This is by no means a great picture of myself, but it is a great story. By and large my experience was that very few spoke English, so questions were always made in hand gestures and lots of pointing when needed. The only time this ever came into play was with my train experiences. Since I wasn't so familiar with place names and exactly how the train system worked, there were times when I felt like I was in the right place, but not everything seemed to indicate that I was, so I would show my ticket to a friendly looking person and hope that they would get the message that I was wondering if I was indeed in the right place. They were always very helpful and friendly, giving great big smiles and making big gestures to indicate that all was well. I always appreciated that.
I wasn't looking for anyone to take my picture, and the fence certainly wouldn't have been my backdrop of choice. I was just minding my own business, trying to take a picture through the fence, getting the ocean in the background when along came an older gentleman walking his dog. Seeing me and my camera, he seemed to be very excited that someone was interested in taking a picture of his city and began to excitedly point at the amphitheater and I assume tell me about it. I smiled and replied apologetically asking if he could speak English, which he couldn't. He however was eager to try and communicate despite that and offered to take my picture. There was no getting out of it, next thing I know I've traded my camera for a dog, holding onto my book in the other while my picture was being taken. He continues to go on, obviously proud of his city and pointing excitedly to the various sites that there are to see in the area. I just kept smiling and nodding appreciative of his effort to make me feel welcome in Tarragona. He eventually went on his way, and I went back to trying to take a picture of the Roman Amphitheater through the fence. Not long after that a woman passed by and began to excitedly explain to me that if I just went over to the other side there would be no fence blocking my view and I could get a great picture. Catalonians are nice.
Unfortunately, this picture is also a reminder of my tragedy of the day (and gratefully only mishap of the trip). Before I had left Germany, I had ordered a copy of The Shadow of the Wind to bring along as reading for my trip. The story takes place in Barcelona and turned out to be a fantastic read. I had gotten some great reading in while in Tarragona and was somewhere around 50 pages from the end, which I decided to save for the train ride back- and I was eager to find how the story would end. Somewhere between this picture and heading back to the train station at the end of the day, I put my book down, along with my return ticket to Barcelona as my bookmark. I was so disappointed and retraced my steps back through the city and checked the bathroom, where I feel I most likely left it, 3 times. The ticket was only 5 Euros, so that was easily replaceable. I'm not willing to buy another copy, so will wait to find out what happens in the end until I can find a library with an English written copy. The suspense is agonizing!
The sought after picture with no fence and the ocean in the background.
Roman Amphitheater
A statue to commemorate human pyramids or castells. Apparently, the Tarragonians have been forming these annually for 100's of years now.
Tarragona Porch
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