I had my first official meeting with the city when we were selected. They asked me if I could do the equivalent of the Sydney Opera House because they said — this was the Minister of Commerce, Jon Azúa, who’s still there — they needed this to be a generator, a commercial generator to bring people. What do you say to that? You say, “I’ll do my best, but it’s not a slam dunk. I don’t know if I can do it. I haven’t done it before but maybe.” When the building was being built, the city was skeptical, and there was one article in the paper, “Kill the American Architect.” That made me nervous. The separatist thing was going on and they didn’t like the idea of somebody coming in from Mars, and they didn’t understand what I was doing. This jumble of metal — ick! “What are you doing?” It’s only after they saw it, then everything clicked. I could live there for the rest of my life for free. If anybody sees me — I was in India somewhere in a plaza and some lady saw me. There was a group of tourists from Bilbao. I didn’t know they were over there. And she saw me, and she said, “Gehry, Gehry!” And they all came running and I was like the Pied Piper. I think it — obviously it worked. And I’m happy it worked. I don’t know why it worked. It’s a magic trick, I think. I did my best and that’s what came out. Since it’s opened, it’s earned close to four billion euros for a city, which changed the politics, it changed — there’s no more separatist. Whatever is left is very insignificant now. There’s a big smile on the community. The building brings in people.