Imbibing Iberia: Do-and-Diet in Spain and Portugal

Among the journeys of deep purpose and soul nourishing that I have taken in my life was the trip that my wife and I took to Spain in 1999. This is the country that, 1000 years ago, was arguably the most powerful country and the center of Jewish life in the world. We toured the towns of Madrid, Seville, Granada, Cordova and Toledo. In each of the cities we visited, we saw the Juderia or old Jewish section of town where Jews lived until they were expelled from the land by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella in 1492. However, nowhere in any of the cities that we visited in Spain did we see a living or breathing Spanish Jew; indeed, as I commented in my September 1999 newsletter, the whole country seemed eerily Judenrein or free from Jews.

What we also didn't see on our first trip to Spain was the city of Barcelona. We had heard from many other travelers, including our son Edward, that Barcelona is a must-see place. When he visited Barcelona fresh out of college, Edward was so captivated by the city’s natural beauty and Modernist architecture that he considered it one of the best places in which to live.

So this fall we set out on our second reunion of 2010, the first being to Madison, Wisconsin, for the 50th anniversary of my high school class. In November we were reunited with the Iberian Peninsula as we toured Barcelona, capital of Catalonian Spain, and Lisbon, capital of Portugal. We went with minimum luggage and maximum anxieties since airport security was becoming more rigorous; indeed, a few weeks earlier the United States government had issued a travel warning for citizens going to Europe. Would we encounter anti-American or terrorist actions? Would we be targets of anti-Semitism? Would we be easy marks for pickpockets who, we were warned, are ubiquitous in that area? Would I be able to stick to my relatively new healthy eating diet? But we went, determined not to capitulate to catastrophic thinking. We went on the qui vive, not as part of an organized tour, but rather as trenchant travelers; for although we didn’t speak either Spanish or Portuguese, we tried to blend in and experience the culture first hand.

Lovely Lisbon
There is much to behold in this part of the world. Lisbon, for example, because of its remarkable geographic position, was already a city in existence when Julius Caesar was in power. It is a picturesque city of seven hills situated on the northern bank of the Tagus estuary. Intrepid Portuguese navigators, such as Vasco da Gama, in the 1400s set sail from Lisbon and increased the borders of the known world, making Portugal a rich country and center of global commerce. In the middle Ages many Jews settled in this region and contributed to Portugal's flourishing trade and culture. In the early 14th century, it is estimated that more than 200,000 Jews lived in Portugal, which was about 20 percent of the total population. In the Alfama quarter of Lisbon one can still visit the narrow streets and labyrinthine neighborhoods where large numbers of Jews settled. Many Jews came in the 15th century, fleeing from Spain after their expulsion by the Catholic monarchs in 1492. The Portuguese king at that time, King Manuel, was favorably disposed to Jews and relied on their wealth and wisdom. But he wanted to solidify his power in the Iberian Peninsula so he brokered a deal to marry the daughter of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain. As part of that deal, the Spanish royal family insisted that Portugal expel her Jews as well. King Manuel reluctantly agreed, igniting an inquisition process even more ruthless than in neighboring Spain: few Portuguese Jews were actually expelled but tens of thousands were tortured and forcibly converted to Christianity on pain of death.

We did find some remnant of Jewish life in 21st century Lisbon. It seems that around 1800, Portugal decided officially to "invite Jews" back into the country; and in1892, the Shaarei Tikvah synagogue was built in Lisbon. However, the synagogue was not allowed to face the street which makes locating it a challenge. We set out from our hotel one day to try to find it on Rua Alexandre Herculano, a long thoroughfare. After trudging along the street, we found a rather small sign in Hebrew attached to a large and forbidding chain-linked fence which was locked. We rang and rang the bell and were about to leave when a man ambled out from the next door shop. He offered to let us in – for a price of five Euros per person (almost $7.50 for each of us). Having come this far, we agreed and he let us in to an inner courtyard. On the right wall of the courtyard were plaques commemorating people who had contributed to the synagogue and others, like Yitzhak Rabin, who had graced it with their presence. The façade of the synagogue, on the left of the courtyard, was also locked but we were admitted without any additional charge. Once inside the small structure, the man with the key donned a Keepah or skullcap. "Are you Jewish?" I rhetorically asked. The tour guide and caretaker of the only Jewish synagogue in Lisbon turned out to be Catholic!

Breathtaking Barcelona
Although we discovered no synagogues in Barcelona, we found the Spanish city to be more vibrant with much more to see. It was easy to understand why Barcelona is one of the hippest vacation spots in Europe with its rich mix of history, culture, and cosmopolitan flair. It is a city that sits on the edge of the Mediterranean with mountains on three sides. Barcelona was the site of the 1992 Olympiad which reinvigorated the city with a new waterfront of palms, promenades, parks, renovated historic buildings, and new cultural institutions. But Barcelona remains still rooted in tradition with medieval districts, including an old Jewish neighborhood, bristling with old world character. However, unlike Lisbon, there is no house of worship to be found; and most shocking to us, there was not even a Chabad presence in Barcelona. You see, the Lubavitch branch of the Hasidic movement, more commonly called Chabad, is well-known for sending emissaries all over the world to assist Jews with all their religious needs. Chabad has centers in over 75 countries, including some in other parts of Spain. My wife and I felt foreboding shockwaves when we learned that Chabad emissaries had vacated Barcelona. I recall that I had a frightening nightmare that night, something that rarely happens. When I told my wife the next morning, she reported that her sleep had been disrupted by a nightmare as well. We couldn’t help but think about the 2008 Mumbai attacks, where the local Chabad house was targeted and six people were brutally murdered, including the local Chabad rabbi and his wife. When we returned to America, we learned further distressing news: Al Qaeda was purchasing passports from pickpockets in Barcelona in order to produce falsified documents which were then put into the hands of terrorist groups around the world. But, thankfully, while we felt somewhat bewitched and bothered in Barcelona, we never felt at all in danger or in jeopardy during our trip in Spain.

I needed to capture some of the rich Jewish heritage that was once the hallmark of this region, and that I found in Gerona. Located approximately 60 miles northeast of Barcelona, Gerona was once an important center of Jewish learning and mysticism. A museum has been built within what was once a synagogue with burial stones dating back to the 13th Century on display. The Museum also gives a picture of daily life in the old Jewish quarter. One of the most famous people born in that city in 1194 was Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman Gerondi who is commonly known as Ramban, which is an acronym of his Hebrew name and title. The Ramban studied and practiced medicine just as the other most famous rabbi Maimonides had done in Toledo; and they both also studied philosophy. Both of these rabbis were writers for the ages whose commentaries, books on Jewish law, and homiletical works are still read and revered today. I have used “Iggeret HaRamban,” a letter written by the Ramban to his elder son, as a model of how a father should relate to a child. The Ramban was also the first to put his thoughts of Kabala on paper. It was always just an oral tradition, although, never codified before the Ramban. So although no Jews have been living here for more than 500 years, at least not openly, the memory of the former historic community has been preserved in the picturesque narrow lane-ways of the Jewish ghetto which make Gerona one of the major sites for Jewish tourists in all Spain. It was a thrill to be there.

Then it was back to Barcelona. Three world renowned artists are associated with Barcelona, and this was in itself a bewildering aspect of the city. All of the stunning natural beauty and aesthetic charm of the region would seem to be the perfect backdrop for realistic artists and painters. Ironically, it is best known for its surreal artists and architects, most notably Antonio Gaudi, Pablo Picasso, and Salvador Dali. Their modernist works are wild and wonderful. Barcelona was the stomping ground for the young Picasso, and the gallery that first exhibited his work is situated here. A short distance from Barcelona in the quaint town of Figueres, Dali has his own museum, a surreal work of art in itself which he designed. But it is Gaudi who would clearly win the People’s Award as the most famous and most revered artist of the city. To visit the Park Guell is to revel in the snake-like tiled benches, colonnades, pagodas, and sculptures he designed. The Sagrada Familia Church that Gaudi worked on for 40 years until his death in 1926 is so complicated that it is still not fully completed to this date. And who can forget his private homes such as Casa Batilo with undulating facades, dragon chimney stacks, and other whimsical decorations?

Iberian Dietetic Eating Style
I could not help but notice one other aspect of Spain and Portugal worth digesting: there were hardly any overweight people to be seen. It made me realize that in countries other than America, cultural patterns have tended to reduce the risk of conditioned hyper eating. People in other countries such as the ones we visited linger longer over meals, eat smaller portions, and eat healthier food. There is also the cultural notion that you don't eat between meals.

When I was a kid growing up in the 1950s, people in America also ate only at meal time. Snacks were the sole property of growing children; adults didn't need snacks. But snacking is now the norm, and data show that it, too, rose in the 1980s and 1990s when the epidemic of obesity began to erupt. Worse, people don't eat smaller breakfasts, lunches, or dinner just because they snack throughout the day. In short, a breakdown in meal structure, with the distinction between meals and snacks increasingly blurred, only promotes increased consumption and, ultimately, conditioned hyper eating.

As David A. Kessler points out in The End of Overeating, which I highly recommend, we also have in America a large food industry whose goal is to make a profit. They do this by serving us hyper-palatable and processed foods with large quantities of sugar, fat, and salt. It's not enough that people eat hamburgers: they have to be layered with sauces, cheeses, bacon, etc. They are also made visually appealing. The food industry is not only generating billions of dollars for itself, it is also creating products that seem to rewire our brains, driving us to seek out more and more of these products. The way food is marketed also hooks people by catering to the emotions: commercials don't generally tout food quality or nutritional value; instead, they promise to make us feel happy, connected, even loved. In short, the presence of hyper-palatable and processed food, the large portion sizes, the incessant marketing, the cultural assumption that it's acceptable to eat anywhere, anytime, have all combined to put more and more people, particularly children, at risk (see http://drjoe32.blogspot.com/ for my son-in-law’s musings on the subject of obesity).

To be sure, even in Spain and Portugal, fast food restaurants, and other temptations are beginning to emerge. I hope that the reverence for tradition and history in this part of the world will hold onto the healthier, more intuitive and more attuned style of eating which I observed and which I am trying personally to follow. I am grateful to Overeaters Anonymous which, beginning in June, launched me on a low-sugar, lean protein diet, on strict abstinence from processed food, and on adherence to meal times versus eating when you feel like it. Or as Dr. Ramban would say, citing a Talmudic dictum, "more people are killed by the cooking pot than suffer from starvation." In short, a pilgrimage to Spain and Portugal satisfied my taste for rich, sumptuous, complex culture and history as well as my palete for plain, natural, and wholesome food.