Go wild, go wild, go wild in the country

The Pinoso Pensioners’ Club has a WhatsApp group. At times I wonder if the the application is totally under the organiser's control but the messages are often interesting. Anyway, a few days ago, there were a few lines on it exhorting me to join in with the upcoming Merienda de Pascua (Easter Picnic) at the Club HQ. The message suggested I pick up my wicker basket, load up on monas, get out my typical apron and headscarf, and come to share my victuals with my friends – to keep alive an old tradition.

Now, I have to say that I don’t like it when I don’t know stuff like this. What aprons? What baskets?

I did know about monas. They’re a version of toñas and a toña is a sort of sweet bread presented as a rounded loaf, some 20 cm across. I understand that one of the odd things about the toña is that it includes potato in the mix. The mona – which would usually translate as a female monkey – is the same sort of bread but with a hard-boiled egg set into it. Often, the eggs are violently coloured.

I had a vague sort of inkling what they were talking about because, a couple of years ago, we went on a walk out of Monóvar (a town that neighbours Pinoso) on a Thursday during Lent. The idea there was to eat the toñas in some country spot. We ended up picnicking on a muddy track underneath the viaduct for the High Speed Train. It wasn't exactly a bucolic idyll.

Also, when we lived in Salamanca, there was a tradition of going down to the river in the city to eat hornazo, a sort of meat pie, on the Monday after Easter. What has, nowadays, become a family picnic in the open air is based on the times when students from the University waited by the river for the return of the prostitutes after their enforced exile on the other bank during Lent and Holy Week.

I needed some Spaniards to ask, but I don’t really know very many. Then I hit on it, just as WhatsApp had started this, it could also provide the answers.

I’m in a book club and that too has a WhatsApp group. No sooner had I asked the question  – what is this “Easter Picnic”? – than the first reply came from Domingo (the only other bloke in the group), just four minutes after posting. He said that the Monday after Easter Sunday (which is still a local holiday), people went out to the countryside with their carts to have a bit of a communal picnic. The specific food he mentioned were the monas.

I responded, asking if it was a bit like the Salamanca tradition I mentioned above. That earned me a slight slap-on-the-wrist response from Loli Mar, who pointed out that Domingo had given me a perfectly good description, and that “Ir de mona” was to go for a picnic in the countryside with family and friends and eat things like fried rabbit, tortilla de patatas, the local broad beans, olives, hard-boiled eggs and longaniza seca – a bit like a very thin, dry salami. For pudding, brazo de gitano, which is quite like Swiss roll but with either a chocolate or creamy filling.

Jacinta came back with a summing-up: in reality, it’s a spring festival that fills the countryside with life, and it’s associated with the end of Easter.

Amalia added that she remembered that, when she was little, the aprons were made in school as a bit of a school project to involve children in the tradition. She also remebered that the mona was something that godparents gave to their godchildren. Later, in the countryside, the hard-boiled egg would be broken on the forehead of a friend!

Conchi joined in and said that the whole point was to spend a day out in the country with family and friends, and Inma repeated more or less the same thing.- neighbourliness and food in a healthy setting. 

Paqui said to me, “I love that you want to know about our customs, which in the post-war decades formed part of our culture. As children, we used to buy our alpargatas (espadrilles) and they would say to us: ‘Let’s see if they are runners…’. And to prove that they were, we would run... that’s how innocent we were... If you go out to the countryside to eat the mona, be careful, because, out of the blue, someone might bop you on the forehead with a hard-boiled egg – Happy Easter 2025.”

Clara, one of the group organisers, said that there had been an article about el Cabezo, which is a salt dome that is very much a symbol of the town of Pinoso, in the programme for the town's fiestas in 2008. She copied that 15-page article to the WhatsApp group because an awful lot of the text and photos centred on the tradition of heading up el Cabezo for this traditional Easter Picnic.

Strangely, that article mentioned that, for a while, as motor cars became more common, lots of people from Pinoso would go to Mahoya to eat the picnic – and Mahoya is some 25 km from Pinoso. The article had pages and pages of photos of local people taking part in the picnic and, not surprisingly, lots of the readers’ club recognised themselves or their friends in the snaps. Oh, and, in the piece, the breaking of hard boiled eggs on someone's head was mentioned as a bit too obvious, and maybe painful, courting technique!

So, I think we all have the idea now.

Caps, wineskins and fans

I was going through my hat collection with a view to throwing a few away. I came across an obvious candidate; a fluorescent Caja Rural baseball cap. It was a pale imitation of the original Caja Rural baseball caps (as in the photo here) that were briefly trendy among urban hipsters as a sort of cipher for their claim to family roots in a bucolic rural past. 

I was thinking about these hats as I talked to my AI Spanish application. Billy-no-mates that I am, I've quite taken to talking to this gadget on my phone. One of the things I like is that, as well as practising my Spanish, the AI is backed by the internet so it knows all sorts of things. It makes for a strangely informed conversation. I asked if it were true about Caja Rural hats and  if there were other things that were everyday and boring but considered to be very typically Spanish. It came up with botijos, porrones, botas de vino and abanicos.

It just so happens that we went to an open day at a pottery museum in Agost a couple of weeks ago and they were singing the praises of botijos suggesting that modern designs of botijos could be an environmentally friendly replacement for cooled water in plastic bottles. A botijo is an earthenware jug or container made from clay fired at low temperature so that it doesn't totally vitrify. This allows water to seep into the interstices of the pot. Once the water reaches the surface, it begins to evaporate, the process draws heat from inside the container and so, the water cools down. The result is that the liquid typically reaches a temperature of about 15°C without needing refrigeration. Obviously enough botijos are suitable for multiple use. The truth is that you don't often see botijos in use, but they are all over the place as decorative items.

Botas de vino are, on the other hand, still very much in use—at least they still get regular outings. They're wineskins, traditionally made from goatskin, used in communal situations. The place where we usually encounter them is at the fiestas in Santa Catalina here in Pinoso, where someone always offers us a drink of wine from one. The advantage, of course, is that the wine comes out as a stream so that the bota itself never touches anyone's lips. Botas also get an outing during romerías (a sort of religious picnic), and rural workers still use them when bringing in the harvest and sometimes for ordinary field work. Indeed they're very much alive and well in rural areas. I have to admit to being a bit hesitant about drinking from a wineskin because I always expect to miss my mouth, but with a confident approach, it's not actually a difficult technique.

Just because the AI told me this, you're going to get instructions on how to prepare a new bota.  First fill your with warm water and leave it for two or three days so that the skin swells and seals any small fissures. Next, you fill it with cheap wine and empty it several times over several days. This removes tannins from the leather and absorbs the taste of pez (a resinous product derived from pine trees traditionally used to seal the interior of botas). The whole process—cleaning the inside with water and then refilling over and over with cheap wine—should take about two weeks. The test, of course, is to put some decent wine into it and taste it; if there’s no difference in flavour, your wineskin is ready to go.

A porrón is basically a glass version of a bota. It has a bulbous glass base that holds wine and a long glass spout that provides a nice, steady flow of wine. Because they’re made of glass, they have the advantage of not adding any taste to the wine but are much more fragile than botas, making them really only suitable for table use.

I thought the AI suggesting fans, abanicos, as being very Spanish was a bit twee. After all, their origin is Japanese. The first thing the AI stressed, rather than the waft of moving air they produce, was a lot of malarkey about the language spoken with them. I rather suspect it's like that symbol that's supposed to be available to women—the one where one hand is held up with the palm facing outward before tucking in the thumb and folding down four fingers over it to form a fist - to show that they are in imminent danger. It's a great idea but only works if both sender and recipient understand its meaning. 

Nonetheless, I have to concede that fans are absolutely commonplace in Spain. Go to any event during summer months, and you’ll see non-stop fluttering fans everywhere. Everyone seems to have one—heaven knows where they’re kept when not in use—but they appear as if by magic when needed! What surprised me was that, supposedly, there are different styles from different regions and that the Valencian Community has important centres of production, which is presumably the reason for there being a fan museum in Aldaia just outside Valencia. It seems that our local fans traditionally have wooden or mother-of-pearl spines with hand-painted cloth featuring countryside scenes; Andalusian fans frequently feature flamenco or floral designs with lace or sequins; Castilian fans tend toward less bright colours with geometric patterns while Catalan fans often showcase Art Nouveau designs. 

Now I thought all modern day fans were made of Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene and were mass-produced somewhere like Guangzhou Township in Eastern China. But this new information means I can now add fans, from Valencian manufacturers with a hundred years, or more, of history behind them, like Abanicos Carbonell (1864), Abanicos Folgado (1906) or Abanicos Vibenca (1910), to my list of local and typically Spanish potential gifts. Or, I suppose, I could get a copy of a Caja Rural baseball cap from Amazon and spend less!

It tolls for thee

Villena is a town forty minutes up the road from Pinoso. It's a town I like: there's often something going on there. The theatre is lovely, there's a train station in town and another, the quietest AVE station in Spain, in a field near enough to be called Villena and, of course, it has 22 kilos of Bronze Age gold—the Villena Treasure. And if none of those are enough, then Ferri, the huge ironmongers, is really good for any unreformed men with all those tool belts and strange bits of machinery. I also find the occasional mispronunciation of the name quite amusing; when I think that someone is off to the Austrian capital rather than popping up the road for a new pool pump.

Anyway, I'm listening to Nieves Concostrina doing one of her little history slots on the radio. She's talking about the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492 with her usual mix of dry humour and anticlerical sarcasm. It's pretty obvious from her description that the two kingdoms that would later go on to be the bulk of present-day Spain—Castile and Aragon—were in a sort of racial and ideological turmoil. The interactions between Muslims, Christians and Jews were labyrinthine and Machiavellian, to say the least. And that's before the Inquisition got its teeth in and began to undermine the power and influence of any socio-religious group that wasn't staunchly Catholic. Remembering that 1492 is a pivotal year: it's when the last Muslim stronghold finally falls in the peninsula, over 700 years after the initial invasion, and it's the year that the world changes forever when Spanish money sent Colón (Columbus) off to find the spice route—and he inadvertently bumped into the continent which would later give us Donald Trump.

Suddenly, in the radio story, there was a little aside about Villena the town and the Marquis named for it. The Marquis of Villena is, like one of those top dog British lords, named for a county, that pepper so many Shakespeare historical plays - "and thee Essex, get thee to Northumberland". Now Juan Pacheco, 1st Duke of Escalona, 1st Marquis of Villena—was an important man at the time of Isabel and Fernando, the Catholic Monarchs. Despite wearing tights, he had castles and land all over the place. He was rich and he was powerful. Later, one of his descendants, Juan Manuel—another Marquis of Villena—would go on to found the Real Academia Española, the organisation that publishes the Spanish dictionary of reference and tries to maintain order within a language spoken worldwide.

When Enrique (Henry if you prefer) IV of Castile died in 1474, there were two claimants to the throne of Castile (by this time Castile was probably about 75% of what's now Spain). The struggle was between supporters of Joanna "la Beltraneja," Henry IV's (probable) daughter, and his half-sister Isabel. Our Marquis, Juan Pacheco, originally sided with Joanna. 

Back in Villena, one of the Marquis's relations—Pedro Pacheco—was the warden of the castle there. He gathered together a bunch of people who had allegiance to the Marquis. The story goes that many of these people had converted from Islam or Judaism to Christianity to hang on to their wealth. They were not well liked by old established Christian families—to keep sides clear I'll call the people in the castle the New Christians. Meanwhile, the general population of Villena, the people in the town, or the Old Christians—had decided to side with Isabel and against Joanna and the Marquis.

As things came to a head, the New Christians planned to attack the Old Christians as they went to Sunday Mass. The plot was discovered as was the agreed signal that would tell the New Christians when to attack—the ringing of a bell five times. When the Old Christians heard that bell they knew what was coming. They were ready and armed to the teeth. There was a pitched battle in the streets of the Villena and nearly all the New Christians were slaughtered. Somehow Juan Pacheco managed to wheedle out of having backed the wrong side when Isabel finally came to power and hung on to his wealth and lands.

And to remember that fateful day the Santa María Church in Villena is unique in Spain in sounding the bell five times for Mass. Apparently it's usually three.

Oh, and the other Marquis of Villena I mentioned—the dictionary-writing one—also initially picked the wrong side when the Spanish crown was up for grabs again during the War of Succession (1701–1714). He supported the Austrian claim rather than the, finally victorious, French one. Like his ancestor though, he somehow sidled out of that disgrace.

As usual with these legends there is a lot of contradictory information. I tried to pick my way through it but do be aware that this account may be complete rubbish.

Chatting with an algorithm

My sister-in-law is, apparently, learning French. She and my sister, who is learning Russian, were talking about Duolingo, the telephone and computer language learning app. I really don't care for Duolingo in Spanish—it's too strict, too dogmatic and often arguably wrong. I was once asked, in a schoolboy quiz, how many sides a threepenny bit had. I was on top of that obvious trick; everyone knew there were 12 sides, but there were two more—the heads and tails—making 14. I showed I'd caught onto their little trick by putting my answer as 12+2=14. "No," said the quiz setter—"12." An injustice that still rankles 62 years later. If that quiz setter were not dead, he'd work for Duolingo.

Lynn—for that's my sister-in-law's name—said that it wasn't the general stuff but the artificial intelligence bit that she actually liked. She said she had conversations and did spoken grammar exercises with Duolingo AI. I've seen the adverts, of course, but I've also seen adverts for penis rings and have never been tempted by those either.

But my sister-in-law does not suffer fools gladly, and if she thought it was alright, it probably was. So I decided to have a look at one of the (several) Spanish AI tutors. I presumed there would be a free version that did the basic stuff and then a paid-for version that would make the tea in the morning. Being of that sort of age where I am constantly reminded of the brecha digital—the digital divide—I asked a couple of everyday AI apps which they reckoned was the best-value AI Spanish tutor. The one I ended up looking at is called Langua, which seems to be related to Langua Talk which is one of those platforms where you can talk to a real tutor using a video call.

Have you ever noticed that on those programmes about the FBI, or in a sci-fi feature film, once something is said it's said. There is no need to repeat anything and there's no hesitation or deviation either. That's what talking to AI is like. It's like talking to a real person but it's very clear and precise. In the Spanish version of Langua you can talk to a man or a woman's voice and that can be in a range of accents and varieties - Mexican, Argentinian, Colombian, Uruguayan or Chilean and, of course, peninsula Spanish. It's the last one that I've been using and I think there are five, or maybe six, different peninsula voices. You can set levels of conversation from beginner to experienced; you can choose set conversation topics or just have a free-form conversation. You can get feedback in the target language or in your native language. I talked with it/her/him about the trials and tribulations of emptying a septic tank, for instance. It’ll do role plays and it produces flashcards (not that I know what they are exactly). You can also do grammar exercises with it. I've been surprised by its flexibility. For instance in the grammar section I asked it to practise the range of past tenses using the vosotros form (which I always forget), and it obliged.

The thing I've found most outstanding about it though is that it understands what I'm saying and even gives me quite a lot of humming and hawing latitude. So when I try to pronounce a word I always trip over, temporizador, for instance, and stumble with two or three attempts, it simply records the word when I get it right or the nearest I get before I give up. If I get a word wrong, it will transcribe the wrong word and then ask me about it later. Because it transcribes what you say as well as what it says, you have a written record of the conversation. This means the AI can provide an overall analysis for you or an analysis of a single phrase. Unlike a real live tutor, it remembers every word so that it will—if you ask—give you either a general analysis of your conversation or a detailed analysis of an individual phrase.

When you get fed up or completely lost, you can just stop. If you want to start again later, you can do so easily without feeling guilty. If it's time to give up altogether, have a cup of tea and then give it another crack—you can. I've only been using it for a few days and it's still surprising me. I suppose the novelty might wear off eventually but, at the moment, it's amusing, and interesting in equal measure. It's not free though. I chose their cheapest plan which costs about 20€ per month; so far I've never reached the cut-off point they told me was roughly 45 minutes per day. I only paid the money to give it a go because the free trial time was very limited. My original thought was that I'd give it up after a month but now I'm thinking I might keep on with it.

This is not a product recommendation as such—I’m very happy with what I've bought—but remember that my sister-in-law was singing the praises of Duolingo's version too. My guess is there are stacks and stacks of variations—all I'm saying is that I've been astounded by what the AI tutoring system I bought seems capable of doing and I'd wholeheartedly recommend it, or something similar, if you're learning a language.

Les Velles de Sèrra

I don't think I'm unusual in keeping my diary on Google calendar. It reminds me of the repetitive jobs, it reminds me of important appointments and it reminds me of birthdays. In fact it's probably one of the main banes of my life with its constant nag, nag nag. I also use the diary to jot down something interesting that I've missed. In that case I put a note to myself, at some appropriate time in the future, to check the details/dates/blood type of the missed event so that I catch it this time around. 

A reminder turned up a couple of weeks ago that said check Les Velles de Sèrra in Elche. So I did. There were several newspaper articles and bits on websites that talked about reviving this ancient tradition. It turned out to be a bit like the scarecrow competitions in the UK or Día de la Vieja in el Cantón with large dolls or mannequins dotted around the streets. In the case of the Velles these were, apparently, mannequins set in a tableau with some sort of commentary on modern life.

I couldn't find any specific information beforehand on where the mannequins were but, when I left home, some 45 kms from Elche, I was optimistic that they would be in central locations. Luckily for us, as we turned up just after 2pm the tourist office was still open. I asked, in Spanish, if there was any information, specifically a map of locations, for Les Velles de Serra. Now my Valenciano is weak to non existent so I had no idea how to pronounce Velles de Serra and the woman behind the desk obviously thought I was asking about the Valencian Fallas which, in Valenciano, are Falles

"Ah, no", said the woman, "They're in Valencia, not here." "No, what I'm after are these scarecrow type dolls that are in the streets here today" "Ah, Velles, no, those came and went." "I don't think so, I'm pretty sure that they are today, I've read a couple of articles that say they happen today until 5pm." At this point the woman checks her computer, "Quite right, today." (Knowing that this is a stupid question) "Do you have a map or a website address with locations?" "I don't think so but my colleague who is in the bathroom at the moment may know." The colleague, a man, joins us. He tells me that I missed them, the Velles that is. The woman puts him right and tells him that the computer says they are on today. He suddenly remembers that he saw some of the mannequins in a school yard this very morning. "They may be on in the centre, or el Raval," he says. I ask him if there are any repetitive locations. He says no. I ask where el Raval is. The woman draws a circle on the map. Thank you, very kind, I say.

We walked around the centre by the Basilica, by the Town Hall, in the old Flower Market. We walked around the central bits of el Raval. We had a coffee in el Raval, the server had never heard of Les Velles de Serra. As hope faded and we headed back towards the parked car, by a purposely circuitous route, I noticed some mannequins outside a shop. The sign with them started with "Che" which I'm pretty sure is a very common sentence starter in Argentina. Good to see the Argentinians keeping their end up for a bit of ilicitano culture. Only a couple of hundred yards further on we found another mannequin tableau about the recent floods in Valencia and this one had a woman guarding it. She told us there were 36 sets of monigotes spread across the city but she didn't know where they were except that some were in some schools.

A bit of a disaster really then. Or maybe it was a triumph in that we found any. Either way the gap between promotion and information seemed somewhat surprising.

On fish 'n' chips

I went to the UK last weekend. I don't go very often but my mum moved, just before Christmas, into a care home and I felt nosey enough, or bad son guilty enough, to go and have a look at her new digs. A long weekend, Friday through Monday. My mum seemed fine and happy enough, given her 93 years and her circumstances, and it was good to see her. To make it even better I got to see my sister and brother and their partners.

I just asked Maggie how long she considers I've spent in the UK in the last 20 years and she reckoned a month. I think it must be more than that but I'd be amazed if it added up to more than three months. This means the UK is a bit foreign to me. Obviously it's not really strange to me because I'm British and lots of stuff just got coded into my DNA - be that sausage rolls, drinking tea, double decker buses, Boxing Day or the winter sound of cawing crows. Just after we'd arrived in the UK, in the bus on the airport apron, a group of young people, young people wearing sports clothes, with modern haircuts and rings in their noses were were talking about looking forward to a decent cup of tea and ginger nuts, or maybe chocolate digestives. I felt welcomed by that conversation.

One thing I always appreciate in the UK is about being able to speak English. Even if the person I'm talking has a different heritage I'm confident enough of my English to find it easy going. There are always new constructions, new words and new phrases that I've never heard before but it's simple enough to catch on to most and I can always ask if I don't know. I can overhear conversations without listening in and I can gauge whether making a comment on that overheard conversation is appropriate or not. I'm still miles from that confidence with Spanish.

Like all tourists some of my main interactions in the UK are with places selling food and drink and with a different range of prices. Paying upfront before someone pours my tea or prepares my Kurdish breakfast is still a bit surprising even if I've adapted to paying for the smallest item with a card or with my phone. I suspect that I will never adapt to drinking through a plastic lid atop a cardboard cup while crockery still exists. I was also surprised this time that I needed to keep my coat on in so many under heated caffs and pubs presumably as a response to high energy prices.

I talk to a woman called Ana most weeks through a video call. I speak to her in Spanish and I was telling her about my trip. I was saying to her that my Britishness still jars with Spain from time to time. I was mainly thinking about my little verbal asides. For instance, only a week ago I was trying to buy a flat hose. The sort of hose pipes they have rolled up in a wired glass cupboard that say Fire Dry Riser. I went to the two agricultural supply stores that we have in Pinoso. It was pretty obvious, after the response in the first, that they wouldn't have one in the second so, when the woman said, "No, sorry," I wasn't surprised and quipped "What a shame, I so wanted to play at firemen." The woman serving on looked at me like I was a blathering idiot - and it wasn't my Spanish. I've been told that it's nothing to do with Britishness and that it's just that I'm a bit odd in my verbal ad libbing. In my defence I'd give the example that last Monday, when I joined the end of the "Non Priority" queue at Stansted Airport to get on a Ryanair plane, I asked a woman if she were the back of the steerage queue. She understood, she smiled a little, she didn't think I was blathering. 

Ana said she understood the steerage line too. To emphasise the differences I then repeated most of the stuff I've written in the last few lines - drinking through plastic from cardboard cups, paying for the smallest item with a credit card, living off takeaway food and ordering up an Uber. She said that those things were dead normal to her life in the Barcelona area where she lives. Alright I said, and I told her the hosepipe story. She laughed which rather confounded my theory of a different sense of humour. Finally, I said about the insecurity of speaking Spanish as against English and she told me that was nothing to do with my level of language competence but because I was a big baby.

Maybe lots of the difference I think of as a British/Spanish thing are more between the bits of England I visit and the Spain I live in. After all home is an almost unpopulated satellite village of a small town which is still, very much, in a bit of a time warp. 

Just after that video call I was listening to a podcast from a bloke called Ben, who lives in Madrid. He was talking about going out for a menu del día, the cheap lunchtime set menus so typical of Spain. He was talking about how the food was usually traditional offerings. He obviously felt the need to be a bit more precise about that. He went on to say that nowadays Madrid is rapidly losing the traditional places and is full of fast food and restaurants offering cuisine from all over the world - not just the long established Italian and Chinese places but lots of South American, Eastern European, Middle East and Asian restaurants. That's exactly what I'd seen on Mill Road in Cambridge the other day. Then, for good measure he mentioned the "midday pause" the two or three hours that businesses close in large tracts of Spain, and how that too was now very much a thing of the past in the big cities.

Oh well, what do I know.

Ouch!

You may have noticed that the tagline at the top of this blog has changed. It used to say old, fat, white haired. Through absolutely no effort on my part I've lost a fair bit of weight. In fact so much so that there was some doubt about whether my feeding tube could be removed today. Patri, the nutritionist, obviously thinks I'm not making enough effort to pile in those calories. I'd like to think it was my vivid description of what I'd eaten on the tapas trail in Yecla yesterday or the slightly inflated description of the nature of Shepherd's Pie, which swung the balance. Actually it probably wasn't as my Spanish was particularly stumbling and faltering today. 

The nutritionist didn't remove the plumbing herself. She had to call for a doctor. I could see why. It was specialist work. The tube I've had in since August last year looked exactly like that clear plastic stuff that blows bubbles in home aquariums. The tube was about 30 cms long had a junction at the end with a couple of hard plastic screw caps where I connected the bags loaded with liquid food and where I had connected syringes to push clean water into my stomach. At first the water was a way of keeping me hydrated and later it was just to keep the pipework clean. There was a plastic clip halfway up the tube to help make sure my stomach contents didn't leak all over the floor if I forgot to tighten up the plastic caps. Up against my stomach there was a plastic disc about 2 cms across to stop the tube sliding back inside my guts. Apparently inside my stomach there was a smaller plastic disc up against the inner wall. Getting the tube fitted had been a full on affair - pre-ops, general anaesthetic, mob handed operating theatre - the works. I guess they made a hole in my stomach and then pushed the smaller, interior, disc through the hole a bit like a button in a buttonhole. As the wound healed it closed around the tube; I suppose.

So the doctor comes in, says hello, checked I'd not eaten a hearty breakfast and tells me he's going to tug the tube out - it may hurt a bit he quipped. He wrapped the tube around his hand and jerked. Ouch. Ah, it didn't come out. I'll have another go. Jerk. Ouch. Hmm, I think we might have to find another solution. I'll have one last go. Jerk. Ouch. It's out. The nutritionist mopped up the blood from the wound and put a couple of those steri-strips, on to hold it together then a big dressing over the top and, a few moments later, I was on my way. The first time I've not had some sort of plumbing dangling from me in months.

The Town Council in Pinoso

One nice thing about living in a small Spanish town is that it's pretty easy to be on nodding terms with most of the local councillors. Not that it's really such a great thing but at least it means you can appear integrated when you have visitors from the old country. I often think it must be quite difficult for them, the councillors that is, not the visitors, because they have no easy escape. I saw one councillor, for instance, obviously in a hurry and trying to buy a couple of things from a local supermarket yet he was being harangued by someone, most forthrightly, about something. 

There are thirteen councillors in Pinoso. As with all Spanish municipalities the number of councillors is determined by population. The way it's done, in most, is that there are population bands that determine the number of councillors. Pinoso has between 5,001 and 10,000 inhabitants so it gets thirteen councillors just like Banyeres de Mariola with a population of 7,255 people. It's always an uneven number. Madrid has fifty seven, a village with a population under one hundred gets three.

At the moment all of Pinoso's councillors are from political parties with a national presence. In the past some councillors were from local parties. The Socialists, the PSOE, Partido Socialista Obrero Español is in power with eight councillors and a clear majority. The centre right Partido Popular, the Popular Party, has three councillors and the extreme right, VOX, has two councillors. 

The voting system in Spain is based on political parties and lists. Each party puts forward a list with sufficient names to cover all the potential seats up for grabs often with a couple of supplementary names that may provide a bit of extra publicity. At the national level the party will put its "stars" at the head of lists in different locations. At the local level that list of names will be known to a lot of the electorate. At the regional and national level it's very unlikely that most people will know anything about the people on the list with the possible exception of that first, star, name. Only the politically very aware will know anyone further down the list. Who gets elected depends on a complicated mathematical formula that is designed to provide a form of proportional representation based on the votes cast. This means that the voting pattern in the local and national elections can be quite different because people choose to vote for the party nationally and for people they trust locally. For instance, last time around, in 2023, there were local and general elections but at different times. The hypothetical makeup of the Pinoso Town Council, based on the General Election results, would have seen the PP in power with seven seats. PSOE would have got four and VOX, two instead of the actual PSOE majority.

The term of office for a council is four years. The last elections were in 2023 and the next ones will be on Sunday May 23rd 2027. When the councillors have been elected the council meets to elect a mayor. If one party has a clear majority then it will usually elect the mayor. Where no one party is able to govern alone the parties horse trade until they have the necessary majority to elect a mayor and to form the governing council. In Pinoso with the clear PSOE majority the party elected Lázaro Azorín as Mayor. Once the makeup of the council is known then the councillors in the ruling party, or coalition, are given various responsibilities - education, health, employment etc. I've put the list with the current councillors and their responsibilities at the bottom. Some of the responsibilities were difficult to translate into English.

Lázaro, the mayor, has a second job, he's also a PSOE Diputado in the Congreso de los Diputados in Madrid. For we Britons he's the equivalent of an MP. Lázaro was number five on the PSOE's list for the 2019 General Election as a potential diputado from Alicante. The PSOE won sufficient proportion of the votes in the province for them to send four deputies to Madrid. Later, when the head of the list, Pedro Duque, Science Minister and ex astronaut, resigned (for tactical voting reasons in parliament) Lazaro, as next name on the list, became an MP. In the 2023 elections Lazaro was number three on the lists and he was elected on the proportion of the vote won by his party.

It is the council itself that decides on the payment levels, expenses etc. for the various councillors, though there are guidelines to avoid profiteering. I kept a note of the salaries reported after a council meeting in 2023. I wanted to make sure I was fair in mentioning those salaries here but I cannot find any reference to salary on the labyrinthine Pinoso Town Hall website. There's a section on the website called municipal transparency, transparencia municipal, but I find it somewhat less than transparent! Anyway, given that this information will probably have changed over the intervening years, and given that it may never have been correct, you should take this information as potentially inaccurate. I think that four of the councillors get paid a full salary, for a full working week, and four get paid a partial salary, equivalent to working about 10 hours per week. The full time salaries range from a bit above 48,000€ down to a bit below 34,000€ with the partial contracts paying around 11,000€ per year. 

So far as I know Lazaro waived his salary as mayor because he gets paid as a diputado. Actually he gets paid less as an MP than he would as mayor (a diputado gets a bit below 44,000€ a year according to Perplexity.ai) but they also get tax free expenses of around 24,000€ a year if their "constituency" is outside Madrid and quite a few other perks from taxi allowances to travel costs. Again, according to Perplexity.ai most common or garden MPs get paid between 4,000€ and 5,000€ per pay cheque remembering that, in Spain, most workers get 14 payments in a year.

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Pinoso Town Council

Lázaro Azorín Salar: Mayor.

Silvia Verdú Carrillo: Culture and Youth, Staff, Treasury, Education, Waste, Agriculture, Police, Civil Protection and Traffic, Forestry and Quarries

María José Moya Vidal: Social Services, Equality and LGTBI+, Protocol, Health, Pinoso Social and Health Associations, Local Media

César Pérez Cascales: Senior Citizens, Archive and Library, Heritage and Historical Memory, Foreigners, Citizen Participation, Social and Health Care Collectives

Neus Ochoa Rico: Local development, Tourism, Trade and Commerce, Markets and Consumer Affairs, Cleaning of Public Buildings 

José Ángel Pérez Verdú: Parks and Gardens, Outlying Settlements, Roads, Water and Water Resources, New Building, Technology and Street Cleaning

Elisa Santiago Tortosa: Fiestas

Raúl Pérez Albert: Cemetery Industry, Housing, Street Lighting and Urban Development

2024 Population in Pinoso

This was such an obvious blog, but one that had been published on the various Pinoso Town Hall websites, that I decided not to do it. Then, in casual conversation to Maggie I mentioned that it was easy to remember that there are now 345 Dutch and Belgian people in Pinoso (it's a topic of conversation amongst the Brits here, the obvious increase in the numbers of these two nationalities). She replied that she'd seen the article but not really taken it in. So, I decided to take the easy blog.

Pinoso had, at the close of 2024 a population, according to the statistical department of Pinoso Town Hall, of 8,836 people or maybe 8,846 (as the various figures in their article don't quite add up) but we're only talking about 10 people so I've used the higher figure to work out the figures in the next two sentences. Of that population 6,758 are Spanish (76%) and 2,078 people are foreigners (24%). There are 3426 Spanish men, 1039 foreign men, 3342 Spanish women and 1039 foreign women. The figures do not include the possibility of someone choosing not to be classed as male or female. The foreigners include people from 65 nationalities though four countries - Japan, Gambia, Yemen and Zimbabwe - only have a single, I hope not too lonely, representative here.

The biggest group of immigrants is still we Britons (801) followed by Moroccans (235), Dutch (210), Belgians (135), Rumanians (81), Ukrainians (64), Irish (43), Germans (38), Chinese (28), Polish (27), Algerians (25), Bulgarians (22), Italians (21) and Pakistanis (20). 

I think I should mention, because someone said it against one of the Facebook entries, that there are quite a few Canadians!

The last time I did this, at the start of 2022 (so 2021 figures), there were 56 different nationalities living in Pinoso. At that time the UK was way out in front with 835 people or nearly 10% of the population, the next most numerous group were Moroccans with 199 people. There were 71 Dutch, 69 Belgians, 66 Rumanians, 51 Ukrainians and 41 Ecuadorians. 

Atishoo!, atishoo!

On a Tunisian holiday we ate lots of carrots and lots of strawberries. They were in season, they were cheap, they were tasty so the hotels bought barrow loads of them for their guests. It's the same with lots of garden crops. They come in shedloads, all at once. Suddenly you have cherries or plums or green beans coming out of your ears. With us it was only ever figs. We've never done well with our garden - most things are early for the next extinction event. The figs were an exception but most of our garden is either dead or dying. We had three trees: two big ones and a smaller one. The big ones produced two crops a year. I mean, seriously, in the UK I'd occasionally see figs in Waitrose and buy them as a bit of a novelty. It was a novelty that lasted for maybe half a dozen figs over a couple of weeks. What does any individual do with thousands of figs? There are only so many jars of fig jam or fig and cheese starters that any one person can eat and most of the possibilities make little economic sense - fig wine in an area awash with proper wineries? You can't even give them away because everyone else has mounds of figs too that they are fed up of freezing and pairing with cheese.

So most of the figs would fall on the ground and had to be raked up. They overpowered the compost bin. It was the same with the autumn leaves. I know we're not supposed to rake leaves up anymore, pile them around tree roots and what not, leave them to mulch down, but these big trees produced knee deep leaves. And fig trees grow quickly. They produce a lot of new wood each season so they'd have to be pruned and what's to be done with all those lopped branches?

I do most of the graft in the garden but it's Maggie who takes any notice of it. She'll try new plants, new flowers, she'll harvest any crop there is and put it to use. I just prune, weed, rake, dig, hoe, curse and bleed. One day Maggie asked me if I'd noticed the white spots on the fig leaves. I hadn't. It turned out they were Cerosplastes rusci, sometimes called wax scales; here they are known as cochinilla. 

When I looked closely all three of our trees had these parasites on the leaves and bark, sucking away on the sap from the trees. At the local agricultural suppliers I only had to say the word higuera (fig tree) and the bloke was reaching for some sort of chemical to see them off. He told me that the chemicals weren't particularly toxic for humans,  so anyone could use them, but he recommended overalls, a hat, goggles and facemask while I sprayed. Each tree needed about 30 litres of two different chemicals. It was August and it was quite hot inside a boiler suit, a woolly hat, goggles and facemask especially with each backpack full of insecticide weighing in at close on 20 kilos. At the start it wasn't too bad but by the end, determined to finish in one fell swoop, I was swaying gently and on the point of collapse. I was probably quite close to being one of those four line stories on the National TV news, slightly longer on the local radio, about some sixty odd year old dying from heat exhaustion.

For a while the trees seemed to be saved. They recovered, they gave fruit, the leaves stopped dropping off and then, suddenly, one of the trees tree just lost the will to live. It died in a couple of weeks. I lopped off all the really weighty branches and left it as a climbing frame for the cats. Later it became a support for the solar powered fairy lights that Maggie likes to festoon the building with. It wasn't till a couple of seasons later that I noticed cracks in the trunk and branches of the other tree, boreholes and all sorts of signs that the tree was doomed. The destruction wreaked by the tiny parasites is truly incredible.

So the two big fig trees were now dead. Again, with the second one I lopped off lots of branches to leave it looking like one of those John Ford Sonoran cactus. Stark.

There was a bit of wind a couple of weeks ago. As always it blew some chairs over, whirpooled leaves into mounds in certain spots of the garden. The wind also blew the first fig tree down. 

I sawed, I spent ages splitting the trunk with steel wedges to make the remains manageable enough to cart away to a large pile of garden waste that I'm unsure what I'm going to do with. Probably it will go the way of the supposed witch in that Monty Python sketch - well it might when the controls on garden fires are eased up.

Tax and minimum wage - today's news

Something in today's news about income tax completely flummoxed me. I think I've got it worked out now. I may be wrong so don't take my ramblings as gospel but I thought you may be interested too.

The current Spanish Government is a coalition. That coalition can usually garner support from other parties to approve its legislation, but not always. Today, one of the news stories was about a row within the two parties that make up the Government. Yolanda Diaz, from SUMAR, has done a deal with the Unions to put the minimum wage up to 1,184€ per month. Because there are 14 payments in the Spanish year that's a total income of 16,576€ per year. At the moment the minimum wage is 15,876€. Yolanda Diaz also pushed through legislation which dropped the working week from 40 hours to 37.5 hours for the same pay. The majority party in Government, the Socialists or PSOE, argue that, as the minimum wage is now a reasonable income, it should be taxed like other incomes. SUMAR argues that as it is still a low income the workers on it should be offered more protection. In recent years the minimum wage has been exempt of the IRPF or income tax.

This news confused me because I know that Spanish income tax (IRPF) is paid in earnings bands with different percentage rates. The lowest rate, on taxable income between 1€ and 12,450€, is 19%. The next band goes from 12,450€ and 20,200€. The tax on that is 24%. There are other tax bands, the highest is for incomes of 300,000€ or more which are taxed at 47%. If the lowest tax rate was 19%, and that applied from the first euro earned, how could a wage be tax exempt?

I also knew that there were tax allowances. For someone under 65 it's 5,550€, increasing to 6,700€ for over 65s and 8,100€ for the over 75s. There are other tax allowances too, for dependants and for married couples. The bit I didn't know was that if the total taxable income was below the minimum wage then there was no tax to be paid at all. Even now that seems a bit odd as it clashes with the idea of the various tax bands.

And that's the change. Presuming that the legislation goes through, in the tax year 2025 even the people on minimum wage will be taxed. As we are just about to have the pleasure of paying our tax bills for the tax year 2024 the rest of this explanation uses 2024 as an example.

1. Exemption for incomes below the minimum wage

Individuals earning up to the annual minimum wage do not have to pay IRPF. In 2024, this exemption threshold was set at 15,876€, equivalent to the annual minimum wage. So, people on low incomes, particularly those earning at or below the minimum wage, are not subject to income tax.

2. The 19% Tax Band

The first €12,450 of taxable income is subject to a 19% tax rate under Spain's sliding scale tax system. Taxable income is calculated after subtracting personal allowances (the 5,550€ and so on) and other deductions. Because of the personal allowances and the exemption for incomes below the minimum wage, many low-income earners do not reach the taxable income level where this 19% rate applies.

3. How the exemption and the 19% tax band Interact

There is an apparent dichotomy which arises because the 19% tax band starts at €0. In practice, no one pays this rate on their first €12,450 of gross income unless their earnings exceed both the personal allowance and the minimum wage.

For instance: A worker earning €15,876 (the minimum wage in 2024) would subtract their personal allowance (€5,550 for someone under 65), leaving a taxable income of €10,326. Since this taxable income is below the exemption threshold (€15,876), they pay no IRPF.

If their gross income exceeded the exemption threshold, for instance if they earned €16,000, they would begin paying IRPF on their taxable income above €5,550. That would mean they would have 10,450€ of taxable income. That figure falls within the 19% tax band (which goes up to 12,450€) so they would pay 1,985.50€ in taxes. (10,450 x 19%)

You can see that, in this case, a small increase in gross pay produces a significantly increased tax bill.

You can also see that there are two possible arguments about whether people should pay tax on their total income or not. The one that has won, at the moment, the PSOE one, is that the personal allowances and the tax bands provide a fair taxation system without needing any extra protection for those on the lowest wages. The PSOE reckons that only about 20% of the people on minimum wage will pay any tax in 2025 and those will generally be single people without dependants.

Singing along

Much to the amusement of Maggie, my partner, instead of resolving to go to the gym or to stop drinking alcohol in the New Year my resolution was to learn the words to Un beso y una flor. It's a song popularised in Spain by the singer Nino Bravo in 1972. 

I don't know about you but I was forced to learn things by rote in Secondary school on pain of serious bodily harm. 

Latin master to an 11 year old me.
"Alright Thompson;  present tense of to love in Latin"
I try.
"Wrong, lift one leg, stand on just one. Try again. Same verb, same tense."
I try again.
"Wrong, lift the other leg too!" 

Should you be concerned I can still trot out amō, amās, amat, amāmus, amātis, amant even when I'm dead drunk. I can also do "I wandered lonely as a cloud, that floats on high etc.," and "So shaken as we are, so wan with care, find we a time for frighted peace to pant, etc. That seems to be it though. There must have been more but they've gone. 

The Spanish used to say, la letra con sangre entra, literally, the letter enters with blood but which equates to our,  spare the rod and spoil the child. Both come from a time when adults were very happy to use severe violence against youngsters and when rote learning was one of the mainstays of any educational system. 

We do learn by constant repetition though, otherwise I wouldn't know tens, if not hundreds, of songs from the ones sung by adults in my childhood like Don't Dilly Dally on the Way or Daisy, Daisy through to all those pop songs of the 60s, 70s and 80s. I do remember making a bit of an effort to learn the words to Jerusalem too when I was at University having been unable to hide my ignorance as a group of about twenty of us did our best to be patriotic, or socialist, or part of the Women's Institute, from the top of a table in the Union bar.

There's a Spanish song, Mediterráneo by Joan Manuel Serrat, that has been voted as the best song in the history of popular music in Spain. You hear it from time to time but it's rolled out far fewer times than songs like Eres tú by Mocedades or Bailando by Alaska or Rafael's Mi Gran Noche. But the song that I've noticed is the one I'm trying to learn, Un beso y una flor by Nino Bravo.

I'm not much for sport but, during the Euros, I could hear that the England football fans were singing Sweet Caroline. I remember too that my mum complained that, in the place she lived until very recently, the residents often burst into a version of that same song. Somehow the song had moved from mere song to anthem. In exactly the same was I found myself swaying gently from side to side as the drunken crowd, out to cheer on the Wine Horses in Caravaca de la Cruz last year, burst into a spirited rendition of Un beso y una flor. I recognised the song and I mouthed a few of the lines that I remembered but the situation reminded me of that table top Jerusalem recital - lots of da, da, da. Some time later, in Pinoso, the town band played the song as part of a concert and, Rod Stewart like, the band's director handed over to the crowd to sing along - ligero equipaje tum, tum, tan largo viaje, tum tiddly. 

That means that on two separate occasions, twice, the song has cropped up as a sing along. It's not happened with any other song, except the Spanish Happy Birthday, so, every day, for just five minutes, as my resolution, I read through the lyrics. So far and we're now into the second month of the year, not a thing, I can't string two lines together. Absolutely useless. My addled brain seems quite unable to cope. But even back in the 60s with those Latin verbs and ancient poems my method was easy - persistence. Just keep going till Elliot or Chesterton or the future tense (amābō, amābis, amābit, amābimus, amābitis, amābunt) ceded before sheer obstinance.

Un beso y una flor, Canción de Nino Bravo

Dejaré mi tierra por ti

Dejaré mis campos y me iré

Lejos de aquí

Cruzaré llorando el jardín

Y con tus recuerdos partiré

Lejos de aquí

De día viviré

Pensando en tus sonrisas

De noche las estrellas me acompañarán

Serás como una luz

Que alumbre mi camino

Me voy pero te juro que mañana volveré

Al partir un beso y una flor

Un "te quiero", una caricia y un adiós

Es ligero equipaje

Para un tan largo viaje

Las penas pesan en el corazón

Más allá del mar habrá un lugar

Donde el sol cada mañana brille más

Forjarán mi destino

Las piedras del camino

Lo que nos es querido siempre queda atrás

Buscaré un hogar para ti

Donde el cielo se une con el mar

Lejos de aquí

Con mis manos y con tu amor

Lograré encontrar otra ilusión

Lejos de aquí

De día viviré

Pensando en tus sonrisas

De noche las estrellas me acompañarán

Serás como una luz

Que alumbre mi camino

Me voy pero te juro que mañana volveré

Al partir un beso y una flor

Un "te quiero", una caricia y un adiós

Es ligero equipaje

Para un tan largo viaje

Las penas pesan en el corazón

Más allá del mar habrá un lugar

Donde el sol cada mañana brille más

Forjarán mi destino

Las piedras del camino

Lo que nos es querido siempre queda atrás

Al partir un beso y una flor

Un "te quiero", una caricia y un adiós

Es ligero equipaje

Para un tan largo viaje

Las penas pesan en el corazón

Más allá del mar habrá un lugar

Donde el sol cada mañana brille más

Forjarán mi destino

Las piedras del camino

Lo que nos es querido siempre queda atrás

A clean break

Being as how they're in season Walnuts are a common sight in Spanish supermarkets and homes around Christmas time. Apparently Britons and Spaniards open walnuts differently.

In the UK, in my youth, Christmas was about the only time of the year we'd have nuts, in shells, in our house. What joy, a reason to bring the crocodile nutcracker out of it's almost perennial hibernation and set it to task. The tail applied the pressure to the nut placed between the beast's jaws.

Now this, plier like, action, is fine for nuts with hard shells - Brazil nuts, hazelnuts and almonds for instance. It was complete overkill for monkey nuts and problematic for walnuts too. Instead of a nice clean break the intricately constructed walnut shells generally shattered when they suddenly lost their structural strength. The crocodile jaws would smack to producing a mixed pile of pulverized nut and shell fragments.

When you buy a net bag of walnuts in Spain they usually (not always) come with something that looks like a flat key. The idea is that you put the short end of the key into the crack between the two halves of the nut, the seam of the shell, and twist. The shell splits neatly and leaves the brain shaped half of the nut in one piece. I bet that's how Rowntrees got those nicely shaped nuts on top of their walnut whips.

Rise, take up your bed, and walk

Maggie tells me I should be explicit and say that I have been given the cancer all clear. She tells me that a sentence built into the story of the Imserso holiday is not good enough. That all the people who have shown concern need to be told clearly and succinctly. Clearly fine, succinctly - not likely given my style.

On 10 January I saw the oncologist at Elda Hospital after doing a PET -TAC at the Vinalopó Hospital in Elche a couple of days before. The oncologist told me that the results showed that the lesion that had been in my throat, in August, was no longer there - the cancer was gone. Every few months I will have to have another TAC scan and then go to see the oncologist to see whether the cancer has come back. I asked what chance there was of the cancer returning and he said 40%. That puts the odds in my favour.

I thought I was done there but Maggie tells me that I should tell you that I'm still having trouble eating. That, even now, I'm taking most food through a stomach tube but that I have started to eat more ordinary food, especially soft food, by mouth. My throat and mouth are not yet recovered - I have a sore throat all the time and my mouth is sometimes slimy, sometimes dry as a bone. My breath is less fragrant than it was. As my taste buds and saliva glands took a pasting from the radiotherapy (and maybe the chemotherapy) eating and drinking isn't a particularly pleasant experience. The treatment has affected my hearing and I'm quite deaf. There are other things which are not quite as before, including things like my facial hair hardly growing as well as changes to other bodily functions which I'm not going to detail here. Full disclosure only goes so far. Oh, and since the day when I was first told that I had cancer until today I have lost 17.7 kilos or two and three quarter stones. I'm very saggy.

By the way Positron Emission Tomography - Computed Axial Tomography (PET-TAC), is the process where the patient, me in this case, is put inside a big tube which allows the medics to take lots of images, a full body scan, that show the activity and metabolism of the body's organs using a radioactive "dye" which interacts with different types of body cells in different ways. People who know what they are looking at can interpret the images to decide what is happening to certain organs and, specifically in my case, to decide whether there was still cancer in my throat and lymph nodes and whether it has popped up anywhere else in other organs.

Holidays on the State

The food tasted horrid. It may really have been horrid but I think it was probably right enough given that it was mass catering. My recentish bouts of radio and chemotherapy have mashed up my taste buds and almost everything tastes odd. In fact until a couple of weeks ago I hadn't tried eating, by putting anything in my mouth, for a bit over three months but, when the oncologist said there was no sign of cancer, it seemed about time to stop messing around and get back to normal. I'm still taking most of my sustenance through a stomach tube though. Whether the food was foul or not it came as part of the package and so, come hell or high water, I was definitely going to force some of it down my gullet. Anyway I'd also promised the nutritionist I'd try. 

Mealtimes, not eating much, I had the opportunity to look around at my fellow travellers. I felt for the few young people who had, mistakenly, booked into the hotel. It was full of holidaying pensioners. Most of us were overweight and a bit doddery. Many of us were rude or at least a bit selfish and unthinking. I'd watch as someone stopped to chat blocking up the narrow aisles between the tables, I'd watch as someone hogged the coffee machine to make just the right mix of coffee and hot milk in blissful ignorance of the ever extending queue behind them. The coffee had, after all to be just right, the wife had been sent for the coffee, the husband expected it just so and the little woman knew her place (presumably at some subservient time during the last century). At least we were the walking wounded, the ones who are still upright. Ah, the delights of old age.

We've just done one of the IMSERSO (Instituto de Mayores y Servicios Sociales) holidays. Eight days away in a hotel in Roquetas del Mar on the Almeria coast for 228.93€ per person. That includes the coach from Alicante to Roquetas, full board and travel insurance including private health cover. The hotel we stayed at was the Hotel Bahia Serena - one of those enormous four star coastal hotels with pools and gyms and entertainment. The photo is of the interior patio of the hotel. 

The Imserso holidays are, essentially, subsidised holidays for pensioners resident in Spain who are enrolled in the Social Security System - there are other groups of people who are eligible too. If you qualify, but your partner doesn't, because they are too young for the scheme, they can also go along. I thought that to be eligible you had to have a Spanish State Pension but English speakers on the same bus as us to Roquetas assured me that wasn't the case. The people we talked to had registered through a travel agent and then used the same travel agent to book them the holidays. Each year there is a period to register and later there is a period to book the holidays. For this season I think that people can register on the scheme through till May (registration opened in November) but the periods seem to change so it's worth checking the Imserso website for up to date information. There is also information there about who qualifies with a points system based on age, income, levels of ability and the like. If you register now it is unlikely that you will be able to book a holiday this season but your eligibility will roll over into the 2025/2026 season.

There are lots of destinations to choose from divided into three categories - coastal holidays, island holidays and short breaks. In our first year of registration we were not able to book the island holidays. I had to wait till the second year. I'm not sure if that's because I didn't have enough points or if it's a general rule for all participants. The main group, the coastal holidays, are along the Mediterranean coast from Cataluña down through Valencia, Murcia and onto Andalucia. There is always a scramble to book up as the new season opens in Autumn. I booked us up online and didn't worry too much about the race to get to the islands. Once we'd found a place that looked OK we considered the job done. There are plenty of people who are hardened Imsersoers. When the booking period opens they hover by their computers with their options well researched. They target what they consider the best deals in the best hotels in the best locations and book multiple holidays. The next time you need Taylor Swift tickets they may be available as subcontractors!

The principal idea behind the scheme is that it helps to maintain the wellbeing of older people who get to relax, to see a bit of Spain and to decrease their potential isolation by mixing with other pensioners in the participating hotels. Philosophy aside it's also a scheme that supports the tourist industry by offering a steady flow of clients in the low season. I think how it works is that the Government guarantees a certain price, for their services, to the airlines, coach firms, hotels etc. Whether the providers sign up or not is a choice for them and their accountants. If, for instance, a hotel decides that there is enough money in the offer they can keep open without having to temporarily lay off staff. 

This was our second Imserso holiday. Last year we went to Cataluña in May when the resort was back in business for the summer but this time, with going in January, the part of Roquetas where the hotel is was, more or less, closed down for the winter and it was a bit desolate. 

I don't remember it as being a particularly difficult process to sign up though going through a travel agent sounds as if it would have been easier. I suppose that, like the hotels, certain travel agents deal with Imserso holidays and others don't. To be honest, I've forgotten a lot of the detail about exactly how I signed up and applied the first time. Nonetheless, like all bureaucratic processes, I'm sure there are slight changes from year to year. That being the case don't take my word for any of this and have a look at the Imserso website if you want to know the truth.

And nobody wears Prada

I was hanging around in the Corte inglés in Alicante the other day. Corte Inglés is a big department store. Like all traditional retailers Corte Inglés has been having a hard time recently but they're still something of a Spanish institution. Anyway, Father Ted like, I, inadvertently, wandered into the women's underwear section. As I averted my eyes, I found myself gazing at small section dedicated to "traditional" clothes from Alicante. I was rather taken with the silk brocade waistcoats but not so much with the 190€ price tag on most of them.

I've often wondered where people get their "traditional" clothes from so Corte Inglés was a bit of a surprise. Maybe all the branches in Provincial Capitals have a "traditional" section. I've asked of course and been variously told that some of the clothes are hired, that there are family heirlooms, that lots are made in family, that there are people who make a living by supplying the clothes and, from time to time, I do see the costumes in shop windows. There used to be a shop in Pinoso, in Plaza Colón, opposite the market that sold fiesta clothes. Down in Murcia, for the Bando de la Huerta celebrations, they move so much "traditional" clothing that you can buy it in the supermarkets.

I've said in the past that the idea of "traditional" dress seems a bit strange to me. (I'm going to give up on the inverted commas now but remember they're there). Who is it who chooses? Who stopped the clock in the 18th or 19th century? Why isn't traditional something from 1945 or 1967 or 2023? And if it were would traditional be what people wear to the office, to a wedding or to do sport?

Probably around 2006 our village, Culebrón, prepared a float for the big parade that is a part of the Pinoso fiesta in August. Culebrón had been promised drains by the PP administration of the time but they were not forthcoming. The float's main feature was an oversized toilet. We were told to try to wear something traditional to accompany the float and that the traditional dress for Culebrón was striped grey trousers or skirt topped off with a white shirt. We did our best.

There's another event in Pinoso which celebrates the liberation of Pinoso from the shackles of Monóvar in 1826. The celebration, called Villazgo, takes place in February. For years it was a great event, nowadays in cash strapped Pinoso it's a pathetic affair held in a car park. I used to buy a newspaper most mornings from a shop called Juanjo and I liked to try and chat to the owner as a way of practising my Spanish. We got talking about Villazgo and Juanjo told me about the typical and traditional form of clothing for men in Pinoso before selling me a sort of smock. Very simple, a big baggy black shirt to be worn with a blue and white neckerchief. He wasn't telling fibs, I know from years and years of experience that it's one of the most common men's outfits for Villazgo. Mine is still unworn. I have never been one for fancy dress and I always think I'd feel like a bit of a fake dressing up as a Spaniard - I was born in Huddersfield after all where cloth caps and clogs might have been more appropriate.

There are several events in Pinoso when people wear something that is called traditional. I often wonder if it's traditional in the way that blokes with bells on their clothes doing clodhopping type dances with clashing sticks on various village greens in England in the guise of Morris dancers or Mummers are, apparently, a part of my heritage. Those Pinoso events include Villazgo. Easter is another. There's a day in the Holy Week celebrations when women process through the streets wearing peinetas and mantillas. You know the sort of thing. Think of a, supposedly, Spanish woman in a 1950s Hollywood film, wearing something that isn't the flouncy fiesta frock. She'll have a high comb stuck into her raven coloured hair to support a very fine lace scarf that hangs around the side of her face and down her back. For most of the time though when the women in Pinoso don traditional dress they'll wear a pleated skirt, called a refajo, which is a huge circle of cloth with a circular, elasticated(?), hole for their waist pleated over and over again and usually in green, red and tonal stripes. It's the sort of skirt that the "carnival queens" wear during the Pinoso fiestas in August but it's also the skirt for the folk dancers.

Another event in the August Fiesta is the ofrenda, the flower offering. People set off from a district called Santa Catalina and parade through the streets to the Parish Church. It's one of my favourite events. The participants smile sufficiently to light up a large city. People from all over the area, even over the border into Murcia, are invited to the ofrenda and the range of traditional clothes is impressive. The contingent from Culebrón always wear those grey trousers or skirts we were told about in our toilet training days. There are blokes in velvet knee breeches and Cordoba style hats, there are women from Alicante dressed in huge silky skirts supported on some sort of scaffolding so typical of the city's San Juan fiesta. As we're in Valencia region it's very difficult not to be aware of the Fallas Fiesta which takes place in March in Valencia City (there are other fallas in other towns too) and even I can tell that there are big differences, as well as seeming similarities, between the women's outfits from Valencia and Alicante. I can't actually remember if either Alicante or Valencia features the breast enhancing bodices but they are also a big part of the ofrenda. To their credit several of our town councillors make a real effort with some splendid traditional clothes in several of these events. Indeed I was thinking of a couple of the waistcoats sported by our current mayor when I was in Corte Inglés.

Mention of the Fallas reminded me of a conversation I had with a friend who was born in Valencia city. She complained that, during the dictatorship, the traditional dress had been discouraged and a sort of Francoist revision of traditional was put in place. I have no idea what the changes were - maybe fewer push up corsets - but she got very hot under the collar about it. She also told me how much her sister had spent on a dress for a recent edition of Fallas - again I forget how much but it made me blanche at the time.

Anyway. So I thought, there's a blog here about the differences that there are between traditional Pinoso and, similar but different, in Monóvar (next town down the road) or Yecla (across the frontier into Murcia). In fact someone told me that the stripes on the refajo skirts are horizontal, as against vertical, in one or the other. I was lying in bed thinking about it. I decided that books, as against the Internet, would probably be a good source of information. 

I went to the library where Clara, the librarian/archivist was extremely generous with her time (and forgiving of my Spanish) as she told me about the local traditional clothes. Basically what she said was that traditional was a load of tosh. That the clothes worn came from a range of periods and the differences between an outfit in one place and another was that one town was doing the equivalent of featuring the 1960s mini skirt whilst another had chosen to highlight the 1970s catsuit (not literally you understand but figuratively) or that two towns had chosen the same basic period but one was stressing Sunday best while the other had gone with working in the fields. Add in a bit of similarity, or variety, because of the seasonal nature of the clothes, the climate they were designed for, the materials they were made of, whether the clothes were made by Balenciaga for a rich landowner or came from Stradivarius for a factory worker and lots of other sensible and obvious factors.

It was a very informative session and I borrowed a couple of books and got to see several reference books with old pictures of the area (sometimes with Clara pointing out her mum or grandma in some grainy B&W photo) but it didn't help me write the definitive guide to traditional dress in Pinoso. Maybe when I've read the books!

Fun for this year

There are lot of strange fiestas in Spain. Every now and then I'll see some article or read a report about this or that event where everyone throws paint at a man dressed as a clown/harlequin for either attempting to steal/failing to steal a religious icon in Guadix and Baeza (Cascamorras), where a man, also dressed as a clown/harlequin, jumps over babies each Corpus Christi in Castrillo de Murcia, in Burgos (El Colacho), where devils capture saints with the intention of burning then to death if they are not sidetracked into climbing onto the balconies of fair maidens with rape in their minds (La Santantonà in Forcall), where six open coffins, with live occupants, are paraded around a church and its cemetery to musical accompaniment in Las Nieves, Galicia (Fiesta de Santa Marta de Ribarteme) or where giant puppets, skeletons and knights Templar parade through the torchlit streets of Soria (Las Ánimas). Once upon a time any list of odd festivals would include the takeover of the town of Ibi and the resulting egg, flour and firework fight (els Farinats) but Health and Safety has turned that into a shadow of its former self.  There are tens if not hundreds more but even I can recognise when a list is getting too long.

Nonetheless, if I come across some fiesta that sounds promising, even if it's kilometres away, I'll log it away in my diary with a note to myself to check out the dates and details closer to the time. My hope is that there'll be something a bit different to take snaps of. The trouble is that I've done most within spitting distance and there is a certain reluctance on behalf of my long suffering partner to spend a fortune on a couple of nights away to see the symbolic bear hunt at La Vijanera in Silió in Cantabria or to see people rafting down the river in Nargó in Lleida. Anyway the years are taking their toll and I'm getting too old or too lazy to drive off to the far corners of Spain to fight crowds of young men to get an out of focus photo of some pagan ritual hijacked by the Catholic Church.

January is a good time for fiestas. Lots of the San Antón festivals are pretty lively and usually involve animals and/or fire. One I went to last year in Vilanova d'Alcolea was a real hoot. It was described as a perfect symbiosis between animals and fire and there was mention of a procession, with horses, passing through all the town's streets, jumping over bonfires along the route. What the description didn't say was that those horses drove the crowd before them in narrow streets ablaze with brushwood in a scene as infernal as any ever envisioned in a doom painting with souls cast into the fiery pit of Hell. At one point I was quite convinced I was going to die in flames. Quite a few of the local San Antón events are much gentler though.

Anyway my diary said I should check an event in Piornal. I had no idea where Piornal was though it turns out that it's in Extremadura, in Caceres, which is a long way from Culebrón. I didn't know what it was about, nor when it was, it's on January 19th and 20th this year and as I'm already booked up for those dates I thought I'd let you know so you could pop over there yourself and maybe get involved if you fancied it.

The fiesta is called Jarramplas and it represents the punishment of a cattle thief who is being driven out of the village. Jarramplas is the name of the character, a man dressed in a coat covered in multi-coloured ribbons, so that he looks like he's wearing one of those rag carpets that were still common in my youth. He wears a conical full face mask with a big nose and two horns sprout from the mask. He parades through the town beating a small drum and people throw things at him; in the past it was any old vegetable but, nowadays, they pelt him with turnips, well small root vegetable called nabos actually. No doubt thanks to the nanny state the 21st Century costume conceals a steel armour undergarment to ensure that Jarramplas isn't killed. You'd think they'd have trouble finding people to take on the role but there are, apparently, enough people willing to brave the volleys of turnips till 2048. Obviously, being Spain, there's a saint, Sebastian, linked to this festival and as well as turnip heaving there are lots of other events in the two days from Saint dressing and foot kissing to a communal meal of migas (we are in Extremadura after all).

No, seriously, Spain really is full of colourful and interesting fiestas and it doesn't take much hunting to find something well worth gawping at. Nearly all the local town halls have Facebook pages where they publicise their fiestas. Now I'm feeling a bit better I'm going to get back into it and see if I can't find something new and fun to point my camera at.