Humility and Fame

Two days of the conference have gone quite fast, filled with interesting presentations and information. The sound levels were far too high - sometimes painfully. But the individual speakers and events were memorable.

Bear Grylls who is a global superstar through his televised adventures, and his role as head scout for 50 million little boys, was one of the star speakers. He spoke about his fear of being at such events, the feeling of exposure, his inadequacy. It was surprisingly moving speech, urging us all to be of service, be humble, and thankful for being alive.

Out in the streets again and freed from the timetable of training meetings we have started to wander around the city. 

One of our small party is eighty years old and has painful legs, so walking is not easy. We called into a chocolate shop – or rather a nougat shop - where everything is so beautifully packaged and offering a wide range of traditional or augmented traditional products, but my goodness, the reliance on sugar to sell! sell! sell! is terrifying.

It turned out that an old friend of mine from Facebook – Kay Newton – was in Barcelona so we agreed to meet for lunch. We have corresponded for several years, but never actually met face-to-face.  She suggested meeting at a restaurant near the university called Kale and Flax which we did, and that turned out to be a revelation, in terms of architecture and menu. 

We had a fabulous meal - all raw food, stylishly presented.

The table next to us was occupied by three young women with very brightly coloured hair. "They look like ‘My Little Pony’"said Kay.

Once we had finished lunch we made our way back towards the apartment and decided to go to the top of the old bull/fighting arena at Plaza Espanya. That is now a shopping centre (thank god). We had met a man in the Metro who explained that the external lift costs 1€ to get the roof but if you use the internal lift inside the shopping centre it’s free. So that is what we did. There is a walkway right round the top of the roof giving views of the whole of the city.

Internally, the architecture is stunning with a very theatrical central space criss-crossed by various escalators and bridges.

We were aware that something must be happening, as a crowd was gathering around the central cinematic floor which has a strange circular screen in it changing all the time and responding to people’s footprints by altering the pattern. Eventually we worked out that a pop-group was going to be appearing a bit later on so we stood and watched as all preparations were made. The pop group turned out to be those girls with multicoloured hair who we’d sat next to at lunch, a band called Sweet California. 
Slightly disappointingly, when they finally arrived their first move was to sit and sign autographs and the wait was too long for us so we went back home

We stopped at a restaurant along the Avenida Parallel on our way and had a glass of wine before we turned in.

If you ever come to Barcelona I recommend a visit to the Kale and Flax restaurant, and I recommend a visit to the top of the bullring shopping centre - the views are spectacular.