Las Fallas

Imagine a carnival without the rides, streets strung with the lights of Ballywood, the smell of melted chocolate, and the sound of fire crackers exploding in the closed off streets. A woman in an 18^th century hoop skirt and a little boy in knee socks follow the crowd toward the center of the square where stands, towering multiple stories, la Falla.

You try to keep up with Natalia and Patricia, pushing past the crowd. You drop your camera and stop to pick it up. When you look up, you’ve lost sight of the girls, and you’re lost in a mess of people. A grown man shoves past you. You try to move forward, but you’re stuck between bodies. Finally the mob starts to disperse and you make your way to the edge, catching sight of Carlos (you host father). Reunited, you continue with the family towards the falla. When you reach it, Carlos explains the gigantic, surreal sculpture.

“The people of Valencia, Valencianos, spend all year building the fallas, and each one has a theme, like the Spanish cinema or the economic crisis.” The theme of this one was Insanity. You see a gigantic gentleman in a top hat an and coat drinking a green potion on one side of the structure, and on the other you see his deranged transformation, broken bottle in hand.

A girl wearing the same type of dress as you saw earlier – laced bodice, hoop skirt, intricate floral patterns and bright colors – runs up to Patricia, and they shout and laugh in surprise. It’s Maria, one of Patricia’s oldest friends. They met one summer while your host family was vacationing (as they do every summer) in Valencia. She offers to take you inside the falla so that you can take pictures without the crowd of people. As you walk around the falla, you notice signs on nearly every part, but you don’t recognize the words. As it turns out, they’re in valenciano, a distinct dialect of Spanish. You crane your neck to see the top, and a flying pig comes in to view, reigning over the caricatured little world.

As you walk through, Maria explains to you that at the end of the week, all of the fallas will be burned at midnight. This is called la cremà. The next day, preparations for the next year will begin. Her falla is called Na Jordana, and everyone who lives in her neighborhood is part of the same falla. All of the women and girls, falleras, wear the same type of dresses. Each one is unique, made of fabrics from Valencia. Tomorrow they will all parade through the streets, bringing flowers to the Plaza de la Virgen.

You follow Maria to a building where everyone one from Na Jordana is eating dinner. Men in traditional Argentine clothes serve meat to everyone. Hungry, you take a bite of a dark sausage. Patricia gives you a surprised look and tells you what it is. Onions and blood. You decide not to eat anymore. When everyone is finished eating, you follow your host family back onto the street. You are about to head toward the center of the city to watch the nightly fireworks.

At 1 am the fireworks start. They are much louder and with more frequency than you have ever seen before. They were designed by the Caballer brothers of Valencia, some of the most sough after producers of specialty fireworks in the world, and will cost the city over 100,000 Euros. You watch as a silver explosion transforms into floating hearts that descend as slowly as feathers, as if becoming gradually lighter. Twenty minutes and thousands of slivery firecrackers later, you head to the car and back to the family’s flat outside of the city. Tomorrow you won’t wake up until noon.

The next day you and the family head into the city at 1:30. At 2 o'clock you find yourself in yet another crowd, awaiting the Mascletà. You're not sure what you're waiting for, and are about to ask when you hear what sounds like a reenactment of Sarajevo in 1914. A cloud of puffy white smoke rises in front of the crowd, slowly engulfing the buildings. Behind it you can see a few red sparks flying in all directions. The crashes grow louder and become more frequent and the tension mounts. Finally a man shouts, and like dominoes, the entire group applauds, whooping and clapping. The Mascletà ends, and the day begins.

Now, Carlos wants you to see the parade of the Falleras, so you wait on a street corner. First you hear the band, and then, in the distance, you see tiny figures, like dolls, walking forward. As they come closer, you realize they're little girls, all with their hair done in the traditional valencian style, wearing beautiful, colorful, lace adorned dresses. Their mothers follow behind them, and then their fathers and brothers. The will use the flower they carry to cover the statue of the Virgen in the plaza.

After watching the last of the Falleras go by, you and your host family meet up with Miguel and Anna, some friends from Salamanca, also here to enjoy the festival. Miguel bought some petardos, or fire crackers, and you and the girls spend the rest of the night exploring the fallas and throwing petardos. It makes Fonsey nervous, so she walks a distance behind us.

At the end of the night, you are invited to watch la cremà from Maria's balcony. At midnight, you see the falleras crowd around their beloved falla, accompanied by bomberos, firemen. They light the little wonder on fire, and the fallera mayor begins to weep. You watch as the flying pig falls, burning, to the ground, and are reminded that only in a fairy tale could he keep his wings. The fire goes out more quickly than you expected, and you are exhausted. Tomorrow, the city will be cleared of all 150 fallas, and it will be as if it never happened.

Chuck Bass

In the beginning, I did a lot of nodding and smiling, pretending to understand, laughing when other people laughed, being awkward. Now, with nearly two months under my belt, the disconnect is losing substance, and I’m starting to think in Spanish. More importantly, other people are starting to see that I understand, and I’m becoming more than just the exchange student who doesn’t get anything.

Every Friday we have a supplemental class called tutoria. It’s sort of like a homeroom, or advisory, except with 30 + people. This trimester, the students have been giving short speeches about Africa during this block. Some of them I found comical - “the animals of Africa include leopards, lions, and piranhas…” – others struck me as so general, they toed around offensive – “in Africa, the main food source is hunting.” And then there were some that I found interesting, with topics like the comparison between the treatment of women in regions with strong education systems and areas where few go to school. I began to think about what I would say in my speech.

My teacher during tutoria is Don Francisco. He’s tall, with birdlike features and thin, floppy hair that I imagine probably went through a great cowlick stage when he was a toddler. After the speeches had finished one Friday, I asked him when I would go. He looked at me, and shouted, “you mean you want to do this!?” as if I were crazy. “You? Want to do this?” A little taken aback, I replied that yes, I wanted to try because I wanted to improve my Spanish. And that’s how I ended up walking to the podium a week later, paper clenched in hand.

I had practiced reading it over and over the night before, concentrating on making all my Zs and Cs sound like “th” and rolling all my Rs. I opened my mouth and just let her loose, thankfully not having to think about looking up every few words as that came pretty naturally, thanks to practice from Model UN. My speech was about the negative effects of imperialism on various countries in Africa, focusing on the Congo Free State as an example (PS Dr. Naeher, I barely had to look anything up!).

By the time I finished, hinting at a correlation between the unrest of the Republic of Congo today and the unrest of its history, I felt my ears burning and I knew I was red as a tomato. I was surprised, though further embarrassed when everyone told me how well I had pronounced everything, and that they were shocked that I could actually speak Spanish.

In the end, I won a little laser pointer, which I have actually been enjoying tremendously. After each speech, every one voted, and mine was voted one of the top ten. Other people won things like incognito glasses (with the nose and the mustache) and little stuffed tigers.

Ever since, class has started to get a little more interesting. In classes with Don Franscisco, economics and philosophy, he’s started calling on me to answer questions. The other day we had an argument about Skinner’s stimuli/response theory of psychology. I don’t know what it’s called in English, but Skinner’s basic argument is that psychology should only consider stimuli and the responses they solicit, and that consciousness and personality are void because you can’t prove they exist.

Afterwards, the girl who sits a few seats behind me, Cristina, mentioned that she was surprised about how much I understood. I was ecstatic to hear that, not because I needed a second opinion (I knew I understood), but because it meant that other people could see that I understood. I had been getting so sick of asking questions in Spanish and listening to my classmates struggle to reply in English because they thought I just didn’t get it. But now, the dynamic is changing, and maybe the playing field is starting to level off.

The next day I saw Cristina walking home from school on my way to the library. I caught up to her and we walked together. She told me that she was going to be going on an exchange program to the US, living with a family in VT for three weeks. Wait. VERMONT?! DUDE!!! I SORT OF LIVE THERE! So I told her she had to let me know when she would be there so I could show her around. Just as she was about to turn the corner to her house, she asked me where I was eating. I told her I would pick something up at the market, or something. She looked horrified. “Ven comigo para comer!” I told her no, it’s ok, I didn’t mind eating alone, but she insisted. So, excited to have made a new friend, I accompanied her to the second floor of a gray building across the street from a small bakery.

I opened the door to the smell of tomato sauce, and to the feeling of a bird pecking at my feet. I looked down and was shocked to see a chicken – or something – on top of my shoe. “Chuck! Que haces?!” Cristina laughed. She scooped him up and explained to me as we headed to the kitchen that Chuck (named after Chuck Bass from Gossip Girl) was a partridge that a friend of her father’s had given her. She liked having a partridge better than a dog or a cat because he was a lot cleaner and didn’t smell. Ok, I thought. I’ll have to make friends with him.

In the kitchen we found her father slicing pieces of jamon, just the way Carlos had taught me. He said hello, and that he hoped I liked spaghetti.

After helping set the table, we all sat down to eat and watched some Spanish news. After we finished eating, he asked me what I wanted to eat tomorrow… surprised but pleased that I was invited again, I said that whatever they were having I’m sure I would enjoy. But he, like his daughter, insisted, so I caved and admitted that I had been dying for some vegetables. The next day when Cristina and I arrived at her house for lunch, there was a pile of roasted red peppers and a plate full of tomatoes waiting for us on the table, watched over by Chuck.

So, I’ve been making more friends, getting comfortable in school, and enjoying soccer. But there are some vital aspects of my life that are missing, namely, Phoebe Long. Ever since sixth grade when we were next-door neighbors, we had a bond. We always enjoyed spending time together, obsessing over High School Musical or Miley Cyrus. But what reminded me of her today was Cristina. Because, like Cristina, she always welcomed me into her home and treated me like part of her family, so while Cristina is no Phoebe substitute, it’s wonderful to have found someone as accepting as her while I’m so far from home.

Zamora

Lili had been so excited all week, and wouldn't stop talking about it. "She named him Javier! Javi! I just want to eat him up," she told my one day in class. "Do you want to come see him with me this weekend? My cousin lives in Zamora - you could see another town!" So I told her sure, I'd go with her to meet her cousin and her new baby.

We ate at her house after school - pasta, pork chops, bread, and natillas. Natillas is this delicious desert, sort of like vanilla pudding or custard - but better. Then we changed out of our uniforms and got ready to head out. I loaded up my bag with the necessities: wallet, camera, cell phone, bike bottle. Upon putting my water bottle in my bag, Lili asked me why I was bringing it. "Because I'll get thirsty," I replied.

"But you can just buy a water bottle," she answered. I tried to explain to her the importance of proper hydration, but she told me drinking water was bad for you. I suppressed a laugh.

By bus, Zamora is about 45 minutes from Salamanca. About half way through the ride I began to regret bringing my bike bottle, because in Spain the busses don't have bathrooms. Suffice it to say it was a very long 45 minutes.

When we arrived in Zamora, a town of roughly 75,000 inhabitants, one of Lili's cousins picked us up. I introduced myself and we soon got into a discussion about running and marathons, and I was really pleased to meet someone else in Spain who liked to run.

From what I could see from the drive, Zamora was much smaller than Salamanca. It was certainly similar though. When we passed by the cathedral, I was reminded that every Spanish town has a cathedral which is always the highest building. To facilitate this, cathedrals are generally situated on hills. We drove towards the outskirts of town and came into an organization not too dissimilar from my own - though not quite so much like Little Winging (we even have a deserted playground reminiscent of dementors).

The house we pulled up to looked like a ginger bread house - tall and narrow, with mediterranean style roofing and white windows. We walked inside and Lili's cousin called us in to the living room. I walked in to find her breast feeding her baby, and I found myself unsure of what to do. So I just smiled and introduced myself, and apparently it didn't bother her at all that I was a complete stranger, and that she was breast feeding her baby right in front of me. Then Lili ran in and sat down right next to the new mom and her tiny baby, ready smother him as soon as he was finished nursing. We all talked for a while, snacking on strawberries, and in the middle of our conversation, the cousin who drove us here remarked that I spoke very well. I thanked him, and laughed, thinking to myself, if I spoke that well I wouldn't be failing Spanish Language and Literature right now. As the conversation went on however, I noticed that I actually knew what we were talking about, and wasn't just pretending to understand, as I sometimes do.

Lili had been holding the baby, Javier, and gave him back to his mom. I watched with some interest, mostly bewildered by how small he was. His mother asked me if I wanted to hold him. "Yo? No, no, gracias," I replied, but she began handing him to me anyway. She insisted, so I awkwardly took the tiny person into my hands. I didn't know how to hold him, so I just made sure his head was up. He started to whine and I knew it was my fault, so I promptly gave him back. I was impressed by the softness with which his mother picked him up, and couldn't help but note

Lili had wanted to show me around Zamora, so we thanked them and left. We walked through the cobbled streets and passed by churches and monuments, all the while singing American songs we both knew.

After a few hours of exploring, we were both starving. But I would much rather go hungry than do what Lili asked me to do.

"I can't do that!" I retorted. "I'm American!!"

"But I'm hungry," Lili protested, pushing me toward a group of boys walking our way.

"Why don't you ask them?" I complained.

"Because I'm Spanish!" Sure, use that home court advantage, I thought bitterly.

Suddenly I was alone in front of three strange boys, all taller and older than me, expectantly waiting for the lost foreigner to say something.

"Hola," I glanced back at Lili, gave her the coldest look I could muster, and reluctantly proceeded. "Sabes donde hay un McDonalds?" Sometimes people ask me if I'm from England, or France, but I cringed with the knowledge that as soon as I uttered the word "McDonalds" these boys knew I was American. They looked at each other, shrugged their shoulders, and one of them replied in English, despite the fact that I had asked in Spanish, "that way" and pointed down the street.

Lili and I walked for a while, but after fifteen minutes she let up her search for McDonalds and we settled for a Telepizza instead. I ordered the same thing one would have at a McDonalds: a cheese burger. But while I had loathed the idea of going to a McDonalds, I had fewer objections to eating the same ketchup slathered, luke-warm pickle topped, greasy cheeseburger at Telepizza. Because here, I wouldn't be associated with any stereotype. Sure, maybe I was filling one: all Americans eat fast food. But had I gone to McDonald's, it would have been like bleaching my hair platinum blonde and then purposefully failing a test. This was a little better, because here - while I was still failing the test (let's call it proper nutrition, Ch. 1) - at least I wasn't contributing the rather shameful association between McDonald's and Americans.