Pais Vasco

I hate European air travel. Mostly because I hate air travel, period, but I have two additional gripes that seem specific to Europe (outside the Americas, anyway). One is that at the ticket counters here, they form a separate line at each counter rather than having one line where you go to the first open counter. Do they know nothing of queueing theory? I know nothing about queueing theory (did I even spell it right?), but it´s so obvious that one line is more efficient. Also, they don´t use jetways as much here. Often you have to take a bus across the runway to the plane. Maybe it´s somehow more efficient or safe or something to have buses rather than planes driving across the runway? I dunno. But I have a very visceral and maybe slightly overreactive hatred for the buses. If it´s an efficiency thing, the airport powers that be should really focus their energies on the check-in lines. I´m a dumbass and thought my flight to Bilbao was an hour earlier than it actually is (at least I didn´t err in the other direction), so I´ve had a lot of time to stew on these airport issues.

So anyway, I flew to Bilbao today. It´s clearly in a transitional state. It apparently used to be an industrial wasteland and parts of it are still pretty ugly. There´s a ton of construction, which is probably a good sign but also ugly, and there are some really cool buildings in the old part of town, but a lot of them look pretty dirty and neglected. But there are some really nice parks and plazas with lots of flowers and there´s some really cool architecture. The cathedral is really beautiful, and different inside from the typical European cathedral. It´s really arty, with some cool sculptures and stained glass that looks like flowers and sunsets. There´s a river running through the town, which is nice just because I haven´t seen one in a while. (Barcelona does have that whole Mediterranean thing going for it, but I like rivers). Unfortunately it´s a very very dirty river that only looks nice from far away. It´s hilly, and a lot greener here than in Barcelona, fewer palm trees. The landscape is pretty, but not beautiful.

There´s a biggish park near the Guggenheim Museum that reminded me of Central Park. For no particular reason other than that it´s big, I guess. There was this big open gazebo-type thing with lilacs hanging from it and fountains inside. Once inside I stayed for a minute because the lilacs smelled so good. Then I noticed there was music playing. Something classical that I´m far too uncultured to be able to identify. Maybe Tchaikovsky; it sounded like Loony Tunes or a beef commercial. Then I noticed that the fountains were going with the music: choreographed water. And the sun was pretty bright so there were lots of little rainbows. It was like watching fireworks, made out of water.

And. I just saw the most fucked up parade. Ever. (Easter is kind of a weeklong event here in Spain, so there´s lots of stuff going on.) People of all ages in robes and KKK hats. Really. They were these very tall pointy hats that covered the whole face and had holes cut out to see through. The outfits were different colors: first purple; then blue; then white, which was really creepy; then black, which was even creepier. And they were playing this music with really loud intense drums that sounded like a battle march. Some people weren´t wearing shoes. Forgive me for stating the obvious, but ETA wears masks. Striking KKK resemblance aside (people here probably don´t know about the KKK, I think it´s a pretty uniquely American thing), aren´t creepy masks a look to be avoided here? I guess if it´s a religious thing than changing it would be letting the terrorists win. Still, I don´t know if it was more the KKK resemblance or the ETA thing (I came here with no intentions of being concerned with or even thinking about ETA), but it really kinda freaked me out.

Oh, and Basque food is famous for being creative and different and wonderful. Tonight I had this egg and mushroom dish that was very, very good.