Lost in translation

I´m sure everyone figured it out already. I made it to España!

In the first 12 hours alone I strolled Las Ramblas, devoured tapas and gelato, discovered several centries-old churches, stopped for an acrobatic hustler show, soaked in the works of Picasso, avoided the mysteriously-colored water on the floor of my hostel, watched a man run down the street with a mattress on his head and enjoyed a flamenco opera.

As soon as we landed we caught the aerobus into Plaza de Catalunya and then strolled through Las Ramblas on the way to our hostel. After a stop to grab some euros, we headed to Jules Verde for tapas before making our way over to the Cathedral.

Our real mission was to find the Musee de Picasso for free-entrance Sunday, where we enjoyed one of the world´s most extensive collections by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso.

Next on the eventhough-we're-dead-tired-we're-in-Spain-we-can't-go-to-sleep-yet agenda was an opera and flamenco show.

We headed back to our room for a minute before the show to find our room in an inch of (excuse me) pee-colored water.

My bed was soaked!

Reception moved us to an empty(!) room, minus the gallons of pee-water and five other hostelers.

Then it was flamenco time.

Let me give you some words of advice: don't go to a Spanish opera on an hour and a half of sleep.

We were thrilled to catch the 9:15 p.m. Opera y Flamenco show. From what I gathered, it was a lot like a telenovela, all serious and dramatic, plus some awesome tapdancing.

Around ten minutes into the show I jerked awake. I'd just fallen asleep during the first act! Isn´t that awful? It had nothing to do with how talented and amazing the ensemble was, but only stainless steel toothpicks could have kept my eyes open. A few English subtitles would have helped, too. I guess they don´t have those in the world of Spanish opera. Maybe we should do something about that.

Fortunately, I woke up in time for the man with the magic feet. When he flamencoed from stage right his feet were pounding the floor like a bionic woodpecker. It was truly an incredible sound.

Then we groggily stumbled back to the hostel for a few sweet hours of sleep.