Souly Ours

In the heart of the Gothic district, the center of Barcelona, is the Plaça de la Seu, where the famous Cathedral de la Santa Creu i Santa Eulalia is located.

From the cathedral steps, I sat looking down into the plaça and I realized that the open space was almost completely absent of any humans.

Plaça de la Seu
Barcelona, 2008

At any given time, a scene like this is highly remarkable.

I took this picture at the end of August, 2008. There are 2 reasons I thought of then and there might be more.

First, the natives leave for their summer homes if they have one, the others go away to a place out of Spain and the rest of us, who are few, stay. For us, Barcelona is SOULY OURS.

Second, the decline of the dollar didn’t bring many American tourists to Europe and the loads of non-Spanish Europeans opted to stay in their native land, probably enjoying THEIR summer homes.

I will probably never get a chance to see such quiet in such a big plaça in a long while.

For a moment, I felt like one of my favorite photographers, Henri Cartier Bresson, known for pictures like the one I took.

Enjoy!