Notes From The Pegboard: strikes, tattoos, grafitti, and bike polo...seriously, does it get better on vacation?!

ahhhhhh vacation...

With long days and loads of them in a row (I think I pegged a 21 day stretch) it was time for a little R-n-R in still my favorite european city - Barcelona, Spain. I was looking forward to relaxing, meeting new people in the hostel, getting tattooed at the big tattoo convention, walking the world's best flea market, and generally relaxing in front of some art. What I DID NOT expect, was walking all day, every day, taking 400 plus photos and a dozen videos, getting two tattoos, running into people I know from San Francisco, a massive strike that ended in riots and a burned out cop car, a self made graffiti art tour that lasted all week, meeting cool bike dudes and being invited to play some polo, meeting more Italians in Spain, and drinking gigantic goblets of sangria while talking about life and travel and of course relationships until 5 in the morning with a couple travelers whom I will probably never see again.

It was an amazing trip...

please dont fly with hand grenades, scalpels or putty knives....

flying over the Costa Brava
First thing I do is walk off the travel - I left the Farm by Panda, jumpped a train to Bologna, a bus to the airport, a plane to Girona, and a bus to Barcelona...long day and worth a walk in the city as soon as I arrive. First picture on the ground, a lady walking her ferret...a good sign of things to come.

The next day was the general strike, or VAGA GENERAL and not much was open that I wanted to see, so I wandered to the flea market that I found back in May and dug through the litterally piles of old junk...

If you can find this old bull fighting ring...

then you can see this...

and standing near this you can find this...

and inside you might find some of this...

old tools...

racially biased toys...

my personal favorite the chandelier guy...

and things I recomend you do not fly with...

the morrocans who sell the majority of the stuff have a "UN EURO!" yell that they do to attract buyers...listen in this video for a great example.

even treasures for both kids AND adults lying side by side...

I walked the long way back to the Hostel, stopped and bought stuff to have a little solo picnic near the Familia Sagrada monstrosity of a house. Building the privately funded catholic church began in 1882 and is not expected to be completed until at least 2025...imagine that...I actually like the pictures with the yellow cranes, the juxtaposition of archaic design carried out in modernity.

Its still my first day mind you so I head back to the Hostel for a little feet up time, to write a little and enjoy a glass of wine on the rooftop terrace. While up there I realize there is a helicopter hovering in one spot for a long time...see it in the photo...

then I realize there is no traffic, which is strange cause the streets of Barcelona are filled 24 hours a day with the whining sounds of revved up scooters taking off at green lights...

not only empty streets but PEOPLE in the streets! It looks like the VAGA, the strike has taken back the streets. I go downstairs to investigate and stay out till 1am when an overwhelmoing police presence near a burned cop car, and my lacking travel visas, sent me to the peace of the Hostel.

this car was later torched...
click here to watch the video link....

Even some little kids got into the action when they took the nervous energy all around them into a square full of silly garbage art installations. here's a picture of the before and a video of the after - funny stuff.

VIDEO AFTER....

The next day was all about getting the tattoo squared away by meeting with Mark in the shop in the Bari Gotic. The Bari Gotic is the oldest part of the city and home to some of the coolest small scale graffiti I have seen before, its a twisted cobblestone mess of streets and alleys of art, retail, food and bars, and dumpy old apartments full of artists and musicians.

You know you are in the right tattoo shop when the toilet lid looks like this...

These are three colour, sepia toned stencils, always found low on walls in small recesses. I took pictures of them before but lost the camera, I was stoked to find most of them again on this trip.

and an Italian restaurant named after my BIKE! I actually opted for sushi for lunch, a moderately priced 8 euro lunch combo that I ate slow and savoured every bite - its been 6 months! mmmmm suuuuuushiiiiii.....

Picking a favorite graffiti in Barcelona starts to feel like picking your favorite tattoo at a convention - there is so much street art and so much of it is great its a little overwhelming. Businesses actually pay to have their roll up security doors painted by local artists...

If I had to pick a style though, this guy would win...these smiling fish heads were everywhere and there is something about them that sums up the art experience in Barcelona - FUN. Even the gallery of contemporary art, the MACBA, was full of installations that were whimsical and fun, no pictures of burning Iraqi oil fields of dirty homeless children, still political messages but with a unique Spanish or maybe Catalan humor mixed in...

Here's the MACBA - a work of art in itself...

and a cool photo installation (with close up below)

the streets are literally filled with art...check these dog piss covered, knitted in place, bench warmers...

Lets get to the Tattoo Convention stuff shall we?

Yeah, RAD! Never been to one before and it was great. The anticipation of getting hand made single poke at a time tattoo from Mark was peaceful, TOTALLY overshadowed by loud shitty music, stale convention air and the familiar hum of that olde buzzsaw as someone gets another misspelled name off in the distance. Had a little trouble getting cash at the beginning and made me nervous all this travel would be for naught - the keypad at the atm was backwards and I had reached my daily limit when converted to euros - duh!

Here's the space, divided into little booths...

this is Mark, he's real good and sticking needles in people one at a time...

the set up...The art you see before you has a story behind it...My bestest buddy in the whole wide world, Aaron "Taint-Boy" Newton lived one summer in a tent as an archaeologist near Santa Cruz where he found some cool artifacts. Like for many men his same age who live in tents in the summer the experience of sitting late night drinking beers and drawing detailed pictures of his discoveries was a life changing event. Because Aaron has been there for me and my many life changing events, especially the one last summer where my late nites in tents was transformative, because his artwork of said artifacts suited itself to Mark's hand poke style of tattooing, and because Aaron himself is covered in tattoos, I decided to get a tattoo of one of the drawings. When Aaron sent them to me and I realized one of them was labeled "Mid-Holocene shaft straightener" well I just could not resist complimenting Taint-Boy's own unique sense of humor and get this "shaft straightener" on my upper thigh where it will provide countless opportunities for more raunchy humor down the road. In actuality the shaft straightener was a tool used by native Californians to make arrows and spears. A pretty cool find and damn good pointillism art.

yes, it hurt...but very differently from a regular machine done tattoo.

Watch this Video of mark at work - truly amazing to watch...

Or this one of Mark going to town with the art and bad convention music in the background...

This dude has tattooed a bunch of famous people and had a hand made tattoo from his waist to his kneecaps - OUCH!

here's the finished product, a couple of rocks on my upper thigh, complete with measurements to further accent the humor of course, these rocks mean the world to me.

I took a nap in the convention hall, exhausted from walking the whole day before and siting for the tattoo, then wandered around to get a look at the rest of the show...

This guy got his whole leg fresco-ed during the show... and never was seen with pants on...
saw some traditional Maori style hammering tattoo - watch the vid.

art too...

and a mini-ramp...

I went back to the Hostel, cooked and ate dinner with an Italian named Walter, drank some sangria and talked late into the night with Walter and the barkeep, Camille about life, dreams, politics and religion all in a mix of mostly Spanish with some Italian and English mixed in when we couldn't find the words. An amazing experience to have, one that left me feeling very much a part of a world community. I took some late night photos of people looking up at monuments to go along with it, then crashed heavy and slept great!

Next day I had promised an Italian lady I met at the convention named Alex that we could roam the flea market so we headed out earlyish, found some gems, she learned the art of haggling for price, we ate a good roast chicken lunch and she hopped a bus home. She is from Rome and promised to show me around next spring when I return. After she split I wandered around a took some photos of architecture, found a neighborhood where the young cool kids live, and took pics of bikes of all sorts. Later I ran into some bike dudes who invited me to play Polo on Monday night. The week was getting even BETTER!!!

wooden bikes!

Saturday nite I found some new single serving friends in the kitchen at the hostel and we carried on until late in the evening. What started as sitting at the same table for dinner turned into goblets of Sangria, late nite Doner Kebab, laughing about relationship stories, sharing jokes and slang from around the world, and telling stories of the adventures we had all been on. A great experience with new people I will probably never see again - not in a sad way, we forgot to exchange emails and I just didn't run into them again. Funny but a great typical Hostel experience I think, which aside from the German sleep talker whom I thought was the ghost of Hitler yelling at us all, and the smell of 14 people's feet in one room, went really well.

Sunday I went back for another tattoo from Mark. When I sat with him on thursday we talked about any other work he was wanting to do, drawings he had, and he said he didn't really have much but asked what else I was thinking. I told him this summer has really changed the way I see bikes and that as much as I love bikes and have tattoos I don't have any bike related tattoos. I told him about the idea that a guy I knew in High School named Mike Mannis had, of the permanent grease smear on the calf, like the one you get when you dismount a bike with a dirty chain - and being a fellow bike fan Mark agreed that it would look amazing and would be really fun to do and add to his portfolio. We did a little art on thursday together, with his bike nearby, and came up with this little gem.

Which people really liked to stare at already... stay posted, a few kids took what should be really great photos and took emails to send later on...

finished product..."uh, Dude, you got bike grease on your leg..." yeah. perfect!

Monday was my last full day and I was feeling pretty tired of walking, and the tattoo made my leg a little uncomfortable - so I used the Metro as much as I could to get all over the joint. Hiked up to Parc Guell - a park dedicated to the sculpture and mosaics of Gaudi. (click the links if you don't know who he is...its good stuff!)

The view of the city was RAD - there's the giant phallus near the flea market...

I also caught these two music acts:

Robert from Tennessee who has lived in Barcelona for 16 years, two in Paris before that and plays a MEAN steel guitar. I sat to talk and listen for almost 2 hours. And THESE GUYS, doing a little reggae in the park, Brazilian style.

After dinner, I walked into the Bari Gotic on a recommendation for a cool local watering hole where I could get what I was craving after a big meal - a Pastis. Pastis is a digestive drink, with little alcohol served over ice and diluted with water. The result is a creamy look, and a deliciously refreshing anise or licorice flavour that aids in the digestion of a huge meal. It is French in origin and this bar, aptly named Pastiss - was rumored to be a favorite hangout for Madamme Edith Piaf and Hemmingway when they traveled through Barcelona in the 1940's. The bar was indeed tiny and filled with paintings, notes, a creepy sculpture on the ceiling and history - it was a great way to end a great trip and I spoke quite freely with the barkeep in Spanish about the history of stuff on the walls and the music they play there.

nuff said..."it doesn't matter if you're ugly, you're a good friend"

But the week was not to be over without a little BIKE POLO! Played just like polo on horses, bike polo is gaining popularity around the world, with competitions popping up in a ton of cities. Fort Collins had a little gathering that started right before I left and San Diego had a great scene too. Problem is, the cops usually shut it down cause its late at night, often involves a little beer (like most good bike events of an underground nature) and can be rough on grass if that's where the field is. In Barcelona, late night noise and kids drinking beer on bikes is not a big deal, and the guys from the shop that invited me down said no one ever hassles them in the place they play. Its a perfect little round sunken concrete court that made for good polo. Watch the video here - these dudes were good!

I walked back to the hostel and crashed out happy having seen my favorite city once again. Drifted to merry sleep and dreamed of seeing all my homies again and decided I got some real "squeezing" to do when I get back. I cant wait to hear what you are all up to, go for a few bike rides, hear the tales of your own adventures, and share a laugh, maybe even a cry.

bye bye Costa Brava...

Woke up and proceeded to take the trip home, which included a brisk (late) walk, an hour and twenty minute bus, an hour and a half plane, another 40 minute bus, an hour train, a wait, and a panda ride back to the Farm. Turns out if you look like a unibomber, and try to avoid eye contact you kinda get treated like you are thinking about doing something wrong. I even had to buy a ticket for my foot when I fell asleep on the train and woke up to a train cop handing me the ticket (only 7.66 but it sounded a lot like 66 and when I protested he asked to see my passport) With all the talk of passports and not having a legitimate visa I started to get a little nervous. Basically next time I travel that much, I'm wearing a nice suit and trying to look much more european. This look works well for bad neighborhoods late at nite, NOT the airport...