EU Migration: There were one or two odd comments - on my FB page - on the article I cited
yesterday. One chap accused the writer - Matthew Parris - of being both arrogant and sociopathic. Which seems way off the mark to me.
Teaching
in England: A few nice quotes from an experienced teacher who now
works as a freelance and has good work/life balance and more money
than when she was employed by schools:
- It's all
based on a lies
- It
starts at age 5
- Everyone
lies so as to try to beat the system.
Is it any
wonder why my ultra-Catholic daughter - who'll deliver me a
grandchild today - couldn't hack this madness? You can imagine, of
course, the sort of people who get to the top. As they say, cream
isn't the only thing that floats. And a fish stinks from the head. Or
Head, in this case.
New (to
me) English word: to markad; markaded. This turns out to be a
cricketing term, coined in 'honour' of an Indian player quite a few
years ago. It means to stump a batsman when you're the bowler and he
moves out of his crease as you're about to deliver a ball. It's
perfectly legal but - as I once found out - you won't be
popular if you haven't previously warned the batsman about his doing this. Or even if you do. It's just 'not cricket', even
though the batsman is technically cheating. An Australian - naturally - did it yesterday in a match against England. Which the Aussies then
went on to win. Needless to say, they were booed off the (English)
field.
Galicia:
Whereas there are 132 petrol/gas stations around Spain selling
diesel fuel at below €1 a litre, only 2 of these are in Galicia.
And I bet neither of them is along our coast. In 15 years, I've never
heard an explanation as to why our fuel costs, in this 'poor' region, are higher than anywhere else. Cartel anyone?
Finally . . . & Pontevedra: Yesterday saw our last big fiesta of the year, barring the Oktuberfest of guess when. Seventeen years ago it didn't exist. Sixteen years ago, it occupied just one short street in the old quarter. Now it's vast, spreading far beyond the confines of the barrio monumental and pushing drivers to new levels of ingenuity in both legal and, more often, illegal parking. So, our shopkeepers, bar-owners and costume hirers now 'make another august' in September. Here's some fotos of this quite astonishingly well-organised event:
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| An pure race (Arab) horse |
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| Medieval soldiers getting ready to roll |
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| Oxen rolling |
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Footsoldiers with the crossbows of which small (real) versions were on sale to kids.
|
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| The main sqaure during the 'dead hour'. |
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| The bar, Viva Zapata, that I thought was closed but now know only opens at 6pm. And Estefonía, in the shade.
And now, proof that no Spanish or South American woman will ever refuse to let you (or me, at least) take a foto of her:-
 The lovely ladies of Viva Zapata |
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| A lady, Anna, who makes terrific cakes and whom I may go into a Betty's Café venture in Ponters |
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| A couple of ladies who followed pedestrian me in their car for more than half a km so they could take my precious parking space |
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| Finally . . . A lovely Colombian lady who kindly told me a barman friend (Michele) had stuck a bit of parcel tape on my shirt. And who then sold me a cold beer. At a ludicrous price, of course. But it was well worth it for that smile. |
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