November 2018

Murcia is still a city short enough that from a distance you can see the cathedral.

It’s an elegant cathedral, built in the 1400s with the later addition of the bell tower, the tallest in Spain, which houses twenty-five bells. The square in front, suggested in the Lonely Planet guide as one of the best places to visit in the region, is useful as an easy to find, obvious, meeting spot.

In our first weeks here, this was the central location where us English teachers used to convene for coffee. We needed to compare notes on our schools and rants about Spanish immigration procedures. It’s the most touristy location in a not particularly touristy at all city. But here, in the cafés on the square, there are menus and the menus are available in English. For me, this is a tad easier to deal with (or at least explain to my parents) than the behind the bar blackboards.

Yes, this weekend my parents are visiting

Which means I’ve been thrown from the role of odd English woman in a group of Spaniards, to the role of ‘the only one who speaks some Spanish’. The pressure is on.

Whilst my Spanish is improving, to understand the meaning of the words on the boards behind the bars you need to order and eat the food. This will take me some time. The more words I learn in Spanish, the more I realise that you can’t use direct translation and maintain the same connotations and meaning. It’s way more complex and nuanced than that.

For now, I’m dealing with basic vocabulary

My ability to ask for an onion might be useful in the market, however isn’t so useful at a tapas bar.

I had to find stereotypical Spanish food that my parents were both happy to eat. One item on the list of starters didn’t involve an anchovy, but I persisted in explaining that anchovies are worth trying here, at least once. I did manage to persuade the Father to try an anchovy, as part of the typical starter called a marinera, despite his lifelong hatred. The Mother’s resolve is intact. She is against them.

Being a tourist is always an interesting experience

I am familiar with some stereotypes of us Brits. The binge-drinking, lobster-skinned party goers who occupy the bars at Alicante’s airport requesting beer as part of their pre-flight breakfast home. The retired folk, who live in clusters along the coast, learning Spanish at a snail’s pace. Content to continue their lives in the glorious sun, but in English. This perhaps the Spanish could all forgive if they could get their heads around the concept of a glass of beer that doesn’t make your hand freeze to hold it, but they can’t.

Then they think we’re weird when it comes to food

The feeling’s mutual. I find the Spanish strange when it comes to food, because of how they all eat the same thing at the same time. Ordering isn’t done based on individual desire, it’s done based on what the table wants. There’s a collective process, but one that I often find I’m not required for. With the exception that someone will remember I’m foreign and double check that I eat shellfish and octopus. Those things the British don’t eat.

I never used to eat octopus. It’s suckers always kind of creeped me out. And I admit, when I’m faced with a shell I am not nimble as I remove it with my fingertips like my Spanish friends. For me it’s an operation demanding my full attention. Otherwise I get fish goo everywhere. I want to say that I’m getting better at this, but that would be lying.

The gastronomic peculiarities of the British returned to conversation at lunch on Friday

In another country, mid-afternoon on a Friday people would be working. Here in Spain, it’s lunch time, and because of a broken swimming pool and some odd hours, my adopted Spanish family gathered for lunch.

It was my willingness to eat rabbit paella that was remarked upon. The Spanish belief is that us Brits don’t eat rabbit. A young Spaniard remarked to me that if you walk down a meat or fish aisle in a supermarket in England, everything is plastic wrapped and filleted. I nodded. Then added that there are people in England who buy meat from a butchers. Plus, in some restaurants, particularly some of the restaurants which are trying to seem a little more posh, people do eat rabbit.

Good work considering our limited language skills

This conversation happened in a mixture of my A1 Spanish combined with the A1 and B1 English of my companions. There was some hand waving and gesturing, but I didn’t have to do my rabbit impersonation. My rabbit impersonation is saved for school as the twelve-year-olds are doing animals in biology.

There was laughter at the idea of rabbit being a posh dish

Here they stick it in stew or paella as a cheap meat, something that is typical to the region. The main industry here is agriculture. The region was one of the last holding out against Franco in the Spanish Civil War, and as such wasn’t high on the list for investment during his long regime. Then there was the financial crisis which hit the whole of Spain but has been particularly hard in the south where property prices crashed. Many of the fruits and vegetables grown here are exported to England, and my acquaintances here include people who work for the British brand Tesco.

Walking through the market this morning however I was a little unnerved by the eyes looking back at me with their dull, dead stares. I think if you’re going to eat meat, it’s best to not waste the parts of the animal lacking visual appeal. And I don’t have a problem cooking any piece of meat I’m given, but I do feel uncomfortable being watched by a row of skin-less, soul-less rabbits. The Mother strode on past, refusing to look at anything, whilst the Father lingered. He wants rabbit, but I’m not sure he knows what exactly to do with one if he had one. I know I’d have to google it.

It wasn’t all dead animals

We went upstairs to the fruit and vegetable section of the Mercado de Veronicas, an architectually proud building. Built between 1912 and 1916, it stands beside some archaeological ruins, the remains of Arab fortifications, across from the river. In the seventies, an additional floor was incorporated into the design to increase the number of market stalls.

Away from the flesh of dead animals, the Mother breathed a sigh of relief. She slowed her pace and after gasping at the size of the cabbages proceeded to buy fruit and vegetables. Including some amazing, fresh dates from the nearby town of Elche.

What I like about the people here is how hospitable they are. This is not a rich area, but the people guide you and show you and try to help you. Their English is, for the most part, no better than my Spanish. Yet I am well looked after. When the greengrocer at the market sold us the dates, after first encouraging us to try them, the expression on her face was, for good reason, pride.

It’s a strange experience showing my parents around this peculiar little city, which is for now at least, my home. It’s rough at the edges, impoverished in places, but it’s growing on me.