Te Dejo, Madrid

Upon arrival in Madrid, the SEE! the world students met with the community service advisor at Universidad San Pablo CEU. She offered us an array of choices for service possibilities, ranging from working with AIDS patients in the red light district of Madrid to playing with orphans on the playground on our free time. Though some students took advantage of these opportunities, they were not the kind of service opportunities that I was looking for initially. My intentions for service placement once I came to Madrid included something medical related (but not too extreme) or continue teaching ESL. In retrospect, these programs provided a consistent basis for learning about progression with community service, since they work with the same people and help develop a relationship with the people in need. Through this, one can map the progress of the people they are trying to help, and whether or not they should change their tactics to “get through to them.” I must admit that the options for service given to me at the time did not attract to my interests, so I held off until I found something that I liked. In the meantime I contacted my cousins who live in Alcala de Henares, a big suburb about a twenty-minute train ride outside of Madrid. I talked to them about SEE! the world and explained the kind of service opportunities I was looking to do. They understood what I was looking for and tried to give me an array of options.

I was informed of an ESL opportunity that past SEE the worlder’s emailed me that they had done, but it too was in a suburb outside of the city. They mentioned it was more of a hassle to get out there and get back. Once they were out at the school or facility where they were to try to teach English to younger Spaniards, they realized the program was unorganized and had to start from the very beginning. This, they mentioned, impeded their progress and recommended trying to find a different program that wasn’t so taxing with transportation and that ultimately offered more.

In a sense, I’m glad I waited to see what my cousins could find out for me with service opportunities in Alcala de Henares, because I would be able to put myself in that area for awhile if it were an overnight project or not since I could stay at my cousins house. In the meantime, I got to know Madrid better. I got to know the people better. I was able to chat with my host family and figure out what true Spaniards considered social justice problems in their own country. I’m glad I assimilated first, rather than dived into service work with all these preconceived notions. I’m glad I got to understand the country and its people and understand what mattered most to them and what they wanted to change.

Turns out, the issue most at hand for Spaniards was right under my own nose. Spain is going through a radical change right now with immigration, in particular immigrants from Peru, Ecuador and Morocco. These immigrants find it hard to assimilate to the norms of Spain, and they find it hard to be accepted by the Spaniards. Last year, I did a journalistic piece of work on immigration problems in Durham and this issue struck a chord with me. Yet, I never thought to get the inside picture that was sitting right in front of me.... I am half Peruvian, and my cousins living in Alcala de Henares are Peruvian immigrants. While they look like Incan descendants, the fact that I am half only lets others know that I am latin, not Incan-looking like pure Peruvians or Ecuadorians tend to look. This was an advantage for me, because it was interesting to see how Spaniards treated me in comparison to my cousins. In fact, I ended up doing my final paper for my Spanish culture class on this discrepancy. In Spain, the less “Hispanic” you look, the easier it is to get by—that sort of racism applies. In a way, this was my 4 month long service project—informally. I couldn’t help but become more informed on these norms and why people acted the way they did.

At least two weekends of a month, I would spend my time at my cousins in Alcala de Henares. There I was able to get a real feel for how immigrants adjusted to the Spanish way of life—in particular the fast-paced culture. The parents had been raised in Peru with hard-working ideals and only expected the same from their children. When the son decided to drop out of high school and start his real world job, their world came crashing down. In Spain, there is a sense of youth emancipation, where they don’t want to finish schooling. It is common for many Spanish youth to not complete all their schooling, including college until by about age 25—that is if they even go back to school. They are eager to get jobs and make money and enjoy their coveted leisure time. Though some may consider this ambitious, the sad fact of the matter is that most of the Spanish Youth that follow this pattern never intend on leaving the home. Maybe it is due to sky-rocketing housing costs, but one study in Spain showed that 45% of men may still live with their parents by the age of 40.

This was the pattern that my Peruvian cousins who are patterns did not want to see happen. They worked so hard to provide my cousins with a great opportunity, outside of Piura, Peru, that they didn’t want to see those values thrown to the mud with Spain’s cultural norms. This is one of their main worries for the future, the future of their children. As I continued my visits to and from their apartment every other weekend, I would learn that Pepe (my cousin who quit high school) was constantly in between jobs. However, the parents were adamant that if he wasn’t going to finish school, that he get a job and help pay for rent. This, of course, was frustrating to Pepe because it was a cultural norm of the Spanish youth to do this. As he was struggling to make money each month to help pay for rent, his other friends who had quit as well were making money to pocket. Yet, he was adamant on not going back. I would often walk into fights of the family where Pepe would be screaming that he wanted to get along with his family, he really did—they just didn’t understand him. I would walk into the kitchen to find his mother crying, worrying how she was going to teach him the values they had tried so hard to protect and the opportunities they had tried to give to Pepe.

But I assured the parents that I thought this problem went deeper than a cultural misunderstanding. Unfortunately, I was not lucky with the random choice of host family I received. In fact, for America’s standards, this would be the prime dysfunctional family. The mother was divorced with two older teenage children, with the older son going through the same youth emancipation that Pepe yearned to have. However, the difference between the Peruvian and the Spanish side was that the Spanish aspect accepted this behavior, hoping it would past. The Peruvian aspect is trying to remedy it from the on-set. As the Peruvian parents understood that they would try to have to fight this phenomena that would otherwise be considered laziness in the US, I would often find my Spanish host mom an emotional wreck because her children would not listen to her. Without a doubt, I was scared to be with my host family because there were constant fights between the mother and her children. But, the Spanish mother’s version of arguing with her children fell on deaf ears—she had already lost influence over her child by allowing him to follow through with this youthful emancipation. This was a common topic with the Spanish mother and me at the dinner table. I believe my host family hosted study-abroad students not only as a means of income, but that the Spanish mother wanted other people in the apartment to maybe ease the tensions. It was an uncomfortable semester, but interesting to juxtapose the two different views I saw.

Also, during my time in my “awkward” housing, I became very good friends with the twice-a-week cleaning lady for our apartment. Her case was an interesting immigration story. She moved to Spain from Bolivia. She had a medical degree from Bolivia, but when she moved to Spain, she found it hard to get a job. The medical profession in Spain is more of a volunteer and does not pay as well as compared to other countries. Oddly enough, of the jobs she was offered, she was paid better cleaning houses. This was a common theme for immigrants coming to Spain. They would leave fantastic occupations in their homeland for a more prosperous country, only to find that the jobs were either not offered or comparable in that country. So, many settle for jobs that pay well, but Spaniards would never consider doing. Mari, the housekeeper, often lamented to me about these issues.

Aside from my informal meetings comparing the two view points living in the same country, I feel these relationships I developed by delving into the issue helped me learn the most about study abroad. I learned about the social issues that create the large divide in the country. I not only got the watered-down talked out versions from both sides, but I got to see how it affected the home in person. I used what knowledge I had about cultural norms and immigration to talk about these discrepancies with each person, and offered my advice. I talked with the children and saw how they were affected by the issue of Spanish youth at hand and the impositions of immigration. From this, I learned that social justice can extend farther than we think, that the smallest differences can wreak havoc on a family. Call it an incoming wave of cultural norm, but maybe the influx of immigration can help keep Spain in line with their protests to such behavior. This may help keep families together, reduce the divorce rate, and possibly up the birth rate that is currently one of the lowest in the world.

Although I feel I learned the most from this experience, I still feel guilty that this opportunity was not “official,” so I had my cousins help me find a service opportunity in Alcala de Henares. I took a weekend to volunteer with their church. At their church, there had been an intensive English learning course for that weekend that I was able to help volunteer with. This was not ESL certified, just a Spaniard offering his services and needing help. The goal of the program was to introduce older Spaniards who were not taught another language in school (under Franco’s rule) to the fundamentals of English. Having taught ESL at Duke to Spanish-speaking employees, I found this program right up my alley. Though it was intense, it helped form some bonds with Spaniards as I got to know them through the course of three days (Friday night, Saturday afternoon, and Sunday afternoon). As is the case with most subjects, it was more difficult to teach older people how to speak English, rather than the younger crowd I am used to at Duke. This, I will admit, I found frustrating. I never realized how short I was on patience, but that weekend made me realize that about myself. As we went over verbs and English rules, I found myself watching the learners, wondering if that was what I looked like trying to speak Spanish. Once that thought crossed my mind, I immediately had more compassion for the crowd as they struggled through that weekend. Perhaps one of the most amazing things I found that weekend was how many older people were willing to learn, still wanting to expand their knowledge. Usually, once people hit that point, they come to the conclusion that they will probably never learn the language. But the one thing I learned about Europe is that the Europeans are forever trying to expand their knowledge on culture and the arts—not so much the same with science. Science subjects were regarded as something you did only if you were devoted to the profession. This made me realize that Americans are probably a little more attracted to subjects because of the attractive occupations that come with it. In fact, my host mom spent a whole dinner conversation on how Spaniards consider the liberal arts much more respectable than the sciences because it is cultural and something you are willing to preserve and keep up on. Her theory proved true with the outcome of older people willing to take the English-learning course.

The weekend was a success, and I felt on track with my ESL tutoring skills. The older Spaniards were very appreciative of the efforts I made to try to help teach them. Although this was a make-shift service project, it was an intense weekend and hopefully redeemed myself.

Coming back from abroad was a big adjustment. I found people cold and distant. Of course I was used to the cultural norms in America, but I had found the people in Spain somewhat more approachable. Aside from the physical aspects that my sleeping schedule was off and such, I found people in America much more rushed. No one wanted to talk to me for hours, or sit at the dinner table for over an hour and a half. No one wanted to stroll the streets to catch up on things. Everything was a race to get everything done by the days end. In Spain, there’s always tomorrow. They value they’re leisure time and take advantage of their social time. At first I was amazed at the different positions between the Spanish and Peruvian families. Now I can see why there is a youth emancipation rebellion going on in Spain… it’s a rebellion to slow down the world, enjoy what is there and enjoy all the culture you can… even if that means learning another language.

-Kimberly Jerdan, December 2006