It struck me today that the key to a happy life in Spain might well be your SF rating, or sociability factor. For a start, the Spanish must be amongst the most sociable people on earth, meaning it’s much easier to fit in if you’re similar. Secondly, and even more importantly, in this very local and personal society much is achieved through friends and their contacts. The more you have, the more you can get done. Or, to put it another way, the less frustrated you’ll be. Finally, people prefer to do things for people they like. All in all, then, if you’re a bit of a recluse, you’re better off staying at home. Or confining yourself to a foreign ghetto on the south coast.

To my not-very-great surprise, I read tonight that the local police have impounded more than a hundred of the mini-motorbikes for sale alongside the main highways. Not, though, because it’s intrinsically dangerous to put a small kid on a powerful machine but because the [plastic] fuel pipe runs along the exhaust. So, you’re allowed to risk your child dying from a broken skull but not from spontaneous combustion.

A week or so ago, the local papers were full of the news that the beachfront apartments in nearby Sanjenjo/Sanxenxo [‘the Marbella of Galicia’] were the second most expensive in Spain to rent during July and August. Tonight comes the rose-deblooming news that discounts of as much as 50% are being offered for the second half of July. Not great news if you’ve already booked, of course.

One of the perils of writing with irony is that you run the risk of being misunderstood. So, responding to the comment posted to yesterday’s blog, I just wanted to clarify that I am no admirer of the macho Spanish attitude towards prostitution. My comment yesterday was intended to convey that, whereas I [like my anonymous reader] would regard all that happened as despicable, some at least of my Spanish male friends probably wouldn’t. For what it’s worth, my own view is that prostitution should be legalised and regulated so as to at least reduce, if not eradicate, the widespread abuse of women ensured by the current situation of collusion between the brothel owners and the authorities. As for returning to the subject regularly … well, whatever one thinks about it, it’s a pretty prominent aspect of Spanish society. And that’s what I comment on.