Photos: GRADUATION!!!

From top to bottom:

1: Teresa on my right and Paloma on my left. School friends at the graduation ceremony. Teresa and I went out to a tea house last week and Paloma is in my class.

2: The boys.

3: All together now! From left, a kid in my class whose name I cannot remember at the moment, Gaston, my English teacher Clara, my drawing teacher Maria Jose, me, Juan An. Below me is Paz and to her right is Isa. At the bottom we have Andy, who does not actually go to our school, and Paloma.

4: A few guy friends getting a little ahead of themselves. Save the dancing for the club, guys! Actually, its my fault: I told them to dance!

5: Us at the club latter that night.

10 Ways in Which Spanish Culture Differs from Ours (And my week)

10 Ways in Which Spanish Culture Differs from Ours:

1) Political campaigning is far more in your face here: their posters are not just the names and slogans of the candidates, but a big head-shot of them plastered across the walls over and over again. During election times, you walk down the street receiving creepy grins from the same ten men and women a million times over. Additionally, they inform you of upcoming rallies over loudspeakers mounted on the top of cars that inch along the roads and blast their message to you, accompanied by music, ten times a day.

2) Recycling is big here. If you don’t recycle, then you are an exception. Every street boasts a line of huge bins for glass, paper, and every type of plastic.

3) Water is a precious commodity here, since we are essentially living in the middle of a desert. Most people know that they need to use their water wisely, so we all turn off the shower while lathering our bodies or brushing our teeth. And not just for money reasons either, but also for environmental reasons.

4) Here they have language schools where you can go for a month or two every day and study a language. At the end of that time, they test and certify you in that language and this opens up job opportunities. These schools are private, but very common.

5) The people here drive so fast that it is unnerving. However, they are also some of the best drivers around because they have to go through a lot of work to get their licenses. But I still wouldn’t want to drive on the same roads as them!

6) Personal hygiene is not as emphasized here: showering is not necessarily a daily thing, and certainly not something you do more than once a day. They don’t always wash their hands before eating, and it appears that they don’t always do so before leaving the bathroom either. Of course, this is a generalization as I don’t follow every Spaniard into the bathroom to check up on their washing habits, but it is clear that they are not as germaphobic as we are.

7) Pharmacies, glasses shops, and a few other specialty shops use universal signs to mark their entrances. For example, for a pharmacy, you will always find it marked by a fluorescent green cross and a glasses shop will be easy to find because you only need to keep an eye out for a lit sign shaped like a pair of pink glasses sticking out of the building. Yes, this is very logical, but any American business would immediately think, “But I don’t want to have the same sign as every other pharmacy! I want to stand out as different.”

8) Graffiti is everywhere. The teens hardly consider it refutable and the city has crews who regularly circle the city to repaint the benches and walls. (This is rather unfortunate when you come to the tram stop only to find that all your benches have recently painted and you have no place to sit for the twenty-minute wait.)

9) School buses are huge in a tall way. They look more like our tourist buses than school buses. One friend asked me, “Are your school buses in America really yellow like they show them in the movies?!” They thought it was a pretty funny idea.

10) The standard size paper is taller, the envelopes are not as wide, their binders all have four holes instead of three, and they hardly ever write on lined paper opting instead for plain white paper or graff.

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Well, things are certainly slowing down here. Well, in my life at any rate. The truth is that things are just getting started in Alicante with all the tourists flocking in from everywhere and shops opening up to receive them. But for me, last week was the last week of school. I took a few tests, which I’m sure I did pretty well on even though I didn’t study, and got results back for some of my tests. Guess what?! I GOT A 9 ON MY LAST PHILOSOPHY TEST!!! I was so surprised when I found out because I didn’t even study for the test, but I essentially got an A on it! Maybe I should just stop caring about my grades and scores more often if I come out with grades like these! Just kidding.

Anyways, I tried that drink horchata made out of the juice from the groundnut and it was really good! It is served cold and is very sweet. I cannot describe the taste, but it reminds a little of coconut and chai tea.

Well, what have I been doing this week aside from the minimal testing? I’ve gone to the beach a few times, and a friend commented that ya’ll aren’t gonna recognize me with this tan! I dunno, I’m still white as cream compared to most everyone here. I’ve also hung out with a few friends on different occasions down in Alicante, browsing shops, going to tea houses, eating kabobs and falafels, and talking.

On Sunday I went out climbing with Ignacio and his dad at a place called Crevillentes. T’was good. It was all displome, “overhanging,” which is my favorite. I only climbed four short routes , but the last one was a fun challenge with a funky crux up toward the end where I had to go up to an under-hanging pocket, clip, and use the side of a ledge to get up to the good holds above. I have to admit that I have not been climbing as much here, so I am definitely not up to my usual level. *sigh* Good thing dad is coming here for a few weeks to get me back in shape before I get back! Man, since I went to Paris, my hands got all soft and shed, so now my climbing time is determined by how long my hands can hold out before I turn in, blowing on my raw red digits. But I will get those calluses back!

Well, I have about two and a half weeks here until my exchange is officially over. During that time, I will go to the graduation ceremony and party, chill with friends, go to the beach, climb, paint, go to an ancient archeological museum exhibit, and hopefully go to a few shows. All in all, I have too much time on my hands. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to do some volunteer work, but who knows if that will pull through. Well, feel free to write me and ask all sorts of lengthy questions to keep me occupied for the long summer hours ahead!

Love,

Jocelyn

Mediterranean Paradise, the Spanish SAT, and Deliciousness

The aquamarine water is so clear and blue that you can see your toes wriggling in the sand four feet below you. The waves are mild and they buoy you up from time to time, pushing you toward the bright, sandy shore where some of the first sun-bathers of the year are already going from tan to milk-chocolate brown. You shut you eyes and submerge under the salty water, as if to say, “Sun, lets play hide-and-go-seek!” You only open you eyes when you can feel the sand on your fingertips and the water warming in the shallow waves of the shore. Thank goodness the sun has finally decided to pay its tribute to the Mediterranean coast! True to the beach-dweller’s tradition, you will lay on your towel long enough to dry and bake before returning to the water and then back to the tanning in an everlasting cycle that could last all day and all summer. This is the way life was meant to be!
But this is not how the beaches here have always been. Sixteen years ago, the Alicante city council decided that it was time to increase revenues, and so, they hauled in a whole lot of sub-ocean sand onto the once rocky shore and created –load by load- a tourists paradise. They planted palm trees in symmetrical lines and provided benches, showers, and foot-paths at every convenient interval. The product is lovely and successful, but one wonders what was lost in that massive coastal transformation.
As I walked along the beach, further from my apartment building than I had ever gone before, I suddenly found myself on an undeveloped part of the coast where fishermen reigned –along with little crabs, snails, and an abundance of little sea creatures with spikes and shells that I cannot name. And instead of sand, it was all lightly colored, rounded stones that served as homes and hiding places for the afore mentioned habitants. Some of these rocks had such a maze of tunnels winding through them that I could imagine a world inside each one, like Whoville. As I stooped every foot or so to uncover some new treasure, I noticed something very unusual about one particular length of rocky beach: the waves receding down the sloping rocks created an acoustic waterfall, akin to the sound of a rain-stick. It was so beautiful and relaxing just sitting and listening to the water shift the rounded rocks in a series of soft clicks and clacks. Mmmmm! I think those three meters of beach are some of my favorite in the world! Oh, what I would give to have completely undeveloped, wild beaches open to my curious exploration!
In case everyone is wondering, all the seniors in high school are currently studying for the last tests of the year, which come during these next two weeks. I can’t be bothered to study, what with the re-appearance of my beloved sun. I might open up my philosophy and art history books, but that is only because I enjoy reading about the thoughts of Nietzsche and the portraits of Goya. After these two weeks of testing, and while everyone else is still in school for three more weeks, the seniors will turn to studying for the highly important college entrance tests. These tests are crucial because your grade determines what colleges you can go to and what majors you can study. For example, lets say you average a six out of ten on the test. Well, sorry but you can’t be a lawyer. However, you can still study to be a teacher! Additionally, these tests are not multiple choice. Each section, based on the courses you have recently completed, calls for several detailed essay question responses which are then evaluated and graded by a group of judges. Thus, the test is much more subjective than the SAT. Also, it determines wholly your college opportunities, so lets hope you didn’t get off the wrong side of the bed that morning. But if you get the grade you were hoping for on the test, then you essentially get to go to college where you want without the whole nerve-wracking application process. Most Spaniards choose to go to college in their hometown, or the nearest city, so that they can continue living with their parents. In fact, most young adults won’t move out of their parent’s house until they get married, which currently averages around 28-years-old and is going up every year. The housing here is so expensive that the youth just can’t afford to live on their own, and so they stay dependent on their parents until a later age. Some people who don’t marry live with their parents all their lives, and this is not socially frowned upon like it usually is in America.
On Thursday there was a strike at my school. Actually, it was a strike amongst all the high schools in this part of the country (in the community of Valencia). Nobody was really sure what they were striking against, but when they hear the word huelga (“strike”), they treat it as a day off from school. My host sister and just about everybody else went to the beach. Me and, ironically, my usually slacking classmates were all at school all day like the good little students that we are or pretend to be.
Well, I am very excited because on Tuesday I will take a train up to Barcelona where I will meet up with the other exchange students before we head up to Paris! Yay! I have never set foot in France, so I can’t wait to see the Louvre and the infamous Eiffel Tower. My friend and fellow exchange student Molly is looking forward to the crapes! I’ll be sure to let you know how they are. And if the airport security doesn’t notice the chocolate and whipped cream oozing from my luggage, I’ll smuggle some back for you too!
Ooh! I almost forgot! Did you know that Spain has chocolate shops. Let me specify: did you know that Spain has shops where you sit down and be served a cup of melted chocolate with churros to dip in it and any array of other delicious tidbits of chocolate. Need I say heaven?!

Well, oodles of love!

Besos,

Jocelyn

PS I re-dyed my hair again and it is faaabulous daaarling!