Home is where the heart is: June 2006

Friday, June 16, 2006

The Dancing Girls&The 'Yamakasi' Parkour Gang.

Last weekend I spend 5 days in my beloved city Barcelona. Despite I work in Madrid since 5 years ago, I like to go and visit me old mates there, at least once a month. Summer is close and the sea always calls me by this time of the year. You cant avoid your mediterranean roots, can you?.

So sunday afternoon, after a copious intake of Beer&food in Carmelo Hill, me and me old buddies decided to spent the afternoon on the top this little mountain in Barcelona where you can enjoy a fantastic and stunning view of the city.

The fact is that this few hills arent normally advertised on the tourist guides, so that allows to keep the place still as interesting, less crowded and very relaxing as it used to be. [Not like Park Güell one really].

So about 4 pm we decided to walk to the top to have a sit there enjoy the view of the city and have a good smoke&chat as we used to do in our (Long gone) teen days.

On the top of Carmelo Hill there used to be an old Army settlement bunker with a long big anthena right in the middle. Its not been used for ages anymore, but some rests still remain there.

My Dad says they could hear the bombs and artillery be heard from the ships in the docks bombing the Carmelo hill during The Spanish Civil War.

Now is only used and heavily enjoyed by ' Urban Graffiters' which I personally think is a far more inteligent use. We certainly enjoyed our funny smoke, but for some reason the place wasnt that quiet this time, as something strange happened to us up there, about an hour after we got on top. Something pretty wierd to be honest.

kids playing

About 5 pm I saw this group of 6-8 girls who were walking from one side of the hill towards where we were sat. As they were progressing on their 'climbing' I kept observing them .

Half an hour later, they walked near us and all sat, right near the edge, about few yards from where we were. After few minutes they suddenly split and start to locate on few different places of the hill, they were spread all over the top. Within seconds they all started to move in a very slow way, like in a slow motion dance.

They all danced and moved their hands in a slow motion way, with their eyes closed.

We had a fresh, but gently brezze up there, you could close your eyes and open your arms and get an incredible feeling of freedom. Me and me mates we were looking each other....wtf?..... we didnt quiet understand, but we kept rollin' and pretending we were used to this situations. You want to be discrete when this sort of things happens, dont you?

We even thought at some point we were target of a joke, or perhaps a tv hidden camera. But no, the wole thing seemed pretty serious, the girls kept on dancing and concentrated on their slow movements. It was the perfect communion with Barcelona Sky. Althought, at some point their dance did remind me that Chinese dance [Tai-Chi?], it wasnt quiet exactly the same I have to say.

The 'scenario' gaved the whole place a very strange [but at the same time] interesting atmosphere. Considering the fact we were pretty ignored [Or thats what I thought] , I decided it was the time to take my camera off my pocket and have some fun.

The Parkour&'Yamakasi'&Parkour Gang

But the surprises that afternoon didnt end up there. When we thought nothing else could get more unreal or bizarre, we suddenly saw on the distance, in the pines tree forest, 3 young lads running also to the top. They were all bare chest and wearing track suits, and I could swear the oldest was probably about 15 years old.

On a pretty impressive way they reached the top within minutes and sweating like mad they ran all around us and near the'slow motion dance' girls too. They jumped over huge stones, ran on top of fences and walk upside down on the walls edges. Wikit. They didnt stop at all for about 60 minutes.

I did hear about it before, but never seen them...

They were the Catalan 'Yamakasi'!!

For those who never heard they are also called 'Parkour' its an outdoor free run, no gravity-urban monkey activity which involves people using the urban 'furniture' to jump and run from one place to another. It can be a wall, a 8 store rough or a bridge, this people has no limits! If you are interested The 'Yamakasi' and the english 'Space Chase' are probably the most popular films on the genre.

Strangely enough, as the minutes ran, nobody there seemed bothered by the others presence, and while my mates were rollin up I carried taking some more photographs.

The 3 young lads were gone about 7 pm. They ran down the hill again, probably trying to find another place for their brave activity.

Goodbye Yamakasis...

The girls kept doing their strange dance for a bit longer, and about 8 pm they started to gather again and all together lie down on the floor like if they were suddenly on a very deep sleep.(!)

An intense release of energy?, An excellent LSD?, fuck! ....I want to try that!......

So we had there this 3 young kids pulling off the most fearless stunts I ve seen in my entire life, and a bunch of 'Hypnotized' iluminated young girls waving their hands and moving their bodies in the slowest way you can. All this in the last lost corner of your city, where the most exciting thing you expect to find is a bunch of stray cats.