1 post tagged “madrid”
Now that I've lazed around and can't remember half of my
trip, I'm gonna post! Not all at once, clearly, as even without half my
memories, I'm a long and rambling narrator. Bah.
We start logically, at the beginning of the trip.
I always enjoy holidays, from start to finish. From the pre-trip purchases (travelsized toiletries and items bought in the name of acting as a transatlantic courier) to the hours waiting at the airport to the actual relaxing and eating. This was (in theory) no exception. I arrive three hours ahead of time to a short security line and a comfortable wait in B terminal reading my new seedy romance novel and listening to my new travel-happy playlist of music. I was positive even though I was still feeling the discomfort of surgery. I pushed it aside.
This joy lasted until hour 7 on the plane. Suddenly I was burning hot, needed to pee, and was trapped in a window seat. My way out was blocked by two sleeping behemoth boys. I suffered in silence for the last bit of the plane ride to Paris...well, except my backseat neighbor might have noticed me throwing myself against my seat and trying to stretch and fan myself frantically. This is why I request aisle seats usually. They couldn't accommodate me. Bah again.
Paris is where I discovered that I had a new airport to hate: Charles du Gaulle. Their sins? Annoyingly slow customs officers who are also snotty as fuck. Misdirecting travelers to the wrong security lines. Making me go through security even though I just needed to make a transfer in 1.5 hours. Clumping me with the huge tour group from China -- just because I managed to get in between them -- when they were stalled at security for some question or other. Balls. Almost making me miss my connection. I don't care that 'They're Gallic' is normally an acceptable excuse. No fucking excuses!
So I grabbed my luggage (yay!) when I arrived in Barcelona. I figured out that I needed to change terminals to check-in at Spanair -- it's cheaper to go roundtrip out of Barcelona and catch a domestic flight to Madrid than it is to fly one-way to Madrid then one way back from Barcelona to home. It wasn't busy where I was, so I didn't anticipate the clusterfuck in Terminal B. It took me 2.5 hours to get to the check-in counter. I arrived at 9:10 am, and had to catch a 12:20 pm flight. That's ridonkulous. I also learned that the Spanish do not respect personal space, lines, feet, each other, or deodorant….So it was that I learned what it felt like to be that person that runs onto a plane last minute, because the board flashed BOARDING as I ran for my gate…Except I wasn’t that person. What I was running for was the bus to take me to my plane. So good. - It was good until I got to Madrid and found out that my luggage, along with half the flight’s luggage had been left in Barcelona by accident. Drink in my pain with me. Drink it! At this point, I had been in transit for over 24 hours. I barely checked my rage.
Two hours and one lost soul later, I had reported my lost luggage – they assured me that it would arrive on the 5 pm or 7 pm flight that night – and full-on panicking about how I was supposed to meet up with WishBear[WB] and her friend [J] hours ago. Hours ago…somewhere in the airport. Yeah. We had a lengthy discussion later about how we have great plans, but no ability to follow through. Was it a Simpson’s thing? The underwear eaters episode? There’s a step one, and a step three, and the step two? we figure out along the way. So step one was, go to Spain. Step three was, meet up in Spain. Step two? Please.
I took the bus to Terminal 4. I took the
bus back to Terminal 2. I walked around, felt broken, and decided to take
a taxi to the hotel. Clearly she would be smart enough to write down the
hotel information that I sent to her aeons ago, no? And she was!…sort
of. She had to find an Internet kiosk to look up the info again, but she
made it to our hotel! Yes she did! And our room was adorable, yes
it was. This picture isn't quite representative of just how cute, but I wasn't going to adjust for light or take a fresh picture while it was tidy. And no judging me for taking bathroom pictures. I'm fascinated by bidets! I digress....
They were both appalled by my lost luggage. I suspect WB mourned her Skippy and Welch’s jelly (both trapped in my lost luggage) more than anything. ^_^ But more importantly? We were hungry. This is where they recalled that the Europeans have no sense of time, and ate at horrible hours…and drank the rest of the time. So we cooled our heels for a spell before taking to the streets, where we wandered around deciding on nothing, where a portly fellow tried to sit on top of J, where WB made us walk up a mountain to see Plaza Major and Puerto del Sol…Here is a mishmash of initial outside tourist pictures:
I had my first Spanish paella – not great, but edible – and I bought my first ‘I need clothes or I’m going to die!’ outfit of the trip: a light cotton tank top with green crochet straps and liberal bedazzling, and a vibrant citrus orange skirt, also bedazzled. The picture doesn't do justice to the color. Let me see if I can find a better color swatch...Too lazy. Imagine it a little brighter. :)
I had to have something to sleep in! I wasn’t going to sleep naked, and I wasn’t sleeping in my black trapeze top and khakis. No sir.
I went to sleep that night quite soundly, but not before finding out that our hotel TV was awesome. They have a FOX channel with dubbed over shows like House, Roswell, Smallville, Boston Legal, Brothers & Sisters, etc. Roswell, ya’ll. Not to mention the German MTV channel. Score! Of course there were even more craptastic shows, like The Ghost Whisperer, Cold Case and Close to Home….I don’t know why. They don’t even work at home…why would they import it? - The next day dawned with clear intent: shopping, food, and maybe some sightseeing…as if we knew where we were going. We had a fun!map, and that’s all we went with. We are awesome and clearly deranged.
We crawled out around noon? They were both concerned about the heat after suffering through Greece and Italy, but I poo-pooed their wariness and went about jauntily. Hey, I was in repeat clothing! I had wet underwear hanging off a hook to dry!
We ended up walking up to the nearest plaza and
sitting down in a little restaurant called Natur Bier. Clearly, natural
beer. Go go gadget four year of German! I tried to order everything
on the menu, but the man cut us off. He eyed us as sissy girls who couldn't
eat, and we took his advice, but vowed to prove him wrong. He was not
wrong. He brought out the chorizo and the croquettes and the
calamari. And the Sangria! Fantastic Sangria. Sweet,
delicious nectar of life... Mmmm....Sidetrack! Anyhow. So he
brought that all out, and we faltered. My tummy was full -- traitorous
mofo. So by the time the paella (round two, Madrid) came out, I was
terrified. Couldn't possibly do it. Neither could J, really.
WB looked at us both with a mighty dose of shame, and stepped up to do her
duty. Witness:
She schooled us both. Do not judge her by the leftover bits. She decimated more than half of it herself. And she is wee. Also note the gigantic lemon wedge...it would have served better in my drink.
After ye good olde satisfying lunch, it was off to do some more shopping to clothe my tired and sweaty ass back. I hadn't been whinging that much (I hope), but the promise of more was on the horizon, lest I get clean with new clothes!
I struck joyous gold at Zara. I bought two dresses --
both of them happily not too out of place with the rest of my wardrobe.
See:
Prior to Zara, we had gone into a Bershka, which
was...no. Seriously. Well, I'm not being fair. Anyone who
thinks the Lily Pulitzer color scheme is their cup of tea needs to go to
Bershka. The colors make Miami seem muted by comparison. No
joke. Go. See. Be attacked by the fluoro (as Fly
calls it. Hee!) just like my damn retinas. Crazy, ya'll. Here, go visit their website. I'll admit, the intro is interesting...okay, it might give you vertigo...but go anyway: Bershka!
I saw maybe two scraps of black fabric in the whole place. WB was happily rummaging for some sweater, J was wandering with a scared look on her face, so I ran for the hills and a bottle of Coke. Then, the haven of Zara, where they were confused as well. Bother. But not me!
Happy with my purchases we wended our way down the Gran Via. This road, by all accounts has a lot of shopping. It isn't as grand as Salamanca, but it is still clogged with people and cars and traffic and all that is horribly messy about humanity. We stayed to one side and giggled our way down the road.
We noted that there was a TGI Friday's here. This will come into play the next day... There were also restaurants a plenty and some shops too. It was a pleasant sloped hill...I was only afraid that we'd have to walk back up. Of course. That's my concern. Hee. So lazy.
We found ourselves at the bottom of the hill, and subsequently the Plaza de España. This is where we saw the statue of Cervantes and Don Quixote. We saw the crazy drunk woman lounging in the fountain -- this does not mean that only crazy drunk people lounge in fountains! Sane people do it too! We saw people sunbathing, and some fun tourists, and wacky stupid graffiti. Not worth a mention. Mini pictorial:
It was very pretty. Not the fountain lady -- she changed her pants in front of us. Not a show I wanted to see. I don't think J and WB wanted to see it either. So we left. And we had a plan. No climbing up the hill for us. No! Now that we were down here, we could cut through the plaza and see the Palacio Real and the Almudena Cathedral. Score! The weather was nice, dinner was hours away. And we had to give the old college try at being a tourist in truth. I think I did better than the other two. Pictures!
And that was the Palacio Real, the Campo del Moro and the Almudena Cathedral. So exquisite. I went in and snapped pictures galore, the girls were more subdued. Hello. Pretty colors! Catholics know how to pretty their holy houses, ya'll. Alas. By now the sun was setting, so time to book it home to siesta. Which is what we did. Except I couldn't, because I finally got a call from sweet sweet lovable favorite hotel guy ever Cesar, telling me that my luggage had arrived. Huzzah! I rejoiced. I drew out everything from my luggage. The only damage was a slightly leaky oil that made everything smell like camphor and eucalyptus. Success! So happy I threw on my green dress and we went back for more goodness and sangria in the plaza.
This would have been nice, had there not been a man with an accordion, and a man with a recorder who walked circles around us and made us want to commit murder. Although I believe one of us pointed out the inconvenience of having to leave the country and a whole extradition nightmare. But seriously. Nothing could improve the smelly Eurostinky recorder player. Seriously, ya'll. Who expects money for playing a recorder? I did not go around with my recorder when I was ten expecting tips for playing Hot Cross Buns...No euros for you! Asshat. Still. Mission accomplished. Drinks in belly, another night pleasant.
The next day was the Fourth of July. We apparently slept in, and paid for it. It was almost four by the time we went out, and we panicked. We were going to miss the food window. Fuuuuuuucccccckkkkkkkk. So we decided that maybe, just maybe, we would make the window at TGI Fridays. We wanted to celebrate the holiday, so what better way than at an American franchise and with free refills? I fail to mention that at this time we had already bypassed restaurants called Nebraska, Texas and Iowa. Let's not question it. Ah, and we had also passed through two or three Bershkas, because WB was still on her hunt.
We made it to Friday's, and ya'll, it was everything we hoped for and more. Potato skins, salads, burgers, chicken fingers, ice cream, huge mojitos, and all the soda you can drink. Sooo good. Had we the inclination, we might have gotten some Jack Daniel's sauce. Oh, yum.
I think my girls could have died
happy right there, because even the soda tasted the same. I personally
think the Coke in Spain is a little sweeter than at home, so seriously, I can
tell. Up until now, I'd been a junky for Fanta Naranja, which
coincidentally isn't as sweet as Fanta Orange here...hmm....anyhow, but for
this meal, it was glass after glass of Coke. Le sigh.
P.S....J totally shined in the Friday's experience. She killed her plate of skins and strips and fries and mojito and ice cream and too many glasses of soda to count. :)
Full of food and feeling sassy, we chugged back up the hill, because it was time for more shopping. I think by this point, the womens were tired of their dirty (and even less dirty) clothes. I wasn't the only one on a shopping mission. Heee. So we stopped at H&M - where it was a fucking zoo. I was afraid for my life. No joke. I left them to fend for themselves and waited patiently outside. I shudder. That makes my fourth country where I attempted to shop at an H&M. This is the only one where I've been unsuccessful. I know. Shameful. We stopped at yet another Zara where I got another dress:
We stopped at Sfera, where we were horrified by the proliferation of rompers. The most offensive? A purple velour one...that we incidentally saw this skinny hag pulling onto her body in plain view. I was so disturbed. Alas. We also went into several more shops I can't recall, but I know I also had to run into a Starbuck's for a recharge. So much shopping, so little time.
We made it to the end of Gran Via only to circle around the Ministry of Defense and the Cibeles.
WB said that her friend said we ought to go through Chueca -- supposed great shopping. So we got lost, but got there, and it was not all it should have been. It was some high end retailers mixed with electronic stores and lots of ghetto. We were saddened, and they learned that they wouldn't be able to trust this girl again. :) At least not with shopping.
We were all in with the tourist bit that day, so we decided to go all the way. We went to Hard Rock Madrid, we went to the Jardines del Buen Retiro:
Wouldn't that frighten you as a child? A headless mouse?
Anyhow, this day winded down with dinner at a tapas restaurant that had hard liquor behind the bar but didn't serve cocktails. We were so speechless when the waitress told us that we couldn't even be bothered to call bullshit. Such a waste. WB remained sober in protest. I am not so strong. I ordered my cava sangria and got muzzy. This led to a not so steady walk back to the hotel, which was a block away, and some drunken emails. I made poor Cesar plan us a trip to Sevila -- we thought we were going to be ambitious and do a day trip -- bus schedules and all, but it was not to be.
The last full day in Madrid dawned with excitement. We were going to have Thai for lunch and shop and sleep and drink our way to Friday. The restaurant was less than stellar, but I had to give it credit for using the right ingredients. But they did not seem Thai. I know my Thai people. One of my relatives in my tree is definitely Thai. They did not seem Thai. And he did not give us dessert on our menu del dia. Lying fucker.
P.S. This is the meal where I redeemed myself. I polished my plates and helped WB finish hers! Huzzah!
No matter. We still had shopping. A little trip to TopShop...success!...and jaunt to Sephora...where (because of WB) I had to pay thrice...although to be fair, twice was me. Hah.
I'm sure we did more, but the day was fairly a haze. We stopped by another restaurant on the way back to the hotel to have a drink, but then we had a mini-siesta. The rest of the night had to be my favorite night in Madrid. Because we went out for the night and found the most adorable smoky bar on the next street over...Calle de Lupe Vega?...and we had the strongest damn caiprinas and mojitos ever. EVER. The proprietor made them himself, took forever, and I have to believe, with gusto. Old Elvis songs filtered in just as frequently as music from -- no joke -- my playlist from freshman year in college. Including what song? The best song ever in high school: Ironic by Alanis. Sweet Jesus. And I must have eaten a whole bowl of sunflower seeds and peanuts on my own. WB laughed at me because I only had two drinks, and for the second drink I tried to get something that the man told me was non-alcoholic and I shook my head, "Nooooooo....Something with lots of alcohol please!" Seriously.
I will call it my favorite bar ever. In Spain. So sweet. Look how kitschy that is!
Next up? A stroll down the street where everyone was trying to get the passersby to come in. We passed up many restaurants and bars, and landed where? Oh yes, Cher's Bar, a karaoke joint, after being shafted by a Doner Kabob joint. It was not even midnight yet! But still. We (J and I) got drinks and belted out bad songs in Spanish...Como yo te amo??? Como yo TE aaahhhhmmmmo.....It turned awfully angry awfully quick. In the song and in the bar. Yowza. Their songlist was amazing and bad. We lasted a couple more songs, dodged another man trying to sell us roses, and left. J left the sweet karaoke boy with a kiss, and we found ourselves trying to find a disco.
The girls, for some reason, let me drag them to a disco that thought itself awfully cool. The drinks were 14 euros. No way. So we danced. And I had made it all the way to YMCA before I realized it was a gay disco. Lots of men dancing in groups, gyrating together, and girls in random clumps. It was fantastic. I almost got pulled on stage, but leapt off after getting my feet up there. Best comment by the girls: "I don't know what to do with this music. I can't whore dance to this!" Yes, these songs wanted us to actually use our feet to dance. Silly, I know. I adopted my time honored bad wedding dancing style. They laughed. I had fun, I hope they did too.
We got in around two? Three? We smelled of smoke, sweat and stink, and we had to leave the hotel by 5:30 am to get to the airport. We were having a taxi pick us up at that time, so all was in motion. Then they had the bright idea of staying awake all night. I agreed, but they also wanted some Internet time, as they had had to pay for too much Internet time across Europe, and it was free here. So they went downstairs to the lobby, and I took a shower and packed it all in. By the time they came up, it was 4 am. They thought they could sleep for half an hour then wake up to pack and shower. I said, okay.So guess who didn't wake up until the front desk called up to tell us that the taxi had arrived? I went down to stall, but I have never been more proud of these women. They packed in five minutes and were downstairs in a jiff. It took them hours to recover from the shock, and J may have broken her luggage, but we were down in time. Our cabbie was a little agitated because he had to be somewhere at 6.30 am, but he was nice in general, and scared at the shit out of me driving at super speed. I was luckily in the death seat and had a prime view of all of the glorious bad driving. He made me seem tame. No matter. We got to the airport in one piece, and now we had Valencia to look forward to.
Ah, dear readers, that is for part two....
