Do You Speak Spanish?

“So…do you speak Spanish?”

After announcing my plan for the 2018-2019 school year was to live in and teach (sort of) in Spain, I probably heard this question dozens of times.  

In my annoyed moments, after hearing it multiple times close together, I wanted to answer with a dreamy tone reminiscent of Luna Lovegood, “No.  Not really.  You don’t think that will be a problem, do you?” Or at my worst, with a sarcastic naivety, “Oh gosh! I never even thought of that.” 

Spanish cathedrals translate well.

I know that most of the people who asked were not trying be unkind or point out a potential flaw in the plan or express doubt in my ability or degrade my choice.  I know it was my own pointed insecurity about the language that made me sometimes hear it this way. 

Which is why I usually said, ‘I understand an awful lot more than I can actually speak.  Usually, if I know the context of the conversation, I can follow what people are saying.”

Which is actually 100% true.  Having been here for about four weeks, I can say more firmly than ever that those words are true. 

But if I was being my most vulnerable self, I’d also tell you, “I think that’s going to be one of the hardest parts about Spain—the language.  I’m used to being articulate and well-spoken, and that’s not going to be my reality.  Which is uncomfortable for me.  But that discomfort is part of the point.  And it will help me grow.  And actually learn to speak Spanish.”

People tell you that immersion in a Spanish speaking country is the best way to learn. And I’ve no doubt that’s true.  But on days, or even moments, when I want to be lazy, it’s possible to get by without much language at all—beyond pointing, miming, and a questioning look.  

Which does make me feel like the trips I recently booked to France, Germany, and Italy will actually be okay. 

But in my better-self moments, I have pushed myself to learn more. 

To date I have successfully:

bought coffee, indicating if I intend it for here or to-go.  Though, no matter how confident I am, I have yet to actually convince anyone that i don’t need the sugar packets they seem determined to give me. 

bought bus tickets, both for the local trip on the bus, and for a distance single trip, and a long-term pass, in the bus station.

bought groceries, house supplies, and dinner multiple times, giving the correct amount of money. 

applied for a long-term visa.

used the computer and made copies at their version of a Staples. 

told strangers that I don’t, in fact, have a lighter. 

gotten a gym membership.

explained to students and teachers that I am from the US and, more regionally, live close to Washington D.C.

Beautiful views always translate.

I have also picked up some specifically Spain parts of Spanish.  They use the word “vale,” like it’s going out of style tomorrow if they don’t use it enough.  It sounds like “Bali” still to me, but it means “okay,” and is a general speech filler that everyone seems to use here.  To my knowledge, it’s not used in Latin American Spanish and I had never heard it before.  But here, everything is “vale.” 

I’d also heard that Andalusian Spanish is particularly difficult to understand because they have the heaviest accent on the ‘sss’ sound.  They make a ‘th’ sound instead so words like “Andalucia” are “Andaluthia,”  That has not been nearly as difficult as the claim they also make to being the most rapid speakers in Spain.  Though I cannot confirm that it is true, I can confirm their rapidity makes things difficult.

I’m trying with Spanish, but I will also admit to moments when I’ve been very glad when people have been able to speak to me in English. Here, opening a bank account is a more major procedure than in the US, and after I tried to explain in Spanish why I needed one (my program will only give me direct deposit of payment once I have an account), the man simply looked at me and asked again “porque?” Out of Spanish words to explain it, I simply sat for a moment, thinking of ways I could try again, and coming up dry, he finally smiled and kindly offered, “ingles?” 

“Thank you,” I said gratefully.  Thirty minutes later he had become one of the most helpful people I had met to date and I was incredibly grateful to him and his ability to speak more English than I could Spanish. 

The list of things I’ve done in Spanish is not long.  It’s not nearly enough.  Which means I have to be willing—in my slow, slightly broken Spanish that is sometimes looked up on Google Translate—to try.  I’ve known how language acquisition works from my ESOL friends for a long time.  But experiencing it is panful, and slow, and challenging.  And much less natural, even immersed in a country like this than people would have you believe.  But it’s a big part of why I’ve come.  

So, I’m going to try. 

Vale.  

Things I’ve Learned (mostly through trial and error) My First Week in Spain:

My body thought it was 2am.  But the sun?

The flight left out of Philadelphia only a few hours before bedtime.  After a terrible night sleep the night before, I fully expected to conk out on the plane despite not having a window seat.  But over a hour later I was still wide awake.  I’d tried listening to Two Broke Girls through my headphones with an eye mask on to turn my brain off, but no luck. I tried resting quietly. I adjusted and readjusted my neck pillow.  Still awake when the lights flicked back on and they brought out dinner. 

I wasn’t hungry, but I was curious, so I accepted the pasta.  I poked Mom to tell her it was now or never on the gluten free, but she mumbled and never woke up.  I was jealous, and still not sleepy, so I asked for the free glass of wine they were eager to dispense.  I drank some passable white wine, ate some spreadable Skinny Cow cheese on a terribly dry roll, a few bites of…interesting pasta and saved the brownie for later. 

I might’ve slept in small doses.  I remember doing the equivalent of tossing and turning in my airplane seat and going to the bathroom despite the Fasten Seatbelt Sign.  I remember seeing the sun glinting pink in the sky when my watch said it was around 2am.  Soon after that, the lights came back on and we got breakfast—a very sweet muffin top and yogurt.  

And we were landing in London.
At this time. 

Somehow I dragged myself off the plane, feeling jealous of Mom that she had slept a little—very little—and told myself for the next four hours that it wasn't a good idea to continually convert the time my watch now said to the time my body thought it was.  My body would never win. 

The flight to Spain was a little over two hours and in the first hour I think I got better sleep than I had for seven hours earlier. But still, by the time Mom and I were trying to navigate through Madrid, each with two suitcases and a shoulder bag, I was exhausted.  All I wanted was to sleep.  For a very, very long time. 

This is mostly my stuff, but
it is for a whole year...

The hotel was fancy and lovely and not in a very touristy part of town.  I probably could’ve slept in the woods in a tent and slept well that night, but even after about nine hours, I was still tired.  When I got up at 7, I opened the curtains and found darkness.  I immediately checked to make sure that it was actually morning and not the middle of the night.  Light started coming on around 8 and I wondered if I was still just confused from the time change or it actually didn’t get light here early.  (It had nothing to do with being tired.  The sun really doesn’t come up until a little after eight.) 

It was long and exhausting and confusing and scary.  But we made it to Velez-Malaga where I was going to be working and I thought I might be able to sort of settle in.  And learn.  

And oh, did I learn. 

Grocery shopping is not necessarily as easy as you imagine it to be.  Maybe because I’ve done it my whole life—gone down the aisles, had a general idea of what I wanted and then pulled it off the shelves—it seems simple.  It is not simple when none of the brands are familiar, none of the words are in English, and traveling has been the main activity for 24 hours, making your strangely exhausted and awake at the same time.  I say all that in hopes that all of my various grocery mistakes sound less lame. 

Is this what creamer and coffee is like here?

The first night, I went to the tiny grocery store—about the size of my bedroom in Virginia—and bought three 1.5 liter bottles since we needed some more cold water in the house.  Even though the Internet said the the tap was perfect fine, it seemed that everyone was buying copious amounts of water. There must be a reason for it.  We must need to do it too.  We put the three bottles in the fridge and fell asleep for about ten hours. 

The next morning when Mom opened one, she had a funny look on her face.  It was clearly carbonated and after a sip, she confirmed—not all totally clear liquid in 1.5 L bottles is water.  This was a strange, almost-Sprite, that tasted somehow more like a fresh soda.  But still very clearly soda.

When I made coffee, I got another strange look.  “I think you bought instant coffee,” Mom said as she looked at the glass container of grounds.

I nodded.  “That was all I saw.  But I think it’s supposed to be good.” I boiled the water, poured in the coffee and then stirred.  I went to get the creamer I’d gotten (which I was very proud of, since it looked nothing like the creamer from home and yet I still identified it).  I opened the top and found something that looked more like a squeeze top for ketchup or mayo.  It was not a pour top, that was for sure.  “Hmmm,” I said, studying it. I squeezed and something that looked more like sweetened, condensed milk than like creamer came out.  

To be fair, it was actually a version of coffee creamer—I hadn’t been wrong about that.  And to be fair, it did make our coffee sweeter and richer.  But it still wasn’t exactly what I had expected. (Though, neither had I expected the only two choices in the London-Heathrow Starbucks to be Skim and Part-Skimmed Milk as cream options.  And that might’ve been worse.)

Then, there were the eggs.  When Mom and I grocery shopped, we’d been pleased about how many clearly labeled Gluten Free options there were for her, and one of the things we bought was a loaf of gluten free bread. We also had eggs, our condensed milk creamer, and some cinnamon, and both of us realized what we really wanted was French Toast for breakfast.  I’m not sure I’ve ever actually craved French Toast, but both Mom and I were super excited for it when we got up.  We got out all the ingredients and as Mom went to crack the eggs, something was clearly wrong.  They didn’t really crack. 

They were already cooked. 

We had bought hard boiled eggs. 

And then we had the saddest regular toast with bananas anyone has ever had. 

Other things we learned: Siesta is a serious thing.  Stores close.  All of them.  Most of them with metal gates that make it seem questionable if they are ever open. But around 5 they come fully back to life. 

Sunday is also a day of rest.  Grocery stores are not open.  Gyms are not open.  Luckily the busses still run, albeit on a reduced schedule. 

Uber and the more European versions like MyTaxi do not exist everywhere.  Even though Velez is the capital of the region and a city of 70,000 people in its own right, the fact that Malaga city has Ubers does not mean they exist 40 minutes away.  

Crosswalks are to be respected and observed.  Cars have gone from accelerating to a dead stop if I move toward crossing the street in the crosswalk.  I’ve never seen someone ignore a pedestrian, and if I’m not certain I need to cross the street, I hesitate very far away to avoid causing delay.  It’s charming, but also nerve-wracking. I don’t completely trust it, not enough to just step out when I can tell a car is coming, but I know that by waiting to see if they slow down, I’m slowing the whole process down and being more annoying.  But it’s not easy to step out in front of a car and assume that they will see you and stop for you in plenty of time.  Yet, without fail, cars stop in crosswalks. 

But perhaps the thing I have noticed the most is the beauty of the place.  What I realized a few days ago that is so lovely about this place is that they make things beautiful even when they don’t need to.  They don’t need to have a gorgeously tiled fountain in the middle of each roundabout, but they do.  They don’t need to have beautiful flowers and trees lining every pedestrian walkway, but there they are.  And this extends to the people—they don’t need to be kind and generous and helpful, but they are.  Without fail, every time Mom and I appeared to struggle at all with our suitcases, at least one, sometimes multiple, men would hop up and come to our aid, lifting, carrying or helping us in whatever way we needed.  

It’s not as though there aren’t beautiful things and wonderful people in the US.  Maybe it’s more that when you see it in something that is strange and slightly scary, like a new country with a new language, it’s easier to realize.  Maybe it’s about being away from what you know in order to truly see.  Either way, it’s a beautiful country, and I know there will be harder things than figuring out creamer and worse mistakes than buying cooked eggs.  But I firmly believe the beauty will remain.