Life in Culebrón

I normally do a roundup of the Pinoso population whenever the town hall releases the latest padrón figures—the official register of all local residents. This usually happens in late January, but for some reason I missed the publication this year. It only struck me the other day, while chatting about the perceived influx of people from the Netherlands and Belgium, that I’d forgotten my annual “easy blog” post. Like everyone else, I’ve noticed a language that I presume is Dutch (though with my ear for languages it could just as easily be Swedish or Lithuanian). I’ve also heard plenty of chatter about the large, somewhat out‑of‑character houses now peppering the Pinoso countryside. Rumour has it this boom in Dutch immigration is largely down to a single family: the Jelies. I can’t say for certain if it’s true, but Perplexity tells me they were featured in a programme called Familie Jelies: Een Huis Vol Emigreert, and more recently in Jelies & Gnodde: Grote Gezinnen Emigreren. Apparent...

I got my hair cut last week. As I'm sure you know I go to Alfredo . One of the tiny pluses of Covid 19 is that Alfredo has cut down the number of appointments he takes in an hour. If it used to be one every 15 minutes it's now one every 20 minutes and if it was one every 20 minutes it's now one every half an hour. This is to give him time to disinfect things and to make sure that there are not too many people waiting or sitting together. It also means, that for most of an appointment, there's just me and him in the room; so nobody extra to smirk at my Spanish. I said good morning and Alfredo said, "Do you know there are 54 Nationalities living in Pinoso?". I had to say that I didn't. The last time I'd seen the figure it was "only" 42. "I wonder why?," he asked. Being an immigrant myself I had answers. I likened it to the Bengali population settling in Brick Lane or Spaniards congregating in West London - friends tell friends that a...