Category Archives: photos

más magica

19 Thursday Jul 2007

Posted by in art, culture, friends, photos, sevilla

≈ 5 Comments

norberto5.jpg

We saw Norberto again this evening.

Some of you may recall when our friend Craig (aka zoomer on h2g2) was here visiting us last July we stumbled upon a little workshop still open around midnight as we were on our way home from having tapas … you can read the full story over here on the ~serigraph serendipity~ post. Anyhoo, Craig bought a lovely serigraph there for his daughter and had asked us to go back and take some photos of the workshop as it had been such a magical moment for him, but somehow it just didn’t happen – until tonight.

In fact, this was quite a serendipitous kind of day. For some reason nice and pleasant things just kept happening to both Nog and me all day long and then this evening we decided to go for a walk and a tapa (which turned into a whole meal! photos to follow) and then while wandering home I thought of Norberto as we were near his workshop and said to Nog that we should go and see if he was there. And he was!

He’s made a few changes to the workshop, including a very nice showcase window outside and a fabulous metal engraved Giraldillo that is also on the wall outside the shop. I told him it was a shame about the meterbox next to it (kind of spoiling the effect) and he said he had a metal plate that he was planning to put over it, but in the meantime he posed next to his creation using his head to cover up the meter thingy (see the pic above). 🙂

And so – finally – here are the photos we promised you, Craig. Click on the thumbnails to enlarge them …

norberto2.jpg norberto1.jpg norberto4.jpg

You can see all the photos in my Norberto album.

bienvenido de nuevo!

08 Sunday Jul 2007

Posted by in culture, food & drink, home, photos, sevilla, tapas

≈ 8 Comments

bar-giralda.jpg

Welcome back Bar Giralda!!!

Back at the end of May I wrote this very sad post when I saw that the very best tapa bar in my street had closed. I later heard from the (ex)owner that it was going to reopen again as a tapa bar (not another Starbucks as feared) and I was very pleased to see that it had indeed opened again under new management last week.

Nog and I were finally able to get over there this evening for a tapa dinner and we were delighted to see most of the old staff working there. I was also happy to see that the new owner had repainted the walls creamy-white again (for some reason they were painted a horrid orangy-red last year that seriously clashed with the gorgeous old tiles).

But I digress. . .

Being Sunday evening, the joint was hopping. We finally got a table outside and it felt wonderful to know that we had our Bar Giralda back again. And the ‘new improved’ menu (basically higher prices for the same stuff … but at least it’s the same stuff!) also came with some extra entertainment value as the new English translations had us in stitches. I mean, ‘thousand leaves with pig’ was bad enough, but a variation called ‘thousand leaves if mushrooms’ almost had me on the floor.

Ah well, maybe you had to be there. . .

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~ Cervecería Giralda ~

lisbon story

11 Monday Jun 2007

Posted by in holidays, life stuff, photos, portugal, trips

≈ 12 Comments

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I am in love with Lisbon!

Some general impressions include: the wonderful pavements, the amazing ‘churrasco’ restaurants, custard tarts, films & television programmes shown in the original language with Portuguese subtitles, hardly any souvenir shops but lots of sunglass and hashish street hawkers, cream coloured Mercedes sedan taxis, the trams, the HILLS …

I found the best way to communicate was to start off by speaking Spanish. If the person knew English they would automatically switch to that, if not it turned out quite easy to converse using Spanish and Portuguese. I picked up a few phrases while I was there and noticed that people quite liked it when I made an attempt at speaking their language.

The Lisbon photo albums are mostly up and somewhat organised, but still haven’t been properly edited and labelled.

And this is what we did . . .
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adiós bar giralda!

23 Wednesday May 2007

Posted by in culture, food & drink, home, photos, sevilla

≈ 8 Comments

giralda-bar.jpg           cerveceria-giralda.jpg           giralda-dining-room.jpg

I’m devastated! The best tapa bar in my street – Cervecería Giralda – has closed. It’s such a landmark that it’s going to be hard to imagine Sevilla without it. I saw the owner this evening at his other bar, La Estrella, and asked him why he closed down the best tapa bar in the street and he said he wanted to start slowing down taking things easier. I reckon he was made an offer he couldn’t refuse as it’s in a very prime location. It better not turn out to be another bloody Starbucks!

Meanwhile, we can still go to La Estrella as the tapa menu is pretty much the same there and it’s only about a five-minute walk from home. But it doesn’t have the same charm and ‘ambientation’ and you can’t sit outside under the orange trees and enjoy people watching as well as a lovely view of the cathedral. f_wah.gif

[update: bar giralda reopened in July! ] 🙂

más plantas!

05 Saturday May 2007

Posted by in home, life stuff, photos, sevilla

≈ 5 Comments

plants.jpg

Bought some new plants this morning.

Almost a year ago now I came across a viveros in the centre of town and got the idea of putting plants on the balconies, since there are six of them and since I can’t have many indoor plants because of f_blackcat.gifAzar who apparently has a ‘green tooth’. The whole saga about that is over here on the viveros post, including when my landlord later on told me I couldn’t have plants on my balconies because the water will rust them and make them dangerous. 🙄
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