A Walk Around Barcelona, Spain

　I arrived in Barcelona.

　My main goal is Gaudí’s architecture, but first let’s just wander around aimlessly. While strolling near the station, I came across a huge building. I have no idea what it is. The area around a major station is overwhelmingly crowded, so let’s make a quick escape.

　A supermarket that somehow feels very Japanese, thanks to the capsule toy machine and kiddie rides out front. It has an old, worn-in charm.

　I wonder if this thing once carried the city’s children through the wind. Its faded colors give it the look of a soft vinyl monster toy, which is pretty cool. I want to ship it to Japan and put it on display at Mandarake.

　It was unbearably hot, so I took a break at a café. People in Spain seem to blast videos at full volume wherever they are and make phone calls nonstop even indoors, so it’s hard to get that “quiet moment in a stylish afternoon café” kind of atmosphere. The terrace seats are simply too hot. A real dilemma.

　The buildings are huge, and the roads are wide. Apparently people in Barcelona have a strong sense of rivalry toward Madrid, like “we’re the real center of Spain.” I thought it might be like the relationship between Tokyo and Osaka, but since it has even developed into an independence movement, it’s clearly less peaceful than I imagined. Still, when you’re just walking around the city, none of that tense background really matters at all.

　Once you get to places with fewer people, it’s sad to see run-down buildings and closed shops lined up one after another. In Europe, buildings get covered in graffiti without restraint, so when there aren’t many people around, the whole area just feels desolate.

　Then little by little, night begins to fall. I like this super robot-style graffiti. It has that sharp, spiky, boyish feel to it. It reminds me of Gaiking and Gekigangar.

　A supermarket lighting up the sidewalk in the middle of the night. Barcelona nightlife may be lively around the bars, but once you step a little off the main streets, it suddenly becomes very quiet.

　The smell of marijuana drifts over from somewhere. In Barcelona, personal use is treated fairly loosely, and at night it’s not unusual for the plant-like smell of marijuana to waft through the air. You can smell it in quite a few places. There are also coffee shops here and there that only locals can enjoy. But just because the smell of marijuana is in the air doesn’t mean the area especially feels dangerous. If you walk down the back streets, someone might ask you something like, “You wanna buy some weed?”

　That said, pickpocketing and assaults definitely do happen, so it’s probably best not to wander around too much late at night. As you can see from the photo, the atmosphere is very different from daytime, and so are the kinds of people out on the streets.

　Every now and then, a sexy woman will call out to you. Street prostitutes, in other words. If you followed one, I suppose you’d end up in some room around here where something sexual would take place.

　I’m the kind of person who finds it calming to walk through sketchy areas, so I was satisfied to explore places like this too.

　Heading toward somewhere brighter, I came to a square. If you sit there for a while, homeless people will come and talk to you. Unfortunately, I wasn’t carrying any cash at all, so while I sat there blankly, they eventually drifted off somewhere. Time to head back.

　Lastly, I stopped by a bar-like place, where slot machines were permanently installed. I had no idea when or how you were supposed to play them, so I just kept staring at them.

　What came out was perfectly ordinary coffee. I realized that there isn’t really a concept of café au lait here, and that instead you order it as “coffee with milk.” 

　On the way back, the neighborhood greengrocer glowed in the night.

　It was a night of drifting through Barcelona with no particular destination.