Spanish views from a small town

After one of the coolest and rainiest months of May in many years (I haven't worn short sleeves even once!), today the sun has risen without almost any clouds and it's starting to warm up. Just in time to usher in June, a few days of good weather are predicted for Galicia. That, and the beautifully long days, have given me wanderlust. At the end of June I have one week all to myself. On one day of that week I intend to make one of my traditional day trips. I am starting to think about where I can go. I set a goal of a maximum of three hours driving to get to the place. Unfortunately, that limits the places I can visit outside Galicia that are still in Spain. Portugal is closer; the border is just a little over an hour away. But I would prefer to visit there in September, so for next month I'm scratching my head and wondering just how fast I can drive. Should I visit somewhere I've already been? Last year I went to Las Médulas in León province and wandered through Po...

Change is a continuous state of nature. Nothing is static. Living in the same place for the past twenty-five years I have only noticed change exceptionally, like when the grove of trees in front of my house was cut down. I have to deliberately stop and think, "That house is new; the house that used to be there was torn down; there didn't use to be a lane there; that stand of trees used to be saplings; etc."  Today I went hunting for a new television for my father's kitchen. I went to a hypermarket in one of the first malls built in Galicia, because I was told there was a good sale on. I hadn't been there in a long time, but the change was apparent. Many stores had closed, small ones had opened, but few people were walking around. The movie theater where I used to take my daughter during summer vacation ever since she had been three or four, was gone. So was the McDonald's where I used to treat her to chicken nuggets after the movie (her favorite on the Happy...

It's a good thing I'm not one of those people who tremble whenever they hear thunder at a distance. If I had been, yesterday morning I would have had been found in the darkest, most enclosed corner of the house. My cat Macarena would not have been happy to have me invade her space.  At a little after seven thirty I woke to a white hot sizzle that flashed through the bathroom window and an immediate boom that sounded like a wrecking ball had smashed against the house. My husband and I flew downstairs. He switched off the mains while I screamed, "Unplug everything!" W e surveyed the house and everything seemed okay, no blacken ed outlets, no smok e . We went back upstairs to bed, to await the end of the storm to check appliances. I don't want that alarm clock on a regular basis.  Unbeknownst to us, a few minutes later, our daughter was quickly traversing the streets of Santiago to get to the stop to await the bus home. As she dodged the raindrops without much s...

A psychologist, Dr. Arthur Aron, once designed thirty-six questions that help to get to know a person well and experimented their efficacy with groups of couples who were strangers to each other. The questions were broken up into different sets to be asked within a quarter of an hour at the most. Most of the couples took longer with each set. At the end they looked into each others' eyes for around four minutes. Through those questions and through looking at each other, they gained confidence in each other, and one couple from the experiment even went on to get married. Amnesty International took a portion of that experiment, and made a publicity campaign. They had a refugee and a European sit opposite each other and look at each other for four minutes. After that time, and most before, they were smiling at each other and trying to communicate. The objective was to show people that labels simply separate us and dehumanize those we label. That after looking at each other we realiz...

Do not mention all cats are beautiful to a police officer in Spain. You might get fined up to 600 euros for insulting him. That's what happened to a woman walking home last Sunday in Madrid. It just so happened that she lived near the stadium Vicente Calderón where people were lined up waiting for the doors to open to watch a soccer game. It wasn't just any game, it was the final of the King's Cup between Sevilla and Barcelona with the King in attendance. Police were crawling all over the place and two of them saw a woman walking by with a large bag. On the bag there was a picture of a cat within a circle. Around the circle was written "All Cats Are Beautiful." Above this were the initials "A.C.A.B." That incensed the police officers.  They went running after her, stopped her, and gave her a fine for the initials on the bag. She argued that the initials were spelled out in the circle and meant nothing denigrating. They didn't buy it and fined her...

From The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes: 'One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I'm after a prize tonight, But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light; Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day, Then look for me by moonlight, Watch for me by moonlight, I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way.' That ballad is a romantic conception of a highwayman, a bandolero . Though, by the time it was published in 1906, highwaymen had disappeared from Scottish and English roads. But not from the Spanish roads. One of the last bandoleros was from Galicia, Mamed Casanova, better known as Toribio, from a small parish in the township of Mañon. In 1900 he and his friends assaulted the parish priest's house and one of the group shot the housekeeper when she recognized them. After two years on the run, Toribio was tricked into accepting a dinner invitation and caught. At first he was condemned to death, but the king l...

Call me a spelling Nazi. Yes, I am the first to admit that sometimes I misspell a word, either because I've forgotten how many s's or t's go into it, or because I don't stop to check for typographical errors. But incorrect spellings are one of my bête-noirs. I swear my eyes bleed when I see some of the misspellings that have become so common lately. It doesn't matter whether it's in English or Spanish. A simple error can be excusable. An axe murder of a word is not. I suppose the habit that was created when trying to cram as many words as possible into one message is to blame. Back when it cost money to send a message, space was at a premium. "Que" was substituted by "k", "por" by "x" and so on. The habit continued into the world of free message apps, probably in order to write a message much more quickly. Unfortunately the habit has extended to other writing environments. When they leave school, most people never bother...

There is glamour and beauty on the red carpet in Cannes as famous actors, actresses, and directors parade before their films are exhibited to public and jurors. Everyone jostles behind the barriers, trying to catch a glimpse of their favorite star. The people eyes are centered on are a world apart, untouchable. But, in the world of agroglamour , the stars mix freely with film goers and they discuss different points of view of the film world. Because the film festival of Cans is down-to-earth. And how! Cans is a small parish and village of the same name in the township of Porriño, in the south of Pontevedra, near the Portuguese border. Back in 2004 someone who realized both Cans and Cannes are pronounced similarly in Spanish, decided as a joke, to have a parallel film festival. But, if the festival in Cannes takes place in five-star hotels and historical movie houses, the one in Cans takes place in swept out barns, abandoned houses, wine cellars, and temporarily evacuated chicken coop...