The flyer man approached Joe, Flora and I, as we wended our way through the streets of Barcelona. He handed out his flyers, fulfilling his contractual obligations. But then he took an interest in us, and told us what he thought we wanted to know.
“What kind of music are you into?” he asked in a friendly way.
“Er. Quiet music.”
“Well bar 13 is kinda mellow jazz. And then there´s a few funky chilled bars on that street.”
“Alright. What about the bars by the port with the scantily clad girls in the doors?”
“Oh you wouldn´t want to go to them. They´re all that way. Full of neon lights, tourists and overpriced drinks. Playing Will Smith. This club opens at 1am, you should go there after a few drinks in bar 13.”
“Um. Just out of interest, roughly how long would it take us to walk to the tourist bars?”
“About ten minutes. But they´re dreadful.”
“OK. Thanks. See you.”
It really was uncanny when we arrived at the neon Tequila club in the port. The first song it played was Will Smith´s dancefloor filler, “Gettin jiggy wid it.” Top quality dancing and overpriced drinks followed the fresh prince, and a strange but friendly Dutch man who took a shine to me and followed me around the dancefloor, and even between neighbouring clubs.
As we were lying on the floor next to a cathedral the following afternoon, our friend the flyer man arrived and asked us about his choice of chilled bars. We didn´t want to disabuse him of the notion that we were cultured city hoppers into mellow grooves and hip replacements, so we lied about how much we enjoyed the bars he had recommended that we hadn´t visited. It would have been bad for his morale if we had told the true story of jumping up and down with vodka and coke and standing on the toes of drunken Scandinavians in tawdry tourist discos.