god bless america.

wow, so thanksgiving has come and gone.

i've felt more patriotic in the last week than i think i have in my entire life. i spent the majority of my 20+ teaching-hours talking about the relationship between the pilgrims and the indians ["what the hell is a pilgrim?" my students would say], explaining why turkey is better than ham, exaggerating about our 3-day feasts and drawing maps of america over & over again to show them where the pilgrims landed in comparison to where the great state of florida lays.

"is everything really expensive in america?" my younger students ask. sometimes i actually give the question real thought, and other times i just say "well, milk is like 4 dollars" & they gasp.

what is it that i love so much about teaching my students about america? i swear they're probably scouting my arms & legs for an american flag tattoo. they probably think my dad works for bush and that i hate mexicans.

this thanksgiving was the first time [i think] that i didn't spend it at my family's farm. i called them in between my classes and they passed the phone around, "we miss you" they said, "it's not the same without you", "don't tell me you're eating olives today darlin'" my uncle lee said with his thick southern drawl. i almost felt like i was there, i could imagine it perfectly. but i settled for a delicious pasta dinner with my favorite american friends here in barca, and [ironically enough] we were able to catch "the new world" on t.v. [a horrible interpretation of john smith, pocohantas, etc.]

on saturday my friends and i went all out. we wanted to celebrate right, and since we all had to work on the "given" holiday, we put together a rather ambitious party a few days later. we were all scrambling around all week trying to find corn meal, cranberries and other "mystical" ingredients that spain has never heard of.

when the day came there was so much food....it was...well...glutton-looking. when our spanish friends arrived i was almost embarrassed, shrugging my shoulders like "well, shit, this is why america overeats." we had a huge stuffed turkey, at least 15 casseroles, candied yams, corn bread, pumpkin pies, apple pies and some weird pecan fruit-cake sent from the US. we drank spiked apple cider, hot buttered rum and lambrusco [spanish dessert wine] for 12+ hours. i [with lambrusco in hand] told the story of thanksgiving to everyone, and we played "pin the tail on the turkey."

my austrailian friend stood up in front of everyone & made a toast, saying "this is my first thanksgiving, and i love the idea of it. and here we all are, living in a foreign place. and i am thankful for that. i am thankful that we all have each other." i think it made us americans feel really good. and really proud. and really thankful as well.

here we are eating, drinking and being merry...

so, this thanksgiving i'm thankful for america [even though i'm not there right now, it's in my bones and it's in my heart.] i'm also thankful for the amazing life that i have made here in barca and the amazing people that i've met. i feel like i've lived another lifetime here in spain, and i wouldn't change it for the world. but america is my number 1. and that'll never change.

catalan? que?

i was mostly unaware of the term "catalan" before i swarmed myself with tourist documentaries on spain. i wanted to have some kind of a clue about the crazy place i was moving [and had never been to before.] that's where i first heard about "catalunya", the northeastern province bordering france...where good ole' barcelona is located. catalan's are from this province.

here's a map of spain...you can see the province on the top right.

and a closer look...

[in the map above, the names are actually written in catalan.] yes, that's right, they have their own language...a melodic combination of spanish, italian and french. this was a fact i knew coming to barcelona, but didn't expect to be so blatant. when francisco franco ruled spain [from 1939-1975], it was illegal to speak catalan. after his death, the "catalan" patriotism was at an all time high, and has been ever since. on the streets they speak catalan, in stores they speak catalan, the billboards, the newspapers [not all, thank God] are in catalan. catalan's are "catalan"...not "spanish".

the other night i was taking a taxi [most taxi drivers speak to you in catalan] & he was speaking in castallano [spanish] and i said "are you catalan?" [hey, it was 5am] & he started raging [in spanish], saying "no, i'm not CATALAN, i'm SPANISH for god's sake...what the hell...f-ing catalan, we're in SPAIN not CATALUNYA." this is a good analogy of how people [spaniards] who aren't catalan feel about catalunya.

in gracia [my neighborhood] the catalan patriotism is always in full force [the catalan flag is 5 yellow stripes and 4 red stripes]:



but i must say, i love the catalan people. it feels good to know that every day i can count on their unfailing admiration for: pork, dark square-rimmed glasses, whiskey with lunch, horizontal striped shirts, magdelenas [the best muffins in the world], taking their babies and their dogs into bars at ungodly hours and their monochromatic dress choice.

mi fin de semana en figueres.

this past weekend my 2 friends [fellow americans] and i took a short train trip up to figueres, a small, humble village, 2 hours northeast of barcelona. like most of the tiny villages that come and go, like a flip-book on the cross-country train, figueres is just another one-horse town. but we weren't there to see the one horse.

Salvador Dalí was born in figueres, which brings a lot of pride to spain, and especially to the catalan people. Dalí was catalan, [most people are unaware of what being "catalan" means...which is something i will approach in my next post.]

so, in figueres, the slender, over-used and over-abused sidewalks busted at the seams with tourists. we were all there for the same reason: to see the famous Dalí Theatre and Museum. it was "molt bé" as the catalan's would say.

some highlights:

interestingly enough [and borderline creepy], Dalí is buried in a tomb beneath the museum...

it was amazing being able to touch, feel and even smell Dalí's presence [i'm talking about the paint...or maybe i don't know what the hell i'm talking about...ha]. i've learned a lot about this man, and have admired his work for years and years and years [i went to his museum in st. petersburg, florida when i was 7 and i remember thinking it'd "changed my life".]

it's funny the different ways that [facets and elements of] spain, and the spanish culture have affected me. needless to say, coming to BFE-figueres was no exception.