debt (maghreb-ish adventure part 1)

scene: rer b towards charles de gaulle airport
time: roundabout 9 pm

this will teach me and my sense of military time...i arrived just 2 or 3 minutes after the last flight to barcelona boarded out of charles de gaulle on vueling airlines. i thought my flight left at 11 pm, but it boarded at 9 (i switched 22 and 20h)...so i was panicking, and found the next flight out was at 6h45 (early in the morning) on air france, and the very gracious woman at the air france desk got me the last "under 26" price ticket for that flight. i stayed in one of the ultra-expensive but hella convenient hotels right next to the airport, exchanged textos with yvonnick and concluded all he wanted was to baise an anglo, and slept 4 hours before hitting the long security line. i was able to check in pretty quickly with the automatic check-in (i had a paper ticket) and from there things were ok.

upon arriving in barcelona, i caught the bus from the airport to placa cataluña and then the metro from there (my let's go espagne [in french] served me well throughout the trip) to tarragona, the closest stop to calla de bejar (darcy, sandrine [another toulousene swing dancer], and i were staying at a pension there). the spanish schedule seems to start around noon, with brunchy type meal at 1 or 2, dinner at 10, and partying til 6 am. we didn't exactly follow that, because swing dancing takes it out of you!

darcy and sandrine were in the advanced levels of the workshops, and generally had classes at opposite times (darcy would have one in the morning, sandrine the afternoon, so i was able to spend time with both of them, in alternance, each day). we walked around a lot, and i saw the fondacion miró and the picasso museum, as well as the barri gòtic on my own (i loved it for its windy streets, closed shops with graffiti and sunny open windows). la rambla was beautiful, full of vendors and travelers and tapas bars selling sangria and various fried items (food was cheap, but i didn't eat healthily in barcelona).

the swing soirées were really fun, it had been so long since i danced! people of all levels came from all over the world -- berlin, the states, sweden, ukraine, obviously france and spain, ... -- but they were still short some leads and even proved to be cliquish! so just like at the cleveland exchanges i had been to in the past, it paid to be agressive. i particularly enjoyed dancing with sebastien, a quiet, small, bespec-ed parisian that reminded me of daniel from oberlin in his light leading.

for the crazy dance, i wore hot lime green leggings bought at that store near the mediathèque musicale at les halles (-3), a black mini skort with a silver band, huge star hoops, sparkly barettes, and a bright yellow wife beater. i think leads may have hesitated to dance with that. darcy called the outfit "a 12-year-old's idea of a rock star." i also decided to wear my huge sunglasses from h&m inside the metro. i couldn't see anything.

darcy and i left by train from the central station at around 9 am for the airport...

...to be continued...