It ain't easy being green...or being an exchange student for that matter.
Classes have started to pick up these past couple of weeks, and I'm quickly realizing that the work is piling up. Studying abroad actually means studying abroad contrary to popular belief...at least in Seville! But Spanish universities and the Spanish educational system in general is incredibly distinct from the American system. For one, the responsibility for learning the material falls heavily and solely on the shoulders of the students here. This is made clear by various aspects of the course structure. For example, there is typically only one exam at the end of the course, and the entire grade rests on that one exam. Without knowing how the professor tests or what the professor is looking for, students have to blindly prepare for the looming final. Besides the fact that there are no "mid-terms" or smaller evaluations scattered throughout the semester, students are also not given assigned readings or even dated syllabi. Instead, on the first day of class, each student is given a page or two outlining the topics that will be covered in the course (no dates listed!). In addition, in lieu of reading assignments, students are given a bibliography of about 20 to 30 books that the professor used to create the course (What on Earth am I supposed to do with that???). Once asked, some professors pointed out a few of the "good ones." Lastly, students are given the exam date. That's it. That's it, people. From there on out, the students are the ones left to create their own study schedules, their own reading assignments, etc. It is truly all on the students. So what do students do? They go to class...sometimes. They mostly go, but all of my classes do seem to be shrinking each week. However, I will say that Spanish students do not, I repeat DO NOT, arrive late to class. In fact, they often arrive 20-30 minutes early just to sit in the room or wait outside (this might be because students often have a number of their classes in the same room). The professors, on the other hand...Let's just say waiting for professors to show up has sometimes felt like another class entirely. But really, I'm not complaining because that means: 1) less material that I have to struggle through, b) less time spent trying with all my might to understand the professor, and c) a chance to be brave and try to talk to Spanish students. So yeah, not complaining. Once the professor does arrive, however, the show begins. Thus commences 1 and a half to 2 hours of transcription. Two of my three university classes are teacher-centered environments in which the professor lectures, and the students listen--or write rather. Typing furiously or writing non-stop on sheets and sheets of blank printer paper, the students try to copy down every word--in essay format (I can always spot the Americans because our screens are filled with bullet points instead of paragraphs). I don't understand the efficiency of the note-taking format to be honest, but it is what it is. With this kind of system, it seems all too easy for students to slide through the semester worry-free only to arrive the day of the exam and completely fail. And indeed, this happens--a lot. They post grades in the hallways (I know, right?), and I found myself astonished while waiting on a bench one day. Out of 0 to 10, they need to get a 5 or above to pass, which in most cases, is all that they care about/all that matters. On the board, however, I saw fail after fail after fail: 3s, 2s, even 1s. It seemed like the majority wasn't passing. Considering the lack of accountability during the semester, it makes perfect sense, but it was still quite a shock. A number of students in my classes are repeating the class, and I have been told it's quite common to be in university for longer than four years. Here, that's not such a big deal. Here, education also doesn't cost anything near what it does in the US. Two students I was talking to were complaining about the cost of tuition. "¿Cuånto pagas?" I asked. The answer: a couple thousand euros a semester. WHAT? I really couldn't contain my shock. Then they explained that private universities cost much more--$15,000 euros sometimes (don't remember if that's for a semester of for a year). (Private universities, as a side note, are also considered much worse here--only for the students that can't get into public schools and instead have to pay a lot for a lower quality education.) The low cost, therefore, makes it much more acceptable to spend another year or two in university whereas in the US, so much rides on us doing well. Our education is an investment, and we are expected to take that very seriously. That's not to say that they don't take education seriously here, but the pressures are clearly different when a significantly greater amount of money is involved. Undeniably, school life and family life are strongly linked, and I think that this kind of educational system lends itself to a culture that is able to prioritize family more. Or perhaps the family culture came first and the university culture came after...who's to say, but I do know that they seem to work in harmony. Many university students live at home and go to the nearest university. Many students go home to eat lunch with their families. They are not (for the most part) hundreds of miles from home. They are not too busy with extracurriculars. They are not running from one meeting to the next. They are not stressing over homework every night to the point that they don't have time to hang with friends. No. Here, they are much more balanced. They prioritize family and friendships and quality time, things that I think America, and Penn especially, has let fall on our ever-growing list. Here, time is spent on what's important, and it's something I'm still adjusting to. My Google calendar at school is a mess of colors: one hour meeting followed by one hour of class followed by one hour lunch with friend, and so on. Here, that kind of schedule just doesn't fly. One Sunday afternoon, I blocked out one hour to meet with a Spanish student, one hour at the gym, and one hour for dinner. The actual evening: I met with a Spanish student and arrived an hour late for dinner. She was focused on enjoying the time with me, chatting, walking, grabbing a drink, meeting up with another friend, seeing a procession that happened to be in the streets. I, on the other hand, was worried about making it to the gym and getting home for dinner on time. I hadn't planned to spend so much time socializing. I hadn't prioritized socializing. I think going back to Penn, that kind of "timeless" social life in which hours are spent wandering the streets, reading poems in the bookstore, grabbing a couple tapas, heading from one bar to the next without the rush and hustle and bustle and urgency and "gotta run" that I've grown so accustomed to--that is something I will miss. And sadly, it's something that I don't see as possible in the US given our educational system. I just want to add, as well, the disclaimer that I am only speaking from my experiences in 3 classes at the University of Sevilla. I have been told high school is much more stressful here because they take one exam that practically determines their whole life. I have been told other departments, like the medical school, are much more intensive. Needless to say, my analysis is based on what I have seen and my thoughts, and they are not meant to mark Spain's truth.
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“In the present day, when popular literature is running into the low levels of life, and luxuriating on the vices and follies of mankind; and when the universal pursuit of gain is trampling down the early growth of poetic feeling, and wearing out the verdure of the soul, I question whether it would not be of service for the reader occasionally to turn to these records of prouder times and loftier modes of thinking; and to steep himself to the very lips in old Spanish romance.” This past weekend, I had the privilege to go to the nearby city of Granada, home to the well-known palace and complex La Alhambra. My group was only able to spend about 2-2.5 hours there, but I could have easily spent a week! As Washington Irving wrote in his Tales of the Alhambra, it is indeed a place to "linger and loiter."
A bit caught up in the "old Spanish romance" Irving mentions, I found myself pulling out my notebook on the morning bus ride to Granada to jot down some thoughts. I had just woken up from a few hours of on-and-off dozing and happily found myself in the golden moment in which everyone around me was still frozen in sleep and in silence. Being the first to awake allows for one of my favorite pockets of time (and not one I get to relish in often as the late-sleeper that I am). It's a time in which the day is in limbo--the moon hanging on by a fading thread as a whispering sun bathes the earth and sky in a hazy light: the day has begun and yet still waits to be awoken from slumber. In the stillness of this particular limbo moment, I looked out the bus window to see the sun barely creeping over the dry Granada mountains and the early fog drifting along in the distance, After a few long moments, I pulled my eyes away from the landscape and let my pen scribble along the page: Man really has nothing on nature, and yet we try so hard. Gazing out the bus window, there are olive orchards, rows and rows of trees, for kilometers. They blanket the mountains, covering steep hillsides and rocky turf. One has to wonder who dared to challenge the land to plant trees here. (And now, a haiku) Spain's mountainous orchards shrink me. How did trees get there? How did we get here? (And now for the debatably less existencial 6-word stories Arielle and I wrote the next day) Estamos en Granada. No comemos granadas (We are in Granada. We don't eat pomegranates). Granada: una ciudad sin las granadas (Granada: a city without pomegranates). En Granada, no hay ningún caballo (In Granada, there are no horses). Hay perros más grandes en Granada (There are bigger dogs in Granada). After spending a lovely weekend in the smaller, romantic and yet overall seemingly more modern city of Granada, I was glad to return to Sevilla (I don't fault it for its preference for tiny dogs). On the bus ride back, I decidedly labelled it "home." To close out, I invite all my loyal readers to take a page from Hemingway's book and share your own 6-word stories. As Sandra Cisneros wrote, "We all have a story." Whether it's about your day, your week, your dinner--I'd love to hear! Missing you all and sending love from Spain (which may be one autonomous region smaller pretty soon)! To say that tensions are running high would be an understatement. Cataluña's call for a referendum for independence has been dominating the news for the past six weeks, and now it is reaching its climax. For those who haven't been privy to a daily update, here is my painfully basic 3-part summary that attempts to refrain from bias.
Now, those are the facts. Here is a list of all that I have heard from various sources (though the vast majority andalucían), including professors, the news here in Andalucía, friends, middle-aged people, students, parents, singles, etc. Hold tight because it's quite a jumble:
In all of this political madness, I have come to four conclusions: 1) Entering a new country also means entering an entirely new political system with which I am completely unfamiliar. I feel as though I have been plopped into Spanish chaos with no context, no history, and the question of reliable sources. Every person seems to have an opinion that is expressed as the singular truth of the matter, and I walk out of nearly every conversation, every classroom, every article, every news segment feeling less and less sure of what I know to be true. With such limited understanding and my limited background knowledge, I feel quite uncomfortable and frankly unjustified passing judgment on the call for independence. After all, these days, American politics is enough of a mess to understand and to trust, and it's A) happening where I've lived my whole life and learned about and B) IN ENGLISH. 2) Despite my lack of profound knowledge, what I do know is that this is an incredibly charged and emotional conflict for many people. Walking down the streets of my barrio, nearly every apartment has the flag of Spain hanging from the balcony. My homestay Dad said the Chinese stores are all sold out! Seeing such a display of national sentiment is impressive. It seems ironic though that although the flag of Spain attempts to symbolize an aggressive kind of unity, the mere display and sheer quantity of flags reveals and acknowledges a spreading crack in that very unity. So along with the cries for unification and condemnation and the declarations of pride and of outrage, the flag also confesses just a hint of fear, fear that what once seemed absurd may become reality. 3) I don't like to see violence anywhere in the world. My friend from Barcelona, Janis Ripoll Garriga, flew there to participate in and volunteer to help the referendum this past weekend, and she has been my amazing "on-the-ground" source of information. The videos and images she has sent me are not easy to look at, but the violence occurring is undeniable. It is precisely this that is bringing Cataluña's call for independence into the international spotlight. The latest update from Janis is that 893 people have been hurt. Warning: some disturbing content. All images courtesy of Janis. 4) Lastly, something Janis wrote to me earlier stuck with me and may be the truest I have heard. She said, "Spain has lost Catalonia already." The sentiments of the catalanas are strong, and no matter what happens with the referendum, the desire for independence will not simply disappear. According to Janis, over 90% of the people who voted yesterday voted for independence (Side note: Janis informed me that over 3 million people voted, but over 700,000 votes were stolen by the police, so that's 90% of the countable votes). That's over 2 million people--2 million people that will not be silenced, that will not give up, that will not change their minds. 2 million people (plus) that represent an enormous problem for the Spanish government, an enormous threat to the unity of Spain. Trying to cage a bird that has decided to be free is futile, and it seems that the page is already turning on a new era.
In Andalucía, the question keeps surfacing: what will Cataluña do once it's no longer part of Spain? Once it's no longer part of the EU? I don't know the answer to these questions, and I don't know if Cataluña knows either, but I think we may be about to find out... Lastly, I encourage all my loyal readers to let this be the beginning of your investigation of what's happening over here. Facts are elusive, so I recommend reading a variety of sources in an attempt to get a picture for yourself. Janis has also sent me a bunch of articles, which I am happy to send to anyone! Love to all, my thoughts to those injured, and my prayers for the families and friends and all those affected in California. I don't understand this world... |