Moorish Moments in Granada

It's not only the Alhambra that gives Granada its distinct flavor of being not-quite part of Europe. Indecipherable signs in Arabic... tea-rooms serving sweet mint tea (and no alcohol)... head-scarved women in cover-all robes. Sometimes you wonder if you've left Spain behind entirely.

Walk up a ribbon-thin sloping lane called Calderia Nueva in Granada's Albaycin quarter, and it's almost like being in a souk in Fez or Marrakesh. Hole-in-the-wall-shops overflow with all the exotic treasures of North Africa: jewel-bright wraps and cushions... leather footstools... ironwork lamps... hubble-bubble smoking pipes... sticky pastries... Aladdin-style slippers with turned up toes. Thankfully the shopkeepers are not aggressively pushy like their Moroccan counterparts.

After more than 500 years, Arabs have returned from North Africa to Al-Andalus -- the name they give to Spain's Andalucia province. And they've specifically returned to Granada, the country's last Muslim stronghold which fell to the Reconquista forces of Ferdinand and Isabella in 1492. It ended both a dynasty and a culture that extolled art, poetry, science, music, and architecture.

Given the West's current suspicions about Islam, Granada brings welcome proof that Muslims and Christians can live together in harmony. One real estate agent I spoke with says the city now has around 15,000 Muslim inhabitants. If you visit Mirador San Nicolas with its incredible views across to the Alhambra, you'll notice there's now an Islamic studies center and a brand-new mosque beside the Catholic church.

Apparently Moroccan craftsmen toiled for seven years to produce almost a million colorful tiles to decorate the mosque's interior. Opened in 2003, its single whitewashed minaret looks across toward the Alhambra and Sierra Nevada mountains. What would Ferdinand and Isabella make of it? You can't help but wonder if these most Catholic of monarchs are spinning in their tombs in Granada Cathedral at the idea of the Muezzin's prayer call echoing from the Albaycin again. It took almost 800 years for Christian Spain to wrest the entire country back from Muslim rule.

On Santa Ana (a few steps from the tourist office), one of the old Arab bathhouses has also reopened. I can't tell you what it's like -- a steamy hammam bath when temperatures are still around 85 degrees at 8 p.m. is unthinkable -- but it's something to try in cooler weather. A bath, short massage, and aromatherapy starts at 17 Euro ($21). You need to reserve in advance: tel. +(958)229-978.

The Albaycin is a maze of small cobbled streets, some extremely steep. Climb upward from Calderia Nueva and the atmosphere of the North African bazaar soon gives way to that of a pueblo blanco (white village). You're back in more recognizable Spanish territory, with cats and geraniums, mysterious stone archways, the glimpse of a shady courtyard patio behind intricately carved wooden doors. And cafe-bars on tiny plazas -- there are still plentiful places up here where non-Muslims can sink a beer. Plaza de San Miguel Bajo is a particularly nice spot.

Steenie Harvey
For International Living

P.S. Granada still commemorates the Reconquista on Jan. 2, a public holiday. It's been suggested that the occasion should now be turned into a celebration of the three cultures (Christian, Muslim, and Jewish) who have lived in the city.