Summer Fling--A Travel Blog

Friday, April 21, 2006

Palacio Real

The Royal Palace in Madrid was a lot like Versailles. Every Room was a work of art; the Grand Hall, the Hall of Columns, the Throne Room (very Italian Baroque; also known as the Hall of Ambassadors), the Rooms of Carlos III (drawing room antechamber, a chinoiserie-inspired chamber, his green tranvia, and is salon).
The Porcelain Room was a room made entirely of—you guess it—porcelain, commissioned from Juan Bautista de la Torre and the Porcelain Factory. The Gala Dining Room is huge. Next to it is a room affectionately called Cinema, where Alfonso XIII's royal family watched films on Sunday afternoons. Mikki drooled in the Stradivarius and Instrument Rooms. In front of the Capilla Real are statues Fernando and Isabel.

    Coolness.
    After the Royal Palace, we went back to Puerto Del Sol. Since it kept raining the streets were slippery. Over a slanting walkway I turned just in time to see Mikki slip and fall flat on her back.
    It was NOT funny.
    What was funny however was that a girl sitting on the wall beside her—not even a foot away—gaped and gaped, and that an ambulance just happened to be passing by. Thank God though that Mikki was ok enough to walk around.
    When Risa was finished buying CDs for Kuya Tommy (Summer classes. HA!), we ate in a 'proper Spanish restaurant'. We feasted on jamón mixtas (an assorted selection of hams), fabadas Asturianas (white beans with sausages), tortilla asparagos (Asparagus omelet), and of course, paella. The paella was perhaps overkill.
    After dinner we were all full. We recovered for a bit before packing. But it was a good way to end our Spanish viaje.

Posted at 07:31 pm by summerfling
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All Hail Queen Sophy

    Once again it took forever to get my sisters and me functional. We used the bus to get near MCARS, and just our luck, it started raining. My luck, especially—I was only wearing my new bolero over my thin shirt, and I had no cap or umbrella. I was kinda chilly, the way Johnny Depp is kinda a cool actor.
    Gotta love sarcasm.
    We reached the Reina Sofia Musem at 11. MCARS, or Museo Collectión Artes de Reina Sofia is a museum that showcases modern, postmodern, and probably post-postmodern Spanish artists. Once I thawed a bit, I enjoyed the surreal and figurative works. Some painters worth checking out:

Jon Gutierrez Solana, and his dark figures.
Joan Miró’s colorful, whimsical abstracts, like his tribute to Pablo Picasso (Mujer, Pajaro y Estrella, 1970).
Pablo Picasso himself. Saw Guernica. It was awesome. That huge a painting (it covered much more than Juan Luna’s Spolarium), and it only took him a month to do it.
Salvador Dali Domenech. I love his work. I have a print of The Temptation of St. Anthony from the Louvre, thanks to the Rubik’s cube finals I had in March. In Reina Sofia, the really cool paintings were El Hombre Invisible (1930), El Enigma Sin Fin (1938), and 1929’s El Gran Masturbador—the last despite the obvious subject, or perhaps because of it.

Outside Reina Sofia

Unfortunately, we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside. I think we had lunch at the museum itself; as usual, the food was overpriced and nothing special. After our lunch, we set out again for the Palacio Real; the public could be admitted inside now that the royals were away. Dad rented only one audio guide, so whoever was unlucky enough to hold it had to relate the information to the rest of us. Mom opted to sit while we toured the accessible grounds.
I’ve been to a couple of palaces prior to this one—Versailles, the Alhambra, and a couple of crumbly ones with long-forgotten names. The feeling I get when I step inside a place steeped in luxury and tradition however remained the same. If I stand still for a moment and let the others in a tour group pass me by, I can almost see nobles draped in jewels and idly gossiping…

Posted at 06:21 pm by summerfling
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Thursday, April 20, 2006

Madrid, Day Two: Royal Sighting!

    Breakfast like in all the rest of our hotels (except the one in London) was complimentary. And like nearly everyday, it took my family the whole morning to get ready to go out.
    Something happened. Basta.
    We took the city bus tour, another hop-on, hop-off version of the one in Palermo. The bus first stopped in Museo del Prado. I didn't take copious notes here as I do everywhere I go (you should see the poor dilapidated notebooks I carry around), since I did the last time four years ago. I heart Velasquez, despite the paintings of the Infanta Margarita. The depictions of Saturn eating his children are gross, and El Greco's art is downright depressing. Too many good stuff to mention—simply put, I love the Prado (Go, Goya). And I wish we spent more than a couple of hours there.

The Pictures at Prado (bawal ba?)

    At two o' clock, we had lunch in Burger King. I just have to note that fast food servings are much bigger outside the Philippines. I couldn't finish my sandwich. After lunch, we 'hopped on' again. We passed by the Plaza De La Independencia, the only Neobyzantine church in Madrid, a park with monumental blocks and a statue of Christopher Columbus, Plaza España, the place where Miguel Cervantes stayed, and Recoletos Square—what's so special about it, I can't remember.
    Ha! Wit.
    And for the girls who know my hobby—many pretties waved. ;) Mostly at my sister (because she was more on the lookout for them), but I'm pretty certain that one Spanish boy called out to both of us.
    Dad, if you're reading this, ignore. :D
    We got off the bus at the Royal Palace. Normally visitors are allowed inside, but today the grounds weren't accessible to the public. This was because the Spanish royalty was in residence. We almost left right away, but heard that they were leaving…it might be possible to catch a glimpse of His Majesty Juan Carlos, and their Royal Highnesses Felipe (?) and Maria. We waited for more than an hour, it seemed.
    At 4:07 pm, several black cars flew out from the gates. I saw them. They waved.

Meep.

After that, my family headed towards Puerto del Sol, Madrid's shopping centre. Mom wanted to see the Plaza del Populo (?), so we went there first. Mikki bought castanets, and we ate Ben n' Jerry's ice cream there.

Puerto/Plaza

In Puerto Del Sol, I made up for my lack of buying anything in Nice. Normally my only vices are books, and new clothes appear only when given by relatives at Christmas or when my decent shirts are threadbare. This time I indulged. I bought a black bolero at H & M, and 3 tops at Bershka (the Topshop of Spain). In El Corte De Ingles, I went gaga over the David Bisbal CD I found. Risa went gaga, period.
By the time we were finished shopping our bus vanished. We decided to eat at KFC for dinner. I like our KFC better—we have free refills of gravy. Nevertheless, it was a good day.

Posted at 08:46 pm by summerfling
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Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Verano en España (sans backstabbing B’s)

    Since we weren’t going on the train like the rest in the SRMO group my family managed to get a good night’s rest. We left Nice at around noon. The whole day was spent in planes, and I get the sense that relating my whole airplane experience might be a tad boring.
    (I do not like security at Amsterdam. I feel so violated. Sniff. )
    Nevertheless, I was excited—I was going to Madrid.
    See, I’ve been to Spain before. I entered the summer program of my high school that involved a weeklong stay at a Spanish high school, lodgings at convents, and pilgrimages to the spots where our martyr founder taught (Go, Pedro!). It should’ve been fun, and I did have fun, when the girls I was with weren’t acting like rejects from Mean Girls. Thank God for Kissa and Anna (and Jana and Kit). Grr.
    Anyway, this time I was going with my family. Hurrah, right? Never mind that the parents didn’t listen to me most of the time and ended up stumbling towards the direction and train and place—and phrase—which I knew was right in the first place, only after bad consultations from various other sources. (Ignore the resentment. It happens all in a day.) I did have fun.
    We arrived in Madrid at around 6 or 7. After some time, we reached our hotel, Puerto Del Toledo at Plaza de Toledo. The rooms weren’t as great as the ones in West-End at Nice, but still very good. My family grew hungry, so we set out for dinner. In a smoky bar we ate tapas, appetizers (pica-pica) of jamon Serrano and queso and callos and pan. Yum. Only Mom didn’t like the bar; the rest of us were glued to the football game on TV.

Posted at 08:37 am by summerfling
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Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Vaullaris

We passed by a quiet town on the way back. Vaullaris is notable for its pottery; when we entered the town proper, there was a large, colorful ceramic dish mounted in honor of Picasso. Picasso stayed here in his 60s, going into ceramics just to prove he was a genius in any medium. We passed by in fact Madura, Pablo Picasso’s former gallery. It wasn’t hard for me to imagine the temperamental artist working there.

And on the way, we saw a cemetery too.

Our dinner was set at seven. We managed to reach it on time. It was my last day with the other kids, so I went out with them after dinner. The Ricaldes, The Baloises, Jojo and I (my sisters opted to go hang with my parents, in their words “stay with the money”) walked by the beachside. Contrary to what Jennifer said, there was quite a bit of nightlife in Nice—on the bay walk, at least. Two performance artists struck shivering poses reminiscent of yoga. Skateboarders some ten years younger than me, and others twice my age were seen strutting their stuff every direction I turned.

Night

We did nothing but talk—turns out that everyone was connected by at least two degrees, barring of course the father connection. Funky. Our number gradually dwindled (the rest of the group was taking the train early next morning), and by the time I reached classy Negresco only Owen and Raffy were with me.
Negresco’s lobby was super (pronounced ‘th’). Seriously; it looked more like a museum with its collection of eccentric sculptures and furniture. Amongst the eclectic art was an extremely fat cat, surveying all around her like a queen. I later found out that she was a queen—Carmen the Siamese cat was born in that hotel, and from the moment of her birth was pampered and spoiled.

Wow.

When Raffy and Owen went back to the hotel, I caught up with Dad and Risa. We ended up going to an internet café and writing an extremely convoluted message to Kuya.

Posted at 11:59 pm by summerfling
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Cannes it be?

In my little notebook there’s something scribbled about Notre Dame des Pins (our ‘Our Lady of the Pines’), but I can’t decipher it. I dozed off somewhere in between St. Tropez and cannes, and when we did arrive in Filmfestivallandia I was pretty groggy.
Cannes is synonymous to its film festival, and to be honest that’s all I can remember. Our only stop there was the Cannes Film Centre, where the walkway is accented with hand imprints ala Hollywood Walk of Fame. My day was made when we saw a certain hand…

For the rest of the day, I kept quoting Chuck Norris.

Other pictures

On the way out to Cannes and back to Nice, there were gorgeous houses with unusual glass façades. These were the vacation houses of Arabian princes, who loved the French Riviera.

The Way

Oops. I meant Côte d’Azur. It was the Americans who gave that name (I think) to distinguish the 200 km long stretch from the Italian Riviera. Naturally the French hated that so one man renamed it the Blue Coast.

Posted at 11:50 pm by summerfling
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St. Tropez: Lifestyles of the Rich and the Famous, part two.

I woke up in that shiny, four-star Nice hotel (still can't get over that) and went down for breakfast. Saw actual sugar cubes for the first time; shut up, I was awed. At 830 our group left Nice to visit several other areas. The first was St. Tropez. I never thought I'd get to go there. Funny, but it was only when I saw their beautiful villas that I realized that.

St. Tropez was named after a roman officer called Torpes. Basically was a dude who was converted to Christianity. Naturally Emperor Nero tried to kill him, and on the day of his baptism sent hitmen and wild beasts after him. Yet the hitmen were deterred, and the animals tamed. Nothing happened, so Nero simply ordered him executed.
St. Tropez (pronounced SANT tro-PAY) was a quiet little village, and bombshell Brigit Bardot used to go there to escape from city life. She was always high on the paparazzi's list however, and pictures of her lounging around St. Tropez appeared regularly. People started taking notice. Mick Jagger's wedding in 1971 was held here, helping turn St. Tropez into an international seaside resort.

White Night. 2152.

    I was talking about St. Tropez. It's now mostly a place for the rich to party and show off their exceedingly expensive yachts. A particular annual is the White Night Party, something that's done to welcome the season. Everyone's supposed to wear white, or risk severe social discrimination.
    Yes, I'm hearing you high school classmates. See Sir Gary? Wet N' White was supposed to be posh. ;)

The White Night Party (originally organized by Eddie Barclay, who died last year I think), isn't only über-hip thing about St. Tropez. They have a struggling artist (well, sort of) community that sells gorgeous paintings by the wharf, thanks in part to the fact that Matisse used to live here. Club 55 was mentioned as the establishment everyone's dying to get in. I saw a coffeehouse owned by the Senequier family (famous around these parts) that has been patronized by celebrities since Foh-Evah.

Paintings by the wayside

Man, the yachts were sweet. Gleaming sleek beauties, all of them, lined up like models in a fashion show.

2350. St. Tropez, Topless.

Nice, of topless bathers, rich people lollygagging on their yachts, and parties on sultry nights…On the way to the restaurant where we were going to have our lunch, I espied an aubergine yacht. Jennifer said that it belonged to Roberto Cavelli, some fashion designer (do any of you guys know who that is?). we passed by the old quarter, which had the former city hall and apartments which once belonged to Lady Sufferen. Her husband, nicknamed by the English as the 'Admiral of Hell', has a statue in front of the aforementioned coffeehouse.

Also in the Old Quarter was a church dedicated to the Virgin Mary (Sigh. It's a sign, I'm telling you). Near the old courthouse we saw a peacock resting on one of the high walls. It was really pretty.

This day was also Leonardo Siguion-Reyna's birthday, my dad's firm's senior/capital partner and one of the co-founders (he's the 'SR' in 'SRMO'). So he treated all of us—even the kids—to lunch in one of the pricy restos in Nice. Le Table Du Marche's supervisor chef guy is Christophe Lamery, also the chef in either Club 55 or that White Night Party, I can't remember.
Man, Sir Sig's cool. He turned 85, and he's still fit enough to go on cruises and walks. Sobrang hanga ako sa kanya.

In the restaurant

After the scrumptious lunch, Jennifer gave us time to shop around. We wanted to hit the flea market—especially the girls—but to our dismay it closed after morning. I ended up bumming for a while. Bought nothing in St. Tropez, but I did get pictures of cute doggies.

On the way to Cannes (pronounced KAN) there were a couple of girls with no tops on. Unfortunately for the dads though (and Raffy, and Erman >:) ), they were all on our side. Steph managed to get a truly priceless picture—probably one of the best photos of the entire trip.

The topless alert pic!

Posted at 06:51 pm by summerfling
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Monday, April 17, 2006

How Nice. (Puns ahoy!)

At six o’clock we caught sight of the town of Nice (pronounced NIS)—and thus began a slew of puns that lasted until the end of our time in France. I imagined a quiet little seaside town, a place where the rich and the famous sophisticatedly relaxed. In the distance we could see Cape Ferrat, an abandoned castle, and a white domed observatory. The picturesque scene only enhanced my perception of Nice.

Nice View

To my shock, once we crested a mountain I saw a large city, some streets littered with trash. The streets we passed on the way to the bay had hair salons on either side. A fixation on coiffure, perhaps? Though our hotel was just a short distance away it took some time to get there due to the traffic.
The city looked interesting though. Right next to the city library was a grey block sculpture equal in height to the buildings surrounding it. The Square Head designed by Sosno, was a building—inside were the offices of the city library.

Nice city

    A lot of the streets, shops, and even a museum had Greek names. This is because Nice like many other seaside French towns was founded by the Greeks.
    At 7 o’clock we reached the central station, and we stepped off the bus to walk to a dinghy Chinese restaurant. All of us kids sat together, and we had fun lambasting the condition and ambiance of the eater. By then though we were ravenous, so despite the dirtiness we chowed down on the un-Chinese fare. An hour and a half later the bus driver, a somewhat grumpy man named Joseph, drove us to the West-End Hotel.
    Wow. A four-star hotel! First time I’ve been in one. I was agog at the space they’ve given us, the beds, the bathroom, the space, everything. It was über-nice.
    Eep. I didn’t mean to pun. So sorry.
    At 10 my family walked around the vicinity of our hotel, and the Hidalgos walked around with us. By that time most of the shops were closed, so we decided to have crepes. For €1 apiece, they were ok; big, even. After eating we walked around again, saw Tito Popoy (Owen’s dad). The only souvenir shop open was rather expensive. We went back to the hotel and slept.

Posted at 03:00 pm by summerfling
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Grasse: Mama’s favorite place in the world.

    My mother has an extremely sensitive nose. She can detect the smell of unwashed hair from maybe five feet away. Staying in the elevator with people who in their culture don’t feel it necessary to bathe daily (then again, it is rather cold where they live…) is torture for her.
    Grasse is the perfume capital of the world.
    We only made one stop in that village—a perfume factory of Fragonard. Papot’s mother and Mom stayed downstairs while we went on the tour to find out how perfume is made.

Funky stuff. Using old-fashioned distillers, they crush about 600 kg of roses, or the equivalents in other flowers. An odor specialist, dubbed ‘the nose’, mixes the scents. The nose had a very cool talent—he or she can recognize 200-300 different essences in a perfume, and only has to work for 2-3 hours. Beyond that, our guide told us, the scents start to smell the same. I wouldn’t want to be one, though; it takes seven years to study, and a lifetime of abstaining from drinking alcohol, smoking, and eating spices.

    Fragonard produces perfume, cologne, soap and cosmetics. Once we were done with the tour, we were led to the factory shop. It reminded me of that bad tour we once took in Shanghai, only this one was of course much better (at least here, they didn’t force us to buy something before leaving). Funnily enough though the moms didn’t veer for the perfume, but for the anti-aging face cream that Fragonard presented at the last minute.
    Tee hee hee.

Posted at 02:16 pm by summerfling
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Moving like Harlow in Monte Carlo.

So, our lunch was once again a sandwich. My sisters and I split an enormous sub into 3, and each had a coke. Then since Risa was in a bad mood, Mikki and I bummed around the shops with ice cream in our hands. Naturally, we didn’t get much done (I managed to get a pin for Kuya, though). What I loved about Mionaco was that there were cute dogs everywhere—huge labradors and tiny shitzus. I oohed. I awwed. The only time Mikki and I bought something for ourselves was when we met up with Risa and our parents. I got a really cute striped shirt.

The Sights

We reunited with Jennifer, our tour guide, at around 3. And just in time too, for the changing of the guards. It was funky, although nothing beats the costumes of the Swiss Guards in Rome.

Changing of the Guards

Outside the Royal Palace

Our group went back to our bus, and we went to the famed Monte Carlo Casino. It was there, even more than the Old Town that I realized I was among the fantastically rich and famous.
Well, really. Everyone I saw looked like they stepped out of a magazine. Their clothes seemed expensively tailored, or perhaps branded. The poodles and pugs and Pekingese dogs were just as manicured. And the Porsches and Jaguars and Peugeots were lined up outside the posh, five-star hotels.

Monte Carlo, Baybee

The Ferrarris in particular were a huge hit—us refugee-looking tourists gawked around the sleek cars, in cherry red, lemon yellow, and licorice black. Hey, us Filipinos weren’t the only ones posing for the cameras. :P

Ferraris. Rawr.

Even their police station looked rich.
My family pretty much just walked around the park, and then we boarded our bus once more, this time heading towards Nice.

Posted at 11:52 am by summerfling
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