Queen’s Speech and Gibraltar

Good one Liz. You know who Liz is, that woman who lives in London in a chic townhouse facing The Mall. (Buckingham Palace)

If you think I am being flippant with the term townhouse, try the wiki link. More info on the actual monarchy website about the history.

However, browsing through the Gib govt website – in vain – for any nice jobs, I read a press release about the Queen’s speech to Parliament yesterday morning.

“My government will ensure the security, good governance and development of the overseas territories, including by protecting the Falkland Islanders’ and Gibraltarians’ right to determine their political futures.”

The Queen’s speech to Parliament is a State Occasion in the United Kingdom and represents the policy of Her Majesty’s Government of the UK.

This sentiment was also included in the “Mid-term Review” of the Coalition Government which was recently published by Downing Street.

That this reference should have been included in such a high profile speech for the first time is a huge step for Gibraltar.

I do hope that means a little gun boat diplomacy. Wait! Do we have any gun boats left? (Shh, the Spaniards may be reading this blog). After all didn’t Cameron (UK Prime MInister) announce some rather sweeping cuts to the armed forces?

Cuts are OK in all services, preferably ones I don’t use (eg education, housing, benefits blah blah), but this is the Ministry of Defence isn’t it? It should be defending the sovereign realm as a priority. Or should our armed forces be invading other countries where we have absolutely no right to be?

Perhaps it should be renamed the Ministry of Attack Other Countries under the Orders of the USA and the United Nations?

Whoever wrote Liz (QEII)’s speech made a decent job of including Gib and the FI though. Thank you.

[I'm not sure I would have written 'including by protecting' - too many gerunds too close together. 'Including the protection of' - maybe? Or That will include protecting' ?]

[Regarding queens, (regnant, I add hastily) I see that former Queen Beatrix (Netherlands) has resigned in favour of her son Willem. Hmm. I prefer the British monarchy ideal that it is a job for life that you are born into. Which is one reason why I wouldn't want to see some sleazy-arsed blood-sucking politician as head of the nation.]

However returning to our boys and girls men and women in blue, (the Royal Navy and our Senior Service – no! not cigarettes). We have a nuclear sub in Gib. Or maybe it has gone now. Who knows? You can hardly see them on Z berth. (The nuclear berth in Gib and not widely sign-posted).

Another press release:

The Government notes and welcomes the arrival in Gibraltar of HMS Talent, a Royal Navy, Trafalgar Class Nuclear Submarine.

Chief Minister, the Hon Fabian Picardo, said: “The movement of Royal Navy vessels is not a matter within the Constitutional competence of Her Majesty’s Government of Gibraltar.

All vessels of the Royal Navy and of allied powers invited into British Gibraltar Territorial Waters by Her Majesty’s Government are very welcome on the Rock.”

Nice little bit of gung-ho patriotism there Fabian, especially as the EU is still clinging to its decision that Gib/UK territorial waters belong to Spain. Shitheads.

No nuclear sub pictures available so I offer you a frigate.

HMS Chatham – type 22 batch 3 frigate

Continuing on the defence theme, and moving onto the boys and girls men and women in light blue, (the Royal Air Force – RAF). I see the scariest airport in Europe (Gibraltar airport) is about to be demolished to make way for a car park. Of course, we need more car parks in Gib because it is just such a huge place to get around that everyone needs a car, don’t they?

I like this old building. Whenever I visited it, I didn’t see any huge queues at the check-in desks, and it seemed perfectly adequate. The currency counter and toilets were also handy when I was walking over to Spain. And I thought the 1959 building added to the sense of nostalgia that some people like to find in Gib. And anyway, it’s as old as me. Should I therefore be demolished in favour of something bright, shiny and new? Don’t answer.

Monteverdi will shortly be knocking it down at the cost of £230, 318.01. And one penny? Who tenders with a price like that? Note to self, when pricing for Gib Govt, always put in a senseless price. And add one penny.

For more about the state opening of Parliament and the Queen’s role – visit Stephen’s good post.

Semana Santa

Holy Week in Spain is a big event. Especially in Andalucía.

The capital cities of each province vie with each other for the biggest, best and most lavish processions.

Seville, reputedly, is the classic one to visit, closely followed by Málaga and Granada. Depends what you read as to which one is ‘best’. Other great Andalucían ones include Córdoba, Jaen, Cadiz and Almería. Not sure about Huelva, but probably up there with the rest of the best.

Our neighbours were discussing it some years ago. Córdoba, pronounced José to his family, had the best procession.

His daughters looked at him in disbelief.

‘You’ve never been to Córdoba,’ said Marcella.

‘I’ve seen it on the TV,’ he answered back knowledgeably and thereby ending the discussion with his patriarchal viewpoint.

Except he didn’t. The daughters laughed at him and told him he was talking a load of rubbish. They probably agreed that Málaga had one of the best.

My first view of Semanta Santa in Málaga was before the actual Holy Week (ie this week) when they basically have trial runs and cart out the religious effigies from their normally sleepy post in church to somewhere else. I have no idea why they do this, but it means that on a Saturday afternoon approaching Málaga bus station, your bus will be stuck in a queue.

So, dear readers, what happened when I later went to Málaga to view some Semana Santa processions?

Well there were a number of considerations to take into account. All of which I failed to do.

1. Processions start off late (remember this one, it’s important)
2. If they don’t start off late, they end up late as they traipse around quite long routes carrying extremely heavy tronos
3. If it rains, they start off even later (if they start at all)
4. There are a lot of people. This is not for the claustrophobically challenged. The pavements, bars, streets are just full of people. Forget going where you want. You go where you can, and even that is difficult.
5. There is a timetable. Ignore it and hope you are lucky enough to see something.

Not being aware of any of those, I had planned an energetic leap around Málaga to catch three processions. Good huh?

No. We got stuck in crowds, bars, rain and decided to catch the last bus home without seeing anything. But wait! Before we did, a procession approached. All was not lost. We stayed to watch. And it made the whole evening worth it. Semana Santa in Málaga is worth the effort. Well, only once anyway.

Next up, Vélez-Málaga. My local county town. Much smaller. While the Málaga processions are on main streets, you could touch the tronos in Vélez. A trono is probably a litter for want of a better word, but I can’t think of a good translation.

We were so close to one that was swaying so much I thought it might fall on us. The tronos are incredibly heavy, which is why the processions take so long. Every ten steps (or so it seemed), they put down the trono and take a rest.

The processions are organised by brotherhoods of the churches. In Vélez I was surprised to see a number of women carrying the tronos. Rather them than me.

Music is solemn and religious. Lots of battering drums. Very atmospheric. As many of the processions take place in the evening, or night, some are done by candlelight.

I do have some SLR photos of Vélez so if I find them, I will scan and add them on here, or maybe Everypic.

Photos are of the posters that are printed every year to publicise Semana Santa. It is a big event.

The penitents who form part of the procession. Eat your heart out KKK.

Jésus. Looking a bit waxy. As you do when you have died and come back to life

This is just a poster. Imagine this on a float surrounded by flowers, trees and whatever else

I’m always surprised it doesn’t happen in Gib, given the huge Catholic population and that Gib does celebrate Día de los Reyes (Day of the Kings for Epiphany).

But apart from that odd anomaly, Gib sticks to Brit traditions, so our Easter is Good Friday and Easter Monday, whereas Spain takes holiday on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. [Note, when I was in the civil service we got the afternoon of Maundy Thursday off too, for some reason I never worked out.]

Let’s finish with a little spice.

I see the Spanish are trouncing the Brits.

This time, in the crappy royal family stakes.

The head of Spanish intelligence was quizzed behind closed doors in parliament on Tuesday over whether public money had been spent on a woman whose friendship with King Juan Carlos has fueled talk of scandal and abdication.

[Reuters]

Nice one Juan Carlos. I wrote about his hunting safari in Botswana last year, but it seems this woman was involved in that as well. She ran a British-based company that acted as an intermediary, oh and well, just fill in the script yourselves, you can work it out.

But is Felipe (crown prince and heir to the throne) any better than Juan Carlos? Not in my opinion, certainly not with his anti-Gib stance. So why swap one poor monarch for another?

In this most important week of the Christian world, don’t you just love a Catholic monarchy where:

a. Sofia of Greece had to change her religion to Catholicism on marrying Juan Carlos of Spain (got to love religion getting in the way of personal relationships)
b. The king in his seventies is rumoured to have a lover in her late 40s
c. The heir to the throne of a Catholic country (Prince Felipe) marries a divorcee

Juan Carlos and Corinna.

And, of course the Daily Wail.

I’m eleven words short for a WPLongform tag. I think I can soon fix that ;)

Encerrado!

In my own house no less. Imprisoned. Locked in.

I set off to do the weekend turnaround on the bus. Nice sleepy journey up. Arrived in Málaga just after 1pm. Plenty of time to catch the 1.30 bus to the village.

But no! What was that long queue doing there for tickets? There must have been 20 or 30 people. Naturally, most of them were booking tickets for a few hours hence, or even in a few days time.

There was a ticket machine, for which you needed a debit/credit card. I watched a few people fail to achieve any success from it and decided not to risk a captured card. I stood in the queue wondering why they didn’t have a window for immediate departures.

Behind me were two people wanting the same route and the same time of bus. We all missed our bus because of the crazy queue. I went to one of the bus station bars to drown my sorrows with a small cerveza, San Miguel, 1.20€. I didn’t buy any food as I had been overly stuffed the last time.

When the bus arrived, I joined the queue. The passengers in front and behind me paid in cash on the bus. Not for them the stupidity of joining a queue at the ticket office.

I’d thought about risking that, but I’ve tried it before and been told ‘No, go and buy your ticket from the ticket office.’ He probably didn’t like foreigners. And if I’d done that and got sent back to the ticket office I would probably have missed the next bus as well.

Did I have half an hour to spare? Yes. But why can’t there be a consistent policy? Local journey passengers can pay on the bus, or queue here for immediate departures?

Arriving home, my neighbour immediately came out to greet me. We discussed the progress of my broad beans, the weather, all the usual.

Broad beans starting to flower

He told me there hadn’t been much rain, but the front door was sticking a bit at the bottom so I needed to kick it.

Um. The last time I did that, I kicked off the paint and was not the most popular woman on earth with Painting Partner. I gave it a gentle nudge and it opened.

Front door

About 3am I woke up in a panic. I wouldn’t be able to open the front door to get out. It would be stuck. I couldn’t get out of the window, those nice fancy rejas – window grilles to prevent burglars – prevent an occupant escaping as well as unwanted visitors entering, and the other door out from the patio into the street was playing up with the lock not wanting to work. I couldn’t risk leaving the house unlocked.

I spent most of the night awake fretting about that, and going through various scenarios.

1) Call Jose when he woke up on Sunday morning and ask him to push the front door.

2) Risk trying the patio door lock – and risk the security of the property.

3) Consider climbing over the patio wall, say 12 foot high and a steep drop down.

The only good thing I could focus on was that I had some bread in the freezer, and some left-over food in there too, some tins of sweetcorn, lots of rice, pasta, lentils, beans, and a couple of courgettes, one egg, and some garlic in the fridge. Oh and lots and lots of olives.

I figured I could make it until the weekend when I would be rescued by Partner (who had work commitments).

Meanwhile in panic mode, I decided to text him. At 3.45am. No answer :(

Eventually he got in touch around 8am telling me to open the lock, stick in a credit type card to stop the lock shutting and pull on the bottom of the door (there is a gap). Well that was worse than useless. No way could I get anywhere with my feeble grip. And the card fell out too.

Fuck it. I grabbed the top of the door, which was free, and yanked. I nearly fell on the floor when the door opened.

But next problem. Would I be able to shut it? Well, the short answer is yes I did. OK, not the first time, because I had left one of the bolts open so that I didn’t get locked out (unlikely given the sticking on the bottom, but still, best to keep to a routine). Once I’d closed the bolt, it slammed with a resounding bang.

My neighbour was watching of course. I duly reported that I had turned off the water, he watched me locking the door, and then asked if I had locked everything securely inside. What a sweety. I really couldn’t ask for better neighbours.

I walked out of the gate and looked back up the street in case he was watching me off, he was. I gave him a wave.

Leaving the village to hit the main road

The return journey was uneventful apart from the fact I spent 40 minutes at the bus stop when buses normally arrive at least every 30 mins. And the bus from Málaga to La Linea was full of crazy people who insisted on pulling curtains to hide from the sun.

They didn’t just pull the curtain for their seat, they decided to pull it back into mine. I moved seat. I liked to see where I am travelling and I like the sun.

Some women got on in Marbella. ‘Can you pull your curtain please?’ said one of them in not very good Spanish.

‘Non.’ I said. And just to make it clear, I added ‘No quiero.’ I don’t want. The bus was more than half empty. If you don’t like it, fuck off and sit in another seat, sensibly on the other side of the bus where there is less bright sunlight. And what was even more annoying was that every time the bus changed direction, all these curtain twitchers kept pulling them backwards and forwards. Serious cases of OCD.

The bus driver put on the air-conditioning. In December! According to the temperature sign in the bus it was 22 degrees. I put my Goretex back on. It was freezing with the air-con.

By the time we got to La Linea, the weather had changed anyway, grey and damp. No-one had their curtain pulled across.

The air-con was off and I was roasted! Why do people have to change things all the time? There is no need to pull curtains and hide from the sun in December. There is no need to put on the air-conditioning. Just take off your coat.

It was of course, bitterly cold (well, relatively) when I got off the bus and headed for the frontier. Nasty cold damp wind. I trudged slowly up Main Street, and fell into the flat, where a delicious casserole was waiting for me. I just love men who cook (future post on Clouds about that one).

Then we both went to sleep. Neither of us had slept since 3/4am when I had woken up in a fit of panic and texted him. He’d read the text but not replied thinking I was asleep. As if!! So we’d both spent half the night worrying about something that didn’t happen. That’s old age for you.

Santander, Burgos, Madrid, Málaga

As someone who has delusions about her station in life and far more aspirations than I can afford, I naturally decided when I quit work, to quit flying.

I should have been born to the rich families whose offspring went on The Grand Tour overland through Europe. In fact I’ve done The Grand Tour more than once, just on a slightly cheaper budget than rich upper class young men did a few hundred years ago.

So, when it became obvious that I would be returning to the UK from time to time, and far more frequently than I had planned, I rapidly became acquainted with every way under the sun of getting from Málaga to York.

The fastest, the cheapest, the most boring, the worst stations, the longest time hanging around for a connection – I knew them all.

I invariably took the train from Málaga to catch the overnight sleeper from Madrid to Paris, then a train to the port of choice. Similar in reverse.

And when I had exhausted the French ports, I moved onto the Spanish ones. The food at Austerlitz (Paris) station was truly awful, and somehow France had lost the attraction it held for me 30 years ago. Similarly I had lost my French, and when I opened my mouth intending to speak French, Spanish spilled out instead.

So the next combination of routes to be explored was across the Bay of Biscay – rather than the Channel – and avoiding Francia, and using either Bilbao or Santander.

Santander

I found an interesting sleeper from Málaga to Bilbao which ran on Sunday nights only. In the other direction it came from Bilbao on Friday night – looked like it was catering for people from el norte to come down to the Costa del Sol for the weekend.

As luck would have it there was a ferry from Santander to the UK on Mondays. I checked out connections from Bilbao to Santander. Extremely tight. Late train? Late bus? = Miss ferry. I employed some lateral thinking and looked up connections between Burgos and Santander. A three hour bus trip. It was now looking do-able.

Burgos, for anyone not familiar with Spanish geography, is halfway between Madrid and Santander. Madrid is sort of in the centre of Spain. That’s helpful yes?

Bus routes, courtesy of Alsa

When you buy a sleeper, you buy the bed for the whole journey. There’s no hot bedding on trains. So to speak. Although I do have a story … but for later.

The cost from Málaga to Burgos was 54.30€ and it left at 9pm. It was cramped though. Six beds in a women-only compartment. It was fine to start with, and then two old dears got on in Cordoba and spent half the night running in and out of the compartment. Not good for sleep.

We arrived in Burgos an hour late around 9am. If I’d taken the Bilbao option I would have been absolutely stuffed and missed the twice a week ferry from Santander (already booked my berth).

I hiked from the railway station to the bus station, which of course was in the process of a refurb. Buy your ticket at the ticket office – but the buses were departing from nearby streets. Oh yes. I’ve been down this road before. There is no option but to ask every single person that you encounter where the bus to Santander will depart from. I used to hate asking stupid questions in my youth, but there comes a point when you realise you either ask the question or you miss the bus.

I did (ask the question). I didn’t (miss the bus). My seat was next to a pleasant elderly Spanish woman, ie she seemed older than me, and we chatted some of the time, and enjoyed the views for most of the journey. The scenery through Cantabria was spectacular. Oh, the ticket cost ten euros.

Cantabria

Santander was beautiful. I grabbed some food. I got the ferry. It was Britanny Ferries. I like Britanny Ferries because you can get cheap cabins. I shouldn’t really give away this whizzy tip, but as none of my regular readers are such cheapskates as me, I doubt it will matter.

The city from the bay

Brittany, being French, works on the same principles as the sleeper trains. You can either have an expensive cabin to yourself, or opt to share with someone else of the same sex. But because – certainly British – women don’t do that sort of thing, you invariably end up with a cabin to yourself for a cheaper price. Wonderful :) Of course, there are always the nail-biting moments just before the ferry leaves and you wonder if someone will suddenly arrive at the last minute. But when they don’t, you have the cabin to yourself.

On the return leg, there was no combination of ferry arrival and sleeper. I needed to spend a night somewhere as it was virtually impossible to get to Málaga in one day.

Burgos. That’s where I would stop. The ferry arrived in the afternoon, catch the bus to Burgos, hole up there overnight, and then a trip to Madrid the next day and onward to Málaga.

I spent more time in Burgos rushing to find the Tourist Information before they closed than anything else. They were amazingly (un) helpful. Spain has two types of TIO. A local one and a regional one, and never the twain shall mix. I found the regional one after walking miles, complete with luggage.

‘Oh just wander down to these streets around here, you’ll find a cheap hotel.’ That’s really helpful. Thanks. I took the map and found a cheap hotel. Hostal Hidalgo. Hotel Nobleman. Not quite. Fifteen euros a night. Nice building. Reasonable room. Just a shame about the thin walls that meant I listened to next door’s marital argument for most of the night.

Nice steps, could do with a lick of paint on the walls

But still, isn’t that what travelling is all about? ;)

Next morning I cleared off for the bus to Madrid. I decided to splash out and get a club class bus (!) Instead of ten euros I think it was a princely 15€. I thought it might go faster, but no chance. It did however have lots of space, only three seats across the bus, and an endless service by a hostess-type of soft drinks, poor coffee, and plastic wrapped Spanish doughnuts. None of which I indulged in.

Arriving in Madrid, I wound my weary way to the southern bus station, had a good wander round and went to buy my ticket. Only to discover the bus I wanted was full and I had to wait until 6pm. Great. That meant minimum arrival time in Málaga was midnight. No buses to my pueblo after 11pm. Partner and dog happily fast asleep 20 something kilometres away at our finca. Hopefully taxis queuing up outside the bus station for people who fail to buy their bus tickets fast enough in Madrid and end up in Málaga after midnight.

The bus finally set off, and was pretty full. Price? Around twenty something euros. We stopped every two hours at a café/bar. While it was tedious to have yet another delay, it was also good to have a leg stretch.

Around 12.30am we arrived at Málaga. The bus station was dead. The surrounding streets were dead. A taxi pulled up and a family of gippos appeared out of nowhere and told me they were FIRST. I didn’t argue. I couldn’t believe how quiet it was. What had happened to Spanish nightlife? It didn’t exist around the bus station. Someone told me it was change over time for taxi drivers. Great.

Some spooky minutes later, one finally pulled up. No gippos jumped in front of me. Naturally being desperate to get in this taxi, I started negotiating the price to my pueblo. ‘It’s 25€,’ he said. I figured that was good and jumped in. And jumped out at the other end, thanking him very much and wishing him good night.

Later, my Spanish neighbours told me 25€ was an extremely good price from Málaga. Ha! That made me feel good.

If I have whetted anyone’s appetite for this exciting journey – forget it. The sleeper between Málaga and Bilbao no longer seems to exist. Sadly. Unless it reappears in the summer. Although going via Barcelona seems to be a viable option!! But not at night.

As for the buses. Everything seems to be run by Alsa these days. So if you want to get a bus in Spain, just key in Alsa.es. And the train is renfe.es. Both are available in English.

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Spanish buses …

…are like many things in Spain, a law unto themselves.

Context

Before I moved to Spain most of my long distance travel in Europe had been on trains. Either my InterRail ticket or trains around France, Germany, The Netherlands etc.

But in Spain, much of the long distance travel is provided by buses. Lots and lots of different companies, and often lots of different bus stations too in the larger cities eg Seville, Madrid. Over the years since I have been visiting, and living here, I have seen bright shiny new bus stations go up, eg at Cordoba and Granada.

The bus travel is cheap. And well used. It’s only in relatively recent years that car ownership has become the norm, so previously, the only methods of transport for a large part of the poorer population were donkey, moto (motorbike) or bicycle. And people in Andalucía were poor. Some still are.

In fact car owners often take the bus on long journeys anyway. It works out cheaper unless there is a car full of people, and it is far less stressful. Can you imagine people in the UK doing that? No.

For the purposes of this post, I’m talking city to city buses, either within a communidad, eg Andalucía, or nationally.

Despite the alleged mañana culture here, buses leave on time. The only time they are likely to be late, is if you are picking one up that has set off at the other end of the country, and by the time it gets to your station, it may well have incurred up to half an hour’s delay (of which more later).

But they certainly leave from the initial bus station on time. This is why everyone gets to the bus station early and there are always loads of people milling around. If you haven’t bought your ticket in advance, you need to factor in time to queue for the ticket.

Of course, the law of contradictions has it that if you leave plenty of time there will be no queue. Whereupon the obvious thing to do is visit the bus station bar for a drink/something to eat. Or buy a sandwich to eat on the bus. On really long journeys, Spaniards often prepare their own picnic and merrily plough through about four courses of a picnic lunch.

Up and down the N340 – La Linea to Málaga

Since moving down here, the bus route that I have used the most is the one between Málaga and La Linea/Algeciras. At one point I had four bus timetables permanently imprinted in my brain:

Algeciras/Málaga
La Linea/Málaga

And the two local routes:

La Linea/Algeciras
Málaga/my pueblo

On top of that, I knew exactly which buses were direct and which ones made stops.

Naturally a direct bus doesn’t mean it goes directly from A to B, or in this case from Algeciras to Málaga. It just means it makes less stops. It actually stops once at Marbella, and takes around an hour 40/50 mins, compared with three hours for the ‘ruta’ or stopping bus. For some bizarre reason the direct bus is also cheaper than the stopping bus.

The same applies on the La Linea route. Depending which bus you get, it may use the autovía (motorway) or it may take the coast road.

And the Portillo timetable is not the most helpful in the world. It tells you time of departure, and the length of the journey (which is approximate). It doesn’t give you the route, ie where it stops and at what time.

So the only way to find out is by trial and error. Well, you could probably ask at the ticket office but you wouldn’t be very popular with a queue developing behind you. The Spanish would take the attitude that if you want to travel to X at time Y, that’s all you need to know. Where it stops should be irrelevant to you. Which is irritating to someone like me who likes to know all the detail about any journey I take.

Off we go to La Linea bus station. According to the time-table there are four buses a day on weekdays.

Salida desde La Línea 8:50 10:30 16:30A 19:00

Now is that not the most stupid timing ever? Nothing for six hours between 10.30 and 16.30. There used to be one at 14.15 which was an eminently sensible time, but it has now been shunted back to 16.30. I know it is the same bus because it has an A next to it. A stands for Alsina Graells. This route is operated by the Portillo company – but – other buses also use the route.

Anyway, the Portillo office has now closed in La Linea, so all tickets are bought from the Comes ticket office. With me so far? A potential of three bus companies encountered for one simple journey.

Bus tickets in Spain have been cleverly computerised for years. Before the bus leaves, the driver gets a print out of the number of people getting on his/her bus, presumably with the destination on too. So s/he knows how many people should be getting on the bus.

I decided to get the 10.30. Entering the bus station I noticed someone I know by sight from Gib sitting outside on the pavement. As you do. Well, I often do anyway.

La Linea bus station is not one of the best in the world. It has a newsagent/drinks sort of shop and a bar which is now run by some Chinese (?). It is however cheap. The beer selection is not good. Draught beer is Spain’s most popular beer, Cruzcampo, which I personally loathe. A small 25 cl bottle is also Cruzcampo. If you want San Miguel then you have to buy a 33cl tin. Or you can buy a tin of Heineken which I also loathe. The bus leaves from platform 8. This is not difficult as there are big signs telling you that. The ticket cashier will probably also write 8 on your ticket in case you can’t read the big signs. Remember, not all Spaniards can read, although they can usually do numbers.

I wandered out to the platform and the guy I recognised was in front of me. People started getting on the bus about five minutes before it was due to leave. It was a civilised queue because there weren’t many people.

Big luggage goes under the bus. You can take hand luggage on the bus. This invariably upsets foreigners who are convinced that someone is going to steal all their worldly possessions. It’s perfectly possible I have to be honest, and I used to peer out of the bus to make sure no-one was taking my tat-looking baggage whenever we made stops. A Spaniard came to rejoin the queue after putting his luggage under the bus. The guy in front let him into the queue. Very polite – so British! I would have done that too.

I took the seat opposite the door so I could be first off the bus. This is a good seat to take if you don’t like being stuck behind tortoises taking years to get off the bus. The other guy took the back seat. This is a good seat too when the bus is quiet as you have lots of space. It is not good when the bus is busy and some woman and her kids ask if you have a plastic bag so that they can all vomit into it.

This was a ruta route, ie it stops at Sotogrande (hello pinkagendist – I couldn’t see your house), Sabinillas, Estepona bus station, San Pedro de Alcántara, and then Marbella.

People often get off at Marbella to have a cigarette, or presumably to go to the toilet. I have never dared do this as I have visions of walking out of the building to see the bus disappearing out of the bus station.

I noticed the guy I recognised had got off the bus. He went inside the bus station building, he’d left his bag on the bus.

The driver walked down the bus asking who was going to Torremolinos. No-one. The driver looked puzzled. Then he counted the number of passengers. ‘Falta uno,’ he said to no-one in particular. (‘I’m missing one’)

Helpfully I intervened, he was standing next to me anyway, and told him the guy at the back was missing. He frowned and went down to the back to confirm this with a few Spaniards who were sitting there. And of course the bag was still there.

Ms Interference looks out of the window and sees the cause of our delay, now standing aimlessly outside. ‘Look!’ I said to the driver. ‘There he is.’ Driver gets off the bus and goes to accost the naughty Brit. They both came back on the bus and the guy got his bag from the back. He then jumps off the bus muttering something under his breath, and the driver escorted him to the next bus down.

So, why did he have to change bus? Normally this bus would stop at the bus stations at Fuengirola and then Torremolinos. Sometimes it stops at Benalmádena too. But because the other bus was doing the same route, it meant we could drop off our nuisance passenger and avoid Torremolinos. Clever huh? I’ve seen this happen before, and it always fascinates me how flexible the system is – why have two buses plying the same route when you can just chuck a few passengers onto the stopping bus from the fast one?

And although we might have been delayed setting off due to the Brit’s disappearance in Marbella bus station, the fact that we only had to stop at Fuengirola made quite a difference and we arrived at Málaga after 2 hours 40 minutes which is pretty good for the bus that doesn’t take the autovía.

It worked out as fast as the Alsina Graells bus (16.30) which does take the autovía and makes five stops at Estepona, San Pedro, Marbella, Fuengirola and Torremolinos. A good result and it is a pretty nice journey as it follows the Mediterranean all the way along the Málaga coastline.

When I got to Málaga I went to queue for my pueblo bus. Alsa has six ticket offices (which are never all open at once) and a single orderly queue. There is even a rope for stupid people who can’t work out how to queue. Previously you used to pick whichever queue you thought might move fastest. This new system is eminently sophisticated. So sophisticated that some Spaniards can’t hack it and decide to approach from the other end and cut in. ‘Oy,’ yells the woman behind me. ‘There’s a queue and it’s HERE.’

Meanwhile it’s my turn. The ticket cashier is beckoning me and the other woman is still trying to queue jump. I walked up. The cashier very politely told the other woman to join the queue. ‘But I only want to ask a question,’ she asked. The cashier rolled her eyes. I put my money down and asked for my pueblo. The other woman asked what time the bus left for Badajoz. ‘Eleven thirty. There’s only one bus a day.’

Who knows whether she was trying to push in, or quickly thought up a question? Anyway, top marks to the ticketwoman who was polite, and insisted on the queue. Spain really is changing!

Up and down the N340 – Málaga to La Linea

How about the other way round? Málaga to La Linea.

I did this route a couple of weeks ago. It wasn’t planned so I had no timetable in my head, but thought the Alsina Graells bus left at 11.30. I wandered down to the main road from my pueblo to get a bus into Málaga to leave me enough time to queue and all the rest of it.

I couldn’t remember the times for the carretera (main road) bus but lo and behold! I’d not been there two minutes when a bus turned up. Yippee! I got into Málaga about 10.50 so plenty of time to buy a ticket and sit around. Too much time in fact.

But when I got to the ticket office (note – to anyone wanting to go from Málaga, you need to use the Portillo office), I was confused.

Salida desde Málaga 7:00 11:00AL 11:30A 14:00 16:30

A bus at 11.00, with an AL next to it. AL for Alsina Graells I mistakenly thought. That must be my bus. Or should I go to Algeciras at 11.00? Another directo, and a shorter journey, but then I would have to get the bus back to La Linea. Dilemma dilemma. I went for La Linea as it worked out cheaper.

Then because I had fixed in my head that it was the red Alsina Graells bus we had a conversation at cross purposes. ‘It’s an Alsa bus,’ said the cashier, ‘and it’s coming from Barcelona.’ ‘Red,’ I said, and ‘Alsina Graells.’

‘NO!’ he said impatiently to the stupid foreigner. ‘Alsa, and it’s blue.’ Alsa, by the way, recently took over Alsina Graells. I decided he didn’t know what he was talking about and dutifully went off to wait at platform 6 or 7, which he’d written on my ticket.

There was less than ten minutes to wait. This was looking good. Except – there was no electronic sign flashing up for the bus. That was not good. That meant it wasn’t as near as it should be. I went to the big noticeboard. There was no confirmation of platform number. I read the timetable at the ticket office again and realised I had stuffed it up and that the red Alsina Graells bus indeed left at 11.30. What the hell was this 11.00 Alsa bus coming from Barcelona then?

By now we have passed 11.00 so I didn’t dare leave the platform again in case the bus came in. Couldn’t buy a drink or food, in case it shot in and did a quick load of passengers and shot out again.

I sat gloomily on the floor, as did another woman. I’m not sure that 50+year-old women should sit on the floor at the bus station, but hey, it’s comfy. I leaned against a nice pillar and looked at my mobile. No mails.

Then suddenly, the noticeboard flashed into life on platform 6. I jumped up so that the driver wouldn’t inadvertently run over me when he pulled in. I sat down again when the light flashed off after a few minutes.

I’d already seen the 11.00 directo to Algeciras pull out. I’d made a real cock-up here. I wondered about changing my ticket for the 11.30 but couldn’t be bothered. Knowing my luck, the bus would pull in just when I had changed.

I watched sadly as the 11.30 Alsina Graells bus to La Linea pulled in. And out. It had of course been raining in Andalucía and other parts of Spain. I wondered how much of a delay bad weather was causing on a journey that was likely to run late anyway because it was so long.

For the record, I have looked up the journey from Barcelona to Algeciras. It is a 19/20 hour trip, and costs 97€. Much as I like buses, I couldn’t sit on one for nearly a full day. It leaves Barcelona around 18.00 and obviously travels through the night. I’ve (not) slept on a bus before in New Zealand and it was no fun at all.

Around 11.35/11.40 the bus finally pulled in. Yay! I wondered how long it would take to get to La Linea. I consoled myself with the fact that if it was coming from Barcelona and was a very long distance bus, it wouldn’t be stopping at every piddling bus stop en route.

A woman in front of me in the sort-of queue for the bus asked – in English! – if it was going to Gibraltar. Well, La Linea is pretty near enough, and she got on so it was obviously the right bus. I mean, only the Spanish would have a bus coming from Barcelona with a Barcelona sign on the front instead of Algeciras. I don’t want to know where it’s come from. I want to know where it is going. But as it makes 19 stops, I guess that won’t really fit on any sign on the bus.

I was surprised it wasn’t busy. Obviously no-one else wants to spend 20 hours on a bus either. I grabbed the seat opposite the door, decided the seats were comfy, and followed the Wi-fi instructions which didn’t work.

I tried again later when we had left the bus station and it worked. But there were no emails and I couldn’t be bothered to browse aimlessly. And anyway, a film seemed to be appearing. Ooh! Exciting. I wished I’d brought my iPhone headphones. Or even some of the free ones I have kicking around from previous train journeys.

Subtitles it was to be. In Spanish of course. Which was good because a quick Spanish refresher course via a film is a good way to top up your language. Especially swear words of which there seemed to be a vast amount.

What was the film? Flypaper, which got terrible critical reviews and good ones from your average person in the street. No idea what it would be like in English but it was seriously funny in Spanish. I don’t think I have ever seen Patrick Dempsey before but he made for a watchable film and it passed a pleasant 1 hour 24 mins. Even better, we only stopped twice – Marbella and Estepona.

According to the time-table we should have arrived in La Linea at 13.00. We arrived at 13.10. How good was that considering how late it was arriving in Málaga? An hour and a half from Málaga and a film. It was worth sitting on the floor of the bus station for half an hour.

I wandered over to Gib feeling smug and very pleased with myself for sticking with my fluke decision. I was so pleased with myself that I rushed around Gib doing a load of tasks that I was going to put off until Friday morning. Simple things hey?

Cost between Málaga and La Linea is 12.52€. It’s around 150 kms.

Useful words, ie the only ones you need:

Ida – single ticket

Ida y vuelta – return ticket

Horario – timetable

Llegada – arrival

Salida – departure

Estación de autobus – bus station

Anden/es – platform/s

Número – number (of platform)

Procedencia – where the bus is coming from, eg Barcelona

Next on the bus: Santander to Málaga

And for those of you following the adventures of our resident gecko in the finca, he seems to have found a comfy, warm and sunny home inside our nightlight in the bathroom. Aww, so cute :) *NO* jokes about fried geckos, thank you very much.

Gecko enjoying the warmth :)

Gib street names

The weekend saw another internet first. But before that – a little about Gibraltar street names. The two are oddly connected.

Partner was walking the dog as usual and someone Spanish stopped to ask directions. This happens all the time.

‘Where is Calle Real?’ they asked in Spanish. Partner gave them directions on how to get to Main Street. Calle Real is the Spanish for Main Street.

‘And what is this street called in Spanish?’ asked the invaders. They were standing on Queensway which is on reclaimed land outside the city walls.

‘It doesn’t have a name in Spanish,’ explained Partner patiently. Now you could translate it into Spanish but this is the whole issue about Gib street names. The old ones have Spanish names, the new ones don’t.

Anyway, at this point he got impatient and started speaking to them in English which, of course, they couldn’t understand. Something on the lines of Gibraltar is British and we speak English here.

And then the arrogant Brit and the Spanish dog from the campo marched off leaving the bewildered Spaniards to find their way to Calle Real.

There is an excellent book called ‘The Streets of Gibraltar’ by Tito Benady which gives some of Gibraltar’s history on a geographical basis and explains the street names.

Apparently most of the street names only became official in the 1870s when signs were put up by the police.

But, as you dear readers know by now, Gibraltarians are bi-lingual and happily continued to refer to the street names in Spanish which apparently caused more than a bit of confusion to new arrivals in Gibraltar, particularly service staff. Whereupon a list was drawn up of the two sets of names, the official English ones, and the popular Spanish ones.

So as you can work out from this, the Spanish street names date back to older Gibraltar and exclude the newer areas. Most of the streets within the city walls have Spanish names, although Calle Real is the one most used. Even my street has a Spanish name.

The two other principal streets in Gibraltar that run parallel to Main Street are Irish Town and Engineers Lane/Governor’s Street/Town Range.

Irish Town was originally Calle de Santa Ana after a hermitage of that name. Engineer’s Lane was Calle del Gobernado, Governor’s Street was Calle Cordoneros, and Town Range was Calle Cuarteles referring to the barracks.

Following Town Range up to Prince Edward’s Gate (1790) you pass a new(ish) block of government houses called St Jago’s. There was an old church of Santiago near the gate and this is where the name St Jago’s comes from. I’d always wondered about that. Pays to know your history.

Moving swiftly up to date, Pippa had been asked for a date by The Artist Sofia from my post of a couple of weeks ago.

So we all agreed to meet up in the morning before it got too hot for a Sunday walk. Sofia’s mother pointed out that I had mentioned on my blog how charming Sofia was but didn’t say whether or not I liked her parents. Ooops! Sorry about that.

In fact, on the walk there are no pictures of cute child with big furry dog because I was too busy talking to her parents while Sofia and Partner were looking after Pippa.

How nice it was to go for a walk with interesting people who were so easy to talk to. The time flew by. The last time we took an internet contact (the one I drew a veil over on the earlier post) for a walk, it was moan moan, no interest in the surroundings and nothing to talk about anyway. What a contrast.

And the connection with Gibraltar street names? Well, my new friend had been in a Gib shop asking for something in Spanish (his Spanish is good) and he had been directed to Calle Real. He didn’t know where that was, but he was told it was Main Street. He knew where Main Street was, but he wanted to know where Calle Real was……

Sorry Jan. I should have written this post sooner, and saved you the confusion. The confusion caused in the C19th for British military continues to this day whether they are Spanish day trippers or English-speaking visitors.

After our walk we enjoyed a coffee at the beautfiul Queensway Marina and an interesting question came up. Are the street names in Spanish as well on the signs?

No. All street names are in English. Although most Gibraltarians are bilingual, English is the official language, and English speakers should have no problems anywhere. It just helps to have a little Spanish though. And when you speak enough, you do what everyone does and switch the lenguas.

With which, aquí estan los fotos of our walk.

I’ve never seen dolphins in Rosia Bay. Ah. People are diving. Looking for dolphins on the seabed maybe?

The trouble with having an intelligent child in the party is that they ask difficult questions. ‘What’s that?’ she asked. I didn’t know. Do any of you? (The red thing stuck to the pillar).

Sofia The Artist has become Sofia The Rock Climber. I used to do that. But with age comes deteriorating eyesight and a poorer sense of balance, so enjoy for as long as you can.

Meanwhile the calm and serene half of the party enjoyed the sun.

I wandered in the other direction where I had taken a pic of tranquil water a month ago when we watched the flotilla. Same place, same rocks. Not quite so tranquil today. But equally lovely.

And Queensway Marina. An old photo, because a bit like I didn’t get one of Sofia and Pippa, I was too distracted with the conversation to think about a photo of the marina.

I almost forgot. On our return journey, a group of Spaniards accosted us. ‘Perdone. El teleferico está donde?’ [Where's the cable car?] Except I am used to them asking for the góndola or the funicular. So I said ‘Qué?’ Very Fawlty Towers huh? So when the penny finally dropped I told them to go left and it would be in front of them. ‘Izquierda y está en frente.’

My American friend asked me how long it had taken me to learn such good Spanish. Um, that was very nice of her, but given that it took me two goes to get teleferíco, it ain’t that good! I’ll know next time though and at least I knew how to tell them to get there.

Over coffee, the two men helpfully (???!!) shared their knowledge of the word teleferíco which seemed to be one they were both familiar with. That’s men for you. Sabelotodos. (Wherein there is another story regarding my partner but not for today….)

And that’s life in an English-speaking territory where people speak Spanish. Oh and the internet first? Meeting up with an internet contact for the second time. Looking forward to the next meet-up.

Hasta la próxima.

Gibraltar – proud to be British

The bunting has been up for a while, red, white and blue. Normally it is red and white – the Gib colours. But this weekend is a British celebration, and Gibraltar is British.

Flags have been increasing day by day, the union flag, the Gib one, and my favourite, the Gib one superimposed on the union flag. Couldn’t find one when I looked in the local souvenir shops the other day.

Chief Minister Fabian Picardo is in London for the long weekend representing Gib.

Joe Bossano is in Ecuador for a UN conference. The following is from a Chron article:

Government minister Joe Bossano yesterday took delegates at the UN C24 decolonisation seminar in Quito, Ecuador back to 711 to illustrate a common thread in history leading to “independence from Spain”, in Gibraltar case with the arrival of the British in 1704.



And in a dramatic turn to illustrate the way in which politics was conducted in the 16th century, Mr Bossano said that thirty-two years after first becoming part of Spain with Queen Isabella taking it from the Duke of Medina Sidonia Gibraltar had, in 1534, “formed part of the state who sent Pizzaro to massacre the Incas in Quito.”



But he said that sovereignty in Europe today is not what it was in the 16th century, though Spain, he argued, has not understood this.

In 1704 he said “Gibraltar had gained its independence from Spain after 202 years under Spanish sovereignty.



In his address, also pre-recorded on a YouTube clip posted at the GSLP website http://burl.co/117125C, Mr Bossano defended self-determination and said that the UN had to defend the people under colonial rule and not be manipulated by member states in territorial disputes.



Referring to the decolonisation list of which Gibraltar is one of 16 territories Mr Bossano said that the continued existence of the list is the reason for the seminar.

“The meeting is to assist the people to fulfil the charter requirement to exercise self-determination,” he said.



Mr Bossano pointed out that the committee has been studying case of Gibraltar’s decolonisation for 58 years and said he himself had been involved in that campaign for that time.

He also said that privately many agreed that Gibraltar’s case unassailable but Spain had astutely manipulated circumstances.

“The present Spanish Government will no more succeed in its attempts to conquer Gibraltar than any of its predecessors have done in the last 58 years. No matter what alliances it makes with others,” said Mr Bossano.

It is, he said, the freely and democratically expressed wishes of the colonial people that count as far as the UN Charter is concerned.

Spain, said Mr Bossano, had been flagrantly in breach of the Charter for decades and did not want the C24 to know what Gibraltar itself wants.

Mr Bossano urged the C24 members to assist in the achievement of decolonisation and urged them to remember the C24 is the guardian of colonial people. The process, he emphasised to them is one of assisting the people from colonial rule to self-rule.

Go Joe! I love the way he doesn’t mince his words.

Speaking of Spain, I see that Sofia did go to visit Liz. But in a private capacity. What a load of hypocrites.

Anyways, apparently there is a street party today. So best wander out and see what is going on.

I may even get to see Rhona the Rhino, who is apparently being pulled down Main Street to raise funds for Africa.

WTF is a rhino doing in Main Street? She deserves to be in Africa, not part of some crazy stunt.

And on crazies, a customs car was vandalised the other day and customs officers were pelted with stones when they stopped a couple of Spaniards with 81,000 cigarettes.

Workers on JBS are on overtime over this holiday weekend putting up razor wire at the airport to stop people escaping over the frontier with their contraband. No street party for them.

White Dove

Pure as driven snow perhaps?

That illegal white powdery snowy stuff?

White Dove – Paloma Blanca - is an anthology of poetry and prose by Gibraltarian author Kailash Noguera.

To add the context, I’ll quote from the intro in his own words, as that will sum it up pretty quickly:

I remember my first sexual experience, I was hardly ten years old.

I can’t say it was good but it wasn’t bad either, I also remember my first joint, my first porro as we call it around here, that was funny. I didn’t like it so I thought drugs were not my thing, boy, I was so wrong.

I came from a good working class family but that life wasn’t for me, or that’s what I thought back then. I loved the streets, the streets were like my second home, so you know, being a street kid you run into street things, one of them being drugs which led to trouble and delinquency.

My life as a drug user and juvenile delinquent made me the person I am today so, honestly, I don’t regret it.

My mother tried very hard to give me the best, which she did, she gave me everything, she showed me the way to God, she showed me the meaning of respect, love and other important human qualities, so maybe that I do regret, I regret causing her pain when, as I mentioned before, she gave me all the best.

Long story short, after the drugs were out of my head and system, other hidden qualities came to light, positive qualities which were always there, but lost by the dark side I chose to live.

I realised my passion for art, especially poetry, music and cinema. So here are some of my writings and poems, which may even make me find my real self.

Kailash voluntarily went into a detox centre in Spain, intending to stay for a few months, but found the detox centre as bad as prison and absconded, if that’s what you do from detox centres.

Instead he locked himself in a flat and decided to get off the drugs on his own.

White Dove, with writings in both English and Spanish, recounts some of his experiences, his dreams, and his thoughts about life and love.

At his last court appearance for assault, his barrister produced his writings as part of his defence, and he was allowed to retain his freedom. The sad fact of life inside prison is that had he been sent inside, he said he would have been back on the drugs.

He’s currently working full-time and has another book waiting to be published.

The Wind Whispers Freedom is the English section of the book. Here are some excerpts from his poems, I’ll add the full ones to the poetry section later.

Looking for my Liberty

I stand behind steel bars locked away from life, a trapped soul in a dark hole waiting to see the sun as I look back to my juvenile past, my first cigarette, my first love,
My first lines, my first problems with the police
Memories of my hang-outs in my childhood patio
Now look where I see myself now
Lost in murkiness, locked behind an iron door.

Like a white dove I wish to fly away and hide from this world, in search of a new
beginning, a journey to a better place
I have paid my punishment in a cold cell, for my freedom I fight to see the light again.

My days as a Street Dog

I remember my days as a street dog, I never wanted to live long
Alone but felt so strong I took the world my storm
‘Cause I thought my weakness was long gone
Even though love was around me I felt lost and Satan trapped me
My faith quickly replaced by thoughts of death, I was not afraid to abandon earth
Left the books for a knife, ready to take on life
Never feeling sorry for the pain I cause even when they dramatized
I never felt terrorized
In a maze of violence and hate, confusion came to my fate
Broke me away from my childhood friends
But I was not aware that the poison I shared made me not care
My anger to society was rising I lost strength but gained toughness towards my enemies
Ignoring my self, my biggest nemesis
Battling against the world constantly, envy I felt for those living happily.

White Paradise (full poem)

I had many friends, it was all fun and games,
Now most of them are dead, who is there to blame?
Some of them are crazy, they call them insane, not knowing they were once students with straight ‘A’s,
I managed to escape after so many internal tears but now I live with fear ’cause I know some day I’ll return,
I cannot escape from that paradise I truly hate, I should have realised but now it’s too late
Forever trapped in the white paradise where many mothers cry
Forever trapped in the white paradise where many children die
Forever trapped in the white paradise, tomorrow I might say goodbye.

Dear God

Dear God, I’m looking for your son, Jesus, so he can get me away from this ghetto prison
Trapped behind cocaine walls the poison of Satan’s claws
Temptation knocks constantly at my door, pain, I need no more,
Flashbacks of cold withdrawals hunt me all along,
There’s no way I’m staying behind these walls
Fighting hard but I give up, trying to survive working nine to five
Sometimes it’s not enough so as a part time I live a life of crime
Watching my mother cry I wonder if I’m guilty, ’cause at risk I put my liberty.
Dear God, forgive my sins as I sin for necessity, that’s how it’s got to be
I don’t want luxury, I just want to live as a comfortable human being.

and the closing lines of the last poem in the English section:

The Wind Whispers Freedom

The wind whispers freedom, smooth air, my eyes see perfection, my reflection seems so clear, no sign of fear, I hear the sound of freedom so near,
observing, alone I stand here, listening to the sweet sound,
the wind softly whispers freedom.

All work copyright of Kailash Noguera and published with the author’s permission.

Cover illustration by Brian Perera.

My view on White Dove? I thought it was good and very powerful. Most of my readers are English-speaking, so I haven’t added any of the Spanish writings from the section called ‘Perseguido por la Oscuridad’ although I will add a couple to poetry. Interestingly because of the language construction, they have a different feel to them, and they are equally as good.

And on cocaine.

According to the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA), Spain and the UK have the highest rates of cocaine usage in Europe among young adults aged 15-34.

Actually at the latest report, which is based on 2011, Spain and the UK have the highest rates for prevalence of cocaine use among all adults (15-64), young adults and youth (15-24). So that’s easy, doesn’t matter which age group you look at.

Worldwide the only country to beat those stats is the USA. And after the top three of US, Spain and UK, the next country is Australia (I don’t know why I am surprised at that given the availability of drugs more than 25 years ago when I was living in Sydney), and then Denmark, Canada, and Ireland.

[Note, those stats are only looking at Europe, plus Canada, Aus and the USA]

And an extract from an overview to the tables:

Cocaine
Cocaine is, after cannabis, the second most tried drug, though levels of use vary greatly between countries. It is estimated that about 14.5 million Europeans have used cocaine at least once in their life , on average 4.3% of adults aged 15–64 years. National figures vary from 0.1% to 10.2%, with half of the 24 reporting countries , including most central and eastern European countries, reporting low levels of lifetime prevalence (0.5–2.5%).
About 4 million Europeans are estimated to have used the drug in the last year (1.2% on average). Recent national surveys report last year prevalence estimates of between zero and 2.7% . The prevalence estimate for last month cocaine use in Europe represents about 0.5% of the adult population or about 1.5 million individuals.
Levels of cocaine use above the European average are reported by Denmark, Ireland, Spain, Italy, Cyprus and the United Kingdom. In all of these countries, last year prevalence data show that cocaine is the most commonly used illicit stimulant drug.

Local newspaper Panorama provided a perspective on the drugs issue in Gib.

The rain in Spain…..

…..stays mainly on the Costa del Sol and along the N340. Or at least it did at the weekend on our journey back there.

Luckily it wasn’t chucking it down, just a few odd light showers. The good thing about grey overcast rainy skies is that you haven’t got brilliant blue skies and dazzing sunlight beating through the glass. So it was a welcome change.

Returning to the finca, there were no neighbours outside, they were clearly hiding from the rain.

Pippa was most disappointed as he wasn’t allowed outside to lie in the wet by his gate.

We left the door slightly ajar for the light and fresh air and he glared at us from underneath his table den.

Preparing the veg for our meal. The Spanish are obsessed with cutting green off veg. The shop woman asked me if I wanted the greens cutting off, and I said no. If I hadn’t wanted the green, I might as well have bought dried onions, and even if I didn’t want them, the chickens would eat it. Waste, waste, waste…….

As you do in Spain, we sat and watched the rain, waited for our food (bean casserole), and considered an early night in order. I’d got the salad prepared for supper – I’ve made that mistake before, going for a quick siesta after lunch and then sleeping through until goodness knows when, and totally missing out on supper.

When the shops re-opened at 5pm we decided to brave the rain, which was bucketing down by now, and go for some olive oil. I put on one of my many leaking Goretexes, and we grabbed our huge Gibtelecom umbrella for the five minute dash down the town.

Our luck was in at the super. Olive oil was on special offer at just over ten euros for five litres. When we first arrived (some ten years ago), the good stuff was around 15-17€ for five litres. Then the price steadily increased each season until it was around a disgraceful 25€ – apparently because of some problems with the olive harvest. Really? It wouldn’t have been because there was lots of money floating around at the time would it?

Now, it’s the cheapest I’ve ever known it. Clearly no problems with the olive harvest now there is no money. Good quality extra virgin olive oil is around 12-14€ for five litres, and if you time it right, it gets brought down to 10€ or so. I think we paid 10.40€ this weekend.

I do think top class olive oil is absolutely essential. Apart from the fact that it is pretty good for you, it’s also less rich and sickly than using butter, for example. I learned from Adelina not to skimp on it, so a healthy amount always gets chucked in whatever I am cooking. I also use it for making any roux-based sauces.

Olive oil duly bought, we ran back up the street, getting totally wet and giggling away like a pair of kids playing in the rain. We ate our meal, fell into bed – and the asparagus and salad greens were still in the fridge the morning after. Note, this turned out to be a bonus in disguise, as the asparagus is now providing salad pots this week.

It was a good thing it rained out on Saturday, because it was bright and clear on Sunday morning for the Romería. Once, in the years we have been here, it has been cancelled due to the rain. They try and leave it as late as possible before they cancel, but given the preparations to deck out the caravans, buy all the food and drink in, cancel work for those who work in the fields – it has to be cancelled on the Saturday. Even worse, then they have to reapply to hold the procession on another Sunday the same month that doesn’t clash with any other procession, festival or cycle race.

One interesting change I noticed this time was the difference in fashions. I thought those frilly frocks were always the same, but no, it seems even they go through changes.

When we first arrived, my neighbour and all her pals would dress up in those frocks with huge spots on them. Awful in design terms to me. There were far less spots in front of my eyes this time though. It seems spots have gone out of fashion. Interestingly there were more skirts as well. They were in the same style, tight over the hips and then flaring out (presumably so women can actually move in them) with the essential frills at the bottom.

My favourite was the one you can just see a glimpse of on the crossing here. An abstract-patterned skirt, with a pale top and a bright gold sash. Worn with a pair of flat brown boots. Very classy. Knocked spots off the spots.

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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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