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I had never heard that the stereotype of the Spanish women was that they spend all their time perfectin their image. I thought their stereotype was: hairy, loud speaking, short, catholic (exactly the same stereotype about Spanish men).
The kind of women you find varies depending on the social level (I'm not referring to economical level). The differences are basically high educational level vs. low educational level and at some point urban vs. rural.
When they are younger, the ones with lesser educational level usually tend to dress worse and wear gaudy makeup, while the educated ones wear nicer clothes and a subtle makeup (or even no makeup at all). These differences become less obvious, the gaudy clothes and makeup are generally abandoned as they mature (22-23 or 24 y. o.).
About the rural/urban differences: Obviously nowadays it's not like 100 years ago, but there are still differences. Urban girls like fashion more while the ones living in villages wear more functional clothes (but anyway if there's a party or event there would virtually be no difference). It's also true that some cities in Northern Spain are considered posh: San Sebastián, Oviedo, Bilbao, Corunna, Vitoria, Valladolid, Santander... and the people there (here) usually dress better, especially women.
I don't agree with the person who said that Spain is closer to Eastern Europe in this matter. Eastern European girls, from my experience, wear micro-skirts, boots with very tall heels, and more makeup. Those characteristics would be seen as "slutty" in Spain.
I see no genetical differences between Northern and Southern Spain. In the South, however, the people is more tanned because they receive more sunlight, but if for example you go to a University in Madrid, where there are people from every region of Spain, you cannot tell which one is from where by only their appearance. If a Civil Guard traffic agent stops me in my region (Northern Spain) I would not be able to say if he's from Andalusia or Galicia, until I hear his accent.
About what the Spanish men consider beautiful: Physically speaking I personally prefer brunettes rather than blondes, normal height, ahtletic body, normal breasts... Being open, nice and intelligent will help a lot, also in my experience people would prefer a less intelligent but open and nice woman rather than an intelligent but embittered one.
The kind of woman I like would be someting like this (her name is Claudia Bassols, from Barcelona):
If you want to know more about what we look like I recommend you to watch these videos:
Spanish women are the most beautiful people in the world. Spanish women are the total package. First, they are easy to look at, dedicated, passionate, loving and caring. If I were ever to divorce my Latin queen I would marry another. I smile ear to ear when I see how motherly they are to their children. After years of marriage, I have become a biased white man but I feel Latino women are best grandmothers, mothers, daughters and wifes. Thank God for my Latin lady!
Spanish women are the most beautiful people in the world. Spanish women are the total package. First, they are easy to look at, dedicated, passionate, loving and caring. If I were ever to divorce my Latin queen I would marry another. I smile ear to ear when I see how motherly they are to their children. After years of marriage, I have become a biased white man but I feel Latino women are best grandmothers, mothers, daughters and wifes. Thank God for my Latin lady!
But we are talking about Spanish women from Spain, mate. Not Latin America.
Spanish women are the most beautiful people in the world. Spanish women are the total package. First, they are easy to look at, dedicated, passionate, loving and caring. If I were ever to divorce my Latin queen I would marry another. I smile ear to ear when I see how motherly they are to their children. After years of marriage, I have become a biased white man but I feel Latino women are best grandmothers, mothers, daughters and wifes. Thank God for my Latin lady!
Ok, here is another version.
Spanish women are the most beautiful people in the world. Spanish women are the total package. First, they are easy to look at, dedicated, passionate, loving and caring. Thank God for Spanish women!
Spanish, Portuguese, French, and british are the descendents of the Basques (1 of the indigenous people of western europe). The brits are mainly basques with a little bit of Saami (indigenous people of scandinavia). Southern Spain was invaded by Jews/Arabs for 800 years, thats why southern spanish women look different from northern spanish (original spanish with no arab/jew blood).
Thats why british people look like northern spanish people.
Spanish women are the most beautiful people in the world. Spanish women are the total package. First, they are easy to look at, dedicated, passionate, loving and caring. If I were ever to divorce my Latin queen I would marry another. I smile ear to ear when I see how motherly they are to their children. After years of marriage, I have become a biased white man but I feel Latino women are best grandmothers, mothers, daughters and wifes. Thank God for my Latin lady!
You have definitely NOT been to Spain.
You're describing LATIN AMERICAN women.
Women in Spain are MUCH more EUROPEAN in every concievable way.
This thread is hard to read, just way too many people confuse or don't know the difference between European people and Latin American people.
Having lived in both Spain and South America...there is an enormous difference in the people. I agree with everything you said, about LATINA women from Latin America/South America. But I wouldn't agree with you that those are the characteristics I'd think of when I think of women from Spain.
Women from Spain are much more similar to their European counterparts.
Spanish, Portuguese, French, and british are the descendents of the Basques (1 of the indigenous people of western europe). The brits are mainly basques with a little bit of Saami (indigenous people of scandinavia). Southern Spain was invaded by Jews/Arabs for 800 years, thats why southern spanish women look different from northern spanish (original spanish with no arab/jew blood).
Thats why british people look like northern spanish people.
I'm sorry if my questions seem silly but I'm really interested in moving to Spain in the future and I'm trying to gather as much information as i can. I'm 21/female/Trinidadian (East Indian decent = dark skin and hair) currently studying Petroleum Engineering and I'm curious as to what i can expect. i would really appreciate if u could give me anymore information about if i would fit in with the culture. i love the culture and the language and the place so i hope that makes the transition easier. thanks for your :-)
In your situation I might be more interested in knowing how dark-skinned people are received in Spain...
Anyway, I lived in Spain for some time, before I moved to Portugal. I had never been to Spain before I moved there, and I was kind of disappointed. I had expected more exotic people, to put it that way. Instead people were rather pale and quite a number of them had blond hair and green and even blue eyes.
In Andalusia and the Alentejo region on the other side of the border there are some rather dark-skinned women, very beautiful in my opinion. Tanning is a relatively recent phenomenon, in the past people tried to look pale because being tanned was typical of farmers etc., i.e. socially inferior to city people working in offices.
What strikes me here (I don't know if it is the same in Spain, never had TV in Spain) is that women in real life look different from those on TV, where they obviously try to cast blond women. It is a kind of 'racism' against darker people I suppose, maybe in an effort to appeal to foreign TV stations or simply to copy Americans... It is a bit sad, frankly.
How can someone say that Southern Spaniards look different from Northern Spaniards and at the same time say that British look like Northern Spaniards?
Southern Spain was repopulated by Northern Spaniards. It's common to find Galician, Basque and even Catalan surnames in Andalucia (not to mention Castilian surnames, which are the most common by far). Granada for instance was repopulated by people from Galicia and Asturias after Fernando & Isabella expelled the muslims in 1492.
During the times of the Spanish Empire Seville, Huelva and Cádiz where the main ports of Spain. A lot of people from what today is Germany, Italy and the Netherlands (Charles V's territories) moved to those cities to work as traders. It's quite common to find blond and blue-eyed people in those cities. For instance these two humorists from Seville:
http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/2954/losmorancos.jpg (broken link)
The "darker peoples of the South" are actually dark because of the gypsies, who settled mostly in Andalusia when they came to Iberia.
Spoiler
First of all the Jews did not invade anything. They had been living in Iberia before 711 AD. The Islam in Spain was during the first centuries quite unique. There was an elite from the Middle East (Ummayad) and a bunch of Berber soldiers from the previously Roman provinces of Northern Africa. The rest of the muslims were simply converted Iberian and Visigoth peoples. Those people from the Middle East and Northern Africa mixed with the local population. For instance Abd-ar-Rahman III, emir of Córdoba was the son of a Basque concubine and also his paternal grandmother was from Navarre. He is described as:
Quote:
.. white skin, blue eyes and attractive face; good looking, although somewhat sturdy and stout. His legs were short, at the point that the stirrups of his saddle were mounted just one palm under it. When mounting, he looked tall, but once at feet he was quite short. He dyed his beard black.[17]
Those mixes created a unique form of Islam. For instance drinking wine was a common practice, while it was prohibited in the rest of the muslim world. There were muslims, jews and christians living in the same cities, althoug the two latter had to pay more taxes.
It wasn't until the Almoravid (an extremist branch of Islam) invasion in the 11th century when this peaciful coexistence ended. Jews and christians were expelled and migrated to the Christian kingdoms of the North, where they tried to force the Christians kings to fight against the muslims.
As the Christian kingdoms expanded their territory to the South of Iberia they forced the muslim populations to concentrate in a smaller area (Kingdom of Granada). When this kingdom was conquered by Fernando & Isabella in 1492 the muslims were forced to either convert to christianism or leave the Iberian peninsula. Some of them ("Moriscos") converted falsely and were expelled one century later.
I had never been to Spain before I moved there, and I was kind of disappointed. I had expected more exotic people, to put it that way. Instead people were rather pale and quite a number of them had blond hair and green and even blue eyes.
That was my experience as well. I was thinking Spain would be filled with exotic beauties. I didn't find that at all. I was in Valencia/Barcelona - with a brief visit to Andulasia where it was a little different, but definitely NOT the norm for Spanish people.
They didn't look bad though, just not exotic. Basically they were very european-looking.
(I'm assuming Portugal was the same? Curious your take on Portuguese women, as I never made it that way).
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Being open, nice and intelligent will help a lot, also in my experience people would prefer a less intelligent but open and nice woman rather than an intelligent but embittered one.
Ok
