Bring me pine logs hither

Around fifteen years ago, when Maggie and I finally set up home together, we bought a Christmas tree from Woolworths in Huntingdon. We still use the same tree. The lights, the sets of lights that burst into life yet again tonight, came the year after. The first set were very sensitive and gave up the ghost after their debut.

I was adamant about us buying a plastic tree. I wanted something that we would remember each year, something that would grow older and more threadbare along with us. I have fond memories of the tree I grew up with, the tree my dad and I decorated to celebrate the arrival of my new baby brother. I wanted something similar for us.

Whisky, like Nat King Cole, is a part of the ritual of decorating the Huntingdon tree. For years it was a decent malt but times are hard and it was Dewars tonight. Unfortunately driving and scotch don't mix which meant that the tree decorating, the official recognition of Christmas, had to wait until we'd been to see The Pinoso British Choir do their stuff in their annual carol concert in the Pinoso Parish Church.

I mentioned the British Choir a couple of years ago. Since then Spaniards and Brits have sung side by side at Christmas. This year a later date for the carol concert meant that several members of the British Choir would have been missing because of the call of family, turkey and sprouts. It looked as though there would be no British presence in the Parish Christmas celebrations The local priest was having none of that. He suggested a separate British concert. That's what we went to see tonight.

To be honest it wasn't the usual standing room only event in church but, nonetheless. there was a good mix of Spanish and British in the audience. The Priest made a good fist of speaking English and the English chap who spoke for the choir did a splendid job of speaking Spanish. The choir did really well. All through the concert I found myself grinning from ear to ear. It was excellent fun.

As we walked back to the car I asked Maggie if she thought I could use a phrase about the choir on this blog along the lines of "What they lacked in technique they made up for in heart." "Absolutely not," she said," I thought they did really well."

I agreed. So our Christmas has now begun.

People aren't nice about Albacete

My mum reads these blogs so I'm going to be in trouble. If you tell Spanish people, presumably those who aren't from Albacete, that you are going there they trot out a little phrase of advice "Albacete, caga y vete" Albacete: shit and leave. There, I've done it now. No pocket money for weeks. Better not to recount the story of my first ever visit to Albacete on a perishing December night as it involves a porn cinema. I could end up grounded for years.

Maggie is not here so I'm alone. She's not a big fan of Albacete anyway. Personally I like it. On a sizzling August afternoon with the heat haze rippling off the plain I think it's about as Spanish as Spanish can get. Today it was a bit dull and then a bit wet.

The town isn't large. It's small or at least it feels small though apparently it has 170,000 people. We, I was with my pal Geoff, found ourselves wandering in circles because we had no map. I would have liked a map. Indeed we followed the signs to the tourist office so we could get one. The tourist office was closed. It was a particularly splendid example of the art in that it had no sign outside to say it was a tourist office. We had to ask someone where it was although we were standing just 10 metres from it. I presume it was closed because yesterday was a bank holiday and local government employees often get the bridging days to form a long weekend. Lots of Spaniards would have been on holiday today but Albacete isn't a big tourist destination so presumably there wouldn't have been any work for the tourism people anyway. Hang on, do I glimpse a paradox here?

We did stumble across the Cathedral though and opposite was a very green building with an ornate frontage. I took a snap and walked over to see what it was. The sign next to the door said MCA. It wasn't a big sign; think solicitor's office brass plate sort of size. Underneath, in quite small lettering it said Museo Municipal de la Cuchilleria. Albacete is famous for knives. Like Sheffield and Toledo it has a long history of finely crafted blades and here was the local museum dedicated to knives, scissors and all things cutlery. We paid a very reasonable entry fee and went in. I thought it was a good museum. Geoff doesn't really read Spanish and, as all the labelling and notices were monolingual, our pace around the exhibits was more hare than tortoise. The video was in English though so we watched that through. I was impressed enough to buy a couple of books telling the history of knife making in Albacete.

Once we'd eaten a rather ordinary meal we took people's advice, at least the second part.

Sorry, I missed that

We've just been to the opening of a new bar - or, more likely, a bar restaurant - in Culebrón.

It's the same bar we went in when we were looking around the village before buying our house. That bar folded. We had a meal there when it re-opened, briefly, as a Uruguayan Steak House. That closed too but, with new people, it re-opened as Casa Pepe for a while. I seem to remember we managed three visits before they pulled down the shutters.


Now I know I'm quite forgetful but I'm surprised what I've already forgotten about the new bar. I've forgotten its name for instance, or when it will be open or what it will be serving.

Actually, come to think of it despite having a house in the village I don't remember being invited to the inaugral event. I do remember that Eduardo (the owner of another restaurant in Culebrón) mentioned that his sister intended to let out the bar/restaurant again and I recall that people at the Neighbourhood Association meal mentioned the opening to us. I don't remember seeing any official publicity though and although I've often been told that the sum of all human knowledge is on the Internet our new bar doesn't feature.

Whilst we were drinking the free drink and eating the free food tonight we were told that the family who will be running the business have been running a successful community bar in the nearby village of Chinorlet. I really do hope that they manage to repeat that success in Culebrón. Having a community meeting point in Culebrón, especially one with beer, would be a huge plus.

I'm not sure though, from what I've seen so far, that my hopes will be realised.

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We went back today. It's called Nou Culebrón. We went in around 4pm with the intention of getting a quick coffee, just to show willing. The restaurant was full, there were lots of staff most of whom seem very occupied. Well at least they seemed too occupied to say hello or  to serve us.

Avoiding carbon monoxide poisoning

Ingrid told me a story. She holds with the majority view that telephone sales people should be made to run around dripping wet wearing only a towel to see how they like it. One day though a chap phoned trying to sell a combined electric and gas supply package and Ingrid positively welcomed the call. She was enthusiastic. She would be delighted to take advantage of the offer. By Ingrid's account the man handled the unexpected situation well. He remembered his training and kept on extolling the virtues as he completed the draft contract. It all fell apart at the address stage though. Ingrid lived in an old half timbered cottage with green wellies in the porch and a big red Aga in the kitchen. "Aah, I'm afraid we can't offer piped gas to your location," said the salesman, "your  house is too rural." "I know," said Ingrid, "why didn't you?" Then she put the phone down.

There's no piped gas in Culebrón either. Piped gas in Spain is generally only available in relatively large towns. We make do with gas bottles. We buy the lighter, Cepsa branded aluminium bottles from the shop at the bodega in Pinoso though we also have a couple of the heavier steel Repsol bottles. We could have the bottles delivered but we're not that organised.

Gas kills lots of people in Spain. Often people cobble together ingenious but lethal heaters that explode and demolish the building around them. Sometimes death comes more quietly in the form of carbon monoxide poisoning.

The legislation says that you should have your gas system and appliances checked at installation and every five years after that. Sensible legislation in my opinion. We had it done five years ago. We had it done again today. So now, if the grim reaper comes to call we can be pretty sure that it won't be in the form of flesh tearing shards of sharpened metal or the lack of oxygenated blood.

May I bring this meeting to order

It was the Annual General Meeting of the Culebrón Neighbourhood Association today. As is now usual we were greeted effusively by lots of people. As usual we had the meal beforehand. As usual we had a choice of rice and gazpacho. As usual Maggie and I sat with Mari Luisa, Daniel, Marisa, Carol and David. As usual there was a gap next to us at table.

With the tables put away, the paella pan scrubbed clean and the prawn heads picked up off the floor it was time for the Annual General Meeting.

The AGM is always a bit disorganised. At least by UK standards it's a bit disorganised. When I say a bit disorganised read absolute chaos. Sometimes there is an agenda but today there wasn't - no minutes either. Of the four key members of the committee - Chair, Vice Chair, Treasurer and Secretary - only the Chair and the Secretary were on hand. With little else to lean on the meeting hinged around the accounts.

The slightly inebriated Secretary started by eulogising the Village Mayoress and the President of the Neighbourhood Association. He made more or less the same remarks every hour for the remaining three or so hours of the meeting. He employed quite colourful  language too - very Kenneth Tynan.

The original fifty or sixty diners dwindled down to maybe ten people. I drank five whiskies, generous whiskies, from a bright pink J&B bottle, during the meeting. The President resigned but, as nobody was willing to take her place, the Secretary suggested she stayed on another couple of years so that she would resign at the same time as the village Mayoress. This apparently made sense. I was happy. She is one of the few people in the village with email.

We were told that the Village Hall didn't really exist as a legal entity which was why we couldn't let any Tom, Dick or Harry donate a gas cylinder to fuel the stoves to cook the paella. That's why gas featured in the accounts! We heard a few times how the President took full responsibility for not delegating responsibility. It's true that she mopped up her own spilled G&T. The President and Secretary complained that nobody was willing to help at Villazgo or carnival time. I dared to speak. "I think it's because we don't get asked." The Secretary  told me I was wrong. Fortunately nobody else heard because they were all talking to each other. I was on the front row. The President asked me if it wasn't true that the trip to Benidormm had been excellent, I agreed, it had. It was decided we would go to Benidorm again.

I was going to have a sixth whisky and see it out but, for no real reason, I chose to slip away instead. I didn't quite see where we were going.

Except Benidorm of course

Bouncing off the ionosphere

I like listening to the radio. Getting your news from the radio obviously has it's disadvantages (no pictures) but radio does have the huge plus of portability and not being attention seeking. The Internet and television are nowhere near as compatible with driving, shaving or showering as is the radio.

Generally radio here is reasonably good. There are stacks of local stations full of local news and stories. Nationally the news coverage is fine with a range of political views spread amongst the various broadcasters though politicians don't get anything like the cross examination that they are subjected to in the US or UK. News aside speech radio doesn't have anything like the breadth of, for instance, BBC Radio 4 (drama, arts, comedy, documentary reports etc)  but with my "Proud to be British" hat on I suspect that very few radio stations in the world do. Sports coverage is enormously important and takes up hours of air time. Sport is synonomous with football though basketball, tennis, Formula One, cycling and golf get the occasional look in.

We have a classic music channel, Radio Clasica, which is a lot like the BBC Radio 3 of yonks ago - a bit highbrow and a bit tedious. There's nothing like Classic FM

Not knowing how to describe it adequately I'll call it pop music. Pop music gets badly treated here. I've said before that the commercial channels tend to play a limited range of songs over and over again: They play far too much dated music (not so much Beatles as lots of "Hips Don't Lie" Shakira) and the playlists change so slowly that you're sure the programme you listened to today has exactly the same content as a programme you heard six months ago.

The state broadcaster has a pop music channel too - Radio 3. A quick look at their website and you can see that they're a bit staid but, then again, it looks hopeful enough. The very first programme I listened to on Radio 3 was playing modern Spanish indie bands and the next had modern world music. Hopeful I thought. Radio 3 does have some good programmes but it also has far too many presenters who prefer the sound of their own voice to the music and they play far too much really old stuff. It also has minority programming like country and western or jazz at peak times.

Now I realise that young people can access modern music in so many ways that radio is not now the key medium it once was. On the other hand the eclectic nature of radio does mean that it can do some of the sifting for you. The radio is on, in the background, you like something, you check it out on Spotify, YouTube, Internet radio or Facebook and then, if you really like it, you download it to your computer or phone and it's yours.

I've been fretting about this for some time now and this morning when I popped into town and some bloke was droning on about some macrobiotic festival in Madrid instead of playing music I decided to do a bit of complaining. And that's what I've just done. I banged off an email along the lines of asking Radio 3 what sort of music policy it has that allows it to broadcast just three 1950s flamenco tracks per hour at ten in the morning - or something along those lines. Actually I should be honest. I wrote an email and then asked a couple of Spanish pals to correct my grammar so that I didn't come across as a fool. It was interesting that they made very few changes but they chose to make my language much more formal.

The website was opaque of course so sending the message wasn't easy and I don't suppose they'll reply but at least it formalises my right to complain.

Moonstruck

There's a bit in Moonstruck - actually it could be in any film featuring Italian people in the United States but I'm pretty sure it was Moonstruck - where the family sits down to eat mountains of spaghetti and behave like Italians. The film came to mind as I dithered between Spotted Dick and Lemon Meringue.

I'd been out all morning and I hadn't been anywhere near Spain. At one point there was a gang of us hanging around a petrol station just out of Barinas. I was one of them. I had an alcohol free beer in hand and I was enjoying the sunshine as I wandered around looking for a poster advertising the loss of a dog. A chap who was blowing up the tyres on his van shouted across to the pump attendant that the place had a very foreign feeling today. The petrol man just laughed.

We were on a car treasure hunt. This one was to raise money for Barney's dog rescue. There must have been about forty of us involved as we drove hither and thither counting the number of arches here and the purpose of the flagpoles there. Perfectly good fun. Our endpoint was the White House restaurant in Fortuna where I feasted on liver and onions. I even considered ordering a cuppa to finish the meal just to maintain the Britishness of it all.

I'm aware of my Britishness much more here than I ever was when I lived in the UK. I'm reminded of it every time I try to coax one of my students to pronounce would like wood and not like gwud and every time a waiter gives me that second glance as I order something.

I went for the mixed fruit cheesecake in the end by the way.

Las Lamparillas

The best route home from Cartagena to Culebrón passes close by the town of Fortuna. Alongside the ring road the gaunt skeletons of hundreds of unfinished houses bear witness to the folly of the Spanish building boom. The planned development, built in the bone dry scrubland that surrounds Fortuna, was to be called Fortuna Hill Nature and Residential Golf Resort.

 A key part of the new resort was the Las Lamparillas development. It was aimed at golf playing Britons who weren't quite rich enough to buy a similar place on the coast and was planned to have 3,737 houses when complete. There were other agreements for other developments in Fortuna. If everything had gone as planned Fortuna's population would have increased from 10,000 to 100,000.

A research project carried out by a local university in 2004 gives some idea as to the scale of the building work planned. Across Murcia, a region with just one and a half million inhabitants, there were agreements to build 800,000 houses. The figures never made sense but nobody seemed to notice before everything went pear shaped.

Work on Las Lamaprillas, which was just part of the whole resort, started in 2007. By 2010 the principal developer of the site went bust with debts of some 120,000,000€. The banks that had loaned the money took the valueless site and the part completed houses as payment. Nobody, not the banks, not the courts and certainly not the developers considered doing the decent thing by the people who had paid deposits for the houses or to the merchants who supplied the building materials. Local businesses and house buyers are still owed around 30 million by the developers.

The town mayor says that it's easy to criticise now but that, at the time, everyone was doing well out of the building boom and nobody was complaining then.

Local councils can re-classify former rural land as urban land. On reclassification citrus groves and farm fields become much more valuable as buildiing plots. In the boom years Fortuna town council found itself with nearly 10 million euros extra from the sale of reclassified land and the councillors set about spending the money with gusto. They expected more money to follow and they borrowed against future income. The result now, in the lean years, is that the council has had to jack up taxes and either cut services or charge more for them. Many projects were never completed but the bank loans on them still have to be paid off.

In small towns in Spain everyone knows everyone else. Little networks of friends and relations do favours for other little networks. The money coming in from the developers apparently flowed into lots of those networks. At the time of the local elections in 2003 with so much money swilling around the locals became much more interested in who was in charge whilst the politicians saw the potential in controlling all that lovely money. The ruling PP party set about buying votes. It wasn't until 2011 that the courts found party workers guilty of vote rigging. The mayor, the same man is still the mayor now as then, chose not to resign.

The people of Fortuna will be paying for las Lamparillas for years to come. Spain is paying for lots of similar projects the length and breadth of the country.

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Since writing this article a higher court has confirmed the charges of vote rigging in Fortuna and the Mayor, Matias Carrillo, has resigned. 

At the Flicks

We're just back from the cinema in Petrer. Maggie persuaded me to see something with Meryl and Tommie Lee Jones. Big mistake as a film but always good to get out to the cinema.

Spanish cinemas are just like modern cinemas everywhere.* Ten, twelve, fourteen screens built alongside some shopping centre. Worldwide the building design is similar. Always the ticket office is placed so that people standing in the queue to pay get tangled up with the people grasping their tickets and those milling around the foyer looking for friends or returning from the outrageously overpriced drink, popcorn and pic 'n' mix stand. I suppose the new trend to combine the sales of tickets and snacks at the same counter will either exacerbate or improve that situation depending on your view.

There are still a few cinemas that are single screens with a slightly musty smell and two week old films. They're usually in small towns - we used to go to a great on in Ciudad Rodrigo - they're cheap, have normal sized bags of sweets and sell popcorn at reasonable prices. Their days are obviously numbered so if you are ever in Caravaca de la Cruz on a Monday evening take the opportunity. Their creaky floorboard theatre is a treat.

In a standard multiplex tickets cost around 7.50€ and on one of the duff days of the week, either Monday or Wednesday the cinemas usually knock a couple of euros off the standard price.

Films are generally either Hollywood or Spanish with TV company money. Very occasionally there is a European offering. You might expect a reasonable number of Latin American releases but generally they don't make it out of Madrid and Barcelona to the provinces. I suspect that has something to do with the generally negative feeling that Spanish people have about hearing Spanish spoken with Ecuadorian, Mexican, Chilean, Argentinian and other American accents.

Titles are strange. The Road, for instance was called "The Road (La Carretera)" using both the original title and a direct translation. The Sound of Music though translates as Smiles and Tears and the one we saw today "Hope Springs" came out as "If You Really Want To." I prefer the titles to be in Spanish because then I can say the words reasonably easily. Trying to produce the Spanish pronunciation for an English title is really hard.

There are almost no subtitled films outside the art house venues in the biggest cities. Films are dubbed. This is very strange if you know the actor's voice. Imagine Morgan Freeman speaking Spanish and not sounding at all like Morgan. Or "You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together and... blow" but without Lauren Bacall. The voice actors who lip sync the Spanish voice versions of various stars usually stick with them through their career. So at the Madrid premiere of a new film there will be the voice star too - Michelle Jenner (English descent, Spanish born) was the voice of Hermione Granger in the first four Harry Potter films for instance. Ernesto Aura did Schwarzenegger for years. "Hasta la vista, baby" the line from Terminator 2 isn't quite so amusing for a Spanish audience and very few Spaniards know that Ernesto's "Sayonara, baby" was just for them.

One very strange side effect of this dubbing is when a Spanish star like Penélope Cruz, Antonio Banderas or Javier Bardem makes a film in English. They get dubbed back into Spanish for the Spanish market but not with their own voices. It must be very confusing for a Spanish person who knows what Penélope sounds like hearing her with someone else's voice. 

I should say that the newer digital film formats do allow a third option to subbing or dubbing which is playing a dual soundtrack. This allows the listener to choose between the original language or the dubbed language. I know of a cinema in Torrevieja where you can put on cordless headphones to listen to the Hollywood soundtrack whilst the general audience gets the dubbed version.

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*Obviously I've not been to cinemas everywhere but I have been to similar complexes in the USA, France, Portugal and Mexico so I'm willing to take the risk of guessing that they are all the same.

Busy doing nothing

When we are in Culebrón we don't do much. We avoid the cleaning. Eddie goes out to slaughter small animals but still demands lots of Whiskas. We usually catch up with our British pals and we luxuriate in a comfy sofa to watch the telly.

The Saturday morning ritual includes going into Pinoso where the one key job is checking our PO box at the the Post Office. We've done that today - Post Office, newsagent, supermarket, greengrocer and Chinese shop. About as ordinary and as boring as ordinary and boring could be.

Tasks done, arm stretching carrier bags dumped in the boot of the car we set out to get a cup of coffee. On the way we bumped into a couple of acquaintances who dance in one of the local folk groups - the Spanish may be halting but we nattered about cutbacks in medical services, incompetent politicians and life. Two hundred metres later it was Ernesto, the ex lorry driver, he supports Arsenal and asked, as he always does, for Maggie's football alleigances. She's Liverpool through and through and the 1971 Cup Final still rankles.

We finally got a clear run and headed to Oasis to have that coffee. The Uruguayan waiter was as pleasant as ever. Outside, in the warm sun Maggie commented how the dry and sweet smelling air of Pinoso was infinitely superior to the stickier and more industrial air of Cartagena.

Not at all bad.

August in Culebrón

These are the official weather figures for Pinoso in August.

The hottest day was the 10th of August when the temperature reached 44ºC. The coldest night was on the 5th when the temperature dropped to 14.5ªC.

Averaging out daytime highs and nightime lows the average temperature across the month was 27.6ºC.

There were 28 cloudless days and it only rained on the 30th when we got 19 litres per square metre.

Just a little post script. We're back in Cartagena now and the maximum minimum thermometer I left here shows a high of 32ºC and a low of 24ºC for all the days from early July to the end of August. That's quite different to Culebrón.