Well I really did think spring had sprung at last, but I was sadly mistaken! The almond trees had all burst into bloom, promising better, milder, even warmer weather, and then…like a stock market crash our expectations turned out to suddenly sink like a stone! In spite of all the blossom around, the weather has been very much more Norn Iron, than Spain. I am reliably informed that when our weather here is grim it tends to be much better in the UK in general, and vice versa. Fortunately for us, in Spain, we get far, far better weather here for most of the year. However it was a bit chilly this morning when I headed out to the health centre…
No doubt we’ll all be complaining soon of being too hot with our summer temperatures hitting 44 C again in the shade. Bring it on, I say! Meanwhile we’ve had the most torrential rain over the last while, almost biblical in its intensity, preceeded by violent storms enough to bring down trees in the town.
Fortunately none of our trees at home were adversely affected, and even the delicate almond blossom survived the onslaught.
Now there are two good things about the rain. First, it’s great for the gardens, the plants, the fruit trees and everything else that grows – the earth seems to waken up and throw colour, fruit and veggies in every direction. Secondly, when it hammers it down in Spain you soon find out where, if anywhere, your roof has a broken tile letting the water in!
Peter has spent a day or two up on the roofs checking the tiles and making sure everything was whole and waterproof. Then we discovered that there was water seeping in to one of the downstairs bedrooms via a little crack in the cement at ground level. So, little bit of mopping up a small puddle, send the husband outside to mix up some concrete, and the job’s a good ‘un again. The perils of living in a big old house, sigh.
At this time of year we often see patches of little purple flowers – I suppose they’re really weeds, though they are gorgeous, bright purple in colour, and they really brighten up the area. This year, probably because of the amount of rain we’ve had, those wee flowers seem to have invaded the whole area, they are fantastic to look at. Drive round any corner and there they are, stretching for a long way, just gorgeous. I don’t think my photos do them any justice, they were just taken while I was hanging out the car window!
They look absolutely beautiful, and they are so widespread they just take your breath away.
I do like a bit of colour round the place, which is why we have bougainvillea and jasmine growing in pots up the columns on the verandah at the front of the house. My wee hibiscus also puts on a great show, but I’ve just cut it back hard now, as usual – it just looks like a scrawny stick! I’m not panicking, though I say that every year, and it’s beginning to show tiny little new buds coming on, so it shouldn’t be long before it comes back to full bloom again.
I know I’ve said it before, and I’m happy to say it again and again.and again, but one of the most important things about relocating to a foreign country is learning to integrate with your local community. I’m aware that there are some people living in Spain who have never learned more than a couple of words in Spanish, and they don’t think they should have to learn any more! When I was househunting here all those years ago, one house I viewed was owned by a couple in their 80s who had retired to Spain more than 20 years before. They proudly told me they knew 5 phrases in Spanish – hola, adios, gracias, dos cervezas, and dos cafés con leche. They were very proud of this, and said they’d lived in Benidorm for a number of years before moving south, and in Benidorm everyone spoke English. Well I don’t know about you, but even when we used to go on holiday we tried to learn a few phrases of whatever the local language was, it’s good manners if nothing else!
I’ve been here 18 years this month, Peter’s been here a few years longer than that, and I think our Spanish is fairly competent. Not perfect, but enough to hold conversations, deal with banks, bills, medical stuff and so on. We speak Spanish every day, we have no English-speaking neighbours, so it’s good practice! I might be slow, I might need things repeated often, but nobody seems to mind, and I’m learning all the time.
A couple of weekends ago we spent a lovely afternoon up at our local bar, where there were plenty of neighbours around so we had lots of extra practice at conversation!
Two of our immediate neighbours, Maria José and Epi were there, and it was lovely to be able to sit in a bit of fleeting warm sunshine and chat to them, practising our Spanish and learning a lot more. We also met a new friend, Melchor, whose wife teaches English, so we were keen to swap languages!
Maria José and Epi insisted on coming up to our house, to help us prune our olive trees – they’d seen Peter having a go and reckoned he needed some help! The first day they came they had actually started the work before we even got out of bed, and they did a fantastic job for us! In addition, and as a gift, they brought us a big 5 litre container of extra virgin olive oil from their own trees.
Well what can I say?! We are so, so grateful to have such lovely neighbours, we’re very, very lucky! From Carmelo who helped us sort out our water supply the night we moved in, to Manolo who kept bringing all our logs up our very steep driveway when Peter was so ill, to Maria José and Epi, who worked hard pruning our trees and gave us fabulous olive oil as well, we are truly blessed.
In return, I can keep them all supplied with home-made lemon curd and wheaten bread, and the latest addition, chocolate chip cookies!
Now, here’s a bit of good news. I’ve been having a lot of trouble with pain in my right knee, from arthritis. On a scale of one to ten it can easily hit a nine, fairly hard to bear, and paracetamol doesn’t really touch it. So, off to the doc,who made me an appointment for the following week for an MRI. Got the results a week after that, saw the doc again, and got an appointment with the orthopaedic surgeon for next month, to discussknee replacement surgery. (I quite fancy having the knee replaced with a tiger that would roar and bite people I don’t like…) I just can’t complain about the speed with which appointments etc are carried out here, especially when I hear about the lengthy waiting lists for consultations, never mind surgery, in the UK. It seems the average waiting time here for knee replacement is 4 to 5 months, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed and shall let you know what happens. My friend Jules needs a hip replacement – we’re thinking of renaming our wee ladies lunch group the Cripples’ Institute Outings!
Incidentally there’s nothing shy about the Spanish approach to looking after your health – there’s a poster on the wall of our health centre which orders you to “Mueve el culo!”, which translates as “Move your arse!”. Hmm, keep moving, keep young!
As usual we’ve been out and about recently enjoying lunch in different restaurants, all within easy striking distance of home. We go quite often to the Restaurante Internacional in Archena, not far from Fortuna. I’m sure I’ve posted this information before recently but it’s such a beautiful restaurant, with amazing food, so here is is again! We do really love it here, the copper ceilings and little lights on branches make dining a very pleasurable experience indeed!
Someone recently sniped a wee bit about us eating out so often….well with so many fabulous restaurants near us, and with fantastic 4 course lunches including drinks at around €15, sure why wouldn’t you? The husband has now got his state pension so with a nod to all the jealous little people…we’ll be eating out even more often now!
I have to tell you about Valentine’s Day this yuear. Now I know I’m a month late but sure better late than never! A friend of ours has been a bit unwell, and was in hospital recently, and told us of a delightful episode, courtesy of the domestic staff there. They made sure that every patient got a specially made Valentine card, which was so lovely! My friend sent me this so I can show you what the card looked like…
Happy Valentine’s Day! May love remind you of the beauty of the world, the kindness of people, and the richness we carry in our hearts.The translation says “Happy Valentine’s Day! May love remind you of the beauty of the world, the kindness of people, and the richness we carry in our hearts.” Isn’t that a lovely gesture? Now I can show you the one I got from the husband, but you need to remember that the man makes me laugh every day, although sometimes it’s unintentional! He wanted to blow up a heart-shaped balloon for me and put it on the wee lamp on the kitchen table, where I’d be sure to see it. He didn’t allow for the fact that it wasn’t in great shape, and had deflated by the time I saw it. So it ended up looking like an upside down heart or, more precisely, another part of the (male) anatomy!
We’ve had a bit of bother with the big lampost outside our house as the wiring was collapsing and looking decidedly dangerous. We tried contacting the company that the town hall told us had responsibility for all the street lighting, but in spite of continually phoning them and waiting in for a few days in a row nobody turned up – unfortunately normal in Spain! Eventually we contacted our electrician, Miguel who also works for the town hall and he advised them it was a danger, and came out himself to do the safety repair. It looked even more dangerous when he had to scale a couple of big poles to secure everything!
Thank goodness for Miguel, the job was done and everything made safe again!
Here’s what we’ve been buying recently – we shop locally and every now and again we come across something that makes us realise “we’re not in Kansas now, Toto”!
This week I spotted cans of fizzy lemon and watermelon…but the cans were clear! Now I’ve never seen these before, maybe you have, but for us they are a real novelty. And the fizzy drinks were also very refreshing!
I’m not sure if you can easily see that they’re translucent cans but I think they are maybe made from some sort of plastic? Look at the bottom and you might see they are clear. Every time we find something new it’s like that feeling you get when you go on holiday and find unfamiliar groceries etc, a bit of a novelty.
As for crisps, my goodness the Spanish do love their snacks! We found own brand crisps in Family Cash, a big supermarket near us, that taste even better than Pringles for half the money. Got to make the pension stretch!
However, the funniest crisps we’ve seen to date are the following…..
And while we’re on the subject of being rather childish about the “foreign” names of some foodstuffs, how about this to make you giggle like a 10 year old?!
Oh dear! As a balance to all that, we buy fresh produce when in season, and very good it is too, usually from our local market on Saturdays in Fortuna. As a wee reference, how about this for a strawberry?! Not at all unusual, either!
I’m off to Norn Iron tomorrow, just for a few days, leaving Señor Kopczynski to get on with some jobs around the house with no distractions! I had messaged my friend Barry Thompson to ask about taxi firms in the Ballymoney area, to get from the airport. His brother, Peter, had recommended a company previously and they turned out to be great, but I couldn’t remember their name! Well here’s a thing, Barry simply wouldn’t hear of me getting a taxi, or struggling with luggage on a bus to Antrim, train to Ballymoney etc – no, he insisted that he and Siobhan would come and collect me! My goodness, you can never believe how kind people can be, and how grateful we are for that fabulous gesture! Señor Kopczynski is so grateful to them for looking after me that he has packed a wee surprise for Barry and Siobhan…just a little “thank you”, which isn’t nearly enough but is a start!
I want to give a mention here to a great Facebook page and website called BeSpain Savvy. Their website is filled with fantastic information about what it’s really like to live in Spain, the pros, the cons, and all the information you might need to help you settle into a new country with all that it entails.
Have a look at their Facebook page, it’s filled with little hints and tips to make life easier in Spain. They also have a great website, and there’s much more detailed information available for subscribers. Always a most informative and enjoyable read!
Right, I really need to get a move on now and make sure everything is packed and ready for tomorrow, we need to leave the house before 6am for me to catch an early flight!
But before I finish, and thinking about me imitating Hopalong Cassidy with my wretched knee, it reminded me of the time I broke my ankle some years ago, and subsequently wrote the following….hope it raises a smile!
I’m not ancient, I’m not decrepit, I wasn’t drinking, and I do generally look where I’m going but occasionally an uneven surface will catch out most of us! When I broke my ankle my lovely neighbour Sue lent me her husband’s zimmer frame (fortunately he didn’t need it at that time) so I could get around the house easier with plaster of paris up to my knee. Getting round the house was easy. Showering? That was a different matter altogether!
So, in case you might need it in the future, here is my advice on how to have a shower with a broken ankle:
1. Get into shower cubicle.
2. Drag zimmer into shower after you.
3. Realise you’ve been so busy positioning the zimmer that you forgot to take your clothes off.
4. Take off clothes and start again.
5. Hook left leg (with broken ankle) over the top of the zimmer.
6. Realise you look like an advert for Readers’ Wives or Gynaecology magazine, start to cry.
7. Turn on shower, alternatively scalding and freezing your skin.
8. Bend over, balancing carefully, to reach shower gel, realising you look like an advert for an even more specialist magazine. Cry some more.
9. Load sponge with shower gel, slather on body…where you can reach with one leg up and the good leg bent at the knee.
10. Realise that rinsing is going to be no fun at all….keeping left leg hooked over the zimmer in a vain attempt to keep the plaster dry, start to rinse off shower gel.
11. Notice that bandage round plaster of paris is drenched so aim to exit shower as quickly as possible.
12. Fling the zimmer out and hop after it.
13. Give up idea of washing hair in shower and head for the bath to lean over it instead.
WHAT I HAVE LEARNED…….if I lived on my own I’d just stay dirty until the bleeping plaster came off.
My life in Spain 