baffled by the nation-state

So me and José got to talking last night about traveling and stereotypes and national identity. He said that he was really surprised when he went to San Francisco, because he expected it to be more like Texas, even though he never had been to Texas. And then he met me and he said he was surprised by how socially conscious I was. I tried to say that if there was any such thing as typically American, neither I nor San Francisco are it, but he said that wasn´t the point, and he´s right. Both me and San Francisco certainly are inextricably American, and I don´t why I was trying to convince José that America sucks and I´m not part of it. Luckily, he was too smart for that. The best part about going abroad is that it reminds me that I do in fact love the U.S. of A., even in the midst of this torturous election year.
Then he asked me what Americans think about Spain. And I didn´t quite know what to say. I told him we don´t think that much about Spain, which I think is fairly true. Then I tried to sum up what I thought about Spain before I came here, but it´s hard to rewind like that. The first thing that came to mind actually was Ernest Hemmingway, bull fighting, basques drinking wine out of goat skin sacks, Carmen, flamenco, La Casa de Bernarda Alba, Don Quijote, chivalry, but also gay marriage and socialism. But I´m curious what other people think. Obviously, you´ve all been prejudiced by reading this, but I´d like to know what you think about when you think about Spain.
I hope that wasn´t too boring. It´s what´s on my mind right now. I´m working on getting more pictures up, but that involves getting my computer connected to the internet which is a little complicated since I don´t have wifi. Those other ones were from José´s camera.