Big Things

You either like them or you don’t.

Madrid is…big-boned. The Plaza de Mayor, an imposing red brick square with a guy on a horse in the middle, where they used to burn heretics at the stake. No burnt patches on the cobbles; guess they must have scrubbed. Ah, God bless the Catholic Church…any other organisation with such a history would have been long since banned.

The Catedral de la Almudena, huge, you have to stretch your neck to take in all the domes and turrets. Inside, it doesn’t feel particularly sacred – lots of gilt and saints. Nevertheless I thought of Felix, my son, and found myself overwhelmed with misery – I had to put my sunglasses on and hurry out. Churches perhaps are not for me right now, not yet. I did like the Homeless Jesus, outside.

Enormous bloody great thing on a roundabout – nothing says Juan Carlos Wuz Here like a triple domed pillared be-statued white marble edifice with horses teetering on top. Duly impressed, yes, but I guess Big Things (at least, of that era) are not my cup of tea. The twisty side streets with their bars offering mysterious delicacies (mysterious to me, as I don’t yet have enough Spanish to tell deep fried pigs’ entrails from cream buns) are more what I like. It’s interesting to watch velvet-eyed young men and girls with cascading curls romance each other in corners, and people trot by in the latest fashions. Apparently leggings with holes in them are hot, which is good, because the moths have been at mine too. Everybody has a puffy coat, except me.

Perhaps I’ll make a start on my magnum opus, ‘Types and Characters of the European Nations, by an Antipodean Lady’ – which is a sort of joke between me and my daughter. ‘The typical Spanish male…’ I might open with (in the manner of a Home Counties matron who takes a dim view of all continentals) ‘when past his first youth, is stout of figure and gruff of mien, with a tendency to burst into spontaneous song…’ I might just add that the horses here are the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. I took lots of photos of them, but they all turned out to be close-ups of me squinting into my phone, as I must have pushed the selfie button by mistake:) So here’s someone else’s photo. You can pat them (in fact, I think that’s basically their job, although if necessary they could probably trample a pick-pocket).

Oh, and the photo up top is of El Escorial, a vast monastery up in the mountains where the Kings of Spain are buried. Built in the shape of a grill, in memory of St Lawrence, who was toasted on one. Also visited: the Palacio Reale de Madrid, where the Kings of Spain used to put their feet up. Apparently the biggest royal palace in Europe. Figures.

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE all this. It’s input. It’s eye food. El Escorial in particular is spectacular (particularly because of its rural setting). Everything is new and interesting…and big! I wish the sun would come out. Just saying.