It’s my 15h day in Australia and a lot has happened. I’ve essentially started a whole new life, but before I can get into my Australian stories, I want to cover the time I spent in Spain. As some people may already know, this wasn’t my first time in Spain. When I was 17 years old I went to Zaragoza, Spain to live for 3 months on a student exchange. What an extraordinary feeling it was going back to the same place 7 years later. However, before I describe what it was like re-uniting with my past, I’ll first talk about the first city I visited… Valencia. When I got off the plane, I was greeted by Alan and his friends. The first thing I noticed getting outside of the airport was the temperature. It was 42 degrees on the day I arrived. SO HOT but I liked! I’ve come to the conclusion that I belong in a warm climate. Spain is really unique when it comes to culture and traditions, which is something I noticed my first time around and even more so my second time around. For example, they eat lunch around 2pm instead of noon and they have dinner at 10pm or 11pm at night. Lunch is the biggest meal of the day and families take the time to enjoy it. A lot of businesses close down for a couple hours over lunch so that families can get together for a meal and of course a siesta (mid-afternoon nap). That’s another thing that’s really important in Spain, family. They place a lot of importance on getting together as an entire family on a weekly basis. And not just your immediate family, but extended as well, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins etc… After lunch, it’s common to sit around the table and just talk about what’s going on with everyone. It’s a really good way to keep everybody connected. Some people make jokes saying it’s the things like long lunches, siestas and late night dinners/partying that pushed Spain into a recession. While this might be true to some degree, I think that we could all learn a thing or two from the Spanish ways. They’re on to something. It’s the quality of life that stands out to me. They seem so happy. Kids don’t sit in front of the television watching shows and playing video games because they are outside playing with their neighbors and friends before dinner. Also, it’s very communal. It’s uncommon if you don’t have close relationships with your neighbors, I really liked that. For example, one afternoon, Alan and I were invited to have lunch with his neighbor and another family joined us. No one was in a rush to finish, no one was on their blackberry and everyone was smiling and laughing. Not bad for a mid-day gathering. That brings me to Spanish food. It’s so good. If there were 3 things I could say about what Spanish people appreciate it would be food, wine, and socializing. The only down fall was my lack of Spanish. My basic Spanish skills don’t get me too far and I wasn’t able to fully build on relationships with the language barrier. Sofia and some of her friends can speak some English but apart from them, not many people can speak English in Spain unless they have been studying /practicing it for years because virtually everything is translated so it’s not as necessary to learn as it is in some other countries, like Germany or Switzerland.
Anyways, moving on from that…After a few days on the beach in Valencia with Alan and his friends, it was time to get on a bus to Zaragoza to meet Sofia (my exchange student from high school). Sofia has come to visit me a couple times in Canada but we hadn’t seen each other for 3 years so it was still very exciting. I met Sofia at the station and we hugged it out. We ventured back to the same home I stayed in 7 years earlier. So much time had passed and yet everything seemed the exact same, but it a good and comforting way. Sofia’s parents, sister and friends were all just as lovely and welcoming as ever. My time spend in Zaragoza was very chilled out. The day consisted of vegging by the pool because it was too hot to do much else. And at night, on the weekends, we would go out partying until 6 or 7 in the morning. This is because they eat dinner so late, so everything else starts later as well. We don’t even leave for the bar until 1 or 2 in the morning. It’s a bit different than Canada considering most bars shut down at 2am.
My final destination was Barcelona before I would get on a plane to Australia. Barc was a super cool city. We did a walking tour and saw all the major historic sites. Some of my favorites was the architecture done by Gaudi. It’s all throughout the city and it’s really unique. We definitely had an amazing time there.
I should probably mention that during my stay in Spain, I spent some time with a couple guys from California. It’s funny, while Canada is right beside America, I can’t say that I have spent much time with Americans. I always hear the stereotypes but have never been able to give my own opinion. Quite honestly, I was pleasantly surprised. These guys went to some of the best schools in the world, Stanford and USC. They obviously had a very privileged upbringing and yes they did think that America was the best country in the world. But apart from that, these guys were curious about other cultures and they had open minds to new things like me. They even understood my sense of humour and were really funny. So overall, I really did enjoy the company of the “Americans” :P. The only real difference with our vocab is in the way we say “about” and even then, you would have to be listening very closely to distinguish it. Oh, and their desire to say dude every other word. That was pretty entertaining.
After Barcelona, it was time to say goodbye to everyone is Spain and get on my flight to Australia that stopped over in Dubai, then to Sydney and then to the Gold Coast. I highly recommend flying with Emerites if you get the chance. Anyways, 30 hours later, I arrive at Coolangatta Airport where my mate Max from University picked me up … To be continued.
