When I was in my mid-twenties I travelled to Spain on my own to build my character and have some fun. It’s what people my age did. I, however, could not quite manage it. I was supposed to be away for a month, so I headed first to a place called Sitges, which is on the coast just south of Barcelona. In six days I spoke to no one. Not one single person. I was too wimpy to eat out on my own, and I couldn’t seem to connect with any other travellers. There was a reason for this, as it turned out. Yes, Bitchy Resting Face. Oh, and Sitges was famous for gay men and beautiful Scandinavian women, and neither group was at all interested in me.
As the first week of that sad Woman Alone adventure dragged to an end, my character seemed close to demolished. I had a tan, yes, but I’d cried my way through a barbaric bullfight (screw you, too, Ernest Hemingway), and had all but forgotten how to speak I’d been so quiet. Tail somewhat between my legs, I slunk back to London, and have had a snitcher on all things Español ever since.
Now that I am in Madrid I realise that my mistake was in not coming here in the first place. I would suggest that it is impossible for anyone to have a bad time in Madrid — it may well be the Spanish Capital of Happiness, if not the world’s.
Of course I wasn’t on my own this time, so I was destined to have more fun on those grounds alone. But the fun bits of Madrid are far less spread out than the fun bits of Barcelona, so whether you’re on your own or in a gang it’s easier to find them.
In this case, the gang consists of me, my youngest sister Rachael, my pal Mike, and his sister Cheekbones. We might possibly be the best travelling gang ever, and here is why: no one really minds what we do, and everyone always wants to stop for a glass of rosado, which is rosé in Spanish, while we do it. I just mentioned, for example, that the hotel concierge thought Madrid’s royal palace was as good as Versailles, plus there was a really good bar across the road — and next thing you know, we were all there.
Now, because I did want to build my character a little bit this time, and test out my new-found 50-year-old-ness, I organised my trip to Madrid a little differently to previous trips to other places. That is to say, I did not organise it at all. As the Ginger would tell you if I let him, I could research the crotch out of a rag doll. I have no time for spontaneity at all, unless it’s between the hours of 13:15 and 13:18 and all other scheduled tasks have been completed to my satisfaction. Going with the flow and blowing in the wind is my idea of a nightmare. If I need to relax I will make a time to do so, and often I will spend this time worrying that I am not relaxing enough.
This is a part of me I’m not that wild about, but it does mean I don’t waste much time, which in my world is precious, so I’m stuck with it for the most part. Still, I know sometimes other people think my level of organisation is scary and, while I try not to give a tinker’s cuss what other people think, I was interested to know if I could go somewhere without a plan. To that end, I did not even bring a Madrid guide book. That’s how confident I was that I could go with the flow. Of course, I had downloaded one on to my Kindle, but I had forgotten about that, which is how a Kindle works if you are me.
Anyway, when I told my buddies about the royal palace it was not because I had done any research. I had walked past it before they arrived, but didn’t know that’s what it was — I was too busy looking at the world’s most handsome mounted policeman. He was unmounted at the time, leaning against a lamp post and smoking a fag, looking all swarthy and contemptuous, like a GQ model. This is what I mean when I talk about happiness coming in small packages, not that I particularly noticed his package, but what a delightful vista upon which to happen.
Hoping to capture it for all eternity, I nearly fell out of my flip-flops in my haste to extract my camera from my handbag — I may even have snorted a little (and drooled) — at which point my amigo caught sight of me and I had to pretend to be taking a photo of his horse instead. The photo is quite funny, because it looks as though the horse is raising its eyebrows and saying, ‘Really?’ I used to have a horse, so I know how they think, although it’s usually more along the lines of: ‘You weigh too much and I’m sick of carrying you, so I’m going to kick both my back legs up at the same time and send you flying towards that gorse bush, OK?’
Anyway, the hotel concierge later told me what the building down near the handsome policeman was, and he was right: it is as good as Versailles. It’s vast, and beautiful, and has a room with porcelain wallpaper. Yes, porcelain. I’m thinking it was probably King Alfonso’s dunny once upon a time, but now it has too many people wandering through it to be a very relaxing place for a decent movement. Also, the royals haven’t actually lived there for a few hundred years.
After I had wowed the gang with the joys of the royal palace, we went to the bar across the road where we were introduced to the joys of tinto de verano. This is cold red wine served in a big glass with ice and lemonade, and it is exactly what you feel like drinking on a hot Spanish day.
Turns out Madrid is the perfect place in which to experiment with a little spontaneity. Some cities, some of my favourite cities even, can be hard to get to know, and it can take a while before you discover where the fun bits are and what to do in them. Mostly you suspect the fun is all happening somewhere else, and if you could just read the subway map you might find it, but probably not.
In Madrid, though, you can’t sneeze without hitting a fun bit. You can have fun completely by accident.
In fact, be warned: it would be a sh*t place to go to if you wanted a miserable time on your own with no food and no drinking or shopping or laughing. (By the way, if you are looking for somewhere to go to have a miserable time on your own with no food and no drinking or shopping or laughing, you should put this book down at once — although don’t even think of asking for your money back — because you are not going to enjoy it, but that is your fault, not mine. I’ll say a little prayer to Saint Jude for you, though. Maybe.)
Getting back to Madrid: it has more bars and cafés and restaurants per capita than anywhere else in the world, so all you have to do is find a street, any street, and you’re in the fun part just like that.
We’ve taken to stopping for a snifter if we like the look of a doorway, and so far have not got it wrong. This is not the usual holiday experience, especially if you haven’t done any research.
We’ve been helped enormously in our spontaneity, might I add, by the fact that I am navigating with what may well be the world’s worst map. It is not to scale, has very few street names, and is written so only ants could read it, certainly not newly minted 50-year-olds who are not used to wearing glasses so never have them about their person.
This means that we are often looking for places ‘in the general area’ of, say, downtown Madrid. Most of Madrid is downtown. We spent quite a while looking for a particular sherry bar the other night, only to give up and go to a different one, which turned out to be exactly the one we were looking for in the first place, although no one could read the sign.
I had entirely the wrong impression about sherry, as it happens. I thought it was a dark, very sweet drink, like what goes in a trifle, but this Spanish stuff was very nice and dry and sort of nutty.
What’s more, we asked for the same bite-sized snacks the person at the next table was having, so ended up with the most authentic tapas as well. Don’t ask me what any of it was. Some of it was ham, I know that, because you can’t even dribble in Madrid without hitting some ham. Seriously, they have ham museums here. On just about every street. I don’t eat meat, but even I was impressed at the number of people who could fit into one small space and excitedly do nothing except eat ham and drink wine.
An inexpensive city (compared with London and Paris anyway) you can fall around Madrid without going to a single museum or gallery or palace, and still be more entertained than you’ve ever been anywhere else in your whole entire life.
In the vast open Plaza Mayor, there is a box bearing three angry heads without bodies that all shout at you as you walk past
, a few steps along are some matadors that don’t have heads but do have bodies, around the corner there’s a technicolour Cousin It creation with a snapping beak, a man holding another man up in the air on a pole (they’re 10 a peso here), and a woman dressed only in flowers. If you’re good at standing still and have a spray can of gold paint handy, you could make a fortune in this town.
On our way to the wonderful Mercado de San Miguel tapas market one night (yes, a tapas market — thank you, Fat Guy With The Beard From The Hangover Movies), we got mixed up in a religious parade of some sort. Judging by the statue being carried along the street, I thought it was something to do with Madonna (not the ‘Like a Virgin’ one, the actual virgin), but my friend from London thought she looked a bit too Jesus-y from the front.
Anyway, had I thought to bring my rosary beads and wear a mantilla I might have got to march a little further, but, as it was, another tinto de verano and a selection of bite-sized snacks called, and off I went in a different direction.
Another night we took a wrong turn and ended up in a street that was throwing some other sort of fiesta in celebration of some other sort of madonna. Pop-up mojito bars lined the cobblestones, while the young things danced in the middle and the oldies mingled at the edges. Revellers helped themselves to what I thought were paper packages of fried squid, but which turned out to be ‘sweetbreads’ or, as one local finally explained to us, ‘young lamb innards cooked in old sheep fat’. Yum!
If ever again I am in the area — the area being Europe — and in need of cheering up, it will be to Madrid that I head. Let’s face it, no matter what anyone says about happiness not being a place, for my money you’re still more likely to find it in some corners than in others.
And you’re more likely to find it with some people than with others. This is worth bearing in mind.
1. Dance
By yourself, as if Madonna is watching and wants to copy all your moves.
2. Take a long soak in the bath
By yourself, as if Gerard Butler is watching and wants to get in there with you.
3. Have a massage
By yourself, and not at the cheap place where you keep your clothes on and they use rancid peanut oil; the nice place with the candles.
4. Walk on the beach
By yourself, when you should really be doing 10 other more constructive things, but you’re not thinking about a single one of them because you’ve got George Michael in your ears (the fun songs, not the whiny ones).
5. Shop
By yourself, for something you don’t really need, like a tiny crystal vase that holds just a single daisy, or a pair of killer heels that you will only wear once before breaking your ankle, or a stunt exerciser who goes to the gym while you lie at home and eat chocolates.
IT DOES WHAT????
So, I escaped death by measles, even though my lovely sister-in-law did not, which showed me, more than many people, that when it comes to living, you can’t afford to p*ss around.
It also showed me that you really need your colon.
Who knew?
I’d managed 40 years without having given the 500 miles or whatever it is of this important piping so much as a single thought.
The colon, as it turns out, is what turns food into ‘waste’. It’s no wonder nobody wants to talk about it; it’s actually pretty disgusting. But if it gets the measles, then you really need to be careful, because the colon has lymph nodes everywhere that carry the measles to your other bits and pieces like your liver and your lungs.
Indeed, the colon is so crucial to our health and well-being that we should really all carry a spare one in our purses. Same with our brains, although then we’d need two purses, and, while that’s a good excuse to shop, we all know that the day we needed the spare colon we’d have the brain purse and vice versa.
One of the most astonishing aspects of having my colon turn so nasty on me at such a young age (shut up, 40 IS young) was that nobody knew why, or had any advice for keeping it safe and sound in the future.
‘Just keep on doing whatever you were doing,’ one expert told me. But whatever I was doing had given me the measles! I didn’t need a certificate forged by some raddled old crone in the back streets of Bangkok to work out that doing the same thing was a pretty f**king stupid piece of advice.
So I googled the sh*t out of colons.
It didn’t really take that long. Nobody really knows how they work, so they don’t really know why they don’t work either. Helpful? Not so much.
What did become clear was that processed food, especially meat, takes a long time to digest, so becomes something of an overstayer in one’s innards, and that can cause problems.
After reading that, I gave up meat.
Of course, I’d never really cared for meat that much anyway, so it was hardly a chore, but it made me feel as if I was doing something. It’s not like I gave up chocolate or cheese.
Then I gave up Diet Coke, because, according to Vanity Fair, that fake sweetener they use in it is the work of the Devil, and I believe everything in Vanity Fair, including the ads.
After that I gave up mushrooms, because I’d never liked them and now I had an excuse.
Then I gave up red peppers, because they give me indigestion.
And I gave up corn, because it gets stuck in your teeth.
I gave up moisturiser, because the skin is the body’s biggest organ and who knows what sh*t is in that sh*t but you are spreading it all over yourself every day.
Next, I spent a year on an Ayurvedic diet, which is extremely difficult if you are in Venice, for example, because you can’t eat flour or seafood on an Ayurvedic diet, and only certain spices, none of which can be found in Italy.
I gave up a thousand things over the next few years, until I realised that there is too much information out there about what will give you measles, and if you read it all and believe it all then you would not eat anything, or breathe anything, or drink anything, or go anywhere. What would be the point in surviving?
What I did find interesting over this period was the difference between changing what I ate to protect my health compared with changing it to lose weight, which I had been doing for so many years, although trying, more recently, not to. It was a completely different kettle of fish oil.
Turns out being a bit of a porker isn’t really enough of a reason to not eat what you most enjoy, which is why diets are so hard to stick at. After all, what’s a bit of flubber between friends? I mean, that is what I was saying in Stuff It, so I probably shouldn’t be so surprised to find out it was true. It’s only that I never dreamed I would get to test my theory quite so thoroughly, and it turned out to be truer than I imagined.
Anyway, as my forties progressed and the measles failed to make a reappearance, I started to relax on the whole body-is-if-not-a-temple-then-the-squat-boring-building-next-to-the-temple business.
Let’s not forget that you could get run over by a bus tomorrow, in which case if you looked down from Heaven and saw the guys in the morgue poking at your dry scaly legs with a set of forceps and some barbecue tongs, you might regret not moisturising.
Eventually, I realised that, just as the nuns said, moderation is the key to all things. (I hate it when the nuns are right! Those bee-arches!)
Eventually, I also had to accept that I might never find out why I’d got the measles. If you’re someone who’s used to knowing things, that’s tricky. But the not knowing felt like it could give me the measles all over again — not that I think that’s how you get them; I still blame sausages — so by my extreme forties, I let go. I moved on.
I now consider that I have as much chance of catching them again as the next person.
I get checked up the wazoo, and down the wazoo, too, and I’m unlikely to apply for a job at Sizewell Nuclear Plant or eat a battery-raised chicken or try the newest wrinkle-reducing miracle cream with 10 per cent extra toxicity for free, but I love Hawaiian Tropic suntan lotion (which no doubt has a mere five per cen
t and you pay for it) and a nice glass of rosé.
In moderation, of course.
(Those bee-arches!)
1. Going to the bathroom
2. Shaving your armpits
3. Putting gas in the car
4. Asking how much it costs
5. Eating the last square of chocolate
I’LL BE THERE FOR YOU
PS: When it comes to Friends, Monica will always be my favourite — I even have a wig named after her.
Of all the things I’ve learned in my 50 (or so) years, it’s that friends count for more than anything else.
If you have one single friend, then you are not alone in this funny old world of ours. And yes, that friend can be a cat. Or a dog. Or, at a pinch, a bird. But not a fish. If your only friend is a fish, I want you to get up, walk out the door, and go directly to the nearest club, any club, so long as there are people or cats or dogs or birds in it.
Screw You Dolores Page 6