My heart has been hurting a bit lately

I have been feeling a bit more of a part of cultural shock lately – the feeling of not belonging. 

I went on my 3^rd date with Josep this past weekend.  We ate at this cool restaurant called Juicy Jones.  Actually when we met that night to walk to the place, Josep told me that he had seen Quincy Jones that day.  I was like wow, tell me more about what happened and why he was at your work (Josep works at the Liceu Theater

famous for its classical music concerts, so the idea of Quincy Jones being there didn’t seem so far fetched).  Josep just looked at me kinda strangely.  To make a long story short he actually had told me that he had walked by Juicy Jones the restaurant that day to check it out.  He didn’t even know who Quincy Jones was.  Then on American idol this past week, Quincy Jones was on that show!  Very funny.

I really like that restaurant (I actually went back the next day when I had lunch with my friend Sue).  We (Josep and I) had great food and conversation.  The service there though was not very good at all, even by Spanish standards.

After dinner Josep needed to stop by at another restaurant to say hi to some of his friends.  So I said that I would go with him to the restaurant because he needed to stop by to say a quick hello and then we would leave.  We went to the place and I came in with him even though I knew that everybody was going to be speaking Catalan.  As he said hello to his friends (and congratulating two of them because they were getting married) everyone was talking in Catalan.  My heart hurt just a little bit, as I wasn’t able to participate in a basic conversation or greeting really.  I just stood there and smiled as people were waving to me and I was being introduced.  I was also a bit sad because if I continue to be friends with Josep, there is this big part of his life that I will not be able to fully participate in (i.e. meeting his friends who all are Catalan and don’t speak English).  I guess I’m learning Catalan all the time (he taught me some new things just that night).  I also can go and take Catalan classes at some point.

After that, I asked Josep if he wanted to go meet up with 2 of my other Spanish friends, Ana and Jesus.  They were going out to this gay bar called the Cangrejo (the crab), which is actually really close to where my apartment is.  He said sure.  So we met up with them at the Cangrejo.  It was not the best décor there, gold everywhere, weird red walls, crabs on the walls, and this horrible art mural made out of pearls and pearl necklaces.  The coat-check system was interesting to note.  Your whole group puts their coats into this sack that looks like the one that Santa uses.  Each sack is a different color, thus they gave us a tag that said our color on it.  Very funny. 

Inside we had a good time, they even played songs like “wake me up before you go go” and people were dancing like it was just the most normal song to be dancing to in a regular club in the year 2007.  All in all it was fun.  But every other song there would be a song in Spanish.  Everybody in the bar knew what song it was and the lyrics to it, except for me.  So my heart hurt just a little bit as everybody was enjoying the song while I just listened, as the foreigner.  Also it just so happened that I was hanging out with all Spanish people that night and it seemed as if everyone in the bar was Spanish as well.  I felt a little bit like the odd-man-out. 

~ by ronrosenow on February 27, 2007.