Dawn

Dawn

Friday, July 17, 2009

It’s a feature of Spanish life that you get flyers on your windscreen if you park your car in town. More impressively, it’s another feature of Spanish society that the streets are not full of discarded flyers and other bits of paper. I believe this is because of the highly efficient daily street-cleaning schemes operated by most town councils.

Talking of parking . . . I have a new theory as to why there are never any places on the streets of Pontevedra. And a possible answer to my question of last week as to how on earth anyone finds a spot to park in near their house. This is that they don’t actually look for one. Rather, they head for the underground car-park which every block of flats has but, if they happen to see a space on the street, they opportunistically seize it. This, at least, is a logical explanation of why there are neither free spaces nor evidence of people driving round becoming increasingly distracted. But I’ve no idea whether it’s true or not.

And still on this theme . . . Another day, another square, another zebra crossing, another another inconsiderately parked car and another blocked bus . . .


In this case, the car driver didn’t appear when the bus-driver leant on his horn. Nor when the angry car drivers in the 100 metre tailback did the same. But this may have been because the offender had left his hazard lights on. So, technically his car wasn’t there. The bus eventually manoeuvred backwards and forwards until it get past the obstruction, with the driver – as usual – showing no sign of frustration or anger. My suspicion is that, given how many times a day this must happen to him, he knows any Anglo-type response would be life-shortening.

I listened this morning to a BBC podcast on the implications for societies – such as the UK’s – which are more unequal than others. An interesting finding was that, in the very equal Scandinavian societies, more than 60% of the people say they trust others. Down at the bottom of the table – at a mere 19% - was Portugal. Spain obviously comes somewhere in between but I wonder where. It is a pretty equal society but . . .

Talking of BBC podcasts . . . I heard one last week about the G8 conference, in which the reporter naturally spoke of Mr Berlusconi’s recent travails. Appropriately enough, his name was David Willey.

Finally . . . Another example of the Spanish antennae-manners dichotomy I regularly refer to. I picked up a leaflet on our imminent Jazz/Blues festival from a pile at the entrance to my midday bar. Having sat down, I put it with my other things on the bar and was surprised – well, not really – when the woman next to me picked it up. Suddenly realising that it might be mine, she asked me if it was. When I said yes but not to worry as there were many more, she went bright red, apologised profusely and refused to take it. As I say, I’m so used to this pattern now that I never get annoyed at the invasion of my space. Though coming back from the toilets and finding that someone has taken the newspaper on which I’ve left a glass of wine, a pen and a notepad can still irritate.

Postscript for reader Cade:
Keep sending you Bilious Thoughts from Leicester and I will keep deleting them. But, should you discard your abusive tone and write politely, I will be happy to leave them alone, however critical of me they are.
Up to you.

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