With two hours left to spend in the day, we walked down LaRambla, crowded with strollers walking both ways in the beautiful night air. A street seller was sending into the heavens a spinning irridescent disk that he could launch 40 feet in the air. While the circling blue light was making its ascent and descent, he watched the crowd for the eyes that followed the disk, knowing that way, whom to approach with his sales patter.
Joaquim and I slipped down a side street, ostensibly to see the church and old town, but the Christmas market was crowded with evening shoppers, shoulder to shoulder, at least four rows of stalls, back to back which would make eight long lines, each two blocks long, of holidays wares, that I needed to check out. The major categories of jewellry, scarves, tree ornaments, berries & leaves/tied branches/ and the Caga Tio (pooping log) were on the square.
It is the extras, the additions to elaborate Nativity Scenes that dominant the scene. The layout at Jordie´s and Rosa´s is six feeet long and three feet wide. The scale of the figures is miniature, the baby pigs and lambs being so small I cannot pick them up. There are streams, bridges, pastures, castles, Roman soldiers, shepherds boiling meals in pots under a tripod, the food hanging over a fire, the three kings slowly approaching in the distant hills, a woman dancing with a tambourine at a fire, a blacksmith using his anvil, someone roasting chestnuts – and of course, in a far corner, a baby being born in a stable. I slowed down on my walk through the market for here there is something for everyone. Something every size, and something for a price that could be sustained by every pocketbook. The background decoration scenese, what is used for the ground, the mise-en-scene, is mainly flat rounded stones. The sides of the scene look like the bark I might gather in the woods at Shuswap, but it is simulated, perhaps acrylic and in as many variations as I could find in the woods.
Joaquim and I only worried about conspicuous consumption three times in our shopping. The first time was the only time I felt him nudged me to move along.
¨Are we out of time?¨
¨No, I am nervous you are going to buy the scarves you were lookiing at just now.¨
¨No worries. I saw these same scarves in Camden Town. They are beautiful silk from Nepal, but too expensive there, and probably the same here. I am just looking, not buying.¨
The second issue about money is that Joaquim wondered how all of the merchants could make money, there seemed to be so many of them and so much for sale.
I had wondered about a marginally related question earlier in the morning, but my question was about how much money it required for maintainance of the Gaudi inspired and free park. The upkeep on a park of that size just boggles the mind. Who is going to do all of that weeding and keep everything in such good repair?
Arta
On the 18th, we went to see Pessebre Vivant (Live Nativity). One of David´s little cousins was performing ¨Ball de Bastons¨ (Dance with Sticks) as part of the gifts brought to baby Jesus. There are four performers working together. They dance and tap each others sticks in different patterns.
ReplyDeleteMany of the live characters matched those mentioned by Arta. There was a market with chickens (dead rubber ones, the kind Arta said my brother Kelvin always wanted when he was a teenager), woman washing clothes at the river, a blacksmith, breadmakers (who gave out a peice of bread torn from a loaf to children as they passed by), Joseph, Mary, angels, a live infant whom I overheard a local saying was ¨una noia¨ (a girl) not a boy, and two other very important categories of characters. The Roman Solidiers (Els Romans) and The Three Wisemen (Els Reis). David said the Roman Soldiers looked like LEGO figures. They were standing tall with their arms by their sides and had armour that resembled those he has assembled into LEGO figures. He wanted to count them but not be counted by them. They were taking a census of all local people for tax purposes and you could get a photo with them. His had to be taken with a wide berth between them and him.
The Wisemen are those the children are truly there to see. They bring gifts to baby Jesus, but more importantly candy for the children. David and his cousins all came hom ewiht pockets jammed with candy. This is only a taste of what will come on January 6th when the real travellors will stop by their home dropping off gifts (the size Santa will leave in Canada for children there). They will be stopping during the night for rest and food for their camels (we will be leaving out carrots and water rather than milk and cookies).
One notorious Catalan Nativity character was missing from the creche nativity next to the live nativity, El Caganer (the Pooper). This Catalan farmer with his pants around his ankles is in every other nativity I have seen in Catalan cities and homes. I looked for him. I could hear each child who approached the steps that led up to the elaborate minifigure nativity set say ¨on es el caganer¨ (where is the pooper). Missing in action. I was suprised to discover that I was disappointed to not find him, that character I used to be disgusted by in a very ¨not openminded to my husband-s culture¨ way. Perhaps it was best, because that would then beg the question of why he was not also in the Live Nativity.
Could you please bring me back a El Caganer (the Pooper) along with the nativity set. Thank you in advance.
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