Girona & Figueres

This weekend adventure brought to you by funky artwork and crazy painters -- Namely, Dali. Yes, Dali was a total and complete nutcase, dare I say whackjob. But he was a brilliant whackjob none-the-less. I feel like I have been saying this to much -- sometimes people ask "Why? What is that? Its, so bizzare" to which, all I can reply is "Why not? Its Spain -- they don't care!" well, at least in Barcelona and Catalunya, they don't. The people seem to embrace, love, and charish the oddities and bizarre. Why not? Enjoy.

The Dali museum was built, in part, by Dali himself to house the works of Figueres' most famous painter and eccentric personality -- Dali. It was rebuilt, of sorts, from the wreckage of a theatre that was partially destroyed during the Spanish Civil War and chose it as the proper location to store his works.

As for his paintings, they are all quite strange, many featuring the phallic symbols piddling into their own mouths, random nudity, and crazy colors. Though, some of his work was also more tame. Really, I don't know how to describe his work, nor do I want to because that really takes the fun out of it.

Its the philosopher's conundrum -- the reason why I hate philosophy of any and all kinds. Scholars will study the intricacies of every minuscule detail of the work attributing give certain qualities meaning -- proclaiming to know true thoughts and intentions with absolutely no tangible proof or factual evidence -- instead of admiring it for the (somewhat bizarre) beauty that the entire painting is. To understand his true thoughts you would probably have to be crazy, anyway.

Then we went to Girona. It was a beautiful small town with lots of small churches, narrow streets, and beautiful sights. Had a delicious meal, where the menu was in only Catalan -- not even Spanish. The wait staff spoke Catalan, and you replied in Spanish. Everyone around you was Catalan -- Not Spanish. We weren't in Spain, we were in Catalunya. Relaxing, enjoyable, and a good weekend.

I have a pretty hectic travel schedule within the next few weeks: Madrid, Barcelona (home), Lisbon, Cork, and after that, probably even more travel -- the road is endless, and I haven't seen all that there is to see -- yet.