Día das Letras Galegas

On Wednesday we celebrated Día das Letras Galegas, or the Day of Galician Letters/Literature (the day itself was Thursday, but we got school off). As you can tell if you've followed this blog, Galician language and literature is one of the major sources of national identity here. Galician Literature Day is a yearly public holiday, and every year it's devoted to one (dead) Galician writer. This year's honoree was Valentín Paz Andrade. Below you can see a sort of puzzle-mural. I drew a large portrait of Mr Paz Andrade, which we then cut up into rectangles, each with a Galician word on it. On another piece of paper, we drew a grid, each rectangle of which had a matching Galician word. The kids painted their rectangles in warm or cool colors according to a simple paint-by-numbers type scheme, and then had to find the proper spot for their piece and glue it down.

Here you can see some decorations for the holiday.

néboa = niebla = fog

choiva = lluvia = rain

xoia = joya = jewel

garfo = tenedor = fork

ovella = oveja = sheep

froita = fruta = fruit

orballar = lloviznar = to drizzle

amizade = amistad = friendship

nai = madre = mother

agasallo = agasajo = kindness

xoañina = mariquita = ladybug

agarimo = cariño = care

ledicia = alegría = happiness

bolboreta = mariposa = butterfly

ruxido = crujido = crunch

colar = collar = necklace

bicar = besar = to kiss

abelá = avellana = hazelnut

reloxo = reloj = clock

lúa = luna = moon

Outside we went around from tree to tree and labeled them with wood signs bearing their names in Galician. And as you can see there was a Galician band (bagpipe, drum, tambourine).

Correlingua

Last Monday we went to Correlingua, a sort of pro-Galician-language festival. Kids from all different schools in the area came to the center of Moaña, about 1,500 in all. All the kids wore shirts decorated with a Galician word. First there was a fiery pro-Galician speech that kind of surprised me but was apparently not of any interest to all the kids who were eating bocatas and yogurt and so on. ("What language do you speak at school? What language do you speak at home? What language do you speak with your friends?" he bellowed. "Galego," the kids answered dutifully, with 90% dishonesty.) Then a band played some Galician music and we all danced (we've been practicing the dances in gym class). 

Día de Fátima

Yesterday was the day of Our Lady of Fátima. I didn't actually know this beforehand, but as we were returning from the beach my friend told me so. She lives farther down my street, right next to the Church of Fátima, so she knew there was a little festival there on the feast day. (It's probably the closest church to my house but not the one I go to, which is Santiago o Maior.) Later on I was sitting in my living room and heard something going on below so I snapped some pictures out of my window. It was a procession heading towards the Church. Above you can see a giganto-rosary. Below an image of the virgin and various clerics including "nuestro obispo Luís."

Praia de Barra

Today we went to a beach called Barra, which is on the Morrazo peninsula past Cangas. It was really nice. The landscapes were incredible: you had the light green of trees, the evergreen color of the mountains, the bright turquoise sea, the blue of the sky. There were sailboats sitting just off the shore. Beyond the ría you could see Vigo and the hazy coastline stretching down to Nigrán, Baiona, and eventually Portugal, and to the right you could see the Islas Cíes and the still shapes of a few big cargo ships. Use your imagination though, because I couldn't take photos: it was a nude beach!

More views from my window

Galician seafood

Since Galicia is a coastal region, seafood forms an important part of the diet. When I came here I had no experience cooking seafood, and was quite intimidated by the idea. When I visited a supermarket fish section or a market, I just saw full fish lying on ice, and had no idea how to go from that starting point to a finished dish. When I first bought fish I realized it was easier than I thought, because the fishmonger guts and cleans the fish for you, cuts off the fins, scrapes off the scales, etc. So I've done some learning. One odd aspect is that I don't know a lot about fish even in my first language. So I'll look things up in the dictionary and then still have no idea what they are. And there are still things I don't understand that well. For example, I know that the difference between "blue" fish and "white" fish is that blue comes from the ocean while white comes from inland water, but I don't really know the relevance of this for the kind of flesh you get from the fish.

Here are some things I have made at home:

Jurelo = apparently a kind of Mackerel, although there are different related types (jurel, jurelo, etc). You can do this in a pan or in the oven. I made it in the oven with potatoes and onions and seasoned with lemon, olive oil, garlic.

Sargo = bream. I bought this from my local fish shop and the shoptender told me that the fish was from the ría de Vigo. I made it in a similar way to the Jurelo.

Acedía = dab. This is a small flat fish that you make in the pan with just a little olive oil.

I made some other kind of fried fish but I can't recall the details.

I also have made squid in several different ways. I made "calamares a la plancha," sautéed quickly in a hot pan, with sun dried tomatoes and garlic. I made "calamares a la romana" which are breaded in an orly sauce and fried. I also made a nice dish of squid and artichoke which you can see in the photo above (it's a Ligurian recipe via Mark Bittman).

I've also eaten lots of other kinds of seafood, including:

Merluza = hake. This is one of the most common fishes that you can find in restaurants.

Chipirones = small squid. Often fried or grilled with onions.

The squid-and-rice dish that is black with ink

Bacalao = cod. Also very common. It's made in different ways, often boiled.

Carioca = I don't know what this is called in English. I had it fried and it was incredibly good.

Pulpo = Octopus! A Galician classic. Often boiled and served with paprika.

Mejillones = Mussels. Very common. You can eat them by themselves or in pasta or other dishes.

Ostras = Oysters. I ate raw oysters last fall and got really, really sick.

Gambas = We can't forget shrimp, which is one of the favorite foods of any Spaniard worth his salt.

Cigala = scampi

May Day

More Labor marches for May Day. You can see lots of labor union paraphernalia. Marchers also carried Republican flags and Galician nationalist flags.

A friend and I were walking towards the old town of Vigo and in Puerta del Sol we ran across some sort of Communist rally. For me it was very strange. They had Soviet flags, people were doing the Communist salute (with the elbow making a right angle and your fist closed), and everyone was singing some anthem (which could of course have been the Internationale, but to be honest I don't know the tune).

According to the next day's newspaper, there were 20,000 marchers.