Red Light, Big City

Soooooooo, Madrid.

It was a short but very sweet trip. The 35 degree heat when I arrived was much welcomed on my poor frozen London skin. Amazingly it's as hot here as it was when I was in Bangkok, but it's not humid so it felt more comfortable. The trip was painless enough, and I bravely took the Metro from the airport to the city.

A little note to "Red" Ken, our esteemed Mayor, how come we can't do cheap and clean public transport. A ticket giving me 10 trips on the Metro cost a mere 5 euros. Bearing in mind that a return ticket on the Heathrow Express is £26 we're doing something wrong here.

The hotel was a brilliant example of how to do budget with class. As regular readers know, hotels are the bane of my life, but this one, the Petit Palace Italia on the Gran Via, right in the middle of everything, was stylish and affordable, with a fabulous shower that had water squirting on me from all directions!

I couldn't work out why the hotel was so reasonably priced, until I went out to stock up on water for the fridge. It would appear I was staying bang in the middle of the red light district! Either that or a lot of scantily clad girls were being stood up all at the same time. Interestingly, 98% of the hookers were Spanish. Everywhere else it seems that the eastern Europeans are taking over the 'minge for sale' market, but not here in Madrid.

The next day I hit the galleries, starting off at the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza. which failed to live up to my expectations sadly, the cafe was fabulous tho, and I had a lovely time sitting in the sunshine with my cafe con leche. From there I walked to the Prado.

As this was just a short trip I didn't have time to linger, but it was amazing to see paintings by Goya, Velazquez, Dali and Bosch...hard to believe that some of them were painted hundreds of years ago. I have to say tho, by the end of it I was 'Jesused Out'. I have my own views about who and what Jesus was, but there's no denying he musta been a great guy to inspire soooooooo many artists. Either that or the Catholic Church were the only people with money to pay them!

Dinner was taken at one of the many fabulous restaurants in the Plaza Mayor, amd usually I spend this time people watching. Not this time tho, I'd picked up a copy of Mark Billingham's new paperback Lifeless, and cliche or not, I simply couldn't put it down....I opened it on the flight out and finished it on the plane home. Still waiting to see a character named after me in one of his novels tho!

Wednesday I went to the Reina Sofia Museum...talk about saving the best till last! My god it was fabulous! Sadly the Picasso rooms were closed so I didn't get to see Guernica, but that only provides me with an excuse to go back. Not that I need one. Focusing more on modern art, there were works that simply took your breath away, from artists like Kandinsky, Rothko, Man Ray, Dali, Joan Miro, Yves Klein and a billion more. I just didn't have enough time to take it all in, this is definitely a full day gallery!

The other brilliant thing about this place was the groups of really, really tiny children being given a brilliant introduction to art. They seemed genuinely interested too, asking the guides questions about the paintings, and really well behaved. I want a Spanish baby! They were so gorgeous, I didn't see one ugly child. Perhaps the dodgy kids aren't taken out in public, but based on the ones I saw yesterday, there aint a dodgy looking kid in the whole of Madrid.

The flight home was easy enough, and thanks to my not checking in any luggage, I was in my flat within 70 mins of landing. Hurrah.

I would write more, but Big Brother is on, and I wanna see what's going on.

One last thing....

EVICT SEZER!!!!!!!!!!!!