{"id":23320,"date":"2025-04-15T13:14:22","date_gmt":"2025-04-15T17:14:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.spcollege.edu\/international\/?p=23320"},"modified":"2025-04-15T16:53:38","modified_gmt":"2025-04-15T20:53:38","slug":"spc-spain-and-portugal-live-in-the-moment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.spcollege.edu\/international\/spc-spain-and-portugal-live-in-the-moment\/","title":{"rendered":"SPC Spain and Portugal: Live-in-the-Moment!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

My name is Anya, and I\u2019ve lived my teenage years inside my comfort zone\u2013 going through the daily motions of school, work, and going out. Every day, I would postpone my \u201cdream planning\u201d for tomorrow (which really means never). I operated assuming that tomorrow was guaranteed to be there, and I ignored the passage of time as I procrastinated on my life. After traveling with SPC to Spain and Portugal\u2013 two countries rich with history and culture\u2013 my paradigm shifted. <\/p>\n\n\n

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I went on this trip excited to learn more about the history of Spain and Portugal. These countries were once the big dogs of Europe, and I was eager to see the cathedrals, cultural sights, and remnants of the people who came before us. As you may have guessed, I\u2019m a history nerd. I already knew a bit about ancient history and Iberian history, so I was thrilled at the prospect of walking in the footsteps of the past and watching the stories from my books come to life.<\/p>\n\n\n

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While visiting a Chapel, an unexpected epiphany struck me on this trip\u2013 and I\u2019ve yet to shake it off: Our ancestors were close with death\u2013 and I\u2019m not just saying that because they are dead now\u2013 I\u2019m saying that because they thought about it much more than we do. It\u2019s present everywhere in Spain and Portugal. From the statues and paintings honoring dead people, to the remarkable edifices that dead people constructed\u2013 death is subliminally everywhere in Europe. Their relationship with death even seeps into how they live now\u2013 with their slow-paced and \u201clive-in-the-moment\u201d culture. Of course, it was a lot easier to die back then, but death is not any less inevitable now as it was centuries ago. Compared to us, death was much higher up on their list of things to zone out about.

I\u2019ve spent my entire life cowering from my fear of death. I think we all do. The infinite darkness. The last goodbye. The sun exploding in 5 billion years. I avoid thinking about it at all to avoid pointlessly panicking. It\u2019s not productive to freak out about something I have no control over and is 100% bound to happen if I don\u2019t meet a cute vampire anytime soon. The only way I can get the answers is by dying, and by that point, I won\u2019t be able to think at all. It\u2019s a lose-lose. Well, one destination floored me and forced me to finally face my fear. That destination is floor-to-ceiling with death: The Chapel of Bones.

The Chapel of Bones in \u00c9vora is an unforgettable sight. You\u2019re in the presence of 500 skeletons\u2013 all of whose bones know stories we\u2019ll never hear. Five centuries ago, some monks had an epiphany on life and dug up a graveyard to create a chapel lined on the inside with bones and skulls. They created a space to reflect on the inevitable nature of mortality, which reminded them to be more present in life. My youthful and na\u00efve sense of immortality totally shrank when confronted by this imposing and eerie scene. In this fast-paced world, we focus more on the now than what comes next: We create cheap infrastructure that barely lasts 30 years, while old Roman concrete is stronger now than when it was first paved thousands of years ago; We drain our Earth of resources and neglect thinking of the consequences for our future generations to endure, while our ancestors erected immortal cathedrals and cities for us to inherit. Why do we have a different attitude towards the future?
\u2013 Anya, SPC Spain and Portugal (High School) Study Abroad Program, March 2025<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My name is Anya, and I\u2019ve lived my teenage years inside my comfort zone\u2013 going through the daily motions of school, work, and going out. Every day, I would postpone my \u201cdream planning\u201d for tomorrow (which really means never). I operated assuming that tomorrow was guaranteed to be there, and I ignored the passage of … Continue reading SPC Spain and Portugal: Live-in-the-Moment!<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1966,"featured_media":23324,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[946,7,24],"tags":[],"coauthors":[923],"class_list":["post-23320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spain-and-portugal-high-school","category-study-abroad","category-travel"],"yoast_head":"\r\nSPC Spain and Portugal: Live-in-the-Moment! - Center for International Programs<\/title>\r\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\r\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.spcollege.edu\/international\/spc-spain-and-portugal-live-in-the-moment\/\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"SPC Spain and Portugal: Live-in-the-Moment! - Center for International Programs\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"My name is Anya, and I\u2019ve lived my teenage years inside my comfort zone\u2013 going through the daily motions of school, work, and going out. 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