Spain: The Alhambra
The first thing you notice when you visit Granada is that it’s a very old city, like a lot of the places we had visited. You can see it in the cobblestone streets which my sandals were much too thin for and so many other aspects of the city. Visiting the Alhambra will probably be the most distinct memory I have of Granada and not just for the historical/cultural significance we were supposed to take in. It was a long walk uphill, stairs I wasn’t used to climbing and a lot of (hopefully) lighthearted complaining along the way. When we arrived, as expected the place was laughably touristy. Most people around us spoke English and we were all recovering from our walk, reluctantly buying overpriced water. When we finally entered and heard our guide explain the particulars of each area, I wondered how much of this all of us were really taking in, how a tourist fits into not only a foreign modern landscape but also an ancient one. We might hear a thousand anecdotal points from our guide but how strong would the impression be, 3 hours later when we were all dying for food and the hotel? The casual nature of tourism imposed on a landscape that used to be anything but casual evoked my usual cynical lines of thinking at first, which gave way to a sense of fascination at this irony, this dissonance.
With this idea, there’s this concept of sequent occupance that probably needs to be addressed. I don’t feel as if any area is devoid of any real history but in this place especially it stands out. I think perhaps I never had enough experience with the Old World, where you could drop your 2.50 Euro ice cream on palace grounds that took years to perfect. It’s a weird thing to know that modern consumption can exist be built on top of a defiantly religious stretch or ground. That’s what I was thinking about throughout the tour, the peculiar nature of culmination. The back and forth cycle of religion and ego also seemed to be the defining conflict of the Alhambra. Creation and destruction are what make the architecture what it is today, the need the commemorate victories of ego and faith, by both Christian and Muslim groups. Nothing stayed still for long, and looking around at the pop up ice cream stands and the overworn fashion trends of tourists in the summer, I can’t help but think the same principle holds true today.