We picked our Madrid Airbnb location to be walking distance from the Masorti (conservative) Shul which meets every Friday night.
After getting partially lost looking for the shul, we had a wonderful Friday night kabbalat Shabbat with the masorti community. They used different American conservative judaism tunes, both contemporary ones and classic ones (Yes, all Ashkenazi here in Spain at the masorti Shul. I was told that the Orthodox Shul has many immigrants from North Africa and was Sefardic). There were about 60 people there and every single person was busy singing, including the teenagers, and no shmoozing. And services were followed by an oneg with homemade challah and some tapas.
We enjoyed talking with some of the members and learning about the community. There were a couple of Israelis, some South Americans and many Spaniards who are Jews by choice and had converted in the Madrid masorti community. We heard stories from a few of them how they had always felt drawn to Judaism and as they learnt more about Judaism, they realized their families had some practices that were likely Jewish in origin and they likely descended from conversos (Jews who were forced to convert over 500 years ago with the inquisition). For instance, one woman I was chatting with (and is now doing a masters is sefardic studies at the university of Madrid), explained how her grandmother (and great grandma and going back for generations) lights two candies on Friday to the mother Mary, and always two candles even though in Catholicism you usually light 1 or 3, snd insists the house needs to be cleaned in the spring. And the matriarch in her husband’s family lives in a small town and insists (like the women in previous generations in her family) on washing the body of all the deceased women in the town before burial (like taharah). It was really interesting hearing from these different folks putting together pieces of their family history. And also interesting seeing this community trying to grow (now creating a cemetery), and provide for themselves and the younger generation (hebrew school, camp and a community day school). And like most shuls I know, there were kids busy playing in the room next door that parents periodically got up to shush.
There are now a few different masorti communities in Spain, but most places are without an organized Jewish community. People travelled far to be there with one Spanish family who drove 500 km to be at services.
Like all European Jewish communities, security was tight and requires advance coordination. As they knew to expect us, we got a lovely official welcome in Spanish. Really a treat. Looking forward to next Shabbat in Shul in Gibraltar.