Los gitanos

Yesterday my lit class had members of the Gitano (gypsy) community come speak to us about the origins and nature of their culture. Before coming to Sevilla I had no idea the strength of the presence that los gitanos have here, and it’s a culture that I’ve been curious about since arriving. The Gitano culture is the origin of almost all things quintessentially Spanish, the most prominent of these being flamenco which was used as an expression of frustration and pain in response to the historic oppression the community has experienced. The gitanos came from India beginning in the 7th century, migrating in groups of 50 to 100 for hundreds of years and eventually achieving the presence that they have today. They are set apart by extreme values of family, solidarity, and adaptation, all of which are the most fascinating in their level of extremity. If a gitana woman leaves her family to set off on her own, for example, she no longer calls herself a gitana – she is literally expelled from the culture. The solidarity amongst gitanos is admirable – if gitanos recognize another Gitano who doesn’t have a family, he will be essentially taken in no questions asked. To be without family is not an option for these people, and I think they have such a beautiful sense of unbridled compassion. It is customary for flamenco to be performed as husband and wife, which is beautiful. Both start learning the music and dance from their families when theyre not even 7 years old and perfect it for years, eventually performing together after marriage.

Today my social justice class went to El Vacie, a shantytown that is literally a two minute walk from my volunteer site. Right on the outskirts of Sevilla, it is where about 1000 gitanos call home. It is primarily constructed out of makeshift houses of wood and cardboard, and provides communal showers and water for its people. It is a place of abysmal living conditions, largely due to the marginalization of the Gitano community. However, its counterpart is called Tres Mil Viviendas, a government project that provides housing, water, and electricity and where many gitanos were replaced to. While this project counteracted the effects of marginalization, it has backfired as a result of the disproportionate resources that projects such as Tres Mil Viviendas provide: namely, education. People are simply replaced there and given resources without any idea of how to properly allocate and preserve them, and so they exploit them. Drugs and crime are rampant in Tres Mil. While not nearly as prominent in El Vacie, the government is reluctant to spend any real time there observing the culture and the people and providing them with a more holistic response to their needs. So, the gitanos stay marginalized. We visited an organization today that provides many services to the children of the Vacie community, such as preschool, breakfast and lunch, a place to have a siesta, clean water to bathe in. Hopefully these resources will give these kids a better chance at survival and at developing their own skills to do so. It was unbelievable and humbling to see how close El Vacie is to Sevilla proper. The question of whether the gitanos want to and should integrate more completely in the Spanish culture is made all the more complicated by seeing conditions such as those in the shantytowns – it should be so simple, allocate more resources to these people, but there is so much tied up in that. The distinct Gitano culture, for one, makes for a very suspicious people who do not necessarily value formal education – particularly if it comes from the public government, which will teach and reinforce Spanish values, not Gitano ones. Their most fundamental values inherently make integration difficult, and it is also a question of whether they even want to integrate and perhaps give up a piece of their cultural heritage versus the human rights that should be universally guaranteed regardless of cultural identification.

I am still quite daunted by the task of writing about my 8 days in Italy and Greece but I do want to share it. So keep an eye out, I’ll get my act together sooner or later!
Besitos!