Never have I been so excited to touch down as I was on a flight to Barcelona. I was only in Spanish air-space and already my sister and I had begun fantasizing about all the beautiful Spanish men. This was the trip we had been waiting for our entire sheltered lives. My mum has always been a fan of Spaniard looks, so as a child, if the word exotic, whisked away and margaritas ever came up in a sentence, my sister and I knew a Spaniard was on my mother’s mind. There isn’t anything quite like being in your 20’s and squealing like a teen over dreamy men, the sheer lunacy of the situation set us sisters off in a fit of giggles for most of the flight. Mind you, our one standpoint example was Ricky Martin, never mind the little fact that he was actually Puerto Rican, he was the epitome of Spanish hotness and that suited me and my sister just fine.
I remember hastily grabbing my luggage from the compartments above and making a bee line for the exit. As the plane doors opened and the bright Barcelona rays touched the tip of my nose, I saw one. He was one of those air traffic control guys and in those cute jumpsuits at that. He was tall and broad, with shades of brown locks to frame his sun kissed face. But that was all nothing compared to his main money maker, his deep deep blue eyes. They were the kind you read about in a Mills and Boon novel. They were strong and did I mention deep? Of course he noticed the starry eyed Indian girls straight away, jaws hung and all. My sister and I exchanged excited glances and squealed some more. We had hit the jackpot, imagine the first Spaniard being that hot. We were going to have an amazing trip!
Or so we thought. After we collaboratively tore ourselves away from aircraft, we were met by slightly older and much to our dismay, grumpy immigration officers. My sister and I decided to cut these old, tired, overweight, balding men some slack. I mean they were Spanish, they must have been hot at some point in their life, right? But as we made our way to the luggage carousel, suddenly our fantasy of beautiful Spanish men began to evaporate into thin air. By the time we made it all the way out of the airport, there was practically only a glimmer of hope left. The air control guy must have been the biggest tease of my life, because as I looked around, ordinary men started coming out of the woodwork, just boring, regular, mediocre looking men. The same kind of guys you could get anywhere. I know this sounds harsh and I’m sure they’ve been gifted with some amazing personalities/characteristics, but at this point I was just completely disappointed.
My sister and I quickly made our way to the hotel and checked in to catch some sleep instead of roaming the beachy town of Barcelona. Once we removed hot men from our holiday equation, nothing about Spain seemed to sparkle as much.
In fact the more time we spent in Spain, the more we hated it. The food was nothing like the tapas we were accustomed to in Kuala Lumpur. The seafood reeked of the ocean, in a way that was highly unpleasant to your senses and the paella never had enough salt. Of course the only thing we began to cherish throughout the disappointments was the unique concoction of champagne sangria. With one of those, suddenly fishy odours didn’t bother me much anymore.
It must have taken my sister and I a whole day to get over the Spanish men fiasco but we did begin to relax and soak up the atmosphere by day two. Only problem was the atmosphere was always repugnant. This was one little fact that Lonely Planet forgot to include, Spanish people are terribly hostile to non Spanish speaking tourists. I was appalled. If I ever tried to stop someone in the street for directions, I’d get shot a dirty look followed by some mumbling in Spanish. This was quite literally the last straw. From this point forth, my sister and I put in the least amount of effort into really getting to know Barcelona and Madrid was no better. In fact, Madrid was ten times worse than Barcelona. At least in Barcelona, the locals only ignored us but in Madrid, the locals just seemed aggravated and irritated by the presence of tourists. Now it would be unfair for me to say that each and every person in Spain was rude but I will say that a vast majority clearly was. The only person to stop and strike up a conversation with us was a Pakistani man who had lived in Malaysia once. He, on the other hand was a little too friendly for our liking.
I remember my sister and I feeling relieved on the day we left Spain, the whole experience was definitely a new and unusual one. I loved to travel and experience new cultures but Spain was just not the ideal place to blend right in and soak up the culture. It’s almost as if they’re too proud of being European and once you get that vibe off them, there’s no point even trying to appreciate anything in Spain.
As I silently vowed to never return at the airport terminal before we took off, a rather handsome man sat down beside me. He began a conversation and straight off the bat I recognized that telenovela accent. It was thick and rich and he pulled his ‘R’s in an adorable fashion. He had dark brown shoulder length hair and a manly after five shadow. He didn’t have amazing deep blue eyes but he had kind eyes instead. After some time, I became comfortable enough to share my disappointment of Spanish men with him. He listened intently as I described how my dreams were dashed and before I could say anymore, he laughed a big hearty laugh. The kind that rings in your ears long after and said as he pointed to himself, “The hot, ‘humble’ Spanish looking dudes are all South American. You’re clearly on the wrong continent.” I smiled right back at him, expectations rising, at least there was hope once more.
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