Many of the regions, provinces and municipal councils involved in the recent elections have until 16 June to sort themselves out into governing administrations. This is because no party gained enough votes for overall control. Until mid June – and because politics famously makes for strange bedfellows - it would probably be unwise to draw any final conclusions. So, here goes . . . Despite the fact that the right-of-centre ‘won’ by getting the highest percentage of the national vote, in many places power will shift to coalition government comprising the left-of-centre PSOE party and one of Spain’s several nationalist or far-left parties. So, something for everyone. Especially if you believe coalition government is more democratic than rule by a party which got less than 50% of the total electorate’s vote. The only place where victory was resounding was Madrid, where the PP strengthened its hold on both the city and the autonomous community. Elsewhere, there remains a lot of uncertainty, most particularly in Navarra perhaps.

The saga of the treasure-seeking ship, The Odyssey, gets ever more confusing. Spain is now going to court in the USA to force its owners to reveal where exactly they’ve found the bullion thought to be worth around 360 million euros. And what nationality the galleon was. The basic unknowns are whether this was British or Spanish and whether it was found in British, Spanish or international waters. But there’s a nice rub . . . . If it was the British ship The Merchant Royal [and not The Sussex], this was ‘in the service of Spain’ when it went down. Doubtless Johnny Depp will star in the future film of this imbroglio, with numerous flashbacks to gore-laden sea battles. And Keira Knightley will play one of the ropes.

My teacher daughter in the UK will be pleased to hear today she’s now allowed to search pupils for knives herself, rather than having to call the police. What a relief.

Galicia Facts & Perspectives

I’ve a feeling I’ve reported this before but all pregnant women in Galicia will shortly be given a maternity pack of materials designed to help them talk to their babies in Gallego. It will include a CD of lullabies in the language.

The most common names for Galician babies at the moment are Lucía, Paula and Daniel. Fortunately, these are spelt the same way in Spanish, avoiding a betrayal of Galician culture. Other common names are Brais, Iago, Alexandre, Uxía, Iria e Antía but – as the maternity pack makes clear - some of these are more acceptable to the Xunta’s Ministry of Language Normalisation than others.

Finally, a short list of odd searches which ended up at my blog in May. Apart from the [unintelligible to me] last one, these appear to share a theme:-
Spanish female naked news presenter
bare breasted newscasters
websites of black female prostitutes in Spain
spanish Autopista sex stops
touch programing night club owners surnames in japan