Spanish Culture Shocks

This will be a much happier and shorter post than the last. I realized the last one was much longer and more emotional than I anticipated. Pretty sure readers didn’t finish it or it was too emotionally intense. I get that. Anyway, on to the culture shocks I’ve experienced so far while in Spain.

The bad. Let’s get these out of the way.

1. There is dog poop all over. A lot of Spanish people, mostly men, do not pick up after their dogs. When at the dog park I’ve observed mostly men who will watch their dogs take a poop, then walk away without picking it up. It’s really bad on the side walks. Honestly I don’t know if there’s a law against “poopetrators” or not, but with the amount of poop I see…I’m guessing no.
2. Dak likes to pee on EVERYTHING. When we lived in the states, Dak only peed on the grass, bushes, limbs, trees, fire hydrants, etc. You know, the usual pee spots. But now that we live in the city and because dog owners here don’t take the best care of where their dogs use the bathroom, the smell of urine is on literally everything. He pees on the buildings, the car tires, the motorcycles, random things outside of shops, and once on a handicap man. I was so embarrassed. I hear this man start yelling in Spanish and I turn around and see Dak’s leg hiked up peeing on this poor man’s leg. I apologized profusely and ran away. Damn dog.
3. The trash pickup comes at 1am. I found this out the hard way as my bedroom faces the street. When the weather’s nice, I leave my patio door open so I hear the truck when it comes rolling in to pick up in the wee early morning hours. Unlike in an American city where you take your garbage to the building’s garbage shoot or out to the street in garbage cans if you live outside the city, in Spain you take your trash out to the street. There are like 4 different bins, all labeled according to what you are disposing of (glass, cardboard/paper, plastic, and rubbish). Which I guess is a good thing, sorting the garbage so it gets recycled. Though every time the glass bin gets picked up, I hear it. Meh.
4. Spanish bureaucracy is awful. It takes literally forever and a day to get anything you need. You must have an appointment to receive documentation or cards for one thing or another. And even if you have what you need, they love to tell you no. And will repeat it over and over again even after you tell them you understand. I call this Spainsplaining. There was one appointment that had been scheduled for myself and other auxiliaries in the program to submit our paperwork for our foreign ID cards. When we showed them the emails with our appointment confirmations that had been made for us by the local offices, the security guards told us to leave because it wasn’t in the proper format. One brave soul snuck past the security team and went to another desk where they had the list of all the appointments with our names on it. So thanks to her, we were able to get in. These types of interactions can be anxiety inducing for me. I read about the paperwork headaches before I moved here and tried to prepare myself as much as possible, but when in the moment, it just sucks.
5. Spanish men will take a piss anywhere. I’ve seen so many men peeing by the garbage bins, trees in the parks, sometimes just on the grass. Even when there are kids nearby. It’s disgusting to me. I’m tempted to just point and laugh next time I see this happening in hopes of shaming them for doing so. Maybe.
6. No stop signs in the intersections…people just roll right on through.
7. No clothes dryers. Well most places do not have dryers, and if you do, it’s a luxury. I’m assuming because electricity here is so expensive. So I’ve become used to drying my clothes on a drying rack.
8. Not everyone speaks English. My ignorant American self assumed that because I moved to the capital city, there would be a lot of English speakers, I couldn’t be more wrong. And what’s interesting, most people at the foreign services offices do not speak English either. Like the people dealing with foreigners do not speak any English whatsoever. This has been the push I needed to really learn as much Spanish as possible and get over the anxiety of getting it wrong and just try. It’s going as well as can be expected.
9. Everything is different in terms of measurements. I’m constantly converting from pounds to kilograms, miles to meters, Fahrenheit to Celsius, dates are swapped, learning to use military time, and gas or petrol as it’s called here is sold in liters and not gallons.
10. The windows do not have screens to keep bugs, rodents, and birds out. It’s just open. So you have to buy a screen to keep from getting mosquito bites if you’re tasty to them. I’m surprised a pigeon or something hasn’t flown through my window at some point. *knocks on wood*
11. The lights in the stairways and entries in apartment buildings do not stay on. Many times I have walked into my building and the lights are off. Sometimes I’ve walked in and the lights are on, then midway up the stairs the lights go off and it’s pitch black. Would be nice to have light sensors in the buildings.

The meh. Not good. Not bad. Just observations.

1. There are barbershops on almost every block. Sometimes two. I counted four on one block close to my house. They are everywhere and are open on Sundays and open late as well. Someone told me it’s because the men like to get their haircut before they go out to the clubs. I am so tickled by how many there are here.
2. Everyone wears white sneakers. I’m not sure if this is because I’m not up to date on the latest fashion trend, but most everyone has on white sneakers.
3. The door handles to the entrance to your flat are in the middle of the door and are nonfunctional. To open the door to your flat, the door must be opened with the key to the deadbolt. Sucks if you get locked out. Gone are the days of using a credit card to open the door if you do get locked out.
4. Nudity is in advertisements and clothing is much more risqué. I’ve seen naked bums and boobs in advertisements as well as on the beaches.
5. Children stay out late. Because people eat dinner at like 9,10, or even 11 pm, the kids are out late too.
6. Drinking alcohol during the day, any day, is normal. I’ve walked around and seen people having a beer at 10 in the morning on a Tuesday. My first thought was “don’t y’all have jobs?”. Europeans do not drink to get drunk, so I’ve been told. They drink to enjoy themselves.

The good.

1. No cat calling. I haven’t been catcalled once since I moved here. This may be for three reasons. First, I’m an overweight amazon and not considered attractive by European standards. This doesn’t bother me in the slightest if this is true as I love my body just as it is. Second, when I’m walking I always have my earbuds in so I can’t hear anything. Lastly, catcalling isn’t a thing here.
2. Relaxed dress code. I can walk around without a bra and nobody bats an eye. I am in heaven. People are not shamed for showing more skin. The children dress like the adults, even in my school. There are so many things I’ve seen the girls wear that would have gotten them taken out of school if they wore that in a public school where I went. This is because children aren’t sexualized and made to feel ashamed of their bodies. I remember when I was in sixth grade, my reading teacher took me out of school and told me I needed to start wearing a bra. Numerous times I was also reprimanded for my shorts being 4'’ above my knees and my tank top straps were too narrow. Heaven forbid you show some skin. I’ll never forget the embarrassment and the shame. This is only problematic for the adults; the kids are just kids and don’t see it that way. It also takes the responsibility away from the parents to teach their sons to respect women and their bodies. Moving on…
3. Dogs are allowed in stores. With the exception of grocery stores and pharmacies.
4. Speaking of pharmacies, a lot of medications do not need a prescription. I was able to bring my Zoloft bottle to a pharmacy and they gave me more. It doesn’t work in every pharmacy though. Also, they don’t use pill bottles, they use tabs which you pop the pills out of instead. Which I think is smart as it cuts down on plastic bottles. And just like barbershops, there’s a pharmacy on every corner.
5. Just like Washington DC, Palma is a melting pot. People from all over the world move here.
6. Taxes are included in the price of the item.
7. Tipping isn’t necessary as people are paid a livable wage.
8. There is one gun shop in the area and they do not sell assault rifles, only hunting rifles. Also it’s very hard to get a gun here. Which brings me to my next point…
9. Fireworks are always fireworks. The first time I heard fireworks here I thought it was gunfire. The person I was with saw I was shaken up because I was used to hearing gunfire. I told them why, they said, no, that’s fireworks. You won’t hear gunshots here. Ever.
10. I feel safe walking around by myself. Spain is a very safe country in general, especially for women.
11. The food tastes so much better here. I don’t feel awful after eating something like I did when I lived in America. And the coffee here is absolutely incredible. When I started researching Spain, I discovered they do not have flavored coffee creamers here like they do in America. And the reason for that is because you don’t need it, the coffee tastes so damn good. I thought I would miss flavored coffee creamers, but I don’t at all.

I’m sure I will discover more the longer I live here, but so far this is what I have learned. Until next time…