And bones in our hair

This past summer, the Spanish Olympic basketball team took out a full-page ad in a newspaper showing all the players pulling the sides of their eyes so as to look "Chinese" as an expression of solidarity with the host city of Beijing. Americans were outraged, the Chinese less so, and the Spaniards simply confused. How, they wondered, was this perceived as racism? How, the Americans wondered, could it not be perceived in such a way?

On Thanksgiving, I was with a gathering of some Americans, a few other varied English speakers, and several Spaniards. At the end of the evening, as most guests were leaving, one fellow American brought up the concept of racism in Spain; he argued that Spaniards were the most racist people he knew. He cited the incident of the Spanish basketball players. In the midst of Spaniards, he was fighting a losing battle. They countered that their potential ignorance should not be misinterpreted as discrimination. Should they be expected to know the difference between Chinese people and Vietnamese people, they wondered, if they'd never seen representatives of either? Hoping we Americans would support him, he turned to us. Yet, at the time, I could not say I agreed with him. I couldn't support the idea that ignorance is an allowable excuse for racism, yet I doubted racism could be determined by the same gestures and terms from one country to another. Moreover, could it not be a form of racism to overlook the reasons for another set of cultural assumptions, taboos, allowances? Certainly, Spaniards are not politically correct in the cautious way of Americans; at times this can even be refreshing for me. Yet I am still thoroughly American, with an American's capacity to be offended.

Tonight at choir practice, our directory passed out a new song. One I had sung previously, in fact, in my church choir: Siyahamba, a song of Zulu origin. The women to my left--fellow altos, women I love dearly--laughed. "Zulu?" they said. "We should paint our faces black for the concert!" one said, doubling over. "And put bones in our hair!" said the next, gleeful. Blackface--unequivocally racist in the USA--is still featured prominently in Spain's Christmas celebrations, as children sit not on Santa's lap to ask for presents, but on the laps of the three kings, one of whom wears dark brown makeup to portray Balthasar (Caspar being European and Melchior Asian in Spanish folklore). However uncomfortable I was seeing these blackface kings, the jokes from my altos were much further over the line into inexcusable xenophobia. My personal line, clearly, yet a firm one nonetheless.

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.

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