On Participation

I know it has been a while since I've posted... sorry about that. To explain... one of my friends who has been to Spain before once told me that because exams here are a joke, she went salsa dancing every night at the end of the semester. I have absolutely no clue what she was talking about. My professors must not have gotten that memo. Oh, sure, they tell us the exams will be easy, "I will give you two essay questions concerning the history of Spain from the beginning of time until the 1500s. You will pick one and write about it for two hours. Muy fácil, muy fácil." If that's what they consider easy I'd hate to see a hard exam...

Last Thursday and Friday we did not have class because there was another holiday here. I think there are actually three long weekends in the month of May, which leaves me convinced that America needs to take lessons from Spain (Córdoba actually has a holiday they celebrate on every Friday of this month). But even though it would have been a good time to travel, I and the others in our group decided to stay here in Sevilla and study for four days straight. I needed to make a dent in my pile of studying with exams coming up, papers to write, and things to do for my internship. And as my señora reminded me, I just got back from Portugal. So study I did, on the roof of my friends house, in a park, at a bar, on my bed...

Basically all I can think about now is my classes, a topic I really haven't written much about. I've really enjoyed two of them, my Literature and City class and my History of the Three Cultures in Medieval Spain class. But I do have a third class, Cultural Anthropology of Andalucia, which has been rather unique...

It all began in the beginning, as most things tend to. For the first 3 weeks of class we had a different professor every class until the real one returned from doing research in Peru. If he was old, I might say they dug him up there, but in reality he's a middle-aged, nervious little man. But on his first day of class, he interrupted his lecture in the middle of a sentence, turned to me and asked if I took this class last year. Yes, because I take classes over and over for the fun of it. He even asked me if I was sure I wasn't in Spain last year.... The plot thickened a few classes later, but you'll need some background. My friend and I have this class right after another one on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and there is also another guy in both classes. But this guy, let's call him Big Oaf, comes in 30-45 minutes late to both classes because he's been smoking and drinking from the smell of it, and then sleeps through class. So when he enters, my friend and I can't help but smirk. Unfortunately, the professor once noticed one of my little smiles and left his powerpoints to launch a nervious tirade against me... why am I smiling, I shouldn't smile, nothing is funny, don't smile, etc. Hey, but I'm one of the few people who doesn't sleep in class and actually writes the papers. But the class managed to go even more downhill. The professor later told me that I need to participate more if I want to pass. Great news. Evidently everyone else who sleeps or skips class half the time participates much more than I do. So as a good student, I tried to ask and answer questions. But unfortunately I must have had a smile on my face during one (I'm not sure why, there are times I just smile. Class isn't always torture, you know) so he ranted on smiling again. Note to self, don't smile in class in Spain. And then today, he asked a question and when the silence in the room got too long (lots of class participation evidently) he turned to me and said "you're quiet, what do you think?" Now, I realize that I don't talk that much. But I do actually participate in class. So we'll see how this all turns out with exams. I'm not distraught about it... I don't think I'm in danger of failing, and I need something to provide drama and good stories after such long days of classes. Ah well, I should probably actually go study for that class... but maybe if I just slept or smoked I would be participating more.