Things I Will Desperately Miss

And thus, of course, here’s the follow-up list:

1. Patra’s knee-slapping jokes (I think there were 3 or 4 this year, and they were all gems)
2. Taking flamenco lessons in a bar, ie, doing as much drinking as dancing
3. Our terrace. Our terrace on perfect days, meals on the terrace, hanging laundry on the terrace, drinking sherry on the terrace at sunset
4. 300 children
5. Seeing one of my 300 children on the street and feeling like a star
6. Saying hello to all the old men taking their morning, afternoon, and evenings walks
7. Living in a cubist’s dream
8. Being halfway between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean
9. Taking Sevilla for granted since it’s just an hour away
10. Hearing Spanish every day, especially the awesome accent the old men have here
11. Being constantly inspired by the beauty of this town
12. Cheap tickets to everywhere else in Europe
13. Being serenaded by an incredible flamenco guitarist
14. Doing yoga in an old Spanish patio
15. The Friday market
16. Olive oil, organic eggs, fruit in season all year round
17. The cliff
18. Flamenco parties every Friday and Saturday (and spontaneous flamenco in the street)
19. The fact that everyone knows how to clap in rhythm here

This list is actually harder than the last, because many of the things I will miss aren’t as concrete as the things I won’t miss. That is, I will miss all the smells of this town, all the strange and beautiful things I see every day, I will miss the sounds in the streets of the old men talking, of bands practicing for Semana Santa, I will miss the feeling that everyone welcomes me in. And I will miss hundreds of people—Patra and Adan, Emma and all the Brits, Santi and the women we danced flamenco with, my co-teachers, the choir members, the shop keepers and café owners, all the townspeople I’ve become accustomed to seeing…and, as I said above, the hundreds and hundreds of children who I love more than I thought possible. But the year has come to an end and I don’t belong here anymore. Such is life. On to the next adventure.

Things I Will Not Miss

I leave Spain on Friday. Though I will be glad to see my family and friends again, leaving Arcos will be like ripping out a small piece of my heart. Thus, to make myself feel better, I’ve compiled a list of things I will NOT miss.

1. Having to wait for a day that is warm, sunny, and dry enough to do laundry (this day having to correspond to a day I wasn’t in school).
2. For that matter, the laundry machine and the long process of getting its door open (this involved a small silver spoon—the laundry spoon—that we used to jimmy the catch)
3. The ants that have taken over the apartment floor, coupled with the fact that I now sleep on the floor due to a broken bed-frame.
4. Relying on a small and inefficient gas tank for hot showers—and then hoping they’re not TOO hot.
5. Dubbed movies.
6. Trying to avoid bird poop while passing underneath the flying buttresses of St. Mary’s on the way to school (thereby avoiding being the object of ridicule)
7. Not understanding people a lot of the time.
8. Having a terrible internet connection.
9. The creepy guy.
10. The gray cat upstairs and how he’s always on the terrace when I’m wearing black clothes.
11. The piercing bark of the dog downstairs (and his young owner calling out “Blanky!” at all hours).
12. The construction that started just outside my window.
13. Feeling like an outsider.
14. Carrying groceries up the hill.

Um, I think that's it. Meaning that everything else currently in my life I am either slightly indifferent to or will desperately miss. Writing this list has only made me more aware of what I WILL miss. Shoot.

Happy April Fish Day!

While all you Americans are tricking each other with short-sheeted beds, saran-wrap on toilets, and telling your trusting children that it's a snow day (I'm looking at you, Dad), the French are busy with another equally exciting tradition today: fishing each other. Although I myself have never been fished, I hear it requires the utmost skill and the result is utterly hilarious: children (and perhaps adults?) attempt to stick cut-outs of fish on each others' backs. And they're completely confused why anyone would go further than that when it comes to mischief-making on the first of April.

Spitting Image

This year, I've thought a lot about spitting. In my "about me" for this blog, I say something about "learning to spit like a Spaniard." Unfortunately, alliteration took precedence over reality in that instance. In truth I find the custom disgusting. In the United States I can forgive when a runner spits into the grass as they're passing by. I can understand when a tween spits in front of his friends to look cool. I don't find either situation particularly pleasant, but not horrible either.

Here's how it plays out in Spain: I'm walking to school. I near an old man. He's got a tickle in his throat, starts coughing vehemently. "What to do with this phlegmy gunk, now loosened?" he thinks. "Well, why not expectorate in the direction of that nice young woman coming closer? Better out than in, after all." He spits, nearly missing my shoes, wipes his chin, and smiles at me. "Buenos dias, guapa!" And a good day to you too, sir.

Bread Sins

"Lunch" is provided for the teachers at my school during recess. Due to the Spanish eating schedule (no food at the beginning of the day, a piece of toast with coffee at 10:00 am, a large family meal at 3 pm, and a dinner meal at 10 pm) lunch consists solely of toasted bread and hot drinks. Every school day at 11:30 am, there is a rush on the one toaster in the teachers' lounge, which is inconveniently placed in the corner of the room, on top of the microwave (to which there is a similar rush for heated milk, coffee, and water for tea).

One day last fall I decided to forgo the long wait, and buttered a piece of un-toasted bread. The looks my actions were met with were completely horrified. Bread, un-toasted? How could someone consume such filth? I might as well have been eating an uncooked piece of meat, still dripping blood (on second thought, that might have been more acceptable). After that experience I never consumed another piece of un-toasted bread, at least not while anyone was looking.

Yesterday I stayed at school after lunch to plan a lesson and avoid the rainstorm outside. The butter, jelly, and pate that are offered as toppings for toast had all been put away in the refrigerator, but the bread was still out. I placed a slice in the toaster. When it was done I didn't want to be a nuisance and dirty up a just-washed knife, so I began to munch away on my piece of toast. Once again: looks of horror. "Why are you eating a piece of dry toast?!" cried one teacher, while another quickly assured me that there was still butter and jelly available (implying: for the love of God, just put something on your bread!) I sighed and walked to the fridge.

In the future, I will remember to prepare my bread properly or face the consequences. I can only imagine what must be said about me: "that foreign girl, wherever she's from, sure is a weird one. You'll never guess what she was eating today!"

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.

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…

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...

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?

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.