Teletorn

Musical Interlude, Eesti moodi

If singing constitutes a fundamental part of Estonian national consciousness and was key in inspiring and fuelling political change, where does singing and music currently fit in in Estonian culture overall? If singing folk songs could uphold a revolution, then what might come of tranformations to traditional Estonian song and future manifestations of the Estonian national voice?

As a starter, sample these tunes by Mighty Windish musical group Collage. Active in the '70's, I was told that the group is once again in vogue (their music was being played on several separate visits to the same cafe). Apparently, these groovy ditties are 1970's reworkings of traditional folk songs.

To hear more, we checked out the celebrated Estonian Men's Choir last week at the Estonia Kontserdisaal (Concert Hall). The pieces -- in Norweigan, French and Latin -- were wonderful, complex and varied, some jolly, others haunting, many uplifting. We were so impressed, we snuck a vid. By the way, the choir is being led by Carl Hogset, from Norway.



Next day, we were in Tartu, in a guesthouse... with TV! A couple of full circuits through the satellite offerings churned up fantastic news, especially for the realiTV-starved. Eesti Otsib Superstaari was airing that night! We caught the last half hour or so, enough to wonder how the contestants were faring with the stoney-faced judges and grab a video sample to take home.



Estonians are clearly nuts for the show. The videos posted by Estonia's TV3 on YouTube have thousands of hits. Even my uploaded video, thrice removed -- with crap-quality intermittent picture and feedback buzz -- has already amassed over 800 YouTube views. It's one thing to re-folkify and classicize the Estonian national voice, but what will become of it once it done been American Idolized? Will the nation see its "superstaar" as a symbol of the Estonian musical character, as constituting its choral core, charged with the vocal maintainance of Estonia's political and cultural future? Not likely. As with the other "Idol" franchises worldwide, this "Singing Revolution" is more about local participation in global pop culture phenomena. More to the point, with a population of just 1.4 million (fewer than live on the Island of Montreal), Estonian young folk are tuning in to "Eesti otsib superstaari" to see themselves, and their friends and neighbours, on TV, doing the Jon Bon Jovi and Christina Aguilera impressions that, until then, they'd only been ballsy enough to perform in sauna anterooms on pitch-black polar evenings into vodka bottle mics. No one is heading to Hollywood with this yellow ticket. Try-outs have been held in 4 Estonian towns, Tallinn being one of them. Assuming that's where the rest of the show will unfold, for some finalists, the yellow ticket probably means bus fare down to the TV3 studio. On the episode I saw, the numbers on the contestants' pinnies were barely into the hundreds, and shots from "on deck" revealed near-empty rooms. No mallfuls of queued-up, pumped up teens, no stadiumfuls of hopefuls: statistically impossible. There is also a noticeable lack of typical post-Simon behaviour. No slamming doors, no vicious outbursts needing bleeping out, no howling, tear-streaked faces, no trembling huddles of the nauseous and the nervously broken down, no appeals to talk to the hand; such behaviours do not meld well with the Estonians' stoic, outwardly emotionless demeanor. In this sense, then, a distinct national character is emerging in Estonia's superstaar search. Who knows, maybe they'll pull some technological firsts for "Idol" as well -- after all, Estonia is the first nation in the world to have Internet voting in national elections. If I could only understand what was being said ...

Sagrada Familia: Brought to you en siete (7) idiomas!

And thoughts turned back to Barcelona ....
Y los pensamientos dieron vuelta de nuevo a Barcelona...
Et les pensées ont tourné de nouveau à Barcelone...
Und Gedanken drehten sich zurück zu Barcelona...
En gedachten die terug naar Barcelona worden gedraaid...
Ed i pensieri hanno girato di nuovo a Barcellona...


The Sagrada Familia construction site in Barcelona offers you beautiful views of the best Europe has to offer in contemporary scaffolding, safety barriers, harmonic machine noise and masterpieces-in-progress for the union-approved capital renovation and maintenance rate of 8 Euros. In the basement museum, visitors are invited to learn more about the long history and slow implementation of the building's construction, figure out what parts of the building were in fact constructed while lunartist Gaudi was alive, watch real-live restoration-engineers craft plaster models of building parts that don't now -- and may never -- exist, and learn about how to make donations to ensure construction in perpetuity.

Also in the basement, the attraction features a non-functioning, wall-mounted and coin-operated sound guide, precursor to the contemporary, and now conveniently mobile, audio guide. If working, the "Guia Turistica Sonora" might have provided visitors insight into one of the exhibits located closest to the apparatus in one of 7 European languages.

* Demostración: cómo funcionar el aparato turístico / Démonstration : comment se fonctionne l'appareil touristique / Demonstration: wie man den touristischen Apparat laufen läßt / Demonstration: how to operate the touristic apparatus / Demonstratie: hoe te om de toeristische apparaten in werking te stellen / Dimostrazione: come fare funzionare l'apparecchio turistico.

*Nuestras apologías, versión catalana inasequible en este tiempo

Really, I wonder if this machine ever worked. What did it say? How long was the message? Did it previously accept pesetas, and was it updated in 2002 to accept Euro coins? (It doesn't look post-2002 to me.) What length of message, or informational nugget, constitutes "good value" for pocket change? Were the original messages recorded by native speakers of each of the 7 languages, or read out syllable by frightening robotic syllable by grating mid-'80s computer voices? What, if any, language was considered for insertion into the empty 8th slot? Is the apparatus temporarily out of order because its clunky recordings are soon to be updated with state-o'-the-art machine translation software?

In celebration of the new translation tech, as well as the semantic and pragmatic impediments that will forever plague it, and with a respectful tip-o'-the-hat to oddball playback devices and "translation" machines of past and present, I hereby add a translation feature to this page. The Babelfish buttons translate the page immediately, though only into one of those 8. The other flags lead to Google Translation, which offers more tongue-swapping combos (including English to Russian), but needs the URL to be pasted in.

Snug as a bug...

...in a rug. That is, as well-placed as any type of microscopic listening device woven securely and indiscernibly into the decorative fibres of a floor-covering, whether or not it is being employed as a wall ornament.

As promised, here's the other ЛЕНИН carpet that was on display at Grutas Park. Consider yourself surveilled.

All-Season Ducks

Mallards are all-season birds in Tallinn. Throughout the winter, they hunker down on the snow in great, silent huddles, sometimes nesting over steaming manholes. These hardy quackers made it through the ice and cold -- here they are after the thaw, scrambling for treats near a bus stop on Sopruse pst.

Siauliai, Lietuva

We weren't the only ones heading to Siauliai (pronounced "Show-lay"..., "ow" as in "ouch"). Fortunately, we'd followed the otherwise spotty advice provided at the info-booth and bought tickets inside the station. Seat number assignments do mean something in the Baltics (even -- or especially -- on buses and in cinemas), which can be handy when things start getting tight. J wasted no time shooing an interloping duo out of our seats -- nos. 41 and 42, the back of the bus -- a great perch from which to follow the unwieldy and complex Rubic's-cubic seat-swapping game that ensued. The bus was nearly full, but passengers continued to board. It seems those who'd bought tickets from the driver had no official seat assignments, and were banished elsewhere once rightful claimants appeared. From a mathematical standpoint, one and only one resolution to the Siauliai shuffle was possible; it revealed itself when the 6 or 7 seatless travellers finally admitted defeat -- after a ridiculous, lengthy, yet forever optimistic, display of squeezing in and out, stowing and restowing of luggage, bumping, knocking and elbowing -- to stand in the aisle for the duration of the ride.

Why Siauliai? Well, we'd arranged to have a tour the following day of a decommissioned Soviet missile base located in Zemaitija National Park. The park was only a couple hours' drive from Sialiai, but not serviced by public transport, so we had no way of getting there. We'd looked into renting a car, but the major rental agencies only operated out of Vilnius and the coastal cities. We figured even if we didn't make it to the park, Siauliai was a convenient midway point on the upcoming return trip to Tallinn via Riga. We raced to Tourist Info before they shut down for the day, hoping they'd be able to call a local car rental agency on our behalf. In the end, they helped us strike a deal with a taxi company; a car with driver would take us to the base and back the following afternoon. We made it to the base, and back. Our driver twisted the agreement, however, demanding extra money in the end. And this, after accompanying us on the tour itself -- he'd never been there, and clearly quite enjoyed himself. I got to (had to) have my first argument in Russian since this trip began. I surrendered, exasperated and sputtering.

Here's a sneak peek at the entranceway to the missile base -- J is going to post about the base itself. That's Ausra, our tour guide, clinging cautiously to concrete while descending the narrow, snow-covered steps. The Russian graffitti above the door reads "Wipe Your Feet". Chomping at the bit is grumpy-driver man, eager to take advantage of the complementary tour.

We spent nearly all day with Mr. Grumpy, in fact. We'd ordered a taxi that a.m. to go to the Hill of Crosses, another Siauliai attraction, and he'd shown up for that. A Yahoo! video documents the weird walk-up-and-over the hill and features a great voice-over brief (by webmaster of "thelithuanians.com") compiled from the hill's Wikipedian entry and other sources. Whatever your take on pilgrimage and cross-planting, a giant pile of anything gathered over time is always eerie and interesting. The traditional Lithuanian carved crosses were particularly nice, as were the home-made ones (out of pipe, fencing, floorboard mouldings, pencils).

We rounded out our day of tourism with a visit to the Siauliai Bicycle Museum. "Vairas," located in Siauliai, was a major bicycle and engine factory in the Soviet time. It's since been privatized but continues to make bikes ("The Panther"). The museum had a lot of groovy exemplars from various bicycle manufacturers across the USSR and Europe. Sigh, makes a gal sorely miss her Écovélo, 'specially since the Tallinn snow's all melted.

The spiritual pilgrimage to the hill of crosses obviously didn't leave our cranky driver in a very beneficent mood. Though the super-friendly gals at Tourist Info arranged the car and told us it would be 35 Litas ("Don't pay until you get back..."), he informed us that that was the "old" price. Whatever. He was the one sputtering this time, as he fought to explain this in very patchy English. We ignored his artful pleas, rightfully kept our cash and jumped out of the car.

When the same guy wandered into the hostel later that day, it had to be to pick us up for the missile base trip. Without thinking, I blurted out -- in Russian -- "It's us -- again."
"A-ha, you speak Russian." Despite having found a common language, he welcomed no chit-chat, saving his words instead for the second (by now, inevitable) price feud of the day.

We had a blast in Siauliai despite having to act like real tourists in order to get to these hard-to-access places. It was smaller and far less ostentatious than some of the other cities we'd visited. We had a chuckle at this shoe store's display; it opens onto the city's main walking and shopping promenade.

We stayed at Siauliai Kolegijos Jaunimo Navynes Namai -- a former college, very nicely renovated and serving as a "youth" hostel. The staff was cranky here, too, though warmed up substantially, giving us student discounts on the already dirt-cheap per-bed charge.

By the end of our 2-day stay, we had sampled some delicious snacks and sipped a variety of tasty local "trauktine" (bitters) at a handful of places around town. We were even welcomed like regulars at the nearby theatre cafe where we'd returned 3 times for snacks, beer and breakfast. I particularly enjoyed watching the giant projection of Cher's "Believe" concert DVD through dinner at "Arkos" on March 9. On this day-after-women's-day, we were surrounded by staff parties, bouquets and store-bought cakes. No one was holding back on vodka or congratulatory toasts.

We made another bus blunder the morning of our departure from Lithuania. We hadn't bothered checking bus times to Riga, assuming idiotically that one would be revving up to go just as we wandered over to the station, putting us in Riga at exactly the right time to transfer to the Riga-Tallinn express. But there would be no bus to Riga for another hour. And, despite the mere 128 kms that needed covering, it would purportedly take 3.25 hours to get there! The bus belched out of Siauliai and limped down the crippled road to Riga. There were 5 of us heading out this Sunday morning on a full-sized coach, and 2 got off at the first stop. (We were nearly 6, but the driver barred entrance to a puffy-faced, black-eyed, bloodied and reeking drunk -- standing vertical only because propped up and tended to by a companion.) We reckoned our tickets didn't even cover the cost of gas. We pulled into Riga earlier than forecasted -- at exactly noon -- and, miraculously, just as the Riga-Tallinn bus was pulling out. We flagged it down and were able to assemble the fare from our various currencies. We were back in Tallinn at dinnertime.

Kaunas, Lietuva

We got to Kaunas -- eventually. When we hit the bus station in Druskininkai, we were the only travellers there. The WC concierge had yet to set up shop (though scurried over before we could sneak in for a free pee). I endeavoured to buy bus tickets at the booth -- the woman asked where we were going. "Now?" she inquired, stunned to hear we were off to Kaunus on the 9:35. Seems we had selected the milkiest of runs. We were instructed to buy our tickets from the driver (he seemed unsure of the price "all-the-way-to-Kaunus"?) and were the only ones to board. I asked the driver how long it would take to get there. (Distance from Druskininkai to Kaunas: 126 km)

--How long until we arrive?
--One.
--Is that all? Just one?
--No! One!
--Really? One?
--No! After three -- I mean, at one!

It finally clicked. "One" as in "one o'clock", not meaning the trip would take an hour. This was the only option available, so we settled in for the ride and the country-style views. Our mid-size bus bucked and bobbed through a zillion tiny hamlets with wooden houses, carved totems and busy markets and some more sizeable towns arranged around grey, yet grandiose, squares and wide avenues interminably lined with dingy Soviet-era apartment blocks. Road signs heralding places called Leipalingis, Veisiejai, Lazdiju, Balbieriskis and Prienu trickled past as the bus trundled on, taking on passengers and usually dropping them off just a few stops down the road. The city of Alytus was our mid-point; we spent 5 minutes here, at platform 5, before resuming the journey to Kaunus.

Kaunas, Lithuania's second-largest city, was an interesting town -- grittier, dingier, seemingly more volatile than Vilnius, apparently its much-detested rival. Like a Vilnius that didn't get invited to the prom. We checked in to "Kauno arkivyskupijos Svečių namai", Guesthouse of Kaunas Archdiocese, then spent the evening checking out a handful of Kaunas cafes and nightspots. The city was hopping. It was March 8th -- Women's Day -- after all. Restaurant vases poised themselves for incoming tulips amid the 'pop' of champagne corks from darkened alleyways. We dropped into Miestos Sodas for beer and cheesy easy-listening piano accompaniment, had a snack at a restaurant called 55° -- that made its own "moonshine", and capped the night off at B.O. (standing for Blue Orange), where we enjoyed observing the inability of young Kaunas bo-hos to sit still. After darting back and forth, pacing, entering and exiting, stumbling over here and wobbling back over there, a sizeable bunch eventually became sufficiently inebriated to gather at one of the back barrooms to engage in a raucous group sing-along. Our holier than thou accommodation provided suitable respite after being privy to the March 8th debauch.

Back to the bus station, and on to Siauliai...

Druskininkai, Lietuva

The bus was headed for Druskininkai, Lithuania -- near the southern border with Belarus, but we got off here, at the town of Grutas, and walked the few kilometers to Gruta Parkas, also referred to as "Stalinworld." It's a Soviet sculpture and theme park, built on a private estate (the owner of the museum used to be the manager of a kolkhoz, then made his fortune in the mushroom business). The park obtained a bunch of the statues (Stalin, Lenin, Lithuanian party leaders and heroes, etc.) and monuments taken down at the end of the Soviet regime. Though the park in no way intends to diminish the worst of Soviet history -- in fact, serves as an important reminder -- it takes a lighthearted approach to remembrance and a critical one to nostalgia by recreating an atmosphere that celebrates all-things-Soviet in the extreme. The staff wear red scarves as did the Young Pioneers, crackling speakers attached to rickety guard towers provide an ever-present soundtrack, playing old-time marches and rollicking Soviet ditties. They've even duplicated the old Soviet pricing regime, right down to charging an extra 5 Litas for photographing privileges (at the ticket booth, J was sternly instructed to pin his permission slip to his coat (pin provided)).














The sculptures are installed along a walking path that winds its way through a crisp pine forest, the route interrupted every so often by cabins housing Soviet-style installations (a library, party meeting room, "voting" station) with commentary and displaying socialist realist art and other period knick-knacks.

The exhibition route leads you unswervingly to the park cafe and souvenir shop. We skipped the "Nostalgia Menu" (which offers things like the "Farewell, My Youth" meat-cutlet plate and other classics), opting instead for contemporary Lithuanian fare. I'd been noticing the word "boletus" a lot since having arrived in Lithuania, and wondered whether it was a bad translation of something otherwise familiar. Surprise, it's a type of mushroom! Though considering Grutas Park's owner's prior business expertise, it was no surprise that the mushroom soup at Gruto Parkas was top-notch. Unfortunately, we had to bolt our boletus, since buses from Grutas to Druskininkai were few and we didn't want to miss the 4:22. We headed back to the stop with time to spare, and waited.

And waited some more.

There would be no 4:22. We changed strategies and sidled up alongside a couple of women who appeared from somewhere in the tiny Grutas settlement to stand firmly on a square of unmarked pavement. A minibus passed by a short while later, but it was already full to its minibussi brim and by now our regiment had grown to at least 5 people. We awkwardly squeezed into the aisle and hoped we were actually heading the 7 kms to town (though we started out in another direction). I tried to glean from some of the other passengers just where we should disembark, but the Russian-speaking ones turned out to be visitors as well ("Мы сами не местные"). One of them eventually asked where exactly we needed to go -- I sheepishly translated "Love Island" into Russian. He replied, snickering, something to the effect of "There's even one of those here, is there?"

We were trying to make our way to "Love Island". We'd booked a nice-looking and surprisingly cheap room at this guesthouse, "located on the scarp of famous Lithuanian river — Nemunas, near the «Love» island". Druskininkai is a small town (pop. about 27,000), so should be easy to find. We followed the map I'd scribbled down from the "where to find us" info online, which led us into a newish, dacha-style suburb with large homes, barking dogs, few finished roads, a rapidly setting sun, and no mobile phone signal. Realizing we'd gone too far (we'd stupidly followed the only paved road), we retraced our steps and stopped to watch a couple of cars try to unstick themselves from a swampy mud-hole. One of the spectators seemed approachable -- I asked whether there was a "hotel" back there somewhere, in the dark and beyond the mud.

"Yes, there is a hotel! Come along, I'll show you. Though you should never try to get there this way, through these mudflats. As you can see, too muddy! But please, follow me, I'll take you there, through this mud, just, please assure me you won't come this way next time -- what with all this mud! Come along, it's just over here, you can see it there, just on the other side of this mud." (This all exclaimed via excited Lithuanian-Russian-German lexical mash-up.) It was quite hilarious. Indeed, just past all the mud, in the middle of a field, was the "Love Island" guesthouse. It was a very nice place, just impossible to access in Druskininkai's squishy soft-earth season.

Actually, the town's raison d'etre is all things "sanatorium". It's a much-visited (by Polish pensioners) health resort and is therefore famous for its therapeutic mud and mud procedures, not to mention its "7 unique spurting mineral springs". It seems the contemporary spa is gradually replacing the sanatorium, however, meaning things like '4-hands relaxation and aromatherapy massage with choice of fruit smoothie' is quickly moving up the popularity scale while 'rectal mud tampon' drops out of sight and into the therapeutic procedural history book. Reflecting this recent trend is the town's newest highlight -- Vandens Parkas -- a massive aquapark, one third of which is dedicated to an enormous baths/bathhouse complex offering several fanciful steaming options representing various national traditions. The Hamam baths even have a "dancing ground... on which the belly dancers appear according to your request." We jealously watched the introductory video in the Parkas luxurious lobby, but sadly didn't have time to visit (nor the requisite bathing suits).

The fellow who showed us the way to "Love Island" had pointed out the better way to get to town -- 50 metres thataway along the building in the opposite direction, then turn 90 degrees and follow the mud-road, but walk next to it on the high grasses through the brush and brambles, and you'll eventually come to a paved road. We managed it despite the undeveloped-subdivision rural darkness. We were lucky it was a moonlit night or we'd never have made it to, or back from, town for/with provisions. Here's what the mud-field looked like the next morning (some flattening and redistibution had been done early that a.m. by (noisy) bulldozer, and there'd been a bit of hardening overnight). Never did see the river, so not sure whether we actually were on a "scarp".

Our Druskininkai-nian exodus begins at the bus station. And we're off ... to a slow start and even slower road -- towards Lithuania's second-largest city, Kaunus.

Vilniaus, Lietuva

Alas, no time to take full blog-stock (and barrel) of Barcelona. It was still "spring break" so we decided to hit the road once again and right away -- enough time to change our shoes and pack our dirty clothes for washing upon arrival at destination-as-yet-unknown. After several unsuccessful attempts to buy tickets to Stockholm on the myriad ferry lines that transport happy Scandinavians from coastal capital to coastal capital in cruise-glam luxury surrounded by duty-free booze, we decided we'd best stay on land and in the Baltics.

As an aside... it's not difficult to ferry to Stockholm -- s'long's you do choose the "cruise" variant and, unless you want to travel "lux", you should be prepared to bunk with strangers in gender-specific cabins. The cruise variant has you travelling overnight, spending a mere 6-7 hours in Stockholm, then night-boating it back to Tallinn. Even though these cruises depart daily from Tallinn, you're not invited to divide up cruises into one-way fares in order to spend time in Sweden. One-way options seem to be available, but information about these is kept under wraps, the complex algorithms used to arrive at prices for the many cabin/berth configurations and fractions thereof (e.g. things like "Q2, A4, B2/4" to the power of many n's) aren't explained, nor is the sum of any of these equations bookable online (instructions unavailable in either English or Russian). Despite all this, a company service representative will be happy to frustrate you and also answer a portion of your questions in person or by lengthy email correspondence.

So we hopped on a bus, this one to Vilnius, capital of Lithuania. It was soon apparent that the Lithuanians are fond of making their venues into "attractions", thus, designing them according to unusual themes and surprising motifs. In terms of interior decor, every surface is considered, nothing left unadorned, every opportunity for audacity, sometimes gaudiness, certainly extremity, always fun, is welcomed and exploited. This regiment of table-heaving gnomes and expanse of astro-turfed wall at cafe Gras'as faces the street, though the bulk of the venue is downstairs in a labyrinth of carpeted and chandeliered caves.

We took a trip by city bus to Vilnius's outer burbs to visit "Kukuruzininkas", a cafe-bar built around an airplane theme, if not an actual airplane. Full cockpit and propeller on display, the rest is made up of airplane seats, an interior shell, airplane parts, pictures and manuals. Here I am getting ready for take-off, and again, settling into the in-flight program after the flight crew passed by with its cabin service.


We'd been warned that service was be horrible in Lithuania, but we didn't experience that at all. We did notice that a few places (ironically, not the airplane restaurant) had buttons/doorbells at your table that said "Please Press For Service". The most ridiculously over-the-top place we visited was "Cili Kaimas", a massive three-storey food-and-beverage-plex with a gigantic tree growing up from its subterranean depths, a live rooster cock-a-doodling at the entrance, an open fish pond and snake aquarium. Click here and choose "Kaimas" for an unfortunately unrepresentative peek at the restaurant's interior and a peruse what's on offer for tapas in the Lithuanian style (liberal use of smoked pork ears). The menu was the size of a medieval manuscript and had full-page glossy ads for featured wines. Dishes were referred to by such brain-teasing riddles as "Nude Maids in Sweet-Flags," "Strong For A Long Time" and "So That Evening Does Not Prolong".

The most famous Lithuanian dish is "cepelinai" -- literally, zeppelins -- after which they're named. Think gummy potato paste football filled with a chunk of meat or curd -- and you've got it. Not that "dirigible", really, especially since they're additionally weighed down with sour cream and cracklings sauce. We tried them the once.













Let it be known that we did more than eat and drink on our trip to Lithuania. After 2 days in Vilnius, we boarded another bus. Destination: Gruto Parkas.

Tapas on the Mapas

The tapas. We set out in search of bits and bites, mouthfuls and morcels soon after arrival. We had some trouble ordering at first (where to begin -- carnes, fish, seafood, salads, tortillas, brochettes, grilled veggies?), but hit our stride after a few days and after nabbing some choice perches at the bar counters, ordering a few things from the displays, then pointing to creations that the patrons next to us were getting, but we weren't seeing either displayed or on the menu.

Notable highlights were anything with "bacalao" (cod), like pimientos del piquillo rellenos de bacalao, (red peppers stuffed with cod paste), pimientos de padrón, (small green peppers, fried and sea-salted), sepiones a la plancha (grilled cuttlefish), boquerones en vinagre (sardine fillets in vinegar) and pulpo a la gallega (Galician octopus).

We also finally mastered the "menu del dia" -- the lunch special -- consisting of una primera, un segundo, pan, bebida y postre. Choice of firsts, seconds, bread, drink and dessert. We were astonished to learn (and the waiter amused to hear us inquire) that we could choose any drink at all -- he graciously listed them all -- we could even have champaña, if we so desired! (Keep in mind, this was no 4-star joint -- just a local lunch spot, complete with key-at-the-counter for the ladies' loo.) The standout here was the 1st course combo plate of jamon (ham) and pineapple -- a decisive victory over the dough-delivered Hawaiian version.

On our last night in Barcelona, we returned to the Gracia district for more grub. We'd decided to check out "Sureny," claimed (as per TimeOut Barcelona) to be a hidden gastronomical gem, and happened to be just 2 doors down from the "llar de foc" that we'd enjoyed so much on the lazy Sunday previous. Suspicious of any gourmet pretentions, we approached the restaurant with cautious optimism and a wadful of Euros. The meal started out on a strange and surprising note with cod cream and red pepper puree, topped with a slick of soft blood sausage (the concoction served in a wine glass!). A rich treat to be sure. Highlights from the next several hours of culinary oohs and ahhs included...

...banana tubes filled with red curry foam and tiger prawns ...

... deer sirloin with tangerine sauce...

...and, lastly, scallop tartare with shitake mushrooms and strawberry vinaigrette.

We were too stunned by the first round of ordering to get photos -- we enjoyed the tuna with ginger and lime, the suckling pig and the green peppers al Padron just as much -- and remember them well. Each dish was better and even more artfully arranged than the last and we left feeling like we had been treated to something truly special.

We thought it an appropriate homage to the Plateau to duck into nearby "Elsa Bar" for farewell-to-Barcelona cocktails. This Else's was run by Elsa, from Cuba, who'd been a known stage singer in Havana, as advertised by the posters and assorted nostalgia decorating the bar. Now in Barcelona, Elsa'd moved from mixing show tune line-ups to mixing mean mojitos. The process was lovingly long and elaborate; we thought it should be documented, and Elsa kindly obliged. Here's the how-to:

Souvenir #3

Oddball souvenir prospects in tourist-saturated Spain looked dim -- a search for a flea market in Riga had turned up nothing (food markets, no fleas) -- and similar assumptions had to be made about fancy-pants, art nouveau Barcelona. A closer look at an old travel guide on Day 6, however, talked of a big junk-and-all market (Els Encants Veils) near Plaça de les Glories Catalanes. It was a mix of everything -- old crap -- bottles, dishes, dusty, crusty books strewn on blankets, mountains of porn (DVD and VHS, too), paintings, mountains of clothes, purses, socks, undies and bras, bangles and baubles, furniture, cameras, coins, tools and machinery. I spotted a tiny, perfectly rectangular flask that looked cracked on its edge -- the seller wouldn't budge from 6 € even though J pointed out the likelihood of it leaking. We passed. J spotted a great old Spanish watch -- no lower than 30 €, though the piece was very banged up, would need some repairs, a new crystal, etc. I finally came across a viewfinder in the guise of a TV that showed scenes of something/somewhere called "Sto. Esperanza Calasparra" (apparently, these are photos of a 'sanctuario' in Calasparra, a town in 'Murcia', an autonomous region in Spain). Though we'd been nowhere near Murcia, the viewfinder pics were reminiscent of what we'd seen of the Monastery at Montserrat a few days before.

As often happens at flea markets -- the seller isn't minding his/her stall when you're stoked for haggling. We returned to the stall 3 times -- and finally got a price from an operator one stall over. 6 €. We had to walk off scowling, grumbling, spitting and flailing to get this scratched-up plastic kid's toy down to 2 €. But it's a beaut all the same. (In fact, I think this photo of the Senora de la Esperanza through the peephole gives off quite a holy aura when digitally reproduced -- perhaps some kind of divine image -- maybe this post should become prayer-per-view/pay-per view.)

Calçots

We spent the first couple of days, agape and agog, marvelling at the grandness and enormity of everything in the Eixemple (Modernista) district. Compared to manageable Tallinn, everything was now on scale gigantico. We were wiped by Sunday, and decided to take a breather in the Gracia district and have a wander through Gaudi's Park Guell -- touted as providing natural respite if suffering from art-and-architecture overload and accompanying neck strain and eye blur. Gracia was hopping this Sunday morning -- literally -- we happened upon this swinging scene around lunchtime in Plaça de la Virreina.



Stomachs were grumbling, so we dropped in at restaurante "La llar de Foc". We'd watched a steady stream of slow-stepping neighbourhood oldsters enter the place as we stood outside for too long, perusing the mostly indecipherable menu (in Catalan) and deciding whether or not to head in. Thank goodness we did! A sign on the door promised "Hay calçots" (We have calçots) -- though the hand-drawn diagram wasn't enough for us to make a culinary ID.

Nevertheless, our spectacular waiter made sure we ordered them, and made us promise not to start munching until he'd demonstrated how they should be eaten. These turned out to be grilled leeks with romesco dipping sauce -- the charcoaled outer leek layer slides right off -- and were absolutely delicious. We also ate red peppers stuffed with cod paste -- served in a cheesy cream sauce -- Catalan torrades (toasts), rubbed with garlic and fresh tomato, rabbit, ribs with rosemary and a bottle of red. The place was packed and buzzing and the calçots were being slurped up on all sides as we left to walk off the kkals in Park Guell.

A few short blocks down, we were lured by smoke and smells of sizzling meats and crackling veg, and heard the chit-chatterings and rustling-and-bustlings-about of a sizeable group of folk. We rounded the corner to find... a neighbourhood outdoor calçot feast! These leeks must be a seasonal Catalunyan delicacy.