Our first visit to Spain via Barcelona

BARCELONA — After a long eight-hour flight from the DiosdadoMacapagal International Airport (I didn't even include the flight and waiting time when we flew from the Mactan Cebu International Airport) and that very long seven-hour layover in Dubai International Airport, we finally boarded an Emirates A-380 doubledecker airplane for the six-hour trip from Dubai to Barcelona, Spain. Dubai apparently is in the crossroads on your trip to Europe.

But unlike what we wrote yesterday, where the Emirates plane was packed nearly 90 percent with Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW), the A-380 plane was also just as full, but this time there were fewer Filipinos on board.It makes you wonder why there are so many tourists who visit Barcelona when it was only last August 17 when the 22-year old Younes Abouyaaqoub drove his van onto the pedestrians on the famous La Rambla tourist site in Barcelona, killing 13 people and wounding 130 others.

On the same day, just a few hours after the terror attack on La Rambla, five men suspected of belonging to the same terror cell with Abouyaaqoub also drove their vehicle into pedestrians in Cambrils, just a few kilometers from La Rambla killing a woman and wounding six other people. I learned that on August 21Abouyaaqoub was killed by Spanish Police not far from the City of Barcelona.

Incidentally just a day before the La Rambla attack, there was an explosion in the town of Alcanar that killed two people including a 40-year old Imam believed to be members of the same terror group that ran over pedestrians in La Rambla. Found in that destroyed building were 120 gas canisters that police suspected would have been used in the La Rambla attack. That must have been an accidental explosion, but that incident heightened the police presence, which is why fewer people were killed by the van attack.

From the airport, when we got into our apartment just behind La Rambla, this was the first place we visited and indeed security was tight in the area. I asked one of the police wearing green-jacket (Barcelona police are easily identifiable because of this green jacket which they wear over their black pant suits) where exactly did the van hit the pedestrians, the policeman told me that I was standing on the site, which was a corner so the van could easily strike the numerous tourists flocking La Rambla.

Ramming civilians on the streets seem to be the newly favorite terror attack by jihadists in Europe these days. Just little over a year ago on July 14 last year during the Bastille Day celebrations, a truck driven by a jihadist ran over revelers on the streets of Nice killing 86 people and wounding scores of others. This is why last January, security was tight during the Sinulog Parade. So the question the people ask is why do tourists still flock to Barcelona in spite of the terror threat? As we mentioned earlier the A-30 Emirates double-decker plane was full of passengers.

Apparently, Barcelona, like the most famous cities of Europe, Rome, Paris, London, or Berlin is one of the most visited places by tourists. Barcelona belongs to Catalonia, which is a separate group of people living in the Iberian Peninsula with its own language and laws. Just recently a massive rally was conducted in Catalunya Square by Catalonians wishing to be independent from Spain.

From this trip, I learned that Italian dictator Benito Mussolini bombed Barcelona upon the request of Generalissimo Franco during the Spanish Civil War. No wonder there is so much animosity between the Spaniards and the Catalans. It is a fact that I often mention the Catalan example in my language issues against the Tagalog national language. Now whether Catalans would achieve independence remains to be seen.

Next stop will be our visit to the historic Sagrada Familia Church created by the famous architect Antoni Gaudi who did not finish his work because he met an accident and died in 1926. Just looking at the pictures of the Sagrada Familia would make you wonder in awe. Gaudi has also made other famous buildings, which is part of the tour in Barcelona. We will feature this in our next column. So far this visit to Spain, through Barcelona was an exciting one. So we shall be planning a visit to Spain sometime in the future.