Surprise, surprise

One of the greatest pleasures of being in a place not your own is the way that it can upend your expectations. Take Valencia. Third largest city in Spain, right on the Mediterranean, home to one of several Holy Grails plus St. Vincent's arm lopped off and displayed on a pretty white pillow. Once a year they have this crazy festival during which they torch huge plaster, wood, and paper sculptures (sound familiar?). Even so, I was expecting a run-of-the-mill European destination--plazas, monuments, cathedrals, palaces, cobblestones, a dirty river through the middle, plus a slew of ugly apartment buildings built between 1955 and 1975 (give or take). And it had all of those things--except the river was diverted and replaced with a lovely park and in the park was this magnificent creation:


Paging sci-fi movie location scouts! Designed by architect and Valencia homeboy Santiago Calatrava, La Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciencies is a brand-new futuristic city within the city of Valencia. It houses a fine arts performance space (the big helmet-looking building on the right, which is still under construction), a "hemisferic" (the center eyeball) IMAX and planetarium, interactive science museum (far left), and beyond that a massive indoor/outdoor oceonographic center.

Now there are plenty of unkind things one can say about futuristic architecture: It doesn't age well, it's utopian, impractical. But walking around that place, all I could think about was the surreal, dream-like state the place evokes (perhaps less so during high tourist season). The forms are futuristic but, with all those sinewy arches and curved surfaces, also incredibly organic. The stark white concrete is balanced out by serene pools of water and the green park in which the mini-city sits. And there's something incredibly reassuring about a super high-tech public restroom; it just seems cleaner. Besides, a complex dedicated to the arts and science should itself reflect the exploratory, experimental nature of those endeavors. This complex does that.

Because I am, alas, sick again and because the place was so huge as to merit several days worth of visiting and we only had a day, we chose only to go to the Oceonografic center. Worth it! You literally descend into the aquarium sections, as though going underwater, resurface for birds and dolphins and seals, then back down for more underwater. These amazing tunnels provide you with panoramic underwater views that I couldn't get enough of, though it definitely helped to have my iPod so I could drown out the hordes of screaming school children that were tearing through these things with pretty music.

Not so much a surprise, but an incredible treat was a meal at Ca'Sento. This family-owned restaurant in a seedy neighborhood near Valencia's port is nothing that those descriptors evoke. It has a Michelin Star, just a few tables, and an army of waiters to meet your every need The seven-course meal we had was a complete palate-spinner. Fresh, fresh, fresh (just-clubbed, I like to say) seafood, the ubiquitous gourmet Spanish foam, surprising combinations (like bocarones on a chilled Parmesan soup with a hint of tomato juice essence). It was dinner raised to the level of fine art. I shall ask Alan to write up a more articulate description. But suffice to say, droooool.

The surprises continue. Back in Barcelona, recovering from what appears to be a cold or a sinus infection or bronchitis or I don't know what but thank goodness I can just pop into a pharmacy and get cheap antibiotics, I was bemoaning the fact that it's my next-to-last weekend here and I'm having to spend it inside doing as little as possible. And then it paraded on my rain. From around the corner came a stream of audio and visual delights. Costumes, marching bands, soon stretching down the entire length of the street. From my balcony, I had a perfect vantage point.

I suspect this has something to do with Carnaval!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! but I cannot be sure. What I can say it was a great treat and something I would have missed had I been out, say, doing something cultural.

--JENN