Your City Barcelona, №17 / spring 2017 by Твой город Барселона

#17, spring 2017

When It's All in the Family: Owners of Barcelona Businesses Passed Down from Generation to Generation

The Fishermen of the Barceloneta

An Unusual Look at the Gothic Quarter

Strolls through Barcelona's Parks and Gardens

An Interview with Slava Polunin, the Famous â&#x20AC;&#x153;Snow Clownâ&#x20AC;?

Antique Stores and What You'll Find on Their Shelves

WWW.yourcitybcn.com

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Your City Barcelona, Editorial Board rambla de Cataluña 115 BIS, 9 / [Business Global Solutions hub&in] 08008 Barcelona +34 931 599 058 www.yourcitybcn.com

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

CONTENTS 4

Publishers / Editoras Anastasia kazenkova, Stella khaykina 666 922 721 editora@tvoigorod.media Editor-in-Chief / redactora Jefe Elena Syrovatchenko 633 351 913 redactora.jefe@tvoigorod.media Designer / Diseñador Aleksey Isaev

6 8

Artists / Ilustradoras Shura tumashova, katya Darvay translators / traducción Alexey Aslanyants, John William Narins, Elena Isaeva, Alexandra Zemlyanuhina Photographers / Fotógrafos Maria hlebnikova, Julĳa kauhova

News Department Editor / redactor de noticias Oleg kazenkov

FROM THE EdiTORS “Great things can only be seen from afar.” OuR AuTHORS The personalities behind the names NEWS ABOuT TOWN The essentials in a nutshell

34 40 54

A ClOSER lOOk The Arc de Triomf. The Story Behind Barcelona's Brickwork Beauty

diSlOCATiON The Gothic Quarter. What the Guide Books Won't Tell You ONE dAY iN THE liFE The Fishermen of the Barceloneta. A Dispatch from a Lost World

PlAN OF ACTiON What to do in Barcelona this spring

FEATuRE ARTiClE When It's All in the Family. Owners of Barcelona businesses passed down from generation to generation talk about how their lives and work became a part of the city's landscape and history

Advertising Department / Departamento de publicidad Anastasia kazenkova 666 922 721, publicidad@tvoigorod.media Proof-reader / Corrección

90 94 98

THERE’S A MuSEuM i WANT YOu TO SEE… The Museu Frederic Marès. The Legacy of a Good Collector THiNGS TO dO Exhibits and Concerts

EXPATS The Kindness of Strangers. Barcelona volunteers talk about what it’s like to do good deeds expecting nothing in return

104

ROuTES Walks in the Park. Strolls through Barcelona's Parks and Gardens

110

CAN WE TAlk? Psychologist Sergei Malkin on the barriers to growing up in the current generation

iN GOOd TASTE Home Cooking. A few restaurants that have become part of our city’s history

John William Narins Authors / han colaborado en este número Elena Almirall Arnal, Marina Ananikyan, Anna Baraban, Vlad Vitkovskiy, Leila Guchmazova, Anastasia kazenkova Sergey Malkin, Sonia rey, Alesya Sidorenko, Agatha Smith Photography / Fotos de Maria hlebnikova, Julĳa kauhova, Alexey Anashkin, Аntoni Bofill Please contact the official representatives of the magazine only with any proposals at / Por asuntos de colaboración contacten solo con los oficiales representantes de la revista: 666 922 721, 633 351 913, info@tvoigorod.media Printing house Exce PVD: € 3,5 this publication is not responsible for the opinions of the authors which may not necessarily reflect those of the Editorial Board. the Editorial Board is not responsible for the content of the advertisements. Any reproduction of the texts published here, or any use of them in any form, including citation is allowed only upon granting of written permission from the publishers. La revista no se hace responsable de la opinión de sus colaboradores en los trabajos publicados, ni se identifica necesariamente con la opinión de los mismos, así. Como tampoco de los productos y contenidos de los mensajes publicitarios que aparecen en la revista. Queda prohibido reproducir total o parcialmente el contenido de esta revista, aun citando procedencia, sin autorización expresa y por escrito del editor.

iN HiS OWN WORdS “Barcelona is a one of a kind country”. An interview with Slava Polunin, one of the world's most famous clowns

72 80 84 86

SHOPPiNG A Rendezvous with the Past. A Review of Barcelona's Antique Stores THE BEAuTiFul liFE The Ambrosia Spa. Gifts of the Gods

NiGHT liFE The Sutton. Where the Stars Come Out

MuSiC The Gran Teatre del Liceu. And the Beat Goes On

Cover Art Strolling through the Old City. Oh, moment — stop! Shura Tumashova

The Editors of Your City Barcelona apologize to Ann Shlibus of Belgium and Ann-Marie Brannigan of Ireland, featured in a piece in the “Expats' section of our Fall issue, #16, entitled “Barcelona Guides,” for an error in the placement of photographs accompanying the text.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Our Authors

From the Editor “Great things can only be seen from a distance,” said the poet, and he was right.

But it doesn’t happen all at once. To make it possible, you have to be far from home. You have to undergo the euphoria of having freedom suddenly showered down upon you, the vertigo of a city where you do not know another living soul — and where nobody knows you. But time passes and then, in the place you least expect it, at the moment you least expect it, suddenly you pick up the aroma of soup with little stars, for example, something that every law of the chronotope tells you should have been swept away by the swift and viscous currents of Lethe and washed up upon the banks of a lovely and very distant past. Or a seagull calls, very distinctly, in a perfectly human voice; it cries the name you had as a child, something no one here would ever call you. Or the apparition of a familiar face amid the crowd. And then, for the first time, you want to go home to where things may be anything but ideal, but they’re yours. You want it so badly — you could never have imagined you would feel this. And, naturally enough, it astonishes you. But you’re an adult now and you have all these various circumstances to deal with. And so you stay where you are — but you’re a different person now. Someone who has seen another kind of life and understood its hidden motivations, someone able to see now just how noble the person is who never leaves behind his family, his profession and his homeland. Such are those seemingly little people who create the history of their family, their city and their country, the ones who were not afraid to walk the path trodden out by their parents. The ones whose desperate struggle is to see that everything endures. We dedicate this issue to them.

Elena Syrovatchenko, Editor-in-Chief of Your City Barcelona

John William Narins John spent the better part of a decade popping up in random spots between New York and Moscow, occupying himself in a variety of ways — teaching logic, leading underground tours, rewriting antitrust law, smuggling literature, singing opera improv, running a ferry service, and writing famously difficult texts. One of the aforementioned random spots turned out to be Barcelona — and at least one basement, an attic and two rooftops and a circular fire in Park Güell later, he canceled the flight out to Madrid, seeing that he had found a place to remember and revisit. And «revisit» the city he now has — at least virtually, thanks to the Englishlanguage edition of Your City, in which John participates as an editor and translator.

Aleksei Aslaniants It’s more than twenty years since Aleksei first came to Barcelona. He only meant to spend the winter here, studying medieval documents as part of his scholarly endeavors. He didn't expect to find anything special in this particular city. But after a taste of calçots, with a few favorite bars in El Raval, and having memorized the Romanesque frescoes at the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, he found himself so strongly attached to Barcelona that he set out to learn Catalan so he could return here the following winter, this time fully prepared for the encounter. Since then, Aleksei has come to Barcelona regularly, spending a good deal time here. He has even written a guidebook to Barcelona, published by Afisha. Even when work requires him to stay put in Moscow, however, he gladly takes the time to participate in projects connected with Barcelona and Catalonia. And we were only too happy to take advantage of that fact and to invite him to translate articles for the English-language edition of Your City.

Maria Hlebnikova From her early childhood, thanks to a mom who always got restless staying in one place too long, Masha was exposed to an extraordinary variety of beautiful places: the boundless steppes of eastern Ukraine, the icy crust of the frozen Barents Sea, the rocky slopes of the Crimean mountains, covered with juniper, the majestic architectural profile of St. Petersburg… That mass of impressions was probably what determined her calling. Masha became a photographer. More precisely, she became a fantastic photographer, able to find beauty in the most ordinary and seemingly banal things. What, then, would she find in Barcelona, a city where interesting people, stories and things await you at every turn? Masha, her camera ever at the ready, has become a key member of the team here at Your City. Like the rest of us here, after all, she never ceases to be amazed and delighted by the gifts this city never stops giving us, day after day. And like the rest of us here, she is always eager to share those gifts with all of you.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

The City Changes in the Offing

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Finance Rented Space Rising

News About Town

2019 has major changes in store for the Rambla. The city has announced a competition for the best project aimed, bluntly put, at recovering the street from the tourists for the people who actually live here. The winning project will be announced this coming summer. Groups participating in the tender are expected to include specialists in a variety of fields — sociologists, architects, engineers, ecologists, anthropologists and economists. That’s the only way to be certain that all the nuances of the issues raised by the task are taken into an account when a solution is designed. And the issues are very real — the Rambla is visited by around one hundred million people annually, and in recent years it has transformed itself into an attraction where everything is calculated to cater to tourists. The city has already taken steps to regulate hotel owners, restaurateurs, kiosk operators, musicians and “living sculptures,” but numerous activists remain dissatisfied with the current appearance of one of the Catalan capital’s busiest thoroughfares. And they won’t be giving officials a moment’s peace. The last major rally trumpeted the slogan: “Barcelona Is Not for Sale!” It was held on the Rambla this January. The protesters spoke out against mass tourism and demanded an end to real estate speculation and to the disruption of the network of stores reachable by residents on foot.

Looking for an apartment in Barcelona with an affordable rent is becoming more and more a kind of exciting quest. In 2016, rents rose by nine percent, leaving the average apartment at about eight hundred euro per month. But that doesn’t seem to have dampened demand — over the same period, the number of new rentals rose by 3.8 percent. According to statistics released by city officials, the Sarrià-Sant Gervasi area is the new record-holder. For a mere 1144 euros per month you can brag to your friends about your neighbors Shakira and Gerarde Piqué. Les Corts and the Eixample were also in the top three. A roof over your head in those areas will run you 986 and 917 euros per month, respectively. If you’re looking for something a bit more modest, check out apartments in Nou Barris. Here apartment owners will be happy to rent their square meters for 561 euros per month. It’s worth noting that rents in the rest of Catalonia aren’t standing still, either — in 2016, they rose by 6.8 percent, which means that the average rental in the region now stands at 595 euros per month.

Sights to See Welcome to Casa Vicens

Good news for aficionados of Catalan Art Nouveau: this fall will see the end of the renovation of Gaudi’s Casa Vicens, built in 1883–1885 in Gràcia. The building, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is expected to have around 150,000 visitors per year. Don’t expect to just walk in and have a look around when the urge moves you, though. Tours will be offered on a strict schedule. Tickets have to be bought in advance and no more than twenty-five visitors at a time will be allowed in each half hour. They will have a chance to admire the rich decorations inside — a young Gaudi conceived them in the Mudéjar style, combining it with Japanese and Indian motifs. A flock of birds in flight, grapes ripening on the vine, a mysterious horse-race in the forest… in short, art lovers will have much to gawk at. We know that for one hundred and thirty years wealthy Barcelonans used this house, with its idiosyncratic facade and interior, as a private residence. In 2014, however, the MoraBanc company from Andorra bought the architectural masterpiece and began reconstruction work — the restoration of the terraces, the original staircase and the fountain on the patio cost about four million euros.

Entertainment Amusement Has Never Been So Generous

In early March, the Tibidabo amusement park emerged from its winter hibernation and opened its gates. What did we find inside? Even regulars will be knocked for a loop. First of all, there are two incredible new rides for the very smallest thrill-seekers. The Mini-Hurricane is a vertical carousel, while Choo-Choo is a train ride through a magic garden. Second of all, the repertoire of the local movie theater has been beefed up by the addition of a pair of new films in 4D. And thirdly, in the very near future the park will be opening an entire new area filled with interactive fountains. The spectacle of light, water and music promises to be every bit as impressive as the Font Màgica fountain on Montjuïc. Besides all that, the management of Tibidabo — which welcomed seven hundred and twenty-five thousand guests and made 15.8 million euros in 2016 — is launching a new social program that includes free entry to the park for retirees with pink cards and children with disabilities. It’s a noble gesture, of course, but there’s also something slightly mocking about it, don’t you think?

Transportation Turn Them Pedals!

Beginning in 2017, cyclists are going to have an easier time getting around Barcelona. The city is planning to introduce thirty new bicycle paths, stretching a combined sixty-two and a half kilometers. It’s a logical decision: according to last year’s statistics, the number of Barcelonan cyclists rose by fourteen percent. Now lovers of two-wheeled transportation will have room to let themselves fly. For example, one bike path connects Plaça de Lesseps with the Ronda de Dalt, while another joins Carrer Pere IV with the Gran Via, and a third simplifies communication between Avinguda Rio de Janeiro and Paseo Santa Coloma… The bike lanes will be equipped with special traffic lights, signs and barriers to guarantee the safety of everybody on the road.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Plan of Action

Things to do in Barcelona this Spring Bask in the Sun (1) Barcelonans associate Easter Week with a whole host of rituals. And they’re not necessarily religious rituals, either. One of the most popular is to take your first day off and head on out to your favorite beach. It may still take some daring to make yourself take the plunge, but everyone is happy to feel the gentle April sun on their faces and bodies. The city usually manages to have all ten of Barcelona's beaches in perfect condition by the time the day rolls around: they've used tractors to sift and dry the sand, cleared it of refuse brought in by winter storms, and checked that all the showers, benches, wi-fi, municipal rest rooms and other important elements of the coastal infrastructure are in working order for the arrival of the beachgoers. When: From April 14 Get Into the Tennis (2) The Royal Tennis Club hosts the sixtyfifth edition of the Trofeu Conde Godó, the Barcelona Open international tennis tournament. It's a gripping show and its heroes are traditionally the top male tennis players in the world. The brackets have spots for fifty-six players in singles and twenty four doubles teams. The players will have something to battle for out there on the clay courts of the Pedralbes neighborhood — the favor of society ladies in the stands, outrageous prize money and the silver cup on its oaken base, the trophy designed way back in the early 1950s by the jeweler Soler i Cabot. But the main twist to this year’s story is Carlos Bernandes as the chairman of the referee's

committee. Anyone who follows sports knows that the Brazilian referee has something against Rafael Nadal, who confirmed his participation in the tournament last fall. When: April 22 through April 30 Wedding Preparations (3) Each year, Barcelona Bridal Fashion Week impels the top Spanish and world wedding fashion designers to drop everything and head on down to the Catalonian capital. You can guess that when we're talking about an event of this scale, “wedding fashion” is going to include much more than clothing for the bride and groom. We're talking about all fashion trends connected in one way or another with the wedding ceremony. What earrings work best for the anxious mother? What tie should you recommend for that strict dad?

What should the best man be wearing? And how do you make the bridesmaids look their best without spoiling the mood of the blushing bride? To pick up the answers to all these burning questions, all you need do is visit just a few of the catwalks at Fira de Barcelona on the Gran Via. And there are also

the parties and the exhibition organized as part of the Week. When: April 25 through April 30 Support Our Farmers (4) It's no surprise to come across a market in Catalonia where you can buy fresh, delicious produce — if you're willing to

travel the region and you schedule things right, you can find that kind of place here somewhere almost every day. Even on the gastronomical map of Barcelona, however, Fira Per El Dia De La Terra, the Earth Day Market, is something special. First of all, it has its own philosophy: an attitude of maximum care and respect for nature. Second, resellers aren't allowed anywhere near the place. Only the actual farmers who gather the honey or grow the olives or milk the cows themselves. And thirdly, the very way they run the market is appealing — it's an enormous picnic spread over the green lawns of the Passeig de Lluís Companys and Parc de la Ciutadella. When: April 29 through April 30 Take Your Hat Out for a Walk (5) Passejada amb Barret, which translates roughly as The Hat Parade, is a strange

spring promenade invented thirteen years ago by a pair of Barcelona milliners, Nina Pawlowsky and Cristina de Prada. The Easter Parade in New York with its famous hats inspired the young women to create a similar tradition on the Rambla Catalunya Boulevard. And it has caught on. This is what it looks like now:: on the appointed day, a laughing crowd gathers by the Flirtatious Giraffe statue. They're all wearing hats — of every shape, style and era. Top hats, derbies, boaters, fore-and-aft caps, straw hats, hats with fruits, hats with veils, pa namas… Hats picked up at flea markets, hats handed down from previous generations, hats made by hand or bought in expensive boutiques… When the clocks ring twelve, the “mad hatters” begin casually moving down the boulevard towards the Thinker Bull statue. Flustered tourists rush to take pictures, the sun shines, dogs bark and everybody’s is happy. And of course anyone who likes to is free to join in. When: April 30 The Museum Run (6) There's an extraordinary number of interesting museums in Barcelona, and every day people line up — in greater or smaller numbers — to see them. Naturally enough, Barcelona, is the kind of city that's bound to be a participant

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

in the international program they call the Night of Museums. The «quest» has the same terms and conditions here as anywhere else: carefully go over the list of participating sites, choose the ones you’re most desperate to see, put on a pair of comfortable shoes and try to get to everything you've planned within the allotted six hours. You can forget your wallet — from 7pm to 1am museum entry is free. If last year's La Nit del Museus is any indication, night owls should be ready for a wealth of enticements. Been dreaming about climbing out onto the roof of the La Pedrera (Gaudi's Casa Mila) at night for an up-close encounter with its famous chimneys? Now’s your chance! Hmm, I wonder what the Torre Agbar looks like from the inside…? tonight you can find out. The list of participating venues for this wonderful night includes around eighty museums, galleries, cultural institutions and architectural landmarks. When: May 20 Fly to Lerida for the Snails (7) The history of L'Aplec del Caragol began in 1980 with a festive picnic on

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

various regions of Spain and neighboring France. You'll find them here everywhere, and in every possible form — sautéed, boiled, marinated and even raw. But the pride of the local chefs remains the mollusks drawn from their native Segre. When: May 26 through May 28

the banks of the river Segre. The organizers were local restaurateurs with an overwhelming passion for escargots. Roasted over an open fire and topped with a spicy sauce, the snails must have wafted such a wonderful aroma that they captivated first Lerida, then all Catalonia. How else can you explain the fact that the snail festival consistently gathers over two hundred thousand guests, making it one of the most famed gastronomic festivals in all Europe? Participants have a difficult but tasty task — to consume twelve tons of snails brought to Lerida from South America, Africa,

Ring Open the Open Air Season (8) The program of Primavera Sound includes performances by over two hundred artists. Among them: Aurora Halal, Dj Tennis, Cymbals Eat Guitars, Glass Animals, Bizarre Love Triangle and even Kokoshca. We have to imagine that a good number of those names won't mean anything even to the most erudite music lovers. And the strange thing is that this state of affairs does nothing to harm the reputation of the event. We've seen all this before. Primavera was and remains the main openair musical event of the spring — important enough to draw guests from Nepal, Greenland, the Cayman Islands and Madagascar. The festival is geographically dispersed, including clubs and open-air venues around the city, but the most popular and interesting part traditionally centers upon the Parc del Fòrum. That’s the venue for the opening event, which will be headlined by Kate Tempest, a poet-rapper from London. When: 31 May through June 4

There are many different ways to get to know a city –through its architecture, its monuments or the biographies of people who were born and came to greatness there. One can read a dozen guidebooks on the city, walk its museums and ride a full circle - or three - on the tourist bus. But there’s another way to understand a city and it’s no less engaging: by talking with people who have run a business there, the kind of business that has been in the family for generations, the people whose life and work have become part and parcel of Barcelona’s history and its cityscape. What do they know about the founders of their business? Do they want to pass it on to their children? What is it like to have that kind of responsibility? For answers to these and other questions, we popped into some of Barcelona’s most iconic family institutions to chat with their owners.

Main Feature Interviews: Elena Syrovatchenko, Alexandra Zemlyanukhina Illustrations and photo: Katya Darvay, Maria Hlebnikova

When It's All in the Family

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

who that was. When they told her he had discovYes, that’s right, I'm a fifth-generation florist. ered penicillin and got the Nobel Prize for it, My great-great-grandmother sold flowers in the though, it took her maybe a minute to make up a street, at the doors of the Liceu and other therose bouquet and aters. It was her daughter, my Every day my grandmother would make present it to the Every great-grandmothrounds of her friends and colleagues and doctor. newspaper in er, who first ask each of them for one flower. And then Barcelona carried bought the stall she would have all the flowers sent down to their photograph. on the Rambla. All in all, she was That was in 1888, the theater lucky enough to when the Univerget to know many important people of the era — sal Exhibition was held here, when the Columbus Federico García Lorca, for one. He came to Barcemonument was built. Back in the day, this was lona a year before he was shot. His play was at the where the city’s bourgeoisie lived and met. So my great-grandmother grew quite fond of it and ended up staying here. She had hands of gold and real strength of character. She was lucky enough to get to

Carolina Pallés, the Floristia Carolina

You have to understand that working on the Rambla was very difficult back then. It was not like the shop we have now, with heating and air conditioning. Back then there wasn’t even running water. There were people whose job it was to take jugs to a fountain to bring water. The working day started well before sunrise. The wholesalers would come in at 4 a. m. to sell their flowers to florists, right there on the street — the business worked that way right up until about the ’70s. The shops and stalls would open at 8 a. m. and wouldn’t close until 6 or 7 p. m., depending on what time of year it was. Opening and closing shop was quite a task, too. When we go home now, our stall stays there for all to see, all lit up and beautiful. Back in the day they had to break the thing up and carry the pieces back behind the Rambla, that’s where the warehouses were.

There were people whose job it was to take jugs to a fountain to bring water. The working day started well before sunrise

My grandmother was a marvellous woman. Nowadays, if a celebrity is coming to the Rambla, we get a phone call ahead of time. But back in her time visits like that were always a surprise. One day Alexander Fleming came to the Rambla — she didn’t even know

know many important people of the era — Federico García Lorca, for one

Teatro Principal, Doña Rosita the Spinster and the Language of Flowers. They needed flowers for the show and my grandmother was in charge of that. Every day she would make rounds of her friends and colleagues and ask each of them for one flower. And then she would have all the flow-

F lor i ster i a C aro l i na

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

hand at the shop. It was here that she met my father. He was from a flower-growing family in Maresme, but when they got married he moved to Barcelona. Now things were really hard for them. Thankfully, our generation was much luckier. As a kid, I would come here and they’d do something like this — they’d give me four little flowers, say, and I was supposed to try to make a bouquet. I started learning the trade, little by little, but our parents never really forced me or my sister to do it.

Our parents always told us we had to go to school and study, it was an opportunity the older generations simply never had They always told us we had to go to school and study, it was an opportunity the older generations simply never had. After we finished school, my sister and I both studied to do clerical work. ers sent down to the theater. Lorca was so grateful to my grandma and all the flower girls on the Rambla that one night he had the theater opened just for them and their families. If you ask me, that evening was a powerful, really emotional thing to do! Grandma was thirty-four when her husband died, my mom was only nine or so. They started picking her up after school so she could lend a

Now we work together, my sister and I. Mom is 81 and she feels great. She had heart valve replacement surgery, though, so she can’t work anymore. But even just two years ago she would still come in and take over when we were having lunch. I don’t have children myself, my sister has two kids. Maybe one day one of my nephews will take over the business. Or maybe it will just close. That would be a sad thing, yes, but everything has its beginning and its end. Anyway, I think all the sacrifices our family made for this business have not been in vain.

In recent years studies have shown that family business remains Catalonia’s leading form of business organization. Between 55 to 70 percent of all companies remain family enterprises. Gathering steam with the onset of the industrial revolution and weathering the Civil War and Franco’s dubious economy policies, they have since become the engine driving the Catalan and even the Spanish economy, with the most enterprising and successful of them even making it onto the global market. For example, Puig, still managed by the Puig family today, is a major player in the fashion and perfume sectors, operating under such brands as Nina Ricci, Carolina Herrera or Paco Rabanne. It started out in 1914 as a small enterprise, owned by Antonio Puig, who kicked things off importing French perfume and manufacturing lipstick. These days, the company markets its products in over one hundred and forty countries, boasting scores of branch offices and thousands of employees. The twenty-two-story glass tower that houses its corporate headquarters in Barcelona was designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Rafael Moneo.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

There are sixteen flower shops on the Rambla today. You’ll immediately know which is the domain of Carolina Pallés, a charismatic blonde. First of all, there’s the sign with the family name on it. And all they have is flowers, tons of flowers, and nothing else. Ever the champion of tradition, the owner of the city’s oldest floristeria is firmly set against compromises – selling souvenirs, for instance, like her neighbors with their Chinese fridge magnets, seeds that grow obscenelooking peppers, Mexican sombreros and whatever else they may put on display. Maybe this is why tourists don’t often stop in front of her shop with all those photos from the family archive adorning its walls. For Barcelonans who know their city’s history, however, this shop has no competition. And the packaging paper at the shop, an imitation of old newspaper clippings, is a rare delight! Where: Rambla de Flors, Parada 10, Metro Liceu.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

There was a very lovely velvet curtain that sepaFamily business in Barcelona is intimately tied rated the bar from the dining area. The pool tables to immigration. In the early 1900s and after the were there until I was about seven, when the Civil War, Andalusia, Aragon and Galicia were place was thoroughly renovated. My sister Crisstruck by famine. Looking for brighter prostina, my brother pects, people Carlos and I startfrom these reBy eighteen I had my own car, a ed helping out gions made for motorcycle, and wore the trendiest when we the big cities. clothes. I had everything I wanted, but here were kids. TogethWhen they sucit wasn’t for nothing — I worked for it. er with our parceeded in making My father was very proud that ents, aunts and money, they then uncles, we did a began to think I worked here little of everything about opening a everything at the restaurant. I remember Grandbusiness of their own, usually in the line of dad working the bar and shouting: “Sandwich!” work they already knew best. If they had “Croissant!” “Carajillo!” You’d just work through slaughtered animals, for example, they might the day, without a break. By eighteen I already had open a butcher’s shop; if they had fixed engines for a living, they would start a garage. That’s my my own car, and a motorcycle, I was studying at father’s story. He was fourteen when he came to one of the best in town and wore the trendiest clothes. I had everything I wanted, but it didn’t just Barcelona from his village in Teruel. All by himland in my lap — I worked for it. My father was self, no education to speak of. At first he very proud that I worked here, proud of the way I showed him by my efforts how much I loved it.

The building is much older, though. It is almost 98 years old. When Dad became its owner, he did his best to preserve its aesthetics

Adolfo Herrero, the Bonanova Restaurant

worked at a butcher’s shop as an apprentice — he didn’t even get paid, but he did get a place to live. Later, when he did manage to pick up a bit of money, he went to study at the academy. Then, finally, they took him in at the El Cantábrico restaurant. He would peel the anchovies and open the oysters, things like that. My mom came from the same area Dad was from. She worked as a seamstress just off Plaça Reial. She was nineteen when she married my father. With what savings they had, they managed first to rent this place, and later to buy it out. Meaning they started their business from scratch, that was in 1964.

The building is much older, though — almost ninety-eight years old. When Dad became its owner, he did his best to preserve its aesthetics and its atmosphere. Mother worked the oven, she put a lot of passion into her cooking, taking her time with it. People came to eat here from all over Barcelona, some very important people among them, too. They’d come to eat and drink and play pool.

R estau rante B onanova

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

lage about three hundred km outside Novosibirsk.

All in all, we have thirteen people working at the restaurant. We never really hired waiters, cooks or sommeliers with real professional training. We always trained them on the job to be professionals. There are some who have worked with us for ten, twenty, even thirty years. And we stay on, too. And it’s certainly not because we’re worried people may steal from us, but because the business is our own. It’s because we truly feel this is our business. There’s a saying: “It’s the

What we chose was something different — earning our money by doing something we really love and enjoying our lives I am fifty now. My sister is forty-five and my brother is forty-one. I am the maître d’hôtel and take care of PR. Cristina does the accounting and Carlos manages the kitchen. He decides what foodstuffs to buy and what dishes we are going to make. All in all, he’s the chef and he likes it when we call him “chef.” (Smiles) Had we wanted to, I think, we could have had ten restaurants by now. But what we chose was something different — earning our money by doing something we really love and enjoying our lives. Will my son and daughter want to continue the business? Somehow I doubt it. And my nephews? Who knows, they’re even younger than my own kids. By the way, my sister’s children, Ivan and Nikolay, were adopted — from Russia. They come from a small Siberian vil-

owner’s care that fattens the cow.” If you ask me, business is a personal thing. Nobody’s going to do it for us the way we do it ourselves.

My father is seventy-five and my mother is seventy. They have property and they have their own money. They can travel as much as they like or spend time in the village they left when they came to Barcelona all those years ago. They are happy that their children are carrying on their business. Although we do disagree sometimes on some things — what family doesn’t? For instance, today father popped into the restaurant and got a bit nervous because he couldn’t quite figure out what it was we were doing on Facebook and Instagram.

Studies have shown that in recent years family businesses have been more likely than others to ride out economic storms. That’s probably true, but it hasn’t prevented Barcelona from losing many of its most iconic businesses that had been passed from one generation to the next. Most of them closed because the owners could not get new leases on their premises due to rising prices, which in some cases jumped from 1000 to 10,000 euros. Public pressure led the city authorities to create, in 2016, a special catalogue of iconic commercial establishments scheduled for protection due to their architectural, historical or artistic importance. Of the 228 establishments on the list that can now count on support from City Hall, thirty-two were granted the maximum level of protection and recognized as untouchable (in the best sense of the word, of course).

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

This family restaurant, managed by the second generation of the Herrero family, has not so far been included on any list of places of significance for Barcelona’s cultural or historic heritage. A couple of decades down the line, it just might be. Paintings and drawings by Spanish and Catalan masters vie for space on its walls with early 1900s posters promoting Barcelona’s beaches. The old diamond tiles on the floor have been carefully restored. The smell of freshly baked bread and the sound of voices, most of them Catalan, fill the air. A sip of ice-cold cava and one can easily forget it’s the 21st century. The eldest of the brothers, Adolfo, who lives upstairs from the restaurant, usually meets and greets all the guests, sharing the latest foodie news with them - what mushrooms are particularly good today and what wine would go best with that divine sea bream. Listening to him, you learn more interesting things than reading the Michelin guides, in which Bonanova has had a place for several years now. Where: Sant Gervasi de Cassoles, 103, FGC El Putxet

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

child. He chose to stay in the shop, where he It all started way back in 1761 when a candle worked from the age of eighteen to when he maker named Jacint Galí decided to start his was seventy-eight. For sixty years he was the own business. His workshop and store were heart and soul of somewhere else, though. They In 1969, when I was four, we had a big the shop. He only relocated fire. It destroyed the workshop completely, cared for all statues as here as Via Laibut thankfully the part of the shop with these if they were his etana was being the decorations was spared. My father daughters. He’s constructed. The bore the smell of that fire on his clothes eighty now. Do I business was alhave any memoready in the for years ries about this hands of another place from when I was a child? After Granddad family, the Prats, by then. You have to understand that in the eighteenth and nineteenth cen- passed away, Grandma would spend most of her time in the shop, serving the customers. And in turies candle makers were something like what her last years she just sat here on a chair with electricity companies are today. They had real her knitting. I remember another power and sat on the Council of One Hundred that once governed our city.

Pilar Subirà, Subirà Candle Shop

The post-Civil War era, the first third of the twentieth century, was another matter entirely. That was the time when my grandfather, Paulí Subirà, was in charge of the shop. He came to Barcelona from Vic. He had a tough task, trying to rebuild a business that had been nearly ruined. Raw materials were in short supply — besides wax, back then they often would animal fat, pig fat mostly. My grandfather had to turn to the black market to get it. The candle makers’ guild was losing many of its many members in those days — there were fewer and fewer candle factories and shops with each passing year. I know they were particularly mad at the churches — they were starting to wire them for electricity, and of course they had been the candle makers’ best customers. Thank God a new fashion reached us from northern Europe, where they used candles not just as a source of light, but to create a special kind of mood. That’s what let the candle industry in Catalonia survive the crisis.

I started giving father a hand when I was twelve, on Saturdays, or when he was away on vacation, or over the winter holidays

Granddad had nine children and he offered them a choice: they could stay in the family business or they could go to university. My father, Jordi Subirà i Rocamora, was the seventh

After Granddad passed away, Grandma would spend most of her time in the shop, serving the customers

thing, too, a rather unpleasant one — in 1969, when I was four, we had a big fire. It destroyed the workshop completely, but thankfully the part of the shop with the decorations was spared. My father bore the smell of that fire on his clothes for years.

C erer í a S u b i r à

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

I don’t think there was one special day when I suddenly decided that now I worked in the shop for real. I started giving father a hand when I was twelve, on Saturdays, or when he was away on vacation, or over the winter holidays. I was here more and more because his health was slowly deteriorating. Two years ago he finally retired, and then I started thinking: was I going to keep the business alive, a business that had been going for two hundred and fifty years, or was I going to shut it down and end the cycle. I really did feel the weight of that decision, but it was the right thing to do, for me to take on that responsibility — that’s how part of your own story gets written. In the end, I decided I should carry on my father’s work, even though my own training was in music. I still continue to work at a classical music radio station. Of course, I can only to do it part time now.

A business like ours cannot just rely on locals, especially now, when tourism is such a big thing I am in charge of the store now. I don’t get paid for the work I do here. I just do my best to make sure that everybody else gets paid and we stay in business. So I’m an altruistic businessman (smiles). I assign the tasks, I decide what things we’ll order more of and what we don’t really need at all. I keep an eye on everything that might need fixing or a fresh coat of paint. My cousin is a manager. She crunches the numbers, she likes that. We have four other women working in the shop. We all take turns at the cash register from time to time. And we all talk with our customers. A business like ours cannot just rely on locals, especially now, when tourism is such a big thing. But sometimes people do come in and tell us they used to buy candles here half a century ago.

About a year ago, Catalonia’s state Centre for Public Opinion Studies conducted an intriguing survey attempting to determine what parts of their lives Catalans valued most. Respondents had to choose between family, work, friends, leisure, politics and religion. 87.5 percent of them chose family as their top priority, while twelve percent stated that relatives were of utmost importance to them. If we sum those numbers up, family was a landslide winner with 99.5 percent, Catalonian society’s undisputed top priority.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

The city’s oldest candle shop sits right on the divide between the Gothic Quarter and Born. Both neighbourhoods are very popular with tourists and both have their fair share of sights to see — yet crowds of curious foreigners are drawn to the richly decorated Subirà storefront like moths to a flame. It is particularly busy before Christmas, when Pilar Subirà and her workers almost never have a moment to sit down. Here’s an old lady looking for those special candles she wants for her granddaughter’s baptism (and a chat with the cashier, of course); in the other corner, a pack of giggling Japanese girls are admiring a pink wax flower bud the size of a giant’s head. A couple in love is waiting their turn in the doorway, a dozen vanilla and cinnamon-scented jars in their hands. There’s no hurrying at Subirà. When it’s your turn to be served, they give you all their time and attention. This has been their way since the eighteenth century and we have no doubt the twenty-first century will be just the same. Where: Baixada Llibreteria, 7, Metro Jaume I

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

was in the early 1900s, when everybody was My grandfather was Daniel Carreras Jubert. I crazy about football and kids were kicking balls was only four when he passed away so I didn’t in every courtyard in town. We used to sell have the chance to get to know him. He was orshirts, too. Before phaned at an earthe Civil War ly age and a Grandpa lived right here in the shop, They cut friend of his parsleeping on the wooden counters. It also started. the cloth right ents took him in had a place where they washed clothes here in the shop and raised him and a room we still call the kitchen, even and gave it to the like his own son. This gentleman though it hasn’t been one for a long time, seamstresses to sew, they worked did business in of course out of their own Catalonia, where homes. Grandma would sometimes come in to he owned a number of lingerie and haberdashery shops. So when he decided to open La Torre lend a hand at the cash register. But in our family the women didn’t help run the business. Just in 1900, grandfather — he must have been because it’s a family business doesn’t mean the about eighteen or twenty at the time — helped him get it started. And later he became the head entire family is part of it — in any case, there has to be one person really in charge. So even of the place. He lived right here in the shop, sleeping on the wooden counters. It also had a place where they washed clothes and a room we still call the kitchen, even though it hasn’t been one for a long time, of course. Grandpa only started renting a separate room upstairs later, when he had some money.

Artemi Carreras Bartolí, La Torre knitwear shop

Grandpa knew how to save money. But he was a good person, too, hard working and always ready to help others. And he was very smart.

But in our family the women didn’t help run the business. Just because it’s a family business doesn’t mean the entire family is part of it A neighbouring shop owner started copying everything that he did and put it in his display window at a lower price. The same sweater, but a little bit cheaper. The same jacket, but just a bit cheaper. So Grandpa bought another jacket, and this time he put new buttons on it, in a different colour, and put it right out in front where everyone could see it. Then he didn’t have to worry that his neighbour would undercut him — how was he going to find exactly the same jacket and buttons?

Ninety-five percent of our stock at La Torre has always been undergarments. There was this time when we also sold clothing for sports. That

G è neres d e p u nt La Torre

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

learned on the job, working and gaining experience. It was the same way for me. I got married at twenty-seven and I had to decide what I was going to do with my life. I had studied music, I played the flute, I could have passed the exam and I would have gotten a place in the orchestra. But I chose to work here at the shop. Why? Well, for one thing, I knew I wasn’t a musical genius. And also I was not really excited about the idea of working for someone else. And I already had a good grasp of the way things worked here at La Torre, I already knew a good deal.

after my father, Artemi Carreras Jaume, came in, it was Grandpa who ran the place. Father is still the owner of the shop. He is in excellent health but he’s not that young any more — he’s ninety-four years old. So he stays at home. He started working early in life, when he only around 14. When they changed the tax laws in the 1940s, it was Dad who had to figure out how it all worked because Grandpa was already too old. But I don’t really think there was this one particular day when Grandpa started giving him the important jobs here. Father just

Now I work here with my daughter, Mònica. I can’t really say if she’ll carry on with this business. You just never know. But I think she will. She’s good looking, charming, always smiling. She’s friendly, very good with the customers — I just love watching her work in the shop. There are lots of those big shopping malls around now, but they’re no real threat to us. They deal with customers in a different way, they’re not going to take care of them the way we do. And then we get a lot of older folks. They’re not looking for exotic sexy lingerie, they need something they can wear every day. All of life isn’t a party. It’s like a bake shop — you only buy pastries when there’s some kind of special occasion, but bread is something we buy every single day. We never changed our concept here at La Torre. We do things just the way we always have. We still write bills by hand, for example, no computers. I think if things have worked fine for a hundred years, there’s no point in changing — you can only mess things up and ruin what you have.

In the early 1900s Barcelona was often home to successful start-ups. Some of these grew to be truly global businesses. Danone is a household name all over the world, for example. But how many people know who is really behind our habit of eating yogurt in the morning? Isaac Carasso, a Jew who migrated to Barcelona from Greece, rented the basement of number sixteen in Carrer dels Àngels, where he set up a small laboratory and started producing yogurt that initially was only sold in pharmacies. That business proved quite lucrative. But things really took off after his son Daniel took over the company. Isaac’s heir introduced new packaging, started adding fruit jam to his yogurt, and, in 1968, commissioned the first ad campaign for Dannon Yogurt. And although Carasso Jr. eventually moved his father’s business to France, he never forgot where it had all started. In 1994, he came back to Barcelona to put a plaque on the house in the Raval neighborhood where his father had produced their first yogurt back in 1919.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

It’s not only its long standing that makes La Torre one of the most iconic shops in the neighborhood. We think it’s the stunning old-fashioned storefront with all those neatly displayed snow-white undershirts, drawers, bras and other garments. It’s all touchingly quaint — some passersby can’t help smiling when they first come upon the place. Artemi Carreras Bartolí, the grandson of the shop’s founder, is too proud of his business to notice. La Torre is well known for its attention to the quality of the clothes on its shelves, stocking only items made from top-quality natural materials like cotton, wool and silk. Where: Pl. Universitat, 4, Metro Universitat

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Slava Polunin:

— Slava, all of your work, in one way or the other, has been about happiness. What makes you happy in Barcelona?

Everything, even the very simplest things. Barcelona is a one of a kind… country. Even the squares here have no corners. Whose idea was it to shave the corners off all the squares? Or take Gaudí. For me, he’s the man who exploded the universe. He was able to see the world completely anew, leading us to freedom in architecture. Or Dalí, everybody’s darling. He was the most fantastic fool the world has ever known. He consciously lived every step his life. I think he was one of the great creators of the sort that turn their own lives into art. The actual artwork doesn’t measure up, it’s more concocted. In the end, Spaniards are natural born clowns. They are passionate, they don’t know where to stop. This is why Spain has always attracted all the great clowns. Jango Edwards spent many years here and so did Leo Bassi. My own life is intimately tied to all these little mountain villages and to Girona. That town has a fantastic atmosphere, I love it.

— Have you come across many of your fellow clowns here?

There was this time when I was on tour in Catalonia and an English TV channel asked if I wanted to revive the Mr. Bean series. So we set up a meeting. Some Monty Python guys came to see me and Leo Bassi came with them. He was just walking down the street and saw us in the window. So he comes in to have a coffee and sees the bill lying there on a tray. So what does he do? He picks it up and eats it. The Python guys didn’t know how to react. But that’s not it. So we walked out into the street and here they just lay down on the pavement. That’s how we conducted our negotiations, with them lying on the pavement and while we stood and talked with them. That’s typical Barcelona. It is endless, reckless and unorthodox, and that’s the kind of people it attracts.

— So one could say the Spaniards have more or less your kind of temper?

Not quite. In their passion, their energy, they’re closer to Leo Bassi. I’m more about minimalism, about immersion. But the audience here has been fantastic.

— We see you here in Catalonia about once a year, right?

Well, I try, because I don't have the time to get to distant islands. I'm a country boy and I don't like spending all of my time in big cities. That’s why I live in the hills near Girona where nobody ever goes, there’s just a bunch of little villages and a whole lot of nature. I think cities are a mistake mankind made because it could not think of a better way to give people more opportunities. But I found a way. You have to live in the country and use cities only when they’re absolutely necessary. And there’s also the fact that, of all the places that I love, Catalonia is the closest to France, where I live now. I've got this project in France, the Moulin Jaune, it's a kind of a center where you can search for another kind of life.

— Could you tell us more about the Moulin Jaune? What led you to set its sails turning in France, specifically?

It is my creative space, the place where I think about what I should do with my life, about what people should do with their lives. At some point I came across the story of Nikolay Evreinov, who was a philosopher and a theater practitioner. He thought that one should make one's life a work of art. As I read that, it seemed a marvelous idea and I decided I would give it a try. As actors, we know what to do when we need a miracle to happen on stage. But what do I do when I need a miracle to happen in real life? I made a list of one hundred and twenty things I needed to do for things to be just right. The very first task was to find the right place. That took me about ten years.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

In His Own Words

“Barcelona is a one of a kind country” Polunin has circled the world with Slava’s Snow Show — more than once. It’s easy to believe he’d find an audience to charm if he found himself on another planet. We met with Slava in Barcelona to see whether there was a place for our city in his personal universe. Interview: Anastasia Kazenkova

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

— Why so long?

everything. There isn’t a clown in the art form that would not be tied to language. An art form anyone could under- world who hasn’t fallen flat on his face I made a list of twelve cities where I in Japan. But they keep inviting us — thought I saw a chance to find harmony. stand. So I started looking for places because they want to learn how to laugh. that had people of every age and every Barcelona, Amsterdam, Moscow, New nationality. I performed in nurseries, in They feel that they have the ability to York City, London, Paris and so on. I laugh, it’s just they haven’t developed it. prisons, in mental institutions, even in spent six months in each of these cita maternity hospital. A friend of mine, a When I was working on my Snow Show, ies — well, right outside the cities — I built ten different levels into it and until finally I realized that every human doctor, called me one day and said, now it shows different facets to different age has its own harmony. It may be that “Look, I’ve got a whole bunch of ladies audiences. In other words, if there’s an here and something seems to be stopNew York City is the place to live when audience that I fail to connect with ping them all from giving birth. Get you’re twenty, while some other place through humor, there’s another door over here and help me out!” is the right choice when you’re thirty. there that will open for them. I’m sixty, so France seems the way to go, because it has the best cultural policies — You recently got back from Japan. What were your audiences like — There are always tons of children in the world. To make a long story short, at your shows. What do you rememthere? in 2001 I found the where I needed to It’s a completely different culture. They ber about your own childhood? be. Half an hour to downtown Paris, half I think I was much more productive have completely different ideas about an hour to the high-speed train, half an back then than I am now. I hour to the airport. There’s had scores of games at a river, a mountain, a tree Biographical Note home that I made with my and two hundred waterA clown-performer of world renown, Slava Polunin prefers to be known own hands, for example. I mills. One of these mills had as an envoy of the Embassy of the Dolphins, President of the Academy just kept experimenting all no roof and no water, noof Fools and the king of the St. Petersburg Carnival. Born in 1950 in the the time. I knew every path body wanted it. That’s how small town of Novosil in the woods and steppes of Western russia, he and every foxhole in the my Moulin Jaune was born. came to Leningrad to study. he could have become an economist or an woods. My cat had the engineer, but he opted to devote himself to the arts. the arts have been worst of it as it had to take — The Moulin Jaune is a the beneficiary ever since, given the endless list of major projects and part in everything. fundamentally multiculprestigious theater awards he had to his name. In his native russia, he

tural project. Your Snow Show is known and loved all over the world. What is it that makes your ideas so universal?

Back in the Soviet days I had this idea that I wanted to make art that had no boundaries. It should be free and accessible to everyone from babies to grandmothers, from North to South. And it was back then that I made for myself what I call my “feet in the water” rule. Every two or three years I stop whatever I’m doing, sit and dangle my feet in the water and ask myself: “Am I heading in the right direction? Is this what I want to be doing?” That is, you just sail about in the clouds and pick up whatever new things happen to catch your fancy. And you understand some of your old things better, too. That is how I came to see that I needed to find an

is still best remembered for his Asisyai revue. Its eponymous character, a touching red-headed clown in huge slippers, made Polunin a household name throughout the Soviet union in the 1980s. In the following decade, everybody’s favorite clown took the decision to leave the country and join the Cirque du Soleil in Canada. Later, he moved to England, making frequent appearances in Liverpool, Dublin, Barcelona and other European cities. having since settled in France, this Santa-Claus lookalike is best known to the worldwide audience for Slava’s Snow Show, a production that has been going strong for over twenty years, packing theaters in every corner of the planet.

BONANOVA A TRADITIONAL CATALONIAN RESTAURANT SINCE 1964

SANT GERVASI DE CASSOLES 103 934 171 033 WWW.RESTAURANTEBONANOVA.COM

— So you lived next to a forest?

Well… about a kilometer away. Everything was right there — the woods, the river… In the winter we could get five meters of snow and I would always go making things out of it and digging tunnels. That’s what why I eventually came up with the Snow Show — because snow was one of my favorite toys when I was a child.

— Well, let’s come back to Spain for the last question. What do you find most appealing about the country?

I am always on the lookout for their carnivals and fiestas. Right now I am going to the Fallas festival in Valencia. Spain is not a holiday destination for me or my actors, it’s a place to live. We bite it, caress it, embrace it.

GENUINE CATALONIAN CUISINE

The menu changes each day, depending upon the fish and seafood caught and the vegetables gathered. Home-made bread and traditional Catalonian desserts. And an exquisite wine list. We aren’t after the popularity of tourist eateries. Our tables are frequented by people who value seriously good home cooking.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

A Closer Look Text: Anna Baraban Photo: Maria Hlebnikova

Street musicians, skaters, magicians and tourists, they all flock here. This is the place where protesters and soccer fanatics gather to wave their flags or cheer their team on as they watch the game broadcast on a big screen brought in for the occasion. Dividing Passeig de Lluís Companys and Passeig de Sant Joan, two major thoroughfares in downtown Barcelona, the Arc de Triomf is smack in the middle of the life of the city.

Detail 1 From whatever side you approach the Arc, there are winged female figures keeping an eye on you, either blowing on their trumpets or holding out laurel wreaths. These are the twelve Phemes, goddesses of fame, whose task it was to help Barcelona achieve worldwide glory and renown. Well, as you can see: mission accomplished!

It wasn’t any feat of arms that put it on the map of Catalonia’s capital, either. Rather, it was part of the preparations for the 1888 Universal Exposition with all its symbolism of artistic, scientific and commercial progress. This was a city of 450,000 and it had to compete with the likes of Paris or London for the right to host an event of such magnitude. And for that it had first to become a giant construction site. Speaking of Paris, by the way — as improbable as it may seem now, the spot where the Arc de Triomf stands now could have hosted the Eiffel Tower. The city authorities gave serious consideration to

The Arc de Triomf

The Story Behind Barcelona's Brickwork Beauty It was the Romans who first came up with the idea of commemorating major military victories with triumphal arches. Later, the tradition spread out around the world — now you can find them in Paris and Moscow, in Berlin and even in New Delhi. But Barcelona’s brickwork beauty has its own peculiar story

Gustave Eiffel’s application but ended up rejecting the design as “too expensive and extravagant.” Josep Vilaseca i Casanovas, however, proposed a design for a Neo-Mudéjar brick gateway that they just loved.

The city authorities gave serious consideration to Eiffel’s application but ended up rejecting the design as “too expensive and extravagant” The head of the Barcelona Architecture School, Vilaseca was very well known in the city. Suffice it to say it was he who had turned an undistinguished house on the Rambla belonging to Bruno Cuadros into the striking modernist building that stands on the site today, replete with ornate parasols and a blue-eyed Chinese dragon on the corner. Vilaseca’s triumphal arch was to be quite unlike its Roman predecessors. How, exactly? Well, for one thing, it would be built of inexpensive red How to Get There bricks of slightly varying hues, reminiscent of MoorEl Arc de Triomf ish architecture. But it was Junction of Passeig de Lluís the sculptural decorations, Companys and Passeig de Sant a mix of ancient and modJoan, Metro Arc de Triomf

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

ment the city’s new image was born. A place that until then had tended to attract dull businessmen became a magnet for travelling aristocrats, artists and other luminaries from all over Europe. Not only is the Arc still standing one hundred and twenty-nine years later, sometimes it even lets

To get to the top, you’ll have to first negotiate the narrow spiral staircase inside in semidarkness

Detail 2 Barcelona’s Arc de Triomf is not just another dreary historical monument – it is an integral part of the living organism that is the city today. Among other things, it is the starting point for the socalled triángulo friki, a triangle of shops and stores that has a cult status for city’s videogame, sci-fi and graphic novel fanatics. When around one thousand Pokémon lovers gathered last summer for a mass Pokémon Go event, naturally, the place they chose was the Arc de Triomf. The “Pokédada” was a great success, even though the police charged the organizers afterwards for failing to get proper prior authorization from the town hall for a mass gathering

ern themes and figures, that would really set the structure apart. These were the responsibility of a team of noted Catalan artists. There is a stern-looking Athena with nude peasant girls on the façade, along with a cogwheel, flaming torches, the coats of arms of the forty-nine Spanish provinces of the time, and a profusion of giant bats. The last bit should come as no surprise: these were the early days of modernisme, and the period had a bizarre weakness for these creatures, off-putting as they may be to the average citizen.

The architect was close to panic when the work was done — he was afraid the whole structure might collapse!

Vilaseca and the sculptors that he appointed to decorate the arch were accomplished masters, so it is a strange thing that the architect was close to panic when the work was done and it was time to remove the scaffolding — he was afraid the entire structure might collapse! Reportedly, his friend and fellow architect Gaietà Buïgas was so confident that, to calm Vilaseca’s nerves, he offered to stand right underneath the arch at the critical moment. The scaffolding came down and the disaster, of course, did not materialize, but the whole affair would make Vilaseca the butt of many a joke among his friends. The 1888 Universal Exposition marked a turning point in Barcelona’s fortunes. That was the mo-

curious visitors inside. To get to the top, you’ll have to first negotiate a narrow spiral staircase inside in semidarkness. The climb may be tiring and claustrophobic, but it is more than worth it, if only for a chance to pet the fierce-looking stone lions that guard the Spanish coat of arms at the top and, of course, to enjoy the marvelous view.

Ksenia Chalaya's flower studio

W e d d i n g D é c or Our wedding decorations use a variety of materials, lighting and accessories, combined with plants and fresh flowers. We are meticulous with every detail in the décor to ensure this very special day is truly memorable for the married couple and their guests. Floratelie guarantees clients a free consultation, at which our expert staff will accommodate the couple’s every wish and help them make the right choice.

L an d s c a p e d e s i g n Floratelie is a team of gardeners, designers and landscape artists who can transform your green plot, park or garden into a paradise that meets all your needs. You’ll be amazed at how the local features of your garden can be used to create a brilliant solution. Floratelie can also relieve you of the burden of maintaining your garden. This is just another part of our service. So relax and enjoy your wonderful garden!

Office ambience We will make an individual selection of live plants for each office to harmonise with the design of the premises. This will lift the mood of everyone who works there and make a strong impression on visitors coming in for business meetings.

www . f lorat e l i e . c o m 6 7 4 3 3 3 3 5 9 Style and organization: Julia Katz “Oh my love” WEDDING PLANNERS. Photographers: Alexey Malyshev, Fedor Borodin

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Dislocation Text: Marina Ananikyan, Tania Rosenthal Photo: Maria Hlebnikova, Julia Kaukhova, Aleksei Anashkin

The Gothic Quarter is one of four districts that comprise the Ciutat Vella, the Old City. It is bounded on the west by the noisy, boisterous Rambla and on the east by the proud Via Laietana, full of quiet inner strength, what the locals consider the most «New York» street in Barcelona. As to the southern edge of the Barri Gòtic, it abuts the Passeig de Colom, while the invisible northern fence runs along Fontanella Street, where it is unceremoniously squeezed up against Catalunya Square, looking so obviously flustered by the incident.

Until the end of the end of the nineteenth century, it never occurred to Barcelonans to worry about their past A curious fact: if you take a pencil and outline all that on a map, you get an odd figure that looks like either a toothless saw or a butcher's cleaver. But what does the Gothic Quarter (and up until the twentieth century, it was called the Cathedral Quarter) look like when you're inside it? It is, in a word, impressive. Built in accordance with all the traditions of the Middle Ages, it is a webwork of narrow streets emerging into rectangular plazas surrounded by majestic buildings belonging to a variety of periods and styles. We know that the earliest surviving structures here go back to classical antiquity: the remains of the city walls, the Palace of Octavian Augustus Caesar and the aqueduct near Tapineria and the New Square. Of

The Gothic Quarter

What the Guide Books Won't Tell You Every Barcelona guide book has to have a chapter on it. Which is just what you'd expect: the Gothic Quarter is the very heart of the city, its severe stone cradle encrusted with toy marvels, the starting place for its history, the dot from which it all expanded. And it's also the object of studies and controversies that tourists hardly ever know anything about. «Your City» has decided to break the silence and tell you what the guide books usually leave unsaid

course, these things are hardly Gothic in themselves — like most of the houses, residential or not, that form the basis of this labyrinth teeming with myths and legends.

Because until the end of the end of the nineteenth century, it never occurred to Barcelonans to worry about their past. And so they had no qualms about adapting their urban spaces to their current needs. In the eighteenth century, for example, when the city underwent a sudden surge of industrial development and a corresponding increase in population, the Gothic Quarter began to grow — upwards. At the time, it seemed there was no place to expand, so they often simply piled new stories atop old houses. And sometimes they outright demolished them to build higher buildings in their place. The quality of living conditions in those buildings wasn't always a top priority, either. Any experienced local realtor will confirm

The reconstruction was guided by the interests of the middle class, which had decided it would turn the provincial Catalan capital into a modern European city that the Barri Gòtic — even today, in the twentyfirst century — beats out virtually all Spain in the number of minuscule apartments (about three hundred square feet or even less) clustered together in one place.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Barcelona only began to realize it had a heritage to preserve somewhere in the middle of the nineteenth century, when the city center was once again being rebuilt. This time the reconstruction was guided by the interests of the middle class, which had decided it would turn the provincial Catalan capital into a modern European city. They would attract foreign tourism and investment. The historians tell us that this process was launched by the transformation of the facade of the Cathedral and the construction of Via Laietana. Those projects sparked a genuine urban revolution over the course of which eighty-five entire streets and three hundred and thirty-five buildings disappeared, while over one hundred thousand people were put out into the street, forced to move to the slopes of Montjuïc. Both in the case of the Cathedral facade and that of the new thoroughfare, the architects and builders had to give an account of themselves to the authorities and the public in 1913. The creation of the “historical” neighborhood around them, however, wasn't over yet. Streets were redirected, buildings were physically moved, modern windows were replaced with bay windows and friezes, the standard street lamps gave way to more artistically conceived designs. As a result, well-informed skeptics see the Gothic Quarter as a kind of theme park, a forgery created to attract flocks of naive tourists who unwittingly pay good money for fake history. But such well-informed skeptics, as you may imagine, are relatively few in number. Far more numerous are those who fall under the spell of the place and are quite happy to believe that when they touch its darkened stones, they're touching genuine history, hearing the echoes of the past, feeling the beating of a centuries-old urban heart.

Well-informed skeptics see the Gothic Quarter as a kind of theme park, a forgery created to attract flocks of naive tourists who unwittingly pay good money for fake history That circumstance may have led us to an inherently paradoxical situation: foreigners comprise fully half of the populations of the Gothic Quarter. And here we're looking only at officially registered

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

residents. If you choose to take into account the hordes of tourists who want to spend their holidays in Barcelona just steps from the Plaça Sant Jaume or La Boqueria, the numbers become far more daunting still.

The mass influx of tourists has been a doubleedged sword for Barcelona. On the one hand, the city's guests leave behind millions of euros, filling the city's coffers and creating numerous jobs. On the other, there are so many of them that the locals are often put out by it, periodically gathering for demonstrations, demanding that measures be taken. Ah, those fanatics of Gaudi, paella and the Mediterranean, all squawking in their own strange languages — it seems they've brought with them every imaginable kind of trouble. The noise, night and day. The pickpockets who grow

But what has Barcelonans most worried is how quickly the appearance of the Gothic Quarter has been changing over the last few years more shameless with each passing year. The high prices. And you can hardly squeeze your way through the crowds in the narrower streets. But what has Barcelonans most worried is how quickly the appearance of the Gothic Quarter has been

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

changing over the last few years. Rising rents, both residential and commercial, are leading to the disappearance of cafes, drug stores and other places emblematic of old Barcelona, places whose histories can span literally centuries. Losing their regular clients and unable to extend their leases on the old terms, their owners pass their traditional spots to faceless chains — stores, restaurants and hotels.

Ada Colau Ballano is Barcelona's current mayor. What is the real source of her enormous popularity? Agreeing that the center of town is swamped with tourists, she put a moratorium on construction of new hotels. And she stopped issuing licenses to companies and private entrepreneurs connected in one way or another with tourism in the Ciutat Vella. New rules are about to go into effect that regulate the external appearance and the hours of operation of outdoor seating at cafes and restaurants. And that's just the beginning — an establishment's very right to put chairs and tables out in the street in the first place will depend on how established it is, where it is located, the time of year and a host of other factors.

“If we don't want to end up like Venice, we have to put restrictions in place in Barcelona,” says the Alcaldessa Ada Colau Ada Colau is waging a ferocious battle with the illegal renting of apartments to tourists, even going so far as to encourage neighbors to anonymously report on one another. “If we don't want to end up like Venice, we have to put restrictions in place in Barcelona,” says the Alcaldessa (ie, Mayor), and she's doing everything in her power to take the load off of the Gothic Quarter, steering tourists towards other parts of the city. It's probably the right idea. But can it bring back the Barcelonans? After all, neither demonstrations nor laws can “repeal” the drawbacks of the Gothic Quarter, great and small, drawbacks the transients hardly feel — the chaos of the medieval street plan, the humble size of the apartments, the crippled infrastructure and so forth. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

La Boqueria The first mention of La Boqueria dates to early medieval times, when peasants from the neighboring villages established the custom of selling meat and vegetables by the city wall. For several centuries, La Boqueria remained an itinerant market. But in 1840, it managed to find a permanent place for itself. Where the San Josep Monastery (a refuge for barefoot Carmelites that had been swept from the face of the earth by a wild mob five years earlier — more on this below) had once stood, rows of stalls were built under the direction of the architect Mas Vilà. That's the source of the market's official name: the Sant Josep Market. The unofficial name may be connected with the Catalan word “vos,” meaning “goat.” But that's just one of a number of theories. However that may be, since the end of the nineteenth century, La Boqueria has been Barcelona's number one meal ticket. And one of its most popular attractions. Tourists are here from the crack of dawn, taking pictures of langostinos they clearly have no intention of buying. Recently the city government decided to limit their numbers at the market. The plan is to bar entry for groups of fifteen people or more on Fridays and Saturdays. Sellers will also be obliged to observe a certain balance between fresh and prepared foods. Cut fruits, for example, will have to be wrapped and sealed to prevent customers from eating them where they stand

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Catedral de la Santa Creu i Santa Eulàlia The foundations were laid in the twelfth century on the site of an earlier Christian church. It was completed, in point of fact, only in 1913, thanks to an impressive donation from Manuel Girona, a successful banker who was Mayor of Barcelona for eleven years. Today the Cathedral, like a treasure box, is filled with precious stories in a variety of genres. There are tales of civic service, of virtue, of sacrifice, of money, and even of love. One of the most stirring, and so one of the stories most pitilessly overexploited by the tour guides, has to do with Saint Eulalia. She was a thirteen-year-old girl who converted to Christianity and was put to horrible tortures by the Romans, who had no notion of freedom of thought, freedom of conscience or freedom of religion. She is now one of the patron saints of the city and her relics in their alabaster sarcophagus are located in the crypt beneath the Cathedral's central altar. And in the inner Cathedral courtyard, in symbolic memory of the martyred girl, are thirteen white geese wobbling about, honking, preening themselves and pecking at curious tourists. The courageous girl, legend has it, was a simple shepherdess from the village of Sarrià, long since incorporated into the city of Barcelona and now one of its most prestigious neighborhoods

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Plaça Reial In 1835, on July 25th, Barcelona was celebrating St. James' Day. The main event was supposed to be the bullfight at La Barceloneta. But things weren't going according to plan: the bulls were passive and clearly had no intention of fighting. The disgruntled spectators went out into the streets and headed towards the Rambla where, since the seventh or eighth century, monks belonging to various orders had lived, prayed and preached. The Franciscans, the barefoot Carmelites, the Capuchins, the Trinitarians… suddenly it seemed as if they were to blame for everything — the recent outbreak of the plague, civil wars, the cramped quarters in the Old City… And they were shown no shred of mercy. Not even the stone walls of the aged monasteries were spared. The abode where the Capuchins appealed to God was among the victims of the destruction wrought in the course of that uprising. And in the place where it had stood the Plaça Reial was laid out. Despite all the gloomy history, today this is one of the brightest and happiest corners of the Gothic Quarter. A big part of that is the terraces belonging to the restaurants and bars that line its perimeter. Visitors sit at their tables far into the night, enjoying a Dorado, sipping white wine and listening to the murmuring of the recently restored Fountain of the Three Graces.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

One Day in the Life Text: Vlad Vitkovski Photo: Julija Kauhova

The Fishermen of the Barceloneta

A Dispatch from a Lost World The Barceloneta has long held the reputation of an old fishing district, its men going out to sea the way their fathers did and their fathers’ fathers before them. The very names of the streets — Atlantis Street, Sea Street, Salt Streetor Admiral Cervera Street — give the neighbourhood a decidedly maritime air, even besides the plethora of seafood restaurants and the garlands of sardines that festoon its squares and lanes come Christmas. But where are the fishermen, one might ask? Are any still left here in the Barceloneta of the twenty-first century? Your City decided to have a look around, to spend a day in their hidden world

Walk down the Passeig de Joan de Borbó, but instead of turning left towards the beach, take a right. You’ll find yourself at the gates of Barcelona’s fishing port. Passing the gate, you enter an otherworldly place that seems far removed from Barcelona’s trendy bars, hordes of tourist, municipal wi-fi networks, instagram hashtags and the debate on the merits of electric city transport. It is a world of hard-faced men, their jerseys carrying the stains of a year or more of work (something no one pays any mind here). They mend their nets by hand, unload heavy boxes of fish from their red or green boats, or just sit there in silence, cigarette in hand, eyes fixed on the horizon.

This part of the port is also home to the Barceloneta fishermen’s guild. The guild’s President, José Juárez, is already waiting for us. He starts with the history of the organization — if anyone can tell us about that, this is the man. Back in the 1400s, there was no Barceloneta; the fishermen who had lived in the city since its origins had their homes in the La Ribera neighbourhood. The guild was more than just a professional union then, it was of a fraternity whose members would

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

always come to one another’s aid. Everyone contributed to a common fund that was used to support families that lost their breadwinners at sea or to provide medical care to people injured in the line of work. It was the fishermen’s guild, alongside the stevedores, that built Santa Maria del Mar, that great church that, as José puts it, “will always remind people just how important the sea is to Barcelona.”

How can you choose another trade when you start helping your dad and granddad unload the catch and stow the nets at the age of seven?

The Barceloneta was built in the late 1700s when the fishing industry in the city was at its peak. At the time, membership in the guild stood at about three thousand — today, they number just three hundred and seventy. Mr. Juéarez explains that these include not only the fishermen themselves, but also dockers, wholesale market workers and some administrative staff. Most of their families have been in this business for at least three or four generations. José himself can trace his family back to his great-grandfathers on both his mother’s and his father’s side — all fishermen. And

how can you choose another trade when you start helping your dad and granddad unload the catch and stow the nets at the age of seven, clean the boat at ten and first put out to sea yourself when you’re only fifteen? The job comes with a lot of hard work, and there’s an unavoidable bit of romance to it, too. It isn’t the kind of job you choose — it’s a job that chooses you.

José may be the president of the guild, but he does a lot more than office work. He goes out to sea almost every night. “My working day starts at 9 p. m., when I get to the port, change and go up on deck,” he says. “We put out to sea, but we stick close to the shore, so that Barcelona is clearly visible, and we use the lights up on Tibidabo (a mountain overlooking Barcelona) for navigation. We have GPS, of course. But the old way is somehow easier. All in all, we sail out for an hour and a half or so. At night we fish for sardines and anchovies. They love the light, so all you have to do is point a powerful searchlight into the water and watch as a whole school of fish swims up. Then we just cast the net and haul it in. Of course, there are bad nights when we come back home empty-handed, too. But, well, what can you do? In our line of work there’s good luck and there’s bad luck. On the way back I try to catch a nap, because I know when we get in I’ll have to unload the fish first and then I’ll still have to go take a shower, change and go to my office to take care of administrative work, listen to complaints and talk to boat owners. A few times I had to go to Madrid first thing in the morning and then come back and put straight out to sea. But even on the best of days I don’t get home before three in the afternoon.” It’s is a stressful schedule, but there is a slight reprieve between early January and midFebruary. “We try to treat nature with the utmost respect,” José says. “So for a few years now we’ve

Sardines and anchovies love the light, so all you have to do is point a powerful searchlight into the water and watch as a whole school of fish swims up stopped fishing at night during this period now to let the fish breed and recover. We only get part-time pay during that time and nobody really forces us to do it. But this profession is not just a business, it’s not all about money. I want to leave behind something my grandsons will be able to carry on.” So far, José only has one grandson, a boy of eight who’s so excited every time he gets to go out to sea it’s like a wonderful gift. But will he continue the family tradition? We

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

asked Cristina, José’s daughter, who happens to work at the guild office and also leads tours around the port. “I don’t really know yet. But if my son does learn this trade, it would something really invaluable. Both for the family and for himself, no matter what he chooses to do in his life,” she says.

The fishermen sort their catch by size and type on board their boats. Octopuses and cuttlefish go into separate boxes Like her father, Cristina literally grew up at the port, where she knows and loves every nook and cranny. She’s also very concerned about its long-term survival. “We’re fighting to get our old building renovated, we’ve been working out of temporary space for four years now. The market where the fish are auctioned badly needs repair, too — it’s in really bad shape.” As we talk, we enter the Torre del Reloj, the clock tower that once served as a beacon for Barcelona’s fishermen and is now the symbol of the fishing port. The view from the top is beautiful and from here you can suddenly see that those million-euro yachts bobbing in the waves, named for their owners’ wives and daughters, and the simple little fishing boats are neighbours after all. “Do you have any idea how much the mooring fees are here?” Cristina asks. The question is almost rhetorical. “We have to fight for every inch of a harbor that was historically ours and ours alone. The current arrangement is that everything from the tower to the end of the wharf is for the fishermen. At least we have that.” It is half past four now, high time we went to the Barceloneta’s fish market. The dilapidated six-sided structure hosts auctions twice a day, in the morning and in late afternoon, as the boats come in after the night or day shifts at sea. The fishermen sort their catch by size and type on board their boats. Octopuses and cuttlefish go into separate boxes. The most prized species are the blue and red shrimp because of how small their populations are. These can retail for over one hundred euros.

Dockers then whisk the catch away on flatbed trolleys to the auction. The open boxes are put on a conveyor belt, their contents clearly visible to prospective buyers in tiered seating. Most of them work for wholesale companies, but there are chefs from Barcelona restaurants and fishmongers, too. The fish is sold off in a Dutch auction, meaning that the auctioneer opens with a high asking price. The figures on the screen continually change as the price gets lower until someone decides to take the deal. A box of octopuses can be had for three euros whereas the same anchovies that cost six or seven euros per kilo at market fetch just thirty or forty cents. Another new friend, a young fisherman named Sergio, confirms our guess. “You don’t get rich quick doing this. But I don’t want to do anything else.

As we talk, we enter the Torre del Reloj, the clock tower that once served as a beacon for Barcelona’s fishermen My brother, he’s a trained economist, with a diploma and everything, and look, he lost his job in the crisis and came to work here. And now he can’t even imagine taking a different job.”

We leave the port at sunset. As we cross the center of town with its bars and coffeehouses, we can’t help but look at all those hipsters trying to look both tough and poetic and think about Sergio and his mates who look that way without trying, just something they get from their fathers,

“You don’t get rich quick doing this. But I don’t want to do anything else”, says the young fisherman named Sergio from the sea and the salt breeze. Just yesterday their world seemed a fantasy out of Hemingway, but now it feels far more real than our ordinary real life.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

IN GOOD TASTE Text: Alesya Sidorenko Photo: Maria Hlebnikova, Filipp Shamshin

Home Cooking Barcelona's food lovers have a soft spot in their hearts for the good old restaurants that have been passed down from one generation to the next. Here the owners and waiters are often on the firstname basis with their regulars, who sometimes don't even need to open the menu to place their order. But what really matters is that the food is cooked with genuine passion and that the cozy atmosphere makes everyone feel right at home

B onanova

Some seventy years ago this place — it was called Los Billares back then — had green velvet on the tables and clouds of cigar smoke hanging in the air. Its fortunes, name and even the smells changed in the 1960s with the arrival of Adolfo Herrero Villanueva and his wife Pilar Salvador Ibáñez, whose sons Adolfo and Carlos and daughter Cristina run what is these days among the most authentic and interesting restaurants in the neighbourhood. As a nod to its glorious past, their heirs have preserved the Modernist interior with its two dining rooms and an interior courtyard and its collection of drawings by famous Spanish cartoonists. And they’ve kept alive the tradition of meeting and greeting their customers in person. As every regular here knows, asking Adolfo directly what’s good today is a much better bet than reading the menu. Your host might recommend the baked lobster, or cod with samfaina sauce, but usually it will depend on what’s in season, from artichokes farmed in the fields of El Prat de Llobregat to young eels from the Ebro delta or white truffles that come to Barcelona straight from Italy’s Piemonte region. Adolfo has worked in his family business for thirty-four years, and his brother Carlos, the chef, has been here nearly as long. Like their father before them, the two brothers insist on the very best quality of produce. They are extremely picky about their suppliers, seeking them out from all over the country, even as far as distant Galicia, a region famous for its superlative seafood. Where: Sant Gervasi de Cassoles, 103, FGC El Putxet / www.restaurantebonanova.com

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

You really can’t go wrong here, whatever you order, be it grilled vegetables, seafood fideua noodles or a homemade crema catalana, not to mention the tender goat ribs. It must have been the ribs that brought Peret here, the famous Catalan rumba star; it’s well known that he was one of the restaurant’s most faithful and passionate regulars. And if you browse the seven guest books overflowing with signatures, you’ll find not only local stars, but also international celebrities like the Arctic Monkeys and actor David Schwimmer (best known for playing Ross Geller on Friends). The current owner of Can Lluís, Ferran Rodríguez, saw most of these celebrities with his own eyes. He started working in the family business in 1965, when he was barely sixteen. His father and aunt ran the restaurant until Ferran took over, but the founder of the place and its first owner was his grandfather Lluís. Lluís was killed in 1946 when the anarchists set off a bomb right in the restaurant — you can still see a small crater in the floor as a sad reminder of the event. Located right in the middle of the immigrant communities of the Raval district, the restaurant has survived to see the twenty-first century thanks to its commitment to basic down-home popular Catalan cooking. And even though the city’s bohemians were always fond of the place, the men of the Rodríguez family never so much as flirted with trendy fads in gastronomy. Their faith in the culinary instincts of their women who always ran the kitchen has never wavered. In fact, some of the recipes at Can Lluís have remained unchanged in their repertoire since the days of the first owner’s wife. Where: Cera 49, Metro Sant Antoni / www.restaurantcanlluis.cat

C an L l u í s

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

This restaurant has been serving Barcelonans since 1786; the Guinness Book of Records lists it as the oldest in the city. And it is to the past that it owes its quaint name — literally, the “Teaspoon House.” According to current owner Susana Agut, in the beginning the place served only hot chocolate and crema catalana, everybody’s favourite dessert. Sometimes there were so many dessert lovers that the restaurant would run out of cutlery and waiters would have to call out “Teaspoons! Teaspoons!” Incidentally, they still have a few of those original teaspoons — they are kept in the restaurant as relics of its venerable past. Its home-made desserts have been a beloved favorite for many a generation of Barcelonans, who often gather here for weddings or christening parties. Can Culleretes has also been consistently popular with politicians, artists, bullfighters and other assorted celebrities, whose photos now adorn the walls of the restaurant, along with three enormous paintings by Francisco Tey. The very length of the menu, listing fully twenty-nine home-made desserts, is enough to tell you how very serious Can Culleretes remains about its postres. But it would be a mistake to skip the main dishes like suckling pig or wild boar stew. And the canelones is always a sure bet, generously stuffed with meat or spinach. Even though the place can sit up to two hundred and fifty guests at once, it is worth calling ahead for reservations: tables here are snatched up, as they say in Spain, like hot churros. Where: Quintana, 5, Metro Liceu / www.culleretes.com

C an C u lle r e t es

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Local fishermen took a liking to a tavern on this pretty square in the Poblenou neighbourhood as early as the mid1800s. Over the years the square has gone through a number of names, but it was and is a lovely little spot, a quiet haven of tiny white houses with green shutters that look like they were transported here straight from Cadaqués. That’s what it looked like forty years ago, too, when Josep Maria Maulini and Toia Durán first saw it. The couple transformed an unassuming watering hole into a sophisticated seafood restaurant. If the place was good enough for Woody Allen when he came to Barcelona, it’s definitely worth giving it a try. Particularly if you’re in the mood for fresh fish. Sea bass, sole, sardines, eels or anchovies, you’re guaranteed to love the catch of the day, especially with grilled vegetables straight from the fields of Catalonia. Chef Rafa Medrán has been giving traditional Catalan recipes a slight modern twist here for twenty-two years here and he knows what he’s doing. The culinary wizard seems to have a particular respect for the virtues of cod, judging by the five different dishes on the menu in which cod is an ingredient. The wine cellar alone is worth the trip to Els Pescadors. And the terrace seating right on the square, shaded by the ombú trees, is the perfect spot for that bottle of red, white or rosé if the weather is fine. With their roots firmly clinging to the soil of Poblenou, these giant trees seem to be shielding this unique little spot from the hubbub of civilization. Where: Plaça Prim 1, Metro Besòs Mar / www.elspescadors.com

E ls P escado r s

SK STYLE BARCELONA has long since become the most popular Russian-speaking salon in Spain, thanks to their stellar service and the close attention paid to every one of their clients. The salon offers a wide variety of hairdressing and cosmetology services, including manicures and pedicures, massage and depilation. The salon’s stylists have won worldwide renown for their trademark collection of hairstyles — they grace the covers of countless professional publications. The beauticians and make-up professionals at SK STYLE BARCELONA will help you find the right skin care approach for you for the summer season. They can give you a professional make-up consultation, too. The salon uses products under a host of well-known brand names, including Schwarzkopf Professional, La Biosthetique, Academie, Janssen Cosmetics, OPI and SND.

BET ON BLOND

The company has held events around the world to introduce the line and the ambassadors of the brand, all expert hair colorists. In Spain, that honor went to Russian-speaking stylist Alexander Kirilyuk, the director of SK STYLE BARCELONA. His work has been a success story in the Catalonian capital for eight years now.

Schwarzkopf Professional is ready for the springsummer season. It has completely revamped its line of blond hair care and color products. Now it’s easy to get just the shade of blond you want without damaging your hair, all thanks to an innovative technology that makes it possible to protect your hair as you lighten it. And the BLONDME line for home care will let you keep your hair shiny while giving it the shade you like.

Over the coming six months, Alexander and his creative team will put on ten different events in some of the world’s biggest cities; they expect over five thousand people in the collective audience.

Trust your hair to professionals

Blonde is more than a color, it's a lifestyle

Alexander Kirilyuk on the fashion trends of 2017: If you’ve decided to go blonde, remember that the top trend of the season is a gradual transition from dark roots to light ends. Professional colorists can offer you a variety of coloring techniques to ideally work with your kind of hair.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

E l D esv À n Shopping Text: Alesya Sidorenko Photo: Julija Kauhova

A Rendezvous with the Past If words like “retro” and “vintage” mean something more to you than filters in Instagram, you’re probably wondering where exactly one goes in Barcelona to find something old, rare and replete with history. To find the answer, we went to browse the shelves and hidden nooks of the city’s best known antique dealers

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Pedro Pasquín’s antiques shop is hidden away in the upper part of town, light years from the bustle of the city center. But it’s not only the location that makes it an ideal place for a trip to the past. The shop’s interior helps, too, with its discreet lighting and walls of that shade of powder pink that eighteenth century French fashion called cuisse de nymphe effrayée (the color of a frightened nymph’s thigh). The objects at El Desván are sure to keep you wondering. Take, for instance, this almost prehistoric-looking chest with carved floral patterns, made in Colombia in the early 1900s. Who was its owner? How did it get here? Or that celestial blue headboard, guaranteed to keep you dreaming — all you have to do is close your eyes and imagine the house where this otherworldly object first found its place so many years ago. Mr. Pasquín’s love of antiques is something he literally learned at his mother’s knee, as she owned and ran El Desván before him. And with him at the helm, the family business continues to bloom. A trained art historian, Mr. Pasquín knows his antiques and is particularly fond of objects that have survived into the twenty-first century with no major restoration work, in a state as pristine as is practically possible. Pedro is also your man if you are looking for genuine Modernist posters or need a professional appraiser who can tell you what that tea set that has always been in the family is really worth. Where: Madrazo, 145, FGC Muntaner / www.antiguedadespasquin.com

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

“I have five thousand, five thousand. Five thousand, once. Five thousand, twice. Five thousand three times. Sold!” You’ve surely heard the words — maybe not in real life, but probably in a movie with millionaire connoisseurs hunting for antique treasures. If you always wanted to have a look at the hidden world of dealers and collectors and try your hand at bidding, the monthly auctions at Subastas Bonanova are the chance you’ve been waiting for. Even on a regular day, though, the place is eminently worth checking out, if only to see what’s new among the old things here. Beware, though — some of the items at Subastas Bonanova may be just too cute to bear. The girls’ dolls in a back corner, a blonde German freulein and her apparently younger friend who looks like a miniature Brigitte Bardot. Next to them is a little Spanish toy horse waiting for a new master. Even if children nowadays may not always appreciate that kind of toy anymore, for a grown-up collector this is a rare find indeed. Subastas Bonanova trades in tableware, paintings and jewelry, and there’s a lot of it all on offer here. Take a good look and you are sure to find something you’ll love, something you’ll want to take home. Like an Oriental folding screen, its four panels covered in Chinese silk. The roosters painted on it are sure to enliven your room and bring you luck in the year to come. Where: Muntaner, 527, FGC El Putxet / www.bonanovasubastas.com

S u bas t as B onanova

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

The owner of this little shop, Alex Picón, proudly styles himself a Salvador Dalí expert. And the minute he sees that the claim has piqued a customer's curiosity, he’ll take the opportunity to show off the part of his vast collection connected with the surrealist master — a pair of jugs with existentialist motifs and a china plate with a frisky blue horse painted on it, pawing the ground with its hoof. Alex may have studied marketing at the university, but when he graduated he chose to carry on the business his father had founded, Josep Picón. More than that, his passion for graphic art led to a significant expansion in the variety of the shop’s offerings. There are rare lithographs and engravings by Pablo Picasso, Joan Miró and Antoni Tàpies, and Alex advises prospective buyers to look not only at their aesthetic worth, but also at their investment value. This is really the ace up this establishment’s sleeve — the pieces by major masters of modern Catalan art are what really set Tandem Antigüedades apart, placing it head and shoulders above most of the competition. But the core of the shop’s stock still consists largely of items that came into Picón’s hands from private collections. The younger generation often simply sells off what it inherits from wealthy ancestors. That’s how this nineteenth century Spanish painted fan with the mother-of-pearl handle ended up here, and also this seventeenth century Persian dish with its abstract geometric pattern, along with its more extravagant contemporary — an exquisite black and red 1600s fivetiered Dutch cabinet with a mirrored niche, the whole thing designed to resemble a suite of Renaissance palace rooms. Where: Banys Nous, 19, Metro Liceu / tandemantiguedades.com

Tandem A n t ig ü edades

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Vintage furniture and interior design pieces from different countries and epochs vie for space in this eclectic shop. It was put on the Barcelona map by Sonia Pérez and Luis Parra. Or rather, by an idea the couple got after the Spanish magazine Habitania paid a visit to their private home. What most impressed the journalists in the house was the owners’ taste, their eye for highly original items. Sonia and Luis have since brought their passion to Antique Boutique, where one can find all sorts of unique pieces, like whimsical mid-century ceramic lamps from the town of Manises near Valencia, famous for its pottery. There are photographs by the great and terrible Stanley Kubrick, by Edgar Degas — languid dancers, taken over a century ago and developed by Degas himself. The place is full of wonders, but you don’t have to be an expert antiquarian to realize that some items in this unique emporium, even if they may look like something from a bygone era, are actually quite recent creations. Sonia confirms your intuitive guess. The wonderful brass palm we saw on our visit was actually made right on the premises, in the Antique Boutique workshop run by Luis. It is not always possible to find that ideal vintage object that will really tie the room together, so when a client wants “something just like this, but with mother of pearl buttons,” there is always a chance that they won’t have to go home empty-handed. Where: Sèneca, 16, Metro Diagonal / www.antiqueboutiquebcn.com

A n t iq u e B o u t iq u e

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

The Beautiful Life Text: Alesya Sidorenko Photos: Maria Hlebnikova

The Ambrosia Spa

Gifts of the Gods Ambrosia is the name that the ancient Greeks gave to the food of their gods and goddesses, a magic concoction that made sure those Olympians would stay young, strong and beautiful forever. Barcelona’s Ambrosia Spa is a place where anybody can feel like Zeus or Aphrodite

Sitting between two of the busiest streets in Barcelona, Opening Hours: Monday to with the constant din of Saturday 12 P.M. to 9 P.M. Passeig de Gràcia to its right Address: Passatge Domingo, and the leafy Rambla de 9, Metro Passeig de Gràcia, Catalunya to its left, AmbroDiagonal / 931 863 342, 628 317 320 / sia Spa manages against all ambrosiaspabcn.com odds to remain an oasis of calm. The place feels soothing from the very moment you step through its doors, with the warm glow of the hand-painted Moroccan lamp, the soft cushions on the couch and the fragrant flowers. The pan-Asian-inspired interior design transports guests to the Indian Ocean shores by way of sunny Andalusia and the mysterious Maghreb. But it’s not just the furnishings that convey the influence of those multifarious cultures. The treatments on offer are just as varied, featuring European anti-stress rituals, Japanese facial treatments and Balinese or Swedish massage, the last of these being particularly recommended after a long flight or a day of sightseeing in Barcelona.

Ambrosia Spa

Man has always strived to look good and to remain young as long as possible, from the time people believed in spring-dwelling nymphs. That’s still true today, when that our standards of well being and beauty are informed by the deities we see in advertisements. At Ambrosia Spa, the answer is Menard skincare products from Japan. Menard cosmetics contain extracts of red and black Reishi mushrooms that have proved incredibly effective in preventing and combatting the negative effects of ageing. A newer addition to the product range at Ambrosia Spa is Silken Oil, made in Spain from the Ebro delta rice germs. Here at Ambrosia, it is used in Japanese lifting, a rejuvenating facial that serves to stimulate the lymphatic system and helps with the oxygenation of tissues. Even though the effects are said to show after the very first facial, cosmetologists suggest these should be repeated weekly for at least a month.

Balinese or Swedish massage are particularly recommended after a long flight or a day of sightseeing in Barcelona As a matter of principle, there are no mechanical massagers or other devices used at Ambrosia, where they firmly believing in the power of the human touch. And they are just as fussy in their choice of skincare and beauty products, insisting upon using only those made with strictly natural components. Like the German Babor cosmetics line, which exclusively uses pure extracts and

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

desses were not only beautiful but also quite short-tempered. Cross them and they’d turn you into a flower or a tree. Rest assured, even the

There are no mechanical massagers at Ambrosia, where they firmly believing in the power of the human touch

laxing massage with the antioxidant-rich grapeseed oil. If you think nothing could sound better, just have a look at their Cleopatra Ritual, which will have you relaxing in a bath filled with milk and rose petals and sipping a chilly cava after a vigorous Dead Sea salts body scrub and a seaweed wrap, the whole package topped off by a soothing massage with a rich mix of orange blossoms, myrrh, geranium oils and frankincense. There’s a version for men, too: the Caesar Ritual. It follows the regimen just described

The Caesar Ritual is guaranteed to give you wings to carry you to the peak of Mount Olympus above, differing only in the essential oils that go into the rejuvenating bath — a bath that is guaranteed to give you wings to carry you to the peak of Mount Olympus.

essential oils from Alpine flowers and plants. Ambrosia estheticians attend Babor workshops every six months or so to keep pace with the ever-expanding cosmetics line and all the new products coming on the market.

Located just steps from the prestigious Paseo de Gracia, this urban spa is focused on the latest trends in wellness. The blend of our organic products and the exquisite ambience of our facilities create a unique and unforgettable experience. A full range of therapies and personalized beauty treatments are available to provide health, wellness, vitality and energy. We offer one of the best massages available. Our best presentation are our outstanding professionals who have unique knowledge of all the advances in techniques and treatments.

As anyone who remembers his Ovid and his Homer will tell you, those ancient Greek god-

Just have a look at their Cleo patra Ritual, which will have you relaxing in a bath filled with milk and rose petals most demanding of the Olympians would find the treatments on offer at Ambrosia Spa to their satisfaction. Treatments like Wine Therapy, for example, that includes a grape seed-based body scrub, a wine-and-lavender body wrap and a re-

AMBROSIA URBAN SPA

Passatge Domingo,9 Tel.: +34 931 863 342 info@ambrosiaspabcn.com www.ambrosiaspabcn.com

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Nightlife Text: Agatha Smith, Jim Kent Photos: Julija Kauhova

The Sutton Club

Where the Stars Come Out Barcelona is known across Europe for its energy and zest for life. Some say, however that it is only well after the tapas and post-dinner drinks are through that the real fun begins. That’s when thousands of revellers pour out to people the city’s many nightclubs. Located past the Diagonal, Sutton is a venue popular even among VIPs and celebrities. True, even they don’t always manage to get past the front door!

In the sixteen years since the Sutton first appeared on www.thesuttonclub.com the Barcelona map in 2001, Address: Tuset, 13, Metro the club has become a real Diagonal force. It has become a Hours: Wednesday to Mecca for the glamour set Saturday, 12 a.m. to 6 a.m. Admission: EUR 15 and up and the place for the city’s expats to gather and raise a glass of something potent.

The Sutton Club

It's worth remembering that the Sutton started out as a location for live music. Nowadays, though, the stage almost exclusively features top DJ’s playing mainstream chart hits, deep house, dance and RnB. The club does not see foreign artists all that often, but when it does, they’re the big names in the industry. The highlight of the 2016 season,

The club holds 1200 people and you’ll find it packed every night except Wednesdays for instance, was a performance by Chris Brown which filled the club to capacity with partygoers paying 10,000 Euros a table.

Paradoxically, though, it doesn’t really seem to matter all that much who’s playing on any given night, be it a home-grown talent or a world leading artist. The club holds 1200 people and you’ll find it packed every night except Wednesdays. And there’s a host of reasons why, between Thursday and Saturday, starting at midnight, the Sutton is stuffed to the gills, buzzing like a hive, a party Babylon. One of

them is that, even if it does have a hint of the ostentatious to it, the place is genuinely beautiful.

Every part of the Sutton is thoroughly thoughtout and beautifully designed, from the main dance floor to the smattering of private rooms with names that evoke the patrons’ drinks of choice. The bar is more than impressive, too, what with all the attractive barmen and barwomen — every one of them like a professional model mixing your drinks. But what really sets the Sutton apart is its unique and easy-going atmosphere. Even though the admission fee is perfectly typical for the city, the Sutton feels like an exclusive location. The club prides itself on being filled with well-dressed, beautiful people. Up to six hundred guests are turned away on the door on some nights — few Barcelona clubs are this

The Sutton prides itself on being filled with well-dressed, beautiful people. Up to six hundred guests are turned away on the door on some nights — few Barcelona clubs are this picky picky. The list of those who failed to get past the front door is said to include the German racing driver Nico Rosberg, the reigning Formula 1 champion, and even Neymar had to leave his favourite Adidas t-shirts behind for a short while to get past the Sutton’s incorruptible bouncers.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

There’s a Museum I Want You to See… Text: Elena Almirall Arnal Photos: Julija Kauhova

The few portraits and photographs of Frederic Marès that survive in the archives show him as an old man, his white beard giving him a scholarly look. He came to Barcelona as a boy of ten. He would eventually graduate from the Llotja Fine Arts School, where he studied to be a sculptor and to which he later returned as a professor. Among his works are some of those monuments without which we can no longer imagine our city — his “Barcelona” on the Plaça de Catalunya, for example, that burly beauty riding her horse, holding a ship in her hands.

The museum is a genuine treasure trove. To do it justice, you’ll need time — choose a day you have no other pressing business, you won’t regret it The Frederic Marès Museum is a testament to the sculptor’s passion for all things weird and wonderful. Marès took up his hobby after a trip to Paris where he had a chance to peer into the secret and mysterious world of antique dealers. Initially, he kept his treasures at home. As his collection grew, however, he decided he would donate it to the city of Barcelona. In 1946, a new museum was set up in the Gothic Quarter, with Don Frederic continuing to search far and wide for new items for the collection until 1991, the year he died.

The Frederic Marès Museum

The Legacy of a Good Collector Objects on display at this eccentric museum include ancient votive figurines and 1800s ladies’ combs, baroque sculptures and vintage buttons, Romanesque church reliefs and antique dolls. When it came to collecting objects that were alive with the spirit of the past, nothing seemed trivial to renowned Barcelona collector Frederic Marès

The museum is a genuine treasure trove. To do it justice, you’ll need time — choose a day you have no other pressing business, you won’t regret it. Small statues of ancient Iberian deities vie for space with terra-cotta figurines from the tombs at Museu Frederic Tanagra that offer a glimpse Marès into daily life in ancient Address: Plaça de Sant Iu, Greece. If medieval art is 5, Metro Jaume I / www. your thing, don’t miss the museumares.bcn.cat Hours: Tue to Sat, 10 a. m. to 7 Romanesque Apparition of p. m. Sun and holidays: 11 a. m. Christ to His Disciples at to 8 p. m. Sea. The highlight of the Admission: EUR 4.20, free Renaissance sculpture on every first Sunday of the display is a series of works month from 11 a. m. to 8 p. m. by Bartolomé Ordóñez, an and every Sunday after 3 p. m. artist from whom works

were commissioned by kings; devotees of Baroque art, similarly, will be delighted by the exquisite mix of religious exaltation and complete naturalism in works by the famous Spanish sculptor Pedro de Mena. As to nineteenth century sculpture, one masterpiece to point out is The Lamentation of Christ by Agapit Vallmitjana. One of the most compelling things about the Museu Frederic Marès is that it’s actually two vastly different museums in one. Once you pass the religious sculpture, you enter the so-called Collector’s Cabinet, an exhibition that Marès himself used to call his “Sentimental Museum.” It is an engaging maze of old vases, photographs, watches, keys, weapons and other assorted nineteenth century curios, with several rooms designed to look like an antique collector’s study or a typical 1800s cabinet of curiosities. There are ladies’ rooms overflowing with beaded purses, combs, boxes, hairpins and fans that used

One of the most compelling things about the Museu Frederic Marès is that it’s actually two vastly different museums in one to serve the better half of Barcelona’s aristocracy — they have long since gone to rest in peace in the cemetery at Montjuïc. The gentlemen's rooms, with their binoculars, buttons, hats, silk ties and smoking pipes, allow

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Toys, too, have a place in the Sentimental Museum. Besides the usual antique dolls, the collection includes items that children these days would find quite surprising. Consider the tin soldiers, whole armies of tin soldiers, ranging from twenty to ninety millimeters in height, painted with the uniforms of European and colonial powers of the era. In Barcelona, it was Italian artisan Carlo Ortelli who first started producing these miniatures in 1828. Made of pewter, tin and alimony, these soldiers remained a hit with Catalan boys for most of the 1800s.

Classic Catalan Haute Cuisine one to imagine what Barcelona gentlemen looked and dressed like back in the day when horsedrawn carriages were the preferred mode of transportation along the Passeig de Gràcia.

Its lovely interior courtyard with its fountain and a small café is an inviting place to read a book or meet some friends

Last but not least, the building that houses the collection — and it’s the medieval palace of the Counts of Barcelona and the Kings of Aragon — is itself eminently worth a visit. Its lovely interior courtyard with its fountain and a small café is an inviting place to read a book or meet some friends. Or just to have a coffee and ponder all the secrets and the stories that the objects in the collection of Frederic Marès, that good old Barcelona eccentric who devoted his life to one passion, have to tell someone who knows how to hear them.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

The Liceu officially opened in 1847, but its history actually goes back even further, to 1837, when a new school for opera and dramatic studies was set up to promote musical education in the city. It was that school, the Philodramatic Lyceum of Montesión, now known as the Conservatori Superior de Música del Liceu, which gave the Liceu its name. The bar was set pretty high, as the first opera performed at the new venue was Vincenzo Bellini’s Norma. As was the case at every other self-respecting opera house of the day, audiences at Liceu could not get enough of Bellini, Donizetti and Rossini, that holy trinity of the Italian Bel Canto.

As the small, nondescript theatre began to gain popularity, it became clear the Liceu would need a new home. After an appeal to Queen Isabel II failed to produce the desired results, it was left to Barcelona’s own wealthy citizens to take the matter into their own hands. They set up two groups of shareholders — one that would contribute money in exchange for private boxes and seats in the new opera house, while the other group was more interested in the new shops and cafés on the Rambla. Very few opera houses in the world were built

The Gran Teatre del Liceu

And The Beat Goes On Perched on the Rambla, the Liceu is one of the most prestigious and famous opera houses of the Old World. Premiere after premiere, star performer after star performer, it has been and remains one of the world’s most storied theaters. With the venerable institution turning 170 this spring, we set out to look back to its beginnings and to see what is going on at the Liceu today

The building’s architect, Miquel Garriga i Roca, was particularly proud of his perfectly curving rows of boxes that way, by and for the people, Milan’s La Scala being the only other famous example. The Liceu went one step further, though, as anyone with even a passing interest in architecture can see. The building’s architect, Miquel Garriga i Roca, was particularly proud of his perfectly curving rows of boxes. Nothing stood in the way of ideal acoustics here. Perhaps most importantly, unlike all the other old theaters, even La Scala, the other great opera house paid for by private citizens, the Liceu had no royal box. The second half of the nineteenth century was a particularly troubled time for the Liceu. After a devastating fire, it had to be completely rebuilt, only to suffer a terrorist attack soon thereafter, when an anarchist threw a bomb into the stalls during a performance. By the 1920s, however, it

became an institution in its own right, an opera house prominent enough to welcome Sergei Diaghilev’s famous Ballets Russes. Since the early 1900s, its repertoire has run the gamut, from Baroque opera to Verismo, with the Italian Pietro Mascagni, a noted composer of the latter style, conducting at the Liceu in person. Later, its musical offerings would include works by the likes of Arnold Schoenberg, Igor Stravinsky and Paul Hindemith. The Liceu was nationalized in the 1930s and suffered a financial crisis. It was only after the Civil war that the house, or what was left of it, was restored to its previous owners. 1955 was a particularly triumphant year for the Liceu, when the famous Bayreuth festival abandoned its home venue for the first time in its history and came to Barcelona for the season with Wagner’s Ring cycle of operas.

The 1990s saw another devastating fire for the Liceu and another reconstruction. The new Liceu became a public institution and professional managers were brought in to run it. Thanks to the latest rebuilding, it now boasts state-of-the-art digital equip- Gran Teatre del Liceu www.liceubarcelona.cat ment, including individual Address: La Rambla, 51-59, screens where librettos are Metro Liceu translated into English, Tickets start at EUR 10 Spanish or Catalan, as well

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

There’s also the Little Liceu with a dedicated troupe that has been educating kids about opera and ballet and entertaining them for years now as new rehearsal and administrative spaces and a learning center complete with separate auditoriums for small-scale performances and chamber music concerts. There’s also the Little Liceu, El Petit Liceu in Catalan, with a dedicated troupe that has been educating kids about opera and ballet and entertaining them for years now.

As to the programming policy on the main stage, these days the Liceu is home to everything from opera and ballet to Flamenco and Zarzuela. While remaining true to its classical roots, the company is not afraid to experiment with contemporary genres, much to the delight of the public. For a case in point, look at Jo, Dalí, an opera in four acts on the life of Salvador Dalí and Gala that was performed here a few years ago. The chaotic relations between the great Spanish artist and his Russian wife were a heady mix of love, hate, insanity, sexual pathologies and a shared passion for art. It was this peculiar entanglement that musical director Miguel Ortega set out to explore with the Liceu’s orchestra and choir, carrying the audience away and closing to a standing ovation.

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Things To Do/Music

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Macy Gray

Ricky Martin

Critics call her voice “scratchy” and “cracked,” but still you hear no irony or mockery in their words. More the reverse: love, respect. She may have won a Grammy Award back in 2001 in the “Best Pop Artist” category, but Macy Gray considers herself a jazz singer. And not without good reason. “Stripped,” her ninth studio album, is just one more demonstration of the fact, featuring Ari Hoenig on drums, Daryl Johns on bass and Wallace Roney on trumpet. Barcelona's music fans will have a chance to judge for themselves when the curly-headed Macy brings songs from the album to town. Where: Sala Razzmatazz. Pamplona, 88, m. Marina Price: starting at 36 euros / April 1

Last fall, on the Ellen DeGeneres Show, Ricky Martin told the world about his engagement to Jwan Yosef, with whom he had been in a relationship for more than a year. It’s nice to see that positive developments in the singer’s personal life have in no way affected his working days. And in particular his One World Tour — a major undertaking that began in New Zealand back in April of 2015. They say it’s a high-quality spectacle — sound, light, scenery, dancing… and, of course, Ricky himself is inimitable. Now, finally, Barcelona gets to see all that. Where: Palau Sant Jordi. Passeig Olímpic, 5–7, m. Espanya Price: starting at 40 euros / April 16

Ed Sheeran

His debut album, entitled simply “+”, made his name. The name is as dull as a math teacher’s clothing, but it didn’t stop the album from passing two million records sold and earning Ed Sheeran “Breakthrough Act of the Year” honors. It won’t be the first time the British singer has performed in Barcelona. This time, he’ll be touring here behind his new disc, entitled ÷ (“Divide”), several songs from which have already topped the global charts. Where: Palau Sant Jordi. Passeig Olímpic, 5–7, m. Espanya Price: starting at 35 euros / April 9

Goran Bregovic

Goran Bregovic, the merry “conductor” of the “Weddings and Funerals Orchestra,” will give a concert as part of the Mil-lenni Festival, which has no lack of trump cards up its sleeve. But you can be confident that this particular performance will be one of the most vivid and memorable on offer. The playlist will feature tracks from their 2012 “Champagne for Gypsies” and the “classics” — the music that emerged during the years of friendship and collaboration with Serbian musician and film director Emir Kusturica. Where: Palau de la Música Catalana. Palau de la Música, 4–6, m. Urquinaona Price: starting at 18 euros / April 4

Ute Lemper

Yuri Temirkanov & Leticia Moreno

He’s the head conductor of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic orchestra. She is a young but already established Spanish violinist who has captivated audiences around the world with her virtuoso play and enchanting stage presence. Together with their orchestra, Yuri Temirkanov and Leticia Moreno will perform two great classic works: Shostakovich’s Violin Concerto Number 1, expressing the state of an artist under the awful pressure of a totalitarian regime, and Tchaikovsky’s Sixth Symphony, generally considered the composer’s personal confession. It’s a happening not to be missed. Where: Palau de la Música Catalana. Palau de la Música, 4–6, m. Urquinaona Price: starting at 20 euros / April 23

She could just stand on the stage for an hour in silence and still no one would have the force of will to tear their eyes from her and leave. But not to worry: Uta Lemper, the beautiful actress and singer, won’t do any such thing to her fans. Having won public acclaim with her interpretations of Edith Piaf and Marlene Dietrich, she is now venturing into the genre of the tango. Would you care to be whisked away for an evening to mid-twentieth-century Buenos Aires? The trip, to music by Argentine composer Astor Piazzolla, promises to be highly rewarding. Where: BARTs. Av. Pamplona, 62, m. Paral•lel Price: starting at 25 euros / April 7

Jay-Jay Johanson

In 2016, Jay-Jay Johanson marked an important personal milestone: the twentieth anniversary of “Whiskey,” the album with which he made his noisy entrance on the world music scene. I remember how while the critics pushed their glasses up their noses and indulged in profound speculations about “the drawling atmospheric undertones and pulsating sequences with a taste of disco-house,” music lovers were raptly listening and relistening to “So Tell The Girls That I Am Back in Town.” It’s a piercing, decadent confession and to this day one of the most anticipated songs at any concert by the Swedish musician. As no one has yet declared an end to the celebration of the album’s anniversary, the song will without a doubt be featured at the Barcelona show. Where: La [2] de Apolo. Nou de la Rambla,111,, m. Paral•lel Price: starting at 22 euros / April 22

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Insurrecciones

Things To Do/Art

The word that is the title of the exhibition is Spanish for “uprising,” “mutiny,” “rebellion.” When they become witness to such an event, even the most ordinary, earthbound people are unlikely ever to forget it. They carry it in their hearts for years. And for a creative nature, disobedience welling up and out into the streets is a still more profound kind of shock, a jolt that compels you to pick up your brush, your camera or your notebook. The exposition in the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya delves into this material in the greatest possible detail, offering us paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, manuscripts and more, all of which came to be in the wake of civil unrest between the mid-nineteenth century and our early twenty-first. Where: MNAC. Palau Nacional, Parc de Montjuïc. m. Espanya Price: 6 euros / February 24 through May 21 / Tue — Sat, 10am to 8pm, Sun and holidays, 10am to 3pm

Peter Hujar: A la velocidad de la vida

“Oh, moment — stop! You are not so magnificent, but inimitable!” cries Joseph Brodsky in his “Winter Evening in Yalta.” The famous American photographer Peter Hujar didn't bother to ask, he just went and froze that moment in the lens of his camera. It doesn't matter who or what you see in his pictures — artist and provocateur Andy Warhol, a goose in a village somewhere, a building, a tree, a pair of unnamed transvestites walking about New York at night — it's always a work of art, a thing that makes you shudder or pause. Or that simply elicits sheer aesthetic pleasure. The author of many celebrity portraits and hotly controversial photo series on gay issues, Hujar was the creator of the famous image of actress Candy Darling on her deathbed. The photo by that name is considered one of the greatest photos of the twentieth century. Where: Sala Fundación MAPFRE. Diputació, 250. m. Passeig de Gracia Price: 3 euros / January 27 through April 30th / Friday 2pm to 8pm, Tue to Sat 10am to 8pm, Sun 11am to 7pm

El Celler de Can Roca, De la Tierra a la Luna

Anyone who lives in Catalonia knows their names: Chef Joan Roca, sommelier and restaurant manager Josep Roca and pastry chef Jordi Roca. And more, they feel the same great rush of pride when they hear the three brothers' family name. The trio’s efforts have kept El Celler de Can Roca, their Girona restaurant, in The World's 50 Best Restaurants for several years running — and made them the talk of the culinary world media. From the Earth to the Moon is an exhibition that tells how the whole story began, touching upon a dozen or so crucial topics, among them the fate of a family business as it is passed down from generation to generation and the role of such an institution in the history and the economy of the region. Where: Palau Robert. Passeig de Gràcia, 107. m. Diagonal Price: free / November 22 through April 23 / Fri — Sat 10am to 8pm, Sun 10am to 2:30pm

World Press Photo 17

World Press Photo, the most prestigious photojournalism competition out there, has been running since 1955. Over the years, the world has learned that it's not a place to look for simple and happy images. The winners' shots reflect the most important world events over the previous year and, unfortunately, very rarely are they associated with positive emotions. This year, the jury reviewed over eighty thousand pictures by photographers from one hundred and twenty-five countries. The first prize was awarded to Burhan Ozbilici, who captured the murder of Russian Ambassador Andrey Karlov. As far as Spain is concerned, Francis Perez made the finals for an image of a loggerhead turtle caught in fishing nets. Where: СССB. Montalegre, 5. m. Universitat Price: 6 euros / April 29 through June 5 / Tue — Thu, 11am to 8pm, Fri 11am to 9pm, Sat-Sun, 10am to 9pm

Pere Torné Esquius

It looks like Pere Torné Esquius didn't find his fellow human beings particularly inspiring. You can judge by the works left to us by the Catalan painter, who lived and worked at the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth. What does recur time and again in his works, however, are depictions of interiors. They are small format paintings that sometimes look like a child's drawing, but they have a depth to them that is a mark of true art. One of the most famous is the “Garden with a Rocking Chair,” where a silent and flat world, with no visible human presence, is nevertheless full of certain fixity and hidden life. Where: MNAC. Palau Nacional, Parc de Montjuïc. m. Espanya Price: 6 euros / April 7 through July 9 / Tue — Sat, 10am to 8pm, Sun and holidays, 10am to 3pm

David Bowie Is

Before departing from this world, David Bowie accomplished a great many good and important things. Some of them influenced the development of contemporary music, culture, and show business generally, some of them left an imprint on the minds and fates of individual people. And it's hard to even imagine how many such people there were. There's a truly planetary love for this musician, which makes the resounding success of the exhibition dedicated to him a foregone conclusion. Conceived and created in London within the walls of the Victoria and Albert Museum, written up in the Times as “stylish and scandalous,” it brings together three-hundred-odd objects of various kinds from the Bowie archives. Among them: photographs, album covers, manuscripts with hand-written song lyrics, costumes and even stage scenery mock-ups. The British rock musician's belongings will spend four full months here in Barcelona. Where: Museu del Disseny de Barcelona. Pl. de les Glòries Catalanes, 37–38. m. Glories Price: starting at 14.90 euros / May 25 through September 20 / Friday, 4pm to 8pm, Tue to Thu and Sun, 10am to 8pm, Fri and Sat, 10am to 9pm

100

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Expats Text: Anna Baraban Photos: Maria Hlebnikova

“

Julia

Kauhova Latvia

The Kindness of Strangers

Moving to another country means you don’t have a second to spare. There is a new home to be set up and a new job or your studies to arrange, not to mention making a life for yourself outside of all that. Some people handle it better than others. And there are even a few who somehow find extra time — to help other people. We spoke to three volunteers who moved to Barcelona from Latvia, Peru and the US about what it’s like when you can do something good for other people without ever expecting anything in return

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Born in Riga, Julia first came to Barcelona in 2011 as an Erasmus exchange student from the University of Latvia. “I can't really say I fell in love with the city right away. But Spanish and Catalan did strike a chord with me as a linguist.” When she came back to Barcelona, it was to get a Master's degree in Spanish and Latin American literature at the University here. “Now that was a disaster in the beginning. I couldn’t understand a thing in my first lecture — and the next thing I know I have to make a presentation on futurism. And that’s how I spent the next two years, one presentation after another; I more or less moved into the library. But in the end I got my degree. Although I’m still waiting for the King of Spain to put his signature on my diploma,” she says. Take into account that Julia always had to work while she was studying. “I’ve done pretty much anything you can imagine. I taught Russian, I worked at a flower shop, I made lookbooks for a modelling agency. At that last job I hit a real creative block and I knew I needed to set my sails against the wind, to change something, so I quit.”

Kauhova has a rule for herself — she’s only going to do something if she’s really interested in doing it. And that’s what brought her to the volunteer movement. “Back in Riga, I tried to become a Red Cross volunteer, but they rejected me. And they never told me why! I was really upset about it. Then I came here and I heard they were looking for volunteers for the Landscape Film Festival. It’s a very cool event that supports young directors making short films. I submitted my CV and they took me.” At the Landscape festival, Julia worked as a photographer. It turned out to be really valuable experience, she had a chance to see the festival from the inside and meet some very interesting people. “There was this night when some of the volunteers had this idea to go out to the Barcelona bunkers at five in the morning (the Bunkers de Carmel, a place with one of the best views in the whole city) to shoot sunrise. It was raining buckets and the photos did not turn out particularly well. But there was a powerful creative impulse there, and a beautiful scene on the level of personal human relationships. We all have great memories of that night,” she says. On the closing night of the festival, all the volunteers were invited onto the stage in a great hall. “The emotion was surreal. You just stand there and think: ‘What did I do to deserve this?’ But there are all those people clapping, applauding for you,” she recalls. After that, our hero wasn’t about to abandon her volunteer work. She took pictures and helped man the information desk at a photography festival and at a human rights festival. And then, last year, an intriguing ad caught her eye. An adult school in the Sant Martí neighbourhood was looking for a Russian language teacher. There was no money in it, of course, but that didn’t deter her. “When I taught at the acad-

emy, I realized I couldn’t do it for money — if you got paid, the magic went out of the teaching. In my family, if you have something special to share, you share it for free,” she says. They were thrilled to have the altruistic young teacher, of course. She still works there today, and with the same enthusiasm. “Public speaking is really stressful for me, but in front of my class I’m completely at ease. The atmosphere in our classroom is really cool, we have a great time together, we laugh all the time. The class is on Friday night. I won’t lie to you, sometimes I’d rather just take a hot bath and do nothing. But once I’m there in the classroom and this wave of positive energy rolls over me and I just can’t regret anything,” she says. There are fifteen students in Julia’s class, and it couldn’t be a more diverse bunch, ranging from a twenty-three year old man to a woman in her seventies. Kauhova can talk about them for hours on end. “I had this one old lady, she was around eighty. She only spoke Catalan and she couldn’t hear very well. But she kept coming to class because she had a Russian grandson and wanted to be able to talk to him. There was a man who had been to the Soviet Union when he was young and he was so impressed with the country he decided he wanted to learn the language now. And there are these two women, they just adore this Russian song, Moscow Nights. We sang it together once and that was it,” she recalls. For seniors the free Russian classes are another way to get out and socialize. The younger students may be genuinely interested in learning something new. “One of my students loves this heavy metal band, Aria. He brings their CDs to class and asks me to explain what the songs mean. I do my best, but I can’t always make them out myself,” says Julia, smiling. Kauhova is convinced that the key to volunteer work is managing your time well. “Before I started doing this, I thought I didn’t have a spare minute for anything. And then I realized it's all about setting your priorities. It's just that there are people who want to share their time with others and people who don’t. Some of my friends ask me ‘Does it pay? No? Then why bother?’ But I think volunteering is a huge boost when it comes to social contacts. And the experience I get is tremendous. When I go back home to Riga one day, I’ll do everything to make the experience pay off.”

101

102

“

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Peru

Carlos

Meneses Salinas

“Well, say there’s a marathon in Barcelona. Besides the paramedics, police and firefighters, it needs a team of thirty volunteers. So I’d be responsible for coordinating them. If one team reports they found an unconscious man on the street, I would contact the nearest ambulance and dispatch them to the scene. These things happen all the time”

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

“In 2004 I turned thirty. I was completely free and started thinking about moving to another country. I wanted to try something new, to travel, to get to know different cultures,” says Carlos Meneses, a native of Peru, as he begins to share his story with us. Back home in Lima, he had studied to be a technical analyst. He was already working in IT when his co-workers told him about a local company that was sending Peruvians to work in Spain. “That wasn’t quite what I was planning for back then. I wanted to move to Australia, not to Europe. But the opportunity was just too good to pass up, so I sent my CV. They offered me a choice between Málaga, Madrid and Barcelona. I picked Barcelona mainly because it had the sea and a good soccer team.” Carlos started volunteering ten years ago, when he was still in Lima. “Ever since I was a kid I dreamed of being a firefighter. Since we only have volunteer firefighters in Peru, I decided I could give this some of my spare time, too. So I went to a fire station and started training. The classes were after work, over the weekend, sometimes even at night,” he remembers. After Carlos finished his training, he was a firefighter — in Peru, they also act as paramedics. “One day we picked up this man on the street and took him to hospital. I waited outside as my crew went to check him in. And then this old lady just comes up and takes my hand and says ʻThank you for everything you do.ʼ It was really intense, I was on the verge of tears. She didn’t even know who I was, she just saw me in my uniform next to a hospital. That was the biggest reward for all of my years of volunteering,” he says. The work was anything but easy, though. “On an average day we had nine or ten incidents. I was never afraid, I never thought about the fact that I was risking my life. Fighting fires just became something routine,” Meneses says. Only once did he really feel he was in a really life-threatening situation. And it wasn’t the fire that was the danger, it was people. In 2000, Alberto Fujimori was elected to his third term as president of Peru. Many Peruvians took to the streets to protest what they saw as election fraud. Buildings and cars were torched all around the city. At some point, a mob surrounded Carlos’ fire truck and started breaking the windows. “Now that was really scary. We could not move or get out of the truck. Two of our guys were injured. It felt like war,” he says.

After he moved to Barcelona, Carlos wanted to continue to volunteer as a firefighter. But turned out that wasn’t such an easy thing to do. Barcelona has a professional fire brigade and the selection process is quite strict. “There can be up to a thousand people competing for just thirty jobs. And most of these guys are young and have excellent training. Only some of the small towns here have volunteer firefighters,” he says, places like Santa Maria de Palautordera. That’s where a friend eventually took Carlos. “I started training with the boys there, but I didn’t last long. They don’t do things like we did them in Lima. The volunteers are not the first responders here. They only come when the main brigade is already in place, they really just provide support. Besides, the town is pretty far from Barcelona and it wasn’t easy to keep going there and back.” It was the Red Cross that really brought Carlos back to volunteer work. “I learned a lot with them. They gave me training in first aid, in logistics, in a lot of other things,” Carlos says. Now he is a kind of universal soldier, always ready to respond in a difficult situation. “Oh, now I can head a team of volunteers responsible for safety at a mass event, for example. What does it look like? Well, say there’s a marathon in Barcelona. Besides the paramedics, police and firefighters, it needs a team of thirty volunteers. So I’d be responsible for coordinating them. If one team reports they found an unconscious man on the street, I would contact the nearest ambulance and dispatch them to the scene. These things happen all the time. I had people falling off the steps at the Camp Nou, I had people who got sick after they drank too much at a show. I had this woman who was six months pregnant and her water broke as she was watching the castellers perform (castellers are traditional Catalonian performers; they climb on top of one another to build a human tower at festivals around the country) — we had to rush her to the hospital right away,” he says.

You might wonder whether Carlos feels his volunteering had a greater impact in Peru or in Spain. “Well, back home I worked directly with people who needed help. What I do here in Spain is more in the way of prevention, you might say. Except when we pick up the homeless on the streets in the winter and take them to shelters, maybe. I do sometimes miss my old volunteer days back in Peru. Either way, though, I feel I am doing a good job here, too.” Less than a year ago Carlos became a father. Now he does his best to spend as much time with his family as he can, and that means less time volunteering. “But I’ll be back, no doubt about it. I want my daughter to know how important it is to help people who really need help. I hope I can set a good example for her,” he says.

103

104

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

“The region that we were working in was very poor, but its culture was incredibly rich. The girls there wear these old, worn traditional dresses. Volunteers were bringing them regular Western clothes, like jeans and T-shirts. That kind of help destroys their traditions. To avoid that, we have to stop acting like some kind of invaders from another world who come in and ‘fix’ other people’s lives. We always have to take local traditions into account”

Kaitlyn

Winegardner USA

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

“I hate it when people ask me where I’m from. I don’t have an answer to that question. I’m a citizen of the world,” says Kaitlyn Winegardner. As dramatic as that may sound, in a way it’s true. Born in the USA, Kaitlyn had travelled all over the world by the time she was twenty-nine. In 2010 she came to Madrid and fell head over heels in love with Spain. Her dream of returning to Spain came true in 2015 when she stepped off the plane in Barcelona to embark upon a Master’s degree in Immigration Management at the Pompeu Fabra University. “I love everything here. The culture, the people, the openness,” she says. One thing that struck Kaitlyn in particular is the fact that Spaniards seemed not to have any stereotypes about age. “Every time we speak my mom keeps asking me, “when are you coming back home? It’s time to start a real life, that’s what people your age are supposed to do!” That means buying a house, buying a car, getting married and having kids. In Europe, and particularly in Spain, they don’t think that way. You can still live with your parents at thirty and nobody thinks it’s weird. What really matters is enjoying your life and not wasting time achieving some kind of illusion of success.” Kaitlyn started helping others when she was very young. Among other things, volunteer work is something many American children and teenagers get to try as part of their curriculum at school. She was nineteen when she told her mother she was flying to Ecuador for two weeks to teach English and math at an orphanage. “I didn’t know a word of Spanish and had never been out of the country before. It was a crazy idea — but I did it,” she says. Her first experience with volunteering was so inspiring that soon after she came back to Boston, Kaitlyn joined the local Rotaract club, a branch of Rotary International. Her first tasks were things like community service — beach and park cleanups, visits to prisons or hospitals, things like that. But soon she was travelling internationally, too, to places like Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Panama, Nicaragua, Peru and Mexico. Given the important place volunteer work had always had in Kaitlyn’s life, it’s small wonder that one of the first things she did after moving to Barcelona was to contact the local Rotaract club. It was a small outfit back then, only four members, but that did not stop the American student and her new friends from plunging in with a passion. “We helped care for babies from poor families, we bought gadgets for kindergartens, we lectured at colleges on HIV prevention. Not long ago, we also helped buy winter clothes for Syrian refugees who were settling in Barce-

lona,” she says. But what Kaitlyn finds most engaging are activities where she can both help others and help foster intercultural exchanges. Take a recent Day of the Dead celebration, where volunteers helped prepare traditional Mexican dishes and sell them, all the money going to renovate the dormitory at a girls’ orphanage in Mexico. “We all came to Barcelona from different countries and this cultural exchange is the first thing we can do to get to know each other better,” she Kaitlyn.

Ten years of volunteer work have taught Kaitlyn Winegardner a lot. She has learned to think through what she wants to do, to take into account the kind of consequences her actions may have. Case in point: her trips to Guatemala. “The region that we were working in was very poor, but its culture was incredibly rich. The girls there wear these old, worn traditional dresses. Volunteers were bringing them regular Western clothes, like jeans and T-shirts. That kind of help destroys their traditions. To avoid that, we have to stop acting like some kind of invaders from another world who come in and ‘fix’ other people’s lives. We always have to take local traditions into account,” Kaitlyn explains. But what about Kaitlyn’s personal life? Does she still have time to spend with herself and her family? Her sadness is obvious when we ask her. Yes, she is restless, and it does get in the way of her spending time with her family. “My niece is four years old and for most of her life I’ve been abroad and I just haven’t been able to be around. Or take this new house my family just bought. Mom called me and asked me to come home and help her with the move. And I had to tell her I couldn’t because I was flying to Lebanon. But my Dad, my boyfriend and my friends all support me,” she says. In Lebanon, Kaitlyn is going to work at a Syrian refugee camp. “Frankly, I’m nervous about it. A Western woman alone in the Middle East? It’s not going to be easy. But I can’t wait to give it a try. Bridging the divides between peoples, religions and mentalities — that’s what really matters. But to tell you the truth, I dream of coming back to Barcelona after that. This is where I really feel at home.”

105

106

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Routes

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

Text: Agatha Smith Photo: Maria Hlebnikova

2. Parc del Laberint d’Horta

Set on the former estate of the aristocratic Desvalls family, this plot of land features the heaviest concentration of Greek gods and heroes in Barcelona. It’s also a good place to test just how well you really cope with a bit of stress… which may become an issue when after your fifth attempt you still can’t find your way out of the Horta’s famous hedge maze. But keep cool, you’ll figure it out — nobody, the park wardens tell us, has ever spent the night trapped inside this park, one of Barcelona’s oldest and finest. Not yet, anyway. Address: Passeig dels Castanyers, 1, Metro Mundet Admission and Hours: EUR 2.25, open daily from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., free on Sundays and Wednesdays, open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Walks in the Park Spring is the perfect time for a leisurely visit to one of Barcelona’s many parks and gardens. Whether you’re looking for a stroll with a significant other, an outing with friends, a walk with your pet or just a chance to spend some time with a book, here are our picks for the greenest, most pleasant and most culturally significant parks in Barcelona 1. Parc de la Ciutadella

Incontrovertibly one of the city’s best parks today; it’s hard to believe that a few centuries ago this was the site of a grim fortress called the Citadel, its guns trained upon the obstinate Catalans who still refused to recognize their Castilian overlords. These days, the place is best known for the musicians unobtrusively occupying its bandstands, for its lake and its resident ducks, and for its inviting lawns. The parks also has ping pong tables available free of charge to all comers. Just don’t forget to bring your rackets and a ball! Address: Passeig Picasso, 21, Metro Arc de Triomf Admission and Hours: free of charge, open daily from 10 a. m. to 10.30 p. m.

3. Jardins de la Universitat de Barcelona

Goldfish and frogs make their homes in the small stone pools scattered about this shady garden, whose wroughtiron park benches are very much in demand with the University students and professors, not to mention the local cats. It’s an idyllic scene. But the most important thing about this bucolic place are the eighty tree and plant species that grow here. As you stroll down the pathways, you can see an aloe tree the size of an elephant, several varieties of palm and even a South American ombú tree, its huge canopy providing refuge from the sun and from the insects, which give the ombú a wide berth. Address: Diputació, 230, Metro Universitat Admission and Hours: free of charge, open weekdays from 8 a. m. to 9 p. m.

107

108

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

4. Parc del Centre del Poblenou

6. Parc del Guinardó

Since it opened in 2008, this park has remained entrenched in the list of Barcelona’s craziest and most avant-garde spots. It was designed by Jean Nouvel, the French architect who had built the fanciful Torre Agbar skyscraper. Boasting 55,000 square metres of carefully trimmed trees and shrubs, the park is a riot of whimsical lamps, benches, art installations and swallows painted on portholes in concrete walls. Don’t miss The Well of the World, a crater with a computer inside that you can use to connect with people at the farthest corners of the Earth. Address: Av. Diagonal, 130, Metro Poblenou Admission and Hours: free of charge, open daily from 10 a. m. to 8 p. m.

Historians have split into two camps when it comes to the etymology of the name of this park, one of Barcelona’s largest and most verdant. Some think it’s related to foxes that were once found here, while others believe the name points to highwaymen who might have found you in a back alley… in any event, both are long since vanished. The park is now firmly in the possession of young mothers with their strollers, old ladies with their dogs, bicyclists and young couples. The last usually wind up at the top of the hill, near the Bunkers. This grim concrete structure, dating back to the Civil War, is actually the best panoramic lookout in all Barcelona, its killer view of the city spreading out beneath your feet. Address: Garriga i Roca, 1–13, Metro Guinardó, Hospital de Sant Pau Admission and Hours: free, open daily around the clock

7. Parc de Cervantes

Grab a copy of Don Quixote and let’s spend some quality time with it in a park named after one of Spain’s most famous writers. That is, if you can think about reading in a rose garden stretching ten full acres and filled with ten thousand rose bushes in two thousand different varieties, coming in every imaginable colour and blowing the visitors away with their scent. To catch your breath, go and enjoy the wonderful view of Barcelona from the semi-circular gazebo at the entrance to the rose garden from the Ronda de Dalt. Address: Av Diagonal, 706, Metro Zona Universitària Admission and Hours: free, open daily from 10 a. m. to 8 p. m.

5. Jardí Botànic

Admit it — when you were a kid, did you collect pressed flowers or grow pea plants on the windowsill? Either way, you’ll be taken with the Barcelona Botanical Gardens. The place boasts thousands of rare plants from Australia, the Americas, Africa, Japan and other exotic locales, and all year round they fill the air with their scents and the sounds of rustling leaves and seeds dropping to the soil. Note the unusual landscape design, too. The alternating triangles of sun and shade created by architects Carles Ferrater and Josep Lluís Canosa never fail to impress architecture and landscape design buffs. Address: Doctor Font i Quer, 2, Metro Espanya Admission and Hours: EUR 3.50, open daily from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., free on Sundays after 3 p.m.

109

110

LET PROFESSIONAL PEOPLE MANAGE YOUR PROPERTY 

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

8. Jardins del teatre Grec

Come to this garden at the teatre Grec, built in 1929 for the universal Exhibition, and you’ll find a sleepy little spot, the silence disturbed only by the bees buzzing among the roses, the gently bubbling fountain and the turtle doves cooing in the trees. When there’s concert in the amphitheater, though, it’s another story — the place becomes a riot of people and motion. the great stone bowl, with its perfect acoustics and breathtaking, dizzying views of the stage, forms a magnificent backdrop for photographs — you can tell your friends that you didn’t just visit Barcelona this summer, but Athens, too. Address: Passeig de Santa Madrona, 38, Metro Espanya Admission and hours: free, open daily from 10 a. m. to 9 p. m./10.30 p. m.

111

Housing Bcn provides Property Management Services in Barcelona to owners of residential and comercial properties. Our mission is to care about your property, guarantee tits safety and ensure profitability. We help you to manage the life cycle of your property, including acquisition, control, accountability, responsibility, maintenance, utilization and disposition. Our team is ready to help you in Legal Advice issues, Registration Matters, Real Estate Process and Advice on Formalities Inheritances. T : +34 669 097 235 info@housing-bcn.com www.housing-bcn.com Registre d'agents immobiliaris de Catalunya aicat 6280

9. Parc de Carles i

himalayan cypresses, grassy knolls and a peculiar something that gets even the laziest visitors to pull out their cameras: a six-meter high sculpture entitled El Culo, which, in Spanish, means “the buttocks.” And that what it looks like — the creation of the Basque artist Eduardo Úrculo is dedicated to Santiago roldán, then President of a government-sponsored holding company created to build the city’s Olympics infrastructure. One has to wonder what exactly roldán had to do to the sculptor to deserve this. the sculpture was a great hit with the locals, though, leading Úrculo to proclaim that Barcelona was the only city in the world where one could put up a monument to somebody’s rear end. Address: Av. de Icària, 90, Metro Ciutadella — Vila Olímpica Admission and hours: free, open daily around the clock.

First lesson for free ! Come and try ! Carrer de Cabanes, 40 08004 Barcelona

+34 633 239 347, +34 931 729 897 +34 722 172 565

matrioshkabcn @gmail.com

matrioshka-bcn.com

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

CAN WE TALK? Text: Sergei Malkin

Grown-Up Kids

It takes a less than a second to send an email around the world. We cross an ocean in a few short hours. There are people who somehow become rich or famous in a matter of minutes. Everything happens far faster in today’s world. There is one stark exception to the rule, however: growing up seems to be something our bold and dynamic generation has serious trouble with. Let’s talk about it, shall we? At six, my nephew thinks he’s all grown up, that he’s seen it all. “What do you want to do when you grow up?” I asked him once. “I want to be a firefighter,” he said, without looking up from his Lego bricks. “I want to save people who are on fire.” Oh, God, not another lifesaver in the family! I say to myself. But before I can think it through, he changes his mind. “No, I want to be Dad. Because he’s the best person in the world.” I feel a rush of relief at that, and I’m proud of my brother. Adults often ask children these kinds of questions. It’s how we try to get to know them better. We want life to be better for them. We went through it ourselves, as the grownups in our lives brought us up, believed in us and watched over us. They did their best to give us the benefit of their experience, to help us steer clear of mistakes, to get us ready for a life that we still find confusing even now that we are no longer kids.

“I want to be Dad. Because he’s the best person in the world.” I feel a rush of relief at that, and I’m proud of my brother Looking at myself and the world around me, I can’t help thinking ours are times of paradox, inconsistency and ambiguity. The streets of Bar-

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

celona are endlessly full of Peter Pan types, forty-somethings in sneakers, a skateboard under the arm. And what may be even more prevalent is for people that age to still be looking for their calling, still dabbling in this or that — “just temporarily, of course,” they’ll tell you. And even

We end up internally stuck, living our lives as if in a dream, as if this were not yet our real adult life though both types surely have some fun doing it, it’s hard to imagine they can avoid a vague sense of discontent. Unless there are pills of other kind or other, of course, but even those don’t last long.

The paradox is that even if, physically, our maturation comes at a younger age, the pressures that modern society and new technologies place upon us grow greater, as well. We end up internally stuck, living our lives as if in a dream, as if this were not yet our real adult life. There’s also a certain vagueness, a lack of clarity that are another symptom of the times. It’s like the “Interested” button on Facebook events that they introduced for people who don’t feel comfortable hitting “Not Going,”’ but who aren’t ready to commit, either. A lot of people these days are stuck somewhere in between distinct age brackets, in between professions, between their own “yes” and “no.” What this vagueness points to looks very much like a sign of an adolescence still searching for its true identity. So when do we really grow up? Is it when we start to understand all those things our parents don’t talk to us about? Or is it when we ourselves start avoiding speaking our minds and start being deliberately vague? Growing up, above all else, is about developing our personal identities. In this respect, things used to be much easier. There were distinct events that most people could match to a given phase of life. Coming of age would give us independence, and it called for important decisions. We had to move out, find (or make) our own home, get a job, start a family. That road to happiness and satisfaction was well defined. But now it has

become a race most of us simply don’t have the stomach to run to end without tripping. And those few who can are not obviously going to feel the happier for it.

It is little wonder, then, that most of us start questioning the very concept of that race. In Spain today, more young people continue to live with their parents than move out. Trying to explain this phenomenon, sociologists tend to blame the current financial crisis and its influence on that particular generation. Psychologists, though, see it as an unfinished adult development, some defining it as a deviation and others, as a new developmental phase.

I would compare this phenomenon to an adolescent trying to pick a college to enrol in. There are so many different options and possibilities, and one still has to cope with their personal anxieties and try to live up to other people’s expectations. Afraid to make the wrong choice, we end up stuck. Even if we do pick one option, we’re likely to remain confused and uncertain. Even as we decide to stick with the choice we made, on the inside we continue searching. It’s like a draft of our lives that we just can’t finish, which would let us take the decision to start living a real life. We don’t grow up in a void. There are people all around us, people who can accurately diagnose what is going on. Those who love us often try to steer us away from error. In doing so, they may

teach us how to avoid these mistakes in the first place — but that deprives us of our freedom to make our own way in the world. Indeed, it is our own experience in developing and defending our identity in our interactions with our parents at an early age that defines our freedom, both internally and externally. “Am I free in the choices I make? Am I free to change my mind and pick another option?” Whether we are able to honestly answer these questions is a foolproof test of whether we are really adults yet.

We may have to test ourselves daily, never stopping until we honestly find what we have been searching for So where do we go from here? I think we need to figure out our abilities and our limits, and then to make the choice, even if it means real challenges ahead. Even if it means going through the ordeal time and time again. We may have to test ourselves daily, never stopping until we honestly find what we have been searching for. And who knows, we may turn out to have been searching for ourselves all along, still living with our parents. But what really matters is that it be an honest choice, worthy of a responsible adult.

www.therapy-barcelona.com 636 946 274

Illustration: Cyril Rolando, When She Was Six

112

113

114

Your City Barcelona №17. Spring 2017

The best space for your company right in the center of Barcelona

New space available now

six rooms will accommodate up to six people, four multi-functional rooms seating up to forty people, cafeteria, reception and waiting area All overlooking the city, the sea and the mountains. Please, visit our site to ﬁnd out more!

+34 931 599 058 info@hubandin.com Rambla de Cataluña 115 BIS, 9 08008 Barcelona

115

116

Your City Barcelona â&#x201E;&#x2013;17. Spring 2017