Awake, for morning in the bowl of night has flung the stone that puts
the stars to flight.
And, lo, the hunter of the east 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

The annual reveal of a strange Catalan Xmas custom. . .

Ahead of another planned road-trip down South next February, I’ve taken a look at my write-up of a month-long trip made there in April and May 2018, bits of which were included in my posts of that time. I’ve decided to re-publish some of my comments and advice here, and now . . .

• In the last 3 weeks, we’ve stayed in at least 15 hotel, hostels and pensions. And I still have no real idea why one term is used in preference to another. Nor how the rating system of stars works. And neither has any employee I’ve spoken to about this. The bottom line is that we’ve stayed in hostels and pensions better than some of the 2 or 3 star hotels.
• I’ve mentioned it was a a calvario to get tickets on line for the Alhambra in Granada. Here’s the list of things you can and can’t do once you get through the entrance queue:- In order to guarantee an adequate environment for the visit, security and conservation of the Monumental Complex and the assets integrating the Dobla de Oro, as well as for the visitors and staff, please respect the following RECOMMENDATIONS.
• Children under 12 must be accompanied by an adult during the whole visit.
• For security reasons, children under 8, must go hand in hand with an adult, given the structural features of the enclosure.
• Please behave properly during the visit, and do not disturb other visitors.
• During the visit  IT IS NOT ALLOWED TO:
  • Access the itineraries in the company of animals in general, with expectation of guide dogs. Therapy or social assistance pets may also be allowed to enter. In both cases they must be identified by microchips.
  • Touch the plasterwork and the tiling.
  • Touch or lean on the columns.
  • Touch, cut or pluck plants or fruits.
  • Climb to any structure part of the archaeological remains.
  • Throw away anything on the floor.
  • Sit on the ground or obstruct the crossing areas.
  • Eat or drink outside the places expressly reserved for it.
  • Refresh or bathe in the ornamental pools and fountains.
  • Smoke in the spaces included in the itinerary of the visit.
  • Undress, take off your shoes, or lie down in the monumental enclosure.
  • Use the flash in the visit to the Nasrid Palaces and in the enclosed spaces.
  • Use the tripod along the itinerary of the visit.
  • Use of selfie sticks or similar in enclosed spaces and, specifically, in the Nasrid Palaces.
  • Give tips or any kind of gratification to the staff.
• WE ASK visitors to:
  • Speak in low tone.
  • Do not speak through the mobile phone during the visit. If necessary, in silent mode and avoiding the other visitors.
  • Extreme precautions in the use of selfie sticks in open spaces or with risk of fall.
  • Do not use flash in evening visits and in the rest of spaces not prohibited in the previous section.
  • Extreme precautions to avoid falls and stumbling to other visitors.
  • Wear comfortable shoes, preferably flat and closed to prevent falls, slips or tripping, especially on rainy or freezing days, since some areas have an irregular surface, such as cobblestones, steps at different heights and mainly soil floors.
  • Pay attention to the ground since at the same level you can find fountains and pipes that can go unnoticed.

With these rules we want to help you make your visit as pleasant and fulfilling as possible. REMEMBER: Each visitor, regardless of age, must carry his/her own ticket, which can be issued individually. The ticket holder must keep it during the entire visit, and must show it, along with a personal identification document issued by the Ministry of Internal Affairs or homologous organism of his/her country, at the request of any employee, either of the monument staff or the security service, as well as to the State Security.

• As if all this weren’t enough, at the first of several scans of your ticket (why?), you’re told to take off your backpack and wear it on your front. Other than as a crime-prevention measure, I have no idea of the reason for this. Most visitors took it as a recommendation and ignored it.
  • As we walked down past the Palace of Charles V, we passed a group of policemen, some of whom carried riot shields and others machine guns. I wondered if they were an everyday feature. Anyway, they were complaining to each other about having missed their afternoon snack (merienda). I missed the riot which was the cause of this.
• Needless to say, visiting the truly fabulous palaces and the Generalife was not remotely like it was decades ago, when you could wander at will, largely alone. Now, you have to fight for space with guided groups and hordes of individuals more interested in taking selfies every few seconds than in looking at the splendours all around them. A good percentage of visitors are from the East, something else I don’t recall from decades ago.
• In the last 3 weeks, we’ve stayed in at least 15 hotel, hostels and pensions. And I still have no real idea why one term is used in preference to another. Nor how the rating system of stars works. And neither has any employee I’ve spoken to about this. The bottom line is that we’ve stayed in hostels and pensions better than some of the 2 or 3 star hotels.
• I admit to finding it hard to stomach the numerous guided groups which clog the narrow streets of Spain’s glorious medieval quarters. But visiting the Grand Mosque in Córdoba for the second time was a personal nightmare. Maybe my recollection is wrong but I have a memory of last time being virtually alone there, stupefied by the beauty of it all. This time it was like a bloody railway station on a busy main line. Hundreds and hundreds of folk wandering noisily around, taking endless selfies. Even more irritating for (bad mood) me was the immense amount of Christian tat which despoils the original construction. I must be wrong but I don’t recall all the side chapels along every wall. Nor the altars set up between the columns. And don’t start me on the cathedral plonked by vandals in the middle of the majestic masjed. And then there are all the display cabinets in the corners. I’d still recommend that you see it before you die but, unless (maybe) you go very early in the morning in mid-winter, you need to be prepared for a very mixed experience. Which must surely be even worse in the high season. Though not if you’re a practising Catholic who finds all the grotesque iconography meaningful. Comforting even. Been there, done that. Lapsed.
• I’ve since read that Córdoba’s Grand Mosque is free early in the morning, before the first Mass in the Catholic cathedral plonked in the middle of it. Well worth taking advantage of.
• Apart from hostelries, I’ve seen a lot of public toilets in Spain during the last 3 weeks and feel qualified to make this critical comment: If you take the 11 things every facility needs – yes, 11 – it’s very rare indeed that you get all of them. In truth, too many places have only 4 – a toilet bowl, water to flush with, a wash basin, and tap water. This would be unthinkable in a Spanish home. So one wonders why it happens in so many public buildings. On reflection, it’s 12 if you add cleanliness. And, if you include a toilet brush, 13. To be positive, I can report that the women’s toilets in the Nuevo Casino de Baeza restaurant, I’m advised, have all 13 requirements.
• Another reflection after 3 weeks travelling . . . The opening hours of Tourist Information Offices – assuming you can find them – are idiosyncratic. Some are open when they say they will be and some aren’t. Some open at weekends and some don’t. All of them seem to operate on hours that are more convenient to employees than to tourists. Well, that’s my perception anyway.
• And yet another reflection . . . Maps provided by said tourism offices vary greatly. In Granada, having got a little lost on the way down from the Alhambra, I was pleased to have in my hands a map from a guide book bought more than 25 years ago, for it was far superior to the one supplied by the tourist office.

Cousas de Galicia

The year 409 was a very a big one for ‘Spain’. Three or four years earlier, a large coalition of barbarian Germanic tribes – mainly the Suebi, Vandals and Alans – had crossed the frozen Rhine into the Roman province of Gaul. They then moved southwards and, in 409, crossed the Pyrenees and entered Iberia(Hispania), spreading out across the peninsula. The Suebi settled in the north western region of Gallaecia (modern-day Galicia and parts of northern Portugal). The Vandals occupied parts of Baetica (southern Hispania), while the Alans took control of Lusitania (central and western Hispania) and Carthaginensis (eastern Hispania). This information comes courtesy of the estimable Autodidact Professor and, if you’re interested in knowing more about the impact of this development on Galicia (and Northern Portugal), you can consult his extensive account of the Suebi here.

In the appendix at the end of this post, you’ll find the results of my own ‘research’ on questions occurring to me.

Portugal

See the last para and the appendix below. Much of what is said there must apply to modern North Portuguese and to their branch of the original galego–portugués/galaico-|portugués language. [The first known phonetic changes in Vulgar Latin, which began the evolution to Galician–Portuguese, took place during the rule of the Germanic groups, the Suebi (411–585)] and Visigiths (585–711)]

The EU

I can’t help wondering what the Europhiles who clutched their pearls when the Conservatives planned offshore detention centres for asylum speakers feel about Brussels’ plans for ‘deportation centres’. Do they now view the EU as equally illiberal and regressive? Or are circumstances, as they do, changing principles?

The UK

I mentioned the traditional pub game of darts the other day . . .A propos – Elves, raccoons and boozy butchers: darts is back and it’s bonkers[crazy]. The annual world championships at Alexandra Palace have jettisoned the sport’s old image, embraced the absurd and become a genuine social phenomenon. https://archive.ph/9eEwU

Germany

Richard North* says there’s a lot to think about as regards the Magdeburg tragedy and then goes on to show why. Disturbing reading, especially if you are German.

*RN at his very best, says my old friend in Hamburg, providing details not even in the German media.

The USA

• I increasingly think one needs to be the the Entertainments editor of a journal to comment on events there. Especially since an orange-faced clown is in charge of the – massively important – country.
• A co-chair of Trump’s presidential campaign has dismissed the UK’s new ambassador to the US as an ‘absolute moron’. But then the latter has said some pretty pungent things about Trump. Which probably won’t make his task any easier.

Russia

Certainly isn’t run by a clown. Choose your noun, but without mentioning Adolf. Provides very few laughs, other than his funny walk.

Quotes of the Day

• Many German voters are thoroughly disillusioned with the political system as a whole: 57% feel Germany is not equipped to deal with the challenges of the present, according to a recent poll, and 56% don’t trust any party to deal with its problems.
• Nothing is more damaging to democracy than hopelessness: the idea that no one can offer solutions with enough conviction to carry them through.

Spanish

• Nutria: Otter. Appearing again in the river Lérez, seen in the fotos above my posts.
• Afear: 1. To make ugly, disfigure, spoil 2. To condemn, criticise, censure. [I never remember the latter . .]
• DANA: The RAE’s word of the year. (It’s DINA in Gallego but I don’t know if the RAG has also chosen it.)

Finally . . .

Some readers might recall that my HP laptop conked out when I was in the UK, very shortly after the end of the 1 year guarantee. I was quoted £350 for a new motherboard and decided to see if it’d be cheaper back in Spain, meanwhile making do with a cheap-ish back-up machine. Last week I got the astonishing quote locally of €600, fractionally less than the €615 I paid for the laptop 2 years ago. So, now I’m trying to get a quote from HP’s exclusive distributor in Spain but, as is often the case in Spain, my emailed request – using their own form and, indeed, automatically acknowledged – hasn’t been answered in more than a week. So, I will contact HP in January and see how far I get. As I say at the top of my posts, life in Spain is not always likeable . . .

Finally, Finally . . .

THE SUEBI/SUEVI

The obvious questions arising are:- 1. Are there any traces of their language in modern Galician?, and 2. Are there any genetic markers via which their descendents can be identified?

So . . . An AI response on Q1: Yes, there are traces of the Suebi language in modern Galicia, though they are limited, for they quickly adopted the local Vulgar Latin language, leaving few traces of their Germanic tongue in the Galician and Portuguese languages. This influence was also limited by their small population relative to the local Gallaeci and Romans, and their gradual assimilation into the culture over nearly 2 centuries of coexistence. The imprints that were left are:-

• Toponyms: In modern Galicia, 4 parishes and 6 towns and villages are still named Suevos or Suegos,
• Lexical influence: The Galician lexicon includes many words of Germanic origin, some of which were introduced by the Suebi
• Linguistic evolution: The first known phonetic changes in Vulgar Latin that began the evolution to Galician-Portuguese took place during the rule of the Suevi (411–585).

On Q2: Yes, Suebi genetic traces can be identified in modern Galicians, although their influence is limited. The number of Suebic invaders is estimated to have been less than 30,000 – a small minority compared to the local Gallaecian and Roman populations. Over time, the Suebi assimilated into the culture, converting to Christianity and intermarrying with the population. Genetic studies have revealed:

1. Haplogroup I presence: Approximately 13% of Spaniards, including Galicians, share genetic markers associated with the Suebi invasion. [The Galician percentage is presumably higher than the national average].
2. Genetic flow: Analysis of Alu polymorphisms in the Galician population shows that Galicia is included in the Western-Central European genetic cluster, This suggests some degree of genetic continuity with the broader European genetic landscape, including Germanic influences.
3. Atlantic coastal corridor: Genetic studies have identified a small Atlantic coastal corridor of gene flow connecting Galicia and northern Portugal, which may be attributed to the historical relationship between these regions, including the period of Suebi rule.

So, while Germanic genetic traces can be identified in modern Galicians, they represent a small component of the overall genetic makeup of the population, reflecting the complex history of migrations and cultural interactions in the region.

My thanks to those readers who take the trouble to Like my posts, either after reading them 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.