Month: September 2019

September 30, 2019 Brie Honest with Me Post a Comment

First Month!

Alright, so.

I’ve been in France for a whole month now, and I can confidently say that I have never, in my entire life, eaten this many baguettes. They’re everywhere. My friends have started sending me tips on how to adequately adapt to this new baguette onslaught, including a Baguette Pack™–a bread-shaped backpack to fulfill all my bread-erly needs. Thanks guys.

Things have been interesting so far! The whole you-must-speak-french-at-all-times-or-you-will-die thing can be a little overwhelming at times, but I’ve already reached a point where I can hold entire conversations in French without wanting to crawl into a deep dark hole afterwards–which, by the way, is a vast improvement from the first week of orientation in Biarritz. The memory of the first dinner with my Biarritz host family, and it’s long stretches of absolute silence, will probably haunt me for some time.

I’m now living with my host family in Paris, and I’m really enjoying it so far. My living situation is a little different than most students in the Hamilton in France program: instead of living in the apartment with the host family, I live in a separate room six floors above them! It’s tiny, but I have my own shower and a baby kitchen. Another student in the program lives in the actual apartment with them, and I go down in the evenings to eat dinner with them. My neighbors seem to be mostly students, and the walls are very thin, so there are times that I feel like I’m right back in a Hamilton dorm room. Except it’s all in french.

The apartment is also very conveniently located in the seventh/fifteenth arrondissement division– I’m a ten minute walk from the Eiffel Tower, Montparnasse and Les Invalides. Sometimes I’ll be heading to the grocery store and I’ll casually glance over my shoulder only to see the Eiffel Tower, and I have to pinch myself. There’s also a nice park area in front of the apartment, and there are always people there–runners, children, yoga people, dogs, couples, some more dogs. At night, it gets pitch dark, but towards the end of the week teenagers like hanging out there (it’s actually a little funny that they don’t even use their phone flashlights).I’ve also kinda fallen in love with the metro. I know that sounds a bit weird, especially since it smells like pee a lot of the time and it’s always a little sweaty, but it keeps me from having to walk an hour to class, gives me nearly unlimited access to all of Paris, and gives me free time to read. I take the 6th a lot and I love it–it’s rickety on the outside, but it goes above ground and I get to see Paris on the way to class. I also end up seeing a lot of interesting people! For example, this girl that was full of coincidences:

I’m still adapting to classes and the mammoth that is the french education system, but that’s a whole other post.

 

-Alina

September 22, 2019 Spained Glass Windows Are Aussome Post a Comment

Culture Shock

Spain is a fine country, but just like with any other country, the customs differ from those of the United States. For this weeks blog, I wanted to mention a few of the greatest culture shocks that I’ve experienced from being in Spain so far. 

 

  1. Dining Etiquette

In Spain, or at least in my homestay, there seems to be utensils for practically every kind of food. In my homestay, we have three different sizes/kinds of forks, spoons, and knives each. Each kind of utensil has its specific uses. For example, the knife that you use when you’re eating fish isn’t the same knife that you’d use for eating turkey. In addition, not as many foods that are eaten with your hands in the States are eaten with hands in Spain. After lunch one day, my host mom asked if we wanted fruit (fruit is often eaten as “dessert”). I asked for kiwi, and my host brother asked for a banana. As I was eating my kiwi with a spoon, which is the same as how I’d eat it in America, I look over to my brother, and see him eating a banana with a fork and knife! Everything from peeling the skin to eating the inside was done with a fork and knife. I was super shocked to see that. I never would’ve even imagined that there are people that eat bananas with a fork and knife. 

Perhaps the greatest shock related to this topic was the time at which people eat. On the day that I moved in to my homestay, we had lunch at 2:30pm and it ended around 3:30pm. Afterwards, I took a nap that lasted until around 7:30pm, then browsed the internet for a while until it was about 9:30pm. I thought that maybe my family ate dinner without me because I was asleep, or that we just weren’t eating dinner that night for some reason, so I went over to the bathroom to brush my teeth. 10 minutes later, my host mom calls me for dinner, and I was like “¿Qué?”. Then I recalled one of the conversations I had with my host mom earlier that day, and I realized that she did mention that we eat dinner around that time, but I just misheard her.  

 

  1. La Siesta

Everyday, from about 2-5pm, most shops and businesses all across Spain shut down for the siesta. In fact, it’s not uncommon for businesses to stop their services 15 minutes before they’re actually scheduled to close. “Siesta” means nap in Spanish, but in this case, it’s referring to the hours from lunchtime until work starts up again. Some people do use the time after lunch to take a nap, others use it to spend time with friends and family. During the first week I was here, I would end up taking a siesta after lunch unwillingly because my family would give me so much to eat for lunch that I would just be so tired afterwards, but after communicating to them that the food that they give me is sometimes too much, I’m not too tired after lunch, and I mostly use the siesta to either do some work or browse the internet.  

 

  1. Don’t Smile

For the most part, in Madrid, people don’t smile at strangers, and I learned this the hard way. I like to smile a lot, including at strangers, and having grown up in a friendly neighborhood and having attended Hamilton these past two years, it’s normal for me to smile at people I don’t know and have them smile back, but this culture doesn’t exist in Madrid and I often forget that. For the most part, people walk with their head straight, not minding anyone else, and if you happen to make eye-contact with someone while you’re walking down the street and you flash them a quick smile, they most likely won’t smile back. They’ll probably just go back to looking straight ahead, and if you smile at someone and they do smile back at you, they’re probably not a native because apparently smiling at a stranger here means you have certain intentions towards that person. This is definitely one of the things I miss the most about Hamilton – that even though you don’t know everyone, the community still feels like family because of how friendly everyone is towards each other, even people they don’t know. 

 

September 12, 2019 La Bohème Post a Comment

on minimalism.

As my orientation week in Biarritz and thus the beginning of my first semester abroad began to approach, I had to start thinking about what I would plan to bring with me on this four month journey. As soon as I found out I could only bring one or two suitcases with me for the semester I kind of freaked out. Initially, I thought my reaction was due to a genuine belief that being required to bring less was an inconvenience, but in reality, being asked to reflect on what my essentials really are and to declutter felt unsettling because it pushed me out of my comfort zone. 

Our society of consumerism has created a climate where the hoarding of possessions is not only normalized but also strongly encouraged. So, being asked to meditate on what is essential and what isn’t can feel like a challenge due to the act’s rather infrequent nature. This summer, as I became more and more comfortable with the unavoidable reality that I would have to pack at one point or another, I realized that there actually aren’t that many things I cannot live without and that there are plenty of products I purchase without necessity on a frequent basis. Especially in light of the exponential environmental crisis we are currently facing, limiting our waste is the least we can do. In fact, we have reached a point where recycling is nowhere as beneficial to our ecosystem as it is to reduce.

About a year ago, I watched a documentary titled the Minimalists. As its name suggests, the documentary explores the minimalist movement which has been rapidly gaining popularity over the last few years. After watching it, I realized my initial understanding of what a minimalist practice entails was flawed. I believed that to become a minimalist, one had to mindlessly reject most of one’s possessions. I was wrong. Minimalism is definitely about reducing the amount of objects we possess and may choose to purchase in the future, but what characterizes this process is its focus on intentionality. Minimalism invites us to reflect on which material possessions enhance our daily routine and compliment our living experience in hopes of avoiding being pushed towards an excess that is inconvenient in the long run, for ourselves and for the environment. 

When we choose a minimalist lifestyle for our time abroad, we are able to pack our belongings into one to two suitcases without fearing lack, because we are confident in that we have carefully chosen that which is absolutely necessary on both a practical and personal level. 

I have chosen to adopt a minimalist lifestyle for my year abroad in order to cultivate a healthier relationship with shopping, consumerism and the material. After my first week in France, I can confidently say that I believe I have brought enough with me to live in the present and feel comfortable at the same time; and because minimalism is personal and subjective, what I consider to be my essentials will not necessarily be someone else’s. My time in Biarritz has been magical, and I have noticed that things as simple as having brought only my favorite clothes have given me the option to spend less time getting ready and jump straight into the day to enjoy every single moment of it feeling as detached from trivial matters as much as possible to focus on my inner growth instead.

 

September 9, 2019 Spained Glass Windows Are Aussome Post a Comment

Galicia Adventures

This past week, HCAYS took a trip to Galicia. Galicia is an autonomous community located in the northwestern corner of Spain. The area was originally inhabited by the Celts hundreds of years ago and you can still see that influence on the culture and landscape of the area today. In that region, they speak a language called Gallego, not Spanish, although there are similarities between the two languages. Much of the architecture is made from stone, which was a main element that the Celts used to build when they inhabited the area. 

Because this trip was filled with so much, I wanted to highlight a few of the cool things we did every day.

Monday:

Our first day there, we walked the last stretch of the Camino de Santiago, which was originally a series of Christian pilgrimages that started in various parts of southeast Europe like Portugal, France, Spain, and ended in Galicia. Hundreds of thousands of people completed the trail last year and though the motivation for the majority of them is still spiritual, a number of them who do it for recreational and sporting reasons. Completing the Camino de Santiago is a very significant achievement and it means a lot to people. My host brother spent two weeks completing the trail from Madrid to Santiago and he said it was an amazing experience for him.

Tuesday:

We went to a wine factory today and learned about the process of how wine is made from start to finish in a town called Cambados. There are many precautions that are taken to make sure the grapes are nice and suitable to make wine out of them. For example, they plant a bush at the beginning of a vineyard, and they health of that bush is a strong indicator of the health of the grapes.

Wednesday:

We went to a different town in Galicia called Vigo. This city is right by the Atlantic ocean which makes fishing a hot commodity. In fact, Puerto de Vigo is the second largest fishing port in the world. We toured facilities where the fish get moved, sliced, and auctioned, and a cool thing that I learned is that hawks are used to ward off seagulls and other seaside birds from eating the fish. On another note, the hotel we stayed in was called the Parador de Baiona and it was literally a castle that overlooked the sea.

The hotel even had a statue of a knight in armor. Very reminiscent of Scooby Doo.

Thursday:

There are multiple small islands off the coast of Galicia. One group of those islands are called Islas Cíes. The island that we visited was a protected national park with multiple beaches and hiking trails. The island is a big attraction, but it only allows for 2000 people to visit per day and you have to book your trip very far out in advance. The island produces as little waste as it can, and there is nowhere to dispose of trash because anything you bring on to the island has to be taken away with you. Even the bathrooms didn’t have paper towels. The views were beautiful, but the water was far too cold to spend too much time swimming in it.

Though we were only there for a short time, I noticed a slight difference in lifestyle between Galician cities, such as Coruña, and Madrid. Madrid is a very relaxed city compared to most of the cities in the US such as Boston, New York, and Chicago, but Coruña is even more relaxed than Madrid. It felt like the kind of neighborhood where everyone knows each other and people are just taking life easy there, which I liked. I believe this is due to its smaller population and because its architecture doesn’t feel like that of a city at all. 

Not only was this a wonderful trip with very beautiful sights to see and savory food to eat, but the group as a whole got closer and I think it was a great segue to starting classes on Monday.

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