How to Not Get Robbed in Sevilla

Step One: Avoid going to Sevilla.
Step Two (Assuming you've bypassed Step One): Avoid the most touristy locations.
Step Three: If you must be a tourist, at least avoid these locations at siesta time (3-5 pm) when the only people out are tourists and thieves.
Step Four: If you must be in a touristy location at siesta time, certainly keep track of your personal belongings at all times. For instance, avoid looking away from your bag, especially if you do not have an arm through the straps (scratch that: always have an arm through your bag straps, no matter what).
Step Five: Avoid being distracted by things like seeing your boyfriend for the first time in three months.
Step Six: Enjoy the peace of mind you now have about not being robbed in Sevilla!

Of course, I did this research the hard way and, as Mom likes to say during Mini-Golf when the colorful ball narrowly misses the hole, I wuz ROBBED. (Echoes of Mom's gangster "You wuz ROBBED!" now usher forth). Patrick, the aforementioned hadn't-seen-him-in-three-months-boyfriend, and I were in the Plaza Espana around 4 pm, we were eating truffles, and some guy distracted us with some bullshit question about directions while his pal made off with my bag. I noticed immediately and Patrick took off running. I stayed behind with Patrick's stuff in near panic ("Oh shit, my wallet...oh shit, my cellphone...oh shit, my iPod...oh SHIT my passport"). A few minutes later, Patrick reappeared disheveled, bagless. Then a shout from behind him, he went off running again, and reappeared a minute later, bagful. I almost cried with joy. Did I actually cry? It's likely. Everything was in my bag except my wallet, which was something I could deal with losing (no credit cards, not much money, etc).

Patrick explained, as we, exhausted, found a bus back to Arcos (good ol' safe Arcos) that he chased the thief across extremely busy streets of traffic and hedges, shouting "Thief!!" extremely loudly all the while. When the thief dropped my unnecessarily heavy bag (thinking he'd made off with the most important thing by taking my wallet), some kind shopkeeper noticed and made sure the bag got back to Patrick.

So, Step One of How to Deal With Getting Robbed in Sevilla: Find a hero and keep him close by.

It's beginning to look a lot like...

Christmas in Arcos: Celebrations start over a month in advance. Sometime in mid-November, Patra and I wondered at the "Felices Fiestas" sign that had just been hung over the entrance to the old town. We weren't sure if we'd missed notice of a November party. But no, it was just early felicitations for the late-December holiday season.

Since then, decorations have gone up all over town, and different restaurants have sponsored parties almost every Friday and Saturday night. These parties feature flamenco singing in the streets, free anise, and bunuelos, which are little heaps of fried dough, basically doughnuts but less wholesome (seriously--they're just sizzled fat; even the smell of them gives a normally healthy person heartburn). Based on the number of these parties we've frequented, Patra and I could be said to be fanatics. Last night we went to a party in our neighborhood, one that didn't even seem connected to a restaurant. Just a neighborhood block party with someone frying dough and other people shaking tambourines in a circle, clapping hands, and chanting the Christmas songs of Arcos. We were given "hot chocolate" with our bunuelos, which had the consistency of a thick soup. Sore stomachs for all!

And although the weather has been temporate lately (usually mid 60s during the day), just as the calendar was turning over to December, a midnight thunderstorm turned into hail, which collected in small white piles in the street outside my window. I can't say I'm dreaming of a white Christmas, but it's fun to pretend...

Andalucian Christmas carols in front of an old convent

But at least I saw Africa...

The theme of my last blog has come true much too often in the past week. Immediately after I wrote the blog I went to flamenco class, expecting to, well, dance. Instead, we discussed the nature of male-female relations in Spain in the present day and what to do if we know someone who's being abused in their relationship (at first I was disappointed not to dance, but then I realized that this conversation was invaluable cultural insight). Then this week, flamenco class was replaced with drinks at a nearby bar. Also a form of cultural insight? Continuing on that flamenco-not-working-out theme, Patra and I went to Sevilla yesterday to see a show featuring Antonio "El Pipa," the teacher of the class we went to in Jerez (see "Rain, Dance"). And it was sold out. But in each of these cases there was a valuable replacement for the activity I expected to do--serious conversation and then drinks with my dirty-joke-telling flamenco classmates (all women over the age of 50), Sevilla nightlife and fabulous tapas.

I'm still looking for a lesson in my travels (travails) of today. I boarded a bus at 4:30 in Sevilla that was supposed to go through Jerez, from which I would take a bus back to Arcos. At about 6:00, I began to realize that Jerez was not in my bus driver's agenda. We went past the city, to be sure, but failed to stop anywhere nearby. The saddest part of the ride, besides the immediate knot that tied up my innards as I came to this realization, was when we passed a turnoff marked "Arcos." I tried to silently will the bus driver to take that turn, but my psychic powers of persuasion failed me. The driver had only one destination in mind: Algeciras.

Let me give you some perspective about Algeciras. Rick Steves sums it up best: "Algeciras is only worth leaving." My Lonely Planet guide describes Algeciras thus: "The major port linking Spain with Africa: an industrial town, a big fishing port and a drug smuggling centre....unattractive and polluted." Then later the guide continues: "Be alert in the port, bus terminal, and market in the evening." And where was I headed? First to the port, and then the bus terminal. In the evening. I felt not a little nauseous.

Eventually we arrived, I waited in the brighest lights of the bus terminal, calmed my nerves by talking to Patrick, then later talking to Patra and Mom, and got on a return bus to Jerez (one that would actually stop there!). In Jerez I had to catch a taxi to Arcos, which was pricey but worth it to return to my own bed and hot shower, and Arcenses singing in the streets. In general, I can't say a lot of good came out the unexpected journey south. But there were a few moments when I was on the return bus to Jerez when I looked out my window and the lights of Tangiers, Africa pierced the night sky from across the water. Africa, so close that signs in Algeciras are in Spanish and Arabic, and on board my bus I heard the music of Moroccan French mixed with Arabic and Spanish (while meanwhile the Mexican-looking man across the aisle from me was reading "For Whom the Bell Tolls" in English).

As Mom reminded me during our conversation, it can be frustrating to have plans spoilt or expectations frustrated. But in the wreckage (in this case, of my nerves and wallet), there are equally unexpected joys. And perhaps that's the lesson: the beauty present in these situations is all the more poignant.

Always the last to know...

I’m living in a haze of misunderstanding, and it’s not always due to my lack of fluency in Spanish. One of the phrases I have heard most often in my school is, “Oh, no one told you?” This has been followed with endings such as “…that we’re having a party tomorrow?” “…that we don’t have class?” “…that we don’t have school on Monday?” etc etc. Sometimes it turns out to be a nice surprise: I found out that I don’t have my weekly English conversation time with teachers tomorrow since they’re having a fish fry instead (and thus I can use the class I already planned for them for next week).

Sometimes, though, it’s more of a panic-inducing surprise, like when I went outside today to meet up with Ana, whom I assist in her first-grade English classes. Instead of Ana standing at the front of the line, Javi-the-gym-teacher was there.

“Where’s Ana?” I asked.
“Not here,” he said, shrugging (the implicit message: “no one told you?”).
“Oh…so are you doing P.E. with them now?”
“No. You are the teacher! You will do the English lesson!”
“WHAT?!”

Luckily Javi stayed with me for the whole hour, because my Spanish is definitely not good enough to control a roomful of screaming five-year-olds. The first few minutes were a little scary, though, because Javi kept asking me where different supplies were in the classroom—teacher’s book, CD for listening exercises, flashcards—and I didn’t know. But we found all these things, and soon got the kids on track (the nice thing about five-year-olds: activities need not be very difficult to keep them entertained; they spend their days counting, coloring, gluing, and singing). By the end of class we were having so much [educational] fun I almost didn’t want to leave. With all my frustration of feeling constantly out of the Spanish loop, being with the first-graders is the best reminder of why I love this place and this job so much.

Who knew eggs could be so vicious?

This is a menu from a restaurant near my apartment, Meson Don Fernando. There's Spanish on the left and English on the right to cater to tourists..once again, I doubt a native English speaker was used as an advisor. Here are some of my favorite translations:

"Table of bread with tomato"
"Cheese of sheep old man"
"Croquettes of the grandmother"
"In a mess (untidy) of pudding rice"

AND the winner:
"Attacked of fantasy of mushrooms of ham Iberian"

Note: the dishes, respectively, are a bread basket, aged sheeps' cheese, croquettes (done, I'm assuming with a recipe from someone's grandmother), something like a stir-fry, and scrambled eggs. Scrambled=attacked? I'm not sure where the fantasy comes in...

Childrens' Rights Day

Today, all the third graders of Arcos got together to celebrate "Childrens' Rights Day." This meant painting a banner (Juan Apresa's banner was painted hurriedly the day before, mainly by teachers--including yours truly), and playing games to demonstrate different rights.

Javi, the gym teacher, and I ran the Africa station. We put the kids in small groups to create Tanagram puzzles; one of the children was supposed to cover their eyes with a blindfold (which, of course, no one had) and the other children had to guide the "blind" child in putting together the puzzle. The game was pretty wack, and much more difficult than anyone had anticipated. At least, maybe, it taught the kids that they should help those less fortunate than themselves...The wackness of the game gave me plenty of time to take pictures, though. Without further ado, here are some of my adorable 3rd-graders:


Our Africa banner: I painted the two A's and the F!

One of my favorites, Alejandro in the yellow shirt; he reminds me of the mouse in Cinderella that's joins the mouse posse at the beginning of the movie

The kids join together in a big circle to sing; also, the China station

Two of my favorites in the front: Jose Manuel and Jesus (Jesus is in "the Animal" shirt)

One of my third grade classes. Adorable!

Que vistas mas bonitas...

In the absence of news, I give you views:

A view of the Arcos cliff from down near the bus station

The castle and Cathedral of Santa Maria in the background

View of the Cathedral of San Pedro from my terrace

View of the lake and mountains beyond from my terrace

Practicing my buleria steps on the terrace

Daily News and the Palace of Time

And now, dear readers, I must tell you about “Daily News” a.k.a. The Bane of My Existence for the Past Month. Basically, “Daily News” is a comedic play written in English. However, whether “Daily News” can be qualified as a play, a comedy, or written in English are all up for debate. I would say it’s none of the above.

I was introduced to this masterpiece [of idiocy and poor grammar] soon after I arrived at my school in October. At first I was excited, hearing that I would be going to a play in Jerez with the sixth-graders AND the play would be in English! However, as soon as we started explaining the plot and reading through it, I realized that the play, in a word, sucks. The following week, to my dismay, I found out the fifth-graders were going, too, so I would have to work on the play in THOSE classes as well. Just last week, as the fifth-grade teacher and I were listening to the last few scenes on the CD, she turned to me.

“This is really bad, isn’t it?” She said, shaking her head.
“Yes…it’s pretty awful. They obviously didn’t use a native speaker as an advisor.”
“And such a shame, considering how many plays they could have chosen.”
“Yeah…” (inside my head: OH MY GOD, OBVIOUSLY, AHHHHHH, I KNOW).
“Well, that’s the Spanish way. They just wrote it themselves and it turned out terribly.”

Needless to say, I wasn’t too keen on going. The other day during lunch-break, however, I was talking to the principal about it. “Well,” she said, “You could go with the sixth-graders; they’re going to the Alcazar of Jerez afterward.” My eyes lit up. “Or,” she continued, “You could go with the fifth-graders. They’re going to a…how do you say…a museum. With clocks. There are a lot of clocks! Some old…some new.” I think she could see how fast my smile faded. “Maybe you would like the Alcazar better,” she said, and I nodded with relief.

Even with the prospect of seeing another alcazar (the word for fortress; though some are more famous, like the Alcazar of Sevilla, they are prevalent throughout Andalucia), I still was a little apprehensive about the horror of sitting through “Daily News.” At least, I reminded myself, after today I would never have to hear about it again.

After a bus ride to Jerez filled with excitement (which I gauged by the amount of screaming and picture taking done by the kids), we got to the theater, which was really just a school hosting the play for several bilingual classes. We got seated and the lights went down. There was so much screaming that they waited a few extra minutes for the students to calm down before starting the play; when they realized the kids wouldn’t stop screaming, they just started the play anyway. An unexpected dance routine opened the act, which made me hopeful. Then a sign was brought out, reading “Daily New,” and I lost hope. Retrospectively, I think there was once an ‘s’ on that sign, but it fell or broke off, and they figured the Spanish schoolchildren wouldn’t know or care about the difference.

As the play went along, I found myself actually entertained. This was a mixture of enjoying random songs, dances, and fight scenes that the actors added (definitely not in the entertainment-is-low-on-my-priority-list script) and just witnessing the general ridiculousness of the play live. Permit me to give you the briefest of summaries: there are 4 characters who work at a news station. The boss, Alfie, is in love with Chloe and thus has given her the job of chief news presenter, thereby taking the job away from Rupert (described as a “talented immigrant”), who is jealous. Chaos and comedy ensue! Oh, and the fourth character? An amorphous assistant named Jack, so amorphous that the director of today’s version changed this character to Jacqueline without having to make any further changes to the play.

Afterward, the kids asked me who my favorite character was and I said Chloe, mainly because the actress was the only native English speaker (in a play where the characters all criticize Rupert for his “terrible English”—pot kettle black?) and thus she was the most natural with the dialogue. The kids all agreed and one little boy told me he was in love with her, which was unsurprising given that the actress was tall, blonde, and very pretty (a moment of vanity: one of the girls said I looked like her. I definitely do not, but maybe to a young, undiscerning Spanish girl, all American blondes look the same). Also, the actress wore a very tight dress with slits up the side and pranced around in very high heels (and—could it get any campier?—at one point she walked slo-mo across the stage with a fan blowing her hair back…and then she did it again). Consequences: At least one eleven-year-old fell in love; several Spanish teachers deemed the play “inappropriate.”

We walked through the streets of Jerez to the Alcazar, a 12th century fortress built by the ruling Muslims of the day. We saw the Mezquita (the chapel), the gardens, the Arab baths. It was a fine Alcazar, but I guess I’ve just become an Alcazar snob. After visiting the one in Sevilla, anyone would be. There was one cool part, though. The guide brought us to the front entrance of the fortress, which was, as expected, a ginormous arched opening where once a huge wooden door hung. BUT, that wasn’t the door to the exterior. No. A fairly narrow winding corridor led to the outside door. Would-be conquerors would first have to get through that door; if they used a battering ram it would run into stone just a few feet beyond the opening, and if they tried to charge in on horses afterward, the horses would be similarly smashed against stone. Defenders had plenty of opportunities to pour boiling liquids, rocks, or arrows on their heads once they were in the corridor. Also, the entire fortress and city of Jerez was surrounded by a high wall made out of local rock. This being fairly arid land, the wall blended in to its environment well, and most conquering armies wouldn’t have realized a city was there until the defenders were already well aware of their presence (and firing arrows). Thus, the Alcazar was a stronghold for many centuries.

Even for an Alcazar snob like me, I was impressed by the history we were surrounded by. I thought of those poor fifth-graders who were surrounded by…clocks. Back on the bus and leaving Jerez, though, a saw a sign for the “Museo de Relojes” (Clock Museum), and in bigger script above that, another title: “El Palacio del Tiempo.” Literal translation: The Palace of Time. Sure of their own mastery, Spaniards write plays in languages they might not fully know, and give the most grandiose of titles of the most banal of places. The truth is, it’s easy to understand why they are so proud, with all the ingenious architecture and beauty that covers the landscape, where the idea behind single door is both revolutionarily brilliant yet utterly simple in construction. If only they weren’t too proud to put on Tennessee Williams plays…

Our elections=the world's elections

No matter how you feel about the results of the elections, let me assure you that Spain (and most of the world, I believe) is ECSTATIC.

On Halloween night I speaking to a woman at a bar and as soon as she heard I was American, she immediately made sure I had voted. She said to me, "Spaniards feel like your elections are our elections. This year, there's so much excitement and hope."

On All Souls Day, I talked to a British woman, who expressed the same sentiments. "The United States, for better or worse, is still the leader of the free world; we're all looking forward to your elections," she told me. She, as well as all the Spaniards I talked to over the past week or so, were sure Obama's lead in the polls meant a definite win. With all to consider, such as the results of the past two presidential elections and possibilities of a McCain resurgence on election day, I told them not to be surprised or disappointed if things didn't turn out as they wanted or expected.

Yesterday, I arrived at school dressed in blue and white, and told my students that the day was extremely important in my country. Some of the students knew why, and knew the names of the candidates. Two of my fifth-grade boys called me over at one point to share an Obama cheer they had come up with. I finished my day in nervous anticipation of the results, which would not come until the early hours of my morning.

At 5 am I woke up suddenly, grasping desperately for my cell phone (perhaps telepathically sensing news?) Five minutes later, a friend in Minnesota called me. He had been watching the results, but told me he couldn't watch anymore. My heart, still half-asleep, was beating wildly. He couldn't watch anymore because the liquor stores were closing soon...and he had to buy champagne. I went out into our darkened living room where Erika was sleeping. I woke her to tell her the news, and we checked NYTimes on her Blackberry. McCain had just conceded the race. Patra came out into the living room, having heard our exclamations. We turned on our seventies-era TV around 6 am just as Barack Obama was walking onstage to give his acceptance speech. Straining our ears to catch his words underneath the Spanish translation, we were filled with joy. After he was done speaking, Spanish political commentators and news presenters tried hard to hide their grins as they repeated the news and showed clips of watch-parties throughout the world--Madrid, New York, Seattle, Kenya, Paris--all filled with people jumping, shouting, crying, hugging, singing, dancing.

Today, I feel proud to be an American.

The Flamenco Project

Before I left home, I got an information sheet about my school, CEIP Maestro Juan Apresa (CEIP stands for Colegio de Educacion Infantil y Primaria…I trust you can translate all those words pretty easily), including contact information and a tiny blurb about Arcos. At the bottom there was a line titled “special information;” following this designation was “This school has a flamenco project.” This, as might not surprise you, was exciting for me. But what would a “flamenco project” entail?

As it turns out, almost no one at Juan Apresa is completely sure either. Most of the teachers have little knowledge or interest in flamenco; one teacher told me she actually has a strong dislike for flamenco singing (I nodded politely, meanwhile thinking, “Are you kidding me, lady? This stuff is incredible!”) The flamenco project is basically a pet project of one teacher, Paco, whose passion happens to be all things flamenco. Paco is an elderly man—old enough, in fact, that he should be retired by Spanish regulations. He stays on at Juan Apresa simply because he enjoys teaching and because he wants to impart his love of flamenco to his students. He has set up flamenco guitar lessons after school for interested students and is teaching his fifth-graders the different categories of flamenco songs (I got overwhelmed by looking at his worksheet of classifications—there were at least forty different types of flamenco music listed).

Today, though, was a special treat. Or, at least, a special treat for Paco and me and perhaps a few of those students who are as in love with flamenco as we are. Paco invited a guitarist and singer to come perform for the fifth- and sixth- graders. I sat in the back, completely enthralled (and, at times, half-heartedly admonishing noisy students, though I doubt the look of utter joy on my face did much to intimidate them or assert my authority). The singer was a woman in her late twenties who was very beautiful as she was introducing songs, but whose face contorted with pain when she began singing. She also incorporated all the flamenco hand movements and general body language with her singing. After a half hour of Jenna-paradise, the woman announced that they were about to perform their last song. This was to be, she said, a “buleria.” She sang, she sang, and then…she danced. She got up and did the buleria steps. And I recognized them. She did the llamada, and I recognized it, the signature buleria “tiro-tan” as my dance teacher calls it, and I knew it, and the entrance and the exit…the whole sequence was familiar to me. I was beyond excited. Why? Because I am not a dancer. I am not a person who knows much about flamenco. But this was something, a small piece of the enormous puzzle of Andalusian culture that I now know how to place.

All Souls

Once again, the whole town congregated in one place today, so Patra and I naturally had to be there; this time we convinced Erika to go along. Under forbidding gray skies, the three of us made our way down from the old town, up past the new town, and into the municipal cemetery. Families were flocking through the gates with flowers in hand, or purchasing bouquets from the extensive supply being sold outside.

Inside, the space around the white tombs burst with color and noise. Hundreds of Spaniards had come to clean the headstones of their ancestors and leave red, white, purple carnations, lilies, roses. I felt a little guilty at being a tourist of sorts at this personal ceremony of remembrance, and the camera I had brought with me certainly did not come out of my bag. However, the general atmosphere seemed more joyful than sad—I saw three of my students, and they all waved at me and grinned hugely. We felt somber at the far end of the cemetery, though, where hundreds of spaces wait for bodies to fill them (caskets here, as in most of Europe, are stored aboveground). We noticed that a few of the slots had been very recently filled—as recently as October 23rd—and the families who came to visit were understandably more freshly grieving. The rain started then, and we left that quiet part of the cemetery to once again enter the bustling aisles of the dead—people pushing and praying and saying hello to neighbors and cleaning and arranging flowers. We didn’t exactly belong, but we felt lucky to be accepted as part of the mass.

Halloween at the Cathedral of Peter, the Mother of God

Patra and I went to a concert tonight held at once of the two main cathedrals, La Catedral de San Pedro. We tried to convince Erika, Patra’s friend who has been visiting this past week, to go with us.

“What kind of concert is it?” Erika asked.
“We don’t know,” we responded.
“Oh…then why do you want to go?”
“Because it’s a concert! And it’s happening here! An event in Arcos AT NIGHT!”

She wasn’t convinced. Patra and I shrugged our shoulders. We were still extremely excited that something was going on in our own little town and, what’s more, it was happening five minutes from our apartment (no hike to the side of town for us!) We wandered over to the cathedral in the light rain, orange light brightening up the dark old buildings; the town was certainly Halloween-atmospheric.

Inside the cathedral, Patra and I recognized at least a dozen people. Teachers from both of our schools had showed up, and the other English language-assistants in town were there. After waving and giving double-kisses all around, we felt suddenly that Arcos was indeed our town, that we were no longer foreigners. We took our seats and gazed up at the ornate ornamentation of the nave, this being the first time we’d been inside the cathedral. Inside gold-leaf embellishments were paintings of saints and angels. Near the ceiling a statue of Jesus stood helping a small child. Below this statue, and directly above the altar, was a statue of Peter, looking perhaps somewhat perplexed and abashed at his central location in this cathedral. I’ve heard that the two cathedrals in Arcos once asked the Vatican which would be recognized as the official cathedral of the town. The Vatican sent its response: La Catedral de Santa Maria. The parishioners of San Pedro were so upset that they removed any signs of Mary from their own cathedral (contemplate that for a second: Catholics without Mary!) and to this day they pray to Peter, the Mother of God.

The concert, to my disappointment, had nothing to do with Halloween. Of course, this shouldn’t have been too much of a surprise, but I was hoping the music might be in a more minor key. The good news, though, is that it turned out to be a choral mass, mostly Mozart, which meant that I had sung at least one of the pieces before. I talked to the director afterward and he invited me to join the choir right away, overjoyed at the thought of one more alto. I happily accepted; while Arcos was masquerading on Halloween as a happening town, and Saint Peter stood uncomfortable in his eternal costume as the Mother of God, I was finally able to imagine myself in a role I’m already familiar with: a singer. So, if you’re in Arcos on the night of December 16th, hit up the choir concert! It’s gonna be hopping…

Snow country

Winter has suddenly descended upon Spain. On the evening news: Swirling snow in the mountainous regions, snow in front of doorways, snow impeding slow-moving cars…and Spaniards in t-shirts looking out of their windows in surprise.

My reaction to the newfound chill in Arcos: I thought this country was supposed to warm!
Spaniards’ response: We did too!

The Christians and the Pagans

In preparation for this week, I was listening through a CD I brought with me of Halloween songs, stories, and sound effects appropriate for children. The only song that seemed like it could work was “Dem bones,” since the third-graders are working on parts of the body (the head bone’s connected to the what bone, children?) But I wasn’t so sure about the line “Oh, hear the word of the Lord.” I know my kids have “religion” class (learning the tenets of Catholicism), but I didn’t want to step on any toes.

Today with the sixth-graders, however, I got a little clearer on Spanish understanding of religion. I was reading aloud a description of the history of Halloween, which began with a section on the pagans’ role in the inception of the holiday. Lola, the teacher, questioned the students if they knew what “pagans” were. They didn’t. They weren’t familiar with the word in Spanish, either.

“Pagans don’t believe in God,” Lola explained in English. “Christians and Pagans—they are opposite words.”
“Uhhh, ‘opposite’?” I thought, feeling my politically-correct self cringe.
“You understand the meaning of ‘Christian’?” Lola asked. “Christian is Catholic, catolico, you know?”
Luckily, I’d been forewarned about this assumption, that Christianity and Catholicism are one and the same, so no major cringing there.
“And God, you know the meaning of God?” Lola asked, unintentionally philosophical.
The children looked on, blankly.
“You pray? You pray to God?” Lola asked, pressing her hands together in prayer.
A child raised his hand: “Ahh, fantasma!”—the word for ghost. (Not, incidentally, the word they would use for the ‘holy ghost’).
Lola got slightly exasperated. “Not ‘ghost,” God! Dios! I can’t believe you don’t know the word God!”

I suppose “Oh, hear the word of the Lord,” wouldn’t have upset any public-school administrators in this country…

La Policia?

I was on the phone when Antonio, our landlord, came to our apartment to fix a light. I let him in and, after a brief salutation, went to my room to talk. I heard Antonio speaking in the kitchen; I assumed he was calling his son Francisco, who sometimes comes by to help Antonio fix things. A few minutes later I wandered into my living room to find two men in police outfits—black boots pulled up over black pants, black jackets with reflective vests, and “Policia” visors.
“La policia?” I exclaimed. There was a split-second when I tried to think of anything I might have possibly done wrong. After that moment of panic, the policemen turned to me, smiling.
“I’m his son,” one of them said to me, gesturing to Antonio.
That was comforting, but didn’t actually explain why they were in my apartment in full riot-gear. They provided no further explanation, but left soon thereafter.
“Antonio!” I said, after they were gone, “That was quite a surprise!”
“Oh yes,” he replied, “I have two sons.”

The Wild Cats of Cádiz

Another early morning: Patra and I once again try to obtain our residency cards.

We took the 7:15 am bus to Cádiz, the capital city of our province; also, the oldest city in Europe. “Cádiz?” you might say, “But I’ve never even heard of Cádiz! How can that be the oldest city in Europe?”

Perhaps you’ve heard of Hercules? Legend has it Cádiz was founded by Hercules when he parted Europe and Africa at the strait of Gibraltar. No big deal. History would have you believe the Phoencians founded Cádiz in 1100 AC (what does that mean? My map’s information says AC instead of AD or BC. Damn these Brits!) I prefer the Herculean version. Also, a guy on his way to India (known to us as Christopher Columbus) set sail from Cádiz in 1492. Needless to say, Cádiz has had an important place in history.

Back to our own epic journey, though. Just as the sky began to fill with light, our bus crossed the long bridge to Cádiz (surrounded by water on three sides). We stopped at a seemingly random intersection and several people got off. Thinking of last week’s stop in the middle of nowhere, I grew nervous (to quote our prez: “Fool me once…don’t fool me again!”) As we pulled away I saw a street name, Avenida Jose Leon de Carranza, which rang a bell. A few blocks later when the bus stopped again, I looked anxiously at Patra. “I think we get off here,” I said. She frowned, but followed my lead. Only after we disembarked did I remember the actual street name where we were supposed to get off: Avenida Ramon de Carranza. Once again, this burst of inspiration occurred as the bus was pulling away. This time, though, we were no longer on it. Oops.

We reoriented ourselves—luckily we’d both printed maps of the city beforehand—and started walking briskly up a main street. It was only a little after eight a.m. when we began walking, and thus my mistake wasn’t too costly; we arrived at the correct office at a quarter to nine, still fifteen minutes before it would even open. I was feeling hopeful; there were only a few other people in the office ahead of us. Also, in the past week, I made several more copies of just about every document ever given to me having anything to do with Spain: I made copies of our apartment lease, my Spanish bank account information, the page in my passport with an exit stamp from Mexico (what does that have to do with Spain? Nothing! But you never know…). We were Prepared.

At a few minutes past nine, Patra and I sat down with two immigration officers and pulled out our application sheets. They shook their heads. “No,” they said. Wrong sheet. I had a minor heart attack.

They handed us new forms, which we filled out as quickly as possibly in the office. This was fairly easy to do since the new form asked for EXACTLY THE SAME INFORMATION as the form we had first presented. Oh, except we had to check a box on this one indicating that we were the ones studying/working in Spain, not the relative of a person studying in Spain. Which is, I’m sure, extremely important.

Having filled out our new documents, we raced out of the building to find a place to make a single copy (of course, they couldn’t just give us two identical sheets to fill out). Finding the place to make copies closed, we entered a store in which we saw copy machines. The copy machines, as it turned out, were not for the general public since the store was actually an office, but a woman there took pity on us and made one copy each of our application forms. We hurried back to the immigration office and had to wait behind two or three people who had showed up since we’d left.

In that time, I noticed a poster on the wall with smiling people of different ethnicities pointing at the camera. The inscription read “Somos inmigrantes, como tu!” (We are immigrants, just like you!) I have yet to verify this, but I think Spain is fairly lenient about immigration. In the past two decades or so, it has become a popular destination for immigrants now that it’s generally recognized as a first-world country. The sign seemed cheery enough, but I felt a little indignant. “Me? An immigrant?” Oh right, I was at the immigration office…still, it felt strange to be identified with a word that is certainly loaded in the US.

Once again, we sat down with the immigration officers. This time, everything went smoothly. They took one copy each of: our application forms, our two letters from the Andalusian government explaining our work situation, and the information and visa pages of our passports. Five pieces of paper in all. We left the office relieved, but weighed down by the extra hundred or so unnecessary copies we still had.

After a quick croissant at a nearby café to celebrate our soon-to-be legality, Patra and I parted ways. She left for Seville by train to meet up with a friend, and I wandered the streets of Cádiz. Past the ruins of a Roman amphitheater, past the yellow-domed cathedral that you’re sure to see first in a google-image search of the city. Here I was walking along the coastal wall, large boulders on the ocean-side to fend off the tides. The sun was out, palm trees lined the sidewalk, I was feeling successful…and something started to smell fishy. Not a huge surprise, since I was next to the ocean and, up ahead of me, several fishermen cast their lines into the water. But then I looked down: the rocks below the wall were crawling with cats. And just ahead: a man down among the cats, setting out water and food. He left a trail of empty tinfoil—greasy with the remains of fish—and satisfied cats.

As infestations go, this one didn’t seem too bad. Not as cute as an infestation of koala bears certainly, but nothing like rats. I continued down the walkway toward the beach. After the land ends, a path along a breakwater continues out to the ruins of a castle on a tiny island. I took out my camera and framed the shot with cats in the foreground. After taking two pictures, I realize one scrawny black cat was advancing on me with eyes flashing. One black cat might not have been able to do much, but a herd of several hundred? I know what happened to catwoman; I’m not interested in superpowers. I continued on to the beach to stick my toes in the Atlantic once more.

On the way back from the beach, I saw the cat-man catapult himself from the rocks below onto the dividing wall. He walked off as though there was nothing unusual about the company he’d been keeping for the past hour or more. A lone cat sat on wrong side of the wall, the side reserved for people. As he passed it, I wondered if there would be some recognition between the cat and the hand that feeds it, but no. I wondered: does he name them? Does he love them? Perhaps this city inspires men to do to crazy things, things that can be hard from which to divine meaning: to divide land masses, to conquer what’s beyond the horizon, to tame a starving mass of clawed animals into submission.

Cats watch me warily...also, the ruins of a castle in the ocean as background

The cathedral of Cádiz...can you spot any cats in the foreground?

The cathedral from the front

Garrrborr

Last night I had dinner with a few other Americans in town, a Canadian, a Brit, and three Spaniards. One of the Spaniards, a gym teacher at my school, wanted to tell me the activity he was planning for this morning.

“We use garrrborr,” he said to me.
“Kickball?” I guessed.
“No,” he said, “garrrrrrrborrrr.”
“Garrrborrr?” I said, “You mean…cardboard?”
“Yes! Carrd-borrd!”
“Why did you say it so strangely at first?” I asked.
“When I want to be understood by Americans,” he explained, “I don’t open my mouth as much. I just speak lazy.”

To the beat of their own drummers

And even more perfect: a flamenco class is held Tuesdays and Thursdays in the same school building as the yoga class. The class is mostly middle-aged women, who start dancing and moving their hands however they want when the mood strikes them. During breaks, one will start snapping and stamping her feet and move to the center of the room to perform who-knows-what steps. Then she’ll move back to cries of “ole!” and the next will move forward to do her own dance. Either that, or the instructor will put on “sevillanas” music at the breaks, which is a dance that the Andalusians learn from infancy (there are sevillanas classes at my school for children aged five and older). It is not a difficult dance, but, since all the women know the steps already, I have not yet seen it broken down into its separate parts and therefore do not know how to do it. The women seem to consider this a moral shortcoming of mine. They drag me into the dance at every break, ignoring my refusals, thinking that I’ll get it if they just keep yelling numbers at me and pointing at their right or left foot while stomping away, or yelling at me to turn a few seconds too late every time so that I always run into someone. Luckily, I pick up the flamenco steps pretty quickly so I feel decently competent the majority of the time.

And, what’s more, little Maggie-the-Brit comes to watch us; the Spanish women adore her, pinch at her cheeks, pull off her little pink sandals and exclaim about their cuteness and slip them back on her feet. If only I could be as unfazed by this gaggle of Spanish women as Maggie is…

yo-GA, yo-GA, yo-GA

I have found a yoga class. What’s more, it’s right across the street from my apartment. It’s held in an elementary school, a gorgeous old building with a small square plaza in the center surrounded by white arches. The school is an awesome combination of old and new; a basketball hoop hangs in the corner of a corridor bordering the plaza and bright plastic desks are enveloped in white-tiled halls.

The instructor is a British woman, Emma, who moved here with her husband and now owns a guesthouse nearby. She led the class in a combination of English and Spanish, refreshing my vocabulary for parts of the body. A dove flapped by as we were in the warrior pose, the poetry of which was not lost on me (Spain never ceases to present poetry as reality, or vice versa).

And running around us as we held our poses was Emma’s four-year-old daughter Maggie, an adorable little creature with bright blonde hair and a British accent (it should not surprise me that a child of British parents would speak with a British accent, and yet it still seems so unbelievably precious). I thought back to yoga class that I fell in love with this summer, held in a heated studio, blocked off from the noises of Grand Ave by the instructors’ jazzed-up background music. This, completely different, seemed even more perfect.

Night and Day

Some of my students have an interesting grasp on geography. This morning, one girl asked me if it was nighttime in my pueblo at that moment. I said yes, excited by her understanding that other parts of the world exist in different time zones.

“Then,” she reasoned, “you must be very tired.”

Kodak Moments

This town likes to take advantage of all the times I don’t have my camera with me. Living in between the two main cathedrals of Arcos, I have now seen elderly people carrying gigantic, ornate silver chalices and purple velvet banners through the streets several times. I suppose they want to get the silver polished before the Christmas season…

Then this afternoon I was in the Plaza del Cabildo, the beautiful heart of the old town, with a gorgeous view off the cliff. I had been sitting in the plaza for a while, reading and writing and listening to the multilingual babble of tourists. I headed back to my apartment down a narrow winding street and, rounding a corner, suddenly came across a group of several dozen Spaniards in their late twenties all dressed up in tuxedoes and ball gowns. None was an obvious bride, the men outnumbered the women at least two to one, and they seemed fairly nonchalant about their dressed-up-ness. I felt as though I’d come across a herd of giraffes, not only because they seemed so out of place, but also because there was nowhere for me to go to escape the incoming tide; I feel like giraffes are a type of animal who wouldn’t go out of their way to hurt you, but would just as easily kick you aside if need be. I found a shallow doorway to protect myself in, and the Spaniards strolled past, seemingly unaware of my presence or my narrow escape from the high-heeled herd. After they passed, I ran back to get my camera and returned to the Plaza del Cabildo not five minutes later. The Spaniards were nowhere to be found, and nowhere to be heard. The party had moved on, and I was left—as I so often am in this town—bewildered and once more reminding myself to always have a camera on hand.

The Sea, The Sea!

Today was an early day, as Patra and I set off to obtain residency cards. This must be done at an Oficina de Extranjería (immigration office), of which there are only two in the province of Cádiz. It also must be done within thirty days of your arrival in Spain; I had been here 20 days already and Patra was at something like 23. We chose to go to the office in El Puerto de Santa Maria, a town on the beach with a reputation for being awesome. The bus to Puerto, though, left at 7:20 in the morning so we were up much earlier to get ready and make it to the station on time. Luckily, this time we didn’t have to walk in a downpour. It was somewhat eerie to walk in Arcos while still dark, though, as the white town is awash in an orange glow from streetlamps at night.

Once on the bus, we traveled west toward the Atlantic. The moon was like an overripe winter melon in the sky, rotting at the bottom. Mist clung to the fields; lone farmhouses stood as though without foundations.

From this dreamlike beginning, the industrial entrance of Puerto was a shock. The bus stopped by an unimpressive bus shelter just before a busy roundabout. Expecting an actual station, I didn’t get out of my seat. “Jenna,” Patra said, “This is our stop.” I got off the bus with grave misgivings. We scanned the map at the bus shelter for Avenida de la Constitución, where we were supposed to find the office, but couldn’t find the name anywhere. We asked a woman seated at the shelter; she said she may have heard of the street, but she really couldn’t be sure. We went across the street to the train station and asked for directions there. Following those directions, we ended up ten minutes away at Avenida Diputación. The man hadn’t understood us. We looked at the map in Patra’s guidebook, also lacking Constitución. We decided we would walk in the general direction of the historic part of town, since there was, at least, a tourism office where we could hopefully get a better map of the town.

It was nine-thirty when we arrived at the tourism office, which didn’t open until ten. There were women directly inside the office and we poked our heads in as politely as possible to ask if they could just give us one map. “We open at ten,” they said abruptly, then shut the door. We asked a woman on the street if she knew where Constitución was. Her eyes opened wide. She told us it was possible to walk, but very long and complicated. Downtrodden, we went to a café and ate croissants until ten. Back at the tourism office, a much friendlier man showed us maps of the town and pointed out all the highlights, as well as a ferry we could take to a neighboring town if we wanted. Desperate to get to the immigration office, we thanked him and asked if he could just show us how to get to Constitución. He pointed it out—maybe five or six blocks from where we were. Neither long, nor complicated.

We arrived at the office a little after ten; already the waiting room was filling up. I recognized one girl from our orientation in Sevilla and she told us that this office required you to have a copy of your every page in your passport, as well as extra copies of your information and visa pages, and any other pages with stamps on them. Flustered, we hurried out of the office and to a nearby copy center. Back at the immigration office a few minutes later and several pounds more paperweight in our bags, we found that six or seven people had showed up since we left, thus surpassing us in line. We sat down to wait, like all the rest, for the one woman handling all of our cases.

After about an hour, the girl we knew was called in to the office. She emerged, triumphant, twenty minutes later. We congratulated her, feeling all the more closer to our own eventual success. We did sudokus to pass the time, read up on the news from the US in Spanish, and kept counting down the people until it would be our turn. In Spain, you don’t take a number or sit in line. You enter a room, ask “Quién es el último?” (Who’s the last one?) and keep track of the line in your head. This system, for the most part, works just fine. Also, you become more aware of everyone around you, begin to put them in a hierarchy based on their timeliness.

It was getting close to our turn, when the one woman handling immigration cases decided to take a lunch break. This was deflating, but I still had hope. There were three people ahead of us. If each one took twenty minutes, and the woman came back by twelve-twenty, then we would definitely get a chance to give her our paperwork. I felt bad—but also a little smug—about the people who were showing up just now. They had no chance of getting into her office before two, when she would close for the day. The woman came back from lunch at about twelve-fifteen and we were back in business. One appointment before ours lasted only five minutes. When we were finally next in line, I told Patra that I had been getting nervous, but at least now we had nothing to worry about. No coming back to Puerto for us!

We entered the caseworker’s office, sat down. I pulled out my application form and handed it to her. She looked over it for a few moments, then said, “You live in Arcos?” I confirmed this, thinking maybe she would say something about how beautiful the town is. “I’m sorry,” she said, “I can’t process your papers. You have to go to the office in Cádiz.” I felt slightly comforted by the fact that she used the phrase “Lo siento” for us. This is taught to Americans as the equivalent for “I’m sorry,” but it’s much stronger than the casual way we sometimes use our own apologetic phrase, much more full of regret. At least, I thought, she wasn’t just a jerk.

Patra and I left the office. We’d waited for over two hours just to be turned away. What’s more, we hadn’t been aware that there would be any division between who has to get their cards processed in Cádiz or Puerto.

At least, we agreed, it was a beautiful day. And we were exploring a new town, albeit what we saw the most of was the inside of a government office. Walking past a fruit store, Patra stopped in for a pomegranate to cheer herself up. My consolation was the ocean. It was easy enough to find, just a few blocks from the immigration office. Past hibiscus bushes and dunes, we came upon a wide expanse of beach. We rolled up our pants and took off our shoes and felt the sand give way beneath our toes. We wandered to the water’s edge and waded in. As soon as the first wave slide over my feet, I felt completely rejuvenated. So the day didn’t go as we had planned. So we will have to go to Cádiz next Friday, our last possible day to register for our residency cards. None of that mattered when I realized that I am alive, I am living in Spain, and the ocean is just forty-five minutes away from my cliff-top town. The day once again became dreamlike, and this time it wasn’t interrupted.



(My feet in the Atlantic! At last!)

Rock, paper, scissors, bing-bong fuera!

Thursday, my first gym class with the second-graders. I am amazed at how often children fall down. Running seems to be a generally new concept for these seven-year-olds. Tag becomes a violent sport, though the contact involved is between victim and asphalt below. Knees are scuffed, hands scraped, and yet the children get back up with smiles even larger than before they fell.

After tag is rock-paper-scissors, which the gym teacher tells me is good for working their arm muscles (in Spain you hide your hand behind your back, then punch it forward). I learn the Spanish words--Piedra-papel-tijera, bing-bong-fuera!--and teach the children the English words. First I teach a group of four children. Then four more add themselves on. Then a few more, and a few more, until I have a circle of twenty-five children around me, the rock-hands pounding the scissor-hands, the scissor-hands chopping at the paper-hands, the paper-hands grabbing the rock-hands, and the fire-hands incinerating them all. Fabulous chaos ensues. It is the happiest classroom moment I´ve yet had.

Se llama copla

Apologies to those fans of American Idol, but I´ve never counted myself amongst your ranks. I think AI, and most of its international doppelganagers, encourages spectacularly crappy singing and gives untold masses inflated hopes about their own blah voices. Admittedly, some of the contestants over the years have been good, but what´s the point of adding one more wailing voice to the overly electronic and uninspired music that is so popular today?

That being said, I love the Andalusian version,"Se llama copla" (copla being the word for traditional flamenco songs). The contestants are given a flamenco song every week to work on, and perform it complete with frilly dresses, flamenco hand movements, and voices that waver so much I expect them to actually burst out in tears at any moment. And after each one sings, the other contestants stand to applaud and stamp out a flamenco beat perfectly in unison with each other.

The fun part is that, "Se llama copla" being specifically Andalusian, small towns have taken on contestants as their personal cause. In Arcos, I have seen several window signs promoting a female contestant named Rocío and reminding passersby to vote for her on Saturday nights. In Puerto de Santa María, a town on the ocean, the signs are all for Nico. I can only imagine a Minnesotan version in which St. Paul would back Sven, Duluth would fight for Lena. But what would they sing?

In one of our orientation sessions about Spanish culture, the instructor talked about different understandings of time. In the United States, we reward innovation, always look toward and plan for the future. Spaniards, in general, concentrate more on the past, on keeping alive traditions and remembering roots. Therefore, the contestants on "Se llama copla," all of them in their mid- to late-twenties, are familiar with and already love the flamenco songs with which they´re presented every week. I must admit, I am jealous of their heritage, jealous of traditions that date back centuries. Meanwhile, on American Idol, contestants sing "classics" from the 1980s...

And we named them and it was...good?

The sixth grade English teacher and I decided to rename the children. For all the Franciscos, Antonios, and Mari-Carmens, we chose good, solid, English names. "Frank, Anthony, Mary," we wrote, crossing off their names in the attendance book.

Presenting the names in class, however, led to mixed results. Some of the children beamed at their new names (especially, I must say with pride, the girl who became Jennifer); others made faces when I told them how their new names were spelled (Sergio, who became Sean, was confused at how S-e sounded like S-h...I shrugged my shoulders). I chose the name "Hannah" for the Fátima in each of the sixth grade classes, thinking the vowels, at least, were similar. I doubted the children would be familiar with the name, showing my ignorance for the widespread effects of popular current American culture. As soon as I spoke the name Hannah, children in both classes erupted with cries of "Montana! Hannah Montana! Hannnnnnah Montannnnnna!!!!!!" (If you don´t know who that is, consider yourself lucky). The two Fátimas, both somewhat shy, blushed with the attention. I hoped they at least were Hannah Montana fans.

A José in one of the classes became Josh, since we already had a Joseph (José María) and a Joe (José Juan). This time there were yells of "Josh Bush! Josh Bush!" With a Spanish accent, Josh and George do indeed sound pretty much the same. While trying to explain that the two names sound very different to English speakers, I did at least feel glad that the Spanish children were aware of Americans other than a teenaged Disney star.*

Meanwhile, my own name constantly confuses well-meaning Spaniards. The most common pronunciation is something like "Chain-a" or "Chen-a" (really not too far off). In flamenco class, however, one woman decided that my name is "Sana" because that was easier than what I was trying to tell her. Perhaps I will revert back to the name I was given in my second-grade Spanish class. From now on, I´ll tell everyone to call me Juanita. Juanita Lafín.

*I can´t say I´m any better at being culturally aware. While Barack Obama makes the evening news in Spain for campaigning in red states, I am just now learning the names of the Spanish president and Spanish celebrities. Although I scored points with the sixth-graders for telling them my favorite soccer team is Real Madrid (the only Spanish team I could think of), I had to go with David Beckham when they asked me my favorite player. Well, he used to play for Real Madrid...

Closed Mondays

My dad often wears a T-shirt from the Minneapolis Institute of Arts (or is it the Walker, Dad?), the front of which says simply, "Closed Mondays." This is true of the MIA, that it is closed on Mondays, but people often assume this to be a personal slogan of my father´s. They nod their heads in agreement, say "Totally, Dude, me too," give him the thumbs-up.

The T-shirt would be very appropriate in Arcos. Okay, I understand the Spaniards like their siestas and thus everything is closed between about 2 and 5 pm. I don´t mind a little afternoon downtime either. And I understand that Spain is historically very Catholic and thus everything is closed on Sundays. That´s all right, I can prepare for the upcoming school-week on Sundays. But I get hungry by Monday! On Mondays I want to start the week off with fresh vegetables and a new loaf of bread! The supermarkets simply shrug their shoulders. "Eh," they say, "Come back Tuesday."

Green grapes

I was eating grapes for breakfast this morning. They were incredible, much better than any grapes I´ve ever had in the US--juicier, sweet like plums, yet still obviously grape-like. They also have seeds.

This led me to a question: Are the grapes in Spain simply superior, or are they better because they have seeds? And then: What do we sacrifice in the United States for the sake of efficiency?

Rain, Dance

Yesterday I went grocery shopping in Barrio Bajo (Lower Neighborhood, ie, downhill from my apartment on the cliff). I got lost coming home, the advantage of living on a cliff, however, is that as long as I was walking upfill I knew I was pretty much going in the right direction.

The disadvantage of living on a cliff becomes apparent during rainstorms. When it rains lightly, the stones in the paths become slick and dangerous. When there´s a downpour, like today, the town turns into a whitewater-rafting course.

Patra and I discovered this as we tried to navigate our way to the bus station. We were determined to get to Jerez de la Frontera, a near-by town, to try out a flamenco class, and thus we set out with one raincoat (mine) and one umbrella (hers). Almost immediately my feet were completely soaked, due in no small part to the small river that rushed past our front door. We were to find--and cross--several more rivers speeding downhill, shooting around corners, spraying off of the tops of buildings. Only when we were just over halfway to the bus station (normally about a twenty-minute walk) did we remember we could have taken a taxi. Ah well, we thought, on with the adventure.

When we were just two blocks from the bus station, albeit two blocks uphill, we came to a flume (formerly a street) with mud at least six inches deep coursing its way downhill. Patra and I looked down at our shoes. We did not want to cross here. We skirted the river down along the sidewalk, looking for a shallower and narrower place to ford. Some of the mud-river spilled onto the sidewalk and sprayed up in fountains when it met with streetlights. A few frantic Spaniards were tipping an old picnic table own to fend off the muddy water from flooding their store.

Finally we found a spot where the river was only two or three feet wide and went for it. Luckily, neither of us slipped or splashed a large stream of mud up onto ourselves. We made it to the bus station with a few minues to spare, and began wringing out our sopping clothing as disapproving Spaniards looked on ("Why didn´t you drive?" they asked, and, "Why did you walk in such a storm?")

It was not raining in Jerez, though we saw acres of flooded fields on the way. We looked for dry clothes to buy for our flamenco lesson, but there are a few trends in Spanish fashion that we are not yet used to (more on that later), and we didn´t find anything quite right.

The flamenco class was in a lovely studio owned by a man named Antonio, nicknamed Ël Pipa,¨who has festooned the place with posters and larger-than-life still shots from performances he´s done. At noon, when the class started, there were five of us; Patra and I were hopeful that Antonio would make the class a little easier, knowing that two-fifths of it was just beginning. As we started the warm-up--balletic arm-movements and the classic flamenco hand-movement known as "la flor," or "the flower"--two more women came in with a nie- or ten-year-old boy, who I assumed was just a son accompanying his mother for lack of anything better to do. They all went off to change and were soon back. Antonio nodded, and gestured toward the little boy, Cristian. Cristian came to the middle of the room and continued the warm-up while Antonio looked on.

Shit. This kid was good. As was everyone else around us.

I began to realize HOW good when we started the footwork. Imagine how fast you could possibly make your feet go, then speed that up, oh I don´t know, a hundred times. That´s what we were contending with, trying to learn from. It was almost impossible to learn the steps by watching anyone´s feet because they were moving too fast. Patra and I fumbled around for the next hour and a half, picking up only the parts that didn´t deal with moving our feet. At the end, Antonio "El Pipa" came over to tell us that he thought we´d had a good class. This assessment was based mainly on the fact that at no point during the two hours had we sat down. I guess that´s good (the most important part of learning something is the magnitude of one´s desire to learn?) but I´m still not sure if that means I learned anything.

As I rode the bus back to Arcos I imagined one of those montages that occur in just about every movie ever made about sports, where the protagonist (or team under the coaching of the protagonist) starts out miserably, unable to catch the football or winded after a lap around the field. Then come the shots of practices after dark, rehearsals with bloodied limbs, running in the rain, always looking determined.

I guess, in our montage, we´ve already got the rain scene.

Spain Day

The Spanish love their holidays.

Today as I walked home from school, I heard music coming from the Plaza del Cabildo, one of the best look-out spots in town. I wandered up that way to find women dancing flamenco, free wine and tapas in tented booths, and antique cars around the perimeter. While sampling the free wine and storing away free fruit for later, I found out that today is "Tourism Day" in Arcos. I might have seen a few tourists, but the majority of the people in the plaza seemed to be Arcenses (the demonym for people of Arcos), all chattering, butting each other out of the way for the food, dancing in the center whether or not they were in full flamenco regalia.

Now I have a four-day weekend, already having every Friday off from school. On Monday, Spain celebrates Spain Day and therefore none of the schools or businesses will be open (as far as I can tell). I can´t wait to see what Arcos comes up with for THAT celebration.

The British are coming!

During orientation in Sevilla, there was one session in which a Spanish woman told us to “be careful with your American words.” The Spanish prefer their English learning to be done in the Royal British tradition, which I say is complete bollocks. Today at school I realized more than ever the difference between American and British English.

My sixth grade English classes were working on school subjects and school utensils. Lola, the teacher, encouraged the children to shout out vocabulary they already knew to get them started. For school subjects, the children said: “English! History! Maths!” I thought Lola would correct them, but she wrote that plural up on that board like it was completely normal. I wondered if I should say something, and then I saw that their book also had it written as a plural. I held my tongue. I guess “mathematics” is plural, so why not the shortened form? Well, because it sounds ridiculous.

Then we moved on to utensils. Again: “Pen! Book! Pencil! Book! Rubber!” That one made me cringe. Sure, these kids probably won’t travel to the United States any time soon and ask for an eraser in the stores, but if they did they would get some VERY weird looks.

So we know vocabulary is different. Not a huge deal. But then at the break time, I was in the teacher’s lounge talking to a woman named Inma who has a very strong British accent. Her English is so good I was lured into thinking she actually was British until later, when she launched into a rapid Spanish conversation with coworkers. She asked me about my education and I told her I “majored in English.” She looked completely lost. I explained that a major is like a concentration, specialization, main area of study, whatever. She nodded, but still looked very concerned.

“I just don’t understand,” she said, “why you would study English. Where is the job in that?” She looked extremely flustered.
“Well, for instance, I’m, you know, teaching English. This year.” I hoped that would make some sense to her, but it didn’t.
“But afterward?”
“My concentration was in Creative Writing…”
She finally looked relieved. “Ah, so you’ll be a journalist or something like that.”
“…Yes. Yes. I want to be a journalist.” I left it at that.

I forget sometimes how uncommon the American system of liberal arts universities is. I felt grateful, though, that we are not required to decide what we want to do with the rest of our lives when we are only 12 or 14 or even 16. Hurrah for the American allegiance to a lifetime of being noncommittal! If I’d had to choose a career when I was in elementary school, perhaps I would have chosen to be a maths teacher. And, in other countries, that’s not something you can just rubber out.

Primeras las guapas

I have become slightly more accustomed to Spanish catcalls. Now that I’m living in Arcos, however, I often think to myself “I might be your son’s/niece’s/friend’s schoolteacher” when someone makes a comment in the street. Not that the comments are particularly rude. Usually they consist solely of the word “guapa” (pretty girl) or slight variations (I heard “guapaguapaguapaguapaguapa” the other day).

In school today, I noted that the boys might be conditioned from a very early age. As it was my first day, I came into classes and introduced myself, and then the children asked me questions that they’d been practicing.

In a fifth grade class:
“What’s your name?”
“My name is Jenna.”
“What’s your favorite color?”
“My favorite color is green.”
And then, from a little boy in the back:
“What’s your telephone number?”
“Uh….”

I said it anyway to them practice with hearing how numbers are pronounced. At least a few wrote it down.

In a sixth grade class, I entered the room, told them my name was Jenna, and a little boy shouted out “Jenna, princesa!” There were many questions of the “What’s your favorite….” variety. Nothing too scandalous. One boy did ask me if I was married, though. At the end of the class, he came over to me, shook my hand, and said, “Pleased to meet you” while batting his eyes. 22 is a little old for a 12-year-old, buddy.

All in all, though, it was a great first day. I loved the students and my coworkers are extremely friendly. I was feeling totally happy as I walked home from the school, hardly noticing anyone else passing in the street. As I was walking up a tiny sidewalk, a man on a motorcycle was coming down and had to stop to let me by. I smiled at him in thanks and he replied, “Primeras las guapas.” The English equivalent might be “Ladies first,” though usually that isn’t used in a salacious tone. I suppose “Beauties first” is a more accurate translation. But hey, if it means I get right-of-way on the sidewalk, or a few more boys will pay attention in class, I guess I’m okay with that.

In the street of the vaults

The problem with having built up such a romanticized notion of Arcos before coming is not only that I seek out quintessential—or perhaps stereotypical—Spanish places and experiences, but that the town so eagerly provides (the motto of Arcos, in fact, is something like “Where dreams become reality”). I say this is a problem because, when it comes to apartments, my roommate Patra and I were looking for something very specific. We didn’t just want an apartment, no. You can live in an apartment anywhere. We wanted an apartment building with plants in the entryway, azulejo tile up the stairs, a beautiful view, and a neighborhood that would remind us every day that we were somewhere different. No matter if our daily walk to school is thirty to forty minutes long and definitely uphill both ways.

The moment we walked into the apartment on Calle Bóvedas, we immediately felt at home. There were plants, tile, a family on the first floor with a little white dog named Blanquito, a red roof-top terrace with a stunning view of the lake, mountains, and bell towers of Arcos’ cathedrals. Our apartment has floor to ceiling windows, barred in by distinctly Spain ironwork and uniquely vaulted ceilings that I’m sure my architect dad will appreciate (I’ll send you a picture soon, Dad!)

The benefit of living in a smallish town is that we saw the apartment, went to see another few, and decided that we were happiest with the first. By the time we’d made our decision, Angela, the woman who’d shown us the first apartment, had left her home (which she also showed us). We talked to her son briefly, who gave us Angela's number on a piece of paper from a pad distributed by Viagra. Then we wandered back into town to get something to eat and happened to run into Angela on the way. We pretty much made our deal there, in the middle of the street, next to a cathedral several hundred years old.

Today we met with Antonio, Angela’s husband and our landlord, to sign the contract. He seemed to be delighted by the fact that Patra has dark hair and I have light hair, calling us “la luna y el sol” (sun and the moon) and “la rubia y la morena” (the blonde and the brunette, more or less). Then he proceeded to discuss our marital prospects for the next hour or so (including his disappointment that his son was already engaged, thus making him unavailable to us) before finally letting us start to move things in.

But now it’s ours for the next eight months, our own beautiful piece of Spanish architecture, a home that is both our dream and our reality.

I've got friends in high places

From www.casacampana.com:

“Local legend has it that Arcos de la Frontera was founded around the time of the great biblical flood and was built originally by King Briga, Noah's grandson, some 2000 years before Christ.

On the same site the Romans later founded the town of Arcobriga, a name which derives from the Latin word 'Arx-Arcis', meaning high fortress.

Following the Roman age, the Moorish period is considered the most important in the history of Arcos de la Frontera (the Moors called it Medina Ar-Kosch) during which the town was incorporated into a kingdom of Spain called the Caliphate of Córdoba.

During the 13th century the site occupied a decisive and dangerous position on the border between the Moors and the Christians, hence the suffix 'de la Frontera' ('of the Frontier'). Ferdinand III, who was then the King of León and Castille, took control of the town and changed its name from Medina Ar-Kosch to Arcos de la Frontera, a name it has kept since then.”

As you can see from this historical information, everyone wants to be in Arcos. And why do they want to be in Arcos? Because of it’s strategic location of being perched high on a cliff. And what does that mean for me? Sore leg muscles. I have yet to find a horizontal street in town. Good for defending territory against the Moors, bad for flip-flops.

Cliffhanger

I've never been on a blind date, but I felt today as though I was in the same type of situation.

I boarded a bus in Sevilla bound for Arcos and sat anxiously as the bus meandered through other small white towns on the way. First came the town of Espera, which translates to "wait" or "hope," both of which I was doing at that moment: waiting and hoping for something better. Nothing against Espera, but it's tiny and the school's playground that we passed was pretty run-down. I wouldn't want to teach kids with low morale due to rusted monkey bars. Espera did have a nice fountain, though; I'll give it that.

Next we passed through Bornos. Also white, also nestled into a hillside. Some nice horses but no castle. Once again, I breathed a sigh of relief that I would not be spending the next 8 months of my life there.

Which is where my metaphor somewhat falls apart. On an actual blind date you have the option of fleeing the scene when you realize the guy wearing the red rose in his lapel was once the kid who peed his pants after he was assigned to be your square dance partner. Or, if you're on the American TV show, Roger Lodge will make fun of you for a half hour, but then you're free.

Really, my situation was more of an arranged marriage. I'd seen pictures, but I hadn't yet fallen in love and was worried that perhaps I never would. That is, would I like Arco's personality? Would it be too honest or too laidback or too stuck in its ways?

To be honest, when I saw Arcos I was somewhat disappointed. The majestic view is from the south and we were arriving from the north. I'd been nourishing myself on grandiose and romanticized views of the town (fueled mainly by this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=it1okjvUu0U) and the reality of its appearance just didn't seem to match up to my expectations. A problem, since I'd been going on appearance alone (like finding out Prince-Arranged-Marriage-Charming has a tooth missing when he first smiles at you--too many metaphors?) As the bus neared, I kept thinking "Maybe this isn't it? No, this is definitely it. Maybe not? No, there's the castle. This is definitely it."

The road we followed wrapped around the western side of Arcos and the more dramatic side of the cliff began to come into view (okay, so Prince-Arcos-Charming might be missing a tooth, but if you look at the right angle, you can't even tell. Actually, his teeth are pretty white...). I felt excited again.

Now I'm in Hotel Los Olivos, in a private room with a terrace that overlooks the view to the south. I can imagine the Rock of Gibraltar out there past the stretches of windmills, and Morocco just beyond that. The breeze blows Mediterranean sea salt through my hair. I'm beginning to think I could love this place, even with any flaws I may soon find. Or maybe it will really be perfect, as the guidebooks advertise.

Maybe I'll find out my Prince Arcos-de-la-Frontera is great at talking about his feelings.


The view from my hotel room's terrace

Goodbye to Sevilla

1. At dinner tonight we learned that the horn players and drummers from the other night actually were practicing for Semana Santa. Apparently, they start practicing when they are very young, and then THEY JUST DON’T STOP. Ever.

2. Also at dinner, we asked for tap water to drink. I hadn't known the term for this, but my friend said it was "agua de grifa." Thus, I asked the waiter for agua de grifa.

"Not here," he said, smiling a little too widely. Red flag.
"What did I just say?" I asked him (he spoke fairly good English).
"Marijuana water."

Note: The correct term is "agua de grifo."

3. The Plaza de España is muy muy bonita:




4. Mis chicas Sevillanas: Patra, Colleen, y yo

Inside the fortress

Sometimes in life you encounter something very beautiful, so beautiful that you interpose a camera lens between you and the experience in front of you. Whether this captures the memory of the experience forever or negates the possibility of that experience is debatable. For me, picture taking can become frantic when every turn presents an incredible new scene, as though digital memory is more important or long lasting than sensory memory. Today, though, I couldn’t help myself; I took something like 60 pictures. For your consideration: the Alcázar of Sevilla.

Out of our hotel and into a tourist video

I arrived in Sevilla, Spain on Sunday afternoon. It was not until tonight, however, that I felt I’d truly encountered Spain…or at least an American cinematic version in which study abroad students go to a foreign land and discover something important about their 20-year old selves to the tune of a lone classical guitar.

First, dinner with two friends in the barrio of Santa Cruz, the old Jewish quarter: we strolled down impossibly narrow alleyways to come upon tapas bars bordering every hidden plaza, cured meat hanging in their bright interiors. We ate instead in what could have once been a Jewish crypt; lanterns hung from six-sided star openings in arched ceilings. I had pizza.

We then wandered toward Sevilla’s fantastic cathedral. And this is where is got theatric. Horse-drawn carriages clopped around the perimeter, lovers huddled under palm and pomegranate trees, and a man perched just beyond a gazebo with his amped guitar, picking at flamenco melodies.

It has been strange to be in Sevilla for an orientation program that has not yet interacted with the city. Tomorrow we will tour the Alcazar and go to a flamenco show. So far, though, our information sessions (covering housing, reality in the Spanish classroom, how to open a bank account, etc) have all been held in the hotel and our meals have mainly been here as well. It’s not that I didn’t feel I was in Sevilla, it was that I felt I wasn’t here because of Sevilla. In truth, I am not. Soon I will be traveling to Arcos de la Frontera, in the province of Cadiz, and there I will spend the next eight months or so teaching English. But to be in Sevilla for a few days already and not to have felt so obviously in need of a stereotypical Spanish experience is strange. Luckily, the night continued to provide.

After the cathedral, we headed west toward the river Guadalquivir. On the way we got our first—ahem, appreciative—remarks from Spanish men. Nothing too fancy, just “guapa” (beautiful) and “qué visión” (what a vision). We continued on, past the bullfighting ring to the water’s edge. Just south stood the Torre del Oro and, from about there, came the sound of snare drums. “Marching band practice?” we wondered and approached the tower. At the base of the tower were about forty men—and one woman—standing in a circle. About fifteen of them had drums and the rest were on some sort of horn, a sort of high-pitched trumpet. They produced the kind of eerie, gut-wrenching sound you would imagine might accompany the Virgin Mary in a solemn procession during Semana Santa. Except that it was a Tuesday night in September, and most of the guys leaned against car hoods or stone stairs leading down to the tower. As we were leaving, a couple of the horn-players had branched off and seemed to be done with the jam session even though the music was clearly not over. We were thinking, Monday-night-poker-night, Tuesday-night-solemn-klezmer-sounding-and/or-Catholic-processional-horn-and-snare-practice-night? In any case, I appreciated the music wafting back to us for several more turns down narrow alleyways, carried along with the scent of orange blossoms.

We passed two more guitarists in the streets on our way back to the hotel. And then drunken Spaniards in one of their picturesque parks. And finally, perhaps the best pick-up possible: just as we’d crossed a street, a garbage truck turned the corner and a man hanging on the end in his bright orange vest signaled to us that we should hop on for a ride. Spain, could you be any more Spanish?


The Giralda of Sevilla's cathedral after dark

The Torre de Oro where band practice occurs