Life in La Unión

My mum is in Spain. She's come with her pal Sheila to see the Easter parades in Cartagena. Easter is a big thing in Spain. All over the country during Easter Week, or Semana Santa, people wear costumes that were the inspiration for the Klu Klux Klan. Big pointed hats and long robes mask the vanity of their wearers; costumes that prove penitence. Lots of people walk barefoot. Big floats or "tronos", heavy wooden constructions topped with life sized wooden carvings depicting Biblical scenes are carried here and there. Watching the processions is a spectator sport. Find yourself a tight corner where the carriers have to work hard to manoeuvre their tronos. Whether you pay for one of the street side chairs, reserve your table at a bar along the route or just bag some pavement space you get to pass judgement on the handling of the tronos. Whenever there is any sort of street event in Spain there will be street vendors and their barrows. The most typical fiesta barrow...

Migas, is an very old and very traditional Spanish dish created to make use of stale bread. It was traditionally eaten by shepherds. It's easy to see why if you imagine them spending days on the hills limited to what they could easily carry with them. Stale bread flavoured with garlic and olive oil or lard cooked over a camp fire is a lot better than nothing. On good days the migas might even include the spicy chorizo sausage, ham or salted pork. I was in one of those little road trains. The things that hold you up in your car in the narrow streets of historic city centres. A man was holding forth on the different versions of migas. He was agreeing with the guide who, outside the interpretation centre dedicated to cave dwelling, had told us a little story. You need four people to make good migas - she said. Un tacaño, un generoso, un estupido y un listo or a tight fisted person, a generous person, a stupid person and a clever person. The miser won't put sufficient w...

It was Father's Day on Wednesday and I didn't get farther than the local bar. I have the day off on Friday and I decided it was time to shrug off this lethargy; to do something. It wasn't a huge thing but I went to Cartagena and did a tour of the local exhibitions. At the Archaeological Museum they had some good and well seen photos on the theme of women in flamenco; at the Palacio Molina they had photos, some of which I thought were excellent and some very ordinary, by a group of professional photographers who once belonged to a now extinct local photo group; at the Byzantine walls museum some paintings by a chap called Miguel Ángel Quiñonero which I thought were laughable and at the MURAM there were some paintings gathered together under the title Spanish painting 1875-1935 some of which I really liked even if it was only for the completely over the top gilded frames. They let me down at the Old Town Hall where the exhibition was being mysteriously re-organised in mid...

I'm not doing much at the moment. Preparing lessons or drinking whisky whilst smoking and reading in the nearest bar doesn't provide much raw material for blog posts. I've become a bit of a Billy No Mates . I still go to the pictures but even that is becoming faintly depressing. I saw three films this weekend. All of them were dubbed into Spanish and the only one I understood in its entirety was Philomena. I suspect that I understood it because it has a British sensibility - like me. My classical music tastes are a bit plebeian too - very Classic FM. That's probably why my favourite bit of opera is the aria Nessun Dorma from Turandot. That's the tune that Pavarotti took it to number two in the BBC top forty back in 1990 when it was used as the World Cup theme song. I like the Jussi Bjórling version best but my reason for that is also a bit prosaic. I first heard it as Ken Russell's contribution to the 1987 film Aria. Not exactly a Glyndebourne experience. ...

I don't think I'm particularly stupid. I've always been a little antisocial in a no dancing, no karaoke sort of way and that's probably getting worse along with my ever whitening hair. Nonetheless I don't think I'm unpleasant. You wouldn't know that though if you were speaking to me in Spanish. In fact you would be certain I was stupid, rude and grim faced. The people I work alongside are a pleasant bunch. The boss invited us out to eat on Thursday night to celebrate his birthday and I really - really, really - didn't want to go. When my colleagues speak ordinary speed Spanish between themselves using everyday idioms I don't know what they are saying. This annoys me. I would use another expression that includes an expression related to sexual intercourse combined with another related to directional urination but my mum reads these blogs so I won't. It upsets me that I spoil their evening by sitting there glum faced and I go home cursing mysel...

I've never been good at popular culture. Maggie has a penchant for those gossip magazines; the sort that mix the "Mother's anguish for teenage son" with how Rihanna had taken to carrying a turnip around as a talisman. I can never fathom how she remembers all the names let alone recognises the same person in photos that look as alike as chalk and cheese to me. A few years ago we went to a music festival in Benicassim. As with all festivals I'd gone primarily to sample the vegetable noodles. I did have a passing interest in the music with the thought of seeing old timers before they died and newcomers who may one day be famous. The Ting Tings and Leonard Cohen as I remember. As we wandered around the site we came across some bloke playing Flamenco music on one of the stages. It was good. The crowd was sizeable but there was none of that fighting crush you get with the headline acts so we stayed a while. The singer turned out to be Enrique Morente. I was impresse...

Every month there is a survey about the things which most concern ordinary Spaniards. Recently corruption has been up there in the top three usually just behind unemployment. Over the past few years there have been several high profile corruption cases and, because the Spanish justice system still hasn't bought many computers and is notoriously slow, most of them are still current news stories. Anyway there are new scandals almost on a weekly basis. The King's son in law is in court on corruption charges and the Infanta, a Princess in British terms, has to declare in court tomorrow. The ex treasurer of the governing right of centre Partido Popular is currently on remand accused of handing over wads of money in brown envelopes to lots of prominent people - one name on his payment list is that of the President. Everybody seems to be in on it from prominent business people and heads of regional government through bankers to town mayors and even to the unions who are accused of...