A few sparks

‘Hola! Buenos dias,’ says our neighbour as usual.

‘Tengo algo para tí.’ (I’ve got something for you).

Well normally that means some veg, but it seemed he needed to bring whatever it was personally rather than hand it over the wall, so Partner skipped out of the gate and waited on the pavement.

In fact it was a business card from an electrician. Hardly something that couldn’t have been passed over the wall. Personally I think José just wanted to come on the terrace to tell me what to do with the garden again.

Apparently, when all sensible people (ie us) were taking their siesta, this electrician turned up to talk to the three or four houses in our part of the street. It seems he has been contracted by the electricity company to change the main cables from the power line to the houses so that we get more current. And he was going to start next week, ie this week.

But our neighbours had told him we were travelling back to Gib, so he could maybe start last week, so I had to ring him.

Well, the first thing to say is that it cost a bloody fortune on roaming for a brief mobile to mobile call. He’ll be getting a text in future.

Next, he didn’t want to work last week at all. He said it was going to rain so obviously he couldn’t be fiddling around with cable in the wet. Zzzzzzzzz! One frizzled sparky.

I asked if he could do the work without us, but apparently not, because he needs to test the leccy inside the house when he has installed the new cables. Fair enough.

We left it that I would ring him when I was going back to Spain so that he could schedule it in.

So we tells the neighbours.

‘Who rang him?’ demanded José.

Well it was me, as I do most of the Spanish ‘phone calls, although Partner can actually do ‘phone calls with people he knows, ie the ones who can understand his Spanish accent by way of Wales, Australia and Newcastle.

José looked put out.

‘Why didn’t you argue with him?’

About not faffing around with mains electricity from the grid when it’s raining? I don’t think so. Not something I would be doing in a hurry.

You could see José was biting his tongue not to ask, ‘Why didn’t you let your partner speak to him? This is Men’s Business.’

I should say at this point, that the original wiring for our house was put in by his wife Adelina, and her sister (used to be her sister’s house). Electrics aren’t José’s strong point. We have since rewired, after the original ceramic switch fell on the floor and shattered our electrics.

It fell on the floor, because I blew the fuse (the whole house was on one circuit) by using the hairdryer to try and look seductive on Valentine’s Night, and the water heater was still on, so boom! or rather bang! And when Partner was trying to sort the fuse he dropped the little ceramic thingy that passed for a fuse control box. Thereby wrecking our electricity supply totally.

Back to the impending visit of the electrician. We told next doors that they have a key so they could let him in. They didn’t want to take that responsibility.

They started arguing between themselves. ‘Sigue!’ snapped Adelina. ‘Sigue tu!’ replied José. ‘Follow,’ as in presumably follow the conversation, because he often doesn’t listen. We stood there laughing waiting for them to finish their marital spat.

‘How about we ring you up when he arrives and you can just drive up?’ suggested Adelina.

Yeah. That’s a great idea. We’ll just sit around waiting for a ‘phone call, jump to attention, put forty quidsworth of diesel in the Landy, pay 15€ in tolls (there and back) for the peaje, drive for three hours, and just scrub our commitments in Gib when we only drove back down a couple of days ago.

No. Life does not work like that. I’d reached an agreement with the electrician so what was the problem? We all have electricity, and quite frankly I don’t care if it gets replaced anyway. Why do I need more current? I don’t.

Anyway, here, for no particular reason, is a photo of the hills behind us that I took that morning. I loved the mist drifting between the low hills and the higher sierras.

The sierras de something or other

Of course when I get back, the cables may well have been replaced anyway!

Happy pig

Top marks for everyone who has dutifully taken their history lesson and learned:

a) who ‘occupied’ Gibraltar and for how long [answers: Moslem 700+ years, British 300+ years, Spanish <250 years, added bonus point for those of you who remember it is currently a British Overseas Territory]

b) that England (later Great Britain) took Gibraltar in 1704 as part of the Spanish war of succession, and the rights to Gibraltar were later ceded by Spain in perpetuity to GB under the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 at the end of the war of succession.

Remember that though, because there will be more on this next week.

Back to present-day Spain.

Wandering around our pueblo we noticed a new development at one of the local bar-restaurants (the village has six for some bizarre reason) – take-away pizzas. That could be useful for an evening meal. If we aren't asleep by the time it opens. Shall have to ask around and see if it is any good and find out when it opens.

Pizza para llevar

The nearest pizza places before this were in town which is four kms away. Not exactly five minutes walk down the street, and cold and soggy before you return, so you might as well eat at the restaurant in town which is far too much like hard work.

On we walked around the houses lining the main road, and we noticed this new and extremely compact vegetable garden. Got to love the way people use space in Spain. In the UK, we like to have lots of space to wander around in and feel affluent. Here, many people use whatever tiny bit of space they have to best advantage.

Compact veg garden

The house itself has been reformed and has been for sale for some time now. The entrance is below street level and it's not a very big house. A British acquaintance we knew went to look at it (it was cheap) but obviously decided not to buy.

The reformed house

A closer look at the veg garden: peas, broad beans, runner beans, cabbage, cauliflower, lettuce and onions. Pretty impressive. So impressive that when we returned home, we started making our plans for adding another veg plot on the terrace.

So little space, so many crops

On the return leg we stopped to talk to a pig. As you do.

(Just out of the picture on the right is a young cockerel, but I have my own, so he didn't get his pic taken).

Happy pig?

(The happy pig was the name of one of my childhood books – I loved it – happy pig had balloons and was generally such a smiley pig).

Hello pig.

Gently snoseing

Oh, here is his/her pal. With the evil eye.

Perhaps s/he didn't like my camera.

What’s going on here?

So cute, rubbing their sensitive noses together.

Still got my eye on you though

Poor little porkers, they will probably end up as jamon serrano. It is ironic that I come to live in one of the best cured ham-producing countries in the world when I am vegetarian, but life is like that. And I couldn’t eat either of those pigs. Not even evil eye.

And back up the main street, one of the local fieldworkers ploughing his ground. I can't call them farmers because basically everyone rents the plots of ground so they are not landowners and they don't have farms. So while I say 'his' ground, I mean the ground he rents. He's never without a huge cigar in his mouth, but sadly he kept turning round to check his work as he was ploughing, so no pic of cigar. Maybe next time.

Earning a living

Still, on with the gardening/growing/crops theme, here is what is left of my nispero tree. One of two, both of which sadly we had to cut down because the roots were beginning to cause cracks in the walls and we didn’t want to see the wall in the street one day, especially not on top of someone or someone’s car.

A sad looking nispero stump

Now being a right-on person and not using pesticides or herbicides, I didn’t want to use poison to kill it off. I did plenty of internet-searching and came up with a few options.

1) Dig it out.

All well and good but because it is in a narrow wall we couldn’t even get a spade in there. No leverage.

2) Salt.

This is meant to work, but apparently it doesn’t do much for the neighbouring part of the garden and remains in the soil. Another no.

3) Human urine.

Worth a go in the dark.

4) Chicken manure.

Got plenty of that too.

5) Seal up the stump to prevent the light getting to it.

Easy enough as well.

So, we reckoned on 3,4 and 5 as our options for a natural way to kill off the stump and roots.

It’s nearly two years since we cut them down, and initially after a period of a few months, I was sad to see that new shoots were vibrantly growing back, even under the plastic and black plastic pot.

This month however, those perky shoots seem to have died back. Could be a success story for urine and chicken manure. And certainly nothing else in the same patch of garden wall has any problems with growing. Two of my lettuces are right next to this tree stump.

Oh, and as well as being chemical-free, it was money-free as well.

When I’m not gardening, walking, cooking, or losing at cards at the finca (a disaster, I got beaten at seven card rummy and gin rummy) I’m reading.

Three books read were: two Jack Higgins, Exocet and Thunder Point, and Len Deighton’s Funeral in Berlin.

Good reads

As soon as I started Exocet I realised I’d read it before. An officer in the Grenadier Guards is seconded to the SAS, goes to the Falklands, gets pulled back to do another job regarding the potential (illegal) acquisition of more Exocets by the Argentinian government. The story moves through UK, France, Falklands and Argentina, and is a good action novel. Also somewhat timely given the 30 year anniversary of the war conflict and the forthcoming sovereignty referendum in the Falkland Islands. Needless to state I read it again and enjoyed it all over. Sometimes books are often better the second time around.

Thunder Point had a wicked anti-hero, or villain for a goody. An ex-IRA killer, who went on to sell his services to any terrorist organisation, is employed (under duress) by the British Secret Service to carry out a job for them in the Caribbean. Another good read.

Funeral in Berlin was a different kettle of fish. Apart from anything else it was set in the Cold War period – hence the scene of activity being Berlin and lots of toing and froing across the wall.

I did get lost in some of the double deals and triple deals and twists with every turn, but that may have been because I read too quickly and I also read it at night. The plot is centred around the premise of the Russians selling a scientist to the west, but nothing is ever what it seems with Deighton.

What is good about both these authors, is that they are hard-hitting (in different ways) and although there are plenty of deaths, there are no gory details or gratuitous murders. The people in their books are professionals and killing is their job. Whether you or I agree with that is another matter, but at least they aren’t writing about sick psycho serial killers and giving us every vile horrific detail about victims being tortured to death.

Before we left Gib, our neighbour plonked a load of books with us. I managed to read one of them at the finca (after I had finished the decent library books). It was the Ravenscar Dynasty by Barbara Taylor Bradford.

This is not a book I would ever choose. But it was readable, at least it was largely set in Yorkshire (Ms Bradford comes from Leeds, and worked in journalism for the Yorkshire Post company so I suppose we have something in common) so that was a minor advantage. It’s about family feuds, family business, handsome hero and, well, you get the idea. Oh, everybody is rich too.

Not one I would recommend, because it isn’t my taste, but if you like that sort of thing then no doubt you would enjoy it. It wasn’t well written, it wasn’t badly written, it just wasn’t anything. Looking up Ms Bradford, I see that her original manuscripts are housed in the Brotherton Library of the University of Leeds alongside those of the Brontës. Does that mean they are comparable authors? I would like to think not. I see Ms Bradford even has an award (OBE) for services to literature. Um.

Speaking of awards I can neatly mention some of the ones I have totally failed to acknowledge over the past few months.

Thanks to the following:

Gerry at Restawyle for Blog of the Year 2012 (told you I was late)

Helen at The Venomous Bede for Versatile Blogger Award

Sisterhood of the World and Very Inspiring Blogger from being mrscarmichael

There were some questions with this sisterhood one, so I thought for once I would graciously answer them.

1) Favourite colour – sludge green

2) Favourite animal – all of them (excludes people of course)

3) Favourite non-alcoholic drink – tomato juice with ice, lemon and tabasco

4) Facebook or Twitter – neither

5) Favourite pattern – Vogue Designer by Armani (I think, because I don’t have it to hand) an asymmetrical jacket, short skirt, all seams over-stitched on the front, and the jacket stiffened with iron-on interfacing before it was put together. Great design. Pic to follow at some point when I remember.

6) Getting or giving presents – getting simple ones – food or flowers

7) Favourite number – 5 and all its multiples, followed by sevens, followed by twos

8) Favourite day of the week – Sunday, it is so peaceful in both Spain and Gib, and when I don’t have to work Monday, there is none of that depression that sets in post lunch when you start thinking about WORK. It’s also a great day to cycle or walk in Spain due to less traffic.

9) Favourite flower – gladioli, lilies, crocuses, jasmine, hibiscus – oh, only one?

10) My passion? – Not a word I use often, although it does occur in my about me page. Otherwise those of you who read Clouds can work out what I get remotely animated about (the latest post being about horse meat in lasagna). Those of you who don’t read Clouds will just have to wonder.

And on blog awards generally, about which I am extremely lax, I never realised there was any value in them until I read timethief’s excellent post about backlinks today.

I’ll end on a serious point for Valentine’s Day because it merits it. Maurice on Duck? Starfish? but…23 has written an excellent post commemorating a tragic oil industry disaster that happened 31 years ago on this day. Not just that, he points out we still don’t learn our lessons from history.

Well worth a read.

Better than reading blog posts about red roses – £45 a dozen today apparently – and no, thank goodness, he didn’t buy me any.

Art for arts sake (2)

One of the strangest customs I have learned from my partner is that of always changing something when a room is decorated.

No, not the colour, but the layout of the furniture or the situation for hanging pictures.

It sounds to me like an old wives’ tale, but he carefully makes sure that at least one thing goes back in a different situation.

Pictures are often an easy way to sort that.

Here, after redecorating our dining room (ie washing down the mould and painting the walls white), are our pictures in there.

A motley mix.

A sepia photo of Bridlington Harbour. Brid is a spa town in the East Riding of Yorkshire and popular holiday resort.

Bridlington Harbour

I spent my long summer holidays there as a child so it was a special place for me. I knew the town better than the ones where I lived and went to school. I was, totally illegally I guess, allowed to wander around the place on my own and would meet my parents later at the bookshop – hopefully to get a new Enid Blyton mystery book which I would then read over lunch at Wilson’s Cafe.

Wilson’s was one of those olde fashionede resstaurants rather than a cafe. You would queue up by a thick heavy red rope to wait for a table in the enormous dining room complete with huge chandeliers, and waitresses in black and white uniforms, including a frilly apron and matching silly hat. I loved their steak and kidney pie.

I loved the harbour at Brid. It was fed by a stream called the Gypsey Race which you could find if you poked around the back streets. My dad – his father and grandfather moved to Brid – used to tell me that if the Gypsey Race ran dry there would be problems. Fairly obvious in retrospect, but I always used to look for the stream and hoped water would be flowing. In my childish mind, I used to think ‘problems’ equalled another war, because my parents often talked about The War. (WW2).

The sepia tones of this photo remind me of Frank Sutcliffe, who took many photos of Whitby. At university I had Sutcliffe prints on my walls. No idea what happened to them.

Here are Luk, Fuk, and Sau. They are Chinese gods who represent happiness, wealth and longevity.

Propitious Chinese gods looking over us

Some years ago, we had a French Mauritian neighbour and she had a Chinese student lodging with her. One day he was going out on her bike, so Partner shot out to offer his helmet to him. When he returned from the city, he presented Luk, Fuk and Sau as a thank you to Partner for looking after his health and well-being. We’ve taken great care of them in our houses and they always go up in our dining room to bring us good feng shui.

This is an extremely nice raptor. The good thing about Spanish newspapers and magazines is that they give decent freebies which is where this came from. I think it is some sort of eagle and it probably says it on the bottom so I will look it up next time. I must have had the frame kicking around so I just slotted the print in there as I thought it matched the colours nicely.

Watching raptor

I love this Toucan. Along with the sepia photo of Brid, it was one of the treasures that lurked in my parents’ dining room sideboard that I discovered in there as a kid. I have no idea where either came from or why they lurked in a cupboard rather than put on the wall. I suppose my parents weren’t really into prints/paintings/whatever.

This one was folded in half for many, many, years – but why not put him on the wall? So, at some point, as with the Brid pic, I acquired him and framed him. Not the best of frames to be honest. It’s one of those Ikea plain glass jobs, but I like the black background. If the glass ever smashes, then I’ll get it reframed, otherwise it can stay as it is in the dining room aviary.

Toucan

And finally in the dining room, here is Partner with his Land Rover mate, posing next to our Land Rover Santana. His mate had been working in Antarctica, and flying back to the UK via Madrid, dropped by Málaga to see us for a few days. We don’t like many people but it was wonderful to see him. He’ll always be welcome at our home/s.

Landy Andy

The frame is vastly over the top but it was an ethical one I bought back in the UK from a local Out of this World store.

And for those of you who haven’t seen the kitchen piccies, an original signed watercolour by Walter Horsnell RA, bought by my parents on their honeymoon in Knaresborough, Yorkshire (because back in the 50s people didn’t do exotic honeymoons) and some copper prints from Brazil, given to us by my godmother/older cousin who lived there for many years. Yes, I know you can’t see the copper engravings in detail but I’m giving an idea rather than detail. It’s good enough.

Copebras

To finish off the art theme, we ie he hung our Hockney print this weekend in Gibflat and I received some wonderful prints in the post today so will be spending more money at the picture framer up the street and our Gibflat will look a little less stark.

The rain in Spain …..

… hasn’t happened very much this winter at all in my part of Spain, and we are all moaning about how much we need the water.

A rare sight - a wet table

Rose in the rain

Normally the winter months ie Jan to March do see some decent rainfall, with snow on the mountains, but this year there has been muy poco (very little).

Naturally, on Saturday morning in Gibraltar, with a sulking tumble dryer, we awoke to hear the sound of rain on the window. Quite heavy. ‘Quickly,’ I ordered, from the comfort of my thermarest, ‘Get the washing in.’ Which he did.

Hey, he’d got up to make coffee, might as well make himself useful while I grabbed a few more minutes snooze time.

He’d done it remarkably quickly, so I draped it all around the flat, and hoped it would be dry on our return.

The journey up to Spain was cloudy, but no torrential downpours.

And then, it started spotting. As we approached our normal dogwalking stop by the beach, it was bucketing down. The dog doesn’t like the rain so we by-passed that one.

I jumped out elsewhere to take a few piccies.

Boats on the beach - not going anywhere

We arrived home, jumped out, ran inside. We opened the door to watch the rain and the dog promptly ran outside!! He came back inside equally promptly. Silly dog.

It didn’t last long however, and today dawned bright and sunny although with a cold wind.

Just as I was getting brunch ready, José called me.

My heart sank. We were having some left over bean slop for breakfast and some tempeh sandwiches.

He proffered a plate of sweet Spanish cakey things that they eat at Easter. Adelina had got two glasses ready for us to get rat-arsed on anis while getting sugar-overdosed on the cakey things. Roscas de Pascua.

Roscas

I explained we were coming back to Gib so we couldn’t drink while driving and we were about to eat and ….

Their little faces fell. Partner came out and saved the day by picking up one of the cakes and shovelling it in. I caved in and said I would have a glass of anis after all (passenger me so no worries there). They looked much happier.

There was a long chat about how they hadn’t seen us over Easter to offer us these goodies, and we were often gone too soon.

We sighed in sympathy and pointed out that we did have to go to work (well, Partner does), and there ain’t much of that in España right now.

From there we discussed world politics as you do, which as usual included Gib’s status and the Spanish claim, and Argentina sabre-rattling about the Falklands. I did notice some weeks ago that the first motion on the agenda for the new Argentine parliament was about Las Malvinas. (Spanish for Falkland Islands). I do think President Kirchner should back off with her bellicose bollocks, or perhaps she thinks she is the new Margaret Thatcher?

However, we managed to avoid falling out with our neighbours, and in the midst of these political hot topics, Adelina was busy saying how she had made the roscas. This was probably because after so many years of living next to us, they know exactly what we eat and don’t eat. So many bought Spanish sweet things are full of lard. I still left the roscas alone, and we agreed to take the rest of them back with us as Partner’s compañeros will no doubt appreciate them tomorrow. Or maybe not.

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Working holiday part 2

Well the Easter Bunny didn’t bring us any choccy eggs which is just as well because we wouldn’t have eaten them.

But we did get a rather nice freebie just before the holiday which will come in most useful.

Doing a refurb always involves getting rid of stuff. The firm Partner is working for at the moment ripped out a kitchen. Did anyone want this granite? A breakfast bar, a corner piece and a long piece with a sink cut-out.

‘That will do nicely for your finca won’t it?’ said one colleague. Hey, we don’t even have to put up our hand and ask. Everyone knows we are tight-arsed into the environment and recycling.

Partner agreed. So instead of being taken to the tip and chucked out, it got put in our truck to take back to Spain.

And as luck would have it, when we arrived, one of our neighbours, his son and his son’s mate were outside. Quick as a flash they were commandeered to unload, the two young lads picking up the huge piece as though it was cotton wool.

‘That’s for jovenes,’ [young people] said our neighbour sagely as he and Partner took the two smaller pieces. Offers of tinnies of beers were refused so we’ll find another way to pay back.

So after ten years of washing up in a plastic bowl on top of a Black and Decker workmate, and throwing the water over the wall, I may get a sink. But hell, there is no rush after all this time. And I need to design and measure up first. That could take a while.

On the road back to Gib we saw this rather neat car flying past us.

‘Aston Martin, DB4′ said Partner. (He likes Aston Martins although not as much as Land Rovers).

Flying too fast to take a photo but we spotted it again in the frontier queue. They must have taken the scenic route after they flew past us.

‘No, I think I’m wrong,’ said Partner sadly. ‘The front end doesn’t look right.’

Any views dear car experts?

Having been to more than enough shops for one day (previous post), we rejected the idea of Morrisons, and I decided I could rustle something up with what little we had in. [tempeh and tofu with a couple of dipping sauces for those of you who are interested - the sauces are probably worth a post at some point]

So we got in, unpacked, and then took an evening walk on Easter Monday with the dog.

Gib wasn’t exactly busy. Just how we like it.

Looking down Main Street (north)

Looking up Main Street (south, obviously)

Looking up the Rock from Referendum Gates

Once through the gates, looking up from Trafalgar Cemetary with the cable car and Trafalgar Heights building on the right of the pic – Trafalgar Heights has a marked resemblance to the leaning tower of Pisa for some strange reason

And down to Queensway Quay marina with the boat masts just visible through the entrance

A lovely ending to a great long weekend.

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Working holiday

Gotta love an extra-long weekend. Hey we live in Gibraltar and Spain.

The Mediterranean is our oyster. What to do??

And we both suddenly decide this is the right time to spring clean. It’s not even Spring (Clean) Bank Holiday. Something wrong there.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday morning, clean the flat (just the usual, wash walls, floors, furniture, get rid of all damp, iron, hang washing out due to sulking tumbly….)

Sunday drive back to Spain, OK, slight break, chill out on the terrace waiting for the chick peas.

Monday – waaah!! (oh, that was today!! seemed like years ago) Did my head in. Pay a load of bills a) at the water office. The water company happens to have offices across the border in La Linea, but I can’t pay there for my finca bills. I have to pay where the Spanish finca is. We can only go back at weekends and they open Mon-Fri from 9-1pm. Globalisation and computerisation don’t seem to have hit Aqualia yet.

But luckily Spaniards revel in Semana Santa and Holy Thursday (ie Maundy Thursday) and Holy Friday (Good Friday) are their big days. By Easter Monday they are all back to work. Including the water office. Zing pay three months worth of bills.

And the post office, zing, pay another few months worth of bills for the electricity company. In fact, when I arrived there were only 33 people in front of me. The ticket machine said 32 and mine was 65. Gloom. Nice Spanish woman said: ‘Senora, mira, hay un ticket en la mesa con un numero bajo de tuya.’

[There's a ticket on the counter with a lower number than yours].

Thank you very much Senora, says me, and only had to wait for 15 minutes or so.

Go to the chicken food man, the supermarket, the health food shop, the other branch of the health food shop to buy more of the delicious vegetarian mortadela and tempeh.

Oh, and then fit the new screen for our chicken house.

Another work in progress

Bed frame, picked up some years ago.

Garden wire, patronisingly generously given to us by a client who was moving house so had no further use for it. Someone’s rubbish is always etc etc etc

Cable ties were bought.

Time for some food. Left over chick pea soup and some mortadela sandwiches with light tapas.

Scran

Then a drive back to our other life. Back to Gib, more work.

Gib

What holiday was that one, remind me again?

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Move along

No posts on here for now. I’m a busy woman. Need to keep up to all my other blogs.

The dog is complaining about the absence of posts on his blog. The ironing is complaining about being wrinkled.

The alcachofas want to be cooked (Ok maybe not). The floor definitely wants to be mopped.

And as for the bathroom?

So if you want to see sunny Spain, you can head over to Everypic where I did actually post something today here.

Thank you for your viewing and your patience.

(Yes, I know I posted this on Clouds, or similar less irritable words, but some of you follow one blog, some follow another, and some just click like as soon as a new post comes up on the feed, but we won’t get into blogging politics. Not today anyway).

Now, the big decision – artichokes or ironing? Of course – artichokes first and iron while artichokes are cooking. Silly me.

Alcachofas - from my Spanish neighbours at the weekend

Waste not, want not

Going to a posh private school from the age of 4, and continuing through the same school until 18, diving in skips wasn’t one of the lessons I learned.

My mother snobbishly abhorred sales, and totally refused to queue with the masses, preferring to pay full price and receive grovelling treatment from sales staff.

Personally, I couldn’t see anything wrong with getting something decent for a cheaper price, although I didn’t buy into (ha!) buying something for the sake of it just because it was cheap.

Oddly enough, some years back, I was happily working away at a reasonable job, earning a reasonable salary, and neighbours were offering me their cast-offs. Why didn’t they offer it to someone else who needed it? The illogic defied me, but I did put my foot down and decided for once, I would buy something I wanted, instead of having a home full of other people’s crap.

Fast forward however, and accepting cast-offs suddenly becomes A Good Thing in Spain.

I have no income, so if someone gives me something, it costs me nothing, apart from a payback of whatever type.

When we first moved to Spain, our neighbours would present us with all their leftover meals. It was like a soup kitchen. I was mortified. I ate it of course, wondering what on earth I was doing. Did I appear so poverty-stricken??

I didn’t know if my neighbour had deliberately cooked too much, to pass the food onto us, or whether she always cooked loads. Who can say?

But I learned to accept whatever meals we were given with an extremely good grace, washed up whatever pans/plates were given to us, and said Gracias.

I was horrified when Partner started to haul bikes onto the terrace that he had rescued from the side of the skip. Why did we want all these pushbikes? What was he going to do with them?

Rescued bikes (and a rescued garden chair, painted grey)

Apparently not just he, but we, were going to cycle. He cast his expert eye over the rescues. Bit of cable, a couple of wheel nuts, and we were ready to go. (Original post here). To be fair though, people had money at the time in Spain, and they were throwing bikes out like there was no tomorrow. Some of the bikes were decent. No-one throws out bikes any more.

Four green garden chairs were rescued (still have those), two white chairs were acquired (since gone back to the skip when they broke), a few plants, missed a couple of wrought iron chairs sadly because we were too slow in going back to a more distant skip, and then the sources dried up.

Garden chairs

But! We have had a recent find in Gib. Ten years or so ago, I bought a metal bucket, and when we bought our finca, there was a nice little mop squeezer thing left behind by the previous owner which fitted nicely on the top, just right for my new domestic cleaning life.

Now, it is sadly perishing in the heat and the damp and with the over-use.

I tried to buy a new one. ‘No,’ said the man in the shop. ‘Unidad.’ I had to buy a bucket as well, ie the whole unit. Er, I don’t think so. I had a bucket. Somewhere, surely, I must be able to find one of those squeezy-out things that would fit my round bucket? And not have to buy another bucket? Just for information, the current wave of buckets and squeezy-outs are sort of oval shape. I wondered if they had stopped making the ones to fit round buckets.

Partner came home extremely smugly the other day. In his carrier bag, there was the perfect squeezy-out, generously thrown out by someone who no longer had any use for it on the estate where Partner is working. They have probably bought an oval ‘Unidad’ because you have to buy new all the time, don’t you?

Prize find

ETA – more on this theme of our disgraceful and irresponsible throwaway society over on Clouds here.

Spanish interlude

If the dog’s routine has changed due to this nuisance novelty of the work thing, so has ours.

The working week plus overtime means finca time is somewhat sparse, but we managed a quick trip back.

En route, or I suppose, en ruta, we always stop for a walk with the dog at the beach. Someone is collecting seawater, as you do.

What are they going to do with that salt water?

Back at the finca, in the glorious sunshine, there is snow on the top of the nearby mountain. Brrrrr.

Chilly up there

I did notice José had pruned my rose bush. Not to my liking, so I pruned it back a bit more. But he had also watered the garden so who am I to complain? Good neighbours vale mucho.

One of my money trees, keep flowering sweeties, I need you right now

As we don’t stay for Sunday lunch, I decided Saturday would be the new paella day.

Should probably have posted this on the not aphotoblog to get the green background :D

A weekend passes all too quickly. Sunday morning saw us cleaning and preparing to leave.

Opposite us at the big finca, the resident person opened his bedroom windows and called ‘Good morning’.

‘Buenos,’ says me. (Short for buenos dias, good day).

Partner was a bit more thinking. ‘Good morning,’ he said very Britishly, respecting our neighbour’s English. And then added, ‘Buenos dias.’

A bit later on, finca man asked Partner if we liked acelgas (spinach beet). Well, yes, we like anything us if it’s free. We’ve learned that one in Spain. In fact we like acelgas so much we grow it in the garden and we just got a bunch of it the day before from Adelina, but hey, some more is great. Lesson Numero Uno in Spain. Never, but NEVER refuse anything because a) you will be considered extremely stupid and b) you will never get asked again.

So, Partner clears off over for the acelgas fest and I turned off breakfast when he didn’t return immediately. I figured they were having a coffee and a chat or something. As you do in Spain.

Eventually he wanders over with a huge crate.

Thanks neighbour

Not only had they picked acelgas, they had picked a load of habas too (broad beans). ‘Medio para mí y medio para mi vecina,’ said Partner.

Habas, tan frescita

So I shared them out and gave half to Adelina next door. But can you ever give anything to someone in Spain without getting something back? I suppose you can if they are robos, but in the case of our neighbours, they will always find something. I mean, they weren’t even our beans that we were giving away! But I still got a handful of herbs, herbabuena (mint) y perejil (parsley).

Mint and parsley

Which gives me a great excuse to talk about Isla de Perejil, Parsley Island, just off Ceuta in the Straits of Gib. Or its other names Leila, Laila (cue for an Eric Clapton song here methinks!) in Moroccan, and Tura in Berber.

In 2002 there was a military dispute about this islet. The summary is that Moroccan forces set up a base there and the Spanish commandoes went in and cleared them off.

You may not have read about this exciting dispute in the British or American or any other world press. I mention it because it is just part of the whole sensitive territorial issue thing that surrounds the Straits of Gibraltar.

Just as Spain claims Gib, and wants to retain Ceuta and Melilla, Morocco claims Ceuta and Melilla – and all of Andalucía actually – the tiny islet of Perejil is part of the mix – claimed by both Spain and Morocco.

Now, the Guardian reported this as the first invasion of western European soil since the second world war. And said that Moroccan soldiers took the Spanish-owned Isla de Perejil – WAIT!!! Whose side is the Guardian on? This is disputed territory.

Oh! Just like Gib!!

I had a great question from Jan about what is there to do in Gib, so the next post will be on the lines of Things to do in Denver when you are dead Things to do in Gib if you are still alive.

And musica. Rosario.

I bought her CD ‘Contigo me voy’ based on the single of the same name, El beso (contigo me voy).

For non-Spanish speakers, Contigo me voy, is – with you I go. El beso is – the kiss.

She is from Madrid, and according to wiki:

Rosario Flores (born November 4, 1963) is a two-time Latin Grammy Award-winning Spanish gypsy singer and actress.

(Note to irritable grammar pedants, I do wish people would say twice instead of two-time/s)

I was going to post Contigo me voy, but today I feel like Rumbo del Bongo. I swear the Spanish grow up learning to sing and to smile and to enjoy la vida. Ojalá.

I should also add that my CD has a beautiful romantic photo of a wistful looking young woman. You won’t see that on the vid if you click on the link. This woman is four years younger than me, so approaching 50 at the time it was filmed last year. I think Rosario is shit hot.

Yes, we did eat spinach last night. Spinach lasagna :D

Oh, and for those of you who don’t visit, there are more Spanish pix over on Every pic

Finca renovation – the bedroom

Continuing on with the finca renovation saga from my Itchy Feet blog – the next room to be tackled was the bedroom.

I had started hacking out some of the plaster in the bedroom back in February when we began the revamp, but the rest of the work had to wait while we systematically – and slowly – worked through the house.

Thing is though, that what appears to be plaster, isn’t.  It’s actually earth mixed with sand from the arroyo (stream bed), and a tiny bit of cement.  Because – with the exception of the cement – it was all freely available back in the year dot.  Gather the earth and the sand, and pay for the cement.  So that’s why it isn’t durable and breaks down.  It is for some years, but not for ever and a day.

So, first up, all pictures off the walls, and furniture, except the bed and wardrobe, moved out and plonked in any available space.

Same treatment as all the other rooms, remove all the soft and crumbling surface and scrape off loose and flaking paint.  Apply PVA to the gaping holes, fill with sand and cement, apply PVA to everything else in sight, fill any other rough gaps – and, then we ran out of materials.

Soft mixture running right along the wall, hacked out, to be replaced with sand and cement

Rendering

Yet another hole - and typical Spanish electrics - cable just hanging around

Partner also had a fit of refixing the electrical sockets which annoyed him because they weren’t flush to the wall.

Neat and tidy socket set back in the wall

So next time will involve multi-finishing the walls to give a smoother appearance (although not too smooth, it is rustic after all), and yet more white paint everywhere.

What else did we get up to?

Well, we cracked the almonds given to us by next doors after they had finally dried out. The nuts not the neighbours.  Did you know that almonds have three, or is it four? different layers?  First the soft greeny outer skin that needs to dry before you can deshell them.  Then a crispy shell, then the brown one that surrounds the white kernel – and then the final white juicy nut.

Just like a real campo worker, straw hat and all

Cracking technique?

Moving onto some more food shots……

Hard work in the bedroom calls for some breakfast.  Fresh mango from our next door neighbours and an espresso.  The coffee is a bog-standard espresso blend from Mercadona.  The Picasso cup and saucer were a freebie with one of the Spanish newspapers – very cool I think.

Delicious ripe mango

Seitan is one of the staple vegetarian/vegan protein foods.  Made from spun wheat it obviously isn’t suitable for anyone who can’t eat wheat products, but for those who can, it makes an excellent casserole, or fries up well in fillet style.

I found an amazing link which says how much protein there is in seitan – I’ve been eating it for years but didn’t know that.

Here it is raw…

Seitan slices

And in casserole with cauliflower and a puree of sweet potatoes and real potatoes…

Seitan casserole

Another good protein product is the fermented soya-based tempeh.

For breakfast, with fried sweet potatoes, mango chutney, pickled onion, and tomato tapas

Tempeh brunch

Finally – paella.  I sort of use a Sarah Brown recipe, or method anyway.

Fry onion and garlic.  Add veg, she uses artichokes, beans and peas, I use flat beans (habachuelas), and whatever else is in season, either peas (chicharros), broad beans (habas), asparagus, occasionally fresh artichokes.  I chucked a few setas (oyster mushrooms?) and courgette (calabacin) in this one.

Veg paella

Now, just about every recipe I have read for saffron (azafran) tells you to add a few strands to boiling water to let it dissolve.  Do not be misled by such advice dear paella cooks.  It is a rubbish method and has never yet turned my rice yellow.  Far better to add the strands to your onion and garlic at the beginning and cook gently.

Once you have stirred your veg around a bit in the paella pan (a good pan is another essential), add some arborio rice or whatever it is called.  Short grain paella rice basically.  Stir that around for a while too.

I think adding boiling water is a BAD idea.  Add cold (bottled) water, poco a poco, and your rice absorbs the water slowly, without leaving you with a sludgy mess, or goo or whatever.  I invariably turn it off for a while to let it sit and absorb the water and generally fluff itself out, hence why I start to make paella pretty soon after breakfast.

Also add tomatoes, herbs, (thyme, mixed herbs, fresh parsley), and olives.  Serve with fresh lemon wedges and tamari if you like shoyu. At some mysterious point you will also notice your rice has turned yellow.

Yes!! That elusive yellow tinge to the rice

Keep the pan for paella only, and you will never have any problems washing it out either.  Mine is totally unSpanish and happens to be an Aga Rayburn pan, but it certainly works well.

¡Buen provecho!

Oh, and it rained too.  The first rain of the autumn.  The sort of days when you can’t do anything because it rains all day for two or three days in a row.  Still, have cards, dominoes, books, bottle of wine and tins of beer and an excuse to do little else but eat, drink and be merry.

Next in the finca project series will, hopefully, be the completion of the bedroom. It’s only taken us a year to do four rooms……