Institut to Naked Man

Apart from smelling like used shit this city has its good points. The Institut del Teatre, for one. A grandiose, modern extravagance of steel, glass and marble, woven together to proclaim wealth and intelligence of the first order. A rough U of building overlooks a large courtyard, with wooden benches where students sit and warm themselves in the sun. In our case anyway. Those native to Barcelona believe, somehow, that it is cold and go out in their coats and scarves. They look at us strangely when we walk by, and most likely comment on us to each other just as we would do to them. So it goes.

Away to one side of the courtyard sits the restaurant with its hideously overpriced food; to the right the library building and directly in front the glass front of a six-floored building, with four basements. Behind is a rather more ornate theatre building, painted in orange and red and covered with all manner of knobs and ornaments. A carpark, too, rather spoiling the view. Also an Italian-styled theatre, one of the outside walls painted dark red and ornamented with pots, crushed in their making and burnt in the kiln. They stick out, making the place look like a climbing wall crossed with a crustacean’s back. The scenics would enjoy it, I’m sure.

Inside there’s wood panelling aplenty and splendid views. Too many rooms and theatre spaces to believe. A library, the largest of its kind in Europe, or so I’m told. On Monday we had the introduction to the school, met the Erasmus coordinator, a lovely, petite woman with near-perfect English, who is looking, on request, into organising Spanish lessons for us. We met the head of the school as well and were informed, unfortunately, that Joan Baixas would not be teaching us due to illness. This was confirmed by her at the start of our Tuesday session with the voice lady, whose name escapes me at present. We will instead be studying with a protégé of his – or so I believe. One who has worked with him before at any rate.

This was something of a let-down. Or, in layman’s terms. A complete fuck up the arse of a thing to happen. We will have our first session with this new fellow on Thursday, and had the Wednesday off because he was busy. Getting back to Tuesday, we met the voice lady and had an introductory session (1 hour approximately) in which we introduced ourselves, talked about our interests, aims and experiences in theatre, a task at which I failed like a drug addict, and then she left and we entertained ourselves with theatre games. How nice to move after so many weeks still! After all, we had the space to ourselves – and few decided to leave, thinking there was nothing to be done. But in theatre, even if there is no show to produce, there is always something to be done. Always training to occur. On these grounds I truly feel we have developed as a group.

But there is always more to come. Getting away from the school, I have started reading plays for the directing project when we come back to the UK. Getting further away, a few noticeable events:

Tuesday night, one of our number got robbed in an alley. He went out alone to meet more of our group at a nearby pub and got lost – although ironically he was on the right track, and quite close. It’s a devil of a place to find, though, is Stokes. A tiny place, serving cheap beer by the crate in a gloriously retarded ‘Power Hour’. I mean... seriously? Anyway. He left the apartment, and soon the call came in that he was lost – and we heard the robbing down the phone. The mugger tried to steal the phone by its top half, an old trick – and one that shows how much you need to keep your wits and eyes about you in the back-alleys around here. I and another went out looking for him, found more of us and turned up nothing. Apparently he walked for ages and returned to the flat before us. Shaken, but unharmed.

Could have been worse. Ate at three places over the last few days. A nice little Buddhism-themed restaurant selling Spanish food. A street restaurant called Pita house, on La Rambla, and another place – again, forgotten, where they didn’t speak a word of English. Also tried my hand at shopping in the market, which went quite well, except for telling an old woman I didn’t speak English before asking if she did, and realising that whilst I can very well ask how much something is in Spanish, it helps to know the numbers so you can understand the answer. God, I felt like a tool.

On a lighter note, spent a very good Wednesday day on the beach with the lads. Started out by being scammed by a coconut seller, who came along the beach with a bucket of coconut pieces and a pair of tongs and handed out coconut to us. I refused to take it, which made him very angry and forceful – which was a clear suggestion that I was right not to take the coconut. God, how I wanted to tell him to fuck off! In short order he started demanding money and wouldn’t accept no for an answer, even attempting to take a phone in place. This was a clear lesson to all involved – there’s always money involved. You NEVER take the coconut.

Found a rope climbing frame and played tag on it for half an hour. Observed a totally naked man with a big knob and an all-over tan walking up and down the beach and seafront the entire time we were there. Amused by my fellows’ humour at him; I, for one, was quite happy. It is a testament to the freedom of this culture that a short man can let his bits hang out for all to see and noone gives a toss.