Day 10: Parked for Good, The Old Home in Olot, & Museo de los Volcanes

Saturday 8 January 2022

I walked back to the little park where I had parked my car. I wanted to write the postcards and send them from Girona, because it’s a bigger city than Olot. I needed a bench in the sun and a mailbox. Both showed up next to the parking place, it felt too good to be true.

I wrote the cards in the burning morning sun.

      

A very old man walked by and asked in Spanish if I had sun cream on, because my skin was too white.

I nodded my head. “Si!” I lied.

He asked where I was from and said that my face was very sympatico. I thought it was a nicer compliment than bella that had been whispered to me on the street a couple of times. Francisca will get angry at me for calling it a compliment.

I put sun cream on the moment the old man walked out of my sight. An old lady walked by with her walker on wheels and imitated me putting sun cream on my arms. She shouted something. I should really work on my Spanish, because I’m still wondering what she said. I just laughed and nodded and the old lady continued with her roll, ehh, stroll.

When I was done writing the postcards, I wanted to post them in the blue mailbox. I didn’t see an opening for letters.

“Perdón!” I shouted to the first victim that walked by.

The old man looked surprised, he had a black moustache like Mario, but with some grey hairs.

Yes, this strange white troll is talking to you. Don’t worry, I don’t eat old people. They don’t look that delicious. Shut up Maul!

I showed Mario that I couldn’t find an opening for the letters.

He shook his head. “In Spanish, it says: only to be used by the mailman,” and he tapped his fat finger on the text on the mailbox.

“O, now I understand. Merci,” I said.

When something is too good to be true, it’s too good to be true. It took me an extra 30 minutes to find a mailbox that wasn’t only used by the mailman. The difference was easy to see. You don’t need the green or blue mailbox, but the yellow one that looks like a huge...

 

Street bollard! (straatpaaltje)

I went back to the car and was ready for the drive to Olot. There was less space in the parking lot than before and I knew it would become difficult to turn my car around. I was going to try it anyway, I had no choice.

 

I drove to the place with the most space between the cars and tried to turn. There was not enough room, not by a long shot. I needed to get the car in reverse, but I had no idea how. I looked before I left the hotel, but I couldn’t find it on the internet.  

I stood still in the middle of the parking lot, blocking the passing of cars. Okay, relax, maybe a button that I have to push first. I looked all around the dashboard, but there wasn’t any button. I tried to push the handle down and up, but still, it would not slide into reverse.

A car came up the parking lot. No! I haven’t figured it out yet. Where’s Gandalf if you need him? You shall not pass!

Honk! Honk! The man in the car wondered what I was doing. It probably looked like I was texting on my phone, but I was looking on the internet how to put my car in reverse. It can’t be that difficult right? Right?!

I pushed the buttons that opened my windows, at least I know how that works. The guy that was inside of the car came out. He wasn’t alone, but his sweet family stayed in the car.

“I’m so sorry,” I said and pointed at the poke, “I don’t know how to put the car in reverse.”

The Spanish man was in his 40’s or 50’s, always harder to say when people aren’t Dutch. He was very calm and had a friendly, fatherly face.

He wasn’t afraid of corona, because he bowed over me, through the window, to check what I was doing wrong.

“You have, ehm, foot, down?” he pointed at my left foot, the one that does the clutch.

“Yes,” I said.

“All the way?” he asked.

“Yes,” I replied, thank god his English is good and he wants to help me! I will call him Angelo from now on. He was sent from the heavens.

Angelo looked at the poke as if it was a mysterious painting. Eyebrows frowned, hand on his chin, he was thinking.

Another car drove up the parking lot, a white van. I bolded my fists. My palms were sweaty.

Angelo touched the poke, and switched it from 1 to 2, back to 1, to 2. He also wasn’t able to get it in reverse.

More people came, that wanted to get their car out of the parking lot. Remember, I was standing in the middle of the parking lot. I blocked the whole area where people could manoeuvre in order to get in or out.

Pearls of sweat appeared on my nose. My shoes turned into tiny ovens. Actually, the whole car was an oven. We are eating a grilled human for lunch.

“Look,” he finally said, still very calmly, and his hand went to a ring lower on the puke. The ring was movable and he moved it upward. Now the poke was able to slide all the way to the left and up, into the R position.

“YES!” I almost jumped out of my seat around his neck. “Thank you! Thank you!” I gave him the best smile that I have in store, the one of gratitude.

The hell wasn’t over yet. I still needed to turn my car around in a very tiny area. I might have thanked him too soon.

“Are you going out or in?” he asked.

“Out,” I said while putting the car in reverse.

He smiled, “okay I will help you, wait one minute.”

He put his car back on the street to make room for me to get out. Then he walked back to my car window and started to give me directions. He saw that I was nervous.

“Tranquilo,” he said, “If you go too quick, boom!” and he smacked his fist in his hand.

My eyes were wide open.

“Okay, come,” he said and waved with his hand.

Slowly I started to drive backwards.

“No, no no, all the way,” he said and pointed at the steering wheel. “All the way, all the way.”                                                                                                                                                                  

I never had to do this before, turning the wheels in one direction all the way, not even during my driving lessons. However, I was also never in this situation before, in such a tight spot where I needed to turn around.

“Okay come, slowly, little more, little more, stop.”

I followed his instructions as if he was the emperor and I was his slave. I trusted him completely, with my life, or car, I had no choice.

“All the way, all the way,” he said again and pointed at the wheel. This time I had to do it the other way. Again I had to do it when the car was (almost) standing still, otherwise, the turn wouldn’t be sharp enough.

We repeated the same thing about two times more and finally, I was pointed towards the exit.

Now it was time to thank him. I had no mouth mask on, so he could see all my white teeth when I smiled. “Thank you!!!” and I drove away.

This experience freaked me out so much, that the beast fell asleep in the middle of a busy crossing. People wanted to go past me and were honking at me. I got it going again within seconds, but those few seconds, my god, what a nightmare.

I was already tired when I started driving, that the road to Olot, wasn’t the best experience. I felt that I got into a trance, almost as if I would fall asleep. I opened the windows to stay a bit more in the real world, I was driving 100 after all.  

       

I was so happy when I saw the parking lot for Hotel La Perla d’Olot, it still had some space free. With my backpack on my back, I entered the hotel, which reminded me more of a retirement home. It was not designed like a hotel, so finding the service desk was a job in itself.

   

I will just find the front door and ring the bell. When I did that, a Spanish voice came out of the speaker next to the door. Normally Spanish is hard, now it was impossible to understand with the little robot voice.

“I’m sorry, English?” I asked.

That turned out to be the password, because the door opened.

Nobody was there to greet me when I entered the home for the elderly. It was silent and deserted. I waved to a camera. Ola!

  

I found out that there was a sign with an “i” for information. When I followed that, I came to the service desk. A bald man, that didn’t look Spanish so I’m pretty sure he was in his 50’s. He helped me with the keys and showed me the room. He looked cranky, did he eat yet?

I screamed out of joy when I closed the door behind me. The room was big, the biggest one until now. It was an entire apartment. First, I rolled up one of the shutters and found out that there was no balcony. Second, I rolled up the other shutter, and saw a tiny balcony appear. Score! I had a view of the inner garden, the playground, and some volcanoes. 

             

Even my mom's favourite lamp was present, a real design lamp.

I opened the curtain in the bathroom and found a bathtub! No way, I will definitely make use of that.

 

I made a tiny video to share my joy with Rhianne and my family, and made myself at home in my new apartment. There was a tulip on the wall. Was it a coincidence or did they see I was Dutch?

When I send the video, I noticed I didn’t have the wifi code. Mierda, this is costing me internet. I walked back to the service desk and noticed the bald man was actually the barman. There were no guests, so he was standing behind the bar doing nothing. He leaned on the beer tap, falling half asleep. He didn’t look pleased when he saw my face again. Maybe because it meant that he had to do something, like, his job.

“Discuple, could I get the wifi code please?” I asked.

 “One moment,” he said and disappeared. He came back, with a piece of paper with the wifi code.

“Gracias,” I said,

“If you want food or a drink you are welcome at the bar and in the restaurant,” he said.

“Okay, thank you,” I said, but I knew I wouldn’t make use of that. He was a bit creepy and there was no one else. When you are travelling on your own, you need to trust your instinct. No one else is going to keep you safe.

First, I wanted to go to the volcano museum. The sun was still shining, so the world invited me to go outside. I started walking through the streets of Olot. I noticed a lot of black people, that I hadn’t seen in other places before. That state of the houses in Olot looked poor and I found tiny supermarkets filled with far foreign products that smelled like Bali. I think most people actually came from Africa and perhaps India, but the smells of spices in the tiny shops reminded me of Indonesia.

Olot was rich in other things than money, it had large forests and mountains and those drew me here. I entered a forest and was baffled by the number of different birds I heard in the trees. It was a volcanic natural reserve, but the beauty is that it then also becomes an ecological reserve. If you leave an area alone, it will flourish with life. Chernobyl is one of the most famous examples of that.

In Barcelona, I was looking for just one tree, and now I was surrounded by them. I felt at home, in the forest, where it smelled like dark earth and sweet oak. Most birds I saw were brown and tiny and jumped on the forest floor. I could hear at least six different kinds up in the high old trees. The forest was known for the number of bird species, because I found a bird identification sign. I made a picture and send it to Rhianne. I finally found my forest, I typed beneath it.  

  
    

The path led me to a big open space in the forest. You couldn’t see the forest floor, because it was covered by a thick carpet of brown oak leaves. In the middle of the field, a family was trying to take a picture. It was a couple with a toddler. This wasn’t the first time I had seen this. To be honest, I saw parents with small children everywhere throughout Spain, and each time, the parent had a phone in his/her hand to film the child. Social media has taken over Spain. Sad development if you ask me. But who I am to judge? I post my entire holiday on the internet, you are reading the proof.

“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” — Gandalf.

I won’t spend it on Instagram and Facebook, that’s all. 

I walked past the family and saw a beautiful house appear in the middle of the forest. It was the volcano museum. A friendly guy with dark hair and grey sideburns (bakkebaarden) stood at the entrance.

 

“Ola,” I said excitedly.

“Ola,” he replied excitedly. One of my fellow Earth Sciences nerds, we immediately connected.

“I would love a ticket please.”

“Are you a student?”

“Aaaa shit, yes and no,”

He looked very confused. It is confusing, I still feel like a student, but I’m not anymore. I’m nothing now. Haha.

“I just obtained my master degree in Earth Sciences,” I said.

“Do you have a card or something?” he asked.

“I’ll look,” I said and felt my heart sink. I knew I didn’t have the card with me, it expired in 2019. “I just had to hand it in at the university, I’m afraid.”

“Recently? It’s okay, I will let you in for free.”

“Thank you!” see? Earth sciences nerds take care of each other.

“The museum is in Spanish, but I have a book with the explanations in English and in French.”

“O great, English please,” I said.

“Are you sure? I have French,” he said.

“English is good,” Pourquoi? Do I look French? Maybe he noticed that I had an accent, but no, not French! Heel erg Nederlands.

“The Earthquake simulator doesn’t work anymore,” he said.

“O no! Did it shake too much and will never shake again?”

He laughed. “Yes.”

I looked disappointed.

“But there is a video, that I can show you, when the other people are done.”

Immediately the smile reappeared on my face. “With deadly eruptions and everything?” 

“More... about earthquakes.”

“Sure, sounds good!”

“Okay, I will get you once the other people are done watching.”

He handed me the book with explanations and I scanned through the first pages. It was about how volcanoes are formed and the different types of volcanoes. The stuff I can dream about.

The museum was small, just one floor made up of a couple of rooms with stones, big maps and pictures. I loved the list of volcanoes, including the one I climbed in Indonesia, the Rinjani. There was a seismograph and a risk map about tremors in Spain. I was in one of the most active areas.

      

    

The museum was filled with children, parents, and me. Maybe I’m just a large child when it comes to volcanoes, they rock! In the middle of the largest room was a miniature of the area. You could push buttons and every button showed the location of a different volcano by a light that turned on. It was impressive. I was surrounded by volcanoes. I made it to Mordor!

  

Come on, if the simulator doesn’t work, please mother nature, just give me a little shake. I want to know what it feels like! It must be so exciting to feel the earth shake, even if I crap my pants.

The guy from the museum woke me up from my daydream by tapping on my shoulder. 

"Do you want to watch the movie?" he asked.

"Yes please!" I said.

I followed him to a tiny cinema room that was in the middle of the museum. The room was red, round, and had four chairs. 

"Do you want English or French?" he asked.

 I was surprised he asked again. "English please."

"Are you sure you don't want French?"

Did he smoke weed during his break or did I really look that French? "Yes, English please."

He closed the red curtains that sealed off the room and turned the light off. The music started and I was taken into the history of earthquakes in the area. How exciting, a private cinema! I only missed the popcorn. 

I thanked the museum guy for his kindness and said goodbye. I wished I got to know him a little better, but because he was working, it felt inappropriate. Ah well, better luck next time. 

I walked back to the hotel and closed the buttons of my denim jacket. I was up the mountains and wasn’t dressed properly. I entered the big supermarket next to the hotel.

 

Next to groceries, I also bought a warm cardigan. It was the only one left in the store, so I was sure something was wrong with it.

Back at the hotel, I found a hole in the shoulder. Was I bringing it back? No, it was the last cardigen they had and it was freezing. I did what any prepared Mirte would do, and sewed the hole back together. Suddenly I was happy with the sewing classes I had in high school, not bad for a catholic school.

  

I listened to the Spanish radio and watched the skies turn red. Blood was being shed somewhere. Tomorrow I had to climb the Mountain of Doom. I closed my eyes and smiled. I hope it explodes.