GRANADA

She had not expected it to be that cold. Else she would have dressed appropriately. As she stood shivering in the long queue for the ticket to Alhambra, a lovely dawn broke through the trees. She took another glance at the long queue and cursed herself again for not wearing warmer clothes. She couldn’t believe they had woken up at that unearthly hour and come all the way to Alhambra, just to get the entrance ticket – the place doesn’t even open till late morning. Anyways, here she was, looking at people from across the world waiting just like her, with the exception that they were more intelligently dressed. 

By the time they had collected the ticket it was a bright morning, and they decided to skip the bus and walk around the place. She was soon to learn that walking was the only way to explore any place. As they slowly made their way back to the hostel, she felt awed by the stoned houses with small plants and flowers peeking from the windows, the smooth roads with lovely plants and creepers planted neatly in the sidewalks, the clear and bright blue sky with its soft tufts of clouds. 

She saw people walking around with poodles. Everywhere. People from Granada seemed to have a special interest in poodles – the only canine species she saw there. No street dogs at all. That felt strange – not to see any stay animal species. Most inner roads in Granada were very tiny, but would still have pavements – she felt the pavements took up more space than the roads. There were two-three storied buildings on either side, but they didn’t seem to be separated. It was one long continuous procession of houses, shops and offices. 

By the time they reached the main street near their hostel the city was wide awake and getting ready for the day. While the shops were still closed, the restaurants and eating joints were slowly opening up. Walking along the road she could not but be amused by the road sense. People crossed only at Zebra crossings, never anywhere else. Which meant, that there were zebra crossings at every street – however small the street was. In fact, every street had pedestrian crossing street lights. The funny thing was the vehicles would stop at these lights, even if no one was crossing. They really were quite safe here, she thought to herself. That was quite amazing. Most of the street crossing lights also had this button – to stop the traffic, in case someone wanted to cross while there is vehicular traffic on the road. She felt they were totally unnecessary. Whatever the color of the pedestrian crossing light, any vehicle would stop at least 10 feet away if they saw just a foot off the pavement and on the road. Boy, did they care about their pedestrians!!!

The traffic sense was also quite amazing here. She never saw anyone changing lanes or trying to reach anywhere in a hurry. There was perfect order in the way the traffic moved. The cars made strange squishing sounds as they passed her. They made that sound everywhere, in straight roads, in curves, at high speed, low speed, all the time. It was quite weird. The buses were just like out of the movies – so neat, shiny and clean. The ticket had to be collected at the entrance, from the bus driver – until each person had not finished this, the bus wouldn’t move. There were obviously no free rides here in Spain. What surprised her was the each bus journey had a fixed fare – it didn’t depend on where they were going or how far the destination was. 

After a lovely breakfast, where the person serving the food was better looking than models she saw on TV, they set course for Alhambra. Once there, she could not stop but feel like she was home. The beautiful Moorish buildings with the intricate carvings were similar to those she saw in India. But that’s where the similarities ended. The buildings were quite well maintained here – there was very little damage to the carvings, and everywhere she could see the restoration work happening to keep this manmade beauty intact. 

As they walked through the beautiful corridors and walkways, she couldn’t stop admiring the beautiful craftsmanship of the carvers. They did the ceiling too – with colored tiles and painted wood. They looked far more exquisite than the marbled floors. The gardens of Alhambra were perfectly manicured and lush. Occasionally there were splashes of color among the green – a bright yellow tree or a tree laden with pink blossoms. It character and mystery to the entire place. The paths through the gardens consisted of beautifully laid down stones and pebbles – with swirling patterns. Someone made this place up with a lot of love and care, she thought.

She couldn’t stop noticing the couples. There were couples everywhere, in every age group. In fact, she thought to herself, there were only couples she has seen since she landed in Madrid. Or groups of couples. Most of them were in their early 20s. While some seemed all cooing, kissing and holding hands, most of them seemed quite normal. However, one thing was common among them all – they seemed to care for each other quite a lot – to the point that they were oblivious to others. And they were quite comfortable being a couple in public. It was like they were used to this since a very young age. So different from back home, she thought pensively. 

Another thing which she couldn’t get enough of was the couples with babies. There seemed to be families everywhere she looked. She wondered how did Indians come to the notion that family concept is not strong in the West. There were so many couples with babies ranging from a few months to toddlers, and most couples had multiple children – all of them cute and lovely. All the parents were lugging around prams and strollers, which carried their bags and jackets, while the children enjoyed their time on their parent’s arms and shoulders. It was beautiful to see such families. She had kept away from babies all her life – she thought them to be these crying and pooping things which need attention all the time. However, babies here seemed so comfortable and happy. The fathers seemed to be more involved with the baby rather than the mothers. That was another strange sight which she was not used to.

She found that Spanish people talk a lot – or maybe their language was quite verbose. When they talked it sounded like constant babble but with lots of expressions and nice to hear. They smiled a lot too – to anyone who met their eyes, even while walking on the streets. Since she was staring at everyone, she got a lot of smiles back from them. Initially she felt quite conscious but soon she started enjoying the smiles and giving it back. Once again she found that not a single person was talking on the cell phone. It was surprising to see that they seemed to live so much in the present – not dividing their attention to something else, somewhere else. They all seemed such good looking people with well maintained figures and postures. They obviously paid a lot of attention to health and exercising and enjoying life. She had this constant feeling that she needed to learn a lot from this place and people. 

                                                          To be continued…..