Bar Exam

Like a lot of guys who have no idea what to do with their lives, I´ve decided to open a bar. The bank said that if I stick to a strict savings scheme, I´ll mess up my first beer on October 24, 2038. Stoked.

But how many bars have you walked into only to walk straight back out again? Time after time, I see beautiful, empty, million-dollar bars. (The reverse is also true, of course. Old 'locals' are still falling victim to a new, hipper breed of dive). Makes me sad. All that effort...someone´s lifetime dream wasting away under forty grand´s worth of lighting. And often there´ll be another bar just a few doors down, teeming with life even though the power to its old forty-watters was cut the week before.

So what attracts people to a place wall-papered with eviction notices, crunchy with cockroaches underfoot? Well, yeah, the drinks are cheaper, but if price was people's only concern, there'd be no room for the funky little cocktail joints that seem to pop up all the time. I think its more about environment. Just as some of us need toilets as clean as our starched collars, some of us feel most comfortable in more...lets say...organic surrounds. Some people like the bar equivalent of a London (picture a sleek, cold, minimalist concrete job with U.V. lights beneath the bar mirrors and finger-print I.D. on entry) and some prefer to visit Barcelona (more your old wooden floorboards, peeling ceilings, abusive bartenders and ancient resident labrador). The former could be seen, in its obscene luxury, as an escape from life, the latter an immersion in it.

Personally, I prefer a place where everyone's welcome, providing they pass the health and safety act. My bar will not have someone checking brandnames at the door. Maybe I'll even be able to do without a bouncer. Nothing against bouncers at all, but I'd like to think that whatever I do create makes people feel better abut themselves and each other rather than worse.

What are your favourite bars? Why? Can you identify anything in particular about them or is it just a 'vibe' thing? Can the 'vibe' be entirely created, or does it depend on who walks through the doors each night? Live music? Happy-hours? Themed toilet stalls? (Nothing like taking a piss surrounded by images of James Brown,'Too Funky in Here' blasting from the micro Boses). What are some of the more memorable details of the bars you've been to? One of my favourite bars over here has lampshades made from a variety of old, battered hats. Another has plastered the wall above the mens urinal with random bits and pieces from the internet. One has a hundred picture-frames on the wall. All the frames are empty. Another is merely very, very old. Another lets you bring your guitar along to destroy Marley numbers with a dozen other try-hard rastas. There's one where each step on the staircase is a piece perspex-covered art.

Yep, Barcelona is full of bars to suit wallets fat and anorexic. The nightlife here is amazing. But if you want to make the most of your time here, don't assume you'll stumble across the best joints, which tend to be hidden away in some fairly intimidating lanes. Come to the HelloBCN Bar and we'll point you in the right direction. Don't worry. We're not going to send you to places we have deals with. We're not paid for the recommendations we make. We've been here a year now, and while we haven't seen it all, we've got a pretty good idea of what's around.

And when you're really struggling for a buck, why not try the best bar of all. The streets. All night, enterprising Pakistanis and Indians sell cans of Estrella for one euro. Get a bunch of mates together, grab some tinnies, explore the city by night and wake up to the sun as it hits Barcelonetta beach. But please... leave your money and passports at the hostel.