‘Honesty is the best policy.’ So said the Archbishop Whately of Dublin in the sixteenth century, and so we may try to follow this maxim in our daily lives. I’ve recently uncovered a whopping great fib, in the form of my linguist’s Year Abroad. ‘Best year of your life,’ MML enthusiasts cry. ‘I never wanted to come home to our ridiculous country,’ newly-bohemian 4th years declare.

So what of the difficulties. These are hardly minor: uprooting your life to a foreign country. Embarking upon a year of self-imposed exile. Maybe I’m in a grumpy mood because it’s January, and January is inexcusably dismal wherever you are in the world, but I thought it was about time that someone made the apprehension public. I went on my year out reluctantly, and it’s time that someone were honest about life sans Cambridge bubble.

Of course I understand that this is a choice I’ve made, and despite my protestations I am enjoying myself here in Spain. So I’ve decided to do something about my January blues, and force myself into having more than a superficial appreciation of the culture I now find myself a part of, by striking up a conversation each week with someone unknown.

A kind of self-prescribed therapy for the sometimes socially awkward.

I live in a large flat of seven, and when I arrived back after two weeks of Christmas break I discovered I had a new flatmate, and thought that this would prove a decent starting point for my experiment. We chatted, and once we got past the obvious questions about where we were from, what we were doing in Spain et cetera, we started to compare different types of humour around the world. Now, whenever British humour is talked about at length, it is often referred to as dry and self-deprecating. And a large chunk of the rest of the world doesn’t really seem to get it. Fair enough, really. However, my housemate said that he loved British comedy, and asked me for some recommendations. I duly obliged, and then proceeded to research Spanish humour for my own personal entertainment.

It seems that Spain prefers its humour a little more bizarre, and yet at the same time more obvious than in the UK. This was probably typified this week when I innocently enquired in a café what types of fruit teas were available. The waitress proceeded to shout the single word ‘TEA!’ and laugh hysterically in my face. Still not quite sure I understand that one.

On a slightly different note, Spanish game shows are brilliant comedy value. Channel-hopping yesterday I came across a game show involving a race through a maze. The contestant’s competitor? A hamster, in a hamster-sized maze of his own. Sadly I had to go out so I don’t know who won, but from a humorous standpoint let’s hope it was the hamster.

Now, those of you procrastinating before any January exams, pay attention. I also thoroughly recommend the Spanish 90s classic, ‘The Great Goose Game’ (El gran juego de la oca), available via YouTube. This show is basically a giant board game where a cast of thousands, some dressed as geese, egg on a contestant who has to participate in a series of crazy challenges depending on which square he or she lands on. Such challenges include the ‘haircut,’ where the contestant is instructed to sit in a barber’s chair and answer questions. Get any wrong, and out comes a deranged barber who hacks away aimlessly at your precious head of hair. Deal or No Deal it ain’t.

Even stranger, I soon found art mirroring life as regards this cavalier approach to welfare, on my way to work the following day. Builders outside my workplace (a primary school), took the interesting decision to leave a switched-on, fully-functioning chainsaw on the grass just by the school gates, while they went off to work on something else. Here my amusement turned to nervously confused laughter, and the incident reminded me of good old British health and safety, and how, sometimes, it can indeed serve a purpose.

So, first week back in Spain after Christmas: done. Challenge started, new friend made, Spanish humour explored. And perhaps most importantly, accidental amputation by chainsaw averted. Maybe life on the Iberian peninsula may turn out to be alright after all.