Gobble Gobble

¡Feliz día de acción de gracias!

Last week I got to spend time with the youngest classes to share my personal expertise on the American holiday of Thanksgiving. This was interesting because, as an American, no meal gets me more excited than cranberry sauce on top of turkey on top of stuffing on top of mashed potatoes with some pie on the side, but my students had mixed reactions to the photos that I showed them of traditional Thanksgiving foods. After a week of stressing the importance of turkey, football, and black Friday, they must all think I’m nuts! It's worth it, though, because I used the “repeat after me” method to teach them that the sound a turkey makes is “gobble gobblet”—thereby secretly initiating them in McCarthiest ritual! Plus, there’s nothing cuter than a hand-turkey on Thanksgiving.

This year I had a real Galician Thanksgiving. Téresa and Fran invited me to their house and we may have eaten the biggest Thanksgiving of my life! It’s hard to compare apples to oranges, or in this case massive quantities of stuffing to the deaths of fifty or so langostinos for which I am personally responsible, but the meal was definitely sizeable. And it was most definitely a Galician Thanksgiving, as the different courses included langostinos, vieras, pato, sweet potato casserole, and yogur con azafrán. Guess which course I contributed! To put the cultural distinction in perspective, I will also mention that I went to seven different markets to find the sweet potatoes! Our meal lasted from about eight o’clock in the evening until one in the morning and featured American music from the eighties, soft lighting for atmosphere, and bubbly Champaign to set the mood!

Because of the aforementioned mood lighting the photos aren’t especially clear—but here is a course-by-course play-by-play of this year’s delicious Galician Thanksgiving!

la mesa

los (pobrecitos!) langostinos

las vieras

sweet potato casserole

el pato con patatas y grosellas

yogur con azafrán

San Martiño

Los gallegos son muy panaderos, y muy de tomar!

I’m not sure that my Spanish is correct here—but the Galicians I have met while living in Cangas are always telling me this: That people here love bread and they love to drink! Especially wine. Writing a will is completely out of the question here, so land tends to be divided into increasingly smaller and unusual portions, but regardless of size and placement most people with a finca have grape vines and they make their own wine at home. San Martiño was my first festival and I loved it! In Spain the holidays tend to be associated with two things: a Catholic saint and a lot of good food! San Martiño is celebrated in the neighboring town of Moaña where there is a lovely Roman chapel. There is of course a mass, but most people come for the fantastic furanchos. Around the church people open their homes to the public to sell their extra homemade wine with tapas. This alone is an excellent notion, but drinking the wine from a bowl definitely made the event special!

An Ode to the Chestnut

many chestnuts were consumed in the making of this post

A Galician abuela might tell you that any meal is incomplete without potatoes—regardless of the meal. Galician gastronomy includes an impressive variety of seafood and shellfish (more on that later), typically accompanied by—you guessed it—the potato! But before the potato there was corn. And before the corn there was the chestnut!

A Fraga is a common Galician forest with a prevalent population of indigenous aliso, roble, and castaño, (alder, oak, and chestnut), trees. This presence made chestnuts and acorns a convenient source of nutrition for early settlers, and, to my good fortune, the chestnut harvest is still celebrated enthusiastically. During Magosto people enjoy castañas asadas, classic roasted chestnuts, accompanied of course by good music and homemade wine! When my evening class ended we all followed the sound of the gaita and the panderetta, Galician bagpipes and tambourine, downstairs, and by the time I reached the last step most of my students had already joined the circle of merry singers and dancers. Not having tried roasted chestnuts for a number of years I was happy to discover that they are delicious!

Vila Nova

Now that I have gotten to know Spain a little better, I was excited by the opportunity to conquer a bit more of the Iberian peninsula with a trip to Portugal. Téresa, Fran, and Paula invited me to join them on a visit to the border town of Villa Nova where there is a popular market on weekends. I sat in the backseat of the car with my passport at the ready in my purse, but when we casually flew by the frontera I started to flash back to clandestine ventures into Brasil and Paraguay! Apparently border control is quite relaxed here, and even if you bother to stop at the aduana, the customs office, it's likely that you'll be the only one there.

Vila Nova is perched on the río miño that divides Spain and Portugal, where twin forts reminisce the days when the border still required patrolling. Today, the forts have been replaced by a single boat that appears to employ fewer staff than the customs office. The town itself is charming. There is a path along the river and there are many sculptures created by the local art school--including a deer motif because the municipality is called Cerveira. At the market I joined some señoras in a fight for discounted brand-name clothing. Any town with a market is for me!

Not far from Vila Nova, the town of Villazón is woven into a fortress that was once strategically and is now scenically situated on a hill overlooking the river. Between the architecture and the view, this town is a local favorite. We strolled the fort walls, browsed the shops, and partook in the savory Portuguese café before heading back to Spain.

a gaviota surveys his empire

Spooky Samain

When asked to tell my students a little about Halloween in America, I realized that I actually had no idea what the history entailed! (I've found that this is actually not such an infrequent occurrence when students ask me questions about American culture!) It turns out that the origins of this spooky holiday are rooted in Celtic tradition--a heritage common to both Galicia and the United States. In Celtic times, Samain was principally a harvest festival noting the end of long summer days and the beginning of short winter days. The literature at school also mentioned bonfires and masks and the dead. Later, in the heyday of the Catholic world, Samain was replaced by All Saints Day, which was precluded by All Hallow's Eve. Its is from linguistic deletion of All Hallow's Eve that we get the modern English title. Although Halloween is a much-embraced commercial holiday in America, it is relatively unknown in Spain as a whole. However, in a soul-searching trend to to distinguish its unique origins, Galicia is staging a Samain comeback. While you won't see any aisles of the supermarkets filled with discount candy or tiny heathens roaming the streets, I think that my Instituto did a great job decorating!

Catholic tradition also proved prevalent in Galicia when I stumbled upon a peaceful cemetery full of mourners, candles, and flowers.

Santiago de Compostela

I have to do the camino de Santiago! Who’s with me?

In Galicia, Santiago is a sort of college-town. Most students from within the autonomous community come here to study, and the campus is very large and full of history. The most widely known feature of the city, though, is of course the catedral. Thought to be the place where Saint James was laid to rest, the cathedral of Santiago is the pinnacle of a 780km spiritual journey and peregrinos from all over the world have been flocking here to pay homage since medieval times. The traditional Catholic misa de los peregrinos has been conserved, but the ever-increasing number of pilgrims means they must now find their own accommodations instead of lodging in the church or neighboring abbey. Although this eliminates some of the old-world odor issues, the botafumero is still used at the mass as a show of skill (and as a bit of a tourist attraction). The metalic vessel for incense is quite heavy, and the act of manually initiating and halting its pendular motion is a task for a master. Even though I haven’t done the pilgrimage (yet!), I watched with awe as they swung the botafumero and then got in line with other visitors to abrazar, or hug, Saint James for luck.

el catedral de santiago

the botafumero hanging in the cathedral

Other novelties in the city include las dos Marías, who are famously--if not a bit notoriously--celebrated for daring to be flashy and flirty, not to mention unmarried, at a time when such actions were generally upbraided. Every day on the dot the sisters dressed up to walk the Alameda, and they continue to coquetear with passersby in effigy!

las dos en punto

There's also Ramón María del Valle-Inclán, a Galician author who was ahead of his day in spectacle fashion!

Ramón María del Valle-Inclán

In addition to its historical flavor, I fell in love with Santiago's winding streets and pleasant shops in the barrio viejo. For lunch my friends Téresa and Fran and Paula treated me to variety of Galician seafood--including the savory bocavante, a kind of blue lobster. This was perhaps the second time I have tried lobster in my life, and it proved challenging as well as satisfying! There may have been an incident of bocavante volante. That’s flying lobster—an unnatural act regardless of the language barrier.

I highly recommend Santiago for pilgrims and pedestrians alike!

cazuela de bogavante

Téresa and Fran with delicious chocolate drinks!

Piso! Piso!

I've settled into my piso and I'm very happy. It's right across the street from the Instituto I teach at, so no commute! Also the dueña, or landlady, is very nice. She's always dropping by with delicious foods! Not having to commute to work and having easy access to the school at any time is a dream come true. Here's a visual.

la sala, the living room

la cocina, the kitchen

la primera habitación, the bedroom

la segunda habitación, the second bedroom

This is your room if you come visit!

Cangas do Morazzo

In spite of an awkward time recovering from my jet lag I found some time to embrace what’s left of the nice weather and explore Cangas. Here is a visual.

A few people have commented that the architecture here in Galicia is a bit of an eyesore because a recent construction boom left newer buildings halfway finished and older edificios in a state of disregard. Sometimes the contrast is interesting.

In its heyday Galicia thrived off of the fishing and shipbuilding industries, but like many jobs the those industries are now more favorable in China. According to Wikipedia, Vigo is the second largest port outside of Tokyo. What an unbelievable statistic! I’m hoping to go to one of the feixeiros some morning to see the fresh catches of the day being auctioned off. Maybe I can try my hand at cooking fish!

In Cangas a few specters remain to remind Galicia of its past. In Cangas there are two abandoned factories--one is an abandoned canning factory and the other is a whaling factory. When I asked some teachers about the factories I was surprised that they only just closed within the last thirty years. This isn't to say that the fishing industry has completely died here, though. Galicia is still famous for its (delicious!) shellfish, and has an important role in the global fishing market and conservation efforts. Pesca nova, for example, stays on the cutting edge of shipping technologies and is one of the only companies with rights to fish in certain parts of Africa. For me, all this means a fabulous new gastronomy!

Beginnings!

I decided to move to Spain for a year!

As much as I am unable to resist the opportunity to see new places, it’s always difficult to say goodbye the old places. I love and miss all of my family and friends in Columbus and Honolulu. Thankfully, I’m also completely crazy about Galicia! I now live in the small town of Cangas do Morazzo, just north of Vigo. Cangas is a beautiful town, and I endeavor to understand it a little better every day. When I first arrived some of the administrators from the Instituto I work at picked me up from the airport in Vigo and drove me to my hotel near the school. While I was checking in it seemed that perhaps the concierge and the professors knew each other, so I asked if they did--to which they responded with a funny smile and said “of course!” I've come to realize that Cangas is a small enough town that most people know each other, or at least know of each other. That, and that the favorite pastime here is paseando, or walking. Workdays are short and when stores are closed the main entertainment is to tomar algo at a bar or restaurant or to walk around town. I won't complain about that!

The program that allows me to have this experience is called auxiliares de conversación, which you can read about here. Like me, there are other Americans and Canadians scattered about Spain teaching at public institutions as part of a cultural exchange and continuing education.

Here are some first takes of my new home...

playa rodeiramar

coles de bruselas

el camino de la playa