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

Barcelona is one part of Spain welcoming tourists – as long as you’re ‘upmarket’.

The secrets of the Camino: hidden gems, cultural highlights and practical tips. Given the huge numbers, I find it hard to believe any parts of the Camino are hidden in any way.

Mark Stücklin of Spanish Property Insight writes that: A new proposal in Congress aims to turn up the heat on holiday rentals in the Canary Islands, with increased taxation and penalties targeting unlicensed properties in what could soon be officially declared a high-pressure housing zone.

A high profile Ukrainian was murdered in Madrid yesterday, as he dropped off his daughters at their school. The foto in the VdG this morning struck me as one which probably wouldn’t appear in societies less familiar with/supportive of blood sports. . .

Cousas de Galicia

Not your everyday headline – Prison for a youth who stabbed his father in a brothel, after going to his car to get a knife.

A less unusual story – A Galician lawyer who was involved in (PP) politics and worked for the Xunta is being prosecuted for defrauding the Tax Office of €154m, after he’d moved to the private sector. Quite an achievement, I guess.

And another VdG headline . . . A record number of prosecutions for corruption but still only 20% are discovered.

It’s been a bad week for animals in Galicia. Sixty pigs died when a truck on the way to an abattoir overturned. And a farmer in our hills lost 22 cows when a lightening bolt hit the watery path they were taking down to the safety of their barn. Nice to see that relatives and friends have gifted him some of theirs to replace these.

This is a site which tells you all you need to know about registering your tourist property in order to comply with Galician laws dating back to 2017 and which, so far, seem to have been – as they say – honoured more in the breach than in the observance. But this seems to becoming a risky thing to do. As with taking ‘black cash’ as part of the proceeds of a property sale.

The UK and Europe

The UK PM boasts that he’s struck a landmark, Brexit-defying deal with the EU but, in truth, he hasn’t. At least not yet. What he’s got is a Heads of Agreement which might or might turn into something better. This FT columnist casts a sceptical eye over the (now perennial) dealings – Britain will be negotiating with Europe forever. Like a poorer Switzerland, the UK will never find a happy balance of independence and access.

The Latest Insane Pronouncements of the Jester

• We had a tremendous visit to the Middle East. It’s been credited as the most successful visit anyone has ever made to any place. [I assume we’re meant to believe this was by people other than President Modesty himself].
• It would have been a lot better if Russia was [had been] in the G8. You know, a lot of people would say that if Russia was [had been] in, you probably wouldn’t have [have had] this war.’ And if you had [you’d had] a different president, you wouldn’t have [have had] the [Ukraine] war either. As ever, one wonders who all these folk are who call Trump to express opinions that coincide with his.

Trumpworld/LA LA Land

After another outrageous ambush of a foreign president in the Oval Office – this time of the South African president – will anyone want to visit Trump ever again? [Reader David in La Coruña has just kindly sent me this BBC fact-check on Trump’s claims of ‘genocide’ of white farmers]

Trump has appointed as ambassador to France the father of his son-in-law, whom he’d pardoned for crimes for which he was jailed in 2005 – including tax evasion, making false statements to the Federal Election Commission, and witness tampering. He might or might not have learned where France is when in prison.

Not-very-surprising news from CNN: It was the US government, at Trump’s request, which took the first step in getting the plane from Qatar, originally offering to buy it – after Trump has seen the sales brochure and noted its appealingly garish interior. Fit for a gold-obsessed narcissist.

Could any planned statute be (slavishly) called a big, beautiful bill anywhere other than in the USA? Do these folk have any understanding of how childish they sound?

Quotes of the Day

• You simply can’t imagine someone like Trump outside the digital-video age.
• Trump doesn’t run the country. He runs his mouth. He’s a borderline illiterate who’s chosen a strange strategy as president: being a writer of memos and tweets and presidential statements.
• Is there no one in the White house who says to Trump: “Mr President this makes you look demented and dumb”?
• The Trump coin is most nakedly corrupt self-enrichment scheme in US presidential history. [See from minute 8 48 seconds here].

Russia v. Ukraine

Trump’s strategy towards Russia remains ‘baffling’ says this FT columnist, though it seems clear that he is being strung along by Putin and that he is ‘playing into Putin’s hands’. These are dark days for a Ukraine fearful that a US president is about to sell it down the river. 

Spanish

• Acotar: To limit, constrain, narrow down.
• Caer: To Fall. To be caught(by the police).
• Anhelar: To yearn for, crave, dream of having.
• Fulminado: Fulminated, zapped, struck down. Like the poor cows.
• Rasante: Gradient.
• Cambio de rasante: Hump (in the road. Probably not on your back . . .)

Did You Know?

The people of Liverpool are known as Scousers. This derives from a Viking (Norwegian) word for a particular kind of stew, called labscouse(Norwegian lapskaus). This is a description of an ex footballer, now commentator, who’s seen as a typical Scouser: Carragher is the embodiment of how Liverpool likes to see itself: chippy, loquacious, witty, incorrigibly argumentative, perennially spoiling for some kind of fight and confident of winning it. He is a composite of so many quintessentially scouse details: Irish surname, Catholic mother, publican father, married to his childhood sweetheart, living close to where he grew up (although he did trade Bootle for verdant Blundellsands, a plush suburb beloved by footballers). His accent is the benchmark, the go-to when someone tries out an “Eeeerm” or an “Arrite ther”. He is so scouse that he avoids using a wallet, having been mocked by his friends for once doing so in his early 20s. Wallet use is, in some quarters of the city, seen as a transgression upon one’s scouseness; to have so many cards and coins to organise is to be acting above your station, 

Finally . . .

A couple more nice lists from The Pillow Book

THINGS THAT AROUSE A FOND MEMORY

• Dried hollyhock.
• The objects used during the Display of Dolls.
• To find a piece of deep violet or grape-coloured material that has been pressed between the pages of a notebook.
• It is a rainy day and one is feeling bored. To pass the time, one starts looking through some old papers. And then one comes across the letters of a man one used to love.
• Last year’s paper fan.
• A night with a clear moon.

FLOWERING TREES

• Plum blossoms, whether light or dark, and in particular red plum blossoms, fill me with happiness.
• I also like a slender branch of cherry blossoms, with large petals and dark red leaves.
• How graceful is the wisteria, as its branches bend down covered with whorls of delicately coloured petals!
• The u no hana [a shrub with white blossoms, something like the common lilac] Is a more modest plant and deserves no special praise; yet it flowers at a pleasant time of the year, and I enjoy thinking that a hototogisu [the Indian cuckoo] may be hiding in its shade. When passing through the plain of Murasaki, it is lovely to see the white of the u no hana blossoms in the shaggy hedges near the cottages. They look like thin, white robes worn over a costume of yellowish green.
• At the end of the Fourth Month and the beginning of the Fifth the orange trees have dark green leaves and are covered with brilliant white flowers. In the early morning, when they have been sprinkled with rain, one feels that nothing in the world can match their charm; and, if one is fortunate enough to see the fruit itself, standing out like golden spheres among the flowers, it looks as beautiful as that most magnificent of sights, the cherry blossoms damp with morning dew. But I need say no more; so much has been written about the beauty of the orange trees in the many poems that link them with the hototogisu.
• The blossom of the pear tree is the most prosaic, vulgar thing in the world. The less one sees this particular blossom the better, and it should not be attached to even the most trivial message. The pear blossom can be compared to the face of a plain woman; for its colouring lacks all charm. Or so, at least, I used to think. Knowing that the Chinese admire the pear blossom greatly and praise it in their poems, I wondered what they could see in it and made a point of examining the flower. Then I was surprised to find that its petals were prettily edged with a pink tinge, so faint that I could not be sure whether it was there or not. It was to the pear blossoms, I recalled, that the poet likened the face of Yang Kuei-fei when she came forth in tears to meet the Emperor’s messenger – “a spray of pear blossom in spring, covered with drops of rain” — and I realized that this was no idle figure of speech and that it really is a magnificent flower.
• The purple blossoms of the paulownia are also delightful. I confess that I do not like the appearance of its wide leaves when they open up… But I cannot speak of the paulownia as I do of the other trees; for this is where that grandiose and famous bird of China makes its nest, and the idea fills me with awe. Besides, it is this tree that provides the wood for the zithers from which come so many beautiful sounds. How can I have used such a commonplace word as “delightful”? The paulownia is not delightful; it is magnificent.
• The melia tree[Melia azedarach] is ugly, but I find its flowers very pretty indeed. One always sees them on the fifth day of the Fifth Month, and there is something charming about these dried-up, oddly shaped little flowers.

And, just in case you think this has all been a bit too sweet . . .

UNSUITABLE THINGS

• A woman with ugly hair wearing a robe of white damask.
• Hollyhock worn in frizzled hair.
• Ugly handwriting on red paper.
• Snow on the houses of common people. This is especially regrettable when the moonlight shines down on it.
• A plain wagon on a moonlit night; or a light auburn ox harnessed to such a wagon.
• A woman who, though well past her youth, is pregnant and walks along panting.
• It is unpleasant to see a woman of a certain age with a young husband; and it is most unsuitable when she becomes jealous of him because he has gone to visit someone else.
• An elderly man who has overslept and who wakes up with a start; or a greybeard munching some acorns that he has plucked.
• An old woman who eats a plum and, finding it sour, puckers her toothless mouth.
• A woman of the lower classes dressed in a scarlet trouser-skirt. The sight is all too common these days.
• A handsome man with an ugly wife.
• An elderly man with a black beard and a disagreeable expression playing with a little child who has just learnt to talk.
• It is most unseemly for an Assistant Captain of the Quiver Bearers to make his night patrol in a hunting costume. And, if he wanders outside the woman’s quarters, ostentatiously clad in his terrifying red cloak, people will be sure to look down on him. They disapprove of his behaviour and taunt him with remarks like “Are you searching for someone suspicious?”
• A Lieutenant in the Imperial Police who serves as a Chamberlain of the Sixth Rank, and therefore has access to the Senior Courtiers’ Chamber, is regarded as being splendid beyond words. Country folk and people of the lower orders believe that he cannot be a creature of this world: in his presence they tremble with fear and dare not meet his eyes. It is very unsuitable that such a man should slink along the narrow corridors of some Palace building in order to steal into a woman’s room.
• A man’s trouser-skirt hanging over a curtain of state that has been discreetly perfumed with incense. The material of the trouser-skirt is disagreeably heavy; and, even though it may be shining whitely in the lamp-light, there is something unsuitable about it. An officer who thinks he is very fashionable in his open over robe and who folds it thinly as a rat’s tail before hanging it over the curtain of state— well, such a man is simply unfit for night patrol. Officers on duty should abstain from visiting the women’s quarters; the same applies to Chamberlains of the Fifth Rank.

My thanks to those readers who take the trouble to Like my posts.

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 . . .

I can also be read on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/colin.davies.752861 or on Substack at https://doncolin.substack.com/

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.
• This post of mine contains several relevant articles from ThinkSpain.
• 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.
• Getting a mortgage in Spain: Some advice on this challenge.