Becoming Spanish: From Expat to Immigrant

Me dicen el clandestino 

Por no llevar papel 

Pa' una ciudad del norte 

Yo me fui a trabajar 

Mi vida la dejé 

Entre Ceuta y Gibraltar 

Soy una raya en el mar 

Fantasma en la ciudad 

Mi vida va prohibida 

Dice la autoridad.

— Manu Chao, "Clandestino", 1998

Spain's population grew by one on Monday.

Some people are born Spanish. Others, like me, choose to become Spanish. Yesterday morning, in Valencia's Ciudad de la Justicia, I swore the oath to the King of Spain and the Spanish Constitution, to confirm my naturalization as a Spanish citizen. Today I woke up Spanish! (Though it won't feel really real until I get the DNI and passport later this month.) This is exciting!

That my "juramento de la nacionalidad española" occurred so closely after Bastille Day, July 14th, marker of the French Revolution and a birthday of sorts for modern ideas about nationalism, was a token symbolism not lost on me. What really is a nation, after all, but a Romantic myth made real by all the bureaucratic paperwork of government institutions, along with the sentimental acts of patriotism by "the people" grasping at straws for some kind of ennobled unity of identity beyond the simple fact of physical proximity… and yet this so-called nation is made a mess of by the many expats, immigrants, emigrants and other migrants who "vote with their feet" and, consciously or not, "resist" the reality of borderlines drawn on maps. I'm not saying "nation" is not "real". Quite the contrary, I am thrilled to gain Spanish nationality. This is a big moment in my life! I'm saying that over the last ten plus years of moving back and forth between Europe and the U.S., and now immigrating to another country, I've gained a very rich and complicated idea of what a nation is, and I can tell you that it is something we produce, not something "real" sitting out there in nature. Which means it's dynamic and evolving. Hey! Yesterday Spain gained a new citizen! This nation is a little different this week than it was last week.

But, oh dear, I've gotten all philosophical. First I should get to the nitty gritty. Answer those usual questions that I get asked whenever I mentioned that I'm applying for citizenship here. These generally fall into two categories: the pragmatically curious (how does one go about doing something like that?) and the pragmatically confounded (why bother?).


     • How does one do it? Do you have to take a test?

Immigration to the United States is a process of such mythic proportions that the process itself has become the subject of many a Hollywood fiction—take Green Card (1990), for example—and even entered pop culture in the form of clichéd narrative twists (marrying for visa, but then falling in love) and popular lingo (e.g. "anchor baby", "fresh off the boat"). Not so for Spain, and maybe that's why so many Americans I know are curious to know what it's like over here.

The latest in a long line of silly
Hollywood movies about the
"romance" of U.S. immigration.

The short answer: much easier. Of course it depends on how you go about applying, but for us married-to-a-Spaniard types the process involves establishing one year of residency in Spain + 2 years waiting for the paperwork to "process" in Madrid. Oh, and it is totally free! (Contrast this with the U.S. where it is 5 years residence to then apply, and I have no idea how long the papers take to process. And throughout the process you pay hundreds of dollars in fees!)

Once the residency requirement is established, you compile various papers to show your cause is legit (proof of residence, proof that marriage is real) and that you have some means of getting by in Spain… for the details check out this official link. And you go in to the appropriate police station in your city and make an appointment to submit them. In my case, about a week after asking for an appointment I got it, and thus had the first of two interviews… and this leads to the other big question: Is there a test for citizenship in Spain?

Of course, it might not be free for long. On my morning waiting for the
processing to be completed, I noticed these posted flyers all around the office.

As the posts indicated, the current PP-led government is threatening
to introduce fees for many legal services provided by the government.

Well, yes and no. Unlike the U.S. there is no formal multiple-choice test to establish proficiency. But there is a requirement in the application that you demonstrate some degree of integration in the community, or some wording to this effect. So in this first interview I had the officer was asking me about the application, why I was applying, and then suddenly asked me where I had travelled to in Spain, drawing an outline of the Spanish peninsula on a piece of paper. She pointed at the paper and asked me to mark on the map the cities and places I've visited. I obliged, marking a fair number of cities (I think she was impressed), and she was satisfied that I had some basic geographical knowledge of Spain… though she pointed out that I had placed the city of Granada too far to the west on the map, too close to Sevilla and Córdoba (a mistake I'll never make again). They made a note of my intent to apply and kept copies of my application. Not long afterwards (I think around 3 months had passed), I received a letter to bring my documents to the Registro Civil, and for my wife to join me. This was, in effect, a second (and final) interview. We were asked questions about each other, but it was not especially rigorous or intense. In fact, the woman who interview me was downright friendly. But, again, there arrived a moment when, suddenly, I was asked: "¿Te gusta la comida española?"

Now, at this point I was recalling my dad's dating advice: "Zach, you like to talk too much; try to be quiet; give simple answers, and let the other person talk". Because I was thinking: "Are you kidding! I'm a total foodie, and heck, I study the history of food! I love Spanish food!!!" So I answered very coyly that, yes, I liked Spanish food (tortilla de patatas, jamón, etc.), and then I pandered by saying that in particular I like Valencian food (paella, arroz al horno, fresh salads "de la huerta"). It was the summer of 2011, so I made a point of saying that I had been making my father-in-law's recipe for sopa de pepino a lot, in support of the poor Spanish cucumber farmers besieged by Germany's Spanish cucumber health scare. And I left the interview wondering: how could one fail that test? Would anyone ever answer: no, I hate Spanish food?

But then I have read Zola-esque exposés in Spanish newspapers about capricious local immigrant officers imposed byzantine tests, such as a judge in Getafe asking applicants what happened in the year 1868 (answer: "la Revolución Gloriosa"… which none of my Spanish friends or family knew), or the more tricky case of a test in Catalonia that asked applicants to name two Spanish athletes, but then failed an applicant for putting "Messi y Ronaldo". Haha! Aren't Messi and Ronaldo Spanish athletes by now!?! But I write these kinds of incidents off as examples of that deeper cross-cultural truth: that there are a**holes everywhere, but they are generally the exception not the norm.

Early morning line at Valencia's Ciudad de la Justicia

Still, when people ask me about my experience applying for visas and citizenship here in Spain, I make a point of qualifying that there were three things which quickly turned the process in my favor with local bureaucrats: 

1) when I opened my mouth, I spoke a pretty good Spanish, above all with a decent Spanish accent, which puts the agent at ease (no awkward hand gestures and annoying confusions necessary),
2) when they asked me where I'm from, my answer--the United States--immediately removed suspicion from them as to my motives for applying, and
3) when they asked by what means I was applying and I answered, "por matrimonio (a una valenciana)", in other words, for love, their hearts softened and they treated me like part of the community.

I can only wonder what a sub-Saharan African immigrant who comes looking for work with only broken Spanish would face. (I also wonder how tiresome it must get for the bureaucrats to deal with overly romantic, hedonistic guiris whose Spanish is atrocious.)

This funcionario pride poster was also
posted around the Registro Civil office. 

But the intractable discretion of street-level bureaucrats is not unique to Spain, nor Europe. (For any social theory nerds interested in this, I direct you to Michael Lipsky's Street-Level Bureaucrats (1980), a classic on the subject.) And I shudder to think what my experience would have been like in the United States where even "desirable" immigrants face a profound skepticism and distrust, where the burden of proof is, "Why should we let you in here?"

So let me pause here to give my thanks to the many bureaucrats who helped me to get here today: Spanish bureaucracy is not that bad. In fact, in my opinion, it's smooth, efficient, professional and downright pleasant when compared to the experiences my wife had in the United States with immigration. (I had nightmare experiences with Homeland Security when my wife applied for residency in the United States.) This shouldn't be much of a surprise, because the people who work in the immigration office are professionals, funcionarios, whereas many of the people who work in U.S. immigration are hourly wage workers. Which is why I groan every time an expat spins another clichéd blog entry about Spanish bureaucracy; or when Spaniards perpetuate the stereotypes themselves. The truth is that most of you haven't had to go through it in your own country, and so you really have no point of comparison. Bureaucracy in the U.S. can be pretty oppressive, opaque, and capricious to an outsider; and Spain's system was fairly straightforward and navigable for me thanks to having my wife and her family as "insider" guides. (It's amazing how easily "local knowledge" can sidestep bureaucratic conundrums by tried and true method of "asking a friend about it" or getting a local to "look into it" for you.)

If anything the economic crisis has been a wonderful opportunity
to display the creativity, inventiveness, dare I say entrepreneurship
in all the brilliant ways that the protesters ("manifestantes") play on
pop culture and popular indignation to give birth to hilarious
and poignant critiques like this one: Rajoy, public enemy #1...
enemy of the public #1

     • Why apply for it? Why would you want Spanish nationality anyway? 

In a way, getting asked this question already offers significant insights into the differences between Spain and the USA… Why don't more people ask this question back in my birth country? Part of me was saddened that I was even asked this by the first immigration officer that I spoke to, not simply for the interview, but as a sincere question: why apply to be a Spaniard when you can be perfectly happy here as an American expat? 

–> Initial easy gut answer: So that I can vote in elections. So that I have a voice. Because it will simplify my life with the local bureaucracy.

Why are such utilitarian, transactional explanations always the most credible? When I give answers like this people nod their heads (and then probably think, "Okay. I guess that makes sense. [But I'd never bother with it!]").

–> Sincere yet awkwardly formed, deeper answer: Because I want to be a member of the community! I own a home here. I live here. It feels wrong for me to pretend that I do not belong here. Citizenship is a part of belonging in modern society. I want to belong.

Yeah, even as I write it I can see that it sounds sentimental and idealistic. But in truth citizenship was not just about convenience for me. It was about commitment. Spain is my future. I'm not just day-tripping here. So it is not enough for me to be a permanent resident.

The moment when I swore the oath to the King of Spain and the Spanish Constitution.

Of course, the corollary question that I get asked is "Do you lose your American citizenship?" Ah, yes, the real test of commitment. Here I can fall back on a legal ambiguity. In the "juramento de la nacionalidad" I did have to renounce my other commitments, including my American citizenship. In Spain, I am now not an American. Yet, I know for a fact that the U.S. won't let go of me so easily. I continue to be an American citizen over there. (Unless I formally renounce my citizenship in a U.S. Embassy in front of a consular officer, it's not official for the U.S.) Indeed, some Americans have tried unsuccessfully to willingly leave the U.S.A. for tax-purposes (Americans abroad still have to declare taxes in the U.S.), such as the co-founder of Facebook recently tried. But de facto dual citizenship exists, as I know from a friend who came to Spain from the U.S., got Spanish nationality, and even played basketball for the Spanish Olympic team… and yet the U.S. still accepts _his_ American passport. So short of Spain declaring war with the U.S., and me becoming an "enemy combatant", I'm still American.

Does this mean I'm a dual citizen? I'll leave any direct answer to that to the lawyers. It simply means that in the U.S. I'm American and in Spain and Europe I'm Spanish. 

     • Whither Expats and Immigrants?

The most trivial of dilemmas I now face as a result of this acquisition of Spanish nationality is that I must now decide what to do about my blogger persona moniker: "An Expat in Spain". I'm not exactly an expat anymore, am I? 

The idea of "expat", and how it differs from immigrant, is a complicated one with a long history. If you are interested in this history, I recommend this article, "Expatriation, Expatriates, and Expats" by Nancy Green, herself an American expat living in Paris. One of the broad points of her article is that few Americans actually ever sought foreign nationality, Henry James a notable exception. (Ernest Hemingway was more par for the course, living abroad for years on end, but never giving up his Americanness and surrounding himself with other expats.) Another interesting broad point of her article is that, as America has become more comfortable with itself as a nation, it has not worried as much about demanding clear loyalties from its subject. In other words, at the beginning of its history the U.S. worried about its citizens being abroad too long; but today it is comfortable that an American abroad is an American no matter how much they might "go native" as anthropologist say. Thus we now use the word "expat" for people who do not in any way intend to expatriate, to renounce their former nationality for a new one.

It has always seemed to me that, broadly speaking, there are three kinds of immigrants: 

1) those who migrate "por el factor n", to be with the novio/a… i.e. for love,
2) those looking for work or "opportunity" abroad, and
3) those who need to "get the heck out of dodge", the emigrants who want to leave a place more than seek one out. 

Depending on which of these three you are, you'll have a very different kind of experience with the process of cultural integration and local acceptance. One peculiarity of Spain's special relation with many South American countries is that it is easier for many South Americans to obtain citizenship than to get a work visa. Which was probably why the majority of people in my swearing ceremony were from there. This has also created an awkward trend in recent years of a population decline for Spain due to newly minted naturalized Spaniards from South America returning home, unable to find work here.

When my wife saw Balseros with me years ago
in the States, she commented on how much
the Cuban boats resembled boats of refugees
that head to Spain's Canary Islands all the time.

And there is obviously a difference between the legal and illegal immigrant. Being from Texas, I've been especially struck by the parallels between Spain/Europe and Texas/United States in the politics of immigration. In some ways, Spain, like Texas, is a major front in the battle lines of illegal immigration for Europe (see, for your reference, latest news story X on boat from African to southern Spanish coast; compare to Cuban raft on Florida coast). And for the last 15 years Spain has had immigration levels comparable to Texas. And yet, while many northern countries in Europe have had a kind of xenophobic backlash to their immigration (like certain reactions in California or Arizona, which see immigrants as a drain on public resources), in Spain, like in Texas, immigrants are generally accepted as a plus for the economy. Even though Spain does not have the U.S.'s long history as a "melting pot", it tolerates immigration quite well even though immigrants do challenge Spaniards' cultural assumptions. (Cue conversation on "los chinos" and how they confound the Spanish conventions on knowing when to stop working – a fruit stand open on Sunday? It's the beginning of the end!)

But what exactly are "expats"? Where do they fit into all of this. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, there is a kind of luxury and casual indifference to those who embrace the "expat" label. It is not about integration. "Immigrant" suggests a desire and neediness for the adopted country that "expat" does not. "Expat" says, "It's so pleasant here. What a wonderful spot to summer, or vacation, or retire!" (Any time Spaniards do mention immigrants as a possible burden on social services, I point out that retired expats are a much bigger drain, using social services in their retirement without having contributed to employment taxes.) But it's more than that. "Immigrant" suggests a struggle of identity, "Am I Spanish enough? What should I preserve, protect from my past self?" In other words, the immigrant offer us the story of real drama and cultural confrontation, the expat the story of fanciful whimsy and entertainment. (Hemingway, are you hearing this? taking notes?)

For a while now I've enjoyed using the expat label because of its convenience, because it conforms to people's expectations of me as an American in Spain. Because it has allowed me to reach out to others from my birth country who are here in Spain, to connect with them on our "similar" experiences falling in love with the country. But there is a part of me that is curious about those (other) immigrants. Why shouldn't I be classed with the Romanians, the Russians, the South Americans, the sub-Saharan Africans, the Chinese who come to Spain? I'm an immigrant, too!

The room where we did the swearing in ceremony,
and the group of immigrants with me.

Hmm. I don't know. I'm still chewing on this thought. And not lightly, I promise. Yesterday morning, throughout the swearing ceremony, I found myself humming the Manu Chao song quoted above, "Clandestino", about those illegal immigrants in Spain, skirting the law. (What a great song!) How much of my life is like, and how much is it different from those "sin papeles"? Obviously drawing too much of a comparison is not fair to them. I've had it easy. But when I ask, what is a nation, what I'm really asking myself is, how are they any different than me? Why is their claim to enter Spain less legitimate than mine? What right do I have to becoming Spanish that they don't?

This cartoon, showing a "blind justice" miraculously able to pass a eye test
focused on euros, is a brilliant critique of the highly unpopular PP proposal
to introduce fees ("tasas") for legal services in the justice system.

     • Once a guiri, always a guiri?:

Some people are born Spanish. Others, like me, will spend their entire lives having to prove they are Spanish. Last May when I was leading a discussion class in the English language institute where I work, I chose as the topic, "a culture within a culture", starting with a discussion of Jewish culture in America, but then drawing parallels to gypsies in Spain. And sure enough, one of the students said that flamenco was Spanish, not just gypsy, but then couldn't easily articulate why gypsies were somehow distinct from the Spanish even though a dance style they introduced could be called typically Spanish. I made the observation that continental Europeans (not just Spaniards) tend to rely more on a tradition-centered, place-based identities than Americans, and that there was a fixity to how they saw identity that, for me as an American, seemed oddly stubborn and out of alignment with numerous examples of hybrid or dynamic cultural currents in contemporary Spain. 

To drive the point home a bit, I asked my students, "In July, I will gain Spanish nationality, but will you think of me as Spanish or American?" Using the classic heuristic of fuzzy sets reasoning (something akin to "slippery slopes"), I then asked about further hypotheticals, "Is the first generation Chinese-Spanish kid, who speaks with a fully Spanish accent, Spanish? If so, are they, in some way, less Spanish than a Spaniard born to Spaniards, because they don't "look Spanish" or because their parents aren't Spanish?" Now, my students aren't bigots, far from it, but they were honest and they acknowledged that I would not "become Spanish", in the broader cultural sense, this July simply by getting nationality. (Formal nationality is not a magic wand after all.) And some even agreed that I might never be Spanish, by many people's standards. Even though, at some future point in time, I will have spent more years in Spain than I have in the U.S.

Frankly, I'm not worried about this. "Blending in" is not my lifelong objective. I enjoy being a bit of a misnomer and "out of place" here, living in a "third space" between Spain and the United States, to pun on an urban planning term. I would like to think that I add to Spain's diversity and cultural richness by being the immigrant that I am, and not a born-and-bred Spaniard. But I do like to get my students thinking outside their comfort zone, so I then told my students about an excellent work in American history, Elizabeth Ewen's Immigrant Women in the Land of Dollars (1985), a study of progressive social workers in 1920s America who sought to work with poor immigrant families to help them integrate and "become American". It was an ironic story. The "very American" social workers kept getting frustrated with what they saw as intransigent, backward immigrants who adopted "American" traditions only partially, selecting some but not others. Of course, what the American social workers did not see, but what the immigrants saw only too well (and the historian with 20/20 hindsight), was that America had changed. The immigrants were not encumbered by Victorian-era values, and embraced the emergent 20th-century consumerism, with all its flash and heady gaudiness. (I don't think it's a coincidence that so many American directors during Hollywood's Golden Age were immigrants. Who better to write the script on the quintessentially American story?)

What was the lesson for my class? Sometimes, just sometimes, immigrants see a country better than the locals do. And both are going to play a part in writing that country's future.

Addendum: A much, much longer entry could be written about the 

many other bureaucratic steps one has to take to "become Spanish", beyond 

residence and citizenship... such as the dreaded "homologación de título" 

for foreign degrees, or getting a local driver's license. Suffice it to say that 

some of these I've done and others I have on radar, but they are much more

complicated, infuriating, arbitrary and time-consuming. 

So I save them for another day.

Guest Post: "I Survived Fallas 2013!"

This year I sat Fallas out, and joined the Valencian vacation exodus, visiting Sevilla. (More on that in future posts to come.) But I didn't want my readers to miss out on the fun here. So I asked Katlyn, an exchange student from Pennsylvania who's staying in Valencia this spring, to take notes about her "first Fallas experience" and write it up for the blog. Here's her account of surviving the whirlwind ride that was Fallas 2013!

20 March 2013

This morning I woke up to the sound of the birds chirping. The streets were clean, not an empty bottle or beer can in sight. However, yesterday, just ONE day ago, the scene was quite the contrary. During the last few days of Las Fallas, I woke up to the sound of people shouting and throwing petardos (the equivalent to fire crackers) and orchestras parading along with hundreds of falleros. The city of Valencia was overflowing with culture, pride, and excitement. If Google Earth were to have taken pictures this past weekend, they would be able to see the city of Valencia illuminated by the hundreds of thousands of fireworks, fires, and lights. I am sure the noise could have been heard from outer space as well. The amount of people in Valencia doubled, and the amount of trash that accumulated in the streets, who knows? But, I’m telling you, while walking to the Plaza de la Virgen today, there was not one empty San Miguel beer can or petardo shell to prove that just a few days ago the biggest fiesta in the world was taking place in this amazing city.

Although the “official” day of Fallas began over two weeks ago with La Cridà, the real Fallas (the date where you really want to be here) begin on March 15th (La Plantá). On this day, the Fallas (a.k.a. HUGE, colorful monuments made out of Styrofoam, wood, and a lot of talent that virtually do not exist anywhere else in the world) were erected in various locations throughout the city. You can tell which barrios have a lot of money because their falla is massive and typically has more detail. Each falla is surrounded by various ninots, which are smaller structures that typically have some sort of political or pop culture connotation that goes along with them.

This was my personal favorite, located in the Plaza del Pilar. 
The plaza is so small, and this falla is HUGE. It is not far 

from the main public library and is definitely one worth seeing.    

This is the Falla de Convento Jerusalén, and it was nominated as the Mejor Falla de 2013.    

The falla in the center of the Plaza de Ayuntamiento.
Looks like a bunch of stereotypical tourists that you would find in
Valencia on a daily basis. Obviously, I am the blonde
American chick scarfing down the churros con chocolate.

This is a Falla Infantil because it is smaller and directed towards the younger audience.
It depicts the classic family favorite Mary Poppins, or as some Spaniards say “Marí Poppis”.

The ninot indultat of 2013. This precious gem (from Falla Na Jordana) will go
 along with the other ninots indultats in the Museo Fallero. The window in the background
had some sort of operating system that made the snow fall!

The fallas were my absolute favorite part of the entire event. During the nighttime, and after the music was cut off at 4am, many people could still be found in the streets admiring the fallas. It was absolutely admirable to see these pieces of art and to consider the amount of effort, talent, and time that goes into making them possible. It is really heartbreaking (but somewhat enjoyable!) to see them go up in flames at the end.

Some of the light displays that went up in the streets were also really impressive. In my opinion, the best and the most light displays can be found in Russafa.

Everyone was in awe at this globe of bombillas in Calle de Cuba.

I feel like I am at Disney World!

La mascletà is definitely something for those who love really, really loud noises. La mascletà is more for the sound, not for the big fireworks with a lot of colors (those are called castillos). This firework show takes place everyday during las Fallas at 2pm sharp in the Plaza de Ayuntamiento. Each day, the pirotécnico changes and the most skilled are saved for the last few days of las Fallas. Towards the last few days, you have to be in the Plaza an hour earlier in order to get a closer spot. I am not going to lie, but you have to prepare yourself to be packed in like a sardine and smell everyone’s body odor. I typically went an hour earlier and got a great spot, but only with a lot of pushing, shoving, and telling people “Mi amigo va a vomitar.” The closer you are, the more impressive the show will be. The mascletà can be seen live on TV, but nothing compares to the sensation of feeling the earthquake that is created by these traca (fireworks stringed along a line) that send pulses through your entire body. It is even more exciting to see the crowd get crazy as the noise becomes so intense that the surrounding buildings shake and your eardrums start ringing!

Probably the closest you will ever find me in a scene from Call of Duty.

I am from the United States, and just like most Americans, I love seeing the fireworks on July 4th. NOTHING can compare to the fireworks that I have seen this past week. There are fireworks to be seen every night during las Fallas. Again, if you want a good spot, you have to plan on arriving at your desired location an hour before. I preferred sitting near one of the bridges farther away (el Puente de Aragón) to be able to see the entire show and to avoid the massive surf of people leaving el Puente de Exposición. The environment before the castillos could be compared to a tailgate party. The majority of the young people could be found haciendo botellón, while the future pyros could be found with their parents throwing petardos. The most impressive show happened at 1:30 am during La Nit del Foc (March 18th). To put this spectacular show into perspective, imagine the grand finale of a firework show that lasts for 20 minutes. ¡Increíble!

... Some pics (and a video) of the AWESOME fireworks from La Nit del Foc ...

 

This is the last two minutes of the show from La Nit del Foc. 

I really could have used a pair of sunglasses and earplugs towards the end.

If you are interested in seeing una Corrida de Toros, there are many opportunities to see one during the week of Fallas. I was able to go to one, and it was quite the experience. If you want to see the traditional, what-you-had-pictured-in-your-mind corrida de toros, you have to purchase tickets for the corrida, not los recortes. They are two separate events, and almost always the corrida happens at night. Everyone will have his or her own opinions about this subject. However, I feel that there is a need to respect what is and has been a part of the Spanish culture for many years. I think my favorite part of the evening was when a group of young guys blew up an inflatable "doll” and tossed it down to the arena, expecting the matador to throw it back towards the crowd. And he did. 

The verbenas are definitely something that the Spaniards look forward to during Fallas. A verbena is an outdoor concert or DJ where everyone catches up with friends, drinks a couple (or a few more!) beers, and dances the night way. I was able to go to two verbenas, and both have gone into the “Things I don’t tell Grandma” region of the memory. My friends and I were able to find verbenas directed towards younger crowds, but there were many throughout the entire city. At one point, we ended up in a verbena that had a lovely mosh pit and some melodic dubstep. We didn’t stay there for too long. Other than that, the atmosphere was fantastic, and everyone was having a blast. By law, music had to be cut off by 4am, but the crowd doesn’t clear until well after sunrise. I called it a “morning” at around 6:30 am, but my fellow Spaniards kept chugging along and went to see some fallas and got breakfast. 

The aftermath of a great verbena! I always feel so bad for the limpiadores after I see sights like this.

As I mentioned before, parades could be heard (and seen) throughout the entire day. There were three parades that I was able to witness. On March 16th, I saw La Gran Parada Mora. This parade is very small in comparison to the others, but it is totally worth seeing. The costumes are amazing, and from what I saw, it seemed that they were worth a lot of money. In previous years, there were camels that participated in the parade, but this year the only animal was a horse that cantered and behaved very well. If you want to sit in one of the white lawn chairs, you have to pay five euros. But, you can perfectly see the parade from the street. I was lucky enough to be able to sit between two dumpsters! :-) 

Before the night of La Cremà, I recommend going to Calle Colón to see La Cabalgata del Fuego. Women dressed in traditional outfits from different parts of Spain (and Europe) led the procession, flaunting their gorgeous dresses. Then, the fun part came. Men dressed like devils were riding on bicycles that were spewing fire into the crowd. People on stilts were whipping around fireballs. Fireworks were being let off in the middle of the street. It was an awesome sight that pepped everyone up for the “burning events” of the following evening.

Could you imagine what the sidewalks of Valencia would be like if all of the Valenbisis did this?   

Definitely did not expect that!

Perhaps the most emotional part of Fallas is La Ofrenda a la Virgen. Thousands and thousands of bouquets of flowers were carried to the Plaza de la Virgen by the falleros. A week ago, a wooden structure was mounted in the Plaza with the heads of Virgin Mary and Baby Jesus. I had no idea that a week later (and TWO days of parading falleros), it would become a grandiose statue of thousands upon thousands of white, red, and yellow flowers that brought tears to the eyes. The Plaza is still covered in flowers and it is definitely an impressive, moving sight. 

La Virgen all decked out with thousands of beautiful flowers.

The back of her dress. It still amazes me that this can be done with flowers.

La Cremà is considered the closing ceremony of Las Fallas. At midnight, all of the fallas (with the exception of the falla in la Plaza de Ayuntamiento) were engulfed by flames. Before heading out, you have to choose which falla was your favorite, or the one that you think will be worth seeing burn down. We chose to see Na Jordana (aka HUGE Trojan horse). At first, I was expecting a huge explosion and I stood behind a larger man, obviously so that he could be my shrapnel shield. But, it was not like an explosion from an action film. Fireworks (Yes, more fireworks!) set off at once and the falla went up in flames. It was so HOT because it was like a giant bonfire, and the huge crowd of hundreds of people stuffed into a small plaza did not help either. But, I managed to keep my eyebrows! 

Before...

... After

Directly after the burning of Na Jordana, we headed over to the Plaza de Ayuntamiento. We then watched the burning of the falla with the all of those tourists. Just when we thought the fireworks were over and done with, the sky, once again, filled with castillos. I teared up because that signified the end of what came to be the biggest fiesta of my life. Valencia sure does know how to party!

The last hoorah of Fallas 2013   :-(

I hope everyone has enjoyed reading my post. I had an AMAZING time during Fallas, and I feel that I was able to make the most of my experience. Everyone needs to experience las Fallas at least ONCE in his or her lifetime. Here are some pointers for those of you who will be here next year:

    • Forget about public transportation. The buses cut their routes, certain streets are blocked off, and the amount of people is just insane. The fastest way to get from place to place is definitely by walking.
     • You will not look like a tourist if you wear the blue/white tartan pañuelo. The majority of the people wear them, and it is really interesting to see the various ways that people rock them. Plus, they are really cheap, and in some bars, you might be able to get one for FREE with a beer logo on it. Do not pay more than 1 euro for it if you find someone selling them in the streets!

    • Plan to not sleep. You have to try to see as much as you can. You never know if you are going to be back for the Fallas. But, taking naps between 2:30-6 will definitely help you survive through the week. 

    • The majority (if not all) stores close on March 19th (the celebration of San José). If you need to purchase food or beverages from the market, make sure to do it the day before. If not, El Corte Inglés is there to be your saving grace.
    • Keep your mouth open during la mascletà. If not, there is the chance that your eardrums will ache for the remainder of the day!
    • Be sure to eat a lot of buñuelos and chocolate con churros! Live it up! Try to see and do everything that you possibly can! #YOLO

Kat, wearing the Fallas pañuelo, in fiesta mode!

Happy to say that I survived Fallas 2013! I cannot wait to do it again in the future!

    —Kat

Vivir para bloguearlo: Valencia Expat/Travel Blogger Meeting

It is a brand new year, 2013 ("20" and "13" happen to be my lucky numbers!) and the very first thing I wanted to tell you all is that some friends and I are hosting a Valencia Blogger Meeting for any expat and travel bloggers interested in joining us.

Last fall Chic Soufflé and I were really happy to learn that our longtime friends from the fantastic dormant blog, Hola Valencia, and the current travel blog, For 91 Days, would be in town for a while to recharge their batteries. We are taking advantage of their stay to invite any and all of you in the blogosphere or #twitterverse to please join us on:

Saturday, January 26th 

at (Spanish) lunchtime (i.e. 2PM)

at Spaghetti & Blues (on the Patacona beach).

[We've reserved a table in the covered patio.
Ask at the desk for the table of "blogueros" with "Zach".]

The title of this entry is inspired by the Spanish saying, "vivir para contarlo" ("living to tell the tale"), or maybe by the Gabriel García Márquez autobiography's titled pun on the expression, "Vivir para contarla" (2002). How many of you bloggers out there in Valencia, or thereabouts (Costa Blanca, anyone?), or within a short AVE train ride away (yes, all of you bloggers in Madrid, too!)... How many of you sometimes feel like you are living your expat or traveller's tale so as to blog about it?

Do you have a tendency to share too much everything online?

Well, then come join us in Valencia on January 26th to meet some other people who "live to tell the tale" of their expat musings on cross-cultural encounters in Spain or those people who we all envy and hate who manage to actually travel the world and the seven seas and write about it.

Here is a final list of our confirmed bloggers/tweeple participants:

Myself

Chic Soufflé

For 91 Days / HolaValencia

Graham Hunt / Valencia Property

Travel-o-Cafe

Emilio J Pérez
Gonzalo M / Just Like Home VLC
Ana Fé
Paz

Please post a comment below, email me, or tweet to me at my Twitter account, if you'd like to join us. I'll update this page with more logistical details as it gets nearer.

Happy New Year!

My wife saw this, laughed, and said it reminded her of me.
I don't know what she's talking about!

___________________

Success! The Jan. 26th blogger's lunch was fun, 
and here's a picture of the group:

... enjoying Birra & Blues brewed beer ...

Good times!
___________________

Blog Birthday: Top Ten Posts and Many Thank-Yous

Today my blog turns one year old. My first post went public on September 1, 2011. Then I was full of fire about "Hemingway Paradigm" stereotypes to debunk, and was in need of a serious distraction from seemingly insurmountable professional hurdles. A year later, and I'm still keen on seeing expats and visitors update or fine-tune their out-of-fashion anachronistic "Hispanomanía", though I confess my passions are increasingly directed away from this not-for-profit hobby to more fiscally-productive, extra-blog-icular pursuits.

Before I share with you what have been my most popular posts for the year, I wanted to say thank-yous to a few bloggers out there who were important over the course of the year in either drawing attention to the blog, or keeping me engaged in it. First thanks should go to Ibex Salad, a savvy Spanish economy blogger whose mention of my blog in its early days pretty much put it on the map so far as search engines and bot trollers were concerned. I had less than a 1,000 hits total before his mention on November 4, 2011, and averaged a 1,000 hits-a-week after. I'm eternally grateful. (So to all you power bloggers out there, don't forget the little guys. We appreciate it!)

My first blog entry was a call to arms... to puncture the Hemingway Paradigm!

Special thanks always go to Chic Soufflé, La Cuchara Curiosa and Hola Valencia / For 91 Days, bloggers who have been my direct inspiration for taking up this medium and whose blog projects continue to impress me with what blogging can contribute to the metaverse... good taste, creative commentary, exciting adventure.

And then there are you many other bloggers who, through your regular comments and constant twitter titter, have kept me tuned in to the project and the Spain expat blogging community, even as my time for blog posts has diminished in the face of an increasingly busy, fulfilling personal and professional life. Here I'll single out for mention, in no particular order... Reg and Nancy at the Spain Scoop, Nieves at Sangria, Sol y Siesta, Hamatha at Pass the Ham, Kaley... y mucho más, Tumbit's Mr. Grumpy (happy 3rd birthday to you!), Gee Cassandra, Mother Theresa at The Rain in Spain, Molly in Granada at Piccavey.com, Steve at This is Spain, Néstor at Luces eXtrañas, and Sorokin at Diario de un Aburrido. There are many, many more of you out there whose interactions I've appreciated this past year, and I try to give some recognition of it by adding you to the "Not Alone" Blog Roll on the left side of this blogsite... But if you don't see you there, please write or comment to let me know! (Spain blog newbies, feel free to comment here to let yourself be known to all of these "power Spain bloggers".)

I'd also like to thank BlogExpat.com for flattering me with an interview, and Expatica.com Spain for reposting many of my blog entries (since imitation is the highest form of flattery). And I can't resist an additional four-letter word thank you to Damian Corrigan, my Valentine, whose ludicrous, overly-trafficked About.com GoSpain site still continues to light a flame in my heart in the crusade to counterbalance trite and superficial expat commentaries about my adopted country. (Damian, yes, I still think you're wrong about Valencia.)

These thank-yous aside, here go my (thus far) all-time top ten posts:

(10) "Not Hemingway's Madrid, part 1"

It's been a while since I looked at this entry and the part 2 that I wrote on Madrid, but I continue to recommend it to those of you wanting to get a non-touristy view of Spain's capital.

(9) "That Perfect Gift: Kukuxumusu, Cartoon Cool"

Very few things cooler than Kukuxumusu. I doubt they need my help selling their image, but I'm happy to do so. Or maybe I should be thanking them for drawing traffic my way?

(8) "Valencia's Fallas 2012: The hangover post"

To the extent that blog post popularity reflects passion and local knowledge, I'm happy that this post has ranked up there among the top. It certainly was a hit the week after I posted it. I hope that next year during Fallas it gets more hits, and also encourages any of you Valencia or Fallas doubters to come here and experience the fun for yourself. Fallas, fallas, fallas!

(7) "A Sport's Nation: Its Always Soccer Time in Spain"

There are no limits to the power of soccermania in this country. No doubt, if any of you bloggers want to increase your page hits and blog traffic, write an entry or two about soccer (a.k.a. football) here. Name drop players' names, and load some pictures of them, too. None of us ever get tired of this image of that magical moment in July 2010. Good times.

(6) "Valencia, Spain's Third Largest City: Getting Oriented and the City Center, part 1"

"Valencia, es la tierra de las flores... di-dadi-da-di-dadaa... Valencia"... Nothing makes me happier than to see this entry in the top ten. Valencia is easily one of Spain's most beautiful, under-appreciated cities. In March I added a photo link to my blog template (in the left column at top) to a page on all things Valencia and Fallas, hoping it boosts the visibility of my adopted city. Valencia is great! Come visit! You'll love it!

(5) "Movie Review: Hemingway & Gellhorn (2012)... A Moveable Flop"

I can't tell whether this post is getting traffic because people are curious about the movie and what a cranky "Not Hemingway" blogger thinks of it, or curious about the sex scene photos with Nicole Kidman. Whichever it is, I'm hoping it has the desired effect of steering audiences away from the film and towards more interesting things like books and articles about Martha Gellhorn. (Fat chance.)

(4) "Two Spains, Many Spains: The Spanish Civil War"

Okay, so I'm actually very proud of this entry. I think it's one of my best written. But can you guys _ever_ get enough about the Spanish Civil War??? I started this series, "Two Spains, Many Spains", with the idea of applying my skills as a historian to broad trends in Spain's dynamic culture. But then I got busy and burned out. But I promise to return to it... On the table: entries on immigration, the Spanish exodus (post-war and contemporary "brain drain"), and European Unification, among others. All trends transforming the country and making Hemingway's image an increasingly obsolete one.

(3) "The Hemingway Paradigm Is... Dark eyes, dark hair, thick lisp"

"Paz Vega" appears right below "Ernest Hemingway" on the list of all-time
search terms that lead people to my blog. Who knew?

Speaking of obsolete images... I only wished that the majority of visitors to this page were actually stopping to read the entry. But again, I suspect the source of traffic here is google image searches on Paz Vega and Elsa Pataky, since the volume of traffic fluctuated in sync with the gossip about these actresses' pregnancies and other shenanigans. This post is one of my every-25-entries-or-so revisits of the "Hemingway paradigm". Too bad the subsequent one on "bullfights, bandits, and black eyes" didn't rank here... but that one requires reading a lot of text to appreciate it.

(2) "Don Ernesto: Ernest Hemingway in Spain"

Well one would wonder if a site dedicated to debunking Hemingway stereotypes didn't draw traffic about Don Ernesto. So no real surprise that this entry gets a lot of visitors. If you didn't get a chance to read it, I recommend the twin entry I wrote with this on "Hemingway's Novels in Spain", which features some wordles of his works.


... and the #1 post of all time for my first year blogging is about ...

(1) "That Perfect Gift: Spanish Footwear"

SHOES! Hah! What a laugh! A subject I know relatively little about. Go figure. I suspect the popularity of this entry is partly owing to a pinterest tag on some of these shoe photos. Or maybe shoe shopping is up there with porn and cute cat photos for massive internet traffic. Who knows? Still, if this post helps to raise the profile of Spanish shoes in the world, then I'll rest happy. A big thanks to my mother-in-law, whose shopping savvy about Spanish footwear made this entry possible. And a thanks to Menorca, whose "menorquinas" sandals inspired the idea for the entry when I was visiting there.


I'll be curious to see what happens to these post rankings and the rankings of future blog entries as a new crop of exchange students, ESL teachers, and travel/adventure bloggers flood appear in Spain this fall and start perusing websites, gleaning information for their exploits.

Check back here next year to find out! And thank you to all for reading!