"Closed"

Hello Blogosphere. Good evening, or whatever time of the day it may be that this post finds you in. Spain has opened my eyes to so many new things during the past few weeks -- nearly month! -- and I'd like to share a little bit with you.

Before I came to Spain, I had read and been told many times that Spain has a very different sense of closeness than the U.S. does. However, I still didn't quite know what to expect! When I arrived in Malaga and met Paola and Abuelo for the first time, I was immediately presented with Spain's closeness in a physical sense, with kisses (as everyone in Spain greets each other with kisses). On my first day of school, I couldn't help but notice everyone hugging, leaning, and just generally being really close to one another. At first I thought that some people were merely being flirty with each other, but within a few days I began to realize that the way my classmates were acting was the norm. So this must have been what they meant by having a different sense of closeness, I thought to myself. Well, not completely.

Yes, I have found the people of Spain to be much closer to each other physically, but it wasn't until a week or two ago that I realized how emotionally close to each other they are. Everyone has everyone's back, and it's awesome. During my first few days of school, I couldn't identify "groups" or cliques of students like one can in the U.S.  I thought to myself after a while I'll figure out the groups here. Except, it never happened -- not really. Everyone is friends with everyone more or less. Sure, people break off into different loose groups of friends during the two recesses and outside of school, but that's expected (can you imagine an entire school , k-12, just chillin' together in a gigantic group?). The entire atmosphere here, both inside and outside of school, is so much more open than it is in the U.S.

When I show people my NHS yearbook here, they usually 1. Are in awe that cheerleaders (and yearbooks for that matter) are real and not just something in movies and 2. Ask if there really are "jocks" and "nerds" (cliques) etc. At first, I answered them with something like, "Kind of. There are definitely 'groups' of students, but my class is pretty tight with each other." Now, I would tell them, "Absolutely, and it's ridiculous." Maybe I need to back up a little. I had an epiphany last week as I was talking with a friend, Adri, at school. He was telling me about a friend of his that is living/has lived (?) in Miami for two years (the conversation was in Spanglish). I was shocked when he told me that his friend didn't like Miami! The beach, the sun . . . MIAMI! I asked him why and he told me, "My friend says that the people are . . . 'closed,'" making a closing gesture with his hands.

The more I thought about what Adri said, the more I realized how true it was. The atmosphere at home (meaning Iowa; America), especially at school, is so "closed" -- I don't know how to explain it much better than that! But I would have never thought so before coming to Spain. Before coming here, I would've said that I'm an extremely open person; open to new things, people, places. Now I realize how untrue that statement would've been, compared to the openness of Spain! Even being a teenage girl that is: thousands of miles away from home, living in a foreign land called Spain, learning a mysterious language called Spanish, I have a box. All too often, I live in my own little world, my box, and am ignorant of the wondrous world around me and those in it.

At school here, my class works together all day, helping each other figure out the work. If somebody doesn't understand something, there is always someone that will help them get it -- no big deal. All my classmates chat with all my classmates, about anything and everything - school, family, friends, ladadada. Last week, I had a classmate confide in me about a really personal topic, and I was quite surprised that they would share something like they did with me, being the new, foreign girl. I feel like I've almost become a part of a big family at school, and with Spain in general. When I come back to The States, I definitely want to bring this openness that Spain has about it. I feel like my classmates here have something figured out that for some reason, American High Schoolers can't get because of barriers put up with another such as cliques, and pride, and self-consciousness. I can't really put my finger on it, but it's like they know that we're all supposed to be here for each other, and that we should all be able to depend on one another. They make the way high schoolers in America treat one another seem so immature.

I wish I could put my thoughts into better words. I am finding this concept difficult to explain. All I know is that it's there, and when I come back to America, I am going to be such a different person than the one who left just one month ago. Being here, in Spain, is giving me a chance to "see" what kind of person I was in America, and what kind of person I want to be.


"Now I’m thinking freely.
I’m going to open my mind to all these
New found exciting possibilities."

-"And Run" by He is We