Barcelona Barcelona Viva

 

– Lahari de Alwis

 

Got to get away from here
Think I know which hemisphere
Crazy me, don't think there's pain in Barcelona.

 

So sings Rufus Wainwright, possibly describing the thoughts of every Englishman heading out to the Catalan capital for a sunny break from the dreariness which can so easily become the personification of England. Being a student for an extended period in the Midlands will, on occasion, tip you in to agreement with Mr Wainwright, but my first trip to Spain was purely business. Well, as much business as business would ever be to a PhD student.

 

Having recently formed a collaboration with a professor from UCL, I met with his former postdocs, currently in Barcelona, via my first ever conference call. The excitement doesn’t end there, as the eager Italians immediately invited me over to Spain, no doubt well aware that explaining their programme over a phone-call was pure fantasy. Two weeks later, I arrived; alone on foreign land for the first time, clutching desperately to a smattering of Spanish and the hope that a smile would get me by. It seemed such beautiful serendipity that a few months before this event Raul, our now fully-qualified Doctor of Biophysical Chemistry, had chosen to intersperse the tedious load of writing his thesis with Spanish classes for the willing, of which I was one. I believe I had the two essential phrases perfected: ¿Hablas inglés? and ¡Ayuda! The latter was in the event of coming in to contact with a member of the Barcelona criminal element, which I had so kindly been warned of by numerous friends with prior experience.

 

My foray in to academia in Spain consisted largely of staring raptly at a computer screen while my obliging mentors furiously input commands resulting in reams of numbers, with the intermittent pause to explain their actions. Depending on how absorbed they were at that particular moment, their habit of explaining to local students would take over and I would be hit by a barrage of Spanish of which I could decipher the occasional word before my blank face brought them back to the reality that I was but an underprivileged soul who only had English at my command. The lunch breaks to the canteen brought my inadequacy further to the forefront as everyone at our table either spoke Spanish, much too fast for me to comprehend, or Italian. A friendly Catalan, who eventually took pity on me, informed me that most of the members of the institute were not actually from Barcelona, or even Catalonia, she being one of the few who were.

 

I would not feel I had done you justice without a collection of tips for any future collaboration you may choose to embark on, so here are two. First, when you see the amazing panoramic view from your collaborator’s office of the beach and ocean, console yourself with the fact that they still have to sit at a computer for most of the day. I do not promise that this will make you happy, but it is a suggestion. Secondly, on arriving it is imperative that you find out the working hours of your collaborators. You will feel rather silly when you diligently get in at 9am and have to wait 3 hours, ‘reading a paper’, before they arrive once all your bright-eyed, bushy-tailed enthusiasm has been replaced by regret at the amount of sight-seeing you have missed out on.

 

Nevertheless, it is difficult to walk through Barcelona without coming across something for which you have to take out your camera, be it one of Gaudi’s masterpieces, the commanding statue of Columbus pointing out to sea, a Spanish guitarist strumming out the tunes of Bob Dylan, the imperious Gothic architecture overlooking works of modern art, a small intricate statue of St George slaying the dragon on a fountain in the cloisters of the magnificent cathedral or a chess set made entirely of chocolate. I feel obliged to impart a fascinating piece of knowledge I picked up from the museum of old Barcelona, the current city being built atop the ruins of the old. The museum takes you underground to the remains of the old city, where you will come across the layout of an old launderette and be informed that “ash, lime and urine were used to wash clothes and bleach sheets.” And, how did they obtain this urine? Quite simply, the outer walls of the launderette had urinals for people on the street to relieve themselves in to, the result then flowing to the necessary point in the laundering process. Before you are left too aghast to read on, let me calm you with the fact that the laundry was mercifully perfumed with lavender seeds.

 

Finally, a tip for travelling in foreign climes: knowing how to ask for directions in the native tongue will not be useful when you realise that you have no idea what the words for “left” and “right” are.

!Buena suerte y buen viaje!