Barcelona - The Gothic Quarter

We took a really interesting guided walking tour of Barcelona's Gothic Quarter. Barcelona was a big deal back in the 14th century, competing with rivals like Venice and Genoa for control of the Mediterranean Sea trade. But after Columbus accidentally bumped into America, the focus shifted westward and those with access to ports on the Atlantic were ascendant while Barcelona fell into decline. Fortunately, this meant a lot of the Gothic structures were preserved. Bits of the city's even earlier history as a Roman colony are evident as well. The fascinating City History Museum is built around an archeological excavation down below street level. Elevated walkways take you through and over the ruins of a Roman town, including the laundries where pots were placed outside for passers by to pee in because urine was used as a disinfectant and also as an ingredient to fix dyes. No wonder Rome fell.

Remnant of the Roman wall



A rare (but logical) pregnant Mary


Modern day minstral


Inside the cathedral


Offerings


The construction of the cathedral was accomplished mostly in the 14th century, but was given a neo-gothic sprucing up in the 19th century.


gargoyle


Two more gargoyles

Barcelona - Language and the Art of Defecation

This trip has been a real challenge language-wise as we've gone from Spain to Italy to France. It's not easy keeping your “graciases” from your “grazies” and your “bon jours” from your “bon giornos.” Not only that, but the Castillian Spanish spoken here is in some instances different in both word choice and pronunciation from the Latin American Spanish we are more used to. For instance, the letter “c”, when followed by an “i” or “e” is pronounced with a lisp (i.e., like a “th”). So “gracias” sounds like “grathyas.” There is a legend that the lisp was a speech defect of a Spanish king some centuries past and his subjects, for fear of offending their monarch, adopted the lisp as well. A nice story, but apparently it's a myth.

Our language difficulties could be worse. We could be traveling in the northwest of Spain where they speak Galician, or in the parts of the north where Basque is spoken. The latter isn't even a latin-based language – it's actually said to be closer to Hungarian.

But Barcelona isn't so easy either. This second largest city in Spain is in the region of Spain called Catalunya, tucked into the eastern corner near the Pyrenees at the border with France. They don't speak Spanish here – well, they do, but it's not their first choice of language. They speak Catalan, which is not just a dialect of Spanish but, as the natives are quick to point out, an entirely different language. To my ear it's sort of a mash up of Spanish and French. “Hello” is still “hola” as in Spanish, but “please” is “si us plau”, which sounds a lot more like the French “si vous plais” than the Spanish “por favor.” We find it's usually best to just stick with what little Spanish we know and hope they have some clue about what we're trying to say. We also do a lot of pointing and gesturing. But nothing beats Deborah's efforts at a German-speaking pharmacy in Northern Italy several years ago when she successfully pantomimed a urinary tract infection.

Welcome to Barcelona - Plaza Catalunya



Plaza Reial


Barcelona has a community bicycle program. Those with a yearly membership can pick up or drop off one of the 6000 program bicycles at any of over 400 locations throughout the city.


A new holiday character for the kids. Read the following photo of an explanatory sign for perplexed English speakers. Yes, Catalan culture is a bit different.



Perhaps inspired by the aforementioned character, this street performer leans into a satisfied sigh when you drop a coin in his pot.


Fortunately, with all that crapping going on, Barcelona has efficient street cleaners always on the job.

Gonfaron - Village of Turtles

Sunday was our last full day in Gonfaron, and it proved to be another sunny one. Deborah and Simon and I took the twins for a long stroll out to Le Village Des Tortues (the Village of the Turtles) – a rescue sanctuary just outside town for injured, ill, abandoned, and otherwise needy reptiles of the turtle variety. It's a kind of turtle zoo dedicated to rehabilitating the ill and injured – sometimes by stitching or gluing their shells back together – with the goal of eventually returning them to the wild. There are also educational displays, including some models of giant prehistoric turtles. The twins didn't appear to distinguish between the big painted plastic turtles and the live ones; understandable since neither variety moved very much. There was an infirmary area that displayed some particularly sickly turtles in glass tanks with their specific malady indicated, be it a respiratory illness, a dog bite, injury from a car, etc. Upon our return to the house, Simon informed Jill that we saw a turtle with a cold. The twins informed their father that we also saw hippopotamuses. Somehow the rest of us failed to spot those.

John and Jill seemed happy with the progress Simon and I made in the attic renovation, although I know we could have done at lot more. And I'm certain they were delighted to have all the breaks from parental duty as Deborah looked after the girls for so many hours, not to mention all the help with cooking, cleaning, and of course hairdos. Deborah would have probably preferred to spend more time redecorating and reorganizing, but it just didn't work out that way, and she really did enjoy the twins, although she firmly reconfirmed her desire to remain childless.

Simon left Sunday evening on a night train to Toulouse. We left Monday morning by train to Marseilles, then flew to Barcelona, where we are now. We LOVE Barcelona, although our hotel's wi-fi is dysfunctional so near term blog entries may be more sparse.

What's wrong with this picture? Me pushing a baby stroller?


Deborah and the twins at the Village of Turtles in giant turtle egg sculpture.


Turtle Village residents




Turtle being treated for a case of severe ugliness


Picnic at the Turtle Village (Simon at back)


Haircut time.


Simon and Blake - the dirty boys.

Gonfaron - Life With Two-Year Olds

The weather during our two week stay here has gradually transitioned from cold and wet to warm and sunny. Today, Saturday, is the best day yet. One could even sunbathe. I asked our host John which of the extremes was more typical and he said “both.” The improved climatic conditions have allowed us to take some nice walks during the day, sometimes pushing the twins along in their stroller. If they protest about getting into or out of their stroller, or anything else for that matter, Deborah is not above using bribes to get them to comply. Lollipops work pretty well, even though the girls haven't really been fully introduced to c-a-n-d-y (we do a lot of spelling around here). We don't break out the adult desserts until after the little ones have gone up to bed.

Celeste definitely has the bigger appetite compared with Camille, but they both actually like broccoli, salad, bananas, clementines, kiwis, any kind of bean, and even their medicine. Strange children. But getting them to leave their “Dora the Explorer” video to go have their lunch always results in at least one of them having their daily Dora Meltdown. This eventually subsides as their schizophrenic two-year old personalities swing to the other extreme.

A couple of nights ago John and Jill went out for the evening leaving the twins in Deborah's good hands. This led to an amusing bedtime duel as Deborah tried to get Camille into her diaper, despite Camille's best efforts to avoid that fate by squirming like a worm and racing butt naked around the bedroom. Eventually Deborah prevailed, albeit with help from Simon and me (yes, it took three of us), and capped off the little ones' evening with a round of storytelling.

Deborah with the twins at story time



Camille


Celeste


Jill with Celeste


John with Camille


Snickles, one of three very elusive and oddly named cats (along with Snuggs and Chicken)


Celeste with spoon


Camille, not to be outdone


Post-bath snuggies


The glazed-over eyes of those addicted to Dora the Explorer videos

Tale of Four Cities

You can walk to the town of Gonfaron from Jill and John's house, but I wouldn't bother. It's really a drab little town where the colorless buildings crowd the narrow sidewalks and most of the window shutters are kept closed. There's a central square but it's empty save for the handful of leafless trees. Everything looks dingy and depressing. Simon looked Gonfaron up in Wikipedia and found it only rated three lines, primarily featuring its “Village des Torues,” a rescue center for tortoises, which have yet to visit. It might be a bit perkier come spring, but from what John and Jill have told us it doesn't improve much.

Fortunately France is filled with many more picturesque villages and cities. We had a chance to visit three over a couple of our days off when Jill drove us to Hyères, Toulon, and Aix-en-Provence. Hyères features some nicely landscaped public gardens replete with palm trees and an old town dating to medieval times which is great to wander. Toulon is a much larger city with a sheltered harbor, numerous museums (unfortunately closed on the day we visited) and all the amenities you could need. Aix manages to be both stately and hip with mansions, cobblestone streets, outdoor cafes, cathedrals and lots of college students. Jill was able to get in a little shopping therapy while the rest of us played tourist, although Deborah wasn't feeling up to the trip to Aix and instead stayed home. The twins were at day care so she actually got to have some much needed quiet time.

Hyeres


Hyers


Deborah and Jill


The HelpXers: Simon, Deborah, and Blake (photo by Jill)


Poster in Hyeres


Toulon


Toulon


Aix-en-Provence


Aix-en-Provence



Aix-en-Provence


At least the sunsets are nice in Gonfaron

Gonfaron, Provence - Working

After spending the first couple of days building some shelves for the garage, Simon and I are now helping John to transform an attic space in the 18^th century stone farm house into livable quarters. We've knocked down plaster to expose the stone walls and then prepared them for repointing. The latter involves scraping away the old mortar – well, dried mud really – to create the space for new mortar. We've also started creating openings in the walls for windows (there are none currently), using old logs for lintels, which will remain exposed. This process involves hauling bags of rocks and plaster debris up and down two flights of spiral stairs. It's been quite awhile since I did such dirty, physical work, but the hours aren't long so I can't really complain. And it's rewarding to see the space transforming. The other stone walls in the house that have already been restored are just beautiful, especially in combination with the rustic exposed beams.

Our work schedule, as well as pretty much everything else around here, revolves around the twins. For two such small humans they seem to have tremendous clout. We don't start work until after the girls are up, dressed, and had their breakfast, usually not until 9:30 or so. Then we work for two or three hours and break for lunch. After lunch the twins have their nap, during which all noise-producing work is halted. We don't start up again until they've risen from their nap, which is usually around 4:00pm, but sometimes even later. So our afternoon work session only lasts an hour or two until the kids' dinner time. If they sleep in long enough we sometimes don't even bother going back to work in the afternoon. Come dinner time the twins eat their's first, then it's bath time, storytime, and off to bed. Unless we stay up to watch a video ourselves, we adults tend to retire to their rooms fairly early also.

In a way I'd prefer to just keep working in the morning until we've put in our hours and are done for the day, then clean up, have lunch, and have the rest of the day free, rather than sit around for four hours in the middle of the day while covered in sweat, dirt, and plaster dust. But I wouldn't trade roles with Deborah, who has been putting in much longer hours helping out with child-minding, cooking, cleaning, and a bit of home organization/decorating. She does it all. The twins are well-behaved and Deborah is quite fond of them, but they are two-year olds afterall, and not beyond the occasional irrational outburst or unrelenting demand to watch Dora the Explorer for the 700^th time. Actually the videos are a godsend when Deborah tires of racing around the back terrace and singing songs from The Wizard of Oz. She can just park them in front of the TV, start up Finding Nemo and they sit unmoving, silent and slack jawed as they stare up at the screen (“kiddie heroin”, John calls it). Deborah says she will cry when she has to leave the girls, but at the same time she is glad she is infertile. So am I.

What the finished stone walls look like
(photo from John and Jill's HelpX ad)

Gonfaron, Provence

Gonfaron lies in the Provence region, the famed area in the southeast corner of France that borders the Mediterranean and Italy. It is also home to the French Riviera, including the famous playgrounds of the rich and famous like Cannes, Nice, and St. Tropez. Gonfaron is a decidedly more modest location up in the hills a good 40km from the coast.

John and Jill's place is an 18^th century stone bastide (farm house) which they have been renovating for the past five years. The pace of reconstruction slowed considerably two years ago with the birth of twins Camille and Celeste. It was just this past summer that they started bringing in HelpX workers such as ourselves to help with renovation, landscaping, and looking after the little ones. Simon, a nice young lad from Liverpool is here at the same time as us to help out in this ongoing project.

Our host John is a retired Air Force helicopter pilot who now works for a Russian billionaire who has his fleet of choppers stationed at various locations around Europe and elsewhere, including Cannes, where John works. He is generally on call for three weeks at a time and home for three weeks. And when he's home, he's working on the house. Jill was a graphic designer but now concentrates on mom duty and, in her few moments of free time, works on the house as well.

The house, naturally, is a combination of tastefully restored rooms and those still awaiting their transformation. Deborah got to try out one of the unrestored bathrooms shortly after our arrival and confronted an embarrassingly disfunctional toilet. We have since discovered that a vigorous clockwise swirl with the toilet brush is at least somewhat effective in creating the necessary siphon action. Or, perhaps more easily, we just use the newly renovated powder room, which is both aesthetically pleasing and fully functional.

I'll describe our work here in the next post.

Aerial View of the Property (photo from John & Jill's HelpX ad)



Front of the House (if it looks like a construction zone, that's only because it is one)



The Back Terrace

The Neighbor's Vineyard


The Neighbor's Geese



The Pigeonnier (no pigeons currently though)




John and Jill and the Girls (photo from their HelpX ad)