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The misconceptions of Spain by those who visit are too numerous to list. At the top are some of my favorites, such as, "They're such a musical people!", "They have a real zest for life!", "It's just a constant party in Spain!" Obviously to assume one thing or another about a group of people, no matter how easy it may seem, paints you the color ass in the end; a color I have known to take from time to time.       Spain is a lovely, wonderful country and I have enjoyed every minute I've been in it, both last year and this, as well as what are to be many more in the future. While the generalizations of Spain can get out of control at times, the ones regarding the fact that Spaniards love jamón are very much true. I love jamón and anyone who visits the country, unless a staunch non-meat eating fundamentalist will love jamón too. And it's also true that Spaniards do enjoy life on what may seem like a greater level than those living in Northern countries. They also enjoy the sun more simply because they actually know what it looks like, unlike when one lives in London.       But for visitors, when you ride the train from the Barcelona airport to the center, you may find that things are even better than your guidebook would have allowed you to imagine. If for instance a group of 10 sixteen year-old girls get on and start singing and clapping "flamenco style" without any prompting, suddenly all those stereotypes seem a bit more real and a grin springs forth from your jet lagged face as you get ready to hit the Ramblas, sangría, and those damned sombreros.       Once again though, things aren't what they seem and truth is in the eye of what the tourist wants to believe as true. The clip I posted below was from when #1 Fan and I left the Barcelona airport two days ago. A group of drunk, trashy, suburban girls got on the airport train to go in to the center. No, this was not the Spanish zest for life you hear in their song. These were a group of Catalonia transplants being about as classy as a strip club as they went out for a Saturday night on the town, bottle of Fanta mixed with vodka in hand, jabbering away in Spanish, not Catalan (again, how is the Spanish language in danger of extinction in Catalonia?) Have a listen and enjoy. And be on the listen for ¿porque no te callas? somewhere in the middle as they quote the "genius" of the king sometime back. The kids are still loving that one.

One of the first things that I noticed when getting in to Barcelona were the street intersections. In the US, we have a standard 90 degree angle cross where two streets meet in a city. This is not the case in parts of Barcelona, such as Eixample. As you can see in the image below, the streets still meet at 90 degrees, but they've cut the corners off the buildings at 45 degree angles to this meeting. This essentially forms a small city square anywhere two streets meet. And with the blocks smaller than standard US city blocks, this makes for a lot of squares in the Eixample district.       While it can make for an awkward walk up the street as a pedestrian, since you can't really walk in a straight line, this also makes for one of the more lovely city settings that I've seen. It forces a calmness on the city because it doesn't allow anyone to tear up and down the street on foot, bike, motorcycle, or car. Some of the bigger intersections even have small roundabouts which further hinder any kind of impatient speed. While probably a pain to those who don't want to take their time, I quite like the effect and find it to be an extremely pleasant change.       The other effect that this design has is to make the buildings on the corners take on different shapes than your standard square building that is usually seen. This can take the form of just one corner in a building being different, or it can take the form of there being a very small building at the corner that fills in this wedge. Whatever the case, it breaks up any monotony in the flow of the city.       Then, in addition to these intersections, there is Avinguda Diagonal and Avinguda Meridiana that both cut across the heart of the city. Much as Columbus Avenue does in San Francisco, this further breaks up the geography. It also breaks up all the misconceptions I had before visiting when I saw aerial shots of the city and thought that it looked like a standard grid-shaped city. How wrong I was.

Ah, traveling. Is there anything better? Well, sure, but for it's purposes, getting out of your permanent place of residence is one of the best things I look forward to each year. This time around, I'm taking a long trip to the Mediterranean for a couple of months. It's the first time I'm done this and as you're reading this, I'm somewhere up in the sky or already set down and enjoying a good tempranillo in Barcelona, which is my first stop for a couple of weeks. Yes, that's right, I said Barcelona, not Barthelona. There is a common misconception about this that I really want to clear up now, because like anyone from Catalonia, I've been corrected on it by many a well-meaning person here in the US and I'm gettin' sorta tired of it. It is for the people of Catalonia, Barcelona. But, let's get in to this a bit.       Okay, you're overhearing a conversation about someone going to Barcelona and as soon as they hear the name of the city, the other person says, "Ah, Barthelona." Obviously, because of what we call a lisp, this is how the Spaniards say the name of the city. This correction will inevitably then be followed by the sentence, "You know why they say that, right? It's because this king [or prince, or duke, or whatever] talked with a lisp and everyone just tried to copy him so he didn't feel stupid." Naturally when anyone saying this is pressed for the name of that king, they don't know it. What is even more interesting is that if you ask a Spaniard, they will tell you that this is news to them. This story is for all purposes just a myth. It's been retold and built upon so many times that it's a lot like the, "Coldest winter I ever spent anywhere, was a summer in San Francisco" bit that is usually attributed to Mark Twain, yet no one really knows for sure, albeit there is truth to this as San Francisco is really cold in the summer, unlike "The Barthelona".       Now, it is definitely true that a Spaniard will pronounce the name of the town as Barthelona. But this is irrelevant because the people living there are Catalans whose language is as different from Spanish as Italian is to Spanish and they all say Barcelona. But, my point is, to call Barcelona, Barthelona is as random as us calling Hrvatska, Croatia. If we really want to be correct and pronounce the city correctly, by what the people there say, then it is Barcelona. Sorry to be banging on this point so much, but it gets to be a goofy argument. Let put this another way. If we were so concerned about saying a town the way that the Spaniards who are speaking Castilian do, then we should also say things like Ibitha and Valenthia (Ibiza and Valencia respectively.) But we don't. We say those any old way that seems to work best.       Okay, so where did this all start then? Why is Barcelona the victim of over zealous cultural correctness? Because, I've found out that it's worldwide. Even Germans and others throughout Europe will make this correction. What is is about Barcelona that makes it so damned special other than the fact that yes, it is pretty damned special? I thought back and I remembered my world map that I had over my bed as a child. Growing up, I always remember Barcelona pronounced just that way. No one ever said another pronunciation when we studied Europe in Geography class. Then it hit me. 1992. The summer Olympics were held in Barcelona that year and with them always come all these stories about the region. At the time, the news media was rather daft about Catalan, even though Catalan was a big deal at the Olympics due to it getting national attention after Franco's attempts to wipe it out. And there it is. The news must have started saying this whole Barthelona thing because that's how the overall Spanish population says it. Because, I gotta tell you, from 1992 onward, I can only remember Barthelona. I realize that this was 15 years ago, but still, I am certain that is the point at things took a turn for the 'th'.       So, what news network was broadcasting the Olympics that year? NBC. And who was NBC's main man when it came to the Olympics? Bob Costas. So, I think that it's only fitting that from this day forward whenever a Catalan person gets with the "Ah Barthelona..." thing, they should silently curse, "Damn you Bob Costas. Damn. You." And hopefully at some point, this will all be corrected.       Oh yeah, if you want to hear more than just my theories on this, you can read this article which gets in to the language specifics and then this article which is similar, but less technical.