¿Cómo se dice "sheepish" en español?

So, um... yeah. I kind of neglected this blog for a month. I swear I've been busy! I've finished my Intensivo, a month-long grammar course (4 hours a day, 5 days a week) and started in on regular classes. In addition to POE (grammar) and Spanish Culture/Civilization, I'm taking 20th-Century Spanish Lit and Art History from Baroque to Present. I've also been traveling a bit; my program gives us three or four free days every now and then to travel, so I've gone to the Parque Nacional de Doñana, Cádiz, Tarifa, and Gibraltar. Unfortunately, since my three-month-old camera decided to die on me, I don't have digital photos to post of the trips. Thanks a lot, Canon... the thing literally stopped working the moment I stepped into the Alhambra.

Anyway, since I'm "maintaining" this blog as an assignment as well as for fun, I'm also supposed to do some reflection on my experiences here in addition to complaining about my camera. So for today, I decided to work off of one of the available prompts: "What did you assume before you left that you are not finding in your host-country, host-culture and/or host family and friends? Why did you make those assumptions?"

Well, one thing that surprised me about Spain is the racial makeup of Granada. Before I came here when I thought of Spaniards I thought of white Europeans, but there’s really a much more diverse population. For example, there’s a noticeable Asian presence, with lots of shops run by Chinese families, and many immigrants from Africa and South America. Every day I see at least one woman wearing a headscarf or other Islamic dress. In addition, Andalucía has the highest gitano (Gypsy) population in Spain.

I’d heard that Spaniards (and Europeans in general) dress much more nicely than people from the U.S. And it’s largely true, but everyone doesn’t look like they stepped out of a catalog, like I imagined. There’s a whole range, from elegant jackets and high heels to baggy jeans and flip-flops. I had heard on various occasions, “No one wears tennis shoes in Spain”, but they’re all over the place. In fairness, Granada might be a special case; it has a really large student population and a reputation for being an easy-going city.

Another thing that went counter to my assumptions was how much people knew about the United States. Before arriving, I had had instances where I was shocked by how strongly the U.S. figured in the Spanish papers; one day I went to the website of El País and was amazed to see California’s gay marriage debate covered in the front page! Still, I didn’t expect people to be so familiar with our system of government, our politicians, our movies and music… after all, if you had asked me to describe the structure of Spain’s government before I decided to study abroad here, I would have been pretty useless.

A big thing: I had also thought before coming here that Spanish people were more interested in bullfighting. I mean, when people think about Spain, it’s one of the first things to come to mind. And the corrida is indeed an enduring part of Spanish culture. But all the same, as they told us in our civilization and culture class, only about half of Spaniards profess an interest in bullfighting; the other half of the population is either disinterested or actively opposed.

When I asked my host family, none of them had enthusiasm for bullfights; Sandra had been to one, but said she had to hide her eyes. The consensus was essentially that while they respect the artistic aspect of bullfighting, they feel too much pity for the animals to really enjoy it. And although proponents of ending corridas haven’t had much success (anti-bullfighting movements have become more potent over time, but the number of spectacles involving bulls has increased as well), they’re vocal in their opposition. One day walking home from class I passed a girl wearing a shirt that read, “Si los toros son cultura el canibalismo es gastronomía”: basically, “If bullfights are culture, cannibalism is high cuisine”.

(Anti-bullfighting graffiti near where I live: "Torturing bulls is neither art nor culture")

Touring the Realejo and Albaicín

Like I mentioned, the other day we toured the area surrounding the Centro de Lenguas Modernas. However, it turns out I was wrong in thinking we had gone through the Albaicín - we hit the very beginning of it, but most of the area we looked at was the Realejo. Just as the Albaicín was once the Muslim quarter of Granada, the Realejo was the Jewish quarter. One major landmark we looked at was the Iglesia de Santo Domingo. It's a beautiful church, but its presence in the originally Jewish space carries some dark overtones from the time of the Inquisition.

When Ferdinand and Isabella conquered the last Moorish territory in Granada, they turned to ensuring that Spain would be thoroughly Christian, using cruel measures; Muslims and Jews were forced to convert or otherwise face exile, imprisonment, or worse. Our guide told us that the very space where the Iglesia de Santo Domingo is now was originally a synagogue, which was destroyed and replaced with the church. For the Christians who came to power in Granada, doing this was a way of sending the message that there would be no place for Jews in the new Spain.

The Iglesia is quite serene now, yet at the same time it's a reminder of a very tumultuous time in Spanish history. Anyway, here's some photos of it, along with the rest of the tour.

First Days in Granada

Well… I’m here. Seriously, I don’t know where to start! Everything has been so overwhelming. I still can’t really believe that I’m in Spain, thousands of miles away from home. I know it kind of goes without saying, but what first pops into my head is that EVERYTHING. IS. DIFFERENT! From the times of day that people are active, to the food, to the way people dress and gesture and greet each other, nothing is quite the same as in the United States. Things that I never paid much attention to at home have suddenly become fascinating – the ingredients of packaged foods, graffiti, the ads in bus shelters – because I’m constantly trying to puzzle out the Spanish. And it’s hot! I’m still shaky on converting Celcius to Fahrenheit, but it feels like 95 degrees during the day.
Speaking of the heat, it’s been really interesting seeing how that shapes the way people go about the day here. Waking up early becomes a million times more attractive because then you can catch some cool air before it heats up. You see people out walking and shopping throughout the day, but most stores shut down for a bit in the afternoon (like from 2 to 5) and it’s after it gets dark that everyone really come outside. At that point, there are plenty of people tomando el fresco, sitting in outdoor restaurants and walking their dogs. I think what’s taken me longest to get used to about it is seeing little kids running around in playgrounds at 10 and 11 at night!
Even with my profound feeling of being a fish out of water, there are still traces of familiar things. In the airport in Barcelona, I stopped by a food stand and they had Red Bull in the beverage case – I never thought I’d be happy to see that stuff. Hello Kitty’s domain extends all over the world, and Katy Parry, the Killers and 30 Rock show up in TV ads. My host mother’s daughter Mari says that not too many films come out of Spain (although that’s been changing recently) so most of the movies featured on TV are American or British with dubbed Spanish voices. And many products we have at home are advertised in Spain. Those irritating Activia ads have followed me across the Atlantic.
I’m really happy with where I’m staying. My host mother’s name is Liberada, and she has two daughters, Mari and Sandra. Mari’s 27, but I’m not sure how old Sandra is. They both live at home; I’ve read that there are very few homes for rent in Spain, so people tend to stay in their parents’ houses until they’re able to buy a place of their own. My “roommate” (we were both pleasantly surprised to find that we each have our own bedroom) is Brittany, from the University of Portland. By total coincidence, we arrived at the apartment minutes apart.
I never anticipated just how curious it would feel to be surrounded by Spanish. In Mexico I had a bit of the same feeling, but I was constantly speaking English with friends and family, so it wasn’t absolute like here. Even as I type this I have the urge to lapse into Spanish! It’s been tough because I feel awkward speaking, knowing it’s obvious that I’m a foreigner and I’m bound to make mistakes. For instance, I was telling my family that my sister Laura lives in a neighborhood in San Jose, and I used the word “suburbio”. Sandra’s boyfriend quickly let me know that that word means a seedy neighborhood, with drug and crime problems, not a nice area like what I meant to express. Instead, suburbs in Spanish are “las afueras”, meaning the areas just outside urban centers. So it was embarrassing, but at least I got something useful out of it.
Today we went on a walk through the areas around the Centro de Lenguas Modernas, where our classes are held. I was in tourist mode, taking pictures of everything. It's incredible to me that this city is thousands of years old. We got to go through the Albaicín, which was originally the Muslim quarter of Granada, and it was beautiful. There’s graffiti everywhere, but a lot of it is so interesting that I don’t really mind. At one point we stopped where you could see part of the Alhambra – I’m really excited to go through it.
It’s been really busy, but I’ll try to write more!