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W E L C O M E T O
T O R T I L L A B A Y . C O M
T
H E W E B S I T E O F
A L B E R T O
V A Z Q U E Z A N D C R A I G
A Y L I F F E
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Philip on
his balcony, Barcelona 2006 |
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B A R C
E L O N A B L O G
There is so much to tell and so much we don't
have room for, like The Chocolate Museum and the
nearly full-size replica of "The Pieta" by
Michelangelo (but in dark chocolate); Our trips
to the Maritime Museum and the Catalonia
Museum, both at the Marina, both of them
fascinating; how we made friends with the locals
- the cheese monger, the bakery, the seamstress,
the local restaurant owners - we felt at home.
We had heard that the Spanish people were among
the most generous and friendly people on earth,
and it is true.
We especially want to thank Philip Cunningham
for putting up with us for so long, coming and
going as we did. Thank you Philip for providing
us a place to base ourselves as we explored some
of the E.U. Thanks for introducing us to some of
your friends and for all the fun things we did
together. |
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Easter Sunday on the Barceloneta,
Barcelona 2006 |
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March
31st
Alberto has gone to El Mercado de Santa Catalina
to buy potatoes and onions and red and green
bell peppers to make breakfast.
He washed the glass patio doors and we set up
the table and umbrella on the patio. I put a pot
of pink azaleas on the table and set the table
with placemats.
It's still early, only 9:30 a.m. and I am
reading. The hours of the morning passed on the
terrace with the long cool shadows turning into
hot bright sauna towels of damp Mediterranean
air. The wisteria is blooming now and the white
jasmine and there are two white and pink striped
miniature roses next to a purple clematis. Right
across the street, the church bells of St. Pere
ring the hours. There is birdsong everywhere.
Canaries in ornate wire cages on the steep
balconies. A huge flock of yellow-face Amazonian
parrots go screaming by. Seagulls wail from
under the bell tower.
Last night we ate at a Basque restaurant in the
Born, drinking red rioja out of big tumblers,
and gobbling down pinchos, traditional
Basque-style tapas, standing up at the worn
wooden counters that line the walls, as is the
custom.
Philip brought
over from the bar small plates of beautiful big
shrimps, tails up, and sprinkled with downy
curls of farmers cheese. The shrimp are impaled
upright with toothpicks on the top of a peeled
and boiled egg white sliced away on the bottom
so it will sit flat on the plate. He brings
other plates of sliced baguettes slathered with
black olive paste, red onions bits and bright
green and silver sardines.
He brings plates of
fried pouches filled with manchego cheese and serrano
ham. All the pinchos are speared with long thick
toothpicks( hence the name). The toothpicks are saved in
a pile and we will count them at the end of the night to
settle our bill. The restaurant is packed, everyone is
standing at the bar, the noise of chatter and clatter is
terrific and everyone is laughing and smiling. We are
with the wonderful Ruthe, Philips neighbor and two of
her friends, a French woman named Delfine and a woman
named Victoria.
Alberto and I have figured out that our idiomatic
Mexican Spanish is found to be charming and so we are
carefree in our vulgarity. We talk about Mexico,
Alberto's mother, Mama Chuy and her tortillas and
pulque, a milky white fermented powerful liquor made
from the sap of the maguey cactus, popular among rural
folks in the remote parts of Mexico.
We swap drinking
stories. I tell them a story about drinking all evening
back in '82 with a group of young men, the local
musicians in a cantina, one night near the Mayan ruins
of Palenque in the jungles of Chiapas on Mexico's
eastern coast. And how I woke up the next morning soaked
from jungle rainstorms, still partly drunk and sprawled
out on the roof of a 1967 blue Volkswagen. Everyone was
gone and the bar was closed. I had a black eye and I had
a hickey. Everyone laughs.
After several glasses of rioja and more Basque pinchos,
we tumble into the street and walk to the small narrow
plaza and turn to the right to visit Bubo's, a gelato
shop that Francine loves.
The Church of Santa
Maria del Mar built in 1134, in the shape of a large
round stone fortress, dominates the plaza, and we find
the shop, an ultra modern italian style glass and chrome
counter filled with exquisite tiny jewels of artisan
chocolates, thick slabs of opera cakes limned in gold
leaf. Breathtaking. We settle on tumblers of chilled
parfaits, mine is mascarpone and ricotta topped with
tart minces of green apple and fresh cream, Alberto has
a lemon and mandarin orange parfait topped with coconut
cream.
It's late, 12:45 a.m.
but the plaza is full of noisy tables packed with
couples. It's Friday night, but we are tired and say
goodnight to the girls.
Ruthe is going to meet a man for a first date. His work
ends at 2 a.m. in a restaurant nearby.
The three of us walk home through the deserted lamp-lit
narrow curving streets, and I cannot tear my eyes away
from the tips of my shoes measuring the freshly washed
and still wet cobblestones, dark and ancient, smoothed
by a thousand years of foot and wagon traffic. My tired
feet know the way home, so now I just let them take me
there.
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The Boqueria on the Ramblas, Barcelona 2006
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View of Barcelona 2006
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Candela Restaurant, Barcelona 2006 |
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A D O L F O
O S T A I N C O N C E R
T
ACCOMPANIED BY
PHILIP CUNNINGHAM
March 30th
Philip has a lot
of musician friends, perhaps because Philip is
First Clarinet in the Liceu de Barcelona, the
world-renowned opera symphony orchestra in
Barcelona.
One of the
most interesting friends that Philip has is a
very handsome man named Adolfo Osta, whom Philip
has known for nearly 20 years. But Adolfo is not
in the Symphony. He is, a troubadour I think I
would call him, really a Renaissance Man. He
speaks multiple languages, and plays guitar and
the lute. He is very well-known in Catalonia and
his concerts are always sold out. Because he is
a performer, he tells lots of interesting and
funny stories and "loves a big room". We eat
lunch with him every Wednesday, and have
traveled together to Setjes, a beautiful little
seacoast village nearby, and many great
restaurants at the beach.
I really
wished all my talented musician brothers were
able to see the concert that we saw him give at
the monastery/ performing arts center a few
blocks from here. The selection of songs
included "Zolst Azoy Leben" an 18th century
Yiddish folk song and "La Tarara" a traditional
Spanish folk song from the 19th century. Philip
accompanied him on the clarinet.
I shot some footage of two songs from
the concert. It's in low light conditions, but charming. You can see the
video right here if you like (at the right).
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Philip and
Adolfo 2006 |
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Adolfo Osta
2006 |
click to play
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N E W F R I
E N D S
Philip is very social compared to
our dreary lives back in the states. We met so many interesting
and intelligent, good-looking people while we stayed at
his flat. Not a weekend went by that we didn't do
something fun and different - going out to restaurants with
friends and cooking at home with friends. Philip has a great
life in Barcelona. And loving friends who care a great deal
about him.
We felt lucky
to get to know each and every one of them. Meet
some of Philip's (and our) friends.
click here
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Ruth, Barcelona 2006
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E A S T E R
S U N D A Y O N T H E BA R C E
L O N E T A
April 16th
- We returned from Paris on Saturday,
April 15th to Barcelona. It was hard to
leave Paris but the overnight trip back on the
train was lovely, although crowded because of
Easter on the following day and families leaving
for and returning from holiday. We quickly made
friends with our gay train attendant so we had
plenty of attention the whole trip. What a joy
it is to come back from the dining car all
sleepy and find the beds turned down. The
clatter of the rails and the shifting of the
train put us to sleep quickly.
The next day, Easter at 11:30
a.m., all the church bells in Barcelona began to ring. We spent
the late morning, early afternoon with friends on the beach (The
Barceloneta), just a short walk fro Philip's flat. We laughed
and talked and drank and ate paella and crema de catalonia,
a kind of Catalonian creme brulee, for dessert.
Just another great day in Barcelona.
That evening, after the sun
had set and the sky was a deep cerulean blue with lingering
pillows of pink and yellow clouds, the view from Philip's
terrace was filled with illuminated church spires from the
Cathedral in the east to Gaudi's Sagrada Familia in the
northwest. Very, very beautiful and it felt ancient and timeless
knowing that some of these churches had been ringing this way
for nearly one thousand years.
This is a recurring evocation
for us, as we try to wrap our minds around the span of
time. The tower bell of the early 12th century Church of Sant
Pere across the street has been ringing out each day, 300 or 400
years before Michaelangelo or Shakespeare were even born. For a
brief moment we let ourselves step into the slipstream of a
medieval Spain, imagining the countless souls that walked
and laughed and lived their lives on these tiny, twisting
cobblestone streets. One feels enriched by the chance to
participate in this tenuous thread of gothic history, albeit
peripherally, and we were haunted at the same time by a
remembrance from a tombstone I once saw in Oxfordshire, England:
" Remember Man, as you pass
by,
As you are now, so once was I,
As I am Now, so you must be,
Prepare, therefore, to follow me."
(But at the back of the stone, some joker had written in chalk)
"To follow you, I'm not content,
Until I know which way you went. "
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Easter Sunday at the Rio de Vigo on the
Barceloneta, Barcelona 2006
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Juan Carlos, Nacho, Francesco |
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M O N T S E R R A T
A N D T H E
B L A C K M A D O N N A
April 19th - Montserrat is a
spectacularly beautiful Benedictine monk mountain retreat about one hour
northwest from Barcelona by car.
Not only is Montserrat Monastery of significant religious importance but
the natural beauty surrounding the monastery is simply breathtaking.
The history of Montserrat is fascinating and started in 880 C.E.
when a small group of shepherd children saw a bright light descending
from the sky in the Montserrat mountains.
A local vicar was brought to the scene and witnessed the same
experiences as the children and parents. The visions occurred in the
same location in a cave on Montserrat mountain. When this cave was
explored by the religious elders of the community they found an image of
the Virgin Mary. A Black image. And from that moment on the cave became
a holy sanctuary for religious pilgrims. The Black Virgin was enshrined,
a Benedictine Monastery was built and the rest is history....For more
than a thousand years, people have visited the Black Madonna, rubbed the
orb and asked for their prayers to be answered. The Black Madonna is the
patron saint of Catalonia and her image is revered everywhere.
We chose to take our hike first, as there
were so many people waiting to see the Black Madonna. We had already
taken a train up the mountain to the monastery, so from there we took a
very steep funicular train to a higher level and then hiked to the top
(!!!) of Montserrat. 5 1/2 hours round trip. It was beautiful at every
moment, the ground and hills were covered with wild miniature daffodils
and lush violets. The chaparral and hills looked like California, except
for the thick copses of wild rosemary on the slopes.
I was struck by how similar the area
was to the place I lived in India 150 K north of Mumbai. The hills there
were filled with "saddhus", hermits who had renounced the world and had
taken on a difficult discipline called Kashmir Shaivism, a worship of
Shiva. They lived in caves or on dung heaps, and depended on the
kindness of strangers to feed them. Like those hills, these hills are
honeycombed with hermit caves, once occupied by religious "anchorites".
I suppose after several hundred years of pilgrims climbing the mountain
to visit the cave shrine of the Virgin, and what with so many hermits
living in stone houses and caves around the area, a monastery was built.
The communal life of a monastery is
called cenobitic, as opposed to the anchoretic (or anchoritic) life of
an hermit. It is said that Christian monasticism started in Egypt.
According to tradition, in the 3rd century St. Anthony was the first
Christian to adopt this lifestyle. After a short while others followed.
Originally, all Christian monks were anchorites (hermits) seldom
encountering other people. But because of the extreme difficulty of the
solitary life, many monks failed, either returning to their previous
lives in the city, or becoming spiritually deluded. A transitional form
of monasticism was later created in which “solitary” monks lived close
enough to one another to offer mutual support as well as gathering
together on Sundays for common services. The concept of a monastery was
born.
Anchoritism never died out though, but was reserved only for those
advanced monks who had worked out their problems within a cenobitic
monastery. The idea caught on, and other places followed.
(Okay, I had to go there with the
whole history of monasticism thing. Sorry. My brother Lindsay says, if
you ask an Ayliffe what time it is, he'll tell you how to built a
clock.)
Anyway, after we returned to the
monastery, we ate a light supper then visited the beautiful Basilica of
alabaster and gold leaf and the shrine of the famous Black Madonna. Most
everyone had left so there was no line, no waiting. We rubbed the orb
and prayed for peace, a Democratic President, clean fusion power, a
general amnesty for undocumented aliens and a working theory for sub
atomic particles and then we left. We drove back to Barcelona, dropped
the women at Adolfo's where we enjoyed a lovely dinner, then as soon as
we got home-fell immediately to sleep. Another remarkable day in a
remarkable town.
See more photos on the Montserrat page
here
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On
Montserrat, Catalonia 2006 |
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Montserrat,
Catalonia 2006
We hiked to the "red dot" at
upper middle right. |
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The Black Madonna, Benedictine Monastery
Montserrat,
Catalonia 2006 |
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MONASTERY OF
PEDRABLES
April 20th -
Founded in 1327, The Monastery of Pedralbes has
been home to a community of nuns called The Poor
Clare's, the women's order of St. Francis
(Franciscan Friars). The building is one of the
finest examples of Catalan Gothic architecture.
See and read
more about out trip to Pedrables
here
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In the
courtyard of the Monasterio de Pedralbes,
Barcelona 2006 |
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C A N
M A R T I R E S T A U R A N T
April 20th -
| I only include this because this is
so typical of the kinds of things we do with Philip.
Philip has lived in Barcelona for
nearly 20 years and has combed the area and the surrounding hills for
interesting little places and things to do, that tourists would never
know about. This restaurant was very hard to get to, I thought. Perched
on the edge of a hill with a gorgeous view of the city below, it was at
the top of a 20 minute ride up a winding, twisting, narrow road. It was
very funky, not elegant, really a country style 'locals ' place
with an open pit barbecue where the meat was roasted and tables
scattered about.
It positively reeked of charm and
local color.
We had a great meal of rioja wine and
traditional baccalla (cod) with a lesson in how to eat bread "Catalan
-style". The bread is first of all, a country "boule" style round loaf
and sliced in thin slabs. The bread comes toasted with a clove of
unpeeled garlic and one half of a tomato. You rub the clove of garlic
all over the bread. The rough toasted surface of the bread peels the
clove and spreads the grated fresh garlic all over the surface. Then you
rub the cut side of the tomato vigorously all over the toast, allowing
the juices to soak into the bread. Then discard the tomato. Wow!
We promise to make this for you
someday......
more pictures of Can Marti
here |
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Wisteria ,
Barcelona 2006 |
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E A R T H
D A Y I N T H E PA R K
April 22nd - Philip lives one block from the
enormous gateway to the Park de la Ciutadella ,
anchored at one end with a tremendous "Arc de
Triumph" and a Zoo at the other. So we were
delighted to hear that there would be a huge
Earth Day Festival there on Saturday. All the
Catalonian granola-heads and hippie farmers were
there with ceramics, beads, didgeridoo's, fresh
organic pastries, you name it. Even the Hare
Krishna's had a tent. We could have been in
Berkeley, honestly. Philip tells us, many of
these people who fled the city and moved to the
surrounding countryside a few years ago, started
buying up the collapsing stone farmhouses and
castles for next to nothing and restoring them,
planted organic gardens, opening B&B's and
living the dream. There are still many of
these properties available once you get away
from a commutable distance to the city.
You might get
a kick out of seeing a video of this awesomely
talented drum team that played there. For some
reason, the nerdy kids who played in the high
school band always turn out to be the cutest,
most interesting people a few years later.....
look what happened to these kids.
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"N A B U C C O " A T
T H E L I C E U B A R C E L O N A
It's another extraordinary opportunity for us. A
gift from Philip (we could never have afforded
the $175 Euro tickets). We had lovely seats in
the first balcony. Alberto was enthralled by the
production, and as his mother said,'It's amazing
to think that my son, the son of a poor Mexican
woman from a small pueblo in Mexico, would have
a chance to do these things we could never could
even dream of.'
click here |
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H A M L E T
Meet Hamlet, the
world's most wonderful cat.
click here
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S I G H T - S E E
I N G I N B A R C E L O N A
A
grab-bag of fun things we visited. The Ramblas,
The Born District, the Cathedral, The Picasso
Museum and more...click
here
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street
performer Las Ramblas 2006 |
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