This first week in Barcelona has been a blur that has strangely brought a lot into focus for me. And I know that sentence is confusing and semantically useless, so I will be frank and admit that it was my hook and hopefully begin to explain what I mean by it now.
It has been a blur in the sense that an overwhelming quantity of things has taken place in such a short amount of time. We have already seen so much of the city and experienced so many incredible things, it is almost hard to believe that we can sustain the pace. I would guess that we won?t, and instead, the influx of excitement and novelty will recede into a deeper pleasure of common satisfaction with the familiarity of a beautifully rich city. In another sense, it has brought clarity and focus through experiences that enlighten. The things I have seen have given me months of material to reflect over. In the interest of codifying memories I will list some of the most notable of these things now:
The trip to the Port of Barcelona was quite possibly the most fascinating and eye-opening experience of my life to date. I remember one of my roommates making the comment that we were seeing behind the veil of ?how the world works,? a simple sentiment that perfectly encapsulates its effect on me. Seeing the infrastructure needed to support civilization as we know it brought about a number of convicting realizations: we ought to be more thankful for what we have, we have based our whole modern economy on a very dangerous philosophy that breeds inequality, and I have no idea how boats are buoyant.
Other notable things about the city include the beautiful architecture, the seamless cooperation of historic landmarks and modern architecture, the interesting people on the metro, the delicious (cost-effective) sandwiches at Bella Pan, and, of course, Gaudi?s image begotten everywhere the eye can see.
I have two hopes for the weeks to follow: I want to better understand the philosophical and religious climate of Barcelona, and I want to learn to speak its native language more effectively. I am fascinated by what it is that gets people motivated in the mornings and what fundamental truths they base their lives on. And to be quite honest, the ego-centric fool that I am, I desire to see how aligned these beliefs are with my own, how I can learn from them, and what I may be able to pass along to the locals. In order to have these enriching experiences, I need to learn the language more proficiently than I have so far. I also plan on attending different churches on the weekends moving forward to dig deeper into people?s beliefs. I will update this blog with progress soon.
