My Madrid experience felt at most haphazard. A classic hit-or-miss, unfortunate-or-lucky kind
of experience. It may be because we were in and out of the city on daytrips and
no continuous stay. It sometimes happens on these “we are on a vacation, but there
is no rest for the weary” vacations. I am usually fairly relaxed and thoroughly
enjoy what I am seeing, hearing, and experiencing on these overseas outings, but
unfortunately Madrid denied me that important element of relaxation. Hence, my mixed bag of memories of Madrid.
Usually one of the first things we do in an unknown city,
after we completed the business of finding our apartment, meeting with the owner,
and taking possession, are to take a ride on a red City Sightseeing bus. They
are in most world cities these days. Tickets are relatively expensive, but I
consider it value for money because I feel it is the quickest way to learn the
lay of the land, so to speak, or discover areas of a city I did not previously
considered, and to get a general “vibe” for the new city.
We found one of the bus’s stops near our apartment and as M
was ready to board the bus, a girl bumped into her, cleverly threw a scarf over
M’s backpack and tried to unzip the back flap. M immediately felt it and
recognized what was happening and quickly pulled away and turned around. The
girl seeing her pickpocket plan is not going to come to any fruition, quickly
disappeared into the pedestrian traffic at a busy street corner.
The site of the second pickpocket attempt near the royal palace. I think the audacity of the second attempt in an open space in broad daylight while other people actually sat on benches and watched the whole ordeal unfold and did nothing surprised me most about the incident.
The first and the second attempted pickpocketing happened in a blink of an eye, not more than 2 seconds I would guess from contact to escape. Twice targeted in the first hour of being on Madrid’s streets? Not the best introduction to a new city. Coincidence? Or was there a message? From then onwards M swapped her backpack for a small on-the-belt pouch. Luckily there were no further pickpocket attempts during our trip. But these attempts had negative consequences on the rest our vacation in that I was never really relaxed thereafter, looking over my shoulder all the time.
We hopped back onto the bus and a few stops later we found
ourselves in the heart of Madrid, the Puerta del Sol Plaza, where we hopped off
again. The plaza was packed with people and a quick look around confirmed that
it really is a nondescript place devoid of any real beauty or interest. Very
much like New York’s Time Square; nothing more than a traditional place to get
together, a hub. Still jittery after our pickpocket experiences, I however,
wanted to get out of there and directed M in the direction of the nearby Plaza
Mayor, Madrid’s other famous square.
By now it was late afternoon, tapas time, and we found the
perfect place for it at the Mercado de San Miguel adjacent to the Plaza Mayor. Oh
My! I have never seen so many delicate, appetizing, mouth-watering dishes
together under one roof. Pure food porn! I have been to many food markets on my
travels, I love to go to them. I have drooled in Florence’s iconic Mercato di San Lorenzo and in the irresistible
Les Halles D’Avignon. I have bought vegetables
for a made-from-scratch Bolognaise sauce at the massive street market in La
Spezia, Italy, and sharp cheese and black olive bread on the Tuesday morning
market in the tiny hilltop village of Gordes, France, and ate strange fried
balls and other unknown delicacies on Kuala Lampur’s Jalan Petaling, but Mercado de San Miguel was a culinary feast beyond
them all, both on the eye and the palate. Obviously we changed tapas into
dinner and unbeknown did the right thing.
Upon exiting the mercado we rested for a few minutes on some concrete balls just outside the entrance and contemplated our next move. We were a bit tired from the travels from Barcelona that morning, but I had plans to join thousands of other Medrileans to watch a Semana Sante. Suddenly several policemen on motorbikes stopped right next to us and started to cordon off the road and the entrance to Plaza Mayor in front of us. We were aware of the terrorists attack on Brussels airport 2 days earlier, and although not terribly alarmed I asked one of the policeman what is going on.
“Procession” he said.
“Alright!” I said to M and immediate got my phone out and
googled which procession was to walk through Plaza Mayor.
It turned out to be a case of being at the right place at
the right time for one of the highlights of our Spanish expedition. What a fortuity
it was to see a traditional Spanish Semana
Sante, a Holy Week tradition. These
processions, a nearly 500-year old tradition, through hilltop villages, coastal
towns and the riverside cities of Spain, by highly committed Catholics, some
wearing tunics and robes with conical shaped hooded hats and their faces
masked, others playing in the band or carry the religious floats, are still
revered and going strong among modern-day Spaniards.
More about that in a next post. Click here of The Holy Week Procession in Madrid.
