Thoughts from Galicia: 15.8.17

Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable.

- Christopher Howse: A Pilgrim in Spain. 

If you've arrived here because of an interest in Galicia or Pontevedra, see my web page here.

Life in Spain:-

• Here's an interesting follow-up to one of Spain's many bull-running events. Unusual in a not-very-litigious society. An augury?
• The latest Gallup poll endorses the view that Spain's macro economic recovery is not trickling down to the lower levels of society. A couple of quotes:- 1. The country's poorest residents may be hardest hit by austerity measures, and 2. The growing differences between low-income and high-income Spaniards are a troubling reflection of the rising inequality.
• A while ago, the newish centre-party, Ciudadanos, entered into a pact with the minority PP administration, to allow the latter to govern. It has now admitted that only c. 20% of this has been implemented so far. I wonder what they expected.
• Talking of the PP party, its leading (low wattage) light is President Rajoy - the only member of the party who knows nothing about its endemic corruption. He's not known for achieving much and is famous for saying even less. Despite (because of?) this, he's reported to be planning to try for a 3rd term in office. They say that voters in a democracy get the government they deserve. But do the Spanish really merit the unimpressive Sr Rajoy?

The Spanish Language:- My latest discoveries:-

• Tener patente de corso: To have a licence to do what you want. Lit: To be a  privateer. Corso = corsair.
• Un piscinazo: 'A dive', as in Louis Suarez in the Real Madrid penalty area. Lit: 'Big swimming pool'.
• Tener muchas migas: To be full of interest/substance.
• Gastroteca: A pretentious place serving food. Like a wine-serving vinoteca. Sometimes the same place.
• Gastrorestaurante: Ditto

Galicia News:

• The Galician Xunta has distanced itself from comments that there's too many tourists now. Indeed, they want more and have plans to bring them here. And not only from the rest of Spain.
• In Santiago de Compostela, meanwhile - as I know full well - things have got so bad that you'll have to wait at least 45 minutes to get into the cathedral, through the single door that's now kept open. Nonetheless, the complaint about tourists in that city is not that there's too many of them but that they don't spend enough once they get there. Cheap pilgrim bastards!
• Our farmers are up in arms against the Hacienda, the Tax Office. For a while now, it's been using drones to find unregistered rural buildings or extensions which should have been declared so that the municipal tax (the IBI) could be levied on them. And now it's demanding documentary evidence farmers are entitled to the cash they get from Brussels. Mainly for leaving their land uncultivated, I think. In theory, at least.
• Another day in hilly Galicia, another less-than-young farmer dead under an upturned tractor.
• Pontevedra's Saturday night bullfight didn't merit a full report in Sunday's El Pais. There was just a brief account in a side column, along with reports on 2 corridas in France(!) and one in Gijón on the north coast.
• The Saturday post-corrida-all-night binge for kids of 12 and upwards resulted in only 4 cases of alcoholic poisoning. And no violence. By the way, if you're female, there seems to be a strict rule for attendance at this - the younger you are, the more you should dress like a prostitute. One wonders if they leave the house like this, bottle of kalimocho in hand.
• A motorcyclist was recently stopped for doing 150km in a 60km zone. Because it had got wet and he wanted to dry it out, he said. Which was possibly true.

This is the charming garden of the Pontevedra Parador, where I go for a coffee of a Sunday morning. Or, rather, where I go to be ignored by the staff. Who, I guess, recognise that I am not staying there. Or just don't like me. They are civil servants, of course, as the hotel chain is government run:-

Out of their own mouths . . . Pastor Franklin Graham: Shame on the politicians who are trying to push blame on President Trump for what happened in Charlottesville. That’s absurd. Satan is behind it all. He wants division, he wants unrest, he wants violence and hatred.  Pastor Graham clearly knows what he's talking about when it comes to the absurd.

Finally . . .  Talking of the absurd . . . This foto jumped out of The Times at me this morning. And it wasn't because of the breasts:-

This, would you believe, is a stomach vacuuming - A contortion achieved by emptying your lungs and pulling your abdomen in under your ribcage and holding the inhalation for 20 to 60 seconds. Its aimed at giving you a 'flat middle and six-pack' with minimal effort. More extreme versions, nicknamed “alien yoga” involve contracting and releasing your stomach muscles in a bizarre rolling movement. I'll probably be giving it a miss.