08/11/2023 Bikepacking Spain Day 3 : La familia afortunada

Today we spent another day with my aunt and uncle. Again, we hardly did any sightseeing because we just wanted to talk so much. I feel fortunate that we had this opportunity to see them; my aunt said this was the best part of their trip. Who cares about the Sagrada Familia when you already got la afortunada familia? ⛪️

So, hey, I feel like I need to provide you with some educational information about Barcelona. Thusly, here is “El Caganer”. In Spanish, that name pretty much means “the shitter.” You probably already figured that part out from the photo - but I bet you don’t know where he comes from. I’ll let you guess (answer below)… . . . . . . . Turns out, this is a Christmas decoration; this pooper comes from nativity scenes and has become quite popular and even accepted by the Catholic Church. Did you guess correctly? 💩

This morning, Janet was doing research for the tours. She got excited about the “family tickets.” They were 20% off. She queried, “what will we do about the last name thing?” Before I could answer, she scrolls down and says, “Forget Family! I’m going to get the senior discount!” Ah, Janet, how you make me laugh with your words! 🎫

Headquarters to Janet! 🪟

In general, Janet and I are somewhat reserved, and in some places we don’t reach out as much as we should (in Latin America it is easy because people approach us - but not so much in Spain). Anyway, my Aunt and Uncle surprised me a little with their ease with people. They just start talking to everyone here in English and it usually seems to work out. After dinner we went to a tiny gelato shop and sat close to another family with 3 kids. Everyone was enjoying their ice cream when the girl sitting next to us had both scoops fall off her cone into the ground. The dad was obviously disappointed; he wasn’t mean, but he brought up how the girl had also lost her sister’s sunglasses today. “Not a good day for her.” Immediately, my uncle came up with a good one: “Hey look! The cone broke,” he pointed out, exculpating the girl from the dropped dessert, blaming it on a defective cone instead. Suddenly the dad got on board and claimed a warranty on the faulty cone. Anyway, the girl felt a lot better after that one and eventually the shop guy saw the humor of it and brought her a new full ice cream with a smile. The mom was wearing a Hijab 🧕, so we all assumed they were from somewhere on this side of the planet… nope, we were to find out they were from the United States too, nuestros paisanos!! 🌍

Only you can include both poop and ice cream into a story worthy of the Pope and helping a young girl feel happy again!

Boris F.