Miniature Land

Everything here is tiny.

The minivan that my family-in-law had rented to transport our luggage was small. It actually looked much smaller than our Volvo in Seattle. The one we sold because we knew we would never find a parking spot for that car in the Barcelona area.

Our rental car, a Honda Jazz, is tiny. In fact, my knees don’t have room on the passenger seat. I either have the baby in her seat almost standing up behind me, or she is sitting normally and I can wrap my knees around my ears. Which, of course, isn't that big of a deal since, most of the time, I actually feel like I want to put my head in between my legs to protect it from all those crazy drivers that are racing around our car, only inches away from us. This is most likely not their fault, I assume I am either very sensitive right now (must be from the jetlag), or streets here are really narrow, probably enough for you to shake hands with the guy driving next to you while on the highway. 

And then of course, nobody wants big cars here since parking garages are built for miniature cars. Definitely not for a Honda Jazz. My husband tried to park our rental, twice, unsuccessfully. He then got stuck in the garage and after 10 minutes of maneuvering, managed to get the car out of the building again and parked on the street. 

I really do hope we get used to European sizes again soon.

Another tiny thing - the apartment where we are staying temporarily here in Vilassar. Everybody tells me it is huge, including my own husband. It is his grandmother's old apartment and I guess things do seem bigger in our memory we carry from when we were kids. This apartment is definitely not big. The glass door that leads to a balcony facing the ocean certainly makes up for it, but when you enter the kitchen you better make sure there are not more than two people in there. The kitchen is filled with tiny appliances, even a small dishwasher, compared to US standards. We have tiny plates with tiny cups and tiny glasses, tiny cutting boards, tiny salad bowls, a tiny fridge, small counter space, tiny knifes, you name it. Well and you can go out onto a tiny balcony in a tiny patio. Oh and the bed in the master bedroom, according to my brother-in-law it is huge, but it's actually smaller than queen size. I guess this would be enough if it wasn't for the two kids that invade our bed at night. And for the memory of our American king size bed.

No wonder Spaniards are tiny people.

They definitely must be shorter than the rest of the world population. The tunnel we have to take under the highway and railroad is too low for both my husband and I, we need to bend our heads.

Walking can be a balancing act at times since sidewalks are narrow.

We went to the mall and looked at furniture, and even the sofabeds and couches we saw were smaller than what we are used to in the US.

Everything is tiny.

To no surprise, the shopping carts were about the same size as the ones in the US.

And there is another thing that is not small which is the bath rooms in our apartment, they are big with big showers! Taking a shower on our second day here, I was actually having all those flash backs from back when we lived here, listening to the familiar noises in the patio, and taking in the familiar smells. It felt good to be back. Even if it was in miniature land.

Small apartments under dark blue sky