January 29, 2014

hella basque

Now another fun fact of where my family is from is called the Basque Country.
What is the Basque Country you ask?
Read this blog that a local Basque friend started a couple of months ago, explaining Basque heritage and all things Basque (Hi Anne Marie!!!! ) and then come back to this blog.
hellabasque.com
(Sidenote: the article about having a Basque name is my life in a nutshell. Also those peasant outfits still remain in my closet to this day. And yes, I did wear those (wool) outfits when I was young....in 90 degree weather in Petaluma).

Read it all?
Good
No?
Go back and read it because you might get lost.
So anyway, Basque Country is located in northern Spain and southern France. So there are French Basque and Spanish Basque. The Basque blog was written by a French Basque and this blog is written by a Spanish Basque, so you get the best of both worlds.
The Basque Country has their own language, Basque which is equivalent to the language of Latin, in that not a lot of people speak it and it is a very old language.
I myself only know like three Basque words
Euskadi (Basque)
Zorionak (Happy Birthday)
Estibaliz (what?!? that's my name- Field of honey, honey & sweet)
So growing up Spanish Basque it was important to be aware of how important it was to be Basque as it is a heritage that not many people know. I remember driving to the Basque Community Center in South San Francisco every Saturday to go Basque dancing for 3 hours for months until June hit and the big festival occurred and that's when I would wear the wool outfits in the 90 degree heat and couldn't take it off until the whole festival was over and then a break and then back again in the fall to dance again.
This went on for about 3-4 years until we moved to East Bay, but even to this day I still know the dances. They are forever engraved in my brain.
Growing up though, when people would ask me what ethnicity I was: I would say Spanish Basque, thinking that they knew. They didn't. They would look at me and ask "What is Basque?"
Or my favorite
"Bass?? Like the instrument?"
::Facepalm::
Basque is not an instrument just like Mayonnaise is not an instrument.
So when I found out that not many people knew what it was, I stopped saying I was Basque and just said I was Spanish from Spain. If people then asked what part of Spain I was from, I would say the north-specifically Pamplona-where the running of the bulls are. And then if they said "Oh like the Basque Country?" or anything like that and they knew what Basque was, THEN I would say I was Spanish Basque.
It's quite a complicated process to tell people what I am.
It's like my name.
As you see my name is Basque meaning "field of honey/ honey & sweet" (What is a field of honey you ask? I have no idea, my guess is like a field covered in bees. If you know please inform me of what a field of honey is. Thanks)
Growing up with this name, much like informing people of what Basque was, was also a struggle. I can't tell you how many times I have to repeat my name to many many people.
It's like I say:
If I had a dollar for every time someone attempted to pronounce my name, I could afford Kim Kardashians wedding to Kris Humphrey.
I'm like dead serious though.
There are so many different kinds of pronunciation of my name that people of called me, it's ridiculous.
For the 20 years I've had this name, it's been quite an adventure seeing people's reactions and their faces when they see my name. I've gotten to the point now that on the first day of school, I make a game of how many professors can correctly pronounce my name.
Surprisingly, many professors can say my name, like I'm even surprised.
And then there are the ones who skip it and go right to my last name.
Let me just say one thing about that:
I know my name is hard to pronounce. I know it's not a common name you hear everyday. I get it.
 So if you try to pronounce my name and really try, like you ask me everyday to pronounce it so you can get it right, I'll help you. I prefer it if you ask me 100 times, I'm used to it.
If you don't even bother to try or are just rude about it, then that just makes me angry.
Just like when people ask me if my ethnicity is an instrument, I don't like it.
My name is part of who I am just like your name is part of who you are. Even if it's the most common name in the US or in the world. Your name is part of who you are and so is your ethnicity. If I don't know much about your ethnicity, I'll ask, because I'm interested.

Being Basque has taught me a lot about culture and how important it is to know about culture despite if people know it or not. I grew up with Basque parents and Basque cousins and Basque friends and a Basque community. We all struggle with the same issues as written above, we all have Basque sounding names or non-common names. We all congregate in one city for festivals, eat lamb, drink kalimotxos, play mus (Spanish form of poker) until the night and then pack everything and wait until the next festival. It's just something that we do, just like any other family would do.
So as I continue to write posts about my adventures in Spain just keep in mind what Basque is and how important it is for people in Spain.
It's a really interesting instrument.

Also, if you are wondering, when I'm at Starbucks and they ask for my name, I never say my first name, I always say my middle name, Gabriela, it's just easier and saves time. I don't know it's like a reflex or something. Someday I'll say my name, someday, maybe when I get back to the states you will see an Instagrammed picture of a Starbucks latte with my REAL name on it.
Dream big.

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