I have been living with an artist in her home-studio-garden in Galicia and working as a private chef, maid, gardener, and firekeeper. I will explain.

          After rotating at a hospital in Madrid for four weeks, I decided to stay in Spain for two more weeks. I arranged to work at a kiwi farm in Galicia, the northwest region of Spain. I would trek up north, live with an older Spanish couple, and exchange five hours of work a day for food and accommodation. Everyone I met in Madrid told me that Galicia, especially the Galician countryside, would be idyllic. Galicia is known for its rain, lush farmland, and hilly coastline—the sum of which produces some of the country’s best produce, wine, and fish.

   48 hours before my scheduled train up north, the kiwi farm daughter—Ana—DM’ed me on Instagram. Her mother was admitted to the hospital. Her parents could not host me anymore. Both Ana and her mother had been so personable in all our communication; I felt as though I had already met the family. I expressed my confidence that her mother was getting the help she needed in the hospital and wished the whole family peace.  

          After imagining an idyllic escape and hearing so much about Galicia over the past month, I was disappointed but not defeated. I already started off my time in Spain, resigned to circumstances outside of my control. Originally, I was supposed to rotate at a hospital in Seoul, not Spain, for six weeks. My grandma was going to come and live with me as well. For over a year, I had been looking forward to my half-Korean homecoming moment (a la Michelle Zauner, who just returned from hers).  But as Korean resident doctors continue to strike (and not for a good reason), my rotation in Seoul was canceled. I instead elected to go to Madrid. I was grateful for the opportunity to live abroad funded by my school, but a cosmopolitan European capital could not compare to the motherland. I would be able to practice my Spanish…I guess. I was already trying to make the best of the circumstances that another “setback” did not seem catastrophic. And realistically, there was no time to mope. I had 48 hours to find a place to live for the next two weeks.

         Ana offered to help me find a new place to stay and reached out to an Galicia-based artist named Iria. Ana previously completed a Workaway with Iria—a sculpturist and printmaker—living with her and helping her garden in her 200-year-old house in the mountains. This alternative, living and working with a Galician artist, seemed like the best-case scenario. But how often does the best-case scenario pan out? I also imagined Ana already overwhelmed with her mother.

          In Spain all alone, I felt as though I could only rely on myself at the end of the day. I told José Luis about my situation. He immediately offered that I could stay for two more weeks if I needed. But after imagining my Galician life for the whole month, I was attached to an escape to the countryside. I spent the next T-48 hours, messaging new hosts on Workaway. I landed three offers, who had last-minute vacancies: an eco-farm in Galicia, a mountain farm in Valencia, and a cactus farm in Valencia. The father of each family messaged me directions how to arrive to the nearest bus stop to their village, where each then promised to pick me up and drive me to the farm.

I was about to buy train tickets to the cactus farm—the farm closest to civilization in case I needed to make a quick escape—when at the final hour, Iria, the artist, returned with an offer. She did not do work exchanges anymore, but she would take me in for the next 10 days. Iria and her chef boyfriend Diego wanted to meet me. They liked my Instagram. An artist-in-residence was inhabiting the guest bedroom at her house-garden-studio in the mountains, but her residency would end in a few days. For the first few days, I could first stay at and clean Diego’s apartment closer to the city. Then, once the current artist-in-residence left, I could move to the house in the mountains and exchange accommodations and meals for gardening and cooking.

          Less than 12 hours later, I was on the first train to A Coruña. Iria picked me up and dropped me off at Diego’s apartment. I spent the next several days alone, cleaning boy mess at home. Although I had no reason to believe so, I assumed the better of a job that I did, then the better they would treat me in the mountains the following week. I was in no position to take chances. I was alone in a completely new region of Spain with no plan B. I scrubbed the bathroom walls. I scrubbed the carpet. I scrubbed the sofa. I was cleaning for my life.

          As promised, a few days later, Iria picked me up, and I moved to her house-garden-studio in the forest. The first couple days, I made 250 seeding pots out of newspaper. In the following days, sometimes I private cheffed, and other times, I was just tasked to maintain the fire. Every day though I used every moment of my own time to write.

The past ten days have been a lot of novelty. . . or perhaps a correct word is strange. I am sitting shotgun in  am going to the Irving Penn centennial in A Coruña with a woman from Berlin, who I never met before, sitting shotgun in her big, white van (#vanlife). I am foraging for dry twigs in the yard because the fire—the only heat source in the house—is minutes from fizzling out. At the end of the week, I am cooking a six-course, Spanish-influenced Korean menu for Iria and eight of her closest friends. (More on this later. . . )

          Every time I found myself in a strange but thrilling, new situation, I wondered how I got here. The only answer I could give myself? Everything Alex Cooks. I have always referred to Everything Alex Cooks as a separate entity because it has always felt as though it has a life of its own. I am traveling in Oaxaca, and I find my zine at a local café-fermentation shop. I am wallowing at my lowest points in medical school, and EAC provides a space for me to bring people together. Or I am scrambling for a place to live in Spain, and a Galician artist offers to let me stay in her house-garden-studio in the mountains. Even when I take a step back from EAC, investing less energy than before, EAC continues to give back to me. This week, I learn my fate for the next four years. It is match day on Friday. Wherever I am headed next—whether back home to California or staying in the City—I am comforted to know that I will have EAC.

          The past six weeks in Spain, I have also been reminded that good, generous people exist in this world. Everyone that I have met—from the hospital to the Metro, from Madrid to Galicia, from José Luis, the cool girls of Madrid, Ana and her family, to Iria, her boyfriend Diego, and all their friends—has cared for me in a way that I have never before been cared for by strangers. I am leaving Spain with confidence that, despite our world’s current terrors, we can still care for each other.

          I feel odd cherishing a country (especially one with an imperial past), but I am truly grateful for the way in which Spain has cared for me. My gratitude is not a romanticized Europe fantasy. I saw patients in clinic, who feeling abandoned by the public system and had to resort to a private system. I lived a couple blocks over to the most gentrified neighborhood in Madrid. I felt over-perceived on the street; at times, my own reflection was the only Asian-presenting person I would see for days. I chatted plenty with the cool girls or Diego about Vox and the resurgence of Spanish fascism.  I even walked past a thundering Vox rally in Madrid. Everywhere has their problems, but despite all their own problems, the people that I met in Spain made time for me. And when I think about the grand scheme of it all—my canceled trip to Korea and initial resignment—Spain has really come through for me.

          Thank you for showing me that I can allow myself to be cared for and that I can remain hopeful that we can care for each other.  These past six weeks make me want to return back into the world all the good will and energy that I have been given. . . whereever I go (or match) next.  ⋆⭒˚｡⋆