Video – Traveling with the Clarks

First Holidays Abroad: Three Kings

As mentioned previously, Three Kings Day (aka Dia de los Reyes) closes out the holiday season on January 6th. Traditionally it was more the center of gift-giving, though this year we did most of our gifts on Christmas.

The Cake

A common part of Three Kings Day is the king cake. This is a bready pastry, often halved and filled with cream. A little king figure is hidden within, and whoever finds it has to buy the cake next year. 2020 king cake’s on Cora y’all!

My ticket to not buying the cake next year!

The Parade

In Barcelona January 5th is a major city celebration, with the Kings arriving in the harbor, then making their way through town to a parade in the evening. Overnight they then bring the presents to kids (except in our house, where Mom and Day buy the presents, and the kids know well and true who to thank!)

While we didn’t catch the Kings earlier in the day, we made it to the evening parade. We got there uncharacteristically early, and even so the kids had to wend their way through the crowd to perch at the front where they could actually see. I’m not sure that Amber got that good of a view, but fortunately the spectacle was large, loud, and often tall.

Creepy tall puppet-like characters? Check.

Choreographed routines on many of the floats

There was a ton of music and dancing as well. Quite the spectacle!

The parade apparently ended with huge amounts of candy being thrown from the final floats. I say apparently because we’d already slipped off a little before that when the kids declared they were done. The dense pack of people was a little much on their hungry tummies.

The Pho

In solid Clark fashion, we used the outing to try a restaurant we’d had an eye on–a Vietnamese place. We’d visited a few others in search of decent pho and fallen short. But at last Bun Bo Vietnam filled our bellies with the noodley goodness we craved.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m thoroughly enjoying Spanish food, but pho ranks near the top for the kids. Often back in Portland the kids would ask to go out, and their top choices were either McDonalds (eek) or pho. So finding somewhere to replace that soup-shaped hole in our hearts was a critical moment.

Overall these first holidays in Spain were a success. We found ways to keep our most important traditions, while trying new things on for size. I’m looking forward to the even deeper chances this next year will bring!

First Holidays Abroad: Thanksgiving

As an American, the holiday season kicks off in the fourth week of November with Thanksgiving. This is not a holiday in Spain, but we bucked the trend and celebrated anyway. And what better way to enjoy the holiday than by introducing our traditions to coworkers!

The weeks before involved a lot of research into what was available in country, and what we’d have to improvise around. Turkey (pavo en español) was the biggest difficulty. It wasn’t hard to find parts–a leg here, a breast there–but the whole bird was almost unheard of. But a few days before Amber found a reasonable sized one at Boqueria Market.

Using that paella pan for it’s intended purpose 😅

Most everything else was available–vegetables, potatoes, breads. But what about the cranberry sauce?! Taste of America to the rescue! This specialty store is uniquely American. The scent of high-fructose corn sugar slaps you across the face on entering, as more than half the store is sugary cereals and candy. But they had the goods a week before the big day. I heard they ran out closer to the holiday 😰. This allowed Amber to introduce the wonders of American cranberry sauce to our friends amidst gales of laughter.

We invited the team I’ve been working with at New Relic BCN. Among those who made it were an American couple, an Irishman, and a ton of Spaniards. I was pleasantly surprised by everyone’s enthusiasm leading up to the event. It turns out, American Thanksgiving is commonly seen in movies and pop culture but faintly mysterious beyond that. What is this pumpkin pie? What does stuffing taste like, or is it called dressing? This proved an excellent chance to lift the veil on this American tradition.

Who doesn’t use their paella pan to roast pumpkins?

We also pushed the max capacity of our flat for a sit-down meal. There were about 16 people, every scrap of table space filled with boisterous conversation, good Spanish wine and charcuterie, galician treats, and American classics.

The holidays have definitely made us more acutely aware of the normal connections with family that we’re missing out on during this grand adventure. But in the end, sharing this tradition with our new friends was absolutely something to be thankful for.

Festa Major de Gràcia

A week or two ago several coworkers asked me the same question.

“Are you going to the Festa Major?”

“Huh, what’s that?”

When multiple people are checking you know about something happening in your new city, it definitely gets your attention.

Each major neighborhood in Barcelona has a yearly festival. These often last for days with decoration in the streets, food, music, all the things you’d expect from a festival in Spain. This week was the one for Gràcia, a relatively central neighborhood we’d considered living in until we found our flat in Poblenou.

Festa Major de Gràcia is one of the larger events and lasts a whole week. We didn’t make it out until the last day. From what we hear about the crowds earlier, it’s probably just as well!

Different streets decorated to themes and competed with each other. Some were mostly art displays, others host to large neighbor dinners or elevated musical stages. Talking with a coworker the day after he said, “Lots of those streets are kind of weird.” As a Portlander, I mostly just felt at home.

We wandered out around 8:30 as dusk closed in. Life in Spain runs as late as you’ve heard. Festivities were just starting throughout Gràcia. We toured several streets, had a baby gelato cones (so itty bitty!), and then found our way to pizza and pasta for dinner before more streets.

One had a video game theme 🤖🎮👾