This post is part of our Love Letter<\/a> series: first-person accounts of what we love about Madrid.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photo Credit: r2hox<\/a>, Text Overlay: Devour Madrid Food Tours<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By my count, I\u2019ve lived in six different neighborhoods of Madrid. Some more central, some further away, but each with their own character. This year, though, I made a big decision: to finally move out of the \u201ccentral almond.\u201d This strangely-named district, which takes its name from the oval area within Madrid\u2019s circular motorway, is a big deal to madrile\u00f1os<\/em>. For a major European capital city, life in Madrid still revolves around its historic center. Live inside the almond, and you\u2019re in the heart of the action. Move outside it, and to a decent number of locals, you might as well be in Cuenca. That\u2019s not how I see it, though. Because a lot of what\u2019s most exciting in Madrid right now is happening outside the center<\/a>. And nowhere more so than my neighborhood: Usera.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As prices rise in the historic center, there\u2019s been a lot of talk in Madrid over the past few years about where will be the \u201cnext Lavapi\u00e9s:\u201d the next rough-around-the-edges neighborhood to become an arty hotspot. Usera is one of the main candidates. But that\u2019s doing the area a disservice. Firstly, because it glosses over the problems that gentrification can cause for less well-off districts. And secondly, because it implies that Usera needs to change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Usera is everything I love about Madrid: not particularly pretty, a little chaotic at times, but brimming with energy and dynamism. One of the city\u2019s most diverse areas, over a fifth of the population are foreign-born. Most prominent are the Chinese and Latin American populations. Needless to say, that makes it one of the best places to eat anywhere in the city. Sometimes it seems like every available space in Usera has been taken up by eateries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n