La Mercé: Part 1

Barcelona was crazy this weekend. I am still trying to sort through the hazy fragments of memories to figure out what happened. I find myself at a loss for words at finding a worthy comparison or the vocabulary necessary to describe the spectacle of “La Mercé,” Barcelona’s legendary “open-city.” It’s like Barcelona’s parents in Madrid left for the weekend to go to the Canary Islands and they made the mistake of leaving the city the keys to the Ferrari in plain sight, a fake I.D. on the table, and an irresponsibly large budget for food. Barcelona just threw an open house party, and Barcelona already had a reputation for partying. 

Throughout the summer, each neighborhood in Barcelona has a respective festival, with concerts, dancing, and various cultural spectacles like ‘Sardanas’ (popular Catalunyan group dancing), ‘torres humanos’ (human towers), and hordes of people celebrating their various neighborhoods. On the weekend of September 24^th through 26^th however, these festivals culminate into La Mercé, and fortunately for me, I was there to witness what might possibly have been one of the absolutely most ridiculously fun experiences of my life.

First celebrated in 1871, La Mercé, or in Castellano, La Merced, began as a feast in honor of the fall harvest and the celebration of “La Virgen Merced,” a Spanish variation of the Virgin Mary. In 1902, the Barcelona city council, obviously itching to party a little harder, must have realized the potential of La Mercé, and added a calendar of events to their festival, transforming their annual feast into the biggest festival of the year in Barcelona. Now, it is arguably one of the biggest, free, public festivals in the world. Leave it to Barcelona to throw the best party in the world, right?

            My weekend began on Thursday night. Thursday is usually the ‘boring’ night of La Mercé, so we went to the “Ice Bar,” which, like the name says, is a bar made of ice. Even the glasses were made of ice. It became too cold so we left. Who knew that you would get cold in a bar made of ice? Now that I think about it, it was more like a glorified meat-locker. Anyway, skip to Friday.

            We hopped from venue to venue, which were sprinkled throughout the city, seeing everything from famous Catalonian bands to Jazz – funk bands all the way from Japan, to drum and bass DJ’s directly from London. Thousands of people walked the streets and plazas, tourists and Catalonians alike, listening to music and enjoying the various parades, having an all-around great time.

There were alot of people that decided to show up.

 

There were concerts like this in almost every plaza in the city.

A friend recommended that we go to the “Forum,” adding that it was his favorite spot. We complied, and packed onto the metro. I have never seen so many people packed onto a metro before. We found out that they are going the Forum as well, and at each stop more and more people packed onto the metro.

                         It was even more difficult to shove our way to the exit of the metro station.

Finally, we pushed our way through the throngs of Spanish youth to the elusive 'Forum.' To be continued in Part 2.