June 19, 2011: Santiago - A Coruña, Lighthouse, Protest

Today we drove to the nearby port city of A Coruña for lunch: yet more delicious seafood. By now I was starting to crave some fresh vegetables, so I asked Eugenio if it was possible to order a salad. Although it seemed like a culinary afterthought to him, there was one on the menu, although a rather sad salad of lettuce, tomatoes and onions. This came as a surprise to me and Mark, since many of the nicest fruits and vegetables we've had from the markets in Grenoble have been imported from Spain. But here on the Galician menus it's pork, seafood and potatoes.

After lunch we visited the local landmark of the Tower of Hercules, a lighthouse originally built by the Romans, more than 2000 years ago in 1 A.D., in the Roman settlement of Brigantium. Over time it fell into disrepair, and legend grew up around its name - the story was that Hercules himself built it to celebrate his victory over the giant Geryon. Eventually in the 1700s efforts to restore it started up, although they never rebuilt the originally spiralling ramp (which you can still see the pattern of on the exterior of the building) - instead they punched holes through the interior domes at various levels, putting in a serious of spiral staircases ascending to the top. It is the oldest Roman lighthouse still in use, and would have been an astoundingly tall structure at the time that it was built (it's height has varied a bit over time, with various rebuilding schemes changing the top portion somewhat).

When we got back to Santiago we joined Eugenio's friends in walking in a day of national protest. It was a fairly loosely-defined protest, more or less signifying discontent about the economy, and maybe the governement, in general. Nobody was too worked up - they brought their dogs and babies, we marched down several streets that had been closed to traffic in advance by the police. All in all it seemed like more of a pleasant communal parade that a protest - I suspect it didn't do much to change anything, but it was a fun event for foreigners to participate in.

 

A Coruña's main square

 

I love Spain's love of pork

 

A great mural on a decrepit building

 

The Tower of Hercules (the exterior cladding has been replaced over the years, but the interior is all still the original 2000-year-old structure) 

 

Inside the tower is a statue of Hercules, draped with an actual (bedraggled) lion skin - bizarre!

 

The foundation of the tower, visible from an underground enclosure

 

Mark looks down from one of the interior spiral staircases

 

The view of the ocean from the top of the tower

 

Mark and I pose on an octopus bench (we had to out-wait a man who was perched on it, looking like he typically asks tourists for money in order to take their photo together)

 

This young protester's sign reads: "This is not a crisis, this is a scam."

 

This dog protester's sign reads: "Respect."

 

Our parade of protest makes its way to downtown Santiago

June 18, 2011: Santiago - Sunshine Coast, Paella

Today was rainy in Santiago, so Eugenio decided we should drive south in search of sunshine. We toured along the Galician coast, in the Pontevedra area. And, as hoped for, it was sunny, although still fairly cool and quite windy.

We walked along the shore and enjoyed a leisurely lunch of paella and barnacles. Eugenio was particularly excited about the barnacles - they're so expensive that he doesn't often order them, but today there was a good special on them. They looked bizarre, but tasted quite good! They're so expensive because they're very dangerous to harvest - diving in rough water, risking being smashed up against rocks covered in all sharp, pointy bits.

The cool weather deceived us - we really all should have been wearing sunscreen, and by the end of the day we were getting quite pink. We drove back to Santiago and up the nearby viewpoint, to see a lovely view of the city below.

 

Sunshine coast!

 

The undulating lines of this sidewalk created a powerful optical illusion that the ground below was not flat at all - actually rather disorienting to walk on.

 

Mark eats a barnacle (but not whole - he just pulled the meaty bits out with his teeth and left the rest of it). Doesn't it look kind of like a dragon's foot (and not edible at all)?

 

Eugenio contemplates our paella (and unwittingly acquires a sunburn).

 

Gorgeous day, but no wonder we got sunburnt - still cool enough in the sunshine that I'm wearing a cardigan.

 

My foot in the ocean.

 

Rounded rocks at low tide.

 

A striking tree - the pattern of branches coming off makes star shapes.

 

An amazing sand sculpture on the beach.

 

Saddest Porsche ever - all torn apart by driving over a parking post. There was a huge crowd gathered, transfixed by the painful spectacle, but the owner was nowhere to be seen.

 

A giant sculpture in pieces of a sun-bathing woman - Eugenio is standing on top, and marks head pokes up from the neck section.

 

Santiago from above. See the City of Culture development in behind it?

June 17, 2011: Santiago - Pilgrim's Service, Pork and More Pork, Old Town, Cathedral Roof, Dinner

Today Mark was off to the university to give a talk, so I was one my own for touring about. The weather had gotten colder overnight and there was a steady rain - why didn't I bring some shoes other than sandals? It had seemed impossible to imagine that Spain would be so much damper and cooler than France.

However, the walk into the heart of the city wasn't bad, and then I had a good long visit at the cathedral to warm up. Every morning they conduct a services for the pilgrims, and I wanted to stay to watch it all. There's a censer (that holds burning incense) on a long rope that is lowered, lit, and then swung back and forth - in the past it was necessary to cover the scent of so many unwashed pilgrims (who had been walking, maybe for months, through all kinds of weather, with no change of clothing). Now it's just a fun ritual. They swing it amazingly high, almost to the ceiling. The crowds were huge - standing room only.

After Mark was done for the day we went for a walk around Santiago with Eugenio. It's a beautiful old city with a distinctly different look from France - in particular there are white, glassed-in "balconies" on the top levels of the stone buildings, designed to take advantage of as much sun as possible in this inclement area.

In the evening Mark and I went up on the cathedral roof for an extensive tour. It was better than most roof tours because the roof was actually designed to be walked on, all over - a shallow enough grade and wide stone shingles. Pilgrims traditionally climbed up to the roof to burn their clothing (the church provided new clothing to them). Amazing views and great weather at last - glad the sun was out for this part of the day.

And to eat - more than one kind of delicious pork, and more great seafood! Grilled octopus was particularly amazing - we had it at a very chic hotel restaurant at dinner with friends of Eugenio.

 

The censer getting started

 

And the censer high in the air, almost at its peak.

 

Sunny balconies.

 

Beautiful old tree.

 

A park with oddly Japanese wall structures? No - it's a former cemetery, with niches covered up.

 

Mark in a door meant for midgets?

 

Burning in hell has never looked so blissful...

 

I loved the 3D, polychromatic, highly dramatic imagery in this small church 

 

One of the ubiquitous seashells (a symbol of the pilgrimage, brought home from the seashore as proof of having made it to their destination).

 

All restaurants have glass-fronted refrigerators displaying their fresh seafood wares to passersby on the street - notice the lovingly draped octopi on the top shelf.

 

This angel in the cathedral is designed to hold a hanging lamp, but at first I thought it was offering up a microphone at some kind of rock concert - there's something about the place that channels Elvis.

 

Mysterious markings on the cathedral's stone walls... Actually, Eugenio told us that they're the insignia of stoneworkers, and there's nothing arcane about it at all. But I could see it turning up in some Da Vinci Code style of book.

 

Up on top of the cathedral.

 

A view from behind of the statues on the roof.

 

Our guide pointed out the unusual stepped-pyramid form of these tower roofs - it's unknown why they were designed this way.

June 16, 2011: Santiago de Compostela, Spain - Citea, Cathedral, Seafood

We're in Spain - Santiago de Compostela. Mark has been invited to give a talk at the university, courtesy of his friend Eugenio.

Santiago de Compostela is most famous for being the destination of Christian pilgrims for centuries, as it is purported to be the burial place of St. James. It is in the north of Spain, in Galicia. This area has been called the "Ireland of Spain" - cool, wet and green. After the consistently summery weather of Grenoble it sounded like a nice change.

Eugenio met us at the airport and we did some local sight-seeing. First up was the rather infruriating contemporary City of Culture development on a hilltop outside of town, a complex of cultural buildings designed by Peter Eisenman. It's only partially built and is already blowing its budget.

The overall design of the City of Culture isn't so bad, but it's terribly car-dependent - it's not connected with the city at all. The notion is that the top of a hill has been shaved off, and the great curving buildings recreate its form, while the walkways dividing the buildings recreate the street grid (or non-grid) of Santiago. There'll be a library, archive, gallery, performance space and museum. But you have to wonder how well-used they'll be since they're so separate from where anyone lives, works or spends their free time. A concert could draw in visitors, but libraries thrive on being close to where life is lived on a daily basis.

Eugenio tells us that a local politician wrangled a connection for selecting the quarry, but when it ran out of stone they had to go to China for more to match. The match is gratingly obvious and the cost is now double the original estimate. The cladding with the stone looks poorly done too - it's hard to imagine it holding up well to the elements in such a wet climate - too many seams and protrusions for plants to root in and flake the stone off. All in all a frustrating exercise in Spanish infrastructure - I'm sure they thought they were using stimulus money to make the next Bilbao, but to me it looks as disappointing an exercise as the Crystal addition on the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.

Santiago's main draw is its cathedral of St. James, the final destination for thousands of pilgrims over the centuries. This was not a disappointment - it's very baroque and over the top. Apparently a different heretical priest is buried there but legend distorted it over time to being St. James. A no-name priest wouldn't attract the same dedicated pilgrims.

For dinner I had some seafood firsts: razor clams and octopus. Delicious! Dinner starts even later in Spain than in France - the restaurant didn't know what to do with us when we showed up at 8pm, so we sat at the bar with wine and snacks for a while. There was a delicious little starter of spicy pork spread inside flat bread.

We have also discovered that English is spoken here much more commonly than in Grenoble - good thing, since the only Spanish I know is what I picked up from Sesame Street's American broadcasts as a child ("agua, agua"). It's liberating as a traveler, but again it makes me appreciate how the immersion in almost all French in Grenoble has been so necessary to improving my ability to speak and understand it.

 

The Madrid airport - gorgeous design. Terrible food. Might as well be eating on a plane. Or in McDonald's. 

 

One of the first places Eugenio took us to see was this church, one of his favourites. It has these giant buttresses all along just one side, because the building started to lean dangerously over. Kind of like a squat Tower of Pisa.

 

Walking from the (distant) parking lot to the City of Culture.

 

A topographical model of the City of Culture and surrounding hillsides.

 

The stone cladding. It pains me to look at it.

 

The City does have some fun swooping plazas - here's Mark and Eugenio at a distance.

 

Can you tell that there are two different quarries at work here?

 

Mark peers over the shoulder of the saint inside the Cathedral (a standard ritual of the pilgrims - you can see the wear and tear on the statue after all these many times).

 

This statue originally showed the slaughter of Muslims - a dicey subject in this day and age. So the victims at the horses feet are screened out of view by fresh flowers. 

 

The cathedral of St. James, glowing warmly in the sunset as we sat at a cafe in the plaza, having drinks.

June 11, 2011: Virginia - Colonial Wedding Continued, With a Tea Ceremony

Today was part two of Quoc and Delores' wedding - a tea ceremony at their home to honour family and ancestors.

We started with a procession into the house of guests and gifts wrapped in wedding-appropriate red. Then lighting of incense and candles, and speeches of thanks and advice. It was a very personal and considerate ceremony with the inclusion of all family members.

And after that a casual backyard barbecue - a great time to kick back and relax. Late in the afternoon Jenn and I headed out for our drive back to New York - also pretty uneventful. We found our drop-off point easily, then caught a taxi back to her apartment.

The next day we had a delicious brunch, caught the new X-Men movie, and then I flew back to France.

 

Quoc welcomes us to their home

 

Delores in traditional red

 

We enter the house

 

Ceremony at the altar