Is there hope for the airport?

Time to actually fulfill some of my threats promises.

One of which was writing about the Gib airport (s).

The title, by the way, also refers to um, a photo shot weekly thing, but more of that later.

A while ago, I noticed the new airport shooting up, and quickly snapped some pix of the old building which I think is particularly nice.

Back on ItchyFeet, I wrote briefly about the airport:

Gibraltar is the nearest airport in the world to its city. Coming across the frontier into Gib currently involves driving, cycling, or walking across the airport runway. When planes are due to land/take off, the route across the airport is closed leading to queues and delays.

Crossing the runway

Just so everyone gets the idea of the unique situation here.

Now, the previous government (GSD) in Gib decided to build a new airport at a cost of a very lot of pounds. (Actually it cost 75mill euros – but why in Gib is this price always quoted in euros? I thought we used sterling here? I digress. Back to the expensive plot.)

This was because, apparently, building a new airport would lead to lots more tourists who decide where to go on holiday based on the quality of the airport. There are a handful of flights a day in Gib. Was the cost of millions of pounds for the airport warranted?

The GSLP thought not. But now they are in power, they have to decide what to do with it.

A few more tales about the airport. Apparently on the open day for the public, conveniently held just before the Gib election, unfinished areas were hidden by hoarding.

And the contract for the first two weeks of cleaning the new incomplete airport cost a mere £90,000. I exaggerate. It was £88,281.90. According to the Gib Chron the owners of the firm are two Spanish businessmen. Well, they won’t need to do too much for the rest of the year will they? I could live on £45K a fortnight, even after expenses.

Shame there aren’t any cleaning firms in Gib huh? But wait. There are. So why didn’t they get the tender? Well? Because that is £90,000 that is going out of Gibraltar (less costs) into Spain. Why?

Is there hope for the new airport? Well, it’s pretty. But seriously, do I give a shit? And I would rather the money have been better spent on something that would have helped the vast majority of Gibraltarians. Eg, housing, KGV (mental health), employment for local people etc etc.

I admire the new government for trying to work out the best way to deal with such a white elephant.

So onto hope.

Well Peter Caruana (former chief minister the government, now leader of the GSD opposition) obviously hoped Gib airport was going to be renamed The Peter Caruana Airport.

Hope that someone can retrieve something out of this abyss.

Hope that a Gib cleaning firm might get the contract at some point and not at such a ridiculous price.

A few shots of the airports.

Arrivals at the old airport

Checking in

The roof terrace - looking towards the cloud-covered Rock

The roof terrace - looking towards sunny La Linea

The new airport from the roof terrace

And another take

The new terminal viewed from the (Gib end) of the runway

And.. departures

Onto ‘hope’. The weekly inspirational photo thing from wordpress for those of us who can’t think of anything to post.

In fact, the photo accompanying the new subject over on The Daily Post showed a tree/plant/shrub growing in concrete. I have to say as someone who regularly weeds a concrete path that this photo griped me rather than inspired me. Nothing hopeful about anything growing in concrete – it’s all too easy I tell you.

My thoughts along the hope lines, apart from the above airport comments, were more conventional.

Walking along the beach on at the end of an old year. Wondering what the new year will bring, new hopes, and, the sunshine hoping to break through the clouds – hoping the rain will hold off.

Hope - for good things in the new year, and sunshine to hold off the rain

It rained. But not much.

Our dog. Readers of his blog will know he loves toast, and always hopes there will be some for him.

Hope I can reach

Don’t be silly. Of course he reached the toast. He always gets the toast.

And finally partner. He is an expert skip scavenger and to be fair, we have acquired a number of bikes, four serviceable garden chairs, a load of plants and various other goodies. Here he is excitedly opening up some sort of work bench thing that he had rescued ….

Hope this is going to be a good find

….. Only to discover that it had been thrown out because it was useless.

I think I could do a photo a day on this theme, but I don’t play those games so I shan’t.

Simple, red, breakfast?

Something tells me I’m not a joiny-in sort of person.

Wherever you look on people’s blogs, they all seem to be joining in something. Primarily photo challenge things, or sometimes books, or sometimes just ‘write a post about whatever word/s we suggest’.

One of the reasons is apparently to get people to blog more often, by giving them inspiration. Now, that is not a problem for me. I don’t need topics for posts. I could spend all day blogging on my countless blogs – but I do have other things to do.

I suppose the second reason must be to encourage networking. But, people, these ‘games (?)’ have rules!! Some more Draconian than others.

You are invariably meant to tag your post, link it back, email it, upload it to someone else’s site, and goodness knows what else. I lose the will to live reading through the rules. I thought blogging was meant to be fun.

So I admire people who can manage this sort of thing. I can’t.

One of my friends is taking part in a photo a day!! Taking a photo every day (although not necessarily posting every day). What happens when you go on holiday or you aren’t on the internet to find out the subject of the day?

Anyway, she has stuck with it so far and produced some interesting interpretations of the subject, and fortunately some text to go with it. I really dislike the type of photo blog where people show off their incredible skill and expertise courtesy of photoshop and/or £1000+ DSLR, there is no accompanying text ‘cos natch a pic is worth 1000 words, and they have 20 comments, all of which say ‘Supah photo dahling.’ Talk about wasting time.

Another friend set up a colour weekly theme – which at least was a bit less onerous.

And I saw on WordPress’s The Daily Post blog that they have a weekly thing too. This week’s was ‘Simple.’

‘Simple,’ I thought. ‘What on earth does one photo for that?’ Not that it is difficult, there is too much choice. The colour-related one was red and tomato soup. The pic every day of the year one was breakfast.

‘Wait’, I thought to myself excitedly. ‘I could join in this and kill three of these games/challenges with one pic.’ I was making red pepper and tomato soup, and it was a very simple recipe, and the leftovers would be my breakfast. Excellent. I pondered whether to add a swirl of yoghurt and coriander to my breakfast helping or whether to leave it simply red.

Of course, you can imagine what happened. And no we didn’t eat it all for supper. But I got it down my neck so fast this morning that I totally forgot about all these games and never took the pic. That’s the nearest I will probably ever get to participating. An all-round fail!

But, here is a pic of the ingredients, just to show willing,

Simple, red, and later for breakfast

and the recipe is as follows:

Red pepper and tomato soup

Put onion in pan with olive oil, or whatever you prefer, and let them soften. Add garlic if you like garlic.

Add red pimientos and cook until they soften too.

Add tomatoes.

Add stock.

Add anything else you fancy.

When you think it is ready enough, zap it up in a batadora. Simple huh? Also quite delicious.

The recipe I vaguely based it on called for celery, and naturally that morning, I had blithely walked past the celery in the supermarket aisle thinking I didn’t need it, or I could get it another day, or .. or … or

It also suggests adding orange – some to the soup, and a slice floating on top. Getting away from the simple here methinks.

Almost forgot, my recipe book that I didn’t follow, suggested using a tin of toms. And tabasco, but that is always on the table anyway so irrelevant.

But seriously, tomatoes, red peppers and onion are a great soup base. Wish I’d made more.

Back to all the photo stuff after that tasty interlude.

If you are interested in the links for these sort of things, drop me a comment below and I’ll add the ones I know of, but right now that’s not my priority as I want to add some other links.

What I do enjoy reading are people’s personal blogs where they have decent photos. They don’t have to be brilliant, but it does help when they are part of a story rather than just something plonked on a page for the artist to sit back and wait for the praise to pour in.

Any regular reader will know I have a dogblog. And it’s always good to find new dogblogs whose person has their own blog.

JB is a cat, and her mum has a super travel blog where she features animal shots and travel ones combined. Check it out here.

Co-incidentally another cat – Mandu, also has a person with a travel blog. Check out her blog here.

Chancy (a dog), has a person with her own blog, not a travel blog, but a personal one like most of us have. However most of us don’t manage to take such excellent photos of birds in our back garden. Have look at hers here.

Almost forgot – I did stumble across a stunning photo blog that didn’t have too many supah dahling comments on it. Here it is for those of you out there who do enjoy photoblogs. Well worth a look.

I’m also in the midst of organising all my blogs, links, categories etc so asking for patience if anything doesn’t function in the short-term.

Clouds blog is now here.

And as a last comment, a good friend has started an interesting business in longboard skateboards – or skateboard longboards? Whatever.

I mention this because she has not spammed anyone about it, she has courteously and politely asked on her own blog if anyone would mind linking to it. I think that is the perfect way to behave – although probably not the best in hard sell terms. So I have no problem in providing a link to their blog here, and wish them all the best in their venture. Everyone knows, it’s hard enough starting off in business as it is. Good luck with Blacklongboards.

Bond. James Bond

The immortal line in the 007 films.  As distinctive as the theme music.

In my quest for light reading at the local library (I’ve now read all the Chris Ryans, Graham Greenes, and various others) I suddenly chanced on the Bond novels by Ian Fleming.

For some reason I never read them in my youth although I must have ploughed happily through every single Saint (Simon Templar) novel by Leslie Charteris.

Needless to state I haven’t been able to read them in the correct chronological order which is a bit of a nuisance as each book opens by referring to the previous one.

However having said that, they are all stand-alone stories anyway, so it is a minor inconvenience rather than a major disaster.  A bit like not being able to read all the Len Deighton Bernard Sampson tales in the right order.

So one of the things I did do over the brief weekend at the finca, was to polish off Goldfinger.  I think the others I read before that, were Casino Royale, Diamonds are Forever, and From Russia, With Love.  Now what has fascinated me, is how much better the books are than the extravagant block-buster films that were made so many years ago.  Somewhat like reading a Robert Ludlum Bourne novel and wondering what on earth it had to do with the Bourne films apart from the name.

To be fair to the Bond films, they did stick to the basic plot – just changed the situation, location and added a few more characters.  To put it mildly.

But back to the book(s).  Overall, they are so much tighter, well written, with a good plot, no superfluous drivel – and each one throughout the series seems to get even harder and tougher.  The character is perfectly painted.  And while I don’t agree with the so-called womanising approach – it doesn’t read like that in the books.  He meets intelligent attractive women and has sex with them, usually one or maybe two per novel.  Or turn it round the other way, one or two intelligent attractive women meet an intelligent attractive man, ie James Bond and have sex with him.  OK so maybe he is irresistible.

Which probably explains Sean Connery’s amazing success in the films.  One of my schoolfriends met him at Gleneagles, she was working there at the hotel in her early 20s and he was obviously staying to play golf.  He was probably around her father’s age and I swear if she could have found a way to throw herself at his feet she would have done.

She sat in my parent’s kitchen chatting to my mum and me (we had gone to school together since age five so we knew each other’s parents pretty well too) and Sean came up in the conversation.  “Oh my god,’ she said. ‘He is just so absolutely gorgeous. Oh he is so sexy, oh he is …. etc etc’ and her eyes just glazed over with a dreamy remembrance of the days she serviced his bedroom in Gleneages.  She was a chambermaid, I hasten to add.

Back to Goldfinger.  It was apparently the third film to be made in 1964, (the book dates from 1959), and was an amazing financial success – it had a budget of $3M, which it recouped in two weeks, grossing a total of $125M at the box office. Incredible. It was also the first gadgety film, which was obviously popular at the time, but to me lead to endless boring stunts.

The book, on the other hand, sticks to guns and knives – with the exception of Oddjob’s amazing hat. There is some dialogue – but it is curt and to the point.  There is a lot of descriptive narration, but the story keeps moving and the pace is fast. Even to me, a non-golf player, the chapters where Bond and Goldfinger were playing for ten thousand dollars (not the gold bar of the film) were well contrived and keep the reader in suspense waiting for the denouement.

My partner read Goldfinger (and all the other Bond books) some 30 years ago.  ‘I love the bit about being squeezed through the aeroplane window like a tube of toothpaste,’ he said casually when we were discussing the book.  How on earth can someone remember a description from a book they read so long ago?  But perhaps they can if the imagery created by the prose was good enough.

One of the strengths of the last two films (Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace), has been to get away from the gadgets, and the terribly boring scenes (to me) where people seem to chase around on futuristic machines underground rushing to kill each other before the whole place blows up.

The opening of Casino Royale was wonderful – even moreso if you remember the old Callan series.  I can never watch those opening moments without thinking of Callan and Edward Woodward.  Demolishing half of Venice towards the end was the film’s weakest point, but the final ending was good, very good, as Bond (Daniel Craig) shoots Mr White, and utters the immortal words when White asks who he is.

I use Casino Royale as an example because I have seen it more recently, but however good the film is, it seems there is always a boring section.  But in the books – there isn’t a boring moment, and I struggle to put them down to do something mundane like cooking or shopping or cleaning.  Much better to allocate a few hours and read straight through.

And for those of you who wanted to listen to Dame Shirley singing – you can look it up on Youtube as well as I can.  Instead here is the rather nice front cover of the hardback from the library. The golden eyes are set in a skull.

Gotta go, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service calls. As do some more tedious duties.  Which will win???

A weekend in Spain

So, taking a break from all the stress of seeking work, and – even worse – finding it, we cleared off to Spain for the weekend.

Initially we had been going to stay for at least a week, finish the bedroom, be in for the water meter person to read the meter, pay bills and all the rest of it. Maybe even fit in a bike ride.

But, when the efficient Job Finding Partner landed himself a job, they suddenly decided they wanted him to start immediately – even though he had said there was no rush. That’s life huh?

No more of this for now

Typical chat with the neighbours when we arrived (translated):

Beam. ‘Hello, here you are,’ says José.

‘How long are you staying?’ he asks with anticipation, hoping we will be there for a few weeks.

‘We’re off tomorrow. I’ve got to start work on Monday,’ says Job Finding Partner.

José’s face drops. As does Adelina’s. Mine probably did too, but I was inside sorting out the bags and baggage.

‘Oh, that’s a very short visit.’

Their daughter piped up. ‘He’s got work though, and that’s very good. There’s nothing around here.’

I’ll do a quick recap for those of you who have a) not read my other blog b) who have but may have forgotten and c) are interested in life in an Andalucían pueblo.

The houses in the old part of our village are small and built from the local soft stone and all painted white. Not surprisingly, the area is known as Los Blanquitoz. It’s not a very big area at all, and was obviously the nucleus of the village a zillion years ago.

At some point in times gone by, someone in the family acquires or inherits a small piece of ground, and if they are lucky, with a couple of rooms. No more than a shack. I’m talking before electricity and public running water came to the village.

If it is just ground – someone builds a house. Over the years these houses get changed and extended onto the available ground. So a two-roomed house becomes a four-roomed one. And maybe it gets split again later when someone in the family, either a sibling or a child, gets married and needs a house. These days they get built upwards too.

Family life is no joke in village Andalucía – you live, sleep, eat, socialise with your family. You may have school friends, ‘cos you don’t leave the village – but the family is your life, and your means of a future home.

So the daughter next door is about five years younger than me, and lives in the small house on the back of her 80+-year-old parents, which her father and her husband built. She has a cleaning job for three or four mornings a week.

Her husband was a partner in a local building business until it folded and since then he gets intermittent work. Sometimes short-term for a building firm, occasionally a three-month stint with the local council (they share these jobs around to alleviate local unemployment), but mostly he is out of work.

One son is still at school and the other has a part-time job at a local stable, on an ‘as and when’ basis.

So the family of six (ie the three generations) basically live out of the state pension for the older couple, the cleaning work – and whatever else comes in. They couldn’t exist if they were paying rent or a mortgage, but they aren’t, so they survive. And the daughter realises that we all need to survive and when there is work – we take it.

Even though we were only staying overnight, we still got the usual gifts – pimientos, tomatoes, lettuce and cauliflower for a salad, and some cut off greens for our chickens. Then I got loads of guindillas (hot chillies).

Hung out to dry

When we were there over new year, our new neighbour from the big finca across the road was chatting to José.

‘Why do you grow those chillies? I don’t like hot food,’ he said, and shuddered.

‘I grow them for my neighbours, the English, they are very fond of them,’ said José stirring as usual by showing what good terms he was on with his foreign neighbours. Finca man was obviously perplexed.

But this time, within a few minutes of arriving, finca man had wandered out of their huge enclosure, and crossed the road to greet us.

Marguerites in bloom, and behind, the finca stable block

‘Good morning,’ he said.

‘Tut tut,’ said Partner. (It was after 2pm) ‘It’s good afternoon. Buenas dias.’

Finca man switched into Spanish then. And they had a similar conversation.

‘How long are you staying? That’s a shame. Oh but it’s good you’ve got work – there’s nothing around here.’

And that’s the bottom line. There is very little work – even for Spaniards. So people understand that we have to work outside the area where we first moved.

Years ago our old neighbours traveled for work too. They went to Badajoz which is nearly Portugal and in the middle of the country. It must have been a shock for a couple from coastal Málaga province – but needs must.

They stuck it for a couple of years, until they managed to get back home. Because Spaniards like to go home. Not all of them of course, but if they can get back to their family village, – whether they have worked in Málaga (city), Sevilla (city), Barcelona, Madrid, wherever – and there is a family place to call home, they go back. And fit in as though they have never left.

That’s only my village in southern Spain though, others may be different. I doubt it.

Alubias con verduras (beanslop), white beans, veg and garden spinach

Eternal roses - are they ever going to fall? I need to prune them! - behind, the finca house

The job thing (3) and a salad with a twist (of mortadella)

For anyone following the exciting saga of our current Gib jobhunt, here is the latest update.

We both had interviews this week. Mine was in the gaming industry and his was in construction.

I enjoyed mine mainly because it was more of a discussion about developing a new role within the company. Given that there was no job pack and no information apart from a title and a couple of lines on the job card it was inevitable that some time was spent actually talking about the job itself, before we even got onto me.

Those of you who have gone for standard interviews (especially in the NHS) will be more than familiar with the panel of nine people (well, usually a minimum of three but can be much higher than that), who sit behind a table, the victim is placed in front of them, and if lucky, walks away without being executed by the firing squad.

There is also usually a requirement to give a tedious presentation. It invariably ends up being tedious because whoever sets the topic manages to find the most boring and meaningless title imaginable. I’m more than happy to be creative – but there are some topics that just defy inspiration.

So it was a pleasant surprise to sit at a small table and be offered a drink (no not alcohol!) as soon as I arrived.

Partner had a similar chatty session with the foreman of the firm he was applying to. And as is invariably the case, he walked out having been offered the job. Typical.

Meanwhile the current shake-up within the local employment sector continues. New jobs are still being posted every day at the job centre – they are going to run out of wall space soon, and people who live in Spain continue to fear for the security of their jobs.

I rang about two other vacancies only to be told they had already been filled ~ but I was told I could send a CV anyway which seemed reasonable.

Contact ‘phone numbers for a couple of jobs turned out not to be actually dealing with those jobs. What is the point of giving out a ‘phone number for people to ring if you can’t provide any information? One email address was wrong, and I never even received an acknowledgement from one. That was probably wrong too.

Perhaps one is not meant to get information about the jobs? How am I supposed to tailor the CV and the covering letter when I don’t know what the hell I’m applying for? I did track down some info on the internet for a couple of firms so that helped (next job app will be for CID methinks).

I found one firm asking for a ‘motivational’ letter with the CV. I’m assuming (without having looked it up) that it means I am supposed to write something about what motivates me at work – or has motivated me to apply? Or what might motivate them to offer me an interview/job? I’ll stick to a covering letter. Sometimes the latest trendiest brightest newest idea in HR/job app terms sounds out of date within a few months.

I’ll finish up with a job-related anecdote – a local waitress who we know told us the place she works at received 100 CVs this week. For bar/waitress work.

And related to that – a vaguely relevant photo. Well, it’s food, not that you will get a salad like this too easily in either Gib or Andalucía. It’s a variation on the Ensalada de Axarquía, which is based on orange, radish and avocado. The avocados – as ever – came from my generous Spanish neighbours, as did the radishes. No oranges sadly so I chucked in a few other things including fresh artichokes, olives and some salad leaves out of the garden (baby spinach, rocket, parsley). The dressing is the usual one, extra virgin olive oil and lemon juice on a base of Dijon mustard.

Variation on ensalada de Axarquía

The rolled slice that looks suspiciously meaty is a vegetarian mortadella. I spotted it in the health food shop (herboristeria) and thought it looked worth a try. It was disgustingly expensive and totally delicious, and included yummissimo pistachios.

A rather empty pack of mortadela

At three euros something per pack of 12 thin slices I made sure it was spun out for a lot of meals. That way it doesn’t seem quite so extravagant. The brand is Vegetalia for anyone interested. Sadly it’s not available in Gib so falls into the Spanish treats category.

Would I buy it again? Oh yes.

No Internet

No Internet.

Yet another proposed invasion of people’s freedom. Thanks to Iquitoz on South of Tonight. With which I shall dutifully sign off the internet for the rest of the day.

The job thing (2)

And – some white collar tales of the job thing.

I signed on at the Gib Job Centre a couple of years ago. There was nothing there remotely in my line of business of course, and I got bored with wandering up every week and dutifully signing on (for which I received no benefit before anyone asks, it was just to stay registered to get the info from the few cards on display) and being treated like someone who wasn’t capable of holding down anything more than an iron for pressing at the dry cleaners.

Anyways, as my dear readers know, the government in Gib has changed so I wandered into the job centre last week (so OK we were going to buy Sugar Soap from the nearby Dulux Centre as well) – and nearly got the shock of my life.

The previously empty boards were absolutely lleno (full). They had even started using the boards on the side walls. There were new daily vacancies. Unbelievable.

And even more surprising – there were jobs in my profession. For people with writing and journalism skills!! Just. Wow.

I joined the queue to find out the details for my chosen vacancies.

All unemployed together - but no orange chairs

Now – I need to explain the way of the Gib Job Centre.

Some years ago Partner went in to ask for a job – this was before we became Gib residents. So to get the details of jobs, you either needed a Gib ID card – or if you obtained a job from elsewhere eg on the street, word of mouth, but not the job centre, you would then become registered because they would receive a copy of your employment contract. Because, everyone getting a job in Gib ‘should’ sign an official contract which then gets passed to the employment office. And then you could look for a job with the job centre. Is that vaguely clear?

You couldn’t look for a job without having one – unless you had the ID card.

Of course, you can’t get a Gib ID card without – yup, a job, or at least sufficient proof of funds or self-employment. See where all this is going? Around in circles.

Well he found himself a job, became registered, we got ID cards, and the rest is irrrelevant, or history, or something.

So last week I goes up to the employment officer, said I was interested in a couple of jobs, and did I need to reregister? We checked my details that hadn’t changed and I was ready to go.

Got the details for two not bad-sounding jobs. By which I mean I got to find out who they were and a ‘phone number. Good to leave things to people’s initiative huh? One offered a salary, the other didn’t. Five short lines on a job centre card. Whatever happened to the days of job descriptions, person specifications, terms and conditions, hours, and all the rest of that crap?

I rang up one and the job had already gone – but, I could always send a CV. OK.

The next one I rang said he would get back to me with more information – and he did that the same day, plus gave me his name and said I could drop off a CV for his attention.

So I did. Well, I walked into the block and asked to leave it with the concierge who told me I needed to go to the office. Up six floors. Whereupon I was told the person I needed was on the building on the other side of the block. On the first floor. Down again – and then – I collared the nearest person and asked for my contact. So my kind guide took me directly to the desk of my contact.

Isn’t that life? Had I dressed up smartly, the concierge would have accepted my CV no doubt. But as I wandered in, wearing my scruffy warm ropa (clothes), I ended up being paraded through a multitude of offices.

Vamos a ver, as we say. ‘We’ll see.’

One of the first announcements by the new Gib government was to ask all employers to use the job centre. Seems to be working better now than before, and what may I ask is wrong with using the job centre to advertise jobs?

My next post just has to be about politics – and the changes in Giblife. The new Gib government is running away with itself it is moving so fast! I need to do a summary of some recent events. Hopefully tomorrow. One day I may post about interesting things :D

The job thing

Back into the serious side of blogging now, after the minor distractions of cat bites, cavalcades, the living Nativity, and everything else that characterises the average Christmas/New Year break.

Let’s start with employment, because for 150 or so people, the first week of the new year did not bring good news.

This is totally anecdotal, ie it is second-hand from people we met this weekend. However, I have found me a story in Gib Chron that suggests that the word on the street is not too far off the mark at all.

So there we were on the dog walk, and we met a British painter who currently lives in Gib. He told us that the government had called in JBS to discuss their employees. Well, getting rid of their employees to be more accurate.

JBS is actually Gibralter Joinery and Business Services Ltd, a government-owned construction company. Over the previous few years, they have taken on large numbers of cross-border workers.

Now, there is no way I can not make this a non-political point, because it is, but it was pretty obvious to anyone with half a brain that when people were working all hours under the sun, – and the moon, on overtime, to make progress on new car parks, housing estates, airport terminals etc etc all in time before the election is called – that it was going to cost (the tax-payer) money. And when there are people in Gib who are out of work and want to work, this sticks in the throat.

Well it sticks in mine and it clearly sticks in Joe Bossano’s throat too. Joe is our new Minister for Employment (and Training and Enterprise), if there is anyone out there not aware of this fact.

Because on Friday, apparently JBS laid people off. Now, according to the Chron, most of these people were sub-contract cross-border workers on short-term contracts. Hmmm.

Back to the Word on the Street (1) – the government was asking for upwards of 300 people to be laid off, but settled for 150. Now this contact isn’t working for JBS so that’s as much as he said, although we did have the usual Gib chat about people coming in over the border and taking money out of Gib.

Word on the Street (2) was today, on – yes, yet another dog walk. We spotted a construction colleague who was employed directly by JBS in non-skilled work. Until Friday. He was told he was British, lived in Spain, and his job would be going to a Gibraltarian. All the other employees who were dismissed were similarly non-Gibraltarian ~ according to him.

He had previously worked for Haymills (another construction company) – which went skint rather suddenly and with a sigificant cloud over its head – and then he was taken on by JBS who took on a lot of the Haymills staff.

So what’s he going to do? Well, he’s entitled to Spanish unemployment benefit which lasts for up to two years (at decreasing rates) but is linked to previous salary. So he’s taking a year off. He put a brave face on it.

Compare this with yet another Gib painter met this morning. He’d been to Social Security to get the forms for special assistance because he was out of work, the bills had come in, and he couldn’t pay them, and he has a family to feed.

Partner had already been to the job centre that morning and told him there was one unskilled painting vacancy, so your man decided to hot-foot it up there and have a look at it.

So when people wonder why this whole employment issue stirs up such strong feelings this is why. I see no reason at all why a Gibraltarian resident, capable of doing good quality work, can not get a job in Gibraltar – when hundreds of cross-border workers do get those jobs. For the record I am not just talking Spanish here, this includes, Brits, Portuguese, Eastern Europeans, Western Europeans, and anyone else living within a 50km radius of Gib – in some cases 100kms plus. No-one likes being made redundant, laid-off, sacked, whatever, – I’ve been there too, and my sympathies go out to people facing a new year without a job. But the Gibraltar economy is strange, properties are expensive either to rent or to buy, the cost of living is higher than nearby Spain, wages are low, and to see full employment on decent wages for locals seems to be a reasonable aspiration to me.

I will be reporting more about the employment status here in Gibraltar as it is one which concerns so many of us. The construction industry is a big contributor to the Gib economy but unless you have any insight into it, it isn’t obvious how it operates.

Caveat reader: the above tales are merely chats I recount from the last couple of days. I have no official press release to quote, and I haven’t asked for my interview with Mr Bossano yet to ask him about his employment policy. The brief and not very informative Chron article is here.

Everything you ever wanted to know about cat bites

It’s always exciting to tick off another first in life. Or maybe not.

I could have done without ticking off ‘cat bites.’ For anyone who hasn’t read the full story, it’s over here on Clouds.

As I now consider myself to be an expert on cat bites and treatment thereof, I shall share my amazingly useful experiences with you all.

On dashing into the flat, I ran into the bathroom, managing not to faint from extreme loss of blood, and turned on the cold tap to stop the bleeding.

Having accomplished that, or at least stemmed the sanguinous flow, I retraced my steps to catch up Partner and dog.

Returning from dog walk to flat, I turned to the trusty medical dictionary to frighten everyone silly, aka the internet.

For those of you who don’t know, as well as being vicious unpredictable little bastards, cats also have filthy mouths. Possibly even moreso than mine.

They are full of very nasty bacteria. Even if they stay inside apparently they forage through their litter tray. Yuk. Well, so it said on the internet and I believe everything I read.

So, what does one do, having been bitten by one of those unhealthy creatures? Well, they may not be unhealthy, but I would not recommend getting bitten by one.

There seemed to be two alternatives. Call an ambulance and get rushed off to A&E for some antibiotics before septicaemia sets in and your arm drops off.

Grate some carrot and apply a poultice to bites, something in the carrot draws out the nasties.

Ah Dear Readers, those of you who know me even partially will know that I do not like wasting scarce NHS resources. Nor do I like wasting expensive organic carrots, even though I had a stock in the fridge.

‘Salt water,’ said the armchair medic. ‘Put some salt in hot water and soak your hand in it.’ So I did.

Not to be outdone in the home remedy stakes, I countered back ‘Aloe vera, I need aloe vera.’ I sent him out to find some as it grows all over the place. I squeezed the gel on the life-threatening wounds.

That night I dreamed about mad packs of vicious cats attacking my hands and leaping all over me. I woke up with my hand throbbing away, and still badly swollen. Maybe I should have called the ambulance after all. I needed to monitor the situation regularly to await the onset of septicaemia and a green and poisoned arm.

The four bites

Christmas Day with a shiny swollen hand

That morning, Partner met cat owner on the landing, and pointed out that I had been badly bitten by darling cat, and that it really wasn’t a good idea to leave it out on the staircase as our dog had been programmed to Kill Cats.

‘Oh he likes the fresh air,’ she said. Had that been me I would most likely have said one of:

‘Then open the fucking window,’ or

‘Take him upstairs and sit on the roof with him.’

Still, Partner wasn’t the one with the swollen painful throbbing hand that was about to drop off, so he smiled nicely and repeated his polite suggestion to keep Fluffy inside.

Until this point I hadn’t actually realised that he was being deliberately let out. I thought they were being irresponsible by letting him escape, rather than being irresponsible by letting him out. Takes all sorts huh? But really, a block of flats where you live in common with a lot of people is not your own house or your own private space.

We cleared off to Spain and I continued with the salt water/aloe vera treatments.

Aloe vera gel in place over the largest and deepest wound

The ending to this dramatic tale is something of an anti-climax. My hand got better. The last event of any significance was on new year’s day when I managed to knock the scab off the biggest puncture wound and bled happily at the Belén. Fortunately not too much. Or over my good coat or my cream pullover.

So there you go. Next time you get bitten by a cat, if you don’t feel like dashing off to A&E, haven’t any carrots in the fridge – you can always try salt water baths and aloe vera gel.

I did say to Partner, ‘I don’t understand why he bit me. We were best friends the other day.’

You can tell I’ve never lived with cats can’t you?

Old year, new year

In topsy turvy order, this post is about new year’s eve and new year’s day. Topsy turvy in as much as it should sequentially have been posted before the last one. Who cares?

So there we were, happily sitting out on the terrace on new year’s eve. The door frame had been painted up, so the decision had been taken to finish work for the day and the year, and chill out in the sun.

‘Holá’ said the daughter from next door. ‘Os invito a un reunion,’ she said. Which doesn’t translate remotely well, because she wasn’t inviting us to a meeting or anything like that. She and the two sons were performing in the Living Nativity on new year’s day that has now been staged in the village for ten years.

Did we want to go? Ambivalent really. Was her father going? (85 years old) Yes. The penny began to drop. Or the centimo in this case. Did José need escorting up there? Of course. Were we willing to go with him? Of course. None of this was said, natch, it took at least ten minutes for us all to have the discussion and agree what would happen. The Belén started at 6pm more or less, so we arranged to set off somewhere around 5.30/5.45.

……. Fast forward a few mins or hours or whatever

Next doors were chattering away to someone, I couldn’t quite hear who it was, as I was flitting between the terrace and the kitchen.

‘Anyways’ says José, ‘it will be a good evening, so if you want to come, we’ll call for you before 6pm.’

Seemed like the party was growing. I asked Partner, who had espied it all. Only the newly moved-in person over the road at the rich finca. Not only had they been chatting about the Belén but person from the finca had been happily chattering about us. ‘Los Ingleses,’ he said, ‘que viven en el Peñon,’ or something like that.

Clearly José next door thought it would be a good hoot for us all to go out together for the night – and for finca person to discover that we occasionally understood the odd bit of Spanish. Not that José bothered saying we were going too. Oh no.

Even later on, it transpired that one of the grandsons would join they party. How jolly.

…….

Next day. We were called to the party wall around 11am. Grapes and anis were served. We were not allowed to depart before consuming two generous glasses of anis. Typically Spanish generosity – the full bottle of anis was placed on the wall for us to help ourselves (which we didn’t). We were ordered to take all uneaten grapes inside.

….. And, after paella for lunch, no siesta for us, as we psyched ourselves up for the Nativity show.

Come 5pm we were ready. Smart shoes retrieved from the cupboard that had only ever been worn twice. Nice clean jeans. Shirt. Warm pullover and jacket. That was just him. Me – trousers (top button not fastening but we won’t go into that), boots of course, vest, t-shirt, pullover, scarf, big coat – you can tell I used to watch rugby matches in Yorkshire and got used to sitting for hours on end in the freezing cold.

José saw Partner sitting expectantly on the terrace and looking smart, so shot inside to get changed. Off we set. No grandson in sight. We knocked on the big finca gate and rang the bell. No answer. Back down to the usual suspects. We dutifully chaperoned our neighbour up the village streets and arrived at the venue.

He kissed a few women, and we stood by smiling, like the token guiris. We found three seats that suited him, and made sure he sat in the middle. Partner and he chatted amicably away.

Suddenly, we noticed the man from the finca. Psssst, went José, and I said ‘Holá!’ Finca man came and sat in front of us. He had a puzzled look on his face.

‘You’re here with the vecino,’ (neighbour) he said looking at Partner. He clearly couldn’t understand why José was out for the evening with a foreigner. Partner held out his hand and introduced himself. ‘Encantado,’ said finca man. ‘Rafael.’ I introduced myself too. ‘Encantado,’ he said yet again. You could see the cogs visibly whirring around.

Every time he turned around to chat to José, José was in the midst of a chat with the non-Spanish speaking neighbour :D We haven’t seen finca man since. Nice enough guy – but hey! not all Ingleses lack Spanish. Especially after ten years.

It was a good evening, and like any local production, it had its share of mishaps. The star guiding the three kings didn’t pull across correctly on its pulley, one of the horses – frightened by a camera flash – stumbled and chucked its rider, and the curtains to the stable wouldn’t pull correctly to hide Mary giving birth, so poor old Joseph was tugging away at them in the end. But all in all, a good community venture and an enjoyable way to pass an hour or two.

The next day, it happened all over again – no we did NOT go. This time it was on at lunchtime, and we listened to the music and the narration which spread all over the village. It sounded totally different. Hopefully it was just as well attended. We’ve sent a few of the following pix to our Spanish neighbours.

All set - ten minutes later the empty seats were full and it was standing room only

A steady stream of spectators coming through the entrance

Dusk, and the Roman legionaries (including two of our neighbours) on guard

Our neighbour on the right, stitching wool allegedly, not too keen on having her photo taken

A darling donkey! Oh, and Mary and Joseph too. The donkey is prettiest