I walked round this corner, coming round the building from the left, on my way back from lunch in Lavapies the other day.

There were 5 Sub-Saharan immigrant guys hovering over that big patch of pavement by the blue motorbike, covering the flagstones with their ragged ‘top manta‘ meter-squares of cotton sheets, full of the latest Hollywood Blockbuster DVD copies, idly browsed by the bored tourist trade..

…and the second they came into my view everything exploded into sudden action, as the men reached down to get the stings that attach to all four corners of the cloth laid out before them, and in one smooth movement the cloth had gathered the DVDs, they had turned on their heels, and sprinted through cars across the zebra crossing to sit things out nervously in the middle of the road.

Then I saw the police car that had pulled up just behind them. One of the agentes lazily made a show of pretending to get out, realised he’d achieved his aim of scattering them to the wind, and pulled his foot back into the car while his partner headed back into the traffic. A tourist bent down and picked up 5 of the DVD’s that had been dropped during the escape, and wandered off casually, showing them to his friends.

I stopped and watched the guys still hovering in the central reservation, sheets clasped tightly in their hands, ready to run again. I walked over to wait at the crossing. Looked into the window of McD’s – some teenagers with mum and dad, eating a burger – lettuce, slab of grey meat, looked like the bun had chocolate chips on top – what?!

Looking down, I saw I was right next to a palid, sad 40-something guy sitting on a scrap of cardboard, his back up against the wall below the burger-eaters window. He had a few coins laid out in front of him, a half-tin of catfood, and a tiny tabby kitten. Every time the kitten made it to the boarders of the cardboard he reached out, grabbed a bit of fur or a limb, and dragged it back. Again, and again, and again, and again.

But something in his half-dead eyes convinced me later that the kitten gave a scrap of meaning to his life, and that the kitten wouldn’t have made it without him either…

We spent a few days in my favourite city on the planet this summer, San Sebastian (how can you not love a city where one of the main forms of transport is the skateboard!), where we discovered the finest tapa known to man. It was just behind surfy-cool Gros beach, which to my mind is far more interesting that it’s posh, famous cousin, La Concha, on the other side of the old town…

So to this mighty tapa, so good it has won it’s own award… It’s a sort of crepey/potatoey bacalao (fresh cod) warm, pickled-peppery sandwitch type colllection of several mouthfuls of bliss, covered in a buttery sauce. How’s that for a description!

I think you’ll just have to go and try it yourself, acutally, at only 2 Euros a go, you can try two! It’s at Pagadi, which is hidden down a little alley with a couple of other wonderful real-Gros-barrio-bars, about two and a half blocks back from the sea just off Birmingham Kalea (it’s marked on this map). If you’re looking for the ‘real’ San Sebastian, this is it!

One small problem, I can’t remember exactly what this tapa was called – but they only have two which involve bacalao, and this is the one that won the award! Try the calamaris too – wow…

This post is in response to Catavinos request for San Sebastian ideas!

Other links:

Faye Davies, who wrote with us at Notes from Madrid, has written a “fast-paced political thriller, a personal tale of pride and paranoia… Ángel Valdés, president of Zamora, has it all: women, peace – and absolute power. But when an overheard remark ignites his jealousy of a long-dead comrade, Ángel finds himself gambling everything to become the undisputed hero of his country…” Read a new chapter every week at http://theseconddeathofjuanlaroca.blogspot.com/