It's bath time!

Entrance to the baños. Under "Hammam", the plaque reads "Bañate en la historia"
(Bathe yourself in history)

Prepare to experience the ultimate cultural immersion: los Baños Árabes (Arab Baths) here in Granada. Since Granada was the last stronghold of the Arab people in Spain, they have had a significant cultural impact in the area. Centuries ago, the public baths, or "hamman" served as social gathering spots as well as places to be spiritually and physically cleansed; private baths existed as well. This concept is essentially adapted from the Roman hot baths that were found all over the Roman Empire. The "Bañuelo" here in Granada is the most culturally significant, as it is truly authentic (although non-functional). To get the full experience, a group of us went to the modern version, which is quite spa-like. In a silent, dimly lit environment with relaxing music in the background, bathers can enjoy three separate pools ("baths"): hot, temperate, and cold, in addition to the sauna, masseuses, and tea. I highly recommend this to anyone who comes to Granada - purely for the sake of understanding the culture, of course. 

Besides the baths, the Arab influence here is very prominent. We learned about a major religious debacle in class last week, dating back to the 1500s, that I found absolutely fascinating (sorry, I'm kind of a nerd). The Moorish Granada fell to the Catholic Monarchs in 1492, and by the early sixteenth century the Arabs were being severely repressed. In an effort to improve the dire situation, two Arab intellectuals, who also served as translators for the Catholic Monarchs, "discovered" a series of lead tablets and relics in Granada. These books included the story of Cecilio, the name they gave to the blind man healed by Jesus (note the play on words: "caecus" is Latin for blind), and the "relics" included his bones, etc. According to this story, Cecilio was an Arab man, and was also accompanied by eleven other Arab "disciples" of Christ. Basically, this was an attempt to appease the Catholics by saying, "Look, our ancestors helped found your religion. So please don't outlaw our language, religion, food, and clothing." It didn't really help the whole oppression thing; the Arabs were expelled from the region a few years later. Nevertheless, many people in Granada believed in the books. It wasn't until 1682 that they were officially condemned by the Pope. The relics were not declared fake, however, and Saint Cecilio - supposedly the first bishop and founder of the archdiocese of Granada - is the patron saint of the city. Several statues of him throughout the city have been "censored" (the arm that was holding the lead tablets is mysteriously missing), but every February there is a grand festival on "St. Cecilio's Day".  Oh, the mysteries of history.


The lead tables were returned to Granada in 2000 and are housed in the Abadía del Sacromonte, which is chock full of culture, religion and history. There is a series of underground chapels, connected by tunnels carved out of the hard, rocky hill. ("Sacro"=holy, "monte"=mountain; "Sacromonte=holy mountain). In one of these caves s is a magic rock! Upon hearing this, one of the guys in our group immediately went up and touched it. Then the tour guide told us that if you touch it you will supposedly be married within a year. The guys who touched it literally ran away, and the rest of the group soon followed.  Not to worry, though, closer to the exit of the tunnels, there is another stone to bless the rocky marriages (pardon the pun) in case a divorce is on the horizon. One legend says it will cause your husband to disappear within the year. You can always count on the magic rocks to come to the rescue.

Entrance to the Abadía del Sacromonte

Just out of curiosity, I went to mass this weekend at - you guessed it - la Iglesia de San Cecilio. Surpisingly, the statue of Saint Cecilio on the front of the building portrays him holding a book that suspiciously resembles something of a lead tablet....anyway, I really enjoyed mass. On Friday night I went to stations at Nuestra Señora de Perpetuo Socorro, which was awesome - they even passed out a song sheet to sing a couple verses for each station! I sort of accidentally went to two masses before, though. I stopped by another church on the way there to see if they had stations, but mass started so I couldn't leave. Then I went to Nuestra Señora de Perpetuo Socorro but was early for stations, and they had mass right before. On Saturday when I went to San Cecilio I got there early and there was a rosary group praying in front of the exposition of the blessed sacrament. I'm not sure if it's impeccable timing on my part or the fact that you're bound to run into some kind of church service in this land of abundant iglesias, but I'm leaning toward the latter.

Iglesia de San Cecilio (looks like this statue escaped the censorship)
At the top of the picture is the Latin phrase "domus dei et porta coeli"
(the house of God and the gate of heaven, according to google translate)

Life is quite busy now. I just finished a week of exams, started volunteering at a local preschool (I thought I was getting good at Spanish until I tried to converse with 2-year-olds) and am now preparing for our spring break trip next week. But I'm never too busy to appreciate life, especially while I'm walking through the city. I was coming back from mass on Saturday evening and passed a musician playing the accordion on a corner. Then a guy came running up to him in a hurry and asked him to play "La Cucaracha", which, as you may know, is a traditional Mexican song (with mostly terrible lyrics but a catchy melody). "How random," I thought, until I actually saw the cucaracha (cockroach) - a guy standing on the sidewalk in a giant cucaracha costume. At that point it wasn't random, just strange. I have no explanation. ¡Así es la vida en España!

¡Huy!

I went to my first fútbol game yesterday! Granada played Sporting at Estadio Nuevo los Carmenes here in Granada and won 2-1. The environment was awesome and the game was super fun to watch, which surprised me a little because while I have a great appreciation for athletics, I know very little about soccer. Most Spaniards are diehard fans, even in Granada, where the team is not quite on the same level as the more popular teams like Real Madrid or Barcelona. During an especially exciting moment in the game when Granada would almost score or be on the verge of making a great play but not quite get there, the entire stadium would shout "¡Huy!" (pronounced something like uuuuooouuuuyyyyy; the official definition of this word is "to denote acute physical pain, prudery or astonishment"). This amused me to no end. I enjoy how three-letter words become three-syllable words in Spanish. For instance, they say "wow" here but it's pronounced more like "uuuooouuwww" - so much more fun and dramatic.

I realized how much Spanish people like soccer after I played an intramural basketball game the other day. It was so much fun to play, and a couple of my teammates were bummed after our team lost because it was a single-elimination tournament. Then someone said, "Just buy your own ball to bring to the courts - they're not expensive at all." What would have been at least a $25 ball in the states was 8€ here. When demand for the sport is as low as it is here, it's no wonder playing basketball is so cheap.

The unemployment rate in Spain is around 23% right now, with the youth unemployment rate at about 50%. Not surprisingly, there have been some "manifestaciones", or protests (don't worry, they're peaceful), of large groups of people.  Last weekend I ran into one - literally - and saw signs that said "el problema es el capitalismo." You don't have to speak Spanish to understand that. It's a vastly different political mindset here compared to the United States. Healthcare is free, education is free, but sadly, there are very few jobs to be had. There are several families that I know of who are hosting American students, relying on the host family stipend to support the family. There is also a movement currently in which grandparents are providing for the the families of their adult children because of the severe unemployment. The social security system is also as unsustainable here as it is in the states; people are living longer here and the elderly population is larger than the youth population, so people like my host dad are paying hefty amounts to social security with what seems like little hope of ever seeing that money again in their old age. Nevertheless, the toreros (bullfighters) continue fighting toros (bulls), fútbol fans yell "huy", and  "la marcha" nightlife rages until 7am. Spanish culture lives! 

Other things I find amusing:

• There is one store in the whole entire city that sometimes maybe has a slim chance of carrying shoes for those of us women who are podiatristically gifted (yes, I'm thankful for my big feet). In addition to being excessively expensive, they are all heels. Like I need height, especially in a country where the average woman is 5'5''. Oh, the irony.
• The peanut butter-chocolate combination, a staple for many American students, is a foreign concept here. Peanut butter in general is not popular; Europeans prefer the chocolate spread Nutella, or the Spanish version Nocilla. Reese's cups are nowhere to be found, and when the American girls at school discovered a store that sells Skippy peanut butter that's all I heard about in class for weeks.
• I was sitting in a plaza reading and was approached by two Spanish tourists who asked me where the Office of Tourism was. The only thing more surprising than the fact that I actually gave them directions (in Spanish) was that I must have looked like enough of a non-tourist myself for them to ask me in the first place.
• I'm writing this instead of studying for four exams and writing two essays for this week. (At least it's amusing to me now....)

 

This just in - I love hiking in the mountains in Spain! I went to Los Cahorros de Monachil last weekend, located in a small pueblo about twenty minutes outside of Granada. Here are a few pics!

Are you smarter than a Roman?

A short anecdote before the real fun begins: I lost my flash drive at school (a.k.a. I left it in a computer by accident and it was nowhere to be found when I returned two hours later). It was the first flash drive I ever had; this does not imply sentimental value, but rather no value at all. Someone must have taken it (by accident, clearly) and now they have a copy of my Spanish Civilization essay as well as a folder of random pictures from my brothers' Trail Cam that lives in the woods behind our house and snaps photos of all moving things (like squirrels and leaves blowing in the wind). Joke's on them!

We went to Sevilla last week! Lots of great stuff there...just outside of the city is "Itálica", an excavated area of Roman ruins. See if you can guess what these are pictures of:

1

2

3

4

5

6

ANSWERS:
1 - An original stone in the road that contains a Roman children's game
2 - Sewage system that ran beneath the city (this concept was apparently lost at some point in the Middle Ages)
3 - Hearth in one of the Roman houses
4 - Statue of the goddess Diana  (goddess of the hunt and wild animals; also of fertility and childbirth)
5 - Gladiator's gift to the gods; footprints signify his desire to both enter into the arena and walk out alive
6 - Center of Gladiator arena where animals were kept for fights


If you scored 1/6, you know more than I knew before I went to Itálica.
If you scored between 2 and 5, you should be a historian.
If you scored 6/6, you are a probably a Roman (or at least as smart as one). Congratulations!

Sevilla itself is a very interesting city. The Plaza de Toros there is a very famous bullfighting center, and the Sevilla Cathedral is the largest Gothic cathedral in the world. It is also the burial site (the real one) of Christopher Columbus. There is a fascinating Arabic influence in the 3,000-year-old city as well; the massive tower of the cathedral  is a remnant of the Moorish mosque.

One of the astounding views from the top of the Giralda tower; the center of the photo is the Plaza de Toros

Center of the Plaza de España (a few scenes in the Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones were filmed here!)

Well, it's officially been two months since I arrived in Spain. I'm learning "un montón" of new things, and my Spanish has definitely improved. However, it's nowhere near perfect. Here's my analogy: speaking English is like playing the piano for me - I've done it for almost my entire life and I'm comfortable with it. Speaking Spanish is like learning to play the piano with my feet - I theoretically know how it works and how it's supposed to sound, but when I put it into practice on the spot it's a lot harder than I thought. Challenges are good, though. They're a fantastic cure for the ailment of complacency.

¡Mis mejores deseos!

What a Wonderful (and Small) World

Well, it's the beginning of one of my favorite seasons of the year - Lent! Like much of Spain, my host family does not practice the Catholic faith on a regular basis. Contrary to popular belief, Spain is a highly non-religious country. It's taken me some time to get used to that. One of my professors said that ten percent or less of the population attends mass on Sundays. So, I explained to my host mom that I was not going to eat meat on Ash Wednesday or Fridays during Lent. She was really nice about it and said, "But chicken is good...yes?" I totally felt like Ian from My Big Fat Greek Wedding when he tells Aunt Voula that he is a vegetarian and she responds, "That's okay, I make lamb." We got it all cleared up, though. I kind of want to make a bundt cake and see what happens. (If you haven't seen the movie and have no idea what I'm talking about, you should probably check it out).

Speaking of culture, I went to Prague and Vienna this past week! Prague was an extremely cool city, and I felt right at home. I think it had something to do with the fact that people were tall(er) there, literally everyone spoke English, and that's the land of my fathers (I think...more on that later). It was a little strange because the Czech Republic isn't on the Euro yet, so we had to exchange our money for Czech Crowns when we got there. One euro is worth about twenty-five crowns though, so paying for things was ridiculous; dinner was cheap by euro standards, but it cost about 200 crowns. It was like having Monopoly money in your pocket. However, the country itself is very new- it has only existed since 1989 (as part of Czechoslovakia) and since 1993 as the Czech Republic. We took a walking tour around the city and got a brief overview of the history there. One of the tour guides knew a lady from the Czech Republic who had lived in nine different countries during her life - but never moved. That's some serious border instability. Therefore, I think I had relatives in the area at one point, but I suppose I will never know exactly where they came from.

Below: Lock Bridge in Prague - the idea is to snap a lock on the bridge and throw the key into the water

 Right: Tyn Cathedral in Prague (notice that the tower on the left is smaller than the tower on the right)

Left: John Lennon Wall in Prague - filled with Beatles-inspired phrases since the 1980s; it was also a source of communist opposition


Right: Giant Metronome, symbolizing the monotony of life under the Communist government


I had researched churches in both Prague and Vienna before going, but I wasn't sure whether I would be able to make it to mass on Saturday in Prague. So I decided to ask the receptionist at our hostel for tips on nearby churches since the big cathedral was far away. When I did, he looked at me with a thoroughly confused expression, slowly pulled out a map, and said, "Well, I know of one church." He then proceeded to circle the huge landmark church on the other side of the river. That's the church I knew about too. I ended the awkwardness and decided to go to church in Vienna. The next day I found out that the country is arguably the most secular in the world, with a population that is 90% atheistic.

Whereas Prague had a distinctly old-European feel to it, Vienna was very modern. I made it to mass at St. Stephen's Cathedral, but it was in German. That's the thing about Europe - you spend a few hours on a train and end up in a totally new country, with completely different cultures and traditions. Imagine if each of the states in America had its own language and distinct ethnicity. It's mind-boggling. In Vienna, we also visited Mozart's house (they're big on classical music there), ice skated in front of the town hall, went to the zoo (the oldest in the world that is still open) and topped off the weekend with a magnificent classical music concert. Definitely a phenomenal trip.

Ice skating in front of Town Hall in Vienna

Inside the Greenhouse near the Vienna Zoo

The Gloriette - across the plaza from the Schoenbrunn Palace in Vienna

Concert Hall in Vienna

It's crazy how small the world is sometimes. In Prague, we happened to run into the people who were staying in the room next to ours in the hostel, and one of them was a classmate from Bucknell! We literally bumped into another Bucknell friend in Prague as well, in addition to seeing other students from our school in Spain. Then in Vienna one of the girls in our group saw a group from her high school staying in our hostel. I guess that's life - you just never know what's going to happen.

I saw a quote the other day that I really like: "Receive with simplicity everything that happens to you."  I'm not really sure what exactly that means or how to do it, but I know for a fact that simplicity is a really complicated idea.

Until next time - ¡hasta la vista!