Culture

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9/17/19

Cádiz

By: Molly Amber

“Never stop wondering, never stop wandering.”

And in the words of my good friend Eric Travis, wander purposefully.

For as long as I can remember, I have been an avid fan of travel and exploration. Whether it’s simply around my own city, or across the globe to the rural streets of China, you’d be surprised at how much you can learn and discover just by getting out of your comfort zone and embarking on a new path. In Wander Purposefully, specifically in the section on Experiential Learning, Eric points out that every time you exit your comfort zone, you become something else; that leaving this safe space builds character. He explains how trying new things and exploring new territory helps us to become more well-rounded, interesting human beings. “I put more tools in my toolbox, so to speak.” I could not agree more with this thought, and I credit Experiential Learning for greatly assisting me in becoming who I am today.

Despite having gone through seven years of higher education, I have always learned the most outside of the classroom. It’s when I am embracing the unfamiliar and at times feeling very uncomfortable, that I am really growing as a person.

I took three years of Spanish in high school, and three years of it in college. While my grades in the courses were always good, I didn’t truly feel like I was learning the language. Conversing in classes was still a big struggle for me, and I knew I needed to be further immersed in order to actually become fluent. When the opportunity presented itself for me to study Spanish language, literature, and other related courses for a semester in Cádiz, Spain, I knew that I couldn’t say no. What I didn’t know yet was just how much I was about to learn through this experience, beyond just learning how to speak the language.

Cádiz is a small beach town that is situated in Andalucía, the southern-most region of Spain. It is located right on the Atlantic Ocean, and is known to be the oldest town in Western Europe that is continuously inhabited. I had been to Spain once before, with my parents, when I was fifteen. We visited Barcelona on a Mediterranean cruise. Now I am not knocking cruises at all – if you like them, all the more power to you. But over time I realized that that is not the way I prefer to travel. I want to delve into a culture; to fully live it.

Much like Eric felt went he decided to embark on his PCT journey, I was excited, but also terrified, to live abroad for the first time. It would be different and uncomfortable for me, but I knew that only growth could come from it.

Throughout the course of those five months in Cádiz, I lived with a Spanish host family. They did not speak a lick of English, mind you. I ate every meal with them, conversing with them constantly, often stumbling over my words, but nonetheless learning about their family, the town I was living in, the rich culture and the long-lived traditions. I learned more random tidbits about Spain and its history from my host family than I could have ever learned from a textbook. I learned about the history and the controversy surrounding bullfighting, and the true reasons behind the siesta. I absorbed the stories about the significant Moorish influence in Andalucía and how it still shines today in the region’s food and architecture. I discovered that Flamenco is not just a dance, but a tale of history; about the battles that were fought in the very town I was living in, about their eventual independence. I learned all of this and more through the perspective of those whose ancestors had really lived through it.

I learned a lot from my classes there as well. But while I loved all of the people in my program, we were all American students studying at the University of Washington. I knew that while I was living in another country, I had to take advantage and get to know the other foreign students that were studying in the town that was quite known as an “Erasmus” destination (the Erasmus program is the European equivalent of our study abroad programs here in the United States). Before I knew it, just by pushing myself out of my comfort zone (going to more local bar events, festivals, and intercambios than any of my fellow UW students), I had made friends from Spain, France, Italy, Germany, Portugal, Austria, Norway, Denmark, Romania, Morocco, China, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Argentina, and Brazil. Similar to my host family, these friends taught me more than I could have ever learned in a classroom. By embracing people that were incredibly different from me, some being from the other side of the world, I began to understand politics, religion, and history through a new lens -- something that could have never happened had I chosen to stay in Seattle and continue to study Spanish at UW.

As Eric discusses in the chapter “Bursting the Bubble,” one of my favorite chapters of his book, “Travel is no longer esoteric. People do it all of the time. [And] because of this, it’s never been more advantageous to attune yourself to others.” But he also mentions something that is crucial. That how often you travel is not as important as how you travel. I absolutely loved the Europe trip that I took with my parents back in 2007. I learned a lot, no doubt. But I can’t help but compare it to my experiences of actually living abroad and immersing myself in a community. I was living with a Spanish family, in a Spanish apartment, eating Spanish food, speaking the Spanish language, living the Spanish way. I was absorbing every bit of the experience as possible, and tying in to one of the central themes of Eric’s book, I believe that I am a wiser, more well-rounded, better person for it. I have put more tools into my toolbox.

This study abroad experience for me was life changing. I came back to Seattle that summer a changed person, and all of my friends and family could see it. I didn’t stick to the typical American study abroad stereotype. Instead, I pushed myself out of my safe space and I discovered a whole new world. I even ended up back in Spain for another year, further immersing myself in the rich Andalucían culture and surrounding myself with people whose upbringing and views were vastly different from mine. They made me question my political beliefs, my faith, my country’s healthcare system, and even the way that I approach my work and my every day life.

I love my parents more than I can say, and I know that I had a wonderful childhood. I was provided with all of the love and the tools that I needed to succeed, and then some. My dad, coming to the United States from India when he was twenty years old, worked his way from the ground up in order to provide his children with the privileges and education that he never had as a young boy. Because of this, he has always prioritized hard work, good grades, and school before anything. Naturally, this made me very academically competitive, always focusing on how hard I could study and how close to a 100 I could get on an assignment or exam. My dad has always told me to work hard now, so that I can enjoy the fruits of my labor later in life. While I will not argue with this mentality, and in fact respect it very much, I know now from my travels and interactions with others that there are a multitude of ways to live happily and succeed.

I have learned how to work hard, but to also slow down and just relax. I have learned to truly enjoy the people that I am with and the moments that I spend with them. Thanks to my time abroad, lunches turned from eating hurriedly at a desk, to a two hour “sobremesa,” which refers to time spent after a meal, hanging out with family or friends, chatting and enjoying each other’s company. Quite simply, I learned that there is so much more to life than seeing how many hours of work you can crunch out in one day. I learned that we should be working to live, not living to work.

I could not have learned any of this in a textbook. I took all of this in by engrossing myself in this culture that was so incredibly different than the one I grew up in. Experiential Learning has helped me to embrace the unknown, and to try things that I never thought were possible. I hope that I never stop learning, and that I never stop pushing myself out of my comfort zone. Because that’s where all of the magic happens.

If you liked this post, find more at Molly’s website .