Monday, March 2, 2009

Things You Might Not Know About Spain, Volume 1

This is my last week here. There are many, many things that I have wanted to write on here but I tend to get distracted by metaphysics and navel-gazing, so this is a catch-all list to inform you on things that you couldn't know without spending a few months here.

1) The art of hairstyles has been perfected here in Spain. The boys wear mullets, and girls have curly bangs. No one thinks anything is wrong with this.

2) Dryers do not exist. Clotheslines do. Draping wet underwear over radiators throughout the house is also an option.

3) Carpet does not exist. This is the one that gets me the most. Every house floor is tile, and thus cold, and thus incredibly depressing when it is the first thing you feel in the morning. If I were Spider-Man I would totally walk on the ceiling and this would not be a problem.

4) In the United States, Chinese restaurants cook cat and dog meat since chickens are so dang hard to come by, right? Well, here they serve the remains of their dead family members. When asked about this, one clever Spaniard responded, "Have you ever seen a Chinese graveyard? Didn't think so."

5) Swear words are not uncommon, nor anything to take note of. In one class of professors, I said a difficult word to pronounce ("this," for crying out loud) and one man was discouraged and said the f-word equivalent. He was sitting next to the town's priest, who did not bat an eyelash.

I hope this has been enlightening for you. More to come, if you like them.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

You would make a good spiderman.
hannah.

Courtney said...

Dear Spiderman,
Please do not get a mullet. Or curl your bangs. I hope that you get carpety goodness soon! Also, I do not think that "throughout the house" is the proper place to dry underthings. You should work on that. Maybe you could spin a special web that will dry clothes in a more proper place....like a corner of a room. I did not know that spiders even liked Chinese food but I think that you should stick to the meals that Aunt May cooks for you. Also, you are my favorite superhero and swearing would make you less of my favorite....just saying
your fan,
Courtney

Anonymous said...

haha! so neat!
Keep them coming!
And come home soon!

Cole said...

1) I am glad to see from your profile pic that you have not succumbed to the hairstyle issues of Spain

2) I like Courtney's idea of spinning a web to hang your clothes to dry... just might work

3) I hate getting out of bed to a cold floor... totally does not motivate me to get up. Spider-Man doesn't know how lucky he has it!

4) *doesn't know whether to shudder or laugh*

5) This would have been even more emphatic if the priest was the one who dropped the spanish f-bomb.

Keep them coming! :-)

Anonymous said...

The first two are the same here. After I wash my clothes my bed frame is decorated with underwear and other clothing articles battle for the other spots. Items take turns in front of my space heater (my radiators don't work well in my room). There are area rugs everywhere here, so I guess that's a nice diff. from there. I suppose I should say a lot of guys hair is almost like a mullet, but not quite. The other main style for the guys is to shave the rest and leave the bangs a little longer (it's worse than the mullets, i think). I think the style thing here has to do with the fact that a lot of what's on tv are 80's/90's American tv shows and movies. I don't know enough of the language to know if they cuss...they do say "God" a whole lot when they're flustered and that allows me.