Ripoll Because Because Ripoll

I know that that is sometimes the nature of travel, that no matter how much training in a language you have, unless you grow up in a place, there are certain things that you will never learn in a book. Take for instance the time Ben and I tried to buy a ticket to Ripoll.

"A donde va?" asked the guy at the ticket counter.
"Ripoll," answered Ben.
The guy looked at him quizically. "A donde?"
"Ripoll," Ben said a little louder. Maybe he was somewhat hard of hearing.
The guy looked at Ben with the universal I have no idea what you're talking about look etched across his face. He leaned his head toward Ben.
I pulled out the train schedule and pointed.
The man nodded in understanding. "Ahhh...Ripohhhwlllllllya."
"Si," I said, nodding vigorously in my attempt to overcompensate for not knowing how to speak his language while expressing my enthusiasm at his ability to read.

Of course there is no way of knowing that you have to hold out the "l" and add a "w" sound to the "o" unless you live there. Plus things are a little more different here since Ripoll is in the heart of Catalan country. To get around here, you have to wrap your mind around the fact that even though you are in Spain, Spanish will not be spoken here. Actually, there is no such thing as a Spanish language, but in fact "castillan" (translation: language spoken in Castilla").

Now before you pull out any of your hair or start riots and begin looting your local hardware store over this new information, let me give you a little Catalunyan and Spanish history (I've borrowed heavily from my Let's Go guide). You see, Catalunya is the most prosperous as well as the proudest provinces in Spain. Located in the northeastern section, it was colonized by the Greeks, Carthagians, Moors, and the Romans. It was even considered to be part of Charlemagne's domain for a time. In 989, Catalunya declared itself independent then united itself with the throne of Aragon. Jumping ahead 900 years, you find Catalunya trading with the Americas. In another one hundred years, they're having what is called the Catalan Renaissance which gives rise to the Modernista movement which gave rise to artists such as Picasso, Dali, Miro and Gaudi. (And what would life be like without these guys other than boring, unimaginative, and lacking a good surrealist sense of humor?)

Unfortunately for Catalunya there was this dictator named Francisco Franco and over the course of his 36 year or so reign, catalaneses (the Catalan people) were persecuted (think imprisonment and death) like no other group in Spain. The Catalan language was no longer allowed to be spoken, taught, or written and declared to be only a dialect of Spanish instead of a a completely different language (which it is. It would be like saying that French is a dialect of Spanish just because they're both romance languages and you like Spanish better.) It was not until Franco died in 1975 that the language was able to flourish once again.
Of course this is all beautiful and good until you're trying to get somewhere and no one has any idea what you're saying. Especially somewhere way up in the mountains. But I'm just being a naysayer. Ripoll, though rainy the whole time we were there is actually a gorgeous town located on in the foothills of the Pyrenees with two rivers running through it, a big fancy door on the front of its monastery and the gateway to all things fun in the mountains - skiing, hiking, and the tiny country of Andorra.