Expatiperro

So now that you know about the dining habits about my apartmentmates, I should probably tell you all about how I came to be living with them in the first place. They are the same people that I was discussing in my second post as I was looking for a place to live, and despite my uncertainties about the next-day meeting, I was lucky enough to be the one they chose to fill the fourth bedroom. They are three girls from the Barcelona area, in their mid 20s, all students or new professionals, and they are extraordinary kind and willing to be amused by my attempts at Spanish, or even lamer attempts at Catalan. I wish that I could tell you all their names, but in spite of how much I like them, I haven't gotten their names down yet. Does that make me a bad person?

My initial feelings about the neighborhood were spot on- this is an awesome place to be. It's not that the neighborhood itself is particularly cool, but it's perfectly located- I'm a 10 minute walk to Las Ramblas through the Raval (the bohemian area where I had been staying before), I'm a block away from a stop on the main subway line that can get me anywhere I want within 10 minutes, and I'm a 5 minute walk from Montjuic, the park where most of the main events from the 1992 Olympics were held, and which is great for running, biking, and swimming (at the Olympic Pool, € 30 per month). I can also get pretty much anything I need within three blocks of my building- fruit stands, hardware stores, a manicure, a massage at the "Massage Club" across the street, you name it. And if I ever get a Barcelona resident's card, I can make use of the free bikes on the rack directly outside my front door.

I'm also quite pleased with the building I'm in. I haven't quite pinned down the age of it yet, but it looks like 1940s era San Francisco apartment building, eight stories tall with bay windows. There's a tall, narrow inside atrium (which our guest bedroom looks out into), and an elevator, which luckily we don't need because we're on the second (or as they say here, the first) floor. Our apartment isn't huge, but comfortable- 5 bedrooms, none too big; a cozy kitchen; a huge full bathroom; and what basically amounts to a toilet closet, in case the real bathroom is occupied. My room isn't anything special, probably about the same size as my junior year room in Hartley, except with a 12 foot ceiling and tile floor.

Pictures of my building and room are below. The pictures of my room were taken right when I moved in, so things have been moved around a bit. Also, I'll hopefully be painting the room tomorrow (a really nice blue-grey pastel color, if I can say so myself), so by the time you read this, the whitewashed walls will be no more. Also, if anyone wants a guided tour via webcam, just message me on AIM or Skype- if I'm home, I'll be more than happy to show you around! And for those Google stalkers, and as a reward for reading this entire entry, here's my building on Google Maps.

My building, from across the street.

The BiCiNg rack in front of my building. My windows on apartment is on the second floor, right about the Citroen showroom.

My room, before moving furniture and painting.

So people eat dinner here late. Like really late. A typical night here starts at 10, when, after settling in after work, you make dinner. Weekend nights start even later, with dinner starting at 11, at the earliest. On every night in the week, restaurants are deserted until at least 9, with the exception of tourists, who can easily be identified in those hours as the ones walking around the city, peering in the empty eateries, and loudly wondering/complaining as to why no one is out.

My apartmentmates follow a similar schedule- home around 8, in the kitchen around 10, eating at 10:30 and then off to their rooms to work or sleep. I'm trying to blend in and get the hang of their nightly routine, but it seems that I'm not quite understanding it yet, especially with the time window for dinner. Today's discovery: that apparently 11 is post-dinner time. I say this beacuse here I am in the kitchen at 11:30, eating my pasta with capers, olives, and ham in olive oil (a little too heavy on the olive oil, not enough pasta, but delicious capers), and I'm all by myself in the only lit room in the apartment, alone, as everyone else sleeps.

I'll get the hang of this one day.

This week, Barcelona is celebrating the Festa de la Mercé, which commemorates the patron saint of the city. While supposedly a religious festival, it seems more dedicated to celebrating Catalan culture and heritage, and to that extent, there have been cultural expos, food tastings, concerts, and street fairs going on all around town.

By far the most exciting and terrifying of these events is the Correfoc, or Fire Run. I'm a little unclear on the significance behind it, but it consists of hundreds of people, dressed up in Devil costumes, running up the main street, shooting fireworks at each other and into the crowd on the sidewalk. At the same time, ranks of drummers marching behind them banging out martial beats, while huge dragon figures dance down the street shooting sparks out of their mouths. And the crowds, despite the flying sparks and loud explosions from the fireworks, stand their ground and looking like they were having a fantastic time.

Like most great travel adventures, we hadn't planned on going to this ahead of time, instead stumbling onto the parade after seeing some quaint and decidedly tamer Catalan folk dancing in the town sqaure before. Needless to say, it was a little shocking to find ourselves caught right in the middle of it, but I did manage to take some pictures.

One of the parade comapnies, spraying the crowd with sparks

Ducking from the sparks. At least one person is wearing a safety mask!

Looking down the street at the back of the parade. The ambulance on the right was the only one that I saw.

Tonght, I went with Aditi, Mariel, Sarah, and her boyfriend to see the movie "Vicky Christina Barcelona" on its opening night in Spain. Either Woody Allen is quite popular here, or the movie's title got people's attention, because the theater was packed- though in an orderly way, since tickets here come with pre-assigned seat numbers. That is an idea that needs to get exported to the New World, and fast.

Anyways, one of the joys of seeing the the film here, especially after having seen it in San Francisco, was witnessing how the audience's reaction to it differed from back at home. Not surprisingly, people here seemed to connect with the setting, as the entire movie takes place in places where they pass through every day (in fact, one scene is filmed down the street from where I'm staying now) . But more entertaining was the audience's reaction to Vicky's master's thesis on Catalan Identity. The running joke in the movie is that it's a pointless topic, and no one has any idea what it's good for. But the Barcelonans in the theater, judging from their prolonged laugher, found the topic ridiculously absurd. Whether its self-effacement, or disbelief that anyone would want to study their culture, I'm not sure, though from my limited experience talking to them, Catalans don't tend to think of themselves as particularly special.

This is really refreshing coming from the US, where we hold ourselves in pretty high regard, as something exceptional. It's a fairly common belief that our form of government is the best, that we are the center is global events, and that our culture is the most dominant (for better or for worse), and we don't even look at other countries to see how they live. I mean, American Studies is fairly popular major at many schools around the country, and while I don't have any numbers to back this up, I'd suspect that it rivals or surpasses other cultural studies majors in number or students. On the other side of the ocean, though, I doubt that anyone here would go to the University of Barcelona to study Catalan Identity.

There's something to be said for keeping a distance between your home culture, and the culture that you study- in objectivity, in curiosity, in keeping an open mind. Though I can also see the benefits of more in-depthly studying your own culture, especially in finding ignored parts of it to dissect and explain. In any case, I couldn't help but be struck tonight by the healthy reaction in the Barcelona theater, and on how, judging from that one brief moment, they were able to take themselves lightly.

Two days into my Barcelona adventure, I'm beginning to get the hang of things, and I've come a long way from when I landed here on Tuesday. Of course, that's not really saying much. I started off in the Barceona Airport overhearing a conversation in what I thought was Catalan, which I discovered was actually German when I tried to join in (to an objective listener, the languages have nothing in common). And I was all set to impress my cab driver by talking in Catalan, but when I forgot how to say where I was going, I gave up and had an awkward conversation in Spanish.

I've been saved from being eaten alive by the Barcelona jungle by Sarah, Mariel, and Aditi, the three awesome American girls I am staying with. Sarah and Aditi are here on a grant, serving as English language assistants in two public schools, and Mariel is in the same position as me, looking for whatever work she can get (tomorrow, she is interviewing to be a rickshaw driver, and she has a bar promotion gig lined up as well). They have a cozy, brightly painted apartment in the Raval district, a bohemian, formerly seedy area which has seen a recent revival as the chic place to live. My room is an "interior" room, which means that it doesn't have a window, but for a free place to crash for a few days while I get my bearings, it really can't be beat.

I'll write more about some of the things we've been up to the past few days, but a brief sample includes:

-Going out to eat with a teacher at Aditi's school, who told us that she was a vegetarian, "except for ham and bacon." In related news, I've consumed a pork product with every meal.

-Starting our own "Editing and Translation Service," with ads posted on Craigslist and loquo, Spain's version of Craigslist. What qualifications do we have, you might ask? Other than speaking English, not many, I might say, except that I want your business and wouldn't be caught dead admitting that. We did get our first email today (!!!), though unfortunately the potential customer wanted a document translated from French, a language none of us speak. While we might exaggerate our qualifications, faking language capabilities might be hard to do.

-Buying bunnies at the pet market on Las Ramblas. We bought Mila and Penelope yesterday, and they've been running around the apartment ever since (as you can tell from the last post). They are beyond cute, though we might run into problems in a few months when they start mating (our bad for buying a guy and a girl). But for now, they're sitting rather contendedly in their cages, and looking soooooo adorable I just can't stand it omg.

-Apartment seaching! While I love living with the girls, one of my goals while I'm here is to spend time with native Catalan speakers, and the best way to do that is to live with them. I visited two apartments today, both in the middle of the city, and both rather inhabitable. The second of the two I adore- three Catalan-speaking girls in their 20s live there now, the bedroom is decent size, and it's in a fantastic area, not too far from where I'm staying now. There's also an extra bedroom that won't be occupied (perfect for visitors!!!). I'm meeting with them tomorrow, though I'm not really sure for what- it's either for a second round of interrogations, or for me to give them the deposit. For all my Spanish abilities, there are certain times when I magically lose my comprehention abilities, which are usually at the most crucial points in a conversation.

My life's in a bit of flux now, and I apologize for not giving a deeper view of what it's been like living here. When I get a chance to settle down, more updates will be forthcoming. Until then, wish me "bon sort"!

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In Chile, a "patiperro" is someone who can't get enough of traveling and exploring new places. Falling somewhere between vagabond and globetrotter, and an adventurer at heart, a patiperro is constantly on the move, seeking out new sights, cultures, and languages. He stays in one place long enough to feel comfortable and conversant, but leaves before he can truly settle down and become attached. But instead of traveling to run away from something, a patiperro travels to learn more about himself, his native country, and the world at large, fully intending to apply the lessons he's learned on the road when he returns home to settle down.

This is a blog about my expat life in Barcelona, Spain. I'm here during the fall of 2008, ostensibly to study Catalan language at the University of Barcelona, but really to live independently outside my comfort zone. Expect updates about local life, learning the language, Catalan idiosyncracies, and other adventures. Comments are welcome!