Well folks, I’m still kicking it Fulbright-style despite my long break from blogging. Since my last post, I have travelled to three new countries, hosted friends and family from the US, and acquired several new hobbies. I’ve fallen more deeply in love with this island as I experienced it through the fresh eyes of my guests. I’ve continued to struggle to figure out my role at school while increasingly hitting my stride in my social/ extra-curricular life. Now that you have read my abstract, I will elaborate on each point for the remainder of this post. Feel free to just scroll through and look at pictures if that appeals to you more!
Around (some of) the EU in (less than) 80 days
Since Christmas, I have hosted my family, my childhood friend Shelby, and my college roommate Kathleen. When I lived in Indianapolis, hosting friends was bittersweet. Making plans and actively exploring the city helped me appreciate Indy’s charms more, but having a friend from home that I missed made me more homesick, and saying goodbye was always really hard. Hosting people in Lanzarote has been a different experience, because I don’t have the same love-hate relationship with Lanzarote that I did with Indy—it’s pretty much all love for the island!
In December, after the longest stretch of being away from home in my life, my family and best friend from childhood came to visit me. There is something so special about getting to share a place that you love with the people that you love. My family and I rented a car for the entire week, and we really took advantage of our freedom to move without the constraints of the bus system. The buses are good enough for getting to work, but having a car is the real key to getting to know Lanzarote. With my parents and Shelby I was able to explore parts of the island that I hadn’t yet seen as well as sharing some old favorites like the Jardin de Cactus and the beach at Famara.
After our week in Lanzarote, my family and I went to Sevilla and Barcelona. I had a blast exploring the peninsula and seeing how different the regions of Spain are!
To finish off my whirlwind winter break, Shelby and I went to Vienna and Berlin.
Almost immediately after returning to school, I had another trip planned– this time to Portugal to meet up with my beloved college roommate Kathleen.
After Portugal, I had the delight of showing Thleen around Lanzarote. Here’s some more pics!
Do one thing every day that scares you
A perfect storm of my innate drive to always be accomplishing something and an insane amount of free time has prompted me to try more new things in the past few months than in the rest of my life combined. Since I came into this program with a willingness to blow through my life savings, I am living the life of a moderately wealthy retiree with no health problems. Here’s just a brief overview of some of the things I’ve been pursuing!
I’m chronically guilty of expressing interest in a new language, starting to learn it via Duolingo or a podcast, and losing interest after a few weeks. However, I have recently begun/ resumed my Arabic studies and I’m hoping that this time my interest sticks. I did a summer Arabic program back in high school, so I remembered the alphabet and some simple greetings. Now that I work with so many Arabic-speaking students, my interest has been rekindled. The kids have a lot of fun teaching me words and hearing me try/fail to pronounce them, and I love being able to demonstrate interest in their culture and language. Things really came together when I, being the ridiculous person that I am, told a taxi driver that I speak Arabic. I told him that the kids were teaching me some words, and he said “That’s street Arabic! You have to learn the real thing! Everyone will want to hire you if you speak Spanish and Arabic!” So, leaning into the situation, I agreed to meet with him once a week to do an Arabic/ English exchange. The exchange has been going great so far, and it’s had the unintended side effect of helping me converse in Spanish more often since it’s the only language we can really communicate in (until I get super good at Arabic of course).
In addition to my Arabic exchange, I finally started my Fulbright side project! Since my favorite hobby here is to complain about not speaking Spanish enough, I decided to organize a language exchange at a local bar. I was inspired by my experience going to Gringo Tuesdays in Bogota, which was a huge language exchange that gradually turned into a party as the night went on. I knew that the crowd would probably be smaller in Arrecife, but I still felt like we could create a relaxed and fun atmosphere for practicing a language and meeting new people. The bar owner, Caterina, was very enthusiastic about the idea. She helped to publicize while my friend Marta and I created guidelines and conversation cards. We have hosted three events so far and they’ve attracted a lot of language learners. Each time, a spontaneous Italian practice table popped up as well!
Finally, I’ve been exploring new sports like rock climbing, sailing, and scuba diving. Getting scuba certified has been a life-long dream of mine. I kept putting off getting certified a little bit out of financial concerns and a little bit out of fear—no matter how much you love the water, it’s hard to wrap your head around the idea of being under it for an extended period of time! But a few weeks ago I met a lovely British woman who runs a dive shop with her husband, and she offered me a resident discount, so I decided it was now or never. Within a week, I was meeting her husband on the beach at Playa Chica for what they call a “baptism dive” before starting the full course. I was surprised at how quickly they got me in the water. There was no time wasted in a swimming pool—they quite literally threw me into the deep end, and on my very first dive I was 5.7 meters underwater, meeting some lovely cuttlefish and corals and colorful fish. It was hard to trick my brain into believing that I could and should keep breathing underwater, but I didn’t have a choice! It was amazing to experience the underwater world without the glass walls of an aquarium, and I can’t wait to continue my journey.
Not all fun and games
Despite my extracurricular successes, I still worry that I’m not doing the school part of Fulbright correctly. I don’t feel like part of the school community, and I spend a lot of the day feeling a little extraneous. At first I was eager to make friends with the teachers and practice my Spanish, but after months of not feeling like my efforts were working, I have slid into a sense of resignation. The extent of my interactions with teachers is typically “Hola, que tal? Bien, y tu?” I feel disappointed and frustrated because I know that I should be doing more, but I also know I’m not the only auxiliar feeling this way at this point in the year.
Something I have been thinking about a lot is the auxiliar program’s prohibition from speaking Spanish with the students. Creating this artificial barrier prevents me from participating in the school community to the fullest extent. Many teachers are not aware that my Spanish abilities are relatively good because I can’t speak Spanish to them in front of the kids. This only leaves the teachers’ lounge, where I’ve had a hard time getting involved in conversations between several teachers at once.
Worse than inhibiting my ability to socialize with teachers, the prohibition hurts my ability to relate with my students and to teach effectively. I often wish I could implement a classroom management technique or social-emotional development strategy, but the students’ English level isn’t high enough for this to be effective without me revealing that I speak Spanish. Also, one of the most important parts of teaching is building a strong relationship with the students. While I feel that I have been successful with this through plenty of smiles, hugs, and high fives, I wish I could ask the students about their weekend or their families or their career aspirations or literally anything other than “How are you?” and “What is your name?” The thing that’s starting to bother me the most is that the kids are obligated to learn my language and show interest in my culture if they want to succeed in school, but I am not allowed to demonstrate my interest in their language and culture. Not to mention I don’t think there’s solid evidence that me pretending to not speak Spanish is an effective way to teach English. In fact, when I was a teacher in Indianapolis I often encouraged my English language-learners by telling them that I don’t speak perfect Spanish and they don’t speak perfect English, but we can keep trying and learning together! I’m not really sure what they solution is to this, but I know I’m not the only one who feels this way because it was something that I brought up at the Fulbright midyear conference. Which brings me to…
Midyear… how??
This past week, I went to the Fulbright midyear conference in Murcia. Honestly, I wasn’t looking forward to the event because I thought it would have the same anxiety-inducing atmosphere as orientation. I was also a little peeved that I had to go to Murcia at all. The most common reaction when I told teachers or friends that I was going there was “… why?” Like less-populated states in the US, Murcia is often the butt of jokes and memes. Some Spanish people are convinced that it doesn’t even really exist, much like some hardcore conspiracy theorists in the US think that North Dakota is a sham.
Despite the low expectations, both the city of Murcia and the Fulbright conference were surprisingly pleasant. I haven’t spent much time in the Spanish peninsula, so even taking the train from Madrid to Murcia and seeing the changing countryside was a treat. Murcia itself seemed like a pretty typical medium-sized city—some modern buildings, some historical buildings, no obvious defects that should make it the subject of ridicule. The biggest surprise about Murcia was the food. I’ve gone on about how much I miss gastronomic diversity in other blog posts, so you can imagine how pleased I was to have access to great Indian food, an all-vegan café, and FALAFEL! It had been so long since I had falafel that I forgot I even missed it, but now my passion is reignited.
The Fulbright conference itself was excellent. Unlike Orientation, which was a series of lectures and trainings to prepare us for the experience, Midyear was an opportunity for people to share their experiences so far through presentations and small group discussions. Hearing about the incredible research and side projects of my fellow grantees reinvigorated my sense of purpose. It was also just refreshing to activate the academic part of my brain, which has been dormant for a while.
I returned from midyear feeling refreshed and ready to take advantage of the remainder of my time here in Spain. My goals for the rest of the year are to push myself to speak more Spanish, even though I feel awkward talking to the teachers at my school. I also want to take the lead in the classroom a little bit more, so I feel less bored during the workday. Finally, I want to follow through on my new hobbies like scuba, learning Arabic, and rock climbing!
Claire y Canaries 