Wednesday, July 27, The end is near.

Juegos de aula, el comic y la familia real
A very traditional Spanish game is called the hankerchief game.  Someone holds the "pañuelo" between two evenly divided teams.  The holder calls out a number and the numbered person on each side has to respond quickly, run and grab the "pañuelo" and run back to their side before being tagged.  We saw this being played on the beach, and the teenagers were having a blast.  There is an endless number of variations on this game, and Begoña uses it with relative clauses that call for subjunctive.  Another game to use as a warm up is called "a mi derecha," where a student who has a vacant desk to his/her right uses a relative clause and subjunctive to see who stands up and sits in that empty chair.  The new student who has an empty chair on the right does the same until everyone has gone.  Example:  I am looking for someone who has a birthday in June.  This requires subjunctive in Spanish, and if it's your birthday month you get up and sit on the speaker's right.  We can all adapt this game in some form.  Begoña pushes forward in the book, and tomorrow we get to do more subjunctive.  Yippee!

Francisco focuses on the use of comics, graphic novels and literature in general for his teaching.  Since he is a literature expert, he finds this to be a dynamic way to constantly teach culture and language at the same time while exposing students to some of the finest writers in castellano.  Spaniards have a rich literary tradition growing out of newspapers, and therefore, the comics have perhaps played a bigger role than in American culture.  Just like Peanuts was a comic before it debuted on t.v. so too have many Spanish comics evolved.  He gives us some good tips on how to use them in class, and we learn that the bubbles that hold the speech are called "bocadillos."  I asked what we called them in English, and "bubbles" seems right, but please comment if you know better.  Maddy suggested we check out http://www.toondoo.com/  for more comic ideas. 

Royalty in Spain seems like it could be a summer course of its own, what with all the drama surrounding these European families that have defined so much of this continent's ancient and current cultural landscape.  Ana talks about "La ley sálica " known in English as the Salic Law of Succession.  This was included in the 1978 Spanish Constitution, and in short, it does not allow a women to become Queen if she has a brother.  Spain is a Parlimentary Monarchy, and you can read about King Juan Carlos and his family until you are blue in the face.  Ana highlights some of the unwritten agreements that exist between the press (paparazzi) and the Monarchy, which contrasts in interesting ways with other European royal families. The transition between the Franco dictatorship and the constitutional monarchy took up the whole class today.
King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia

Tuesday, July 26, Back to classes

After a delicious and adventure filled weekend, we are back to classes on this, again cool and wet, Tuesday.  Begoña does not hesitate to throw subjunctive mood at us bright and early.  Most of us have to teach subjunctive, so many of us are engaged as she explains how to accurately use dependent and independent clauses.  We all appreciate this theme on our own terms, and what I take away is her suggestion to incorporate cultural information while having students give an opinion about things like, for example, kissing each other on both cheeks every time you meet up with friends in Spain, or arriving late after agreeing on a time to meet.  We also play a guessing game that sends a person out in the hallway who must come back and guess where s/he is based on our clues that include indicative and subjunctive sentences.  It's fun because we are language geeks.  Example:  It's true that you hear music.  It is sad that the music is too loud. You hope that they play your favorite song.  Answer:  You're at a concert. 

Francisco probably had a lesson plan for today, but all I needed to do was ask one question, and the rest was, well, history.  Kyle Jacobs (Kip's son who studies Spanish at Carleton College) asked me to find out what I could about a case called "el caso Garzon."  It has to do with the very bold, Spanish judge who went after the Chilean Dictator, Augusto Pinochet.  Opinions abound on this current topic, and the future promises more headlines that look back more than 70 years.  The new Historic Memory Law called "la ley de memoria historica" is a touchy topic that attempts to sort out the pain and suffering of the twentieth century in Spain.  Our trip to Guernica this afternoon will surely shed more light on this polemic. 

Ana takes us out for pintxos in the casco viejo neighborhood (the old part of town).  We overeat our way to happiness and stroll through the plaza nueva before we walk a kilometer or so to the train station for our 45 minute ride to Guernica.  The key stops in Guernica include the Peace Museum, the Henry Moore sculpture, the Casa de Juntas and famous Guernica Oak Tree.  Seeing and understanding the Casa de Juntas helps us realize that Guernica played an important politcal and symbolic role in the history of the Basque Country.  This helps explain why Franco had Hitler and Mussollini bomb this otherwise small and militarily insignificant town.  Most believe it was to send a message, by hitting the Basque Country in one of its most popular trading and cultural centers.   Eyewitnesses gave their accounts to journalists while Franco's journalists claimed the "Reds" were actually responsible.  The Peace Museum makes a terrific effort NOT to glorify war, and instead focuses on the value of peace, and what it actually means to live in peace.  This is very thought provoking museum that puts peace front an center in an effort to move us forward as a people so we can avoid the things that caused this tragedy in 1937. 

The building on the right is the Peace Museum in Guernica. It's worth a visit.  Please read the Tools for peace below printed in four languages at the museum:  English, French, Spanish and Euskera. 

Tools for peace
Firm dialogue
Respect for human rights
Looking to the future
Honoring our fellow human beings
Putting ourselves in the other party's position
Listening to different opinions
Searching for common ground
Meditating to unite the wishes of both parties
Inventing and creating
Gearing the situation towards reconciliation
Admitting our mistakes
Thinking positively
Investigating and discovering other realities
Confronting postures in a positive fashion
Reviewing laws and regulations
Not stigmatizing persons and their problems
Standing up to injustice
Making our postures more flexible

Taken from the Peace Museum in Guernica, Spain, www.peacemuseumguernica.org

Monday, July 25, Festival de Santiago

Today is Monday, and a holiday, so no one works or goes to school.  Stores are closed, and it is still raining, so it's a perfect day to recover from the busy weekend.  When July 25 falls on a Sunday, it is an extra special year for pilgrims in northern Spain.  The legend of St. James or Santiago is an interesting one and is symbolized throughout northern Spain with a shell (see image).  Pilgrims from all over the world walk all or part of the Camino de Santiago, from southern France west to Galicia, directly above Portugal.  Bilbao is part of the Camino, and we see hikers every day.  These shells are on buildings, signs and in the pavement all along the route.

Our list of films keeps growing, and we take advantage of this cold and rainy day to watch another.  Watching a different film almost every night makes it hard to keep them all from running together.  We watch "El lobo," a film about the ETA terrorist group in the 1970's that was infiltrated by a mole known as "el lobo."  It is a good film to get a sense of that part of Spain's history.  Another particularly good film is "los girasoles ciegos," for its poetic, human quality during a difficult political time after the war.  And  "Los soldados de Salamina." also shows the human side of war, focusing on an act of mercy during an otherwise brutal campaign.  One theme in every one of these films so far is the incredibly strong roles that women play.  The saddest example of this is "Las 13 rosas;" thirteen young women, some still teenagers, who fall to a firing squad.  All of these films somehow prepare us for our visit tomorrow to the small town of Guernica, made famous by Picasso's mural, which  reminds us of what happened there, on a Monday afternoon in 1937.

Sunday, July 24, One more week

Donostia (San Sebastian), Heineken Jazz Festival

Our hopes were high for this day, and we planned well in advance to make sure we could soak up the sun on the beaches of this popular city of 180,000 people on the northern coast of Spain, a hop, skip and a jump from France.  Hannah Reimer's friend, Igor, from ten years ago, whom she met in Germany, met up with us and introduced us to his wonderful family.  Unfortunately, as you can tell by our jackets and sweaters, mother nature didn't get the memo about sending the sun to the jazz festival.  Instead, we walked around with umbrellas, usually open, and only caught a sampling of music as a result. Usually the beach is packed with people on this day, but the cold and rain has been parked over pais vasco for several days now. 

The great thing was to be able to see a young family speaking to the children in euskera and then switching to castellano so effortlessly.  It is a beautiful thing, and research has shown that it is good for the brain to use multiple languages throughout life.  The custom of going out for "pintxos" in Donostia (San Sebastian) is something you can do regardless of the weather.  So we sampled some delicious dishes at a number of fine establishments that fill the narrow streets of this charming town. Igor, Leticia and their two children showed us a great time despite the lousy weather.  They know they have an open invitation to visit Milwaukee anytime.  The Euskera word for good bye is "agur," and you hear it all the time around town.  So thank you Igor and family for making our visit to Donosti even more memorable.  Agur!

Saturday, July 23, Excursion

La Rioja:  San Millan de la Cogolla y La Guardia

These two plaques inside the monastery Yuso in San Millan de la Cogolla (La Rioja region) show the first record of written Basque (Euskera) on the left and Spanish (castellano) on the right.  Below you will see copies of the Latin texts that the monks were working on and trying to translate into the common languages that the people in northern Spain were speaking before these languages had a written history. 

Hardly visible here, but obvious in the margins up close, are what are called the "glosas emilianenses."  That is, glossed notes in the margins of the Latin text written in both euskera and castellano to explain the Latin, since only the very well educated could understand the written Latin in the eleventh century.  These glosses are like the annotations we write in the margins of our Shakespeare books so we can understand what Romeo was really saying to Juliet. 

Even though truck stops have certain reputations in the US, our lunch on the way to Laguardia (in English) was quite exquisite.  The "patatas a la riojana" were some of the best stewed potatoes I have ever tried.  I'm not a big fan of cured meats, but this Iberian ham (jamon iberico) was sweet and buttery.  They take great pride in feeding their pigs acorns to produce the best jamon iberico possible.  We then went to Laguardia (in Spanish), a walled city full of narrow streets and charm to walk off our lunch.  The town specializes in bodegas that cater to the wine aficionados of the world.

Friday, July 22, Last Day of classes of Week 2

Spain today and thousands of years ago

(Jeff, Kevin y Olga en el monasterio, Yuso, de San Millan de la Cogolla, La Rioja)

Begoña lays out the itinerary for tomorrow's excursion to wine country, La Rioja.  We will make two important stops:  Los monasterios de Yuso y Suso in San Millan de la Cogolla and La Guardia.  A description of each will be on tomorrow's page.  Today's activity in class is to demonstrate how to use "la coartada" (alibi) as a engaging tool to practice past tense in class.  Four students are sent in the hallway to collaborate on their wherabouts during two hours last night when a crime was committed.  Kelly, Eva, Olga and I are the suspects.  We agree that we were all watching a video together last night while eating popcorn and drinking Coca Cola, Light (Spain's Diet Coke).  The class calls each one of us in, one at a time, to interrogate us about last night's details.  The questions are all in past tense, and our classmates all discover what we were doing and then try to decide which one of us committed the crime.  We are such good lyers that all they can deduce is that we are all equally guilty, and therefore, they convict us all of the crime.  This is an activity we'll probably bring back to our classrooms in some form for when we teach the past tense. 

Francisco is a literature expert, and it seems like he has seen and read everything under the Basque sun.  He keeps giving us more movies and more books.  For insights into ETA he recommends a movie called "El lobo (The Wolf), 2004."  Picking up a Spanish newspaper today shows that this issue is still a recurring theme as Spain moves forward politically, unquestionably linked to its recent history.  The following trailer of "El lobo" illustrates the historical intensity of this on-going struggle. For another Spanish Civil War movie he suggests "Las 13 rosas," 2007, a film that recalls the firing squad execution of thirteen very young Spanish women in 1939.  It has taken Spain more than a generation to begin unburying its past with movies like these, and many would say that it is all part of the healing process that was impossible to begin between 1939-1975, the years of the dictatorship.  A 2007 law called "La ley de memoria historica" (Historical Memory Law) was passed to try to bring some closure to what happened during the Spanish Civil War and the 40 year dictatorship that followed.  However, like in all politics, it is controversial and criticized for possibly "opening old wounds." 

 To transition from the heavy stuff, Francisco shows us part of a more light-hearted film from yesterday's class called, "Los peores años de nuestra vida."  Here's the ending to ruin it for you since I find these love stories a bit tiresome.  The scene Francisco uses in class is on New Year's Eve and shows the custom of eating twelve grapes as the clock in the Puerta del Sol strikes twelve.  Using a film fragment to highlight colloquial language and customs is good way to engage students without using several class periods to show a whole film. 

Ana is our Spanish culture and history of the language expert who explains why we won't have class on Monday, the festival of Santiago.  We also get off on a tangent about the sun's nickname being "Lorenzo" and the moon's name being "Catalina."  She seemed miffed that we don't have affectionate nicknames for them in English.  It seems to me that July 25, the Festival of Santiago, is an expected three day weekend in northern Spain (maybe in all of Spain?) that marks the middle of summer vacation.  Ana spends considerable time preparing us for tomorrow's journey to San Millán de la Cogolla, considered to be the birthplace of the Spanish language.  The plaque to the right indicates its status as a Unesco Cultural Heritage site since 1997. 

This monastery claims to hold the first written records of Spanish (castellano) and Basque (Euskera) languages.  There was a time in Spain when Cristians, Jews and Muslims shared their intellectual wisdom to more the human condition forward through collaboration.  The ancient Hebrew, Latin and Arabic records give testiment to how much we can accomplish if we are willing to let go of certain stubborn tendencies that push us toward intollerance, division and war. An optimist might think that Spain may be experiencing that sort of renaissance today.  Ojalá!

Thursday, July 21

Coartadas, Cine y Roma:

Our teachers are walking encyclopedias and do not hesitate to share their knowledge.  There seems to be no end to the ins and outs of Spanish grammar, and we learn the word "tiquismiquis" to refer to someone who is picky, anal, detail oriented, or in today's world, OCD.  Using a classic tale in present tense is a great tool for having students re-tell it in a different tense.  Another activity is that of the "coartada" or "alibi," to get students to ask relevant questions in past tense after a small group of suspects has time to collaborate on a story explaining their whereabouts.  Suppose a crime occurs between 9:30-11:30 p.m..  Tomorrow we'll see who has the best alibi. 

Using a film clip in class is useful to expose students to culture while working on comprehension and composition skills.  Francisco explains how he introduces a film clip, the relevant vocabulary and how to effectively set the stage so students know what to expect in the film.  Tomorrow we will see a clip and go through progressively more challenging exercises to analyze a popular film.

 Taxes are everywhere, and Ana shows us a check stub of a typical Spanish employee.  The wages and deductions look like our pay stubs, but the abbreviations and financial jargon need translation.  We also learn about Spain's maternity leave policy and the incentive for childbearing called, "chequebebe."  Mothers here can expect four months of maternity leave at full pay from their job and perhaps another two weeks for nursing.  Fathers also have maternity leave thanks to the current Socialist government, but it has not become the expected norm yet. 

Ana finishes this class with the linguistic situation in Spain.  The history goes back thousands of years and includes conquests and reconquests.  Language geeks like us love this stuff, but blog readers, probably not so much.  The Romans left Latin and some amazing aquaducts.

Tonight's movie is "El orfanato" (The Orphanage).  It has little to do with Spanish culture, and is best described as a creepy, psychological thriller along the lines of an American haunted house type film.  If you like that sort of thing, go for it.  No me gusta.