Thirty-Seven: Barcelona Blues (10-19-2022)
It's rare to go to a place and immediately identify it as superior to another. The only American instance of this phenomenon is going to a McDonald's or Taco Bell that is cleaner and better run than your local franchise. Barcelona is a place, disregarding its rocky and complex history, that has accomplished the supposed tenets of the America experience far quicker and more efficiently than any US city. To appease urbanists- the city is currently undergoing massive redevelopment schemes to improve transit access and walkability while limiting the presence of cars in the city center, but walkability and beautiful cities have never been an American ideal.
Travel guides for Barcelona will advise travelers of a local Catalonian nationalism, which is only as present as typical city pride, and does not create barriers of communication for Spanish speakers or foreigners whatsoever. In fact, by present day, Barcelona has become a city with such a layered and diverse ethnic makeup that (to some unfortunately) it is more an international city than a highly localized one. In this way, the non-neighborhoodization of Barcelona's immigrant communities has accomplished the melting-pot strategy of American culture without falling into the unfortunate reality of salad-bowl fracture groups, which in some part play into the ethnic and cultural conflicts present in America. Whether this dense patchwork of habitation and commercialization is the result of good urban design or luck is unimportant, as neither occurred in America's case.
Culturally, it is evident that Barcelona is better than any American city, unfortunate to say. Late nights, early mornings, slower work pace in combination with a rapid social sphere is highly attractive to young people, who may stay longer for Barcelona's growing professional ecosystem. Most importantly- Barcelona is in possession of a forbidden fruit- Taco Bell. With Spain as Europe's largest market for Taco Bell, any claims of inauthenticity can be dispelled. More importantly, the menu at Taco Bell Spain stands alone as a manifestation of the true efforts of visionary founder Glen Bell's dream of available and cheap Mexican-American cooking. Patates bravas burritos, spicy habanero chicken, and most importantly, beer, round out a menu incomparable in America.
Quick food, greasy environments, and cheap beer is supposedly quintessential to the American cultural landscape, but exists in its truest form only in Spain. Americans do not realize the level of spiritual joy that can be had at Taco Bell when Taco Bell serves beer. Nowhere in America can three beers and a quesadilla be had for 4 euro (or dollars). Walkability, beauty, cultural compatibility are not the major factors that set Barcelona ahead of America in America's own race, but Barcelona's possession of a fast food restaurant with cheap beer. If America does not make the necessary changes to allow this development scheme within the near future, it is inevitable that its role as a culturally dominant force will dwindle, especially as more Americans experience the genetic satisfaction of consuming cheap fast food with cheap beer without the need for multiple stops.