"Duermete Sin Temor"

I am an au pair here in Spain for a family of two little boys, one almost three years and the other just nine months old. I mainly care for the baby during the mornings of the weekdays and once a week I babysit so the parents can go out. Mind you the term ‘babysit’ is used loosely here. By the time I come into the picture as an authority figure the boys are already asleep. I am mostly there in case they wake up, which they do rarely. Tonight I went in to check on them, pull over kicked off covers and just listen to the soft breathing a few times before I went to sleep myself. Tonight there was only one soft breather. The baby has a bit of a cold and was snoring, the deep, adorable snores that only cherubs and babies can make. I went to his crib to check his covers and then went over to his brother’s bed and covered him up, gently patting his head before I went out the door. There was something so magical about the feeling in that room, the essence and innocence of being a child swirling around and into my heart from the little hearts of those boys. All I wanted to do was watch them sleep. I remembered how nice it is to have someone watching over you…

Feliz Día de Acción de Gracias!

If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, "thank you," that would suffice.  ~Meister Eckhart

When I first introduced the national American holiday of Thanksgiving to my Spanish family the first, and most obvious, question that arose was: why?

The typical and idyllic picture of the “First Thanksgiving” has long been banished from my mind and I am aware and sensitive to the atrocities that the white man, my ancestors, did to the peoples of this land. Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, but I do not believe any of us should turn a blind eye to that fact. Naively celebrating a romantized, highly embellished story of a harvest feast is untrue not only to those who were, and continue to be, wronged, but those who committed those acts against them. The days of skits and picture books of such an event is over.

I explained to my Spanish family that it was more of a family event now, a reason to meet and remember all that we have to be grateful for. I do not, for one moment, feel that the origins and realities of “The First Thanksgiving” should be ignored, but my thoughts and understanding of that is for another post, with a different title. I feel that my explanation is not inaccurate.

As I have been added to the rotation for cooking at home here, I volunteered to switch days with my Spanish host mother so that today, Thanksgiving Day, I could cook up a mini, simpler version of the feast that my family participates in annually with as many as 20 other family members and friends. Normally cooking isn’t really my scene, having been discouraged by the disasters that my first few attempts undoubtedly were. My sisters still laugh themselves to tears when they think of the smoke alarms I have set off and the pots and countertops I have ruined. Because of this I was rather under the impression that I wasn’t much of a cook and, in various times of my life, that I really didn’t like cooking much.

Thus, every time I am asked to cook I get a bit nervous, and more than a little self-conscious. I am pretty sure that does not really help with the cooking much. It was this nervousness that woke me up a half-hour early this morning and I stumbled downstairs uncharacteristically early. I began, probably a little too early, to clean the kitchen in preparation for cooking I began to think of the grand event that would be taking place tonight in the United States, 3407 miles or, rather  5483 kilometers, away. It wasn’t so much that I wanted to leave, but I really would have loved to be there, just for Thanksgiving…but it wasn’t quite time to salt the potatoes so I fought back the occasional tear by naming all the things I was grateful for. My family, the roof over my head, the clothes I wear, the family that took me in, the incredible opportunity to be able to come to Spain, the fact that this list is so very long. That seemed to work well. As preparations for the meal began to finish up the feeling slowly leaked away and the work of cooking didn’t feel so burdensome.

The food was ready…an hour early. My Spanish family trickled back home from errands, school and work and, finally, we sat down to eat. It was nothing like the angel- food my grandfather makes, but it was most definitely Thanksgiving. Maria, my Spanish mom, and I made an apple pie yesterday and we added this to our very full bellies. Muy rico! It’s my first Thanksgiving away from home, and certainly one to remember. While cleaning up, staggering a little with our big bellies, I realized that I didn't mind cooking so much. With time, experience and energy it becomes a pleasure to cook for others.

Although food seems to get the spotlight today, I hope everyone remembered to take at least a moment to think of the blessings in our lives that we have to be grateful for. Come to think, why stop after today?

God Bless you and your families, and Happy Thanksgiving.

Kika

Mas despacio por favor!

A different language is a different vision of life.  ~Federico Fellini

Whoever happens to have the misfortune of falling in love with me has to accept one thing: my first love is the English language. Like many, or few, writing and speaking and reading, the English language creates for me a feeling of right-ness in the world. Nothing I have encountered on this earth gives me the same feeling or takes me to the same place as English does. It has nuances that I can almost see and when I finally get the right combination of words to express both fact and feeling when I am writing I almost hear a clicking noise.

Although I am half Japanese, half caucasian American I am, rather sadly, only fluent in one language…English. I came here to Spain, in part, to remedy that.

When I first arrived here there was a lot to adjust to. From the size of the highways to the food I ate, I encountered differences everywhere I looked. But the hardest, and most complicated, to get used to was, and continues to be, the language.

But the more I get to know the language of Spain the better I am able to understand her people, her culture and another perspective of the world and of life as a whole. Just as English is the language I would choose to express my soul, so Spanish is for those who grew up in it.

I realize that to those that are perhaps better traveled, or smarter than I am, this might seem obvious. I should tell you that sometimes, in my more discouraged moments, I feel resentful toward the people on television because I feel like they’re showing off their perfect Spanish while mine is only just above that of a cave man, and only that good because I am cuter than a cave man.

I’m not sure what it says about my global perspective that it was not until I came Spain that I even considered how my own Spanish must sound to those fluent in it. I guess that, in many cases, the need to communicate took precedence. But now a lot of my life is centered around learning to speak the language fluently and it I find two elements of language, communication and structure, sacrificed to one another in the struggle.

I just joined a local chorus in the pueblo I live in and on my first day (last Tuesday) we sang from an enormous collection of Christmas songs in preparation for, well, Christmas! It wasn’t the tunes so much as the words that I kept tripping over as both unfamiliar melodies and words kept jumbling themselves up in my mouth.

I was a bit relieved when we turned to “White Christmas” or “Whyeet Krrreesmas” which the chorus was singing in English. It was also then that I began to smile, then chuckle. Honestly, it wasn’t just the chorus I was laughing at, but myself a bit too. That must be what my Spanish sounds like to them!

So you might have gathered that my Spanish has a rather long way to go before arriving at fluency, but nonetheless I find myself almost enjoying the trip. The similarities between English and Spanish are all well and good, but the differences show me more of the culture, and grant me an inkling of a completely different perspective, a whole other world view. That, I think is the hardest part of language to learn and get used to.

I have been thinking of that the newer, the harder, the stranger the experiences one has, the more a person’s heart and perspective must grow. That is what I hope to accomplish here in Spain.

Have a great weekend,

Kika

Kika: The Girl From New England, USA

Two days ago marked one month since my plane touched down in Madrid, Spain where I got a job as an au pair for the Dominiguez family. Two hours ago marked the moment I finally decided to get my arse in gear and do what I've been tempted to do for years: start a blog. To be honest, nothing I've ever done has really been worthy of blogging...but I figure packing up and taking off to Spain for ten months instead of going to college as planned is at least close to worthy... and so I begin!

As I have never blogged before, please forgive the occasional slip-up in various departments, although I promise you right now that I, as a crazy and often emotional teenager, will try and stay as far away as possible from any whiny or adolescent rants that remind one of nothing less than an open and awkward diary.

To say that my initial transition into Spanish society was a challenge would be the understatement of a lifetime, but true to my word I won't go into the messy details.

Maybe I wasn’t quite prepared for the obstacles and struggles I would have to face coming here on my own and knowing no one. As a gal who, I now realize, has been spoiled rotten with love and care from her family her whole life, it was a bit of a shock to suddenly feel alone in a strange country. Sometimes I think that if I knew what I would experience in my hardest moments here before I left I would have never left at all. In many ways this trip is a product of my stubborn, if untried and unproven, opinion that I am capable of making my own way in this world.

“If you don't jump, you'll never know if you can fly” (Miranda Lambert, New Strings).

So often it is that fear of the unknown that keeps us from speaking up and getting out and making our lives adventures, inside and out. More than I fear the unknown, I fear becoming a bench warmer in my own life, talking and talking about dreams and the way the world needs to change, but never getting off my couch or away from my computer long enough to do so. And even though in the beginning the jump makes me feel a bit more like I'm falling than growing wings, I, in a random moment, realize how much I have accomplished, how much I have changed and grown…and all the pent up anger and tears and frustration seem to lessen a bit.

So it hasn’t been a cake walk, and maybe if you had asked me in my first week here if all this was worth it,  to do something crazy because if you don’t you risk bench warming your whole life I would have said no, it hurts too much and I am tired of feeling so alone. But there was a moment, last week, when I realized all that I have felt in my last month here: love, a lack thereof, pain, loneliness, discovery, fear; everything was all a part of a great thing called Life and to be human is to have the good with the bad, the joy with the tears and I can honestly say that I would not trade the last month for one at home. This is what living is.

Now I feel almost like saying I am settled in wouldn't be a lie. The house feels more and more like a home every day, the family I live with closer and closer to my heart. Still so far to go, but look! How far I have come!

So, I hope I have stuck enough to my promise to keep you from being irritated with me. If not, remember, this too shall pass…

Have a great week,

Kika