It’s been about a week since I got to Spain and living with a host mom has been nothing short of fantastic. Her name is Carmen and she is basically what would happen if Betty Crocker, Hillary Clinton and the lady from Facts of Life had a baby. In short, she’s the bomb. She cooks, she cleans, she knits, she has a full time job, three grown daughters, she can school most people in movie trivia and she has a lot of really interesting opinions about politics. The only thing she does not do is speak English, but that has turned out to be an up-side for me because ONLY being able to communicate in Spanish has made me light years better. The first couple of days were very challenging, but never really disheartening. We got through a lot by pointing at things, very Hellen Keller-esque.
As we got to know each other better and my Spanish started to rapidly improve we were able to move on to topics more in depth than “do you like fish” and “do you need to use the restroom”. We are both big tennis fans so it was fun to chat about that for a while. I told her I would kick her butt on the court and the joke landed, which was very exciting (my first joke in another language!). Either that, or she just felt really uncomfortable and decided to laugh it off, lol.
Then we moved on to movies, which we could literally talk about for days…Julia Roberts in English is Julia Roberts in Spanish, it’s really a great way to make small talk with someone of another background. PLUS the movies here are almost all American movies with Spanish voices on top of them. I think I always thought that there was a whole other culture of films here. After all, there is a Best Foreign Movie category at the Oscars, I always figured that they imported one or two really huge American movies and the rest were Spanish based but it’s just the opposite. We saw Pirates de Caribe (Pirates of the Caribbean) the other night…long and boring in English, longer and more boring in Spanish. We had a long convo about Hitchcock and we watched Rear Window in Español. I told her that in the USA some people compare me to Jimmy Stewart…again more uncomfortable laughter (as if to say, “that’s sweet of them” lol).
There was a big election here and she was not pleased about it. She kept yelling things out at the TV. The conservative party here won big and the liberals are not pleased. She does not really identify with either party and she was telling me that it’s not like the states with just two huge parties and the rest unimportant. There is always a left side and a right side but there are a few different parties that play a big factor in different elections. She asked me how I felt about the death penalty and Osama Bin Laden. Its interesting to discuss something complex in another language, because you want so badly to get your point across, but finding the words in English can sometimes be tough enough. She couldn’t understand any time when the death penalty would need to be used and although I tried to explain that Osama couldn’t be captured, because he kept escaping she still did not agree with it. Then we got into a very interesting convo about the death penalty and how weird it is that it’s so accepted in the states. I agreed and that convo led into the topic of the mentally ill who are treated equally as poorly here as in the states.
The economy is majorly struggling here as well. There are no jobs for young people after graduation. Sound familiar? The only difference is they pay very little for college… oh and they don’t have to worry about paying for healthcare. We’ve started to discuss that as well, but I hope to form a better opinion on universal healthcare at the end of this trip. It’s still very complicated for me. While discussing all this stuff she is literally serving me three meals a day (when I don’t go out with the other students). The food is amazing! She is a great cook and if you get past the fact that you are eating an entire fish that is staring you in the face, it is freaking fantastic. She also does my laundry… I’m spoiled. She even told me that Gwyneth Paltrow came to Spain and lived with a host family so things can TOTALLY happen for me, hahaha. ‘I hope she likes dinner theater’ was all I could think. But how cool would it be if I got famous and then I could fly her to the states to see movies and shows. I think I’m gonna make that happen… but only cuz Carmen has been so awesome. Wonderful people deserve to be rewarded. Maybe I’ll even marry Neil Patrick Harris…BUT only so she can meet him. I’m so selfless sometimes.
No comments:
Post a Comment