Vile bodies

People tell me they are never swayed by advertising. Not me; I see an ad for something that looks useful and I'm there. That spray to stop the water stains on the glass shower screen, for instance, is great.

I saw an advert for some stuff to stop fungus growing on your toe nails. I hadn't realised that I had fungussy feet till I saw the advert. Gross. I just thought it was, well something else. So adverts are informative too. My feet and hands tingle a lot, it's not exactly painful but it's not nice either. The last time I asked a doctor about it he or she (I forget which) told me it wasn't anything that showed up on tests, none of those normal but nasty things like diabetes. Their expert advice was that I put it down to getting older, grin and bear it. Last night on the telly I saw an advert where some people were grimacing as they twiddled their feet or shook their hands. The advert described circulation problems being eased by their medication. It looked like me.

I went to the chemist today and asked for the circulation stuff by name and, whilst I was there, something for the fungus and a box of aspirin. The forty three euros price was a bit of a shock but not exactly a surprise. Prescription drugs are charged at different rates depending on your circumstances. Don't quote me on this but I think that the very rich have to pay 60% of the cost, normal level workers either 40% or 50% and pensioners 10%. Some people are exempt of all charges. The prices for these prescription drugs always seem reasonable to me, I remember some antibiotics were about 3€ so the full price must be around 7.50€. Mind you I don't need stuff every week nor have I ever needed anything exotic. On the other hand over the counter stuff, the throat sweets, the cold remedies, the antiseptic creams and the like are exactly the opposite. "What!?" - "Eleven euros for some crushed paracetomol with a lemon flavour?" That's why the price didn't surprise me.

Like I say I don't go to pharmacies very often. Thankfully I go to the doctor's even less. There is a free health service here just as in the UK, at least it's free for me because I pay my social security and so I'm covered. British pensioners are covered by the health system too through EU legislation. There is a registration process, which I hear is pretty lengthy, but, in the end, it allows the UK to pay the Spanish Government for any treatment given to UK pensioners without the individuals having to pay. Lots and lots of Spaniards believe that older Britons come to Spain specifically to take advantage of the healthcare system and no number of official statistics will ever persuade them otherwise. There are lots of people who aren't entitled to free healthcare and there are lots of contradictory reports about the right to healtcare and to emergency treatment because rules keep changing about either excluding or including non legal residents, about including or excluding the long term unemployed etcetera. Often in these news reports there is no link made between health care rights and payment. I suspect, though I don't know, that although nobody will be left to bleed to death that doesn't mean there won't be a big bill afterwards.

Just to round off, neither everyday dentistry nor eyecare are included in the free system. I'm talking about fillings or a crown and getting yourself some nice new specs, not about cataract operations or jaw rebuilds. Opticians are just as bandit like as in the UK. I was quoted 936€ for a pair of specs and ended up paying about 500€. Dentistry seems pretty inexpensive to me. There is a lot of competition which keeps costs down so that a decent crown costs around 180€ and a filling is in the 30-40€ bracket.

I'm sure that pretty soon, as the months and years roll by, I'll become much more au fait with Spanish healthcare.

Microclimates

I've written a diary every day for the last forty six years. For several years now I've put a little footnote to describe the weather - hot and sunny, wet and grey - and, alongside, the maximum and minimum temperatures. I bought a thermometer for the process but, when I lived in La Unión, there was nowhere I could site the thermometer in the shade so I started to use the data from the Spanish equivalent of the Met Office.

The weather, here as everywhere, is a talking point. It's been hot for the past two or three weeks generally in the mid to high thirties. Some parts of Spain have been over forty on occasional days. People often exagerate the weather. They tell me that it was 53ºC in their patio or somesuch so I try to slip into the conversation, gently of course - well, the highest temperature ever recorded in Spain before today has been 47.2ºC in Murcia and, according to the local weather station it only got to 38ºC (or whatever).

But local variations are very noticeable. Spain is the second highest country in Europe and there are mountains all over the place. They affect the microclimate to a remarkable degree. Driving from home in Culebrón to Pinoso just five kilometres away the temperature can rise a couple of degrees whereas Rodriguillo, on the other side of Pinoso towards Fortuna, is often a couple of degrees cooler than Culebrón. Humidity is another startling varaible.

Last year, I think it was last year, hail destroyed rooves, furniture, cars and whatnot in Paredón, another of the villages that encircle Pinoso. In Ubeda, on the same day, the same hail storm but with less intensity smashed the windscreen of a friend's car and put hundreds of little dents into their neighbours car. Just 3km up the road, in Culebrón we got heavy rain but no hail.

Yesterday it rained heavily for the second time this week in Culebrón. When it was over we had large pools all over the garden and I had to mop up in the back bedroom where I'd left a door ajar. I have proof that it rained, I was on the phone to my sister and I made her listen to the noise as the big drops collided with the tin roof.

This morning, when I checked yesterday's temperatures (High 33.6ºC, Low 21.8ºC) I  noticed that the rainfall recorded in Pinoso, where the official weather station is, was zero. In fact none of the weather stations in Valencia, in all three provinces, recorded any rainfall whatsoever.

So was Culebrón the only place it rained yesterday?

Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything

I mentioned on Facebook the other day that whilst we were surreptitiously guzzling more than our fair share of the "wine of honour" after the religious procession in the village I was propositioned by the president of the "Third Age Association". He thought I should become a member.

Now I'm not big on joining in but I thought, at 8€ a year, it can't do any harm. An opportunity to get to know a few people, to practice a bit of Spanish, to become a bit more involved in the community.

So I went along today ready to hand over my money and join up.

The sales pitch involved dominoes, bingo, short hikes, special masses, crowning of the Third Age Carnival Queen, a bit of ballroom dancing, regular exercise classes, presentation of the trophies for the winners of the table games events, a gachamiga making competition and so on just for the near future. I didn't think he made enough of the upcoming performance of Maria Jesús and her accordion. She's the woman whose big hit was the Spanish version of the Tweety Song. I noted that no event passed without including food. Carnival Queen crowned and off to El Timón, walk up a hill and a picnic, presentations and a buffet, no reason at all and a vermouth session. Do you know they have over 700 members, or about 10% of the town population?

All I need are a couple of photos, identity documentation and a copy of my health card (!) Maggie can join too despite her tender years. She gets in thanks to my vintage. Unfortunately the admin person is on holiday at the moment and wont be back for a couple of weeks so we'll have to wait.

What I can't understand is why I'm hesitating.

From books to fiestas

I read something, in an electronic newspaper, yesterday that said that our President, Mariano Rajoy, isn't a big reader. It went on to say that the only complete newspaper he has left on his desk, alongside the daily news roundup written by his staff, is a sports newspaper called Marca. I'm not sure whether it's true or not but he doesn't strike me as any sort of intellectual or even a deep thinker so it may well be true.

It would certainly be in line with the last survey of the Sociological Investigation Centre - Centro de investigaciones sociológicas - which reports that 34% of Spaniards have not read a book in the last twelve months, that 10% read only one book in the last year and that just 7% read more than a book a month. Maybe this explains why many children are unsure of the name of the capital city of Spain.

Talking of books my pal Carlos, writing under the pen name of Carlos Dosel, has just self published a book on Amazon - police story with a Nazi war criminal slaughtering Jews saved from Hungary by a Spanish diplomat. And, as that's a plug for Carlos, I should mention Miguel who writes a blog about The Six Kingdoms and has had a print book published La llamada de los Nurkan. So, even if Spaniards don't read much I happen to have bumped into at least two who write.

There certainly wouldn't have been much reading going on in the village this weekend. It was the weekend of our local fiesta dedicated to Saint James with Saint Joseph tagging along. There is a religious element to the fiesta because the local priest leads a mass from the village chapel before the Saints, in effigy, are paraded around the streets of the village. Jaime is carried by the men and José by the women.  Otherwise it's all very non religious but very community. Someone I see regularly at the Wednesday morning session at Eduardo's commented on the number of people who were only ever seen in the village at fiesta time.

We had the meal on Friday evening. Catered event with metal cutlery, crockery and waiters followed by a duo with an electronic keyboard and songs from the seventies and eighties. I hear they, unlike us, went on till five in the morning. The next morning there was an organised water pistol fight and a session with drinking chocolate and toña (a sort of sweetened breadcake). A bit later, at lunchtime, there was a gacahamiga competition. Gachamiga is a food made from nothing - garlic, flour, water, oil and salt cooked into a sort of thick pancake. The procession was that evening followed by some buffet food and wine. Into Sunday the village was heaving with people taking part in the 5km or so walking and running race. There were over three hundred participants the event being rounded off with food of course. Into the afternoon there was some sort of children's entertainer - you know the sort of thing, bouncy castle and organiser with a floppy hat, baggy trousers and balloon sausage dogs. There was a bit of five a side footie going on at the same time. We got called over because there was a surprise and unscheduled vermouth session and I suppose they knew we would be attracted by the offer of alcohol. We were.

We'd left the village to go and have a very unsatisfactory meal in Aspe where we'd met one of Maggie's pals from Qatar. The after effects of that meal meant that we didn't go to the cena de sobaquillo and, in a way, that was there because we'd suggested it. What we actually suggested was a bring food to share meal but one of the neighbours shouted that down. She said that we foreigners always turned up with an inconsequential and inedible cake whilst the locals took proper food. A cena de sobaquillo is a sort of communal picnic. We'd stocked up with stuff to take but, in the end, we stayed home.

Good fiesta this time though. I tend to be a bit surly and uncommunicative when faced with people. I can hide either behind the camera or the alcohol but Maggie seems to be on a bit of a roll at the moment. Her teaching sessions, and simply being here all the time, means that she knows far more people and she is neither surly nor uncommunicative. She was running from person to person chatting away so I ended up talking to people almost by default.

A week before the Fiestas

I could have driven home. I'm sure. After all I'm typing so I must be have some control of my faculties. But I didn't. It never crossed my mind. Till now. I left the car and walked past the ermita, up past Eduardo's, past the goat farm and the barking dogs and came home. I didn't see a single car. It isn't far, maybe 500 metres.

Tonight was the vecino's meal, the neighbourhood association. The chicken from Maribel's wasn't bad but, for the first time ever, I didn't have to to fall down drunk instead of talking. Not that I didn't drink but I didn't end up dead drunk, just drunk. What's more important, to me at least, is that I kept talking. I made hundreds of errors, I couldn't remember half the expressions I was looking for but I went around and I kept talking. Language we talked about, of course, but music, films, food, travel - normal sort ot things - Belgian beer and Tossa de Mar, stag nights and Gibraltar.

I was still there at 3am, talking. It was normal. Tables in the open air, a warm night, strings of incandescent bulbs hanging from the trees. All as usual except that I kept talking. I didn't retire into drink.

It's all Maggie's doing. She's the one who has forged the links with the locals by teaching them or their children English, by having a bilingual chinwag every week. She wasn't there so they made do with me as a substitute. They took care of me. The annual vecinos meal. Splendid. Best ever.

Bad language

If you do not like foul or uncouth language do not read this post.

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When the radio did it's exploding into life thing this morning the first song on was called A la mierda something like "fuck it!"  or a bit more literally "shit it!"

A couple of my pupils, lads about eleven years old express surprise by saying "What the fuck!?" in English. I heard the same phrase used by The Gran Wyoming, a well known TV presenter, who hosts an irreverent daily round up current affairs and news on a TV programme called el Intermedio. Motherfucker, is also a relatively frequent word on Spanish lips. It always catches me unawares. It's a word I would not use lightly. I put it down to a lack of understanding of the violence of these sort of phrases in English.

Now I am not the best person to comment on the intricacies of Spanish but this overuse of expletives, foul language and swearing seems to me much more commonplace in everyday language than in the UK or, more accurately, it has a different focus. I swear a lot and I know that young people in the UK do too. But the use is emphatic, it is there on purpose, to shock, to underline to rebel. I don't find the usage the same in Spanish. Here it is often just a different adjective or nearly as innocuous as Golly!

A little  while ago the River Ebro flooded and caused a lot of damage. Pedro Sanchez, the opposition leader, made a statement: "Qué coño tiene que pasar en este país para que Rajoy visite la ribera del Ebro?" I'd maybe translate it as "What the hell has to happpen in this country before Rajoy (the President) comes to see the Ebro." But coño would be a strong word for us - the c word. Coño though can be quite friendly if said with the right inflection. I suppose we Brits do the same with bastard. But the fact is that it's in the mouth of everyone, including the five year olds I sometimes teach. It's not a word limited to Guy Richie characters; in Spain. it's an ordinary, everyday word.

Maybe it's to do with use. I seem to remember that the French word for mackerel, maquereau, can be an insult. It wouldn't have much force in English or Spanish. In Spain I understand on the other hand that zorra, the female fox, a vixen is a pretty strong way to express whore or slag and it is definitely at the forceful end of bad language. You little vixen sounds nearly Enid Blyton to me.

It is strange though. The number of apparently nice  children who use the word shit as an expression of mild surprise, who want to shit on something, refer to me, in what is undoubtedly a friendly tone, as coño or who pepper their language with fuck this and fuck that as they talk still causes me surprise.

June weather

The average maximum daytime temperature in Pinoso during June was 29.2ºC and the average low was 13.7ºC. There was a tie for hottest day with both the 28th and 30th coming in at 37ºC and we had eleven days when the temperature was over 30ºC. The coldest day was on the 7th when we got down as low as 9.5ºC.

We had nineteen days with sunny clear blue skies, eight with with sunny spells and three cloudy. It rained four days and we had thunder and lightning twice.

Overall we got 53 litres per square metre of rainfall but 30 of those litres fell on one day, on the 13th.

Carriers

Internet shopping is great. I want a new book, Kindle. Fifty seconds later I can start reading. Present for someone in the UK? Piece of cake. The problem comes when I want something that exists, something that has form and bulk, for myself.

Sometimes Amazon, or any of the other people I shop with, choose to send the thing to our PO box. Easier than easy. Often the Post Office even sends me a text message to say the package has arrived.

Sometimes, too often, the Internet seller uses a carrier - DHL, MRW, FedEx, UPS, SEUR, Tourline Express or any number of firms which claim to be the modern embodiment ot Herodutus "Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night, stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds". They are all the same. Most of them can't find the house, I suspect that most of them don't even try.

Sometimes the carrier can't find the village. They take it back to San Juan or Alicante or wherever they have their local depot. They telephone me from their offices to suggest that I should move to a larger town with streets. I wonder why the driver didn't phone me when they were closer? I get to wait a couple of days more and still I have to meet them in the village.

I've got a new one though this time. They don't believe my address. I've talked about this before. No street, just numbers in our village. Obviously the people at DHL, MRW, FedEx, UPS, SEUR and Tourline Express don't believe this is possible. Some idiotic robotic voice calls to ask me to confirm my address. I confirm my address. Ten minutes later I get an email asking if I can confirm my address. The last package required about five minutes to order and pay. The "next day" delivery took nine days and required two robot voice questionings, one email, one phone call and one customer contact form.

When I was a boy I often holidayed in the Lake District. In Keswick there was a climbing shop. In the window they had a display of envelopes that were addressed to the shop in the most outlandish ways - the shop up from the pub, the shop with red boots in the window and the like. Someone, in the Post Office, a person who knew Keswick would read the envelope, use a bit of gumption and deliver the letters. I suspect that nobody actually reads  my address; some machine turns it into an unintelligible barcode and the fun begins.

Dogs, bulletins and cats homes

I was reading the news from the local town hall. There was information about the new hunting season. I read, for instance, that from 19 July until 25 December rabbits can be hunted with dogs. No more than eight hunting dogs though and, even if you bring a gang of pals with you to hunt, you can't have more than fifteen dogs all together. Certain breeds of dogs are prohibited and greyhounds can only be used between July and October. Oh, and hunting is only possible from Thursday to Sunday and on Public Holidays. This is pretty detailed stuff. Falconry, firearms and bows come in from the 12th October. There were lots more details about exactly what can be hunted, when and how. The piece ended though with a web address for the Diari Oficial of the Comunitat Valenciana - the official bulletin of the Valencian Community.

All of the regional governments have something similar; a publication where local ordinances, byelaws and official reports are recorded. It's the place where contracts can be put out to tender, where details of bankruptcy are recorded and where all sorts of announcements can be officially made. There is a national equivalent - the Official State Bulletin - where  "parliamentary bills", royal decrees and lots more is published. Once upon a time they were printed on paper now they are published on the Internet. I've read parts of the bulletins from time to time when I've being trying to find something out but, as you may imagine, they make dull and heavy reading.

I occasionally go onto expat forums often looking for a more human, and English language, version of the same sort of information. The information on the forums is unrelaible in the sense that people pass on what they have heard and what they have surmised as well as what they know. It's done with the best of intentions but it can cause confusion.

The thing is you see that although we live in Spain we all, well all of us older people, continue to be Norwegian or Moroccan or, in our case, British. And it's the Norwegian or Morrocan or British experience that we use as the yardstick (yes, it's a pun). Take something like a driving licence or a will (both of which I have had conversations about today). Spanish inheritance legislation is quite different to the British version. We might not know the ins and outs of the British system but we know the broad detail. You can leave what you want to whom you want. In Spain, though, inheritance law generally gives precedence to the children of the deceased. This system seems so, well, foreign, to us and obviously, wrong. I've never asked a Spaniard about it but I suspect that they would think a British will that disinherited sons and daughters was equally bizarre.

Now Maggie needs to change her British driving licence for a Spanish one. Bar room conversations about driving licences are commonplace. It doesn't seem odd to we Britons that, despite living 2000 kms from the UK, we should continue to hold a British driving licence. Anyway Maggie was trying to find out what she needs to do to exchange her licence. She asked Google but Google just pointed her indiscriminately to out of date and wrong web pages as well as to accurate and up to date stuff. She was confused by the contradictory information.

The information on the  DGT or "Ministry of Transport" website was perfectly clear and seemed straightforward but it would also involve at least one trip to Alicante. She decided, for ease, to let an intermediary, the local driving school, handle the process. The chap there told her what paperwork she would need. His list differed from the one on the DGT website but I rather suspect that the intermediary is taking the belt and braces approach. He's working on the assumption that if he has every conceivable piece of paper when he goes to the traffic office then he can't be caught out

One document he asked Maggie to get hold of is something that nearly everyone calls a residencia; residence permit. Of course Europeans don't need a residence permit because we have right of abode, well provided we have sufficient medical cover and money to ensure that we are not going to be a burden on the state, we have right of abode. The document is more accurately something that records or register the fact that an EU citizen is living in Spain. We registered years ago and, anyway, once an EU citizen has lived here continuosly for five years we apparently gain the right to permanent residence (something I learned in my search). But this chap told Maggie she needed a newer version of this certificate in order to exchange her licence.

This didn't sound right to me and I thought I'd check it out. What I think I found was that we British expats are talking about three different systems that have existed in the last ten years and all of which are called residencia by their British holders. The document format has varied from plastic cards to bits of paper and back to plastic cards with a different purpose and design. The renewal period for this documentation has varied from every five years to never. The changes to these "residencia" rules have also affected another document called the NIE - the Foreigners' Identification Number.

Someone recently told me that their NIE had a three month sell by date. I was sure they were wrong. My NIE certificate certainly has no expiry date. They were right though, at least about their documentation. The short lifespan is to ensure that, at the end of the three months, the EU citizen who is going to live in Spain has to tell the authorities. Unless the person swaps their NIE for a "residencia" when the three months are up they will find it difficult to transact lots of everyday business from getting a phone line to picking up a parcel from the post office. It's at that point too that the authorities can check that the person wanting to live here has the financial wherewithall to do so. Consequently whereas I have a white A4 bit of paper for my NIE and a green bit of paper for my registration newer arrivals start with a white bit of A4 paper which they soon have to trade in for a green plastic card.

So my experience, my information, about a key process for we foreigners is now wrong. What we immigrants need is some sort of definitive version of all the rules and regs easily accessible on the Internet. Oh, hang on a minute,. Now if only it were written in English but then we are, as I said, 2000 kms from the UK.

Fear stalks the land

The stories of huge water bills in Spain are legion. Not for the cost of the water, which is usually very reasonable, but for undiscovered leaks.

Everyone in Spain has a water meter. Leaks on the supply side, before the water meter, are the problem of the supplier but, once past the meter, the problem is yours.

The water supply to our house is not sophiticated. A plastic tube is buried in a shallow trench under the dirt road that passes the house and a spur brings water to our meter. Our supply is no more than a thick plastic hose buried only inches under the garden. When it gets cold we often lose water for a while until the pipes unfreeze. Because of this I check the water meter regularly to make sure that the consumption seems reasonable and normal. The past couple of times the reading has been a bit high. Six or seven cubic metres instead of the usual three or four. I didn't worry too much. We've run the irrigation system on the garden a couple of times and there is a more general use of the hosepipe to water plants here and there. We also use an aljibe, a big rainwater tank, to water the garden but even then a few hundred gallons from the piped supply seemed explicable.

Maggie said to me the other day though that she could hear the sound of water running in the tubes. Sure enough, with an ear pressed to the wall, it was obvious. I checked the meter carefully and it was confirmed; the smallest needle was creeping inexorably round.

All of our pipework is buried under concrete floors and behind ceramic tiles. Unless it was a simple problem with the taps we were going to be smashing tiles and digging up floors. Yesterday the plumber confirmed the worst. It wasn't the tap. We needed to reveal the pipework and the plumber suggested a builder who came and smashed the marble in the shower cubicle, cutting his hand in the process. The leak wasn't in the uncovered pipes.

This was bad. Sleepless night bad. Something else would have to be dug up, maybe the floor of the shower, maybe the tiled floor. The plumber came back today with a man who had a listening device to find the source of the leak. He found it and the plumber has now dug up the floor of our bedroom to reveal the dodgy pipework. He's still in the middle of doing it as I type. He's gone to get specialist soldering kit.

The good news is that he's found it. Even better he found it underneath the first tile he lifted and he's only had to dig up two tiles to gain access. The bad news is that we have no spares for the tiles dug up and whilst it's a common design the chance of getting an exact match are slight. In the walk in shower the destroyed marble is going to be hard to replace too.

Well, said the plumber, at least you won't need a boat now but maybe you'll need a new rug.

Interview for Expat Blog

The people from Expat Blog asked me if I would answer a few questions. I said yes. Here are the questions and answers

Why did you choose to expatriate to Spain?

We'd been to Spain lots of times on holiday and we were taken by the country, with its habits, customs and with its people. Life in the UK had become one huge round of work with almost no private life and with the sale of our house we were in a position to up sticks and give it a go.

What were the procedures to follow for a British national to move there?

As European citizens all we needed to do to move to Spain was to cross the border and settle here. Obviously we also needed to go through all the usual processes like getting an NIE and later a “residencia”, signing up to the local padrón, registering with the health services, doing all the things associated with buying or renting a house. We'd brought a car with us which also needed re-registering but as to the actual move that was as easy as deciding to do it. No paperwork at all.

How long have you been in the country? What is your current family situation?

We came as a couple in autumn of 2004 and we brought a cat with us too.  No children. So we've been in Spain for going on eleven years as I write.

Are you currently working? What are the local labor market's specificities?

My partner had taken a job as a teacher in a bilingual private school before we arrived. The job had been advertised in the UK and she had also done the interview there.  She went on to have a series of teaching positions through a project organised by the British Council which meant that she worked in state schools after the private one. She also spent a year out of the country. She is now registered as self employed and has a small business organising bodega tours called Secret Wine Spain. She also has some private English classes and does some part time work with a local estate agency. 

I did not have a job when I first arrived but I found work with a local furniture shop. When we moved to a different part of Spain I found work as an English teacher in a private academy. We have changed location twice since then and I have found work as an English teacher in both cases without too much difficulty. Finding jobs in Spain is not easy. Unemployment is a huge problem.

Was it difficult to find accommodation there? What are the types of accommodation which are available?

We bought a house almost immediately. There are now thousands of properties at very reasonable prices in Spain as a result of the bursting of the building bubble a few years ago. Whilst we have continued to own the house we have also moved, for work reasons, something like six times and we have never had the least difficulty in renting a property. We have always used an estate agency to help us find a place and although this is, perhaps, the most expensive way to do it we have also found it quick and safe.

How do you find the Spanish lifestyle?

Living in Spain is the same as living anywhere. You have to go to the supermarket, watch the telly, listen to the radio, cook, clean, do the laundry and suchlike so a lot of the lifestyle is to your own making. 

We have nearly always had work which means that our hours have become quite Spanish,  I would never think of having lunch before 2pm. for instance. Our Spanish is good enough to be able to say what we need to so that we are not lost on an island of foreignness. We know lots of Britons who live in a bubble almost isolated from Spain. It's quite easy to listen to British radio, watch British TV, buy British newspapers, visit British websites etc. At home your mealtimes can be British ones and your food British style. Here in Alicante there are thousands of us so we can also use British plumbers, British builders etc. if we want. 

I still find Spain interesting and exciting. I like the events that start at 10pm at night or at least are billed to but actually start at midnight. I like the heat of Alicante and Murcia and the slightly anarchic nature of lots of the leisure activities. There is always something going on, culture is strongly valued and people are generally pretty open in social situations so that it is easy to make superficial friendships. 

Have you been able to adapt yourself to the country and to its society?

The country is European. It works well. In basis it is very similar to the UK. People complain about the bureaucracy for instance but bureaucracy here is simply different to the UK rather than being excessive. It is a safe country, it's a law abiding country, it's a democratic country so, as I said, in all the basic things it is very similar to the UK. Obviously there are thousands of differences but it's all in the detail. Food is a good example – it is quite different but only at the level of recipes – it's not a vegan society or one where animals have to be killed in specific ways or where religion prohibits or limits certain foods. 

The one thing I cannot stress too much is the difference in language. Here, as everywhere, you can get by with English but without Spanish your life will be harder, your social contacts fewer, your isolation greater and your potential for being happy reduced. Think about the number of times that you need to use language to explain or understand things – when you ring the mobile phone company to complain about the bill, when you need a plumber to staunch the flood in your kitchen, when your car breaks down at the side of the road, when you're with the doctor. If you do not have Spanish those things become hard and a daily problem.

What does your every day life look like in Spain?

Just like the UK. Work, cooking, telly, internet, radio, driving around, doing the garden. The difference is when you venture out of home and even then you will usually be with other Britons (or at least other English speakers) so that although you may be surrounded by Spain you are actually in a little British bubble.

What has surprised you the most at your arrival?

How cold our house is in winter. We'd been in Spain several times in the winter but if hotels are warm then houses aren't. It's perishing. The houses in Alicante and Murcia have next to no insulation. Central heating, carpets and curtains are a bit unusual – the houses here are set up for warm weather not the cold. Winter is purgatory. I should stress that this is not the same if you head for Salamanca or Galicia – anywhere that has colder winters – because there the houses are equipped for the colder weather.

Any particular experience you would like to share with us?

There would be hundreds but the one that came to mind straight away was of the village meal. We live in a village that has about a hundred residents. We are members of the local neighbourhood association.  Each July, as part of the local fiestas, we have a meal for members of the association. The tables are set up under the trees outside the local social centre and fifty or sixty of us sit down to eat. It's always warm, the conversation and drink flow, the bulbs hung in the pine trees twinkle, the air is alive with the sound of crickets. It is just lovely.

What is your opinion on the cost of living in Spain? Is it easy for an expat to live in there?

I think it is probably cheaper to live in Spain than the UK but then again incomes here are derisory. Although he obviously has lots of other sources of income the salary of the Country's President for instance is about 80,000€. Members of my family earn that much in the UK for perfectly ordinary jobs.

Housing is generally cheaper, transport is cheaper, clothes are about the same, food is about the same, eating out is cheaper, alcohol is cheaper, furniture is expensive, second hand cars are ludicrously expensive, electric is a bit more expensive, water varies but is generally cheaper, car tax is less, “rates” are less, income tax is about the same, fuel is a bit cheaper, banking is expensive etc.

How do you spend your leisure time? What are the activities which are accessible to expatriates?

I do anything I want to do in my leisure time that I would have done in the UK. Sports facilities are good, theatre is everywhere (though it's in Spanish), I go to the cinema a lot though all the films are dubbed into Spanish unless you have specialist cinemas to hand as in Madrid or Barcelona. Eating out is something all we rich foreigners do (rich in the sense that we are not usually economic migrants) Going to local fiestas is also a common pastime. If you want to para-glide then you can, if you want to dance you can, if you want to join a classic car club or the local chess club you can. The list is as endless and as limited as it would be in the UK.

What are the differences between life in Spain and in England?

I think I've answered that in lots of the other questions. 

What do you like the most about the country?

Another question that I can't answer simply. I like the things I like and they may not be the same as someone else. I liked the rivers and hills over in the North West when I lived there, I like the sweltering heat of Murcia City in summer, I like rice with rabbit and snails, I like Spanish radio and the colour of the Med is something to behold. I like the crisp blue winter sun, I like having a brandy with my coffee sometimes in the morning, I enjoy the conversations with my students, I like having figs trees in my garden. 

What do you miss the most about your home country?

Nothing really. I occasionally think nostalgically of the outdoor Shakespeare season at Tolethorpe and the Ely Folk Festival and, every now and again, I get a craving for a pork pie or Stilton.

Probably the thing that is most different and I miss most is being able to express myself precisely. I was trying to explain myself to a Spaniard the other day, who had corrected my Spanish, when I had used a particular construction. I had said what I meant to say and I have subsequently checked that the grammar was correct. The difference was between the thought that I wanted to express and the thing that the Spaniard thought I wanted to express. It wasn't an important difference but the gap was unbridgeable. The difference was between wonder and think – “we wondered about” was what I wanted to say, “we thought about” was what the Spaniard was sure I wanted to say. 

If I ask for a beer in a bar in Spain and the barman goes huh? I presume I have said something wrongly. If I ask for a beer in the UK and the barman goes huh? I presume he has not heard.

Would you like to give any advice to soon-to-be expatriates?

Learn Spanish.  Number one without a doubt.

If I were choosing my main home again I would not have chosen to live where I am. We are a bit isolated from Spain. There's no bar in our village and no shops so we have to drive. Another few years and that may be a problem. If I were doing it again I would choose a village, town or city that offered me the facilities I was looking for and then find a house that I liked.

What are your plans for the future? 

Well I should be cooking the lunch now but otherwise just to get on with the day to day I suppose.