Spanish classes before lunch, surfing classes after – and evenings with fellow students in the bars and restaurants of Cadiz. GARY QUINNcouldn't ask for more from an educational holiday
THERE’S A MOMENT in every beginner language class when you’re asked to turn to the stranger beside you and describe their eye and hair colour. It’s one of the odder experiences that anyone who has plunged into a new language gets to enjoy. It can immediately spark friends, enemies or lovers, and I suspect that language teachers secretly enjoy the embarrassment it creates.
And so, on my first morning at the Melkart school, in the walled town of Cadiz, in southern Spain, I turned to Robert, the mountainy man from the Canadian Rockies, and told him his eyes were blue, his hair was black. They weren’t, but my vocabulary was lacking, and neither of us wanted to prolong such a delicate encounter: there’s a fine line between casual observation and drinking in the moment. But at the Melkart school intimate encounters are the order of the day and language acquisition is just a by- product of a lot of fun.
I had signed up for a week of intensive classes in a language I had always liked but never tackled. Not content with just that, Eurolanguages.com, the Dublin-based organisation that put my Spanish-language package together, had talked me into taking up a new sport, too: surfing. Knowing exercise is great for the mind, I agreed, and my week was set: mornings in the classroom, afternoons on the beach and evenings eating and drinking in the squares and winding streets of Cadiz.
But this was no random agenda; everything was designed around the same goal: learning Spanish.
I’m a bit of a language-school junkie, so I was geared up for a packed programme. I’ve taken residential classes in France and Croatia and made lots of trips to the Gaeltacht as an adult, so I know exactly what I’m looking for in a school. That’s not to say I’m a linguist – far from it – but I get a kick out of the atmosphere and challenge of starting something new.
Building a holiday around a language school has a lot of benefits: you can go alone and know that you’ll meet new friends; you get to learn about the city and country that you’re in from the people who live there; and you forsake lounging by the pool for thinking like a local – and, without realising it, have built a siesta into your day and forgotten you ever needed a map to get around.
In short, you become immersed in a culture rather than simply looking at it through a camera lens, and you come away not only proud of yourself for learning a new language but also deeply attached to the place you have been in. Of course, choosing the right school and location matters, and this is where a good organiser such as Eurolanguages.com comes in (see panel, right).
Cadiz is an incredibly friendly place. As it is the oldest city in Spain, and said to be the oldest continuously inhabited city in Europe, its residents, the Gaditanos, have had many years to perfect their gracious welcome.
Cadiz has experienced incredible waves of wealth and hardship, joy and sorrow in its long life, and its city walls and narrow streets have contained the excitement and trepidation of so many journeys and lives lived. Christopher Columbus set out for the New World on two of his voyages from Cadiz, leading millions to do likewise and building a period of expansion that would change Spain and Cadiz forever.
The architecture of the historic centre of the town, where I was based, reflects its long history with a series of beautiful plazas linked by long winding streets, with each leading ultimately to the sea. The most famous beach in the town is La Caleta, best known as a substitute for Cuba in the opening scenes of the James Bond film Die Another Day.
I signed up for three hours of Spanish tuition per day: one class of grammar and one class of conversation based on that grammar. It worked, plain and simple. With small classes and expert, friendly tuition, Spanish just seemed to fit.
During that week I was taken from being a complete beginner to knowing that speaking Spanish is only a matter of time, study and the willingness to let it seduce you. And seduction is easy when you are being enveloped by a culture that retains food, rest, song and dance at its heart.
It wasn’t a trial to fit into a slower pace of life. I love food and drink, and even moderately good weather makes me think of having a nap, so the siesta that came with every day was easy to take on board. And as I was out each night, eating, listening to flamenco or just hanging out with the other students in local bars, I began to see why the siesta matters. You can’t live the Spanish lifestyle on an Irish schedule.
Central to this is the food. Cadiz is a paradise for food lovers. While vegetarians might not find what they’re looking for, the rest of us will. In one restaurant I ate from a menu that hasn’t changed since 1812; in another, Show de Tapas bar, on Calle San Francisco, I was presented with a plate of octopus cooked in its own ink. It was black as the night sky, incredibly fresh and bursting with flavour, and it cost less than €3.
In Meson Cumbres Mayores, on Calle Zorrilla, I had a huge tuna steak cooked with garlic, the flavour and texture of which were an utter surprise to someone who has only eaten tuna from a tin. I returned a second night for an evening of tapas and tinto de verano – Rioja and lemonade – surrounded by locals who confirmed that I had found a gem.
A visit to the fish market in the centre of Cadiz is a fantastic experience that lets you see where the Gaditanos’ appreciation of fish comes from. There is no going back after that. As for the wine that accompanied it all, well, just choose local and relax. It really is that easy.
For me this is the key to any holiday, particularly a residential language course. You have to relax, let the language wash over you, make mistakes, get confused and then forget about those mistakes. You have to dive into the lifestyle around you and simply enjoy it.
The hardest thing to gain is confidence, and this is where your school comes in. I’ve been to classes in other places where teachers are more than willing to converse, explain grammar or teach in English. It doesn’t work, and Melkart staff know this. They work at a pace that suits the group, they cover topics that are relevant and they use a system proven over years of experience. They teach incredibly well and help you through a minefield of grammar.
The other students matter, too. Melkart attracts students from all over the world and from all age groups. There are a lot of twenty- and thirtysomethings, but older students as well, and from all kinds of backgrounds. I met engineers, teachers, graduates, chefs and carpenters, each one travelling alone but more than ready to meet up and explore Cadiz as a group.
They had all chosen different types of accommodation, each organised by Melkart. If your goal is to really perfect your Spanish, then the best and most cost-effective way is to stay with a family and eat breakfast and dinner together. Melkart chooses families that are experienced with foreigners and enjoy having them in their homes. It’s also possible to share an apartment with other students. Or, as in my case, you can stay in a hotel. I stayed at Hotel Argantonio, a beautiful Andalusian house that has been converted into a hotel. The staff are fabulous and make you feel at home. It only has two stars but deserves far more for its welcome, comfort, location and attention to guests. It’s a place to which I will certainly be returning.
CADIZ TODAY IS a Mecca for sports enthusiasts. It would be a lazy man indeed who could walk the polished coastal paths of Cadiz and not want to cycle, run or rollerblade with the Gaditanos, or not imagine a lifestyle where exercise and sunshine were just part of a well-structured day.
Built on a sand spit in Andalusia, Cadiz strikes out into the surf of two bodies of water, the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, and so can claim to be among the best water-sports locations in Europe.
This confluence of water also strikes up a great breeze, which might be cooling relief for those on the sand but can whip up a terrific storm for the wind surfers and kite surfers who have claimed Cadiz as their own.
But I was here to try a sport that its devotees claim to be the only sport in the world and who have a mantra that, I quickly learned, over-rides all others. It’s a simple enough rule: surfers surf. And for that week at least I was to become one of them.
I was picked up at the language school by Elizandro Lima, a Brazilian surfer who runs a surf school called Surf Training, just outside Cadiz. This town being what it is, it was no surprise to find that he was no ordinary coach. His other job is as a selector for the Brazilian national youth surfing team.
According to Lima his team are second in the world, but according to others I asked they are the best and Lima is just being bashful. So here I was, standing in my wetsuit, trying to look as if I might know what I was doing with a real live surfing professional.
I was scheduled for a three-day course that was designed to bring the complete beginner from nothing to being able to ride a wave. The teaching begins on the beach, were we practised that most sacred of surfing moves: how to get from lying flat to standing upright on the board. It’s one of those things that looks so easy but is a careful combination of speed, strength, balance and timing.
The first day Lima stood in the water and held the board steady in chest-high water as we waited for a wave: he doesn’t believe in letting his students paddle for a wave until they have more experience. It was surreal to lie flat on the water with Lima, watching for the perfect wave, and then, seeing his face light up as he spotted it building behind us, and with utter conviction, launch our boards forward as the swell began to lift us. He loves the sea and every wave it offers, and his excitement grew with every wave.
It was quite a trip and proved to me that Lima is possibly the most optimistic of surf teachers – and born to teach. Never in the history of surfing has a man managed to smile so much in the face of his students’ lack of ability. Along with some of my classmates we bravely, but with incredible consistency, managed to collapse on almost every wave we met. But through it all Lima smiled and coached, laughed and pushed us onwards until finally, mercifully, we did the impossible: we caught a wave – and some of us more than once.
They were small waves in calm surf, but for those brief seconds when the wave, board and rider were in sync it was fantastic. After so many failed attempts, finally feeling the calmness that comes with catching a wave is almost a mystical experience. Everything Lima had taught us suddenly clicked into place, and his confidence in us and his own teaching made perfect sense. Better than that, we were coming back the next day to do it all over again.
A three-day course like ours is a gift. You get to know your teacher, you learn at a slower but deeper pace and you pick up skills that one-off courses can’t provide. On our final day we took a detour on the way home, visiting Lima’s favourite surf store, Etnica, stopped for a beer in a local bar and were introduced to the Spanish band Fito Fitipaldis as we drove along the highway.
He was happy, we were happy, the sun was setting and we were heading back to Cadiz for the night. No one was thinking of home.
** Gary Quinn was a guest of the Spanish tourist board
Go there
Aer Lingus (www.aerlingus.com) flies from Dublin, Cork and Belfast to Malaga. Ryanair (www.ryanair. com) flies from Dublin and Shannon to Malaga. From there you can take a bus to Cadiz.
How to arrange a holiday, and where to go in Cadiz
You can book a Spanish-and- surfing package in Cadiz through Eurolanguages.com, a Dublin-based online service that helps select your school and works with its partners to organise your trip. See www.euro languages.com or contact Peter Hutchinson at the Enterprise Centre, George’s Place, Dún Laoghaire, Co Dublin (01-4434703, help@eurolanguages. com).
The following is a typical offer from its site: two-week Spanish-and-surfing course at Melkart and Surf Training: €400; accommodation in a shared apartment: €100 per week; or half-board accommodation with a family (including breakfast and dinner): €170 per week.
For more about Melkart School of Languages, contact Israel Barro on 00-34-956-222213, see www.centro melkart.com or write to the school at Calle General Menacho, 7, PO Box 417, 11004 Cadiz, Spain.
Elizandro Lima, the surf teacher and a selector for the Brazilian national youth surfing team, runs a school named Surf Training.
Call 00-34-661-011745, see www.surftraining.es or write to the school at Calle General Munoz Arenillas s/n, 11010 Cadiz, Spain.
I stayed at Hotel Argantonio (Calle Argantonio 3, Cadiz, 00-34-956- 211640, www.hotelargantonio.com), a beautiful Andalusian house that has been converted into a hotel. The staff are fabulous and make you feel at home. It only has two stars but deserves far more for its welcome, comfort, location and attention to guests. It’s a place to which I will certainly be returning.
Meson Cumbres Mayores (Calle Zorrilla 4, Cadiz, 00-34-856-072242, www.mesoncumbresmayores.com) serves great tuna. Go for an evening of tapas and tinto de verano – Rioja and lemonade.
In Restaurant Show de Tapas (Calle San Francisco 3, Cadiz, 00-34-627-473574) I tried a plate of octopus cooked in its own ink. It was black as the night sky, incredibly fresh and bursting with flavour – and it cost less than €3.
For more about the city and its surrounding province, see www.cadizturismo.com.
For more about Spain, see www.spain.info.