To Iberia And Beyond

Carter Fails at Being Cultured, Poorly Represents the USA

There are a few times when I just really suck at this being cultured thing. That normally wouldn't be an issue if I didn't think I knew what I was talking about. Some examples:

I met a girl from Hungary the other day, I asked if she lived near Sofia....which is in Bulgaria...about 700 km away

At dinner the other day with friends I asked the people at the other end of the table what they were talking about. They said Faust. I said, "oh yeah" then started singing (on bum) Hall of the Mountain King..which is a song by Ibsen, not a character in a book.

Later friends were chatting about German philosophers and artists. I had a very Bart Simpson moment when I realized I knew of them, and next to nothing about them.

I was asked who my favorite American director was and I realized I can only name about three. So I said M Night Shyamalan, representing Philly.

While doodling in class I started drawing a map of Europe and I was all proud of myself since I thought I was doing a great job drawing the borders of Western European countries. Then I realized I have no idea what Germany's shape was, but I did know relatively where it went. Then I got to the Balkans and I had to leave that blank. A French classmate helped me fill the rest in.

USA! USA! USA!

Spotted in Salamanca, aka Amélie Eat Your Heart Out

Yeah that's right, I found the photo-booth repair man. I was on my way to class so I didn't stay to see if he took a photo of himself.

I have also seen:
Spaniards in shorts (gasp! I thought only uncultured Americans did that)
Spaniards in flip flops (same reaction)
A dog wearing a whole bunch of clothes
 
A man walking an albino ferret/mink.

And many other things but wild and amazing, but that's the highlights.

When Collateral Damage Strikes Back: ETA Edition

A lot has changed in the public opinion of ETA ever since they were responsible for launching the first Spaniards into space*during the final years of Franco. They now seem to be hated in much of Spain and now in Pais Vasco. The provincial elections in Pais Vasco are this March and it's starting to look like for the first time in a very long time that a non-Pais Vasco nationalist might win.

Recently ETA blew up a government building, but a neighboring house was destroyed as part of collateral damage. The neighbor was pissed, so he went to a bar known for having connections with the terrorist group and trashed the place with a sledgehammer. He was then arrested and I hope they keep him in protective custody.

-Side note: ETA is only one letter away from "teta" which is tits in Spanish. Generally where someone has written ETA in graffiti someone else puts a T in front of it.

*I couldn't find a clear link explaining this, but in 1973 ETA assassinated Franco's second in command which helped clear the way for democracy after Franco died. This made ETA relatively popular for a bit since people seem to like freedom over oppression (to simplify). But the way ETA did it is legend. Carrero Blanco's car would drive the same route every day and he'd go to the same church for every mass and park at the same spot. So ETA planted a BUNCH of explosives and blew the car up. "The explosion sent Luis Carrero Blanco and his car 20 metres into the air and over a five story building. The car crashed down to the ground on the opposite side of a Jesuit college, landing on the second-floor balcony"- Wikipedia. People jokingly refer to Blanco as the first Spanish astronaut because of it. There is a recreating of the scene on youtube which is pretty cool to watch.

Nicknames Playing Soccer in Salamanca

This morning my Islam class was canceled since my prof is in Colombia so I went to the park to play some soccer. Since it's still Carnival till Wednesday, and non Uni students get school off for that, the park was filled. So I played soccer with five other kids ages ranging from 8 to 13. I was not the best player there but I was in the top three and I scored 3 goals for my team (the final score was 7-6 or 6-7 I don't recall). We switched positions every couple of goals scored on either side. I never let in a single goal. After the match I stayed in the goal and 5 or so 10-year-olds shot on me and I DESTROYED THEM. I think I stopped like 90% of the shots, and there were sometimes more than one ball at a time heading at me. Maybe the fact that the goal is about 7 feet by 5 feet helps a lot. Or it could be the power of the blue hair.

Anyway, one of the kids, the 8-year-old, was nicknamed Calabacin (zucchini) and I think he kept calling me Azul-lado  (blue-side). At one point it was Calabacin contra el Azul-lado in a shoot out. The final score was 0-0 since I blocked all his shots and as I have no aim so most of the time the ball was nowhere near the goal.

That kid also had a foul mouth. I've never heard someone say joder that much in my life before (true, I didn't hear the word before last year). I guess that word just isn't that bad here. Oh well.

Blue Hair in Salamanca and American Culture's Love of France

Monday was a pretty fun day. I had what I thought was going to be a debate but was really a discussion in a class, my Spanish friends saw the blue hair (they're torn between X-men and Milhouse, I think X-men will win out, but they like it), I had my French lesson, gave an English lesson and ate food from the Rhineland zone.

The dinner was cooked by Melanie's mom who is in town visiting. I was told that since they are from the German/French border their food is a mix of both German and French cuisine. Dinner was a cheese/sauerkraut dish, wine, bread and salad. If I had to make up a stereotypical mix between French and German food that would be it. We also had a little bit of Camembert cheese (which is illegal in the US) before dinner. It was probably the best cheese I've ever had. My friend Allison who is living in the heart of cheese country (France, not Wisconsin) had a similar experience (and she had it first) with a different type of cheese. Which raises the question: how many cheeses are illegal in the US?

In my French lesson I learned colors and descriptions of people. The other week we did numbers and questions. I'm learning the same in Portuguese but I'm not doing nearly as well in Portuguese as I am in French. What gives? Portuguese is supposed to be very similar to Spanish (which it is, most of the basic words are the same) but the sounds are very different than most sounds I've heard before. I would probably have just as hard of a time as Colin Firth if I fell in love with a Portuguese girl. 

I think the thing is that French words and sounds pervade American culture. The ability to imitate the French accent is practically a must for any good comedian. I'd wager most Americans have heard a very strong French accent at some point in their life. And imitating the accent is the key to being able to pronounce the words. Outside of Love Actually I have not heard much Portuguese and so my ability to make the sounds are limited.

There are a host of movies that deal with France or French culture. Casablanca, Les Miserables, An American in Paris, An American Werewolf in Paris, Beauty and the Beast, Camelot (the list goes on) and so French words slowly trickle into our language that way. French words for things political, sexual, artistic and the like are also sprinkled throughout our language.

French words are pretty impossible to spell for me, but here is a list I think most Americans have at least heard in passing and have a general sense as to their meaning.
Noir, Blanc, C'est moi, J'sui, Bonjur, Bon Voyage, Bon Chance, Trois, Deux, Adieu, Mon' Du, Sacre Bleu, Rouge, Maison, Bof, Fromage, Liete, Avec, Au' Gratin, Oui, No. Etc

Of course my French knowledge is very basic, but poco a poco it'll get better, and one day I might do what most English speakers view as impossible: Speak three languages.

It's also interesting that we have such a large French influence and not other non-English speaking European nations. Maybe it's the whole they-helped-us-become-independent thing. My Brazilian friend has a lot more trouble with the sounds and the words since I'm guessing Brazilian culture doesn't have a strong French influence.

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For some reason I can't get YouTube working here, but I wanted to link to the Robin Williams' Live stand up part where he talks about Euro Disney in France and Eddie Izzard's "Dressed to Kill" stand up part about learning French when he says that English speakers think it's impossible to speak more than one language although the Dutch speak three and smoke pot.

Aznar

Jose María Aznar was Spain’s Prime Minister for a while but he and his party, Partido Popular, lost the election in 2004 mainly due to his support of America and our war in Iraq. Also Spain suffered a horrible terrorist attack right before the election which Aznar blamed on ETA (the Vasque separatist terrorist group) when it was really Al-Qaeda. People were PISSED that their involvement in an unpopular war has increased their already existing threat of attacks from terrorists.

Since then he has moved to DC and is sort of a professor at Georgetown. Last year he spoke to my Comparative Political Systems class.

Spaniards generally have very strong opinions about him. I have met two students who love him and a whole lot more who don’t and had very strong words to say about him. I don’t know a whole lot, but I’m not a fan (especially since he is now trying to lead a campaign against fighting Global Warming….I’m pretty glad he isn’t the PM anymore). But the Spaniards who don’t like him have been interested in my opinions since I heard him speak in person (side note: I’m the only one in my family who has yet to see Obama in person). I’ve sort of developed a shtick making fun of Aznar when I’m asked about him. I honestly don’t remember what Aznar said when he spoke to my class. I do remember I asked something about wind power and that in his answer he said it wasn’t that important. I do remember it being really hard to understand what he said since he speaks in a pretty low and muffled voice. He also had a bushy mustache (which I hear he shaved and I read it hides a scar).

So I tell them that his English is a little worse than my Spanish (that generally gets a chuckle) and that it was hard to understand him since his mustache muffles his voice. Then I put my hand in front of my mouth and mumble to illustrate the point. I then take my hand away and say something to the effect of “wait, what did you say, ETA, Al-Qaeda? Who?” Now that I think about it, it’s kind of surprising that Spaniards maintain their sense of humor about that attack.

Then I generally make a comment that the Spaniards are lucky they got to get rid of their dumb President before we could, same with the Brits, the Aussies and the French. Someone else generally mentions that Sarkozy isn’t the greatest of guys, I honestly know nothing about him besides that fact he is the PM of France, there is a voodoo doll of him which is very popular and I think his wife is or was a model or something like that. But then I say next step is Berlusconi. People are generally impressed that Americans know who the PM of Italy is, I don’t mention to them that I learned who he was recently since my intercambio is Italian and really doesn’t like him

The moral of the story: mocking unpopular politicians is an easy way to make friends.

Brussels

One week later and I still haven’t written about my time in Brussels, sorry about that.

Brussels was very cool and I think this summer when I try to learn French (you can learn a romance language in a month and a half right?) I will either spend it traveling in France or find a place to live and take a class in Brussels. Brussels is a city with a very long arc of history. It has churches that are hundreds of years old and EU parliament buildings that seem like they were built yesterday. It also has the Mannequin Pis, which is a statue of a peeing boy. For some reason it is one Brussels' biggest attractions. Katie and I saw it, took pictures with it and had a good time, but upon reflection it was exactly what it says it is, a peeing statue. I guess it is like the frog on the skull here, it’s all about the legend around it…which I don’t really know. But Wikipedia to the rescue, ah there are a bunch of stories about it, but the one I like the most is that the kid saved Brussels by peeing on the fuse of a bomb attackers planted at the walls hundreds of years ago. His various costumes are pretty cute though, and the fact that he occasionally pees beer is neat as well.

My favorite statues in Brussels are Peter Pan and Europa. Peter Pan is in Edgemont Park (which shares the name of my favorite park in Montclair NJ) and was a gift from the children of Great Brittan to the children of Belgium between the World Wars*. It has a couple of bullet holes in it from WWII which makes for a very powerful and somber image. Europa (or at least Katie says it’s Europa) is right by the EU parliament building. Its base is the same figure lined up in a rising spiral and as the figure progresses it becomes more defined; raising from this a woman triumphant holding aloft the EU “E”. An interesting thing from a gender relation point is that the partly formed figures are all male and the final, “evolved” form is female.

We went to a small comic book museum which had only one exhibit about Blueberry, a cowboy… in French. Katie and I tried to read and understand the French, hilarity ensued.

Mainly we did a lot of walking around and enjoyed the architecture and murals. Brussels is like Philly but all the murals are comic drawings which is very cool. One day I need to go back and take a mural tour of the city. Tin Tin seems to be popular there, and I think in Europe as a whole since I read an article in a Spanish magazine about Tin Tin’s asexuality. I never read a Tin Tin comic so I don’t know much more than the fact that he is a boy who travels around the world with his dog and an old captain who says “Blistering Blue Barnacles” occasionally. And evidently my brother’s girlfriend’s brother has hair like Tin Tin and some website mocked him about that. 

I strongly recommend visiting Brussels and I’ll definitely go back some day.

Oh and supposedly the mussels in Brussels are famous…no joke.

Linguistic note: All conversations took place in English with a smattering of French formalities (pleases and thank yous). We did eat at an Italian restaurant and so I spoke with the waitress/manager in Spatalian.

*According to Katie who is studying in Dublin, the Irish call WWII the Great Catastrophe since they remained neutral (while leaning towards the Allies) thus it was not a “World” War. What’s really interesting is that in Spain they call it World War One and World War Two even though they didn’t participate in either of them. I guess the Irish are/were more slightly focused on the linguistic implications than the Spanish are/were. 

Carnival

Carnival, wow. Ok, yeah, CRAZY day. The day started at 7:30am. I wake up, get ready and than catch my 9am bus to Ciudad Rodrigo (the first bus of the day). Exactly a nap and an hour later I arrive, when people say something is an hour away there is generally a few minutes of leeway in either direction, but no, the trip was 60 minutes long. Now this may not come as a surprise to some people, but I forgot to plan my trip and coordinate with friends. So most of the people I knew were on one of the 11am buses. Woops.

 

I got off the bus, bought my return ticket for the last bus home (7:30pm...Carnival activities happen at night in Rodrigo but for some reason the last bus is at 7:30) and then headed uphill. Around the crown of the hill is the cities stone walls and within that is Plaza de Toros some churches (of course) and a toilet museum…yeah a toilet museum. The “Plaza de Toros” was really their plaza mayor with some wooden bleachers and a ring. Heading to the plaza I bumped into some French classmates from my Sustainable Agriculture class so we went to the plaza together and watched the “maletillas”. The vacillas is theoretically an event for children but everyone had fun. While people are chilling out in the ring guys dressed as bulls rolling bull mannequins run in and chase down the people. The fake bulls also spray water so it’s a fun fair activity. There are also people dressed like picadors, the guys on horses who stab the bulls with spears, who smack the guys dressed as bulls with long poles. I think American fairs should adopt that activity.

 

After it was over I went with my friends to search for food, I found candied almonds at a street vendor. They didn’t find anything they liked so we went to El Arbol (the tree), a grocery chain here. I bought a liter box of Sangria for 80 euro cents. Around that time, the 11am bus crowd arrived so we parted ways so I could find them. However, the running of the bulls was about to start so I had to find a place to chill out with my box and camera to watch it. Yeah, I saw bulls run in the streets of a Spanish city. I watched from behind the rather large metal fence which was set up to keep the bulls in the streets and away from the buildings. Other people participated on the other side of that fence, but as my host mom forbade me from running with the bulls and as I don’t have a death wish I decided to stay where it was safe.

 

I was in an interesting spot on the path. Streets are usually like this ========, but I was in a wider area, the scheme was like this ====[__]====. The opposite of a bottle neck I guess. Only in the [___] part were there fences, the === part was too narrow to have any thing like that so the doors and windows were boarded up. You have three groups of people: people in the street, people in the clearing and people behind the fence. The people in the clearing were just milling around looking in the direction from which the bulls were coming. It was really cool seeing such a “herd” of people turn around and start running in unison. As the bull came, most people scrambled for the fence either climbing on top or sliding under. Others stayed in the clearing to taunt the bull to try to get its attention and then they’d run away. The trick is to avoid their horns or legs. But before the bulls run in the streets, a herd of cows are sent to the plaza to entice the bull. The cows just run straight to the plaza so that’s not so interesting. It’s interesting in the sense that females are leading males to their death. There were only about six bulls since Ciudad Rodrigo is more of a pueblito but it was still fun to watch.

 

Evidently, there is a signal that signifies that the gate to the plaza has been shut and that the streets are safe again….I didn’t know that. So when all the bulls passed by, and I asked the group of Spaniards next to me if there were any more bulls and they said no, I put away my camera and took my box of sangria and I climbed over the fence. Imagine my surprise when I was in the clearing and everyone started running away from the plaza towards me since the bull was coming back. I dashed back to the fence and climbed up and over to safety. The Spaniards then explained the signal to me. They were about five or six masters students, and so we started chatting since they said I shouldn’t be drinking sangria from a box, I should be drinking beer with them. So I ditched the box and hit the bars with them: friends made! After a while, I realized I haven’t seen my other friends in a while so I called them up and found them (after bumping into other Hoyas who seemed surprised by my hair which is blue).

We then walked around the city, seeing costumes but not the bull fight, they for moral reasons and I wasn’t in the mood to pay to see an animal tortured and slaughtered, I think I will see it happen sometime this trip though. We climbed onto one of the city walls and relaxed for a while. It was a beautiful vista AND you could see solar panels in the distance, woooo! Before we headed out, we went on the bumper cars which were part of the fair just outside the city walls. It was probably the best bumper car experience I’ve had in a while. Usually in theme parks, there is a thing in the center and you have to drive in a loop. Not here, no rules, just bumper cars.

(me and random mimes) 

I then caught the bus home and was sitting next to some Americans. After a failed attempt at conversation, I decided to close my eyes. A nap and an hour later I woke up in Salamanca. Since I thought I was going to be out all day, I told my host mom not to worry about dinner, my French/Spanish friend Melanie and German friend Arnika and I went to Arnika’s flat and I cooked dinner while Melanie slept and Arnika went to the pharmacy to pick up some medicine since she was sick. I cooked spaghetti and prepared a tomato sauce from scratch (well the tomatoes were already in liquid form, just without any spices. I was told it was really good, and I agree. I had some difficulties opening the containers since I yanked off the metal tab on the can of mushrooms which required a kitchen scissors and a surprisingly large amount of force to fix. I also couldn’t figure out the “right” way to open up the box of tomato paste. Imagine a juice box now imagine it without the little aluminum thing for you to puncture. It was nothing a scissors couldn’t fix; it just resulted in some teasing about American’s handiness.

 

After lounging around for a bit Melanie and I headed to my English friend’s birthday party while Arnika decided she was healthy enough to go party with the Greeks. Then we all went to a very cutre bar called Paniagua. Cutre means hole in the wall but in a specific sort of way, in my pre-orientation language class the teacher taught us this word but had trouble explaining it. She said that Paniagua is the embodiment of cutre, so while I cant describe it, I know it when I see it. There we met a Leonessa (a girl from Léon) and a guy from Atlanta who teaches English in Extremadura* which is the poorest part of Spain. He said he strongly recommends it saying it’s really cheap there although there is neither night life nor cute girls…a really ringing endorsement.

 

I walked Melanie back since she lives kind of far away, there were a lot of drunk guys in the street and I’m just very used to walking friends home. On my way home, I ran into a group of Spaniards who absorbed me into their pandilla so we went clubbing till about 4am, oh Spain. One of them loved the soccer team Barcelona and had some other connection to the city (even though he was from Léon) but he was a Spanish Nationalist (as in against the nation splitting up, not as in fascist).

 

Today (Sunday) I woke up around 3pm, had lunch, and wrote a paper and various blog updates. Next I will finish my Politics and Violence reading, write a three-page reaction on the Revolution of Asturias and then prepare some talking points for my debate Monday (the subject of which I’m still not really sure, even after talking with other students and the prof). My plan is to keep silent for the first 20 minutes or so until I figure out what’s going on, then I’ll jump in and try to debate Spanish history with Spaniards in Spanish. I have a feeling I’ll then be able to understand how the bulls feel. 

Side note, Pepi keeps diaries of her travels and won a writing competition a few years ago with a short story. Today she let me read some of her stuff and then she read aloud for a while. I don’t really understand it 100% but what I do understand is very beautiful. She read a part to me and I’ll admit I was surprised to hear the words “erótico y sensual” coming from her.

*Note on Extremadura:

Extrema- extremely    

Dura- hard, harsh, severe

….does not sound like a fun place although the Gtown program is taking us there so I’ll get to see first hand.

Spaniards Speaking English

Occasionally when I meet people they want to practice their English with me, hilarity usually occurs. I was talking with two guys dressed as knights at Carnival in English and I asked “so where are you guys from” to which they responded saying “We are not guys, we like women”—with a Spanish accent guy and gay sound very similar. We had a little conversation about various words in Spanish and English to describe that. Our conversation got some more material since my friend Melanie was dressed as a ladybug which is mariquita in Spanish. Mariquita is also the root of the word marica (a really bad word for homosexuals, but some people use it as a general exclamation). Mariposa (butterfly) is also a bad word for a homosexual, which makes me wonder, why do Spaniards link beneficial garden flying insects to homosexuality?

Sometimes Spaniards are really excited to meet Americans and more than once, I’ve been absorbed into a group of friends for a while and taken bar hoping with them. The trick is getting the conversation started; having blue hair seems to have helped that out. Usually in these groups, one person takes more of an ambassadorial role and chats with me and will clarify things (some speak in English to do it although I would prefer if they spoke in Spanish since I need to practice and I understand their Spanish better than their English but I understand that they want to practice English). Generally, good times are had. People also really enjoy learning curse words in English so I like explaining the extreme utility of the F word and how it can be a noun, verb, adjective, part of a word and thus it can be nearly every word in a sentence.

Some Spanish S’musings

A good thing about learning Spanish is that I’m becoming a better speller in English since I have to look up words in the dictionary a lot. Evidently encourage is not spelled “incourage” and knowing how a word is spelled is kind of useful for looking it up.

There aren’t many Spanish words that start with Az (there are only 30 in my dictionary) but there are two toxic chemicals that are in this list. Azufre, which is sulfur, and azogue, which is mercury. Maybe they are both linked to the word azar which is chance, misfortune and stuff like that.

 

In Spanish the word gilipolla (not sure how it’s written, I’ve only heard it, it’s pronounce he-lee-poi-ya) is a bad one. I think it means dumbass or something to that affect. I was chatting at a friend’s birthday party with a guy from Tenerife (the capital of the Canary Islands, we had a pretty cool talk about identity, but more on that later) and he said that Spaniards don’t call people “estupido” they’ll say gilipolla. But I didn’t realize that was the word until last night. I thought it was hijo de polla (literally son of a bet), but I thought polla was a hen since pollo is a chicken. I also didn’t know what the insult meant; just that it was a pretty middle of the spectrum insult. So when I was at Carnival and made friends with a guy dressed as a chicken I tried to make a Spanish play on words. I meant to say “oh, so you’re a chicken, which means you’re a son of a chicken.” It’d be equivalent of calling someone dressed as a puppy a son of a bitch….Yeah, that didn’t work out. I called him a hijo de polla, when the word is gilipolla. Not only did I fail with the attempt at the play on the double meaning of the word, I didn’t even get one of the meanings correct. I rule!

 

In happier linguistic note, I was told by the Tenerifen (?), who I had met once before two weeks ago, that my Spanish skillz have drastically improved. I forgot what his words were but it was something to the effect of “last time you could chat in Spanish, now you can talk in Spanish.”

 

I still haven’t figured out what Spaniards think of the American accent. I ask people occasionally and I got my first good response last night. That the American accent is kind of curious since it’s a mix of Latin American Spanish, an English accent, and Spanish Spanish. Makes sense to me, although the answer “el accento Americano es super sexy” would have been a good response too. And yes, super is an often used word here, and sexy is used too. If something is really cool you can call it super guay, a fact I bet Paraguasions and Uraguasions love.

 

A question for you dear readers: Has there been a noticeable change in my style or quality of English writing?