The Arc de Triomf was built to serve as the grand entrance of the 1888 Universal Exposition. It was at this exposition that Barcelona introduced the modernisme architectural movement to the world.

About the upper four sides of the arch are friezes of a decidedly unmilitary nature.

They are said to represent the Reception, Reward, and Apotheosis of Industry, Agriculture, and Trade. That sure is what it looks like to me.

So one might assume the event celebrated by this arch is the triumph of the economy. But then, what's with the bats?

It turns out they're are devices from the coat of arms of Jaume I. In 1229, he conquered the Moors in Mallorca—a triumph of a different sort. So I guess this arch commemorates both the defeat of the Infidel by Christianity and the vanquishing of Planned Economies by Free Markets.

Makes more sense to me than the French one. Their arch celebrates French military victories, from the Napoleonic Wars all the way up to the... er... Napoleonic Wars. Those that they won, anyway.

The playfulness of modernisme Catalonian architecture shines through in the goofy domes with ribs, crowns, stars and arched windows. Horn-blowing angels nod to an older tradition, but art deco wings give them away.

They sort of say, "Just kidding."

In all, I think it's a fine monument, defining the north end of Passeig de Lluis Companys, a broad pedestrian way flanked by ornate lampposts and palm trees.

Now, turn 180 degrees. What do we see?

How could they?

Who issues building permits around here? Don't tell me the Mayor and the City Council and the Planning Commission didn't know about this monstrosity. I mean, why didn't they just put an oil refinery there and be done with it?

That governs least, governs best. That allows eyesores like this, governs not at all.

Octopus 'R' Us. Just Octopus.

OK. Just octopus and squid. But that's it. No clams, no hams.

Can you make a living like that? Maybe not. The place is never open. But then, a lot of businesses in Spain seem never to be open. Doesn't mean they're not in operation. Just not when I'm there.

The other day I was enjoying a meal of lightly breaded sauteed seafood and thinking about how ordinary foods like octopus had become to me. My plate contained octopus, squid, whitefish, fresh sardines and barnacles.

Yep. Barnacles. They're really, really good. Poor man's clams. Much appreciated in Spain, restaurants tempt patrons by displaying bowls of them in their windows.

I liked mine so much that next chance I got, I ordered a whole plateful of them. Really. I'm not lying.

Unless the sun strikes the neighborhood at the right angle, it's usually dark and sort of eerie.

Romanesque arches give on to small plazas. Some contain tables where you can get a drink.

Gargoyles unexpectedly jut from walls.

Barcelona is really old. Way older than Madrid. A Roman wall and bastion a few yards from our door mark the original city perimeter.

In Roman times, Madrid was a cow pasture.

Almost completely hidden by medieval walls, a few Roman columns remain.

These may have been reconstructed after falling. To me, they are like the old roots of the city. There are not many cities in the world that have been in continuous existence for over 1,600 years.

Walking through the old city, glancing through an opening on my left, I saw this:

What the hell was she doing in this hallowed place? Some airhead bimbo strutting around—looking for what? A party? A date? C'mon! She doesn't belong here!

Then I realized that in 350 C. E., another girl just like her undoubtedly strolled here, wearing a skimpy toga, shopping for myrrh—very much at home in her own city, as is our modern girl.

Catalonian, Spanish and Barcelonan flags.

Catalonians think of themselves as a people separate from, and superior to the Spanish. Generalissimo Franco, in an attempt to keep the unruly province under control, outlawed teaching of the Catalan language in schools and its use in official communications and documents. The people cheerfully disobeyed him, and today, Catalan is very much a living language.

So much so that the airport taxi driver spoke to us in it. Now, everyone who lives in Catalonia speaks Spanish, so it's not like he couldn't, too. And almost no one getting into his taxi at the airport is likely to speak Catalan. So why the posturing? Rude SOB.

Menus, directional signs and the like are all in Catalan, and pretty much comprehensible to Spanish speakers. Rapidly spoken Catalan is not.

We can all parse this sign. Quiet: Hospital Zone.

But if someone read it rapidly over the telephone, I for one just wouldn't get it.

Even the name of the region is different, partly because the Catalan alphabet lacks the Ñ:

Catalonia—English
Cataluña—Spanish
Catalunya—Catalan

Here's some more Catalan words that might interest Spanish speakers or students:

E: Anchovies
S: Anchoas
C: Anxores

E: Chorizo
S: Chorizo
C: Xoriço

E: Chocolate
S: Chocolate
C: Xocolata

Failure to understand a foreign language can create some strange situations. The other morning I ordered the breakfast special that had been scrawled on a chalkboard at our local café: Flauta de Tonyina Canya Tallat. I was served a tuna-and-anchovy sandwich and a beer.

They were performing traditional Basque dances as part of a cultural program taking place on or near the Barcelona Cathedral Plaza. I was reminded of folk dancing exhibitions in the Jardín, the ones that are put on by people from the cultural center.

Music was provided by three recorder-like instruments and a drummer.

The notes, all of them, are produced by fingering with the left hand only. The musician on the far left is using his right index finger over the end hole of his flute to produce a vibrato.

The men are wearing those wide floppy Basque berets—wide enough to act as an umbrella in the rain. They were for sale in shops here and there, but I couldn't imagine wearing one, as much as I would have liked one. They're just too un-Mexico.

Following the female dancers, a group of men emerged, dressed as sailors, carrying oars and a seaman's chest on their shoulders. Another man leapt on top of the chest and performed a kind of jig.

An odd performance; six guys straining and grimacing while one dancer jumped and spun, took bows and garnered applause.

While basques have never had a navy, they are avid and skilled seamen. Basque fishermen probably beat Columbus to America, while catching codfish and salting and drying them on shore in Newfoundland.

The crossed keys on the dancer's banner aren't related to the Basque flag or coat of arms. I would guess they are the keys of Simon Peter, loved by fishermen because he was a fisherman too. Does one of you have a better explanation?

As is the case with so many folk festivals, this one had an ad-hoc feel to it. Among last-minute items overlooked were dressing rooms.

A little public semi-nudity wasn't gonna get in their way. The program called for swapping the blue sailor suits for white ones, so they just went ahead and got the job done without worrying about appearances. We could use guys like this in the Administration, if you ask me.

At the bottom of the photo is Gaudí's gorgeous mosaic lizard. No fewer than five people are sitting on it. Why?

They are posing for photographs.

There are 12 heads in this photo. At least ten are holding cameras. Six are in the act, at this moment, of taking a photograph.

I swear, if a few more cameras were sucking photons out of the lumeniferous ether, it would become prematurely dark in this locale.

It wasn't helping that I too was there, taking pictures. I was being jostled by other photographers, and jostling others in turn. Objects I wanted to photograph were obscured by bodies, either posing or shooting.

I shot the following images in less than five minutes:

Good grief!

The digital revolution has empowered legions of new photographers, who can click away for hundreds of shots in a single day at little cost. So they flood into scenic places, which become scenic no more, because the scenes are full of camera-wielding tourists.

This year's tourist guides tell you it's OK to take photographs in places like the Prado or the Thyssen as long as you don't use flash or a tripod. Not so. The guides are out of date. I haven't found a single museum that permits cameras anymore. It's becoming obvious why the new rules are needed.

After an hour of repeatedly checking back, I finally caught a moment when the wonderful lizard was devoid of posers. I was setting up when suddenly, another brassy model came along and spoiled the shot.

Oh, wait. That's Jean!

So many people were sitting on the iconic Serpentine Bench that not enough of it showed for a picture. I had to be satisfied with a rear view. Every Gaudí structure became a strange attractor, a nucleus for swirling clouds of tourists.

My expectation of a peaceful, relaxing afternoon strolling through Parc Güell, snapping pictures of stunning architecture was shattered. The only way to get a sense of being in an actual park was to get away from the structures, themselves; off into the plantings.

That's what this photographer did.

From this vantage point, we can see past one of the park's dreamlike gatehouses, across the city to the Mediterranean Sea.

Towers on the gatehouses were patterned after real mushrooms. The botanical name of the model for this one is Phallus impudicus. I'm not making this up.

All of Gaudí's phantasmagorical curves and color are in play here.

The details are playful and arresting. Here a feline head—a leopard?—forms the spout of a fountain. It's mounted on a red-and-gold Catalan shield.

Many people used the fountain to wash their hands or to get a drink on this hot day.

A wall contained scores of designs formed from broken tiles. I could only photograph a couple of them because of restoration work.

Quilter Jean says these are clay quilts. Exactly.

The tiles were artworks created for use at Parc Güell, each a complete composition in itself. After firing, all were smashed and the pieces reassembled into mosaics. What a concept!

This is called the Room of a Hundred Columns. I didn't count them

The columns are the only classical elements in the design. Even so, Gaudí gave the room a ceiling with his trademark curves...

... and mosaics.

A primitive gallery offers shade and relief from fractured colors and shapes.

The coarse, jagged stones create a form of such precision, such soft curves.

A fence formed of palm leaves protects the grounds from intruders.

The spikes at the top are the most fearsome I've ever seen.

The main square is ringed with the famous Serpentine Bench.

I photographed it from behind for reasons I'll give in the next post.

Parc Güell is an artifact of a real estate development gone bad. Count Eusebio Güell commissioned it as the focal point for a suburb of exclusive homes. But the Count violated the real estate adage: Location, Location, Location. At the time, nobody wanted to live this far from downtown. The Güell heirs were prevailed upon by the city to donate it. We're all lucky they did.

About the size of apricots, they contain 3-5 large brown seeds shaped like wedges taken out of a sphere.

The flesh is less than 1/4" thick. It has a mild, slightly tart taste. Kind of a generic fruit flavor. It's not gonna be the next kiwi, believe me.

The label in the store read nisperos. Do any of you know what it's called in English? Or its botanical name?

Bulking up above the rectangular pile of stones are four oddly-shaped towers, with roof friezes and iron ornaments that manage to incorporate lightness without diminishing the building's authority.

Our short stay here didn't allow for a real look at Barcelona's architectural gems. I can see spending a month next time we visit, just to study the buildings.

Not truly Moderniste, this lighthouse surmounting a mansion in Passeig de Gràcia suggests the playfulness to come.

Taking the concept of lighthouse towers with tall thin ornaments to full development is Casa Terrades...

... informally known as Casa de les Punxes (the points, in Catalan).

With Casa Lleó Morera, the architect managed to break free of straight lines, of simple Euclidean solids. Now things are beginning to curve.

The dome appears to be a form called a truncated ellipsoid. (This is a really interesting notion to us geeky engineers.) The dome has been covered in tiles, and from the look of them, they're not square tiles.

Sadly, the Rotonda is decaying, but you can bet it will be saved. Barcelona is putting tremendous resources into preservation and restoration of its buildings.

Wonderful forms and colors crop up in small ways as well as large.

The most famous of the Moderniste architects is Antoni Gaudí. Casa Batlló below, is one of his designs.

Surreal curves, reminiscent of Salvador Dalí's melting watches, complete the breakaway from any kind of convention; yes, it has floors, doors and windows. But it's all distorted: comprehensible, yes; normal, no.

That's Casa Amatller to the left, designed by the first Modernist architect, Josep Puig i Cadafalch.

Some kind of spirit was alive in Barcelona at the turn of the last century. An artistic explosion occurred in which creativity broke free of convention. The energy still present in these buildings resonates with me, an engineer who participated in the startup and flowering of Silicon Valley. I see in Barcelona the same freedom to imagine, to create and accomplish that I enjoyed, working with a bunch of guys that created the Information Age.

Barcelona remains a vibrant design center. Modern buildings sustain the spirit of the Moderniste movement.

This could have been just another ugly cube. But just look at what the tiles have done to it! Another free-thinking architect, another risk-taking client.

—§—

In the sidewalk cafés beneath my window every table is occupied, mostly by tourists. They are the lucky ones. They have made it through the gantlet of caricature artists, mechanical cricket vendors and three-card-monte operators to the relative safety of the watering hole.

Even then, they are prey. The raucous bleating of a saxophone accompanied by an accordion drifts up to my window. It's annoying. Soon the alleged musicians will attack the crowds, hats held out for coins—demanding payment to make them go away. The Spaniards, the French, the Italians will ignore them. The British and the Americans will pay them off out of guilt. The Japanese will give them too much money because they are simply bewildered. It is the law of the street...

—§—

One way to make a buck off tourists is to pose as a living statue. Here's one of my favorites.

I'm always a sucker for angels. I put some coins in her... uh... urn. She slowly, almost mechanically, broke into a beautiful smile and with sweeping arms, blew me a kiss, before freezing again.

Living statues set up shop everywhere tourists throng. Most are not as gracious as my angel, which doesn't slow Jean down one bit.

See? She's already friends with the wax fruit lady. Friends for a couple of euros, that is.

Later, we walked past a bronze John Wayne. I averted my gaze, not wanting to encourage this sort of thing. I heard Jean calling to me. I ignored her, making a great show of photographing a brick wall. Soon both Jean and a male voice were calling me. I turned...

Honest to GodI What if my friends see this?

Jean told me later that when I wouldn't turn around, the statue told her "John is a bad boy," and drew his gun.

—§—

Out on Las Ramblas, shortly after arriving in Barcelona, we were taken down like newborn Dik-Diks. Hungry and thirsty, we stopped at a sidewalk café and ordered breakfast. Asked if we wanted orange juice, I ordered one, knowing it would probably be expensive.

"Large or small?"

"Large." (Well, I was thirsty.)

This is what we got.

"Large" meant "huge, canned and €10." The full tab—for bacon and eggs, juice and coffee—€35. "But John," you ask, "how is this possible—a $40+ breakfast?"

Here's how:

€10—One large canned orange juice
€18—Two orders bacon and eggs
€7—Two coffees
€4—Charge for outside table service
€4—Regular service charge
€2—EVA (tax)
---------------------------------------------------
€35—Total check

—§—

The herd moves on, its lost members already forgotten. The lions, sated, slumber. They'll be hungry again, tomorrow...

And when Europeans travel in the spring, where do they go? Well, they sure as hell don't go to Norway, where the snow is still on the ground. No, they come to warm, sunny places: Northern Africa, Southern Italy, Greece, and—Spain. The squares and sidewalk restaurants are overflowing with them.

You could tell who the tourists were, because they all looked lost.

I usually feel like a doofus, standing on a busy street, frowning at a map. But in Barcelona, I fit right in with the crowd. There's something satisfying about seeing sophisticated Europeans just as flummoxed as we ignorant Americans.

Surprisingly, it's a young crowd that vacations here.

Many don't have that employed, career-oriented look. Nor do they look particularly well-heeled. My guess is that they are members of the huge state-supported army of unemployed European youth.

There seems to be a lot of piercings and varicolored hair among them. You know why men are attracted to women with tattoos? They're thinking, "There's a girl who's capable of making a mistake she'll regret for the rest of her life."

They've apparently decided not to apply for jobs in customer service or sales.

Nordic blondes know they'll get a warm reception in Spain. Their coloring and dress just scream "I'm from Sweden, and I'm looking for fun."

You don't often see them traveling in little homogenous groups. These must be newly arrived. They're not paired off yet.

Long, tiny braids are abundant.

This young woman manages to achieve a sort of good-time gal effect with hers...

... while this one projects an untouchable innocence.

Barcelona attracts people from all over: Asians, Africans, Americans—a truly cosmopolitan city.

Tourists eat food on the street, something they probably wouldn't do back in Paris.

But we all let our hair down when we're on vacation.

This woman had the most interesting profile...

... with her flattened nose, her enhanced chin and her perfectly pyramidal form descending.

I'm accustomed to seeing young people with hair in vibrant colors not found in nature. The results of their experimenting invariably look bad, usually because of the do-it-yourself dye job.

This mature woman obviously had hers done in an expensive salon, and while startling, it somehow works.

This woman was surveying a sidewalk café, looking for a suitable table.

Humpf. None met her approval, so she sat on some steps and wrote out some postcards.

Finally, we have Mr. Sensitive.

It's hard to imagine he's a European. He looks like a Special Forces drill sergeant. You could land a helicopter on his flattop. Maybe he's a retired American military man. I didn't ask him. I was afraid to.

My original idea was that we would travel in the shoulder seasons. We'd avoid summer crowds and we'd get out of San Miguel during the punishingly hot month of May and the insanity of the Independencía and the stupid San Miguelada in September. Europeans have already figured that out.

Back to the drawing board, I guess. How about April and October?