My first weekend out was with my German roommate. A nice girl of 21 from Munich, and though she was pretentious at times and difficult to live with, after that first week she felt that I was reeling from culture shock, took pity, and decided to take me out on the town. We headed to the Ramblas after a pre-party involving a bottle of Sangria. When we arrived, I was amused to see several people of Middle Eastern background (she later told me they were Pakistanis, mostly) walking around with 6-packs of the local beer called Estrella, and selling them to passersby for a Euro a piece. Although I did not quite understand how they could make a living doing this, I did find the idea to be novel. It especially made me smile when, while standing in line to get into a club, I was offered one, and, after having felt it to make sure that it was still adequately chilled, I bought it. This brings up another important point about the nightlife, in that there is no such thing as an open-container law. It is very common to see people drinking on the streets, and the police do not seem to care unless you are being obnoxious, abusive, or otherwise incorrigible. I could only imagine how vendors could make a killing selling beer to the people marooned in the long lines in clubs in NYC or LA.
After we entered the club, we made our way up a flight of stairs. At the top it opened up into a huge dance hall with bars lining every wall, except the one directly in front of us; here is where the DJ was stationed. Above the DJ was a huge screen, and on it was playing old episodes of Soul Train. The music was distinctly disco. I nearly doubled over in laughter. Apparently disco did not die, it just moved to Spain. And just when I didn’t think anything could get more ridiculous than this scene, we began to snake our way through the dance floor, and the style of clothing worn by the young people in this club was a complete throw-back to the late 1970’s in America. I was beside myself with hilarity, but still managed to get out onto the dance floor and shake a groove to the super sounds of the 70’s. Ooooo baby!
The next weekend I decided to go out with my classmates from NYC. We went to the Olympic Village which was built for the Summer Games of 1992. Now it had been converted into a boardwalk with many tourist bars and nightclubs. This particular bar was called IceBarcelona. It was a bar in a freezer completely made of ice. The constant temperature was -.6 degree Celsius. After paying the cover, you were given a winter jacket, a pair of thick mittens, and a huskie hat. Everything was made of ice: the bar, the tables, the stools, the sculptures, the walls, even the glasses they served your drink in. Being a desert rat from Arizona, my blood froze almost instantly, but the experience was well worth the numbing cold. I ordered a drink, and toasted my friends. Upon completing the drink, and knowing that it would all be melted down at the end of the night anyway, I simply threw it against the wall where it shattered into several pieces. This amused my friends, who all did the same in unison upon draining their respective drinks. Here are some videos of that experience:
On the final weekend of my program, the night before I was to leave Barcelona, my friends and I decided to go to a place called the Dow Jones Bar. Here, the price of drinks were set by the simple rules of supply and demand. The more popular the drink, the higher in price it would climb. The least popular drinks were the cheapest, and whenever the bell rang it would announce drink specials. I found this place to be novel in that not only could you get drunk there but you could also learn a basic lesson in economics as well. We must have been there for a few hours “playing the market” and had it been a full house (we went on Thursday so I was not as full as it could have been) I think we would have seen greater fluctuations in prices, but it was a good experience all the same.
Overall I would rate the nightlife in Barcelona to be on par with any major American city. Definite advantages were to be had in the availability of alcohol on the streets and the ability to consume it anywhere. Also, the fact that bars did not close until sunup was another major plus. The diversity of the scene is seen in the clubs playing music ranging from swanky jazz to modern electronic house music to pop music to yes, even disco. Even so, I do not believe my disco experience was an isolated incident, and I do believe that the art form is alive and well in Barcelona. Also, the fashions are about 20 years behind the times and come off as tacky. Still, the electricity in the air can be felt and tapped into, and can propel one to dance the entire night away. Sleep was always a welcome reprieve after a night out in Barcelona.
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