Fútbol Allegiances

This week the kids have been celebrating the Día de Andalucía. This ambiguous holiday does what Spaniards do best, celebrate themselves and their region. All week, they colored Andalucían tiles, made books about the history, had a celebratory breakfast, and played a soccer game against the teachers.  My favorite event, however, was the string concert given on Thursday.  To appeal to the kids, the string quartet played songs the kids could sing along to.  They started with the Spongebob Squarepants theme song (here known as Bob Esponga).  They really got the crowd riled up, however, when they introduced a big soccer rivalry into the mix.

Sevilla has two fútbol teams: Sevilla Fútbol Club and Real Betis.  As my school is located closer to the Sevilla stadium, the majority of the kids are Sevilla fans.  This doesn't just mean that they support Sevilla, but it also means that they hate Betis with every fiber of their being. So, when the quartet started playing the Betis hymn, all hell broke loose.  Kids were jumping up and down booing and generally causing mayhem.  The quartet had to stop, and explain that they were going to be playing BOTH hymns - and that the kids needed to respect the others.  This worked well in theory, but when they started up playing the Sevilla hymn, the Betis fans did not take it well.  While the Sevilla fans were singing along, clapping to the flamenco beat and swaying, the Betis fans clapped hands over their ears, stuck fingers in their eardrums, and did all they could to block out the travesty that was happening around them.  One boy even pulled off his fleece sweatshirt and wrapped it around his head - blocking all senses from the clear horror.  The little girl sitting next to me asked if I was a Sevilla fan, to which I halfheartedly replied yes.  Wrong choice.  She gave me a look that could kill and refused to look at me for the rest of the song.  When the Betis theme started, she sang along proudly, and loudly, as a kind of screw you to me and the rest of the Sevilla fans in the mix.  I didn't have the heart to tell her that I don't really care much for fútbol.

All was forgotten, however, and bygones were bygones when the music brought them together the only way how: reminding them of Spain winning the world cup.  Images of Spain’s team dashed across the overhead and the band played the World Cup theme song - Waving flag.  The kids proudly sang along, and I was proud as they nailed the English lyrics in the chorus (when I get older/I will be stronger/They'll call me freedom just like a waving flag).  By the end of the song, Sevilla and Betis fans had their arms around each other, swaying in time to the music.  When the song ended, one boy got up from his chair and ran around the room, fists pumping into the air, as if he just singlehandedly won the world cup for his country.  Now that’s some pride.  Even the little Betis fan next to me forgot my supposed Sevilla allegiances and held my hand as the last song, Andalucía's anthem, played in the background.

Baking in Spain: easier said than done

There are many reasons why baking cookies in Spain is difficult.  First, and most importantly, I don’t have an oven.  Second, many of the ingredients just do not exist.  Third, measuring apparatuses are not easy to come by.  Not surprising, as there is not even a word in Spanish for “baking”.

Despite all these setbacks, Rachel and I were determined to make some good old American chocolate chip cookies.  A few weeks ago, we spotted the holy grail of rare American goods that are unattainable in Spain: chocolate chips.  Knowing we had to use them for something, we bought them immediately, despite the expensive price tag.  We then decided we had to make cookies.  Hitting up two of our local grocery stores, we found almost every ingredient we needed.  The brown sugar was more like sugar in the raw for your coffee instead of packed baking sugar, and we accidentally bought powdered sugar instead of plain white.  We had to substitute baking powder for baking soda, and the questionable vanilla extract only came in one size: enormous.  Our tub of margarine had to substitute for sticks of butter and we got off-brand Spanish M&Ms to make up for our small amount of chocolate chips.  Who said baking has to be an exact science?

Getting our ingredients home, we faced challenge number two: no measuring cups.  Our recipe called for cups and teaspoons, whereas our products were measured in grams.  Realizing there was no conversion from a measurement of volume to a measurement of weight, and without a scale to measure the grams, we were up the creek without a paddle.  This is where some great guesstimation took place.  We converted cups to liters, and measured out approximately how much a cup would be by filling a one liter water bottle and pouring it into water glasses.  Turns out, if my rough calculations were correct, one water glass equaled about one cup.  So we began to mix our ingredients in small Tupperware containers, unable to produce mixing bowls and wooden spoons.  The batter looked and tasted a little different than normal, but cookie dough is cookie dough, and we proceeded to eat many bites.

Luckily, our friend Julia has an oven, so we were all set to bring over the dough to make our cookies.  We had no cookie sheets, so we fashioned one out of tin foil.  This seemed like a good idea at the time, but pulling out a flimsy sheet of foil from the oven is easier said than done.  Some cookies fell, some smeared, and all got mashed up into some sort of half-cooked, half-gooey nightmare.  We dug in with our fingers, and the hot dough with the melted chocolate tasted amazing, despite the less than attractive appearance.  Given the circumstances, they turned out as well as we could have hoped.  But from now on, I think I’m a believer that cooking is an art… baking is a science.

True Life: I’m Becoming a Spaniard

It’s official.  I am becoming Spanish.

During my four months here for study abroad, I was baffled by the Sevillanos’ unofficial rules to not break out the summer wardrobe until after Easter.  Easter typically runs in mid April, whereas temperatures start hitting the 70s in mid February.  So that means two months of sweating it out in winter coats, scarves, and mittens… for what?  After living here for a more extended period of time, I have discovered that it isn’t so much about a fashion statement, or about distinguishing yourself from the t-shirt wearing tourists and study abroad students, but it’s just a state of mind that cannot be changed.

Little by little, I have become accustomed to Sevilla’s warm, Mediterranean climate.  Summer temperatures lasted until November, when the climate began to descend into Sevilla’s answer to winter.  Maybe it’s the humidity that causes the not-so-cold temperatures to feel bone chilling, or the fact that no buildings here, from my apartment to my school, have heat, but suddenly 50 degrees felt like dead winter. 

I first noticed my becoming a Spaniard on my trip to Egypt.  Although the temperatures were mid 70s with a hot sun beating down, I constantly wore a sweater, jacket, and scarf… comfortably.  I told myself that I was just dressing conservatively because I was in a conservative country… but the fact is I actually would have been cold wearing less.  People looking through my Egypt photos proclaimed that they thought it would’ve been warmer there, an assumption based on my constant layers.  I responded, well, actually it was quite warm.  So what is the reason for all the layers?

A similar experience occurred on my recent trip to Marrakech, Morocco.  Upon looking up the weather online, I noticed that it would be a high of low 70s.   Only a high of low 70s?  In my Spanish mind, that meant winter coat weather.  So while my friends and I walked around bundled up in scarves, sweaters, and winter pea coats, tourists from northern Europe and the UK bared their arms in t-shirts, tanktops, sundresses, and skirts.  Now, Sevillanos don’t just wear winter clothes because they want to.  They also look down upon others wearing non winter clothes.  Throughout study abroad, I thought that this was a snobby way to distinguish the extranjeros from the Sevillanos, but now I’m not so sure.  I think it’s just that they truly cannot understand why some crazy person would wear summer clothes in what is clearly not summer weather.  To my dismay, I have also adopted this mentality.  Upon seeing the tourists in their summer apparel, I had two distinct reactions.  The American in me was astounded that women would wear clearly inappropriate outfits in a country that believes in covering up.  Do they have no sense of others’ culture?  This small outrage, however, was masked by the even larger outrage of how are they not freezing??!  Staring like a Spaniard, I would give these women my look of disapproval, not because I deemed their outfits culturally inappropriate, but because they were clearly dressed for the wrong temperature, and must be out of their minds to think that it is summer weather.

Back in Sevilla, my winter coat and scarves have become staples in my everyday wardrobe, even as the temperature begins to crawl up to the mid 60s.  I join in with my fellow teachers as we run through the hallways of school proclaiming “que frio! que frio!”  I wear my winter coat inside the classrooms.  This year, Easter runs late, with semana santa beginning at the end of April.  By then, temperatures in Sevilla will most likely be in the high 80s.  While I’m not sure if I will hold out for that long, or if my USA born body will finally register the hot temperatures, I have a feeling that my winter coat will be a staple in my wardrobe for months to come. 

Twelve Cups of Tea: Marrakech

Two years ago, before studying abroad, I never thought I would now be living in Spain, writing blog posts about my travels.  I never thought I could say that I’ve been to Morocco three times, or North Africa four times.  And yet here I am, just coming back from my third trip to Morocco.  I can easily say that this may be my favorite country on Earth.  

My three trips to Morocco have spanned the country: north to south, east to west, coast to mountains. The first trip wasn't very adventurous: I went

Family from a village, 2009

with a guide and a group of about 50 Americans, being shepherdedthroughout the city, clutching our cameras and our purses. The second trip brought me to Rabat with my human rights class with the emphasis not on sightseeing but on conversation.  This cultural exchange programbrought us together with Moroccan students to discuss everything from religion and politics to food and clothing, and subsequently women’s rights.  Although I didn’t always agree with what was being said, and some members of my class were offended by some anti-women’s rights comments, the experience was incredibly eye opening and a once in a lifetime look into a completely different culture and point of view.  The current trip was my time to explore.  With just three other girls, no map, and open minds, we ventured into Marrakech to get ourselves lost in the medina.  This is the story of our adventures.

Friday we arrived in Marrakech and found our way to the hotel.  Hotels in Marrakech, called Riads, are designed like traditional Moroccan homes with all rooms looking out onto the open air patio in the center of the house.  Our room was beautiful, decorated with Moroccan lamps and Berber rugs.  We were a bit dismayed to discover that our Riad did not have a map for us to take into the city.  A Moroccan city of labyrinths surely isn’t the place to go wandering without a map, we thought. We soon realized that we were

very wrong.  The entire city is centered around one large square, Djemma el Fna, where snake charmers, henna artists, storytellers, acrobats, soothsayers, palm readers, orange juice stands, tea, kabobs, and horse drawn carriages gather. This square was conveniently located two blocks away from our Riad.  Behind the square, a labyrinth of shops called souks stretches for a mile.  As there is no way to navigate yourself through these narrow alleyways anyway, its best to

Steaming cup of tea

forget the map and lose yourself in the spices, lamps, teapots, Berber rugs, scarves, jewelry, and inevitable catcalls. Wandering through these souks, your mind is on stimulus overload.  Bright colors and glittering objects catch your eye in all directions as you wander amidst the busy chaos of the vendor stalls.  Motorcycles and burros weave their way through the crowd, adding an element of danger to your walk. From every direction, different fun phrases are yelled out at the four tourist girls amidst the locals. ¨Ooh Spice Girls!¨ and ¨Hannah Montana!¨ were just two phrases used to describe our presence.  Sometimes we stumped the shop owners, however, who could not clearly pinpoint our race.  Such examples would be ¨Aye papi!¨ ¨Fish and chips!¨ and, my personal favorite, ¨You speak just like the Queen!¨  Clearly this city does not see a lot of American tourists, as none of the references were correct.  Upon hearing that we were in fact American, the shop owners would usually be completely surprised and offer their welcome to this fabulous city.

After initially exploring the gentle chaos of the souks on Friday, we decided to rest our minds and sit down to our first tea of the trip.  Tea is extremely important in Morocco and is a way to bring people together.  It is also delicious.  To pour, you hold the silver teapot about a foot or two (depending on skill level) above the little decorated tea glass and pour, creating a nice frothy layer on top of the tea.  Of course, our first attempt went horribly, spilling tea all over the table.  But with some time and about 10 cups of tea, we finally got the hang of it, and were able to pour like pros.  After tea we did a little more exploring before settling down for dinner. We chose a restaurant in the square that came highly recommended and had our first delicious meal of the trip: chicken couscous with veggies,

onions, and raisins. I could live off of Moroccan food forever.  After dinner we decided to try some delicacies from the square.  At night, the Djemaa el Fna square comes alive.  Drums, clarinets, singing, dancing, and the yelling of vendors fill the air with a festive noise.  Carts appear selling delicious hand squeezed orange juice, dried fruits, traditional foods and spicy tea, filling the air with a mouth water aroma of spices.

Orange Juice cart at Night

Friday night we decided to try the tea, which contains a hodgepodge of spices.  The tea was incredibly rich, with a spicy aftertaste that burned the back of your throat as it went down.  The first couple of sips were irresistible, while the last couple were nearly impossible to choke down through the fire in your throat. Tired, and mouths burning, we decided to call it a night and headed back to the Riad for some sleep.

Saturday we woke up bright and early to the thing we were most looking forward to: breakfast. Breakfast was served in our Riad on the rooftop, in a traditional Berber tent filled with decorative couches and tile tables.  I quickly decided that I want a rooftop with a Berber tent on it. The breakfast included some more mint tea, delicious orange juice, yogurt with fresh honey, homemade jams, and the best bread I have ever tasted.  We had signed up for a cooking class through our Riad for mid-morning,

so we decided to do about an hour of exploring beforehand.  We walked to Djemaa el Fna and took in the sights, with a few photos as well.  This is where things started to go downhill.  If you stand in one place for too long, look at somebody, or take somebody's

Me with some Snakes

picture, you find yourself suddenly surrounded by street performers demanding money.  After standing near the snake charmers, watching the cobras dance with weary eyes, we were descended upon, being split up and taken to see various snakes.  Once they have your hand it is all over.  I was dragged into the snake pit to observe as Rachel had a snake unwillingly wrapped around her neck.  Photos were quickly snapped as we tried to escape the clutches of the so called ¨non-poisonous snakes.¨ The charmers were faster, however, and quickly started demanding money for their ¨services.¨  I held out 50 cents and proclaimed that I had no more money to my name.  Rachel and Jan followed suit and claimed that I had all the money.  The men demanded more and more, saying ¨paper, paper, no coins.¨ I´m sorry, but I just won’t pay you 20 dollars for accosting me.  We finally got ourselves out, pushing our meager coins into their greedy hands and taking off.  We quickly made our way back to the Riad shaken up and cringing from the feel of the snakeskin.

Back at the Riad, we learned how to make chicken tagine with apricots, prunes and dates.  First, the woman cooking showed us the Moroccan way to cut an onion, which involved holding it in your hand and throwing your knife down on top of it to dice it.  Clearly us Americans did not have the skill of hand chopping without taking out a finger.  The woman wearily watched our feeble attempts at dicing without a cutting board before saying that we just need one onion – the one that she had perfectly cut.  I swear, we’re not incompetent in the kitchen!  Despite the low level of our involvement in the actual cooking process, it was actually a fun class, and yielded some delicious results!

Souks inside the Medina

Saturday afternoon we did some more exploring of the souks, this time with our eyes on the prize and ready to buy.  Of course, buying things in Morocco is a bit more labor intensive than elsewhere.  You can never set your heart on any one thing because it is completely up to the shop owner and your own haggling skills on whether you can set an agreeable price.  After striking out at buying lamps, we ended the day at a random shop, where the owner, Reda, immediately struck up a conversation with us.  Upon our entrance, he started pulling out his collection of rugs and telling us the history of his Berber people.  Every rug tells a story, which he told us with pride.  We had heard that you are more likely to negotiate a good price if you have a rapport with the owner, so we heard out his winded, hour long speech about the Berbers before making our offers.  Jan walked away with a beautiful white Berber rug while Rachel and I both bought Moroccan lamps.  After striking these deals, our friend Reda told us that he knew of a great restaurant that the tourists don’t know about, and offered to take us there.  We were a bit suspicious as to his motives, especially when upon arrival to this restaurant he was greeted by his dogs. I’m pretty sure he was just getting more business for himself.  We were tired and hungry after our long conversation with him, however, so we decided to stay for a delicious meal.

Sunday, we woke up for our last full day in Marrakech, excited as always for breakfast.  We had booked appointments at the Hammam (bathhouse) for that morning, and weren’t sure what to expect.  My second trip to Morocco involved a traditional Hammam experience, in which we all sat around in a hot room dumping buckets of scalding water over our heads.  Moroccans typically don’t have showers in their houses, and use these Hammams for bathing.  Sure, we stuck out as a group of 10 Americans in the Moroccan bathhouse, but it was a great experience that not many tourists can say they have done.  The hammam from this trip, however, was completely different.  More spa than bathhouse, and more for tourists than locals, its emphasis was more on luxury and comfort than practicality.  Jan, Rachel and I decided to go for the traditional hammam scrub, in which a woman scrubbed us from head to toe with rough bath salts.  Skin feeling a little raw, we were then slathered in mud, then oil, as we prepared for our massages.  We left feeling as smooth as a baby’s bottom.

Oranges

After getting clean and relaxed, we went for lunch in the square and decided to actually do something touristy by going to the palace.  It was kind of a letdown and not kept up very well, but at least it gave us a break from shopping!  At this point we had started to realize how much we had actually bought, and were getting a little worried about fitting it all back in our carryon.  If you don’t know, Ryanair are sticklers about carryon items.  Oftentimes they make you stuff your purse inside your bag and try to fit it into the impossibly small metal cage before boarding the plane.  If your bag doesn’t fit, they can charge you 35 euros on the spot to check it.  We, of course, wanted to avoid this by any means possible.  As the night got later and we got more tired, the ideas of how to get past the impossible Ryanair standards became more ridiculous.  Ideas such as lamps made into hats, teapots wrapped around our heads in some sort of headdress, and cameras stuffed into our jackets making us look like robust pregnant women were tossed around.  None of which we actually had the guts to pull off.  When push came to shove, we pushed and shoved until all of our belongings were either being carried on our person (I wore all 5 shirts I brought, and 3 scarves) or packed into our bags.  I was unsure whether my bag would fit the little steel cage of doom, but I was ready to fight Ryanair if need be.  Turns out, the Ryanair Morocco staff could not have cared less about our dodgy backpacks and we were quickly ushered on the plane, souvenirs and all.

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The World According to Sanchez

There are certain people in your life who act as a kind of running joke. They are always there, lurking in the background, ready to pop out with an amusing interaction at any moment. Here are a few of these key supporting actors in my life in Sevilla.

Enrique

Enrique, or the Riq-ster, wanders the streets of calle Venecia with pride. Walking back and forth, hands gathered behind his back, long beard blowing in the wind, he is a constant presence in our neighborhood. Even when not visible, signs of Enrique are still there. A dirty mattress lying on the sidewalk. An empty crate. Three bottles of Don Simon. A bag of half eaten oranges. A big heaping pile of bubble wrap. A wooden chair and armoire. A cornucopia. Enrique is a shape-shifter, taking on different personas with a new collection of outfits. From a cowboy hat, to a Peruvian smock, to a Chicago Bears jersey, he is our friendly neighborhood homeless man with style.

Oscar

This jovial fellow has graced the pages of my blog before. He can often be seen making jokes, bagging fruit, and even dolling out a few free goodies to the Riq-ster. He has come to love me and Rachel mostly because he can laugh at us. Upon seeing us, he yells into the streets “good afternoon!” regardless of the time of day. He finds humor in our list of items for the week, and the way we switch off while ordering. He likes to practice his meager English with a wide smile on his face, while his Spaniard customers scoff and pronounce “todo el mundo de extranjeros.”

Macarena

The butcher at our ghetto grocery store, Día, Macarena has come to know us well. Every week we stand in line with gossiping old biddies to order “un kilo del fillete de pollo en dos paquetes separados” (one kilo of chicken wrapped in two separate packages). While the biddies order their jamón, chorizo, and other questionable meat products that I wouldn’t bring within 10 feet of my mouth, we are always there for our pollo. Upon reciting our order to us, Macarena grabs a full chicken, slaps it down on the counter, and starts tearing it apart. She wears no gloves, does not wash her hands, and takes no care in manhandling her meats. I never want to watch but I can’t look away as she throws the bird again and again onto the questionable juice-soaked counter. And yet we are back, every week, our order memorized and on the tips of our tongues as we approach her counter.

Sanchez

Sanchez is like a character out of a 1980’s comedy. His hair defies gravity – pointing straight up to the sky in effortless spikes. He has a smart comeback for everything that is said to him. His favorite, of course, is “pero seño, no tengo ninguna idea” (but teacher, I have no idea). At least five times per class, the teacher stops in her tracks, does a little dance and proclaims “Sancheeeeeeez, what are you doing?” He likes provoking the other students around him to join him in his leisure. Recently, I have been assigned to watch him like a hawk. Hovering over his desk, I point out, line by line, what he should be doing in the class assignment. Before you can blink, however, he is suddenly out of his chair and halfway across the room. The kid moves like lightening. And yet it is my job to stand there, bringing his attention again and again to the worksheet, as he sighs again and again. Something tells me we are going to become great friends this year, little man.

Antonio

This man is perhaps my favorite of them all. Always with a joke ready at the waiting, he spends half his time laughing and half his time lecturing. He has immense Spanish pride, and believes that everything that comes out of Spain, from olive oil to Cruzcampo, is the greatest thing ever. The Spaniards are, of course, the greatest race on earth. Sevillanos, of course, are even greater, coming from the greatest city from the greatest country on earth. The Spanish diet, of course, is the healthiest diet to ever exist. Can’t blame the man for having his pride.