Likes, dislikes, Christmas decorations and talking local

When Spanish people ask me what I like most about Spain I say the anarchy. Then I have to backtrack because the word has more history and more significance in Spanish than it does in English. I should say something like the informality, a touch of rebelliousness, the remarkability of some fiestas and the way that after a family meal in a Spanish restaurant the proverbial bomb dropping would make no noticeable difference nor would it stop the kids playing tag around the tables. There are lots of other things I like too but it's a good starter.

When Spanish people ask me what I like least about Spain I say the cold. They think I'm joking. I explain that in the UK it might be cold outside in winter, and dark, but that inside it would be nice and warm. It's not true of most of Spain but here in Alicante, where insulation is practically non existent, where tiles and ornamental stone are everywhere and where central heating is almost unknown then wearing outdoor clothing inside in Winter is common.

Each year, at the beginning of December I drag our Christmas lights out of storage and usually buy a few more to light the front of our house. I like the pagan idea of scaring away the winter's dark with light and Christmas is the time to do it. Inside we have a Belén, a nativity scene (not for any religious reason but because we live in Spain) and a tree. We bought our Christmas tree at Woolworth's in Huntingdon in 1997. It sheds each year. I've always argued that a returning artificial tree gives a certain continuity but I have to admit that it is now, officially, bald and has to be retired, replaced and discarded. 

I was talking to one of my online Spanish chums about the tree and she said they'd had no decorations of any sort for Christmas. No tree, no lights and, given that most British households would now be the same, no cards either. Cards have never been a thing in Spain. Obviously Spanish people put up Christmas decorations. You see them but compare them to those films set in small town United States where everyone wears Santa hats and drinks eggnog as the Christmas tree lights are turned on or, indeed, the majority of British homes, then Spanish Christmas decorations are definitely an optional extra.

I like to go places. There's so much to do, so much to see. My partner isn't quite so convinced. This reticence on her part is not new. I remember she wasn't over enthusiastic about going to the Prickwillow Engine Museum even on a steam day, and that was last century. So, when she went to the UK for a few days, I went to see the Todoli Citrus Fundació groves in Palmera near Gandía. The Foundation has over 400 different varieties of citrus fruit. I thought it would be an interesting visit. The website said the tours were available in Valencian, Castilian and English. The bloke who took us round was a Valencian nationalist (someone who strongly identifies with their own nation and vigorously supports its interests, especially to the exclusion or detriment of the interests of other nations). He used some not so subtle tactics to gerrymander a result to prove that the group wanted the tour conducted in Valencian. I can understand Valencian, to a degree, but after straining to understand for a while I go into Homer Simpson mode and the birds soar freely in the emptied sky of my mind. It rather dampened my enthusiasm for the visit and my Google review was not kind.

I absolutely understand why people in Catalonia, the Balearic islands and the Valencian Community are keen to keep their language alive. That said I have never understood a pride in having been born in a certain place or having any other innate trait; can anyone be proud that they have brown eyes? I'm very happy that I was born British but only in a very selfish way because it means I've had health care and schooling and clean water all my life. I see why people are proud of the things they achieve but not in the product of happenstance. And the line is a very fine one between promoting something, like Valenciano, and purposefully excluding people.

And if it's not too late: Happy New Year

Not the playing fields of Eton

I remember sport, things sporting, at school with a mix of horror and shame. Rugby was shivering on frost hardened mud with my hands down my shorts waiting to be crushed. On my cricketing skills my report noted that I would do better if I didn't run away from the ball. At university I did a fair bit of sailing and canoeing but they never captivated me nor did I show any particular skill for them. Between then and now I have generally avoided anything that involves wearing shorts, Lycra, oddly shaped sunglasses, vests or neoprene; in fact anything that smacks of sexual fetish or sweat.

Yesterday though, for some strange reason I spectated at two sporting events. No neoprene you understand. Street clothes for me and well away from the activity. Just watching.

You know that round here there is a local language, a lot like Catalan. I usually call that language Valenciano. The Spanish that the world speaks is called Castellano. It can become a bit odd at times - why do I say Valenciano, which is a Castellano word, rather than say Valencià, which is the name of the language in the language or just translate directly into English and say Valencian or Castilian? 

The next town down the road from us is called Monòver in Valenciano and Monóvar in Castellano. That's where I went to watch a sort of handball game yesterday. Despite Monòver producing nearly all its publicity in Valenciano I can, normally, get the gist of what they're saying and if I get stuck Google translate set to Catalan bails me out. The poster said 1 Autonòmic de Galotxes de Monòver and showed some people playing a version of handball. Fair enough I thought the game is called galotxes. When I was there, I began to wonder if the courts were the galotxes and the sport was called pilota because on the walls were things like Galotxa Antonio Marhuenda (so something named for Antonio) and Galocha Oficial De la Matinal (La Matinal sounds like a club so this is their official Galocha). It's probably the first time that I've been to something on purpose and not known what I saw!

The games were a bit boring to be honest - it was played by hitting a squishy tennis sized ball over a net rather than against a wall but those reverse shots from the back wall were allowed. As a spectator I had no idea who was winning and who was playing well. There were lots of quite heavy people, plenty of middle aged players, a few women but, not too surprisingly, the fastest and most competitive game I saw was between two teams of fit young men.

The football I've been threatening to do for a while. Someone who Maggie knows plays in the local Brass Band and he and his wife go to the games of Pinoso FC. They said they'd take me along and they were good for their word. The Pinoso team did really well last season and were set for promotion to some sort of league that, whilst it was still pretty low, was good for such a small town. I guessed, though I don't know, that it was a bit like the old Fourth Division. Anyway there was some political argy bargy about funding with the town hall and the team folded. More argy bargy and it reformed but by now their place in the division was gone and they had to start again from scratch in the deepest pits of the lowest leagues - well Grupo XI de la 2ª Regional sounds pretty modest to me.

It's the sort of ground you'd expect. They do well to have grass given our climate. There is a covered stand along the length of the pitch with plastic seats on concrete terraces and otherwise it's all pretty open. No fancy scoreboards, the dugouts are bus shelter style and just 3€ to watch. Season tickets are 10€. Maybe a couple of hundred people watching though I may be being a bit over enthusiastic. Despite the five nil scoreline it was hardly an action packed game but at least I knew what was going on.

That's probably enough sport for a while though.

Bàsquet: els equips cadet i infantil inicien la competició

I am often quite concerned by my Facebook feed. Apparently I have friends, acquaintances and friends of acquaintances who believe that wearing particular clothes is dangerous, that seeking a better future is intrinsically wrong and that arguing that people should be treated equally is woolly minded thinking. I listen to Trump and Matteo Salvini and Viktor Orbán knowing that Jair Bolsonaro is about to join their ranks and I wince. I think of my home country and its isolationist anti cultural bigotry and I wonder where it all went wrong.

My dad used to talk about how, in his youth, there was hope for a world order of sorts. People working together to solve common problems. Obviously we're now on exactly the opposite track. United Nations, World Trade Association, European Union. Forget it. We'll do better on our own.

On the most parochial of levels, with something very tiny, I don't like what's happening in Pinoso. I have some mobile phone application that collects news articles. Amongst others it takes the news from the local Town Hall. It's news that isn't news really but it helps me to keep up with what's going on locally. Since we got back from our holidays though I wonder if there has been a change of policy, if the news has been Marine Le Pen-ised; Pinoso for the Pinoseros? This was the crop of news headlines yesterday:

Música, jocs i màgia per celebrar el dia de la Comunitat Valenciana

Handbol: inici de lliga amb derrota

Bàsquet: inici de la competició

Futbol sala: resultats del cap de setmana

“Meldo” visita la escuela infantil municipal

Futbol: resultats del cap de setmana

You may notice that they are all in Valencian, the local language rather than in the worldwide version of Spanish or in both. I'm not that interested in the games and magic to celebrate Valencia day, the handball, what happened with the basketball or five a side teams or even about Meldo visiting the nursery but what if the news were about local taxes or changes in administrative procedures that had a direct effect on me? 

The last time I saw a full list of the nationalities living in Pinoso it read like this, ranked in number of people from each country: Spaniards, Britons, Ecuadorians, Ukrainians, Moroccans, Colombians, Bulgarians, Argentinians, Uruguayans, French, Paraguayans, Cubans, Brazilians, Romanians, Germans, Bolivians, Swedes, Algerians, Pakistanis, Italians, Norwegians, Dominicans, Georgians, Lithuanians, Belgians, Portuguese, Czechs, Russians, Venezuelans, Thais, Belarusians, Slovakians and someone from the United States.

It's likely that only a percentage of one of those groups speaks Valenciano. So am I to presume that the rest of us can go take a running jump?

I thought the word was plurilingual

There is a local language in the Valencian Community which is called Valencian in English, Valenciano in the worldwide version of Spanish sometimes called Castellano and Valencià in, well in Valencià. Most people seem to think that it's not the same language as Catalan but the academic body that looks after the the rules and vocabulary of the language says they are wrong and that Catalan and Valenciano are the same with local variations.

As you would expect, and as I've reported before, there is a fairly strong local movement to promote Valenciano as a cultural heritage. Maggie keeps saying she's going to have a go at learning some. Rather her than me; I have enough problem with standard Spanish. Lots of people speak Valenciano as their principal language but there are lots of areas in this region where Valenciano is hardly spoken. Apparently about 50% of the population in the Valencian Community can speak the language and 85% can understand it.

Yesterday, over my work days lunchtime sandwich, I was reading the magazine produced by the communications team from the Pinoso Town Hall. The magazine's name, Cabeço, comes from a local hill. You will notice it is a Valenciano word with one of those French type cedillas. Our local council has a socialist majority and, as you would expect from a team directly employed by them, the reports in the magazine tend to highlight all the good things that are going on in the town. Most of it is pretty anodyne stuff anyway; new park benches here, a bit of tarmac there, what's on at the local theatre but, if you want to, you can argue about anything - wooden park benches - in this climate? Money on park benches when people are out of work?

There is some space in the magazine for the opposition political parties. Not much space but some. I always enjoy reading that because it means I find out where the local frictions are. I nearly always find something I didn't know because the Spaniards I talk to don't talk to me about that sort of thing and most of the Britons I talk to know even less about local controversy than me.

So, in the magazine, the conservative bunch were having a bit of a dig at the local budget - how much of it goes on staff, why rent office space instead of using council property etc. Then I got to a bit about education and about the use of Valenciano in the local schools. I read it twice, then a third time. I understood most of the words, I understood the sentiment but I didn't really understand what it was talking about although the gist was obviously that Valenciano was being pushed in all the schools in the Valencian Community, as a result of a Regional Government policy, which was bad for people who mainly spoke Castellano and would mean they'd have to pay for English classes. How did English come into this?

For years parents in the Valencian Community have been able to decide whether their children do the majority of the subjects in Castellano or in Valenciano. Currently seven of every ten youngsters are taught in Castellano. The Regional Government, which is ruled by a coalition of socialists and nationalists, has decided to change this twin path for a multilingual option. Now state and state assisted schools have to decide whether to slot into one of three levels - basic, intermediate or advanced - depending on how much of their basic teaching is done in Valenciano and how much English they offer. If the school teaches mainly in Castellano they end up in the basic level, and those which teach principally in Valenciano go into intermediate or advanced.

I should mention here that a very common model in Spain is for a bilingual school. Outside of the communities with a local language this usually means that the school teaches in Spanish and English though I'm sure that there are some which teach in Spanish and French or Spanish and German. Murcia, the community next to Alicante, the one in which I teach, has tens and tens of bilingual schools. Maggie used to work in one where she taught English in English, Art in English and a subject, Conocimiento del Medio, which is a sort of mix of natural and social sciences, in English. Personally I'm glad that I'm not a Spanish youngster having to struggle with a foreign language as well as the intricacies of the subjects themselves but it seems to be an accepted idea here.

Oddly it's English that is the incentive in this change from teaching in Castellano to Valenciano. Schools which teach half of the curriculum in Valenciano can up the percentage of the curriculum that they teach in English to 30%. This means that at the end of their school secondary career students will automatically get a B1, lower intermediate qualification in English, and a C1, lower advanced, qualification in Valenciano. It also cuts the amount of Castellano to the bare minimum allowed by Central Government legislation.

The Regional Government argument is that Valenciano and English are minority languages with Castellano being way out in front, so this change gives youngsters the opportunity for good levels in three languages whilst also helping to preserve a local cultural heritage. The detractors say that schools which cater to Castellano speakers are basically being punished by denying them increased access to English which, in the long run, is likely to be more useful. That's where the link was to English. The argument I had read in the magazine was saying that by denying Castellano speaking schools as much English for free, in the schools, the good parents would feel obliged to send their children for private classes.

What I found really odd about this was that I didn't know. After all I live here. I read the news most days, I listen to radio news and I even sometimes watch news on the telly but this policy had passed me by all together.

At the flicks - again

I go to the flicks as often as I can. As with everything else I write in this blog I've mentioned it before. My life just isn't exciting enough to sustain a flow of new adventures.

All films at the cinema are dubbed into Spanish. I've discussed this several times with Spanish chums and students. They try to argue that the Spanish versions are as good - better for them. They're wrong. Changing the language just mashes up the film. Nonetheless I still love going to the pictures.

How much of the film I understand is down to chance. I never catch all the nuances or get all the puns and subtleties but it's rare for me to be completely lost. It does happen from time to time and when it does I come out of the film disappointed and angry in equal measure. The easiest films to understand are British ones followed by other European fare. Hollywood films are usually relatively straightforward but action films are an exception. I miss the vital links amongst the explosions and CGI. Spanish language films are the hardest because they are loaded with idioms. I saw one called El Niño yesterday and I was well lost.

In Pinoso there is a group called something like the Platform Against Gender Violence. Amongst their activities they often show films in the local cultural centre. There was one tonight  - a 2005 French Canadian film called Crazy.

Now around these parts as well as the language we Brits call Spanish there is a regional language called Valencian. To differentiate we use the term Castilian for the standard Spanish and Valenciano for the local one though I think it's actually Valencià in Valencian - if you see what I mean. The posters for the film were in Valenciano.

Being an event the local press were there to take some snaps. The photographer is a chum from our village, someone who recently helped me to arrange a language exchange with one of her friends. She came over to ask me how it was going. I stuttered and spluttered in barely comprehensible Castilian. It just compounded the trouble I'd had when we went on a bodega tour earlier today. It did not bode well for another adventure with the language. 

Being an arty sort of film there was an intro from one of the group members. It was in Valenciano. I crossed my fingers that the dubbing would be Castilian. It was. It would have been very difficult to get up and walk out as we were a very select group. It didn't help though. I understood next to nothing. 

Not knowing what was going on the film seemed to drag on and on. I was very relieved when the gay son reconciled with his dad and the credits started to roll. But nobody moved. We had to critique the film. Blow me if that wasn't in Valenciano too.

It won't stop me though. If there's another one, and I can go, I'll be there.