Arcadia Spain

Last Friday there was a field study that dealt with the uneasy history of 20^th Century Spain.

Our day trip was to the Spanish-French border, the Museum of Exile and the small seaside village Colliure. The trip was planned in order to show students the hardship and pains of Spaniards in the 20th century. Their suffering was a result of the Spanish Civil War and the rise to power of one of the most infamous fascist dictators of the century, Francisco Franco.

The field study’s hands-on approach to learning more about the fates of these 500,000+ people who were fleeing the persecution of a dictatorial regime that offered them the choice between a firing squad and leaving behind their homes and loved ones.

The museum itself boasts a very modern and well made exhibition on this topic that not only explains the fate of the refugees and their exile, but also the ideological conflicts that led to the war. Other topics include the persecution of various peoples and the fates, explained in first person, of those who chose to never come back to Spain.

The setting of the museum, in the very same place where the exodus of thousands of Spaniards did take place in 1939, is in a very dry and, in winter, hostile landscape, which underlines what it meant to live all this.

During this semester's tour even the very cold and windy weather conditions helped to imagine the hardship of the people. The final visit to the village of Colliure in France brings the students to a place where the first part of the exodus ended for many Spaniards. The contrast between the harsh historic events and the nice, lovely and calm Mediterranean village of today gives this part of the trip a special meaning.

The visit to the tomb of Antonio Machado, one of the famous victims of this exile, impresses most students, especially when they notice the huge amount of fresh flowers on the tomb. This shows clearly that this chapter of Spanish history - now nearly 80 years ago - has still not been closed.

I hope you all enjoyed it!