merce festival

after a few days in paris damon and i headed back to barcelona for the merce festival, the city's largest celebration that serves as a final farewell to summer. as i have noticed with all large festivals, an electric sensation can be felt while walking the grounds for the first time. the merce festival was no exception. everywhere that we went crews were working around the clock to set up massive stages in nearly every open space in the city. things were shaping up to be really awesome.

the first indication that good times were to be had occurred as damon and i made the walk through plaza catalunya, down las ramblas, and towards gretch's apartment. the streets were even more jampacked with people than normal, and as we approached the juame metro stop the crowd became too thick to penetrate. we finally made our way down a side street only to discover that we were walking in the middle of a parade and headed towards a procession of 20 foot people dressed in colonial costumes.

seeking refuge on the sidewalk, my heart skipped a beat after feeling a loud explosion nearby. i had recently read an article in the local paper about an anti spain al qaeda statement and immediately assumed the worst. however, the explosions were merely coming from the line of firebreathing dragons that followed the 20 foot people. how could i have been so foolish to mistake pyrotechnics for terrorism? damon and i exchanged sighs of relief and made our way to gretchen's, pausing in a plaza to watch a mass of people sing and a fireworks display above an old church. it was all really awesome.

after meeting up with gretchen and a few of her program buddies we headed to the beach at barceloneta for the real fireworks show. the fireworks were definitely a bit of a let down and did not come close to besting any of the fourth of july celebrations that i have witnessed. if nothing else, everyone reading this should hold their heads up just a little bit higher in acknowledgement of america's superior ability to blow things up. god bless the good ol' u.s. of a.

from the beach we headed back towards plaza catalunya for a concert. when we arrived there were already thousands of people filling the plaza, but unlike concerts in the u.s., there was no battle for personal space. everyone seemed to be a lot more laid back and a lot of people even had their backs turned towards the stage. going to a concert to have fun and not worry about getting up front to take pictures of the performers? if only that idea made its way across the atlantic.

we hung out for a while towards the back of the plaza while dancing, trying to locate sketchy indians who were selling cold beverages, and people watching. during the encore break gretchen and i each looked at one another and must have been thinking the exact same thing because she grabbed my hand and started charging towards the front of the stage. within two minutes we had our hands on the metal gates that served as the only barrier between the stage and the crowd. never in my life have i witnessed someone split a crowd of nearly 25,000 people with such determination and ease. gretchen was truly on point that nite.

a few songs later and the concert was over. the band, who played a blend of pop and reggae, took a few bows and then it was time to go home. damon and i volunteered to walk gretchen back to her place and suddenly we were off on a falafel hunt. i will not go into details, but the hunt did not exactly end on a good note. someone knocked over the tip jar, causing the man behind me who happened to be holding a giant set of foam dice to role a 1 and say, "you're friend just rolled this. she lost the game." i nodded my head and gently smiled to keep from going red. yo sé. yo sé. all in all a stellar night and an experience that i hope i will not soon forget.