Tag Archives: Dº Chamberí

9th March 2024: Minerals, fossils & trains (Madrid, Spain)

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I might not be the most people-person ever, but if there is something that makes conventions extra fun, it is seeing attendees unapologetically geek out about what they love – in the case of Expominerales, that would be… rocks. Of course, this is an over-simplification. Expominerales is held yearly in the mine and energy engineering school Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingenieros de Minas y Energía (ETSIME) in Madrid. The year 2024 marks the 43rd edition of the event, which is considered one of the most important fairs in Spain in the topic of Earth Sciences – minerals, fossils, gems, and meteorites are widely available to the public. Aside from the small historical museum Museo Histórico-Minero Don Felipe de Borbón y Grecia, there were dozens of exhibitors with all kinds of items for sale, ranging from a few euro to several thousands. These year there were a few lectures, too, and coincidentally, the two of them I was most interested in happened on Saturday, one after the other.

I arrived at the ETSIME around 11:00, and I walked around the stands a couple of times. I have to say that I wanted everything, but I set a budget and I was able to stay around it, after shopping and lunch. At noon, I settled to listen to the lectures – one about the rehabilitation of an ancient gypsum mine in a hamlet called Hornillos de Cerrato, in the area of León. The other one versed about the uses of an already-rehabilitated one in the south of Spain, home to a huge geode. Both of them were pretty interesting, though the conference room was freezing. Someone had forgotten to turn on the heater there, it seemed…

Expominerales 2024 at ETSIME

After the two conferences, I had a last round to buy a last thing, so in the end I bought an iron-meteorite pendant, a fossilised shark tooth pendant, a plesiosaur tooth, and a soil sample of the K–T boundary. A plesiosaur was a marine reptile with flippers, a short tail and a long neck. The K–T boundary (now named the Cretaceous–Palaeogene (K–Pg) boundary) is the theoretical layer of iridium-rich black sand that was formed by the meteorite that caused the extinction of non-avian dinosaurs – and basically most life at the time, in one of the great world-wide extinctions in the history of Earth.

Shopping from Expominerales

At 14:30, I had a reservation for lunch at a Japanese franchise called Ramen Shifu. While I had originally been looking forward to trying the ramen (and I got my hopes pumped up when I read that they were Hakata ramen style), the noodles were rather disappointing. Fortunately, the okonomiyaki – Japanese pizza of sorts, made with a base of cabbage and topped with sauce and bonito flakes, was all right. On top of everything, paying was stupidly difficult because they did not have change.

Shifu Ramen ponzano - okonomiyaki and ramen

When I came out of the restaurant though, it was raining like crazy. I pulled out my umbrella and hopped towards the closest underground station, as my next destination was inside the metro system – one of the Underground’s museum network Museos de Metro de Madrid the collection of classic trains Estación de Chamartín: Exposición trenes históricos, inside the Chamartín stop. The exhibition displays four historical trains, restored from among the first ones that ran under the city, and some memorabilia. It was a bit underwhelming – more like false advertisement. I hoped I would be able to snoop inside the trains, since that was the photograph that opened the webpage, but unfortunately they were cordoned off. There was however a map with the works by Antonio Palacios in Madrid, which will become handy eventually.

Classical Train Exhibition Madrid

Afterwards, I just headed off towards the train station and got back home.

16th December 2023: A day out of ExpoGema (Madrid, Spain)

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Since the mineral expo ExpoMinerales back in February was all cool and fun, I decided to attend its shinier (and unbeknownst to me, way more unaffordable) sibling, the gem expo ExpoGema, and make a day out of it. Thus, I headed out for Madrid on the 9:00 train with temperatures below zero – I was not made for winter. It was not much better when I arrived, but for once the train ride was uneventful, I actually made my connection, and it seems that after a chaotic year, the underground train tunnels are finally open. Everything going smoothly gave me some unexpected 45 minutes to wander around as the square Puerta del Sol slowly became fuller and fuller with people.

I had booked a guided visit through the company Madrid en Ruta, who has the exclusive concession to show the business centre Casa Comercial Palazuelo. Located in downtown Madrid, it was designed by architect Antonio Palacios. The promoter, Demetrio Palazuelo, bought the lot left behind by a fire, and commissioned the building with the goal of renting it out to shops and professionals – it was thus the first office building in Spain conceived as such, and not repurposed from a manor or an apartment building. Palacios drew inspiration from the Chicago School commercial architecture and used iron to stabilise the building, which allowed him for bright interiors using lots of glass. The office building was erected between 1919 and 1921, and the offices are still rented out today, with the only caveat that the beautiful interior translucent-glass doors have been painted white – to either protect privacy or hide the fact that today the house seems to be almost empty – at least according to the building’s own directory.

The exterior façade could be considered eclectic – the main frame tends to neoclassicism with huge glass windows framed in black iron. The interior tends towards Art Deco and modernism. The offices are distributed around a central indoor patio, with curved balconies that overlook it and lots of lights mainly due to the skylight. There are two classical lifts which are the original ones, in peartree wood. When we went up, I took the stairs, which have white treads, and the riser is made out dark green ceramics. I have seen these in other works by Antonio Palacios.. The interior, with the iron balustrades and its curvy design, was really cool, but I think it is really a pity they painted over the glass.

Interior of Casa Palazuelo

The visit started at 11:00. We spent the first fifteen minutes outside getting context, roughly half an hour inside, and the last twenty minutes on the roof of the building, waiting for the clock of the Puerta del Sol to strike 12:00, then we were ushered out. I really wish we could have wandered the house a little bit, even if we could not go into the offices. The ten euro we paid surely did not feel like we were paying customers, but more like we were sneaking around like unwanted guests – which we probably were anyway.

Puerta del Sol from the roof of Casa Palazuelo

I grabbed a quick snack then and headed off towards the engineering school Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingenieros de Minas y Energía (ETSIME) for the sixth edition of the gem fair ExpoGema. The fair itself was neat, but most everything was way above my budget range. I was there at the typical Spanish lunchtime, there were few people, and most were at the stands. Thus, I had the museum Museo Histórico-Minero Don Felipe de Borbón y Grecia almost completely to myself. I really like old-style museums, and this one has a huge amount of specimens, most of them are minerals, but there are also fossils and a collection of cave bear skulls and bones. I had decided not to book any guided visit or activity as none happened within the couple of hours of lunch downtime.

Geology Museum at Etsime

I bought an ammonite pendant, a small pyrite with almost perfect right angles, and another pendant made with a small meteorite from Campo del Cielo, along with a tiny extra piece. Campo del Cielo is an area in Argentina where four or five thousand years ago an iron meteorite fell. The meteorite shattered upon entering the atmosphere and, when it impacted the surface, the different created up to 26 craters. About 100 short tonnes of a fragmented iron meteorite have been recovered to date, and I now own around four grammes of it – yay me. I did not buy any precious stone though since the pretty shiny rocks were way out of my budget.

Expogema 2023

I left the ETSIME and I walked towards the square Plaza Pablo Ruiz Picasso, where there is a temporary art installation called El Regalo (The present) by Amigo&Amigo, a studio specialising in art installations. The artwork comprises a few arches that end in pads that can be stepped on – when they are, music sounds. The day was still bright, so the artwork was not shining, but a bunch of kids jumped on the pads to keep the music playing.

El Regalo artwork

Afterwards, I took a train and headed off towards central Madrid again. I had a reservation for an afternoon tea at Nubel, an “avant-garde gastronomy space” in the modern art museum Museo Reina Sofía. I had been drawn to the place due to the “freshly-baked scones” they advertised.

The experience was beyond disappointing. First, I had to wait to get seated, but then the person who checked me in forgot to notify that I was there – this is what I assume happened, I was literally told that “the kitchen had forgotten about me”. The set menu took 40 minutes to come out, and the scone was cold anyway, so not even freshly-made. I had got a decaf latte that was also cold when the food came.

The menu, 16€ as I don’t drink alcohol, consisted of: two mini-sandwiches – the two of them had been made from the same bread slice, so you can imagine the size, with some kind of mayonnaise filling which was not bad but rather unidentifiable; one shot-sized glass of (pre-made) gazpacho; one scone; a piece of red velvet cake; a piece of carrot cake; one chocolate brownie; a side of cheese cream, butter and jam; and in my case the already-stone cold decaf latte.

Nubel afternoon Tea

The scone was cold – so much for freshly-made, the only thing that had kept me waiting. Furthermore, the cheese cream, albeit nice, did not fit it like at all, so I had to use butter on it. I laughed to myself thinking about “the horror!” while I clutched my metaphorical pearls. The red velvet was probably the best, but in general the cakes were too sweet – good thing the menu included free tap water. Afterwards, I was comped another free decaf as an “apology for the delay”. However, when I tried to pay, more drama ensued. First the card-reading machine was not working, then they could not take cash because they were balancing the register, then they could bring the machine to the table. All in all, I spent almost hour and a half there – about five minutes waiting to be seated, forty minutes waiting for the tea set, and twenty minutes trying to pay. I’m sorry to say I did not tip, nor do I plan to ever come back.

I missed my train due to the paying delay, and I had to wait almost half an hour for another one. I hung out the Christmas market for a bit, and looked at the lights around Puerta de Atocha station. As it was cold, I walked in and went to check out the original train station, now turned botanical garden. I had never stopped to look at the iron ceiling, just at the plants – and the tortoises people used to dump there – but there had been an old photograph during the Casa Palazuelo visit that made me want to look at the building itself, and I recognised that old station in today’s building, with its wrung iron columns. Funny, how you can look at the same old things and recognise them.

2nd December 2023: Iron balconies and croquettes (Madrid, Spain)

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I wanted to do a full day in Madrid this weekend, but ticketing did not align, thus I had to organise two half days. So on Saturday morning I set off for an 11:00 visit to Frontón Beti-Jai. A frontón is the court where games of Basque pelota (pelota vasca) are played. The term refers to a number of sports that use a small hard ball which is hit by the players so it bounces off the vertical walls of the court. Depending on the specific variety, the ball can be hit with the hand, a racket, a bat or a type of basket, and it can bounce on one or two walls of the frontón as long as they are at right angles with each other. Basque pelota is mainly played in Spain and France, and it is also popular in some Latin America countries. Though it was originally included in the 1900 Olympics, it has only been played as an exhibition sport and never in competition.

In the 19th century, Basque pelota was a popular and lucrative business in Spain, especially in Madrid. In 1891, businessman José Arana commissioned architect Joaquín Rucoba to build a frontón in Madrid, “similar to but better than” the one in San Sebastián, the original Beti-Jai. The capital’s Beti-Jai (“always party” in Basque) was placed in the district of Chamberí, witch construction starting in 1893. The architect designed a white-and-grey outer façade in an eclectic style with Neoclassical reminiscences in order to blend with the mansions in the area at the time, and a red-brick Neomudéjar secondary or side façade. The inner wall that stands behind the main entrance is also Neomudéjar. The playing court is plain concrete, and he whole area is shaped as a half-ellipse. There were long-lost stands on the ground, and three upper stories supported and adorned by cast iron balconies and columns, with a wooden roof on top. The decoration on the balconies is different for each floor.

The frontón opened in 1894 and it hosted games until 1919 – it is said that the crackdown on the betting systems and loan sharks caused Basque pelota to slowly fade out of fashion. Throughout the period and afterwards, it also had some alternative – and creative – uses, among them aeronautical experiments by renown engineer Leonardo Torres Quevedo, car workshop (a few times in different years), motorbike shop, political hotspot, even industrial bakery. The stands were eventually walled off – which protected the ironwork. Though both in the late 1970s and the early 1990s the building was “declared” as protected, the structure was eventually left to rot. The building was bought and restored by the Madrid Town Hall between 2010 and 2019, finally attaining protected status in 2011. It is the largest and oldest frontón standing.

Frontón Beti Jai inner façade and stands

I like cast iron architecture a lot, which is why I signed up for this Pasea Madrid guided visit. We did not get a nice and knowledgeable guide this time, so I mentally checked out. She was not just nervous, she read the whole visit out of a phone, gave some wrong or plain false information, and relied on people “knowing things” and “having visited places”. I wandered around taking pictures and approaching the group periodically trying to fish out any interesting bit of information, until the guide grew tired and kicked us out when most people decided to just stand in the sun, even if there was some time left. People who had been listening to her had barely any time for photographs.

Fronton Beti Jai Stands.

After the frontón, I had a reservation for lunch a restaurant part of a franchise specialising in croquettes, is called Solo de Croquetas Zurbano – a pun between “only croquettes” and “croquettes’ solo”; Zurbano is just the street. It has been a bit of a buzz lately so I was really curious about it. The place was organised in three floors – a bar on the ground floor, a loft-like seating on the first floor and a bigger restaurant-like area in the basement.

Though the Internet said the restaurant opened at 13:00, I was offered a reservation at 12:45, which I took because I did not want to be wandering around in the cold for too long. I was not extremely surprised though when I popped by at the reservation time and it was indeed crossed. I ended up wandering for a while before 13:00 came up and I could sit down. I decided to try a basic “croquette tasting”, which includes six savoury croquettes two sweet ones, and a drink. There are three lists to choose from, and I took the B-set:

  • Rulo de cabra con pimiento caramelizado, goat cheese roller with caramelised red pepper – happy to report the pepper was barely distinguishable, just added some colour to the filling. Very cheesy, cheese is always good.
  • Boletus con trufa, boletus with truffle. Lots of mushroom, little truffle, but okay. I’m not that much of a truffle fan anyway.
  • Provolone con tomate seco y orégano, provolone cheese with dry tomato and oregano. There is never such a thing as too much cheese.
  • Cachopo; a cachopo is a typical dish from the North of Spain that consists on two beef steaks with a filling between them, and everything breaded, which I ate once in Astorga. This one was weird.
  • Cecina con puerro y queso gorgonzola, beef jerky with celery and gorgonzola cheese. Probably my favourite out of the savoury ones.
  • Sobrasada de Mallorca con queso Mahón, sobrassada (cured pork sausage filling) with Mahon cheese. All right.
  • Croqueta de Oreo con chocolate blanco, Oreo and white chocolate. Rather good, which is surprising considering I don’t even like Oreos…
  • Croqueta de Cheesecake con frambuesa , Cheesecake and raspberry. Surprising, to say the least.

Solo de croquetas tasting

All in all it was good. The croquettes were decently sized and had distinctive flavours. The set felt a bit scarce though. Not that I went hungry, but I could have done with another couple of croquettes. I think it is what they are counting on – the tasting is okay, price-wise, considering the novelty (18.50 €), but if you want anything else, the meal will get very expensive very fast. I guess it is noteworthy that all croquettes are gluten-free, and the tasting has a lactose-free set and a vegan set.

I left the restaurant and walked towards the train station. On the way, I was distracted by the small Christmas market, more precisely by the a gorgeous 1900 merry-go-round that had been installed among other attractions. I had a bit of a walk around to check out the stands and then I went to wait for the train – which was, predictably, delayed.

Carousel in Colón Square

23rd October 2023: Happiness Museum and a former hospital, Madrid (Spain)

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At the beginning of the year, I found out about an old hospital building turned office building that looked pretty interesting to visit in Madrid had opened up. It is a governmental office, so the visits are guided and supervised. Unfortunately, I was working an afternoon shift and they only run the visits on Mondays at 16:00. I signed up for the waiting list hoping for a summer visit, but they don’t run them in July and August. The September and early October visits did not work out either because I was in London. I finally managed a spot for the visit on the 16th of October, which was rescheduled for the 23rd. It’s not hardcore work season yet, so I was easy to rearrange meetings to have the day off.

Of course, it was a Monday, and Mondays are not Madrid’s best day, especially when the weather is not nice – most things are closed, and even though there are many neat parks, they usually close in the event of storms or winds. However, I almost accidentally discovered something potentially-fun and open, and I made plans with my sibling and nibling, who had a free morning.

I took a train with an hour’s berth of time, but then, because what else is new, there were train issues, and we were all delayed. I was stuck on my line for almost 40 minutes, and decided to walk instead of taking the connection, and they were waiting at their station for almost 30. If you are wondering why I keep taking the train, it is because during 2023 I can get a four-month unlimited pass for 10€, which beats any other transportation mode.

In the end, we luckily made it on time to a new photo-op place, which calls itself the Museum of Happiness Museo de la Felicidad MüF, with a little happy face on the u. It is a two-storey… silly-fun kind of place. Out of all the “instagrammable” places I’ve visited, I think this has been the weakest, as there were actually few things to actually do (too many touchscreens), and it kind of looked a bit… plain. Probably because it was Monday morning and there was no animation. I mean, it was fun, don’t get me wrong.

The first thing you see when you come in are two individual trampolines and a slide that ends in a ball pit. As I can’t jump, I skipped the trampoline. There is a small exhibition on lucky symbols, and another on things that make people happy. There is a small soundproof capsule where you are coached on how to laugh – weird – and a “team good people” that you can stand behind for a picture (the message being “kindness brings happiness”). As I was taking a photograph of my nibling, someone – who had just seen me show my ticket – decided I was the official museum photographer. I turned her down as nicely as I could. It was a day with a lot of comments about my camera.

The MüF has some screens and a VR experience, a “magic” trick on a screen, a big heart made of blocks and a hugging machine – apparently made to comfort autistic kids who benefit from deep pressure, but can’t deal with actual people hugging them. To go down from the second floor back to the first one, you can use the slide into the ball pit or the plain old stairs. That slide is steeper than it looks…

The basement has a few more things that you can touch, a ward with headphones and uppy songs, and the abrazadores (huggers), big plushies that are apparently designed to simulate hugs and grow people’s confidence. They were fuzzy and warm, but I am not sure how they can improve your mental health… There are a few confidence boosters, and a “five-senses happiness booth” where you get to eat chocolate, which is always good. In the end there were lots of silly giggling, because in the end that is why you go to places like that. There is also a “closet of truth” which you should not spoil for other people and helps you discover who is the most important person in your life.

Happiness Museum Madrid

After the museum we headed off for an early lunch. Despite being 300 km from the nearest port in the Mediterranean Sea, one of Madrid’s most famous meals is the calamari sandwich – bocadillo de calamares. A lot has been speculated about how this came to happen, though no one is really sure how the sandwich made its way into the local gastronomy throughout the 20th century. The squid is cut in rings, battered, and served within a small loaf of rustic bread similar to a baguette (pan de barra), an interesting combination at the very least.

The most famous joint to eat a calamari sandwich is Bar El Brillante. It might not be the best, and it quite surely is not the friendliest, but it is the iconic place for it, which actually makes it a tourist spot. The bar was established in the 1950s and it is a family company, the current owner being the third generation. They do not care much about customer loyalty as their business is based on the “novelty” and the “being a must do in Madrid” since the 90s – or maybe they’re just nice to regulars? I for one I’m open to try thebocadillo de calamares again, but not the place. The staff was unhelpful and took forever to clear the tables, which led to a lot of… hm… “birdwatching” as pigeons and sparrows helped themselves to leftovers.

Calamari Sandwich at El Brillante

We separated after lunch and ice-cream, and I continued alone towards the Chamberí district, which at the beginning of the 20th century was the outskirts of Madrid. There, philanthropist Dolores Romero Arano commissioned architect Antonio Palacios to build a hospital for labourers: Hospital de Jornaleros, known today as Hospital de Maudes. During that time, it was typical that a hospital had a “target patient”. In this case, it was male workers from the newly industrialised city who were not infectious or incurable – sort of a trauma unit, early-20th-century style. They took in labourers that could be cured, nursed them back to health, and released in “perfect working conditions”. Considering, of course, that the hospital opened in 1916.

For the building, Antonio Palacios chose a cross layout with a hall on one side and a church on the opposite one and two smaller buildings to complete the symmetry. He used Francisco Zuloaga’s ceramics for decoration until money ran out, and aimed for lots of light and open spaces. There are two types of decorative ceramics on the outside: water drops which imitate waves, and broken tile mosaics (Trencadís, a technique favoured by Antoni Gaudí). Palacios even built lifts of sorts to take patients to the roofs of the wards. The hospital worked for its intended purpose until the Civil War broke out and it became a military one. It was eventually abandoned and derelict during the following years until it was bought and restored by the local government in the late 20th century.

All this was explained to us during a 45 minute talk for an hour-and-a-half visit, as we stood in the hallway – which is actually in the basement floor. I arrived about 15:50 for the 16:00 visit, gave my name and ID and sat to wait. We had to go through metal detector and X-ray before the visit started – there is a volunteer guide from a retiree association and an actual worker to chaperone (governmental workers do not work afternoons in summer, which explained then why there had not been visits during that period as I had hoped for). Once the “introduction” was over, we finally got to see what I wanted to see – the building itself. Unfortunately, as the guide prattled on and on inside, it had started raining, so we could not go out to the patio, nor barely see the outside. That was disappointing – I mean, I’m all in for introductions and historical contexts but this is my problem with guided visits, it is just too much talking and too little visiting.

As we walked into the inside of the building, we were pointed out to the ceramics on the walls. Then, the tunnel that connected the hospital with the morgue – which was one of the outer minor buildings. We went up using one of the decorative stairs and we finally arrived at the ground floor of the crossing point of the wards. The centre of the structure is the octagonal patio with the fountain in the middle. As people saw me taking photographs with the camera – I had asked for permission beforehand – they decided I was either a journalist or the official photographer. It got annoying at the fourth or fifth time I was asked or someone made a comment / joke about me photographing them. Which I was very careful not to, even if they keep walking into my field of view.

Maudes Laborers Hospital exterior

The main material of the building is white limestone, which both contributes to the building’s luminosity and it’s common in Palacio’s design. His likings are also shown in the green colour of the interior tiles, which are very similar to the ones in the ghost station of Chamberí. The tiles all along the corridors are decorated and some of them feature heraldic symbols. We got to snoop around the cafeteria, one of the few areas that still features the original floor, since most of the flooring was too damaged to be restored.

The central area surrounding the patio is also octagonal, full of ground-to-ceiling windows. From one side of the corridor to the other and through the patio you can even seethe main staircase that we used to access the second floor behind the windows. Once on the second floor, we crossed the metal bridge that separates the main building from one of the accessory constructions, where the external consultation rooms used to be. Finally, we went downstairs again, walked around the patio and crossed over to the former operating theatres (the above-ground area of the morgue), which are now being transformed into an exhibition room.

Maudes Laborers Hospital interior

By the time the visit was over, it was raining heavily, but I still had the time to visit the in-hospital church Santa María del Silencio, Our Lady of Silence, which is the parish of the Madrid deaf and hard-of-hearing community. Lots of the architecture details are Modernist in style, including the iron fence and coloured glass ceiling.

Altarpiece in Our Lady of Silence

It was still raining cats and dogs when I left, so I forsook the idea of walking around the building to take pictures of the main hospital entrance, I just crossed the street to head to the train station. After aquaplaning on the square to get in, I had to wait about 50 minutes for a train, as the morning breakdown was still causing delays. And of course, when the train came it had already stopped raining.

Maudes Laborers Hospital and Our Lady of Silence from the outside

It was a nice day out, with great company and lots of laughs. Food was okay, the hospital building was amazing, the guide not so much. And the weather… very… autumn-ly.

5th April 2023: The ghost station of Chamberí (Madrid, Spain)

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Perusing the web for something – I can’t even remember what – I came across one of those things that I had discovered a long time ago, then forgotten because life is hectic and so (read: Covid happened). In Madrid, there an underground ghost station, one that has not changed since the 1960s. Well, sort of – it was closed, then restored, and finally turned into a museum. Anyway, somehow accidentally, I ended up securing a free ticket to visit it during Easter break, so there I went. I decided to round up the trip with a fancy lunch in a place I also wanted to visit.

The Madrid underground system Metro de Madrid was the third underground line to open in Europe, after Moscow and London. It ran a little short of 3.5 km, with eight stations, when King Alfonso XIII inaugurated it in October 1919. Subsequent ampliations and renovations of the line were carried out until it reached its current 24 km and 33 stations (plus twelve more lines). The city expanded, its population increased, and underground trains grew with both, going from four to six carriages in the 1960s. The stations were renovated to fit the new, longer trains. Most of them. The ampliations of the stations of Bilbao and Iglesia made it inefficient to do the same with the stop that lay in-between – Chamberí. Thus, this station was locked down – and bricked off – in 1966.

The city forgot about the station’s existence for decades, until in the early 2000s, it was turned into part of the Underground’s museum network Museos de Metro de Madrid or Andén 0. Today, Estación de Chamberí can be visited for free, but only under reservation. Pre-pandemic, I looked into it a few times, and never found a spot, then the whole thing slipped my mind, until I relearnt about it, and lucked out.

I took the train to Madrid and walked from Recoletos to the square where the station was built Plaza de Chamberí. The original entrance has long disappeared, so the underground area is accessed through an ugly metal kiosk and a spiral staircase. However, the original station looks completely different. It was designed by Antonio Palacios (1878 – 1945), a Spanish urbanist and architect with a very recognisable style, whose most important works still stand in Madrid (such as the Círculo de Bellas Artes and Palacio de Comunicaciones). My entry slot was 11:30, and I arrived with plenty of time – trains have been unreliable lately so I gave myself a wide margin. When most of the group had arrived, we went down the modern stairs that yields to the old hall. Characteristic white tiles are laid along the access tunnel that leads to the original ticketing stands and the exit control. The station used to have a skylight, now closed off. The original stairs and maps still stand, along the Metro logo – though everything has been adapted for wheelchair-users.

Ghost Station of Chamberí. Entrance corridor and old ticketing booths

The group comprised 25 people, with a surprising amount of non-Spanish speakers – at least seven, who of course did not care about the guide’s explanation, which was little more than the Wikipedia page (so I guess anyone can take the visit. Print out the wiki and read along). There were families with kids who tried to yell over anything the guide said. Furthermore, underground trains still run through the station, which make for cool pictures, but their six-minute frequency drowns all the given explanations. It was hard to actually get into the “ghost station” mood.

Estación de Chamberí does look really cool though. Unfortunately, glass panels separate the platform from the tracks – they are dirty and get in the way of pictures of the other side of the platform. However, it was interesting to see the old advertisement mosaics – they used to be painted on tiles, and built into the walls themselves, and surrounded by very cool darker slabs with metallic tint. The visit takes about 40 minutes, and on the way out, you get to go through the old ticket gates, which have a very ingenious way of opening – you step on the little platform in front of them, which triggers a latch, and you can push the gate open. Really fun.

Ghost Station of Chamberí. Collage showing details - the name of the station on the old logo, tiles, the platform, and a train coming through

Truth be told, I had booked another free visit before lunch, but I realised I had messed up the location. I cancelled that one before entering the ghost station so the ticket would be available for someone else to use. And thus, I had a bit of time before my lunch reservation at 14:00. Since the weather was nice, I decided to walk to my next spot, and I spent the extra time – and some not-extra money – in one of the big bookshops in the centre of Madrid. At 13:50, I arrived at the back entrance of the hotel Hotel Riu Plaza España. This hotel opened in 2019 in a mid-20th century skyscraper (Edificio España) designed and engineered by brothers Julián and Jose María Otamendi. It is a 26-floor tower which was the highest building in the city at the time of its construction. Situated in the square called Plaza de España, it is close to the Royal Palace and Main Square.

Edificio España - tower like building in reddish and white brick, spanning 26 floors. It is the Riu hotel now.

The hotel has a large terrace on what would be the 27th floor, a rooftop bar and a restaurant or “gastro bar”, whatever the current buzz word means. Entry to the terrace is 10 € (5 € on a weekday), and food is not on the cheap side (everything around that area is stupidly expensive), but I found a deal at their Edén Gastro Bar: one-course lunch + drink + entry to the rooftop terrace for 30€ which allowed me to skip the queue.

I did skip the “ticket-buying” line, but there is only one lift to go to the rooftop, so that queue I had to wait. I ended up reaching the restaurant around 14:10 or 14:15, and snagged a counter-with-a-view seat. I ordered a salmon poké and a drink, and got a few complimentary snacks and breadsticks to complete the meal.

Rooftop picture showing Madrid's Plaza de España and Royal Palace. Blurred in the foreground, lunch

Afterwards, I climbed the stairs to the terrace, officially called 360º Rooftop Bar, on the 27th floor. Music was blaring and there were tons of people drinking overpriced cocktails. The views were cool, sort of a once-in-a-lifetime thing that I don’t think I’d need again. The terrace has a small all-glass balcony that I did not wait the queue for, and a glass platform that would probably impress a bit more if the glass under your feet were clean(er). The terrace was completed by a tacky bull sculpture with metallic-gold testicles.

Madrid rooftop view - low houses with red brick roofs, and in the very background a few highrises

I walked around a couple of times, and then I headed back to the train station after calling it a day. I killed time reading one of the books I had just got, and time flew on the train. It was a nice little outing, but I did mess up with one of the locations, so it could have been more efficient. I guess not every little trip can work flawlessly…

11th March 2023: Rocks from the land and fish from the sea (Madrid, Spain)

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Back in 2018, when going to Madrid’s Geomineral Museum (Museo Geominero), I stumbled upon an event in the Mining Engineering University – something called Expominerales. At the time, I did not have time to explore it, and only later did I realise what I had missed – an international fair for the trade of minerals, rocks and fossils. I made a mental note to check the event out the following year, but something came up and I completely forgot about the whole thing. In 2020 the pandemic struck, and finally in 2023, almost five years to the day, I went back to this event held in Madrid.

Expominerales is held yearly at the working engineering school Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingenieros de Minas y Energía (ETSIME), which offers the bachelor’s degree in Mining Engineering, and the one in Energy Engineering (whatever this last one is). The first weekend of every month, the school organises a “mineral-world flea market”, and the second weekend of March, it hosts an international mineral, gem and fossil fair, with shopping stands and different workshops and activities. After a few cancellations due to Covid, it returned in 2022 and it’s back to its former glory in 2023 – Expominerales XLII, the 42th edition of the fair.

The ETSIME in Madrid. Pink-and-white building from the 19th century, accessible through stairs, with flags hanging over the door

Mining Engineering became a formal education path in Spain in 1777, originally in the town of Almadén, a mercury hub. The school was moved to Madrid in 1835 and a two-building campus was ordered. The historical building in the ETSIME (M1) was designed by architect Ricardo Velázquez Bosco, and decorated by ceramist Daniel Zuloaga between 1884 and 1893. The second building (M2) was damaged during the Civil War, and has suffered several modifications to accommodate classrooms and laboratories. The premises also include a reproduction of a mine, Mina Museo Marcelo Jorissen, however this one is closed for renovation – a lot of that seems to be going on around the university, since part of the decorations of the buildings are also covered.

The M1 historical building has a central cloister with an ironwork colonnade. The building is rectangular, and on the short sides there are two symmetrical wards. One holds the historical mining museum, the other one the historical library. The central cloister is the main area where Expominerales is held, on the ground and first floor. On Saturday, the exhibit opened at 10:00, and we were there a bit later in order to sign up for the first guided visit at 11:00 (3€) – we wanted to take it so we had access to several rooms that would otherwise be closed to us. The idea was being there before families with kids started arriving and the activities became overcrowded – it turned out in the end that most the activities were indeed organised for children, so it did not really make a difference. Furthermore, the visit we feared full only had 6 attendees.

We had one hour before the guided visit that we spent looking at the stands on the ground floor on the M1 building. The guide was a student who might have been partying the previous night, because he sounded a little out of it – forgetting info and words, even things related to his own degree.

First, we went to see the mineral collection, the origin of the historical museum in the M1 building, Museo Histórico-Minero Don Felipe de Borbón y Grecia. The mineral collection was started in 1831, and throughout the years it was increased with new minerals donated by different institutions. It was later expanded to cover palaeontology and historical artefacts related to mining and other earth sciences. Though a lot of the displays are scattered throughout he building, the original museum dates from the 19th century, and it has four sections: the mineral collection, the fossil collection, the cave bear collection and the mining archaeology section, totalling over 10,000 items.

The historical mining museum at ETSIME Madrid. It is a large ward with cedar wood shelves from floor to ceiling, filled with rocks and fossils. The picture also shows some close-ups of rocks, two cave bear skulls, and a cluster of fossilised snail-like animals

Today, the museum is named after King Felipe VI, who visited the museum in the late 1980s after the university reached out to him to propose the name. The then prince came to visit then, and the name “the king’s stairs” was given to the set of side stairs he used – Escaleras del Rey.

We also visited the small hall where candidates read their theses, a little hall with spectacular ceramic tiles by Zuloaga, and finally the historical library, with obsolete but cool volumes. The library also dates back from the 19th century, with the walls covered in wooden shelves, with a small metal staircase to access the upper balcony. Unfortunately both this one and the one in the museum were cordoned off.

Library in ETSIME. It is a large room with cedar wood shelves from floor to ceiling, and a spiral staircase.

The visit ended at the lecture hall on building M2, one of the few remaining areas of the original design. It is a marble room with wooden benches and decorated windows that represent the original subjects taught to Mining Engineers. After we were left off, we sat down at the cafeteria for a drink.

Lecture hall in ETSIME (Madrid). It's a marble room, rather dark, with smoked windows representing different subjects of the Mining Engineering Degree

We recharged batteries, and then we had a look at the stands on the first floor of the M1 building, alongside the collection of apparatus that they had. Afterwards, we decided to separate in order to do shopping. Expominerales hosted over 30 stands, national and international.

Expominerales. A view of the ETSIME cloister from the second floor, showing different stands and lots of people peering curiously

I, being the nerd that I am, got myself a tiny slice of iron meteorite (from Geoterra Minerals), a mosasaur fossilised tooth (from Carlos Hammann, who also had amazing megalodon teeth that I will never be able to afford), a decent-sized of recrystallised bismuth (from Rossell Minerals), and a small piece of black tourmaline (from The MineralShop) – all for 51€.

Collage: a fossilised tooth, a bit of mineral in metallic colours, a slice of meteorite with silver orthogonal markings, and a bit of shiny black rock

When we met again, it was a bit past 13:30. There were too many people by then – families had started arriving, so we decided to leave. We had booked at a nearby restaurant for lunch, and they did not mind accommodating us a little earlier. The restaurant, called DeAtún Ponzano specialises in tuna dishes – particularly Atlantic bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus), sustainably caught in the Straight of Gibraltar.

Before overfishing was even a thing, Phoenicians settled in the south-west of Spain somewhere between the 9th and 7th centuries BCE – the city of Cádiz, credited as being the longest-standing city in Europe, may have been the first port. The Phoenicians observed that the bluefin tuna migrated from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean every year around the same dates, and later they came back to the ocean. These guys came up with a very simple technique – that was later developed further by the Romans and perfected in the Islamic period: the almadraba.

An almadraba is a portable but complex net which is lowered for the migration period. The bigger fish are funnelled into a box-like construction, and the smaller ones swim right through it. Once the almadraba is full, a number of fishing boats lift it in a process called levantada (raising). Expert fishermen walk onto the nets, discard any small specimen that might have been trapped, and choose the tuna that will be sold, generally individuals heavier than 200 kg.

Since the fish are selected on a case by case basis, the amount of both the catch and by-catch is small in comparison to other fishing methods. Both the seasonality and craftsmanship of the whole process make it much more sustainable than others – of course, this also causes fewer pieces in the market, which in turn increases the price. Furthermore, all the fish are wild, hand-picked, and only bled out when they are loaded onto the ship. Thus, the quality is extremely high. Another factor that makes almadraba-caught tuna more expensive is the fact that walking onto the levantada is dangerous. Fishermen have been seriously hurt by struggling tuna, as some of the fish might weigh up to 500 kg.

Working almost exclusively high-quality tuna means that DeAtún is not a restaurant on the cheap side of things. I’ve actually traced down their tuna provider and the prices are rather cost-adjusted for almadraba-caught tuna. There’s another thing to consider, too, which is that the Spanish law forces restaurants to freeze fish that is going to be served either raw or quasi-raw, at least for 24 hours at a temperature under -20 ºC – this is done to destroy a fish parasite called Anisakis, which can cause stomach distress and serious allergic reactions. Apparently, the perfect temperature to keep the tuna properties is -60 ºC. So yay Anisakis-safe almadraba-caught tuna all year round (though it’s true that the freezing law makes it impossible to eat fresh tuna raw).

We got a welcome tapa of boiled potatoes with olive oil and herbs (“papas aliñás”), a favourite from southwestern of Spain, the same area where the almadraba tuna are caught. We shared some European anchovies (Engraulis encrasicolus) “anchoas del Cantábrico” with tomato and toasted bread. These anchovies are salted for at least six months, cleaned, and stored in olive oil. They have a strong flavour, and are not everyone’s cup of tea, but I adore them. We also shared a portion of “ortiguillas” (Mediterranean snakelocks sea anemone Anemonia sulcata, battered and fried), also typical of the south-west – I’ve never been much of a fan though.

Lunch at DeAtún. Collage with a potato salad, anchovies and battered seafood balls

Finally, as my tuna preference is raw, I was wondering whether I wanted sashimi or tartar. In the end, I decided to try a combo (“trio DeAtún”): tuna sashimi (slices), tuna tartar (dice) and tuna tataki (heat-sealed slices), with a side taste of different sauce emulsions – wasabi, kimchi and curry. The tuna cuts used for these preparations (descargamento and tarantelo) would be the otoro or toro Japanese cuts, which are appropriate for raw preparations – technically the best ones, fatty or very fatty meat. I don’t love tataki, thus my original reticence to try this combo, but it was good. My favourite bit was the sashimi though, the tartar was missing a bit of spice.

I was offered chopsticks to eat the dish, and I accepted – easier to handle the fish. That apparently made the maître think that I had been the one choosing the restaurant, because in his words I “seemed to be an expert, chopsticks and all”. That was hilarious – I mean, why offer chopsticks if you don’t expect them to be accepted? For the record, although I booked the table, I did not choose the restaurant – it would have been a little on the “too fancy” side for me. The truth is, there were a bunch of very-elaborated dishes that we decided to give a miss, and we went for the raw tuna.

Lunch at DeAtún. A plate with three tuna cuts. The centre is round, and rose-like, and the sides are extended on a line. The fish is uncooked and it looks dark red. There's a similar dish in the background, with more cuts

Desserts were okay, but not the reason we had chosen this place. The point was eating tuna – raw tuna in my case – and the restaurant delivered. I was however amused by tables around us refusing the raw options even when the chef himself came out to greet them and recommend the dishes (someone over there must have been an acquittance, I don’t really know). Finally, we set back home to compare treasures and plot going back to Expominerales in its 2024 edition – at a time where we can snatch some discounted rocks.

12th & 13th February 2023. The Epic Apocalypse Tour in Madrid (Spain)

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The year 2020 was going to be so amazing that I actually would have had to choose the things I wanted to do and sacrifice others. It didn’t turn out that great in the end, with lots of rescheduling and cancellations. I was eventually able to budget time and money for one of those rescheduled events – the joint concert by the metal bands Epica and Apocalyptica in their Epic Apocalypse Tour. For a while, however, there was a bit of uncertainty with dates, as they bounced between Sunday 12th and Monday 13th of February, so I needed to juggle work dates in order to make sure I’d be free on Monday. In the end, I was all clear, all the concert-related activities were set for Sunday evening, and I decided to make a two-day trip out of it – I needed to take a hotel for Sunday anyway.

I arrived in Madrid around 9:30 in the morning. I had some time before my first appointment so I walked into one of the large parks of the city Parque del Buen Retiro, which is part of the Unesco World Heritage Site Paisaje de la Luz (Light Landscape), officially called Paseo del Prado y el Buen Retiro, paisaje de las artes y las ciencias, declared in 2021.

Parque del Buen Retiro was built in the 17th century for one of Felipe IV’s palaces, and it was opened in the late 18th century as public park. The park was almost destroyed during the war against Napoleon’s troops in the early 19th century, so most of it has been rebuilt. Aside from the obvious flora, it features sculptures, fountains, buildings… It is home to a lot of birds, and unfortunately a large number of invasive and fearless monk parakeets (Myiopsitta monachus), whose culling has been controversial in recent years. I got to see common blackbirds (Turdus merula), a European green woodpecker (Picus viridis) and a European robin (Erithacus rubecula).

One of the most important features of the park is the sculpture Monumento al Ángel Caído, which represents an angel falling from grace. It was originally designed by Ricardo Bellber, who made it in plaster in 1877. It was later cast in bronze and the original plaster destroyed, and eventually the sculpture was made into a part of a fountain in 1885. Around the area, there is also an ancient water mill, and to my surprise, the almond trees (Prunus amygdalus) had started blossoming.

Retiro Park collage: a pathway with trees and bushes on both sides, ducks, and a robin.

Retiro Park collage: a water mill, blossoming almond trees, and the fallen angel fountain

At 10:15 I had a guided visit to the Real Observatorio de Madrid (ROM), commissioned around 1785 by Carlos III, as an centre to develop and study astronomy, geodesy, geophysics and cartography. The main building is the astronomical observatory, built by Juan de Villanueva in what then was the outskirts of the city. Today, ROM belongs to the National Geographical Institute (IGN), and it is home to the National Astronomical Observatory, the Central Geophysics Observatory, and the data gathering division of the National Volcanic Service, though no measurements are taken there. The main astronomy measurements are carried out in the Centro Astronómico de Yebes, in a town around 80 km north-west of Madrid. The observatory is also part of the Unesco World Heritage Site.

The visit comprises three stops. The first one is the main building, called Edificio Villanueva, which has three rooms – the main rotunda with a Foucault pendulum, the library, with the spot where gravity was first measured in Spain, and the “Time room”, where the sun used to be traced to determine the hour.

ROM collage. A small Neoclassical building, an inner room with a pendulum and telescopes, a telescope and a 19th century library.

The second stop is the Great Telescope, a replica of one that William Herschel built in the 18th century – Hershchel was one of the greatest telescope makers of the time, and is credited with discovering the planet Uranus, two of its moons, and two moons of Saturn. The telescope was destroyed during the war against the French, but later rebuilt thanks to the number of laminates that had been preserved – the original had a focal distance of 7.6 m and a 61-cm diameter mirror (which is displayed in the main building), and Herschel himself considered it the best he ever built.

Herschel grand telescope: a wooden scaffolding structure keeping a huge black tube pointing at the stas

The final stop, the little museum of “Earth and Universe Sciences” has a small collection of ancient instruments used for astronomy, navigation, and geophysics. There are also a couple of seismographs – one of them new, which is up and running – and material retrieved from the volcanic eruptions of El Hierro in 2011 and La Palma in 2021.

Collage. Ancient telescope, old tide measuring device, an old globe, and lava bombs

I had planned for a typical sandwich at an iconic bar afterwards, but I ran into a political demonstration. Thus, I scratched that idea and took the underground westwards. When I was in Egypt, one of the places I visited was Lake Nasser, created by the Aswan High dam. The lake swallowed a lot of villages and monuments, but a few of them, such as Abu Simbel and the Temple of Philae were saved by Unesco. Between 1960 and 1980, a total of 24 monuments were saved, and five out of these were presented as “grants-in-return” to five countries which had offered exceptional technical and financial assistance to the campaign – Germany, Italy, Netherlands, the United States and Spain, the latter being impressive as Spain was in the middle of the dictatorship, and pretty shunned by the international community at the time.

The monument was a small and ruined temple in the now-flooded town of Debod, to which it owns its name Templo de Debod (Temple of Debod). Dedicated to the god Amun, it was built around the location of the First Cataract of the Nile, some 15 km south of Aswan, about 2200 years ago, though the core of the building may have been older. The monument was actually affected by the original dam at the beginning of the 20th century, and it was covered in water for most of the year, which destroyed its colours and damaged the reliefs.

During the Unesco salvage mission, it was dismantled, and eventually granted and taken to Spain, and “freely” reconstructed – a lot of information had been lost, and there were missing blocks. National stone was used to fill in the gaps, and the gates (remains of the pylons) were built in the wrong order, according to some old pictures. The restorers built an air-conditioning system, a wooden roof, and the main hall was closed off with a glass door and window panes. Today, the temple is open to the public at weekends, but unprotected from the Spanish weather – rather different from the Egyptian one – and pollution, it is rapidly deteriorating.

I went inside the temple once when I was a child, and I had a clear memory of it that kept surfacing when I was in Egypt – so I wanted to go back. The entry is free, but capacity is reduced, so I had to queue for almost an hour to enter. I finally matched my memory to reality. The interior of the sanctuary has a small chapel and some carved stones had been taken to a makeshift second floor to display them as a little museum.

A collage of a small Egyptian temple - it has two floating gates that lead up to the main building, which is small with four columns. One picture shows a tiny and dark inside room with an altar.

After the temple, I got lunch on the go, then walked towards the hotel to check in and change clothes. Around 16:15, I set off to La Riviera for the concert. I had a Meet and Greet ticket and had to be there before 17:00. Personnel from the venue were extremely nice, and there was no chaos at all, even if things had been a little disorganised and some fans were lacking M&G confirmation emails. Everything was well-handed and everyone who had paid for an upgrade got through. There were about 30 people to meet and greet Epica and we were ten for Apocalyptica.

Apocalyptica is a Finnish four-man band – Eicca Toppinen, Perttu Kivilaakso, Paavo Lötjönen and Mikko Sirén – founded in 1993. They are “semi-officially” a symphonic metal band, but they’ve ventured into everything from Metallica covers (which was their origin) to pure classical works. They have a very specific style heavily using classical cellos and combining them with modern drums. They currently collaborate with American – self-identified as Cuban in the concert – singer Franky Perez for vocals.

Meeting the four of them was really fun. I got autographs and took the most epic picture I’ve ever taken with a band or artist before. As we were only ten, after it was over, I had time to buy some merchandising and still be the second person to settle on first row – despite having decided that I was going to sit back and relax.

Apocalyptica white and black poster, signed by the four members

General admission started at 18:00, and the crowd was surprisingly tame throughout the whole thing. The venue filled up and the supporting band, Wheel, came up at 18:30. Wheel is a Finnish progressive metal band that consists of James Lascelles (Vocals/Guitar), Santeri Saksala (Drums), Aki ‘Conan’ Virta (Bass) and Jussi Turunen (Lead Guitar).

Wheel Setlist

  1. Hyperion
  2. Blood drinker
  3. Movement
  4. Vultures
  5. Wheel

Wheel playing, each member at his insturment: bass, guitar, singer and drummer

The second band was Epica, which I remember having listening to back when the world was young. They are a Dutch symphonic metal band currently composed by Simone Simons (lead vocals), Mark Jansen (rhythm guitar, vocals), Coen Janssen (keyboards, synthesizer), Ariën van Weesenbeek (drums), Isaac Delahaye (lead guitar) and Rob van der Loo (bass). Simone can go insanely high with her voice, and she has an amazing presence on stage, and the whole band has an immense amount of energy – she also reminded me of a comic character. The keyboardist had a lot of personality too, and he was extremely fun.

Epica Setlist

  1. Abyss of Time – Countdown to Singularity (recording)
  2. The essence of silence
  3. Victims of contingency
  4. Unleashed
  5. The final lullaby
  6. The obsessive devotion
  7. The skeleton key
  8. Rivers
  9. Code of life
  10. Cry for the moon
  11. Beyond the Matrix
  12. Consign to oblivion

Collage of Epica playing, showing different members at their choice of insturment - singer, bassist, guitarist, and keyboardist with a portable keyboard

Finally Apocalyptica came on stage, and it was extremely fun. The things those guys do to their classical cellos would make some classical musicians cry, but the sound is super-powerful. We had Franky Perez for vocals, and a very fun moment regarding “listen to our classical music album at home, because we still feel like death metal”. They interacted a lot with the public, and it felt somehow very friendly / warm – yes, I’m talking about metal here. It was really that fantastically weird.

Apocalyptica Setlist

  1. Ashes of the Modern World
  2. Grace
  3. I’m not Jesus
  4. Not strong enough
  5. Rise
  6. En route to mayhem
  7. Shadowmaker
  8. I don’t care
  9. Nothing else matters
  10. Inquisition Symphony
  11. Seek & Destroy
  12. Farewell
  13. In the Hall of the Mountain King

Apocalyptica playing with Franky Perez. Perez is in the foreground, dressed in black. The thee cello-playing members are in the frame, playing. The drums peek behind them, but you can't spot the drummer

Apocalyptica playing at La Riviera. They have classical cellos. Two of the members stand on the sides, playing their cellos. Another one is walking swinging his as if it weighed nothing, The final one is slamming drums in the background.

We finished off just short of 23:00, I bought off some fast food for dinner, and headed back to the hotel to have a shower and get some sleep. I was woken up early in the morning due to the cleaning crew and the garbage mini-vans noises, but I did not leave bed until 9:00, then set off at 9:30. I bought some cold coffee on the way and walked into the former royal palace gardens, now public park Jardines del Campo del Moro.

Though I’d seen the gardens a few times before, this was the first time I actually walked into them. Despite the frost covering everything, I got a nice view of the palace and different fountains and buildings sprinkled throughout the green – Chalet de Corcho, is a small hut with coloured windows; and Chalecito de la Reina a wooden house that is currently closed. I was insanely amused by a little grass-cutting robot.

Jardines del Campo del Moro. Collage. It's winter and most trees are grey and bare. At the end of the walkway stands the Neoclassical Royal Palace. Two smaller buildings - one of them is white with brown beams, reminscing of German architecture; another one is a small kiosk with colourful windows - red, green...

I wandered around for an hour or so, then headed off via underground to the National library of Spain Biblioteca Nacional de España for the absolutely worst guided visit of my life. Like… it’s true that it’s free, but tickets run out within hours of coming out – on the 20th of the month, for the following month. I’d actually been trying to do this since Covid lockdowns ended… It turns out, we did not see any real books, we could not even peer into the reading area, the book and reading museum is closed and the only information we got was… that the guide did not like the Library. We did not get to see anything interesting or that we could not see on our own, and we did not get to learn anything, so this was a huge blunder. Live and learn – but it was one of the few things that was open on a Monday. The library is a huge Neoclassical building with a fantastic marble staircase inside. The doors and gates are protected by intrincate ironwork fences.

Biblioteca Nacional de España. A Neoclassical building in white and grey tones. The exterior has columns and statues of writers. The interior showcases a pair of twin staircases with the statue of one of the most important library directors between both.

I met with family for a quick lunch and then we went for a walk. We had thought about going to one of the terraces to see the cityscape, but it was closed because it was a Monday. We ended up at the Parque del Retiro park again to make some time and walk. We sat in the sun for a while, then went to see the Palacio de Velázquez there. Currently, it’s part of the modern art museum Museo de Arte Reina Sofía, and I did not really care much about the exhibits, but I like the building. Architect Ricardo Velázquez Bosco built it in brick (with ceramic tiles by Daniel Zuloaga) for the Mining Exhibit in 1883, inspired by London’s Crystal Palace, now gone. The interior is pristine white with hints of iron architecture, but the building’s official style is “neorenaissance historicism” whatever that means.

Palacio de Velazquez: A brick building with large windows and tile decoration. The inside is all white with bits of iron architecture.

Velázquez Bosco and Zuloaga also came together when they designed another building I really like, the glass-and-iron greenhouse Palacio de Cristal, which was built to home tropical flora and fauna from the Philippines in an exhibit in 1887. In front of the palace, there’s a small pond home to some cheeky ducks and geese.

Palacio de cristal. A huge greenhouse with a dome, and two wings. A white duck wanders in the foreground. Between the greenhouse and the duck there's a small pond.

Then, we went to have a snack. Trying to find something on the map before the trip, I’d come across a place called La Mejor Tarta de Chocolate del Mundo, which translates to “The best chocolate cake in the world” and that had to be tried! It was really nice, even if the place was pretty small and felt a bit cramped.

A slice of chocolate cake in front of mugs and teapots

We finally took a stroll down towards the sunset, and I took the train back without much of a hitch, then drove home

26th May 2019: “Komeko Sin Gluten” event in Madrid (Spain)

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After almost literally everybody and their dogs ditched me for a cooking workshop in Madrid, literally the day before I decided to bite the bullet and go by myself, so I bought my ticket on Saturday night, barely 12 hours before the event, a promotion of a Japanese-Spanish shop and its products based on rice flour. The shop is called “Komeko Sin Gluten”, which translates as “Gluten-Free Rice Flour”.

Evenbrite ticket for the event: Taller de Cocina de Komeko: crepe, helado y tarta 10 euro

The event happened in a venue-for-hire in Madrid, and consisted in three distinct parts: a small market in which I would have spent a lot if I had not got a few samples with my ticket, a cooking workshop and a taiko concert. I arrived early due to Sunday having awful public-transport connections, and I arrived in Madrid an hour before the event even opened, and then we got a delay with the start of the workshop because someone was missing. During that time I got to sit around among aaaall the Japanese people around, including the head drummer of the taiko group, , whom I admired a lot since I watched him in HA·YA·TO: Drum Masters.

The small market was comprised, of course, of gluten-free products, especially Japanese ones, most of them can be found online, yay. I decided not to buy things upfront as the workshop included a sample of products, and I wanted to buy what I did not get. In the end, I did not have to buy anything because I got next to everything!

Pictures of the rice flour items - flour, noodles, snacks...

Anyway, the cooking workshop:

  1. Komeko crêpes: We made the crêpes on portable pans. There was a mini drama as the cook refused to start until we had chopsticks to flip the crêpes, and I was amused at first until I realised how convenient they actually were. While he was worried that I ahd any problems with the chopsticks, I’m happy to report that I was not the clumsiest in the class! After they were cool, we filled one up with ‘pastry cream’, banana and whipped cream for presentation – but we got to take the rest home and I tried them with chocolate. Serious improvement!
  2. Steamed banana sponge cake: this was really interesting to make, and also really easy – it involved mixing all the ingredients in a plastic bag, and then cutting a corner off the bag to pour that into little trays so we could steam it. That was… neat, and a team effort.
  3. Japanese green tea (matcha) ice-cream: Double team effort! (≧▽≦). As the paste needed time to freeze, we actually observed the chef prepare the ingredients and ate the one that had been prepared in the previous workshop.

Collage. Chef preparing crepes, and a picture of the materials, the matcha ice cream and my own creppes and banana spongecake

We had a snack with our crêpes and the matcha ice-cream. Then we got the haul of goodies: ramen and spaghetti noodles, komeko, komeko with glutinous rice, and komeko with cocoa, well worth the price (10€) I had paid for the whole workshop… Talk about promotion ☆⌒(ゝ。∂).

Different flours and noodles I got as present

Afterwards, I headed downstairs for the taiko concert. Enishi Taiko is a Spanish group, and Keita Kanazashi usually collaborates with them rather often. The concert was, of course, more humble than the one with HA·YA·TO, but it was still a lot of fun.

Taiko group playing and having a lot of fun

Afterwards, I got Kanazashi to sign the HA·YA·TO DVD and the picture I had with him from that time, which was really cool. Furthermore, the main drummer in Enishi Taiko remembered me from the X Gran Exposición de Ikebana y Semana Cultural Japonesa session, and another session I took at their headquarters.

I had thought that I would be eating in Madrid but as I had snacked on the komeko products I was not hungry at all, so I decided to head home. On the way towards the station I found this really cool fountain.

Urban waterfall. The fountain looks like a massive bench, with a thin layer of water dripping from the top

18th & 19th May 2019: Madrid (Spain) for Jupiter (and fesFE[M]!)

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The weekend started extremely early on Saturday, when I took the first bus out to Madrid, and I think I was there around 7:30 to meet my friend C*****. She had been having a rough time and she had asked me to “keep her head off things”. Up until a couple of days before, we did not even know whether she would be able to come to the concert, so I had a whole plan up my sleeve. Unfortunately, a couple of steps backfired slightly. The main event – which we had been planned since the previous December – was Jupiter’s concert for the ZEUS Europe Tour on Sunday the 19th, but we made a whole weekend out of it. I was not actively following Jupiter at the time of the announcement, but C***** and I decided to attend because Madrid is easy and convenient, well-communicated and an opportunity to spend a weekend decompressing somewhere. As the time drew near and we could access more material, the excitement built up – I also managed to find the album they were promoting and it sounded really well, actually.

Her bus arrived earlier on Saturday than mine, and when we met, we decided to have breakfast at the coach station, to catch up and to give shops and so on the time to open up. When it was a reasonable time, we took the underground to drop our luggage at the hotel – the lovely EXE Moncloa. I had selected it because it was near the concert venue, and I hoped that we could hang out the terrace and the swimming pool, which unfortunately did not open until June. After getting rid of the luggage, we rode the underground towards the neighbourhood of Chueca, where I had looked up a bunch of Goth apparel shop which were right up her alley and… did not open at 10:00 as the internet said, but at 12:00.

Fortunately, other shops were already open and we were able to pass the time amicably. We were actually close to the Telefonica building, so I suggested we headed up there for the TeamLab exhibit, which I had already seen, and I thought she might like the digital art.

Teamlab logo and digital art: Waves, butterflies in red and green, and a dripping circle as if it were painted with a brush. All of them are light or bright colours on black.

Afterwards, we moved onto Callao Gourmet Experience for a snack. I wanted to introduce C***** to the Niji Mochi shop, and we also shared a chocolate ice-cream shake.

Mochi and coffee with whipped cream

Afterwards, we were shopping for a little longer before we moved on to have lunch. I had a surprise for her. While I care little to nothing about Korean food, she is a fan of everything Korean. Thus, we hit one of the best Korean restaurants in Madrid, called Seoul. I gave her free reign to order for both of us and we shared, though being honest, the only thing I enjoyed was the green tea at the end.

Lunch: fried dumplings, roasted meat, rice with vegetables, and green tea.

After lunch, we went on and found an underground station. We rode towards the Museo Arqueológico Nacional, National Archaeological Museum, although we had not realised that it was museum day so instead of a quiet exhibition I was used to, we had to deal with a ton of families! On the bright side, it was free, though. The museum, which shares a building with the national library Biblioteca Nacional, was founded in 1867, at a time when creating national museums had become popular among European governments. It was the start of the development of archaeology in Spain. I remembered it from the time I was a kid, dark and with wooden floors, but it was recently renovated with wide spaces and modern interiors.

Exhibits at the archaeological museum: bones from a mastodon, boar statue, lady statue, Neanderthal skull, Roman mosaic of an octopus, Horus statue, Iberian stelae, primitive animal that looks like a boar or a bull carved out of stone, Grecian vase

C***** was tired from spending all night in the bus, so we left the museum and headed back to the hotel to finish our check in process and then catch a break. On the way, we stopped and bought a few snacks for the following day because you always have to be ready for a post-concert low.

We had to look for a place to have dinner, and I found a few interesting places. There were not one, but three Japanese restaurants in the area where we were staying. One of them required queueing and sounded quite self-important, so we were left with two options. We decided to try one in the evening and the next for lunch the following day. Thus, I booked a table at the nearby Naniwa. We had some decent sushi, chicken, and takoyaki… then ordered takoyaki seconds because we had a discount (and I was hungry because I barely picked on lunch).

Dinner: sushi, fried chicken, octopus balls, chicken skewers

The next morning, we headed to the venue Sala Copérnico door around 9:00 and upon seeing nobody queueing yet, we went to have breakfast at a nearby café. Then, we walked around the Moncloa park area, mostly chatting, until we went back to the venue – no queue. And later went back to the venue – no queue. And afterwards, we went back to the venue again, just to find there were still no people in the queue.

Coffee and bread breakfast

In the end we ran into the supporting bands went to have lunch to the second Japanese restaurant in the block, Morikaen. It was around 13:30 as we were heading there, and I said something along the lines of “I feel sorry that they’ll arrive and there’s nobody here to greet them”, and as we turned the corner we almost literally ran into the whole crew coming out of the bus. Talk about timing. They looked tired so we just walked by, but we were rather sure that we had been noticed. On our way to the restaurant, we walked past a family all clad in “Sunday church clothes”, and their small girl wearing aaaall white just stared at us – in rock-goth black clothing – with pure envy in her eyes. Here’s to you, little one. You’ll get there too.

Lunch was all right – tuna tataki, tonkatsu, takoyaki. A bit more expensive than the previous day’s dinner, but we also ordered higher-class ingredients and more complicated dishes.

Lunch. Tuna tataki, rice and chicken, breaded pork, octopus dumplings

Jupiter is a Japanese band who define themselves as “melodic metal band”. It could be said that it is a visual kei symphonic power metal, which means they combine a very particular image (or a bunch of images, the most iconic being Hizaki’s Baroque-inspired dresses) with a subgenre of metal that combines hard drumming, metal guitars, and elements of classical music. On the 22th November 2018, Jupiter announced their new album, a Japanese Tour, and a European Tour, ZEUS Europe Tour. Bassist Rucy left between the announcement and the album release due to creative differences, and I really thought they would cancel the tours, but luckily everything went ahead. The remaining members – guitars Hizaki and Teru, current vocal Kuze, and drummer Daisuke were joined by support bassist Shoyo.

Schedule for the tour

There were two promoters involved for this concert. The local promoter, which in Spain was Madness Live, sold general admission tickets – they have a clean and neat webpage and buying from them is easy; I got ours on the 12th of December. The other, Editions Hikari, was in charge of coordination of the European tour, general information, and ticket upgrades. I think they are one of the worst organisers I have ever come across.

Hikari announced those upgrades in January. There would be VIP experiences, on sale on the 14th of February. Besides that there would be two kinds of upgrades, there was no real information about them until a few days before the sale. The best tickets were called “Venus Premium” (40€ face value + 5€ reservation costs) included autographs + handshake + backstage access before or after the show or soundcheck access (if possible) + photo with 1 member taken by a professional photographer (sent by e-mail later after the tour) + priority access to the merchandise, and there were five per show. The “Venus” upgrade (25€ VIP + 3€ reservation costs) comprised autographs + handshake + priority to the merchandise, there were 20 available per show. Getting the tickets was chaotic, but in the end, C***** managed to buy the two Venus Premium tickets we wanted – luckily. A lot of people did not even find out about the option to upgrade. In the end, the backstage pass / soundcheck was not available for any concert in the tour, and the priority access to the merchandise was impossible in Madrid due to the two independent promoters. Either of the VIP upgrades granted the option to buy an “Instax” (Polarid) photograph with the whole band at extra cost.

Hikari’s Facebook instructions were that Venus and Venus Premium ticket holders had to go to the merch booth – to which they supposedly had priority access – at the beginning of the concert. However, as the access to the actual venue was controlled by the local promoter ticket, there was no way they would access the merch booth with any kind of priority unless the managed to somehow skip the queue. Any kind of communication with Hikari was impossible as “they could not check emails, Facebook messaging, nor reply to comments.” However, they still made posts, and that is how we found that the CDs which Jupiter brought to sell at the merchandise booth were confiscated by customs’ officers before the first concert!

On the 10th of May, we received an email form the local promoter, Madness Live, informing us that the door timing had been changed and they were nice enough to send us the following schedule: Doors at 19:00, VII ARC (German support band) at 19:15; fesFE[M] (Japanese support group) at 20:20; Jupiter at 21:30. There was no information on the upgrades, because they had no clue about those, as Hikari was in charge. The day of the concert thus arrived and we had no actual about that, except for rumours and comments of what had happened in previous concerts. That was why, even if there was no queue, we had decided to stick around Sala Copérnico instead of heading into the city centre.

Eventually, after lunch, I decided that I was too tired to keep going up and down the streets, so around 16:00 we settled at the venue doors until they opened so we could get into the chaos that was the concert. At 16:30, other people arrived, so we got talking – that was how we found out that many people had never even heard about the upgrades. Doors opened around 19:00 – without any kind of priority access to the merchandise, nor separating VIPs and GA. C***** and I decided to divide and conquer – she went to secure a spot on the first row, while myself checked in at the merch booth to get the Instax tickets with the whole band.

That is when I saw the lousy, half sheet of paper taped there saying “Venus and Venus Premium ticket holders, gather at the merchandise booth at 20:00”. That placed the “Venus experience” in the middle of the support act, which meant either having very good friends who saved you the first row spot, or sacrificing it. We decided to give the place up and find somewhere more convenient so we could move about. Without holding spots for the VIPs, this was totally unacceptable in my opinion, especially since there had been no early entry, or priority merchandise. A bunch of people who did not want to buy anything missed out on what they had paid for.

The first support band was VII ARC. They were okay, a bit of stereotypical German heavy metal. I can see how they might appeal to the general metalhead crowd, but it feels that they were chosen because “they dress up sometimes”, and Hikari thought they would fit. It is formed by Kay (vocals), Fū (lead guitar), Bena (guitar, screaming), Grazel (Bass) and Z’ev (drums), and they could probably fit a bit on the “visual” style, but they did not bring any distinctive gear.

VII Arc playing in Madrid

At 20:00, as fesFE[M] prepared to take the stage, the Venus Premium and Venus ticket holders gathered around the merch booth and we were ushered past a barrier, towards the bar. There, we had to wait for about 10 minutes while the second support act started. A Japanese staff lady with little to no English came to “check” the Premium tickets and “sort of explain” to us the whole thing. First the Venus Premium would be shown backstage one by one for the one-on-one photograph – there were four of us, we never knew if the fifth was never sold, they did not come, or they missed the whole experience. Afterwards, we would come out again and joined the regular Venus for the autographs and handshake, then the Polaroid would be taken for the ones who had bought it. We were ushered past a curtain and the backstage door towards the mess room where the remains of the lunch buffet were.

As I entered, I caught sight of Shoyo, the support bassist, who was sitting down on a low mattress in a room to the left, looking bored. I greeted him in Japanese, and he greeted back. C***** turned to see whom I was talking to and her eyes were wide. I asked Shoyo if he felt lonely, he said a little. Another attendee who also spoke Japanese asked for a picture (beating me to it, actually) but he said he was not allowed.

The conversation died out when it was time to go into the private band area for my picture with one of the members. As I walked in, there was Kuze to my left, Daisuke to my right and Teru and Hizaki in front of me, Teru dead centre and Hizaki a little to the right. I was asked whom I wanted my picture with and chose Teru, as I had long ago decided that I would if I could. He smiled and posed with me, then he shook my hand. I have got to learn to look into Japanese musician’s eyes when I talk to them.

We said good-bye to Shoyo on the way out, and almost left, but it was now time for autographs, handshakes and Instax. I pulled out the CDs I had brought for C***** and myself, and I got to shake hands with all four of them and receive the band’s autographs. Since the CDs the band brought had been seized, we might have very well been the only ones in the whole country that produced some official material for signing. Then, we took the Instax and the staff would ask with a thumbs up sign “okay?” to check the picture was good, before we left.

CDs signed by Jupiter members

All in all, the band was very friendly and amazing, but the timing and organisation was horrid. We lost out first row – despite having “priority access”, and we missed half of the fesFE[M] concert. As Copérnico has two levels though, we found a nice spot at the stairs that connect both, and I could lean against the handrail to watch the rest of the act.

fesFE[M] is a relatively new visual kei band where all the members take up “doll” personas. Their career in 2017 and released their first mini-album in May 2019, just in time to come over to Europe for Jupiter’s tour. For each album / season, the band dons a doll theme, and they were currently on the “horror genre” dolls. The members and their doll types are: Lion [リオン], vocal, Distress Coppelia doll (from the namesake ballet, dressed as a bloody bride); Aito [アイト], guitar, Apathetic Prince doll; Zeno P [ゼノP], guitar, Bloodthirsty Child Killer doll; Toru [徹], bass, Emotional Princess doll; Rensa [蓮沙], drums, Psycho Butler doll; and Jun, keyboards, Scalded Dollmaster doll (dressed as a nun because… reasons?).

The first time I heard a song by fesFE[M], I was not extremely impressed – the PV was a bit too creepy. However, they are really good in person, even with the bad sound quality and reverberation in the venue – and the fact that we missed about half of their act. They were really engaging. The whole visual part was amazing, and the coordination was great! Their music was much more powerful live. The band played some songs from their mini-album enseMble autoMata: Doll in blueberry jam [Doll in ブルーベリィジャム], Arachne ni haitoku wo [アラクネに背徳を], Psychological stolen heart, and Freiya [フレイヤ].

Fesfem live in Madrid

The Jupiter concert was as expected, very energetic and fun – it actually went beyond expectations. Our spot was really good in he end, a bit raised, without getting pushed, and we actually watched the concert next to fesFe[M]’s bass Toru. Sometimes he smiled and waved at us, and we waved back without fail.

Kuze, Jupiter’s vocalist held his ground better than I thought he would be able to. I was kind of impressed when I listened to the Jupiter single Theory of Evolution and later to the album Zeus: Legends never die. While we were expecting the guitar and metal power, Kuze’s voice range in the recording was rather wild, and I did not think that he would be able to keep it up live, especially on a final concert after touring both Japan and Europe. He proved me wring, and he held all his notes and his vocal range, just like the recording. He had practised his English a lot and learnt the MCs, but he switched to Japanese quite often, and he spoke too fast for me to get! He did a great job even with songs that had been released in the previous vocalist’s time.

Daisuke was pretty much hidden by his own drums from where we were, but we did see him bounce a couple of times. Hizaki was on the other side of the stage from us, and he looked divine in his Baroque dress. I don’t understand how he can even move in those clothes, much less play guitar or crouch, which he did so a few times in order to interact to first-row fans. A couple of times I did fear for his safety as someone grabbed either him or the guitar. Most of the songs that were played were his. It’s fun to imagine what he would be thinking when writing “die, die, die, go fuck yourself”, when he presents as such a beautiful and innocent lady, but it surely was fun to yell.

And finally, Teru had a blast. He kept twirling around as he played, his stud-leather coat swirling around him. He played with a huge smile on his face all the time and he gave off the vibes that he was having a lot of fun. He also interacted with fans a lot.

Jupiter Live in Madrid

Setlist:

  1. Arcadia
  2. Last Moment
  3. Angel’s wings
  4. Drastic Night
  5. Bring me out
  6. Show Must Go On
  7. No cry no more
  8. The spirit within me
  9. Tears Of The Sun
  10. Memories of you
  11. B.L.A.S.T
  12. Blessing of the Future
  13. Zeus: I. Legends Never Die / II. Conversations with God
  14. Symmetry Breaking [Encore 1]
  15. Theory of Evolution [Encore 2]

While the concerts were a lot of fun, the whole event was stressful due to the abysmal organisation. I actually feel a bit ripped off, because they did not deliver a lot of what they had sold in the upgrades. At least C***** and I are lucky enough that we managed to get our pictures, autographs, and saw the concert from a relatively good place. All in all, Jupiter are amazing, they were super nice, and so were the guys from fesFE[M]. The concert was great, and we don’t regret going for a second.

After the event, waved at Toru for what we thought was the last time. When lights went on, we also saw Rensa, who stopped for us when we told him he had done a good job. C***** and I decided to pool our money together to buy the CDs fesFe[M] had brought – and not got seized. Apparently, it is typical that the entry-level bands hang around merchandise booths after concerts, and we were lucky enough that they agreed to sign the CDs and take a photo with us. Lion was extremely surprised and nice – or acted so. He complimented me on my poor attempt of Japanese and complied with what we requested.

CD signed by Fesfem members

Finally, C***** and I headed back to the hotel, and we went home the next day – fortunately we left from the same bus station so we could maximise our time together.

Hikari took a few days to send out the VIP pictures, but they eventually arrived on the 1st of June. Getting them was also hard, and amateurish – they wanted to put them in a Google Drive link and post that on Facebook. At least we got them to send them via email, citing European Data protection laws at them… I really, really hope to avoid this promoter in the future, but if I do, I’ll be on the lookout in order not to miss anything.

2nd January 2019: Jurassic and 19th Century Madrid (Spain)

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I was in the middle of winter holidays and a couple of family members asked me if I had plans – I said I was getting tickets for a dinosaur exhibit in Madrid, and they jumped in. We made arrangements to head over there on the 2nd of January and spend the day in Madrid. I don’t think they really realised what it meant to be around me and the “terrible lizards” (≧▽≦). But off we went.

General entry ticket for 2nd January 2019

The Jurassic World: Exhibition was held in Madrid. The whole thing is organised in-verse, as if you actually visited the island.

Jurassic World the Exhibition logo and title

After you walk in, there is first a small introduction on the “boat” as you travel towards Isla Nublar. There you are given the instructions (mainly, keep your hands to yourself), the boat makes dock and you are let into the Park. Keeping in touch with the spirit of the films (not the book though *giggles*) there’s a Brachiosaurus there to greet you, just like the first animal you see in Isla Nublar (and later the last).

Pretencious gate with two columns on the side, reading Jurassic World. A brontosaurus head peers down at you

You also catch a glimpse of a Parasaurolophus.

The head of an herbivore dinosaur (parasaurolophus) peering through the bushes

Then you get to the “stables” where you get to see a Triceratops mama with her baby.

Mom and baby Triceratops behind a fence that reads Gentle giants petting zoo

Afterwards, there is a small room that represents the laboratory where the dinosaurs are made – I could have made it out with a critter but there were only baby Iguanodon.

Fake amber pieces and DNA extactor along with an incubator with eggs and baby dinosaurs

Next, you walk into a tiny museum with some fossil reproductions and actual scientific information…

Reproduction of carnivore dinosaurs skull and bones, along with the drawing of a huge T-rex fooot print drawn on the ground to compare it to a human one

… right before everything goes to hell and back when you’re shown a hologram of Owen Grady talking to his velociraptor Blue and you get a… guy in a velociraptor costume prancing around (≧▽≦).

Person disguised as a verlociraptor

The next room shows the Tyrannosaurus rex cage (by the way #TeamTRex here, in case you did not know) behind her cage, menacing and staring.

T-rex animatronic, showing the huge head behind a fence

The final room is another garden in which you get to see a Stegosaurus being stalked by the made-up Indominus rex.

Stegosaurus

Head of the Indominus rex, looking like it's stalking prey

And at the end of the exhibition, after the shop even, you find the velociraptors, which have apparently escaped and are ready to attack!

Jurassic world velociraptors on a wrecked crate

All in all, being the dinosaur geek I am, I had a blast. I’m not sure that my poor family members that had wanted to tag along with me knew what they were bargaining for (≧▽≦).

However, they were still willing to put up with my for a little longer, and together we drove off to the centre of Madrid, and somehow ended up at the Museo Cerralbo. They asked if there was something I wanted to see, and the Cerralbo Museum was running a couple of Japan-related specials I was curious about. The museum stands in the Palace of the same name, and it holds the collection of the late Marquis Cerralbo.

The museum is… crammed and chaotic, but interesting in its own way. It holds thousands of pieces, from worthless-looking mementos to priceless paintings by masters such as El Greco. Art experts say that the Cerralbo collection was the most valuable of its time.

Collage of cerralbo museum. A room with two samurai armous. A centrepiece made with swords. A long table, set, with chairs along and an ellaborate lamp hanging from the ceiling. The hall of the museum, with a staircase with an ellaborate balaustrade and a glass lamp hanging from the ceiling.

The museum was holding a designated route focused on the Japanese pieces it has, including samurai armours.

Collage of Asian and Japanese pieces of the museum: hars, a samurai armour, and an hexagonal carey box

Furthermore, there was an origami exhibition on the lower floor.

Origami pieces: a phoenix, a snake, an orca, corals, and a life-sized hippo

After the museum we sat down for lunch at a fusion Asian-Japanese restaurant, because the family members “wanted to try” – although they were rather scared of the food. Eventually they managed to enjoy it too, and even have seconds – however I needed to make a run to get my tablet serviced.

Lunch. Sushi, chicken skewers, rice dish and noodles dish

Once it was up and running, and family had come to find me, we walked towards the shopping centre in Principe Pío for dessert – yoghurt ice cream with berries and smarties. A great way to end the day!

An old station from iron architecture epoch repurposed into shopping centre

Frozen yoghurt with berries sauce and smarties

28th October 2018: HA·YA·TO: Drum Masters (Madrid, Spain)

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Out of all the taiko [太鼓] shows I have attended, this was without a doubt the one I enjoyed the most. HA·YA·TO is a wadaiko [和太鼓] (Literally ‘Japanese drum’) group formed by the three Kanazashi brothers: Keita, Ryota and Yuta (Keita Kanazashi spends a lot of time in Spain, we’ve seen lots of ‘taiko workshops’ organised with him as a special trainer). This time they’re touring Spain with their show Drum Masters, accompanied by a number of renown musicians: Koji Hada, Takayuki Hashiguchi, Makoto Sekine and Syunchiro Kamija, aside from two special guests: Chieko Kojima (dancer and first female wadaiko master in Japan) and Masato Shibata (shamisenworld champion).

Hayato Premium Ticket I found by chance

I was lucky enough to get a premium seat as I attended a matinee show in the theatre Teatros del Canal in Madrid. The show represents the four seasons of the year, and each part has its own rhythm and characteristics, along with energy and colour. At one point there were seven drummers and sixteen drums being played on stage at the same time.

Hayato Drum Masters Poster

The show was divided into the four seasons. During the first part, spring and summer, energy was abundant. Spring brought all the musicians to the stage, so while the great weight of the show rested on the drums, we also got shamisen (Japanese guitar) and Japanese flute. Kojima showed us her dancing skills in front of a black background with a flurry of cherry blossoms.

Then came summer, with a torii background and the matsuri (festival) atmosphere. The big central drum was put into action. This was when Keita Kanazashi showed off his Spanish and used the audience as another instrument, making them clap and stomp their feet in a sort of call and response routine which was really fun.

The most impressive number had the seven drummers on a row, and sixteen drums in total, all in a line. Thus, each drummer had three taiko, one in front, and one on each side, all lined up. However, they were actually sharing the side taiko with the drummer next to them, so at any given time that they banged they could collide with the musician next to them. It was amazing to witness the crazy-you-dont-get-to-see-the-batons-fast speed slamming the drum.

The second part started with autumn, that had the four supporting drummers playing ‘tennis’ with the small crash cymbals, first one on stage, then two, then three, then four, then with the audience, and then with each other all around the theatre. Then we had a demonstration of Chieko Kojima’s art on stage, first dancing, and then with the taiko – it was impressive to see how such a small lady can bang the drum in a ethereal red kimono. First she did it with the free sleeves, then she danced with a sash that she used to tie them back so she could play more forcefully.

Winter was a bit slower on the uptake – though with impressive technique – but it grew into an amazing mix of sounds and visual arts, again with dancing, taiko, crash cymbals, flutes and shamisen. In the end, Chieko Kojima danced with her parasol making it ‘snow’ (at a point her sleeve got caught in her hair décor and she needed a tiny stop). It was beautiful.

Hayato Drum Masters ensemble greeting at the stage

Theatre window with the Hayato Drum Masters poster

Finally, Keita Kanazashi introduced the musicians and informed us that they would be outside to take pictures after the show. I was lucky I could do so with everybody! All the artists were nice and friendly and it was a great experience. I also bought a DVD.

30th June 2018: Spanish breakfast, Japanese entertainment (Madrid, Spain)

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30th June 2018: Spanish breakfast, Japanese entertainment (Madrid, Spain)

My friend C***** came over to Madrid for one of those crazy crazy things that we do – a crazy Saturday. She took a bus overnight and I went to meet her up for breakfast. The day started with a good omen, because I caught a rainbow around 7:30.

To celebrate that we had met up for the first time in a long while, we went to the most famous chocolaterie in Madrid, Chocolatería San Ginés for chocolate and churros. As her bus arrived in the early morning, I think we were there around 8:30 as I took the first train available.

After breakfast, we head over to the area of the theatre, Teatros del Canal, for the main event at noon – a piece of Kabuki [歌舞伎], a piece of classical Japanese dance. In this case we were going to see an adaptation of Fuji Musume and Renjishi. First, we checked out the little market of Japanese craftsmanship and decided that we wanted everything, because of course we did.

Then we walked into the theatre. The company Heisei Nakamuraza was bringing two key pieces in the history of kabuki. The first was Fuji Musume [藤娘] “The Wisteria Lady”. It is a representation of unrequited love, dancing under the wisteria tree that represents femininity, and the pine that represents masculinity. During the dance there are several kimono dances and it is visually stunning. The second piece, Renjishi [検索結果], “The Two Lions”, is a very spectacular dance, in many ways mirrored between two dancers. The first part represents a parent lion-dog and its cub, then there is a small comical interlude and finally the lion dogs come out again in celebration. No pictures allowed of the performance, but have some of the theatre:

The show was over much too quickly, sadly. We went out of the theatre and raided the matsuri / market.

Then we walked a few minutes to the Japanese restaurant Hayama, where we had some sushi, gyoza, takoyaki, curry and ramen to share.

As C***** had an early-evening train to get back (I did mention that this was a crazy escapade specially for her), I tagged along to the station and I saw her off. Awesome way to spend a Saturday, though I wish we could have hung out for longer!

11th March 2018: An old-fashioned museum and a strike in Madrid (Spain)

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I was looking at a work-related trip and wanted to use up Sunday morning to visit “a couple” of museums, then meet some relatives for lunch. Unfortunately, I was caught in the middle of a public transportation strike, so in the end I had to walk for a long while instead of doing what I wanted! Anyway, what I managed to do was getting to the Museo Geominero Nacional, the “Geomineral Museum” in Madrid. It is located in the headquarters of the Geological and Mining Institute of Spain, in a classical-looking building finished in 1925. It was designed by Franciso Javier de Luue. It is a classical-looking museum with wooden cases and an impressive stained glass ceiling, comprised by a central room and three surrounding balconies.

The access is through a marble staircase and the first corridor is already packed with display cases, even before you get to the main area. These cases show small and not-so-small fossils and replicas, displaying the first taste of the evolution of life on earth.

Once in the main room, most of the floor is taken up by the standing cases holding minerals, fossils and meteorites.

In the centre of the room lie the remains of a mastodon, located in the area of Ciudad Real in the 20th century, one of the crown jewels of the museum.

Of course I have been able to locate the collection of megalodon and shark teeth that are on display on the balcony.

Other displays on the upper floors include Spanish mountain goats, cave bears, and a human-evolution collection. Unfortunately, those did not photograph well due to the sun reflection.

And finally, my favourite piece of the collection is the Tyrannosaurus rex skull replica that presides the museum for the second floor.

When I came out, public transport was not running any more, so I had to walk through the Madrid backstreets until I got to the area where we had arranged to meet, and we went to a restaurant called El Escarpín, where I had an awesome pan of… wait for it… gratin meatballs with molten cheese on a bed of potatoes (Albóndigas gratinadas con queso de tetilla sobre cama de patatas). Amazing! Either that, or I was really ravenous after my hour and a half walking. Serves me right for not keeping up with the news! I learnt my lesson!

16th September 2016: Some Madrid (Spain) Museums

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I woke up one morning, a silly weekday that I did not have to work for some reason and I decided to wander off and take a day trip to Madrid to see some museums, just because I could.

My first stop was the Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales, the museum of natural science. The museum is divided into several buildings. The first building holds the “Biodiversity” collection. This includes preserved specimens – in better or worse shape, mostly stuffed, and some skeletons.

Then I walked over to the palaeontology and mineral museum, where at the moment most of the collection is composed of replica, sometimes it feels that you see the same diplodocus or arsinoitherium (two-horned rhino) skull everywhere. Of course, however, I hunted down every megalodon tooth on site and sight.

After this, I walked around the mineral collection and walked down Castellana Avenue until Colón Square, where I had lunch somewhere before I walked around to see the Museo Arqueológico Nacional – National Archaeological Museum. There were a few things that interested me there.

My first goal was to study the Iberian stelæ . Nobody really knows what they are or what their meaning is, but it is thought that they were funerary monuments, maybe of fallen warriors.

An interesting thing to see in this museum is the sculpture of La Dama de Elche, the Lady of Elche, the limestone bust of an Iberian lady dated back to the 4th century BC. It is supposed to be a woman who belonged to the aristocracy that was later revered as a goddess, or maybe a reinterpretation of the Goddess Tanit of Cathage. The back part has an opening, which suggests that it could have been a funerary urn. It was originally polychromated, but it has lost its colours. I really like her expression, and probably due to the Hellenistic influence. I have a thing for Greek sculpture, after all.

A second “lady”, the Dama de Baza (Lady of Baza), stands next to the first. This one still keeps some of its colours. This one is full-body, also carved out of limestone, and it traces back to the fourth century too. This lady seems to have been designed in pure Iberian style, without Hellenistic influences.

The last key pieces of Iberian sculpture in this museum are the verracos – sort-of headless boars, pigs or bulls (depending on the interpretation), but it is commonly accepted that they are symbols of protection of cattle routes. Most of them are… visibly male.

Once I had seen what I really wanted to see I wandered over the rest of the museum, stumbling upon the currency exhibition, which was strangely interesting.

I walked past the Medieval rooms and then I found the Egyptian area, which is humble, but has some interesting things like the X-rays of a mummified falcon. Finally, I checked out the classical Greek area before calling it a day and making it back home.

15th July 2014: Robots and Drums (Madrid, Spain)

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A bit over ten years ago, when I was in universe one of my neighbours was paying for a proto-on-demand TV subscription, and it turned out that my TV caught it for some reason. At that time I got to watch a bunch of anime – in Spanish, badly-translated and rather… altered. Among the series I watched was Gainax’s “Neon Genesis Evangelion”, or Shinseiki Evangerion [新世紀エヴァンゲリオン]. Evangelion is a rather confusing series in itself, but the creative translation and censorship made it almost impossible to understand. Evangelion tries to be a giant robot anime with a religious / philosophical background, where humans piloting huge robots (“EVA”) battle monsters called “angels” which apparently seek to destroy humanity. Or something.

The point of this anime-history paragraph is to explain how I ended up at the Museo ABC de Dibujo e Ilustración, the drawing and illustration museum in Madrid. They were running an exhibition about Evangelion and the Japanese katana Evangelion y las katanas japonesas. It was something interesting to see, and the first time I’ve ever seen actual Japanese katana information. The exhibition has three focuses – actual katana, recreations and figures of elements of the series, such as the robots, pilots or weapons, and weapons inspired by the anime.

After the exhibition I took the underground towards the thratre Teatro Circo Price to watch a taiko exhibition: “Taiko Performing Arts Ensemble: Dandan” by Kodo. Taiko are the traditional Japanese drums and there is a whole drumming style for them. It was really, really fun. Due to a fluke of destiny, I had very good seats, so I could enjoy to the fullest – far away from the reverberation and echoes, close enough so I could even sneak in a good picture or two!

The performance was amazing. I think this was the first time I’ve ever seen something so grandeur. Even when I saw a taiko school in Japan, it was just drumming, while Kodo added a lot of acrobatics to the mix. It was really great!

Unfortunately, I could not even check the merchandise after the performance as I had to run for my train, or risk getting stranded overnight in Madrid.

7th May 2013: The inner works of the Geomineral Museum in Madrid (Spain)

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Due to work reasons I ended up in the Museo Geominero, the Geomineral Museum, in Madrid. The Museo Geominero is a rather anachronical place – it displays a great mineral and fossil-replica collection in an early 20th-century building. The inner area is used for research and hides all the high tech. However, they work with really old and cool geological elements.

This was the firs time in my life I ever held a meteorite – just imagine, this thing floated around space, and I got to hold it. It was heavier than I would have ever imagined. You can see the zig-zags on the surface, those are magnetic markings because the main component of this space rock is iron.

There was a session going on about identifying fossils, and this is what I came up with:

Out of the bunch, I also got to play with the ammonite…

… counted the corals…

… and I petted the trilobite…

As you can see, I snuck quite a few pictures. It did not work so well during the museum walkthrough, so I guess I will just have to come back for the main exhibit some other time (≧▽≦).

Flashback to 26th December 2009: Winterday in Madrid (Spain)

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  • Palacio Real de Madrid (Royal Palace)
  • Templo de Debod (Egyptian Temple to Debod)
  • Arco de la Victoria (Victory Arc)
  • Palacio de la Moncloa (Palace of La Moncloa)
  • Puerta del Sol (Square Puerta del Sol)
  • Plaza Mayor de Madrid (Main Square)
  • Plaza de Colón (Columbus Square),
  • Puerta de Alcalá (Puerta de Alcalá Arc)
  • Edificio de Correos (Postal Building)
  • Fuente de la Cibeles (Cibeles Fountain)
  • Edificio Metrópolis (Metropolis Building)
  • Gran Vía de Madrid (Gran Vía Avenue)
  • Círculo de Bellas Artes (Fine Arts Club)
  • Estación de Príncipe Pío (Príncipe Pío Station)

Note: This is a flashback post, which means it is just a collage regarding a trip I took before I started the blog in 2012. Tags may be incomplete or slightly off.