look back upon it from a new perspective. Alec has “gotten a much better idea of what people think of the States (bad) and how the States look from a country outside of North America (worse), where the media doesn’t make everything bad look not so bad.” Others, like Lily, found a new perspective on themselves. “I grew, living alone. It was my first time away from my parents. Renting a piso. Paying bills. You mature here. You learn a lot about yourself, about your limits, your possibilities, what you are capable of doing and not doing. Everything I’ve acquired here serves me much more for my life than for school. It was the best year of my youth so far.” A little vomit in the streets, a few drunk and slacking students, and too much noise outside our windows is a small price to pay for such growth.
Issue # 13
September 8 - 14, 2006
They come every, every spring, summer, and fall. They come in droves...in packs. They come from France, Iceland, Germany... Europe. They come from the Americas — North, South, and Central. They have a few things in common: they’re all students, they’re all here temporarily, and they’ve all been given a free folder with their program name proudly plastered on the front. Erasmus — WHAM! — here’s your free folder, welcome to Barcelona. Erasmus is just one program — the most famous perhaps, but there are more: Institute for the International Education of Students (IES), Leonardo, Pioneer, Cultural Experiences Abroad (CEA), in addition to general masters and doctorate programs — SMACK! — bienvenido, temporary guiri! Each year, these programs bring more and more and more foreign students into Spain. Since 2000, the number of Erasmus students in Spain has climbed steadily from just over 17.000 in 2000/01 to over 23.000 in 2004/05, and that’s just counting students from the European 18 which are nations that enjoyed full EU member status at the time of the survey. Erasmus’ fields stretch even farther, however, including crops of students in many other countries such as Russia, the Czech Republic, Poland, and more, pushing the totals for Spain up above 25.000 students per year. Inevitably, a large portion of these traveling academics fancy a tour of duty in Barcelona. It seems sun, beaches, cosmopolitan diversity, and, of course, fiesta are major pulls. Erasmus graphs estimated the total number of students in Catalunya in 2005 at 3,371.
In the quite recent past, the exponential growth of tourism from the USA has been matched by similar growth in the numbers of American students studying abroad in BCN. When IES, a program specializing exclusively in American students, began in the fall of 2002, its first group totaled 83. This fall they have approximately 300 students enrolled. As we speak, these gringos are getting off planes, making sad faces as their dollars turn into fewer euros, and looking for that big blue airport bus. In winter, 500 more will come. In spring, 200 more. IES alone brings 1,000 americanosthrough every year, and that number continues to grow. According to Xavier Purificacion (vaya nombre, hombre!), who is currently working on a still unfinished study in conjunction with Turisme de Barcelona and the BCU (Barcelona Centro Universitari) on the economic impact international students have on BCN, approximately 5,000 Americans are coming to this city during this school year.
Exact totals are impossible, as not all students that come to study are censurados. According to El Pais, 12,500 foreign students were studying in Catalunya in 2005. This year, if growth trends continue (which they seem to be doing), Catalunya will be called home by, por lo menos, 14,000 foreign students, the large majority of whom will be in Barcelona. That’s a lot of new people to meet.
Why they choose Barcelona differs from student to student. The most common responses are those you would expect. The lovely Lily, a Parisian wrapping up her time here in BCN after her Erasmus year, said it was like a pequena Paris. I took minor offense, but her point is valid: Barcelona has culture, music, cinema, and cosmopolitan diversity. If you’re looking for variety and options, it’s a good choice. Other responses add in the beach, the nice weather, the siesta, the fiesta, and the generally laid-back attitude. Combine all these and you have generally satisfied students abroad. Very few foreign students have harbored bad feelings for the city itself, and while some found it expensive, none found it boring.
The appeal of the city seems to overshadow, however, a rather important truth apparent to all those who have lived here for even as little as one week. We are technically in Spain, but we are also in Catalunya — KAPOW! — benvinguts, guiri amics! The language classes are conducted in depends largely on the university. At the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) the majority of classes last year were taught in Castellano, although a significant number of Catalan classes were also offered. At the Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya (UPC) half of the classes were in Catalan and half in Castellano. Other schools are predominantly Catalan. Lily and Mateo, who is from Italy, did not find classes taught in Catalan to be particularly difficult. Nor did they find making friends with Catalans to be overly troublesome. However, their countries of origin and their native very-Latin based languages give them an obvious advantage with regard to their Catalan comprehension.
Students from northern European countries or from the States found it more difficult to cope with their encounters with the language and with Catalans themselves. An Icelandic student who studied at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona (UAB) and who will remain anonymous warned future students that “this is Catalonia, not really Spain. Therefore the official language of the UAB is Catalan, not Spanish, so many courses are taught in Catalan, and some teachers and students don’t respond to anything but Catalan. Also, all forms and info regarding the courses are in Catalan.” That would be hard enough for someone who had lived here for a year, let alone a BCN rookie. In student reports published on the website, http://istudy.iagora.com, students responded to the prompt, “I wish I had known...” with, for example, “that Catalan is so widespread. That some classes at university are only given in Catalan! I would have taken some classes before!” This is hardly excusable. Not to blame the students entirely, but even mediocre research would inform them that in Catalunya, people speak... wait for it... CATALAN! Surprise, surprise. However, some blame must also be placed on the universities and the different study abroad program representatives who fail to point out to students interested in learning Castellano that their classes and course info will be in Catalan. “Oh... gee, I forgot to mention that...”
There seems to be a prevailing opinion that Erasmus and other similar programs are more like an extended vacation than a period of genuine study. Of course, the amount of truth in this depends on the student. How much you get out of something is directly proportionate to the amount of effort you put into it. According to Lily, many of her fellow students rarely went out, spending the majority of their time in the libraries of their universities, studying. They were perfectly content with their time here, doing what they wanted to do. They should be commended — but Lily’s academic story is a more common one, with a fairly negative view of the Spanish/Catalan educational system.
First semester, September to January, she went to most of her classes and passed easily. The classes, however, never really sparked her interest and during the second semester, from February to June, she “almost never went to class.” The classes, Lily? “Fatal.” As we should hope, her Spanish professors here were more knowledgeable when it came to teaching Spanish literature, grammar, culture, and history than their French counterparts at her university in Paris, but, according to Lily, professors here never made efforts to engage the students. It was pure, boring lecture, she said, in amphitheater classrooms. "Every day I would go to class ready to take notes, but I would be so bored that I would put my head down and go to sleep. After a while, I decided to just sleep at home instead of going to class.” Towards the end of second semester, before exam time, she asked a fellow students for a copy of the notes, studied them, and passed the exams. Did she study a lot? You have to study “un poco, un poquetin.”
My Icelandic informer felt similarly that it was “mainly just lectures, given by the teacher with a silent class. Very little class participation, and no practice seemed to be done in many classes. Often just 100% exam with no other work to do.” The educational system here is notoriously exam based. Mateo didn’t disagree, but then again, he wasn’t in class that much anyway. “I went to class about half the time, o menos.” Did you study? “Bastante poco.” How much is bastante poco, Mateo? “Two weeks per semester.” Did he pass? Damn right he did. “When you don’t speak Spanish very well they don’t expect too much from you,” noted Alec, an American who just finished his program. “Even though I came to study, I could have gotten by without learning a damn thing.”
Like Lily, Alec, and Mateo, most students who come through BCN spent more time out and about, absorbing all the newness that a foreign city and language has to offer them. They also participate in trips organized through their programs exploring more of Catalunya, though they mostly stick to repeated expeditions into the cosmopolitan center as opposed to the Catalan mountain. Basically, these students do what we all do: they live here. They speak Spanish and even some Catalan in shops, on metros, while playing basketball or flirting on the beach. And so they learn. Poc a poc. Because they are young and relatively carefree, perhaps they party a bit more than the rest of us perma-guiris. After all, their time here is limited and they seem to grab life by the cojones. It’s this attitude, this energetic presence combined with indisputable diversity and love of partying, all laced with a time limit, that has a distinct effect on this city. Exactly what that effect is, though, is difficult to pin down. Do they have a significant cultural effect? Xavier Purificacion shrugs that off. “In a city the size of Barcelona, not really.” Mateo agrees. “If you are with Erasmus, and you go out a lot, you affect your neurons more than anything. You don’t affect the culture much.”
Mr. Purificacion does agree, however, that there is definite economic impact. He insists that an entire submarket has formed in Barcelona that caters to student needs. One google search of “erasmus” shows him hard to prove wrong. From apartments and single rooms for foreign students, to guided tours of the city and its surroundings, to special fiestas, to jobs distributing flyers, to minor drug deals, to simple tourism, foreign students contribute considerably to the current economic boom in Barcelona. According to an IES study, the average American student studying in BCN in 2005 spent 1,700 euros. Multiply by 5,000 students and you get 8,500,000 euros. There are at least just as many Europeans spending their money as well. And South Americans. BCN sees euro signs!
That leaves us with the last effect, the fiesta effect. “Where there are students, there’s fiesta,” says Lily. “It gives a youthful feeling and cosmopolitan coolness to the city.” “The people always change here,” adds Mateo, “it forces you to meet new people.” Who could argue that Barcelona is an incredibly easy place to meet new people? And most of these new people gleefully partake in the nightlife while imbibing the shit out of some beer, wine, sangria, green absinthe stuff, vodka red bulls, y mas. Maybe they smoke porros. There isn’t much more to say about young foreign students partying. A list of specifics would fill this issue and more, and would likely delight and disgust you. While this behavior might seem one-sided, irresponsible, and juvenile, Mateo, Lily, Andrew, and countless others we haven’t interviewed agree that they learned more outside class, while speaking and socializing, than they did in it.
Being here gives students from other countries the opportunity to see different ways of doing things. In some cases it allows them to step outside the only “truth” they’ve ever known, in order to look back upon it from a new perspective. Alec has “gotten a much better idea of what people think of the States (bad) and how the States look from a country outside of North America (worse), where the media doesn’t make everything bad look not so bad.” Others, like Lily, found a new perspective on themselves. “I grew, living alone. It was my first time away from my parents. Renting a piso. Paying bills. You mature here. You learn a lot about yourself, about your limits, your possibilities, what you are capable of doing and not doing. Everything I’ve acquired here serves me much more for my life than for school. It was the best year of my youth so far.” A little vomit in the streets, a few drunk and slacking students, and too much noise outside our windows is a small price to pay for such growth.
Ikea (Figuras # 6)
Published in BCNWEEK
Issue # 12
September 1 - 7, 2006
Which Figuras is this? Number six, I think. It seems like ages since I met that charming young Pakistani man selling beer, followed him around, slightly annoyed him, and so birthed the first column. Forever ago and yesterday. But what is a figura? To this guiri, a figura is a unique soul. An original character. A distinct presence. But those three definitions cover quite a broad range. And here we reach our predicament. Paris Hilton is a distinct presence, like a splitting headache behind your eyes, but I’ve yet to see her walking down Las Ramblas with a one-euro Estrella in her bone-thin fingers. Aside from bitchy and selfish supa-socialites, however, where do we draw the line? I ask you, dear reader. Read the rest of this. Is this week’s Figura legitimate? Let me know if you, like some of our editors, think what follows is a hack job. And if you do, I look forward to angry emails and well-articulated insults. Don’t leave me hanging. But before you respond, try to stop drinking Coca-Cola cold turkey and then tell me it isn’t a distinct and one-and-only presence in your life.
With that out of the way, I ask you to look around your apartment, if you’re in it, or the coffee shop your sippin’ in. Wherever. This is the figura on your bed. The figura in your private bathroom, lavatory, loo. Your kitchen. It might very well be the figura under your cafe con leche right now! Can you guess it? Its real home is a small country far, far away full of many blond people downing snus and bilar. Soon, its massive blue and yellow buildings will be counted among the man-made objects visible from space. Se llama IKEA, mis amigos. Interviewing this monster is a touch difficult, but it was nothing compared to trying to find the way out once in the damn building.
There are 12 in Spain, two in Catalunya. In 2005, there were 221 stores worldwide. 453,791,000 people shopped at IKEA that same year. It’s impossible to know exactly how many shopped at which store, but if you divide the number of shoppers by the number of stores, you can estimate that 2,053,353 people shopped at each store. Since there are two IKEAs in the Barcelona area alone, that means that 4,106,706 people shopped there while in BCN. With Barcelona’s estimated population at 1,582,738 and including the smaller but significant populations of L’Hospitalet and Badalona, it seems that every motherf#@$er up in this b&%ch shopped there. Now try and tell me it doesn’t figura into your life.
It’s the figura you love to hate. Or is it the figura you hate to love? Sure, it obviously sucks that everybody, everywhere has the same stuff. But hey, with 12,405 products available this year, you might be able to find something that only 331 other people have! Yes, going there is an exercise in patience and self-control. You may reach ecstatic highs and homicidal lows. One customer held up a kitchen knife encased in plastic packaging with a gleam in his eye. “They shouldn’t sell knives here. They really shouldn’t. Don’t let me hold this knife.” Put it down, buddy. But whatever your experience is, at the end, when you finally find one of the eight people working in a warehouse the size of Outer Mongolia, and have all your things paid for, including your 6 varieties of egg beaters, there’ll always be that sweet, sweet bilar waiting for you in the food section.
Issue # 12
September 1 - 7, 2006
Which Figuras is this? Number six, I think. It seems like ages since I met that charming young Pakistani man selling beer, followed him around, slightly annoyed him, and so birthed the first column. Forever ago and yesterday. But what is a figura? To this guiri, a figura is a unique soul. An original character. A distinct presence. But those three definitions cover quite a broad range. And here we reach our predicament. Paris Hilton is a distinct presence, like a splitting headache behind your eyes, but I’ve yet to see her walking down Las Ramblas with a one-euro Estrella in her bone-thin fingers. Aside from bitchy and selfish supa-socialites, however, where do we draw the line? I ask you, dear reader. Read the rest of this. Is this week’s Figura legitimate? Let me know if you, like some of our editors, think what follows is a hack job. And if you do, I look forward to angry emails and well-articulated insults. Don’t leave me hanging. But before you respond, try to stop drinking Coca-Cola cold turkey and then tell me it isn’t a distinct and one-and-only presence in your life.
With that out of the way, I ask you to look around your apartment, if you’re in it, or the coffee shop your sippin’ in. Wherever. This is the figura on your bed. The figura in your private bathroom, lavatory, loo. Your kitchen. It might very well be the figura under your cafe con leche right now! Can you guess it? Its real home is a small country far, far away full of many blond people downing snus and bilar. Soon, its massive blue and yellow buildings will be counted among the man-made objects visible from space. Se llama IKEA, mis amigos. Interviewing this monster is a touch difficult, but it was nothing compared to trying to find the way out once in the damn building.
There are 12 in Spain, two in Catalunya. In 2005, there were 221 stores worldwide. 453,791,000 people shopped at IKEA that same year. It’s impossible to know exactly how many shopped at which store, but if you divide the number of shoppers by the number of stores, you can estimate that 2,053,353 people shopped at each store. Since there are two IKEAs in the Barcelona area alone, that means that 4,106,706 people shopped there while in BCN. With Barcelona’s estimated population at 1,582,738 and including the smaller but significant populations of L’Hospitalet and Badalona, it seems that every motherf#@$er up in this b&%ch shopped there. Now try and tell me it doesn’t figura into your life.
It’s the figura you love to hate. Or is it the figura you hate to love? Sure, it obviously sucks that everybody, everywhere has the same stuff. But hey, with 12,405 products available this year, you might be able to find something that only 331 other people have! Yes, going there is an exercise in patience and self-control. You may reach ecstatic highs and homicidal lows. One customer held up a kitchen knife encased in plastic packaging with a gleam in his eye. “They shouldn’t sell knives here. They really shouldn’t. Don’t let me hold this knife.” Put it down, buddy. But whatever your experience is, at the end, when you finally find one of the eight people working in a warehouse the size of Outer Mongolia, and have all your things paid for, including your 6 varieties of egg beaters, there’ll always be that sweet, sweet bilar waiting for you in the food section.
Trixi Drivers (Figuras # 5)
Published in BCNWEEK
Issue # 11
July 28 - August 3, 2006
You’ve seen them in la Plaza de la Catedral,or maybe down by Colon. They’ve almost run you over — though at a slow clip — while you were walking down Sant Pere Mes Alt. They are the taxistas reales. They don’t spend the day sitting on their asses, absorbing air-conditioned air. You callthat a job? These guys pedal for a living, that is when they aren’t lounging in the shade, shootin’ the shit, and sippin’on a Moritz, as I happened to find them last Tuesday afternoon. ‘They’ are trixi drivers.
The name trixi is a combination of tricycle and taxi, and these finely tuned, finely tanned drivers will usher you around in their two-seater, motorassisted trixi for a price. “Can you take me to the airport?” Impossible. That’s a real disappointment. It turns out that these trixistas can’t bike down highways. Why? Top speed not fast. They can’t take you to Park Guell either. “Getting there is like this,” he says as he extends his forearm to show a steep slope.
“So what’s your name?” “Diesel.” It’s not everyday you get to interview a guy named Diesel. He grabs his walkie-talkie off his belt and plays with the dials a bit. “Within the company, everyone calls me that.” His real name’s Dani. That’s cool, Diesel. I dig it. There are 10 trixis in Barcelona, and ten guys. I met Diesel, Manolito, and Jose.
They all wear the Trixi uniform, which is a cutre black-and-white, grafitti-esque and therefore Desigualesque t-shirt and grey shorts. Diesel, in character, has cut off his sleeves to reveal that nice tan. Sandals on the feet. Walkie-talkies at the hip. They wait for tourists to approach, and on this particular day, sip some cans of Moritz. Jose, with the dreadlocks, eats a bocadillo de tortilla de spinach.
Some girls stroll up, then a mother and daughter and a lone guy wanting to ask a question. The trixistas jump into action. “To Sagrada Familia? That’s 15.” Whatever money they make during the day is theirs to keep. On a good day they make around 60 or 70 euros. But it hasn’t seemed to make them too formal on the job. Jose takes another bite out of his bocadillo and continues explaining why a trip to La Sagrada Familia will cost a little more.
One by one, they start to say goodbye. The first takes off with the pair of girls as Manolito pulls up, ending a tour. It’s important question time now. “So,what’s the best part of the job?” “The freedom. It’s an eight hour day, but you can spend parts of it with friends, hanging out, talking, being outside. And you can make a lot of money if you want to work hard.” Sounds like the definition of a good Barcelona work day for this guiri.
And do you fight over who takes the pretty girls? Without a moment’s hesitation they respond,“yes, always.” Jose cracks another Moritz and puts it behind the seat of his trixi.“With the chicas, Manolito is peligro numero uno.”
Issue # 11
July 28 - August 3, 2006
You’ve seen them in la Plaza de la Catedral,or maybe down by Colon. They’ve almost run you over — though at a slow clip — while you were walking down Sant Pere Mes Alt. They are the taxistas reales. They don’t spend the day sitting on their asses, absorbing air-conditioned air. You callthat a job? These guys pedal for a living, that is when they aren’t lounging in the shade, shootin’ the shit, and sippin’on a Moritz, as I happened to find them last Tuesday afternoon. ‘They’ are trixi drivers.
The name trixi is a combination of tricycle and taxi, and these finely tuned, finely tanned drivers will usher you around in their two-seater, motorassisted trixi for a price. “Can you take me to the airport?” Impossible. That’s a real disappointment. It turns out that these trixistas can’t bike down highways. Why? Top speed not fast. They can’t take you to Park Guell either. “Getting there is like this,” he says as he extends his forearm to show a steep slope.
“So what’s your name?” “Diesel.” It’s not everyday you get to interview a guy named Diesel. He grabs his walkie-talkie off his belt and plays with the dials a bit. “Within the company, everyone calls me that.” His real name’s Dani. That’s cool, Diesel. I dig it. There are 10 trixis in Barcelona, and ten guys. I met Diesel, Manolito, and Jose.
They all wear the Trixi uniform, which is a cutre black-and-white, grafitti-esque and therefore Desigualesque t-shirt and grey shorts. Diesel, in character, has cut off his sleeves to reveal that nice tan. Sandals on the feet. Walkie-talkies at the hip. They wait for tourists to approach, and on this particular day, sip some cans of Moritz. Jose, with the dreadlocks, eats a bocadillo de tortilla de spinach.
Some girls stroll up, then a mother and daughter and a lone guy wanting to ask a question. The trixistas jump into action. “To Sagrada Familia? That’s 15.” Whatever money they make during the day is theirs to keep. On a good day they make around 60 or 70 euros. But it hasn’t seemed to make them too formal on the job. Jose takes another bite out of his bocadillo and continues explaining why a trip to La Sagrada Familia will cost a little more.
One by one, they start to say goodbye. The first takes off with the pair of girls as Manolito pulls up, ending a tour. It’s important question time now. “So,what’s the best part of the job?” “The freedom. It’s an eight hour day, but you can spend parts of it with friends, hanging out, talking, being outside. And you can make a lot of money if you want to work hard.” Sounds like the definition of a good Barcelona work day for this guiri.
And do you fight over who takes the pretty girls? Without a moment’s hesitation they respond,“yes, always.” Jose cracks another Moritz and puts it behind the seat of his trixi.“With the chicas, Manolito is peligro numero uno.”
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