La Rambla

I was twenty-five, on Contiki, walking down La Rambla in Barcelona with a group of brand new friends, the kind you grow close to so quickly and then never see again.

A man walked past us in bright pink underwear. Just the underwear. Nothing else. We laughed, kept walking, filed it away as the strangest thing we’d see that day.

Five minutes later a second man walked past. Completely stark naked. Nothing on at all. Deeply, evenly tanned, the kind of tan that takes years of genuine commitment and walking at a pace that suggested he had somewhere to be and this was simply how he was getting there.

He was completely at peace with it. So, within about four seconds, were we.

Nobody in the group said much. What was there to say. The pink underwear man had, in hindsight, been a warm-up act. A gentle way of easing a group of tourists into what Barcelona actually had in store for them that afternoon.

We kept walking. So did he.

Some cities give you a landmark. Barcelona gave us a man, fully nude, perfectly tanned, entirely unbothered, strolling down one of the most famous streets in Europe like he was popping out for milk.

Nineteen years later it’s still the first thing I think of when someone mentions Barcelona. Not Gaudí. Not the cathedral. Him.

Paul Mercuri
Wake Up Here Founder

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