Throughout our study tour in Spain, I felt at home. From experiencing the amazing paella to taking long siestas in the middle of the day, I began to believe that I was born in the wrong country. Looking back on my experiences now, I realize that two major concepts left a lasting impression on me: Valencian tradition and the value placed on personal relationships. These things were greatly evident through my experiences in the local markets.
The second day of the study tour in Valencia, we visited a local market called Placa Redona or as we would say Plaza Redona. Located in old Valencia, the market seemed contained older and more classical architecture, I think it was romanesque (See location of plaza: www.valencia.es/ayuntamiento/urbanismo) . As we entered the market I was feeling tired and wondered why we were visiting such a simple place instead of an elaborate church or historical structure. As we passed into the inner circle of the plaza, I found nothing but an old woman sweeping and a vendors selling sewing materials. I thought this was odd because this seemed like a prime place for business. In America, I figured it would be given to the most profitable vendors rather than small local sellers. I quickly learned from Dr. Prytherch that this market was actually a major symbol of the preservation of tradition in Valencia. We learned that older, original vendors are kept in the inner circle in order to maintain Valencian economic tradition. The outer circle consists of more touristy shops that tend to be more profitable such as clothing shops and ceramics. As a business major, the fact that a culture could value tradition over more profitable opportunities was amazing. It showed me how different Valencia is from our profit driven economy. (For more information on Placa Redona visit: www.valenciavalencia.com/sight-guide/sight-listing/plaza-redona)
In addition to tradition, the personal relationships I experienced within the fresh fruit and meat market showed me a different side of Valencian culture. When I first arrived in the market, I noticed how fresh everything seemed to be. The colorful fruits brightened the area and the fresh fish smell wafted throughout the market. From our readings, I knew these were likely the products of Valencia’s Mediterranean landscape. Feeling my mouth begin to water, I quickly found a cheese vendor that was selling what seemed to be over a hundred different kinds of cheese. Being no cheese connoisseur, I felt as if I was playing a game of eenie meanie minie mo. I finally decided on a yellow cheese that seemed to be some type of Gouda. As I made my way to place my order, I found myself behind an elderly woman that looked to be five foot tall and had the curliest brown hair I had ever seen. I waited patiently thinking her order would only take but a minute. However, I was mistaken. She carried on what seemed to be a ten minute long conversation with the vendor. I have no clue what they were talking about seeing how they spoke in Spanish but I could tell they knew each other from their mutual smiles. After she left and I finally received my cheese (which turned out to be delicious), I found it quite odd that a vendor would expel infinite amounts of time on a customer even though he could possibly lose another customer’s business for doing so. I quickly learned from the information we were given after the market that these vendors tend to know most of their customers on a personal level because the customers tend to make daily buys. This made me think back to the cheese line and I realized in addition to the long conversation the cheese vendor had with the woman, that she never even ordered. The vendor knew her order because she must buy from him often. I found this interesting because in the United States we have no such personal relationships with the people we buy food from. In addition, we tend to visit grocery stores maybe once a week at most. This experience really showed how Valencian’s value personal relationships and attach more of a meaning to visiting the market.
These experiences led me back to many of the geographical concepts we had previously learned in class. The first experience emphasized a more economic way of preserving culture. From previous readings, we have learned how Catalans have differentiated themselves and kept their traditional ways by maintaining Catalan language, history, and cuisine. It seemed to me that Valencia was doing something similar but doing so more economically. They preserved a sense of tradition by keeping traditional vendors at the forefront of Plaza Redona. Likewise, my second experience took me back to the reading about how food defines a person. The fact that people visit the market almost on a daily basis shows that they value freshly prepared food and the overall market experience. The types of fresh fish and fruit available at the market also gave way to what we had previously learned about the landscape of Valencia and the influential Mediterranean port. Overall, I really enjoyed Valencia and found their traditional and personal values admirable.
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