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 launches a ‘major crackdown’ on tourists

Lenox Napier delves here into both the current Montoro corruption scandal and into others of the last decades. BTW, in the former there were numerous bank accounts – more than 50 – opened for the purpose of moving ill-gotten gains around the world. I rather think that, if you or I did this, someone would notice and tell the Tax Office. But I suppose that, if it’s the head of the Tax Office himself doing this, there might have been be a Nelsonian eye* turned on this activity. *The story of Nelson turning a blind eye” comes from a naval battle in 1801. During this, Nelson got a [flagged] order from his superior to withdraw. But he put his telescope to his blind eye and declared, ” I really do not see the signal”, and then continued to press the attack.

Lenox cites the case of Carlos Mazón – the president of the Valenica region who couldn’t be contacted in the early hours of last November’s horrendous flood as he was having a long lunch with an attractive lade¡y. Strangely, say some, despite being a journalist she’s said nothing about the lunch. It seems that Sr Mazón turned what one might call a Nelsonian ear to the increasingly frantic calls to him.He should have resigned, of course. Or have been sacked. But he hasn’t and won’t be.

And here Lenox tells us of a very balls-out, bullish plan.

As Lenox says, Spain is different.

Cousas de Galiza

Well, right on cue . . . There’s one compensation – possibly small – for the loss of local population: Abandoned villages in rural Galicia, once the domain of foreign investors and nostalgic descendants of emigrants, have taken on a new life—this time in the hands of outsiders from other parts of Spain looking for a radically different (and much cheaper) way to live.

Actually, I know all about the difficulty of getting rural properties for sale. Twenty years ago, I worked with a Galician lady who targeted folk – especially Brits – who wanted to move Northwards and to live in the countryside. It was almost amusing to see properties you couldn’t give away to a local suddenly become worth €100k when a guiri asked about sale. Anyway, she was obviously ahead of her time.

Talking of properties . . . This is today’s leader in the VdG: In the second decade of this century, tourist apartments spread throughout Europe, and in 2017, the Xunta (regional government) included them in the registry of tourism activity companies. That year closed with 2,000 registered homes. Now there are more than 28,000. The exponential increase has been paralleled by rising prices, and currently, on average, they are €200 euros for a 2-bedroom apartment[range 4,600 Viveiro to 9,500 Sanxenxo, Pv city7,000. This means that each of these properties in Galicia generates an average of 6,200 euros net annually. Most are concentrated along the Galician coast, especially in the Rías Baixas, and it is common for their owners to return them to traditional rentals when the tourist season ends. Need I add that the vast majority aren’t registered, as they should be. And that I doubt all the income is being reported to the Hacienda.

Local councils are increasingly trying to confine tourist rentals to specific zones and even to ground and first floor flats, while being inventive at getting money from folk who use them. Low hanging fruit, of course.

The UK

Some folk are decidedly unhappy that Trump is currently on a 4-day private visit to play golf at his Scottish resorts*, Especially since, despite it being a private affair, it has required a significant security operation, with about 1,500 police officers called from elsewhere.

* ¨Working tirelessly round the clock to make things better for American citizens¨: Katherine Leavitt, White House Press Officer.

Europe

Divided views – of course – on how to respond to Trump.

The MAGAland Reality TV Show

Trump was reportedly told by his administration that his name appears in the Epstein files multiple times. Senior administration officials toldthe WSJ Wednesday That Attorney General Pam Bondi informed him in a meeting in May that his name is in the DoJ documents on the late sex offender, and that that the files contained what officials felt was unverified hearsay about many people, including Trump, who had socialized with Epstein in the past. This meeting happened weeks before the DoJ and the FBI announced that ‘no incriminating client list’ existed and that they would not be releasing the files they had previously promised to disclose. Need I add that: An Administration official immediately shot down the WSJ report.

Allegedly . . . Rank-and-file Republicans fear party leaders are making a mistake by starting their August recess early instead of voting to release files on Jeffrey Epstein. Said one member: “The way it appears doesn’t look good. It looks like accusations are flying about, everybody’s just covering it up and putting it under the rug. It’s pretty hard to contend that it doesn’t look that way.” Besides the bad optics, many in the GOP don’t trust that their leaders — including Trump and Bondi — have a plan to deal with the Epstein issue. Rank-and-file members are questioning what will be different when lawmakers return to Washington in September.

Spanish

Pareidolia : Same in English, and Galician: A psychological phenomenon where the mind perceives a meaningful pattern, such as faces, animals, or objects, in random or ambiguous stimuli where no actual pattern exists. It often involves seeing familiar shapes or images in clouds, rock formations, or everyday objects, like the “Man in the Moon” or faces on inanimate things. This tendency is a specific type of apophenia, which is the broader human tendency to find meaningful connections in unrelated or random information.

Did you know?

Un parte amisto: A document used in the event of a traffic accident between two vehicles. This allows both parties to jointly and mutually record the details – the damage sustained by the vehicles, and the personal data of the drivers. The main objective is to facilitate insurance companies’ handling of the accident, streamlining the determination of liability and the payment of compensation for material damage caused.

Finally . . . More horticultural notes

One area of my garden where I’ve utterly failed to grow a single blade of grass from seeds is down the poorly sunlit side of my house. So, I left it for moss to grow there. Except it’s now being rapidly colonised by one or both of crabgrass and crowfoot grass – respectively Digitaria and Dactyloctenium aegyptium. But these are weeds, not true grasses . . . Crabgrass and crowfoot grass are often used interchangeably for similar grasses with finger-like seed heads. Crabgrass is typically a low-growing summer annual that spreads rapidly and is notorious for lawn invasion, while crowfoot grass is a closely related species sometimes also called crabgrass. TBH, I don’t really care that they’re weeds, so long as they stay down the side of the house, where they can be mown. And are green.

Finally . . . You Have to Laugh

Found in my files. Can’t recall what prompted it . Perhaps a Freudian wish . . .

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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.

If you´re thinking of moving to Spain, this link should be useful to you.