How glad I am to be in Cordoba at last! Today is only my third day here, but already I feel a fondness for the city’s cobblestone streets and Moorish architecture. We spent the past two weeks traversing Andalucia, roaming quaint streets, watching flamenco shows, wine tasting, etc. in a fun albeit tiring tour of Spain’s southern cities. Currently, I sit not at a little wooden table sipping a cafe con leche as I have for the past afternoons, but rather, on a dirt mound inside the protected feline wilderness habitat of Parque de Ruth y Jose next to the Rio Guadalquivir, about a five minute walk from the apartment homestay I share with (another Paulson fellow) Talulah.
It’s amazing how tranquil and isolated the park feels, despite being merely a few hundred feet (I still don’t know meters…) away from the bustling street. Various birds chirp in the distance, their distinct songs alternating between high-pitched, sweet tweets and deep, rumbling whistles. There’s the distant whoosh of cars, too, when I really listen. But louder than the turning of their wheels are the honks and quacks of ducks on the river, paddling along in a line, an almost comical parody of the nearby automobile traffic. The river, although beautiful, is a dull greenish-gray, the water level is quite low. Shockingly shallow rivers are not necessarily a new sight for me, having grown up in the dry Sacramento valley of Northern California. My temporary home of Andalucia faces similar climate struggles to my home in California; both regions suffer incredibly dry, hot summers and are severely drought-ridden. At the beginning of last year, Andalucia reservoirs were operating at just 21% of their total capacity! Of course, it makes sense that they share the same weather and environmental issues, since central California and southern Spain roughly align with the same latitude (the 36th parallel, I believe?). I suppose this similarity, although not a positive one in essence, allows for a heightened understanding of my study abroad city’s climate crisis “profile,” and will hopefully make it easier to meaningfully engage with whatever local project I choose.
The tip of Cordoba’s famous Mezquita (mosque) peeks through the river shrubbery even from afar. A flock of white birds soars quickly past. There’s a grove of spindly birch trees to my right, their white bodies spotted with brown, standing in the vibrant green grass at their feet. I gaze more intensely at one of the birch trees directly next to me, and I notice its interior is exposed on one side – a large red-brown wound among its gray-white exterior. To the touch, the tree’s outside is hard and bumpy while its inside is soft, fragile, moist – crumbly even. There are many cobwebs and small bugs in the crevices of this strange section of trunk. I wonder how the interior of the birch became so exposed; Is the tree sick? Is that why its inside is so fragile and its branches so delicate? If so, is such an illness affecting other trees in the area, caused by Andalucia’s water crisis, or is it completely unrelated and specific to only this individual birch? The tree, in a quite literal way, reminds me of the birch tree that my family used to have in our front yard. That birch, too, fell ill and had to be chopped down. It’s strange how many parallels to my home there are in this place thousands of miles away (well, including identical names of cities and natural features because of colonialism). These parallels, I suppose, make my transition to living in a new country a bit easier, even if subconsciously so. Yet at the same time, they are such vague reminders that in a sense, they even amplify the other differences between my two homes. But I look forward to exploring these differences in all their nuances, to understand the specifics of Cordoba and Andalucia’s environment (both culture and climate- wise), to integrate myself into the local community.
