Cosas de España/Galiza

Galicia and Portugal would like a better rail link with France but Paris is refusing to chip in for the cost, pointing out that their case would be stronger if they’d ever managed to get together to create a link between Lisbon and Vigo. They have a point, I guess.

HT to Lenox Napier of Business Over Tapas for the news that you can still be sued for something approaching blasphemy in Spain. Three right-wing groups are suing the Mongolia magazine for what they claims was an offence against religious feelings.

Barcelona, it says here, is battling against the ‘plagues of locusts’ disgorged by the huge cruise ships which dock in the port.

Pv city’s new Tourism kiosk was going to be open for the Easter influx of visitors but, sadly, it wasn’t. All down to ‘lack of materials’, apparently. Fingers crossed for July and August.

With the advent of spring, Camino ‘pilgrims’ are starting to flood through the city. But they aren’t what they were 12 years ago when I did my first one. Some of them are clearly a great deal wealthier – and older – than the average pilgrim back then. When the number doing the Portuguese Camino – at 5,000 a year – was a fraction of today’s 125,000 or more. Some at least are able to afford the newer hostales and pensiones charging in excess of €70 a night, compared with around €10 for an albergue bed. Yesterday I was passed by 4 English women of advanced age, impressively kitted out to the nines in walking gear.

Another pedestrian has been hit one of the zebra crossings I used to brave 4 times a day down by La Barca bridge. These days, those I use near O Burgo bridge are a tad safer. Though not in the dark, when I resort to fluorescent armbands to increase my chances of survival

The Way of the World

The insanity continues, courtesy of Nike . . . We live in a world where a man who masquerades as a sportswoman is showered with praise and money while an actual sportswoman is branded a ‘stupid fucking bitch’ and punched in the face. A world where a bloke can be paid thousands of dollars to prance around in a sports bra in a grotesque parody of a female athlete while a real female athlete is set upon by a seething mob and told to ‘go the fuck home’. A world where a man in leggings doing a sub-Dick Emery satire on womanhood is held up as a role model while a young woman who trained her whole life to be an elite athlete is damned as a bigot and – direct quote – a ‘transphobic bitch’. , , , That the elites feel more comfortable with a man’s frivolous performance of womanhood than they do with a woman’s passionate, reasoned defence of womanhood confirms that the trans ideology has laid waste to truth, science and sexual equality. . . The trans ideology has rendered womanhood meaningless. It has emptied it of its truths and reduced it to mere costume, one that anyone can don. Full article here.

Cybercrime: Be careful what you tell your chatbot helper… Alluring and useful they may be, but the AI interfaces’ potential as gateways for fraud and intrusive data gathering is huge – and is only set to grow.

Finally . . .

I’ve started to use a notebook instead of scraps of paper to record the things I have to do near term. Seeing them all in one place, I’m surprised to see how they mount up over time, giving me some idea of where my day goes. But I don’t suppose any mother will be. And possibly few wives.

For new readers:– If you’ve landed here looking for info on Galicia or Pontevedra, try here. If you’re passing through Pontevedra on the Camino, you’ll find a guide to the city there.