Awake, for morning in the bowl of night has flung the stone that puts
the stars to flight.
And, lo, has caught the sultan’s turret in a noose of light!

Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable – Christopher Howse: ‘A Pilgrim in Spain’

Cosas de España/Galicia

The Spanish PM is about to do a Mrs Merkel, it seems . . . Half a million illegal migrants will be given residency under legislation proposed by the Left-wing coalition government. As I reported recently: Immigration has become a key concern for Spaniards after 40,000 illegal migrants arrived by sea or land in the year up mid-September – a 49% increase on 2023. Needless to say, not everyone is happy about this. Click here.

In another surprising move . . . Spain is set to give great apes ‘human’ rights. Proposed legislation would ban experimentation and research, if these would harm the animals.

Spain is different . . . A more relaxed attitude to risk. Walking back to my car last night, I passed a flat-bed truck parked facing downhill with its engine running but no one in the cab. Then this morning, I was passed by a very souped-up small Mercedes which then parked in front of me. And this, too, had been left with its engine running while the driver went into a shop. I was tempted to at least drive it round the block.

The last couple of days here in Galicia have been Octoberish – very wet and windy. And this is predicted to continue for another 4 days. Given this, I was surprised to read this morning that Galicia is forecast to be drier this autumn/fall than every other Spanish region. The good thing about this weather, of course, is that it keeps the ‘pilgrims’ in their albergues, hostels and hotels, leaving me a table wherever I want.

Which reminds me . . . I wrote not long ago that I’d plumped for a particular building in Rúa do Ponte in Pv city’s old quarter as the most likely candidate for where George Borrow of The Bible in Spain stayed back in the late 1830s. And this is it, as it appeared today in a local paper:-

Fittingly – if I’m right – it’s going to be converted into a pilgrims’ albergue.

The UK

• A right-wing columnist’s view of the Labour’s conference currently taking place: Censorious, priggish, envious and mean-spirited. I imagine that’s not how they see themselves, having the virtue of being of the Left. Sort of.
• Quote: Good news. The revolution is coming. Laptop-wielding coffee-shop table-hoggers who monopolise the best seat in the house for 5 hours having bought 1 poxy drink for £3.20 are starting to feel a boot up their entitled backsides. Cafés are making a stand against e-freeloaders using their heating, electricity and wi-fi while nursing an empty latte, depriving other paying customers of a table. Here in Spain, as I’ve said, cafés and bars have solved this problem by the other expedient of not giving the wifi code to clients, claiming they don’t now have wifi. As if.

The EU

The combustion engine ban threatens a ‘grave crisis’ for Europe, says Italy. The Industry minister has warned of large-scale job losses among carmakers, unless the Green Deal rules are relaxed. I’d bet my life on the latter happening. Currently, the ban on combustion engines is set to take effect in 2035. Place your bets on a later year now. The 12th of Never?? Or at least not before 2050.

English

• Nork: A female breast (usually plural). Slang, of course. New to me. Not that I’m expert in this area. Of breast euphemisms, I mean.
• Fupa: Fat upper pubic area. The things you learn in the ‘quality press’.

Spanish

We’re approaching the veranillo de San Miguel. Or the little summer of St Michael. This is: Un fenómeno meteorológico caracterizado por un periodo de temperaturas cálidas y clima estable que suele ocurrir a finales de septiembre o principios de octubre en España.

Did you know?

‘Lukewarm’ comes from the fact that the waters around the UK warm up in the days leading up to the feast-day of St Luke – or Luketide – on 18 October.

You’ll have immediately appreciated that this comes just before – or even overlaps with – the little summer of St Michael. Whose feast-day is September 29.

Finally . . .

• I forgot, yesterday, that a 3rd thing had broken down – in fact, before the printer and the phone. My kettle, brought from the UK. Luckily, just a blown fuse, albeit in a British plug. But I’ve used my last spare fuse. So, time to cut the cord and replace the plug with a local one.
• To continue the woe-fest . . . Because my old phone ceased to function after I’d opened it, I lost all my fotos, as they couldn’t be transferred. Plus all my voice recordings. Naturally, I’d switched this week to taking notes via recordings, as opposed to sending emails to myself. Hey, ho. Worse things happen at sea. Or so they say.

MY YEAR IN THE SEYCHELLES

• Part 1: 12 September 2024: Why VSO?
• Part 2: 13 September 2024: The Leaving of Liverpool
• Part 3: 14 September 2024: An interlude: The Seychelles back then
• Part 4: 14 September 2024: Departure, Nairobi and Arrival
• Part 5: 15 September 2024: Arriving in Mombasa
• Part 6: 16 September 2024: The YCWA in Mombasa
• Part 7: 17 September 2024: The flight to Mahé
• Part 8: 18 September 2024: Our Arrival
• Part 9: 19 September 2024: Early Days
• Part 10: 20 September 2024: My Colleagues and Some Early Adventures
• Part 11: 21 September 2024: Mr Warren and Me
• Part 12: 22 September 2024: Chris Green
• Part 13: 23 September 2024 The Hotel des Seychelles
• Part 14: 24 September 2024: A Night to Remember

Episode 15: Visitors

Among the minor nuisances of hotel living numbered the ants, the cockroaches and the mould. None of these, however, confined their activities to the Hotel des Seychelles.

The ants came in 2 varieties – walking and flying. The former were fascinating but the latter a bloody nuisance.

Every chalet had its complement of walking ants. In Goelette, they came in through a hole under the back window and departed through a similar hole at the front.

Occasionally I’d be visited by a troupe of strangers who’d march around the shower and out through the hole made for the inlet pipe.

But my regulars, eschewing the straight line principle, would climb upwards from the back window, across the ceiling, down the front wall and out again into the fresh air.

At least, half of them did. The other half took the same route but in the opposite direction.

I never did discover where half of them were going and whence the others came but they provided me with hours of fascination. There not being a lot to do of an evening, after the sun had gone down. Which it did every single night of the year, not long after 6pm.

I confess that I developed quite an interest in knowing more about ants and, in 1970, my future wife presented me with a huge book on them. Which, of course, I’ve never read. And have no idea where it is. Probably burnt in a warehouse fire in 1974, when we were living in Iran. Along with all my photos from that year. These, by the way, had been taken by a 1930s Kodak box-camera, lent to me by an aunt. Despite looking like this and being more than 30 years old, it took very good pictures. And gave quite a few people a good laugh:-

Anyway, back to the ants . . . One thing in particular amazed me about them; whenever one going West to East met one coming East to West, they’d bump into each other briefly and move on. Since each of the parallel lines contained many hundreds – thousands? – of creatures, there was a hell of a lot of bumping going on. I’ve since learned that they’re blind. Which explains a lot.

Whereas the walking ants continued their manoeuvres day and night, year in, year out and never constituted any kind of nuisance, the flying variety only called just before the rains and created havoc.

Their target was always the electric light bulb. Hordes of the little black pests would sweep in through the windows and blanket the light. This by itself would have been irritating enough, especially if one were reading. But their favourite trick was to shed their wings and plummet downwards – wreathing, squirming and crawling onto everything in the room.

Since I rarely wore a shirt at night, this was particularly nauseating. The only solution was to switch off the light and wait until the rains fell. Of course, this presupposed that the electricity was working. If if wasn’t – and this was a frequent occurrence – we weren’t bothered at all by the nocturnal plague.

The cockroaches and the mould constituted a particular danger to our clothing and little could be done to get rid of either. But we found the former susceptible to the right boot and the latter to extended bouts of strong sunlight.

Ignoring, for now, the month-long stay – mostly in his sick-bed – of Noel Coward, there were 2 other major visits during my year in the hotel. One was by an official of the International Voluntary Service(IVS) – Mr Frank Judd – and the other was by a wandering bug of the genus “Salmonella”. About which, more anon.

As for Frank Judd . . . He was a member of the Labour Party, for which he later became a senior MP, with an interest in overseas activities. This is him, at a somewhat later stage in his life. Not quite as I recall him.

The first I heard of his pending arrival was a phone call from Martin who warned me that someone from IVS. was coming to inspect the work of his volunteers and that he was to move into my room. Since he couldn’t be expected to share a room, with me I was to move out and, for the week he was staying, share with either Phil Murray or Martin. I opted for Phil because it meant less distance to lug all my belongings.

He duly arrived one day in February 1966 and seriously inconvenienced me.

When I arrived home from College the afternoon of his arrival, a scene of unbelievable frantic activity met my eyes. Mr Judd was due in 30 minutes and Jerry’s men were just putting the finishing touches to the new paint on the front of ‘my’ chalet. The inside walls had all been whitewashed and my bed exchanged for a more comfortable model; a new light had been fitted on the porch and all my belongings were being piled shoulder high in Phil’s room.

As Mr Judd had nothing to do with the organisation for which I was working, I was already put out by the trouble his coming had caused me. But I boiled over when I witnessed the lengths to which Jerry was prepared to go to convince him of the attention his people were receiving.

As it happened, Jerry’s plans dramatically backfired. Mr Judd was not happy at finding that 2 of his 3 graduates – John Edgely and Joanna Walley – were Ritzing it up at “Seychelles’ Leading Hotel”.

Having been told of this, John and Joanna decided to move out and set up house for themselves, on the other side of the island, near Victoria. To the consternation of Mr and Mrs Paddy Taylor, our self-appointed guardians, Martin and Jane left the protection of the hotel and went with them.

Since relations between myself and the two IVS volunteers were somewhat strained, I decided to stay in the Hotel. This had the unfortunate effect of endearing me to Paddy and his wife.
Who then tended to fuss over me – when not angry with me – for the rest of my stay.

The visit to the hotel of the 2nd major visitor – the Salmonella bug – merits a chapter of its own . . .

My thanks to those readers who take the trouble to Like my posts, either after reading on line or in my FB group Thoughts from Galicia.

The Usual Links . . .

• You can get my posts by email as soon as they’re published. With the added bonus that they’ll contain the typos I’ll discover later. I believe there’s a box for this at the bottom of each post. If you do this but don’t read the posts, I will delete your subscription. So perhaps don’t bother if you have other reasons for subscribing . . .
• 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.
• For those thinking of moving to Spain:– This is an extremely comprehensive and accurate guide to the challenge, written by a Brit who lives in both the North and the South and who’s very involved in helping Camino walkers. And this is something on the so-called Beckham Rule, which is beneficial – tax-wise – for folk who want to work here. Finally, some advice on getting a mortgage. And this article ‘debunks claims re wealth and residency taxes’. Probably only relevant if you’re a HNWI. In which case, you’ll surely know what that stands for.