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.

BEST WISHES TO ALL FOR 2026

Cosas de España/Galiza

Mark Stücklin kicks off the year with more criticism of the attempts being made by European politicians to solve the problem of housing shortages: France is moving to make rent controls permanent, echoing policies already unfolding in Spain and the UK – and revealing how Europe’s housing shortage is being made worse by the very politicians who claim to be fixing it. . . . Some commenters put it succinctly: the problem is not greed, but supply. The uncomfortable truth is that rent controls do not fix housing shortages. They mask symptoms while making the underlying disease worse. Sitting tenants with good profiles may benefit in the short term, but newcomers, younger households, and marginal renters pay the price through scarcity and exclusion. European states are neither willing nor financially able to fund a massive expansion of social housing themselves.

A critical factor in Spain is a low percentage of public/social housing stock c. 2.5% of total dwellings nationally. Galicia’s percentage is about the same but Pv city’s is very much lower than even this. The real structural problem is that land release for new housing is “practically blocked” by public authorities in Spain. In plain English: supply is not keeping up with demand, and there is no sign that this will change any time soon.

Given the excess of supply over demand, you won’t be surprised that the forecasted percentage rise in house price is increasing.

Galicia – particularly the West coast – has a major problem with the company – Audasa – which has the concession for the North-South autopista. The already high tolls on it were increased by twice the inflation rate today. The Xunta has been trying to wrest control of the highway from Madrid for some time but without success. One starts to wonder why Audasa gets what seems to be exceptionally good treatment. But I can’t pretend to understand what’s going on. Only that it will now be even more expensive to drive between here and Vigo. BTW, the increase is actually more than double inflation but Madrid is subsidising some of it.

Talking of Madrid, again for reasons unknown, the DGT has – at the very last moment – withdrawn the new regulations that were going to apply to e-scooters from today. Bizarre.

Foreigners are said be choosing one of these 8 ‘cheap’ cities in preference to living in Barcelona. Thankfully, Pv city isn’t one of them.

If you’ve ever wondered why New Year’s Eve is called ‘nochevieja’ in Spain, here’s the explanation.

And here are the main reasons why folk end up in A&E on the final night of the year.

Talking of grapes, and following on from reports on how festivities on NY’s Eve have switched to the afternoon – el tardeo – we’re now told that the young folk are downing their 12 grapes in daylight, well before the 12 bells of midnight. In a ceremony which is called pre-uvas.

Here in Pv city, there was no municipal firework display last night but there were 2 or 3 private displays below my house. And firecrackers somewhere near at 6.50 this morning!

Quote of the Day

From a book called ‘How Tyrants fall and How Nations Survive’: Tyrants are powerful, but they are constantly haunted by the fear of death. And despite all the bluster and seeming insanity, most of these leaders are rational. Due to the structure of the regimes they depend on, their biggest threat comes from the people around them – the ‘palace’ elites, generals and advisors . To survive under such hostile conditions, despots have to manage elites – [billionaires and tech bros] – through riches and repression.

The USA

There’s no doubt that Trump – a would-be tyrant – will eventually fall and that US democracy will survive, though with a huge amount of damage done to the country and to its (pseudo) empire. One interim question must be: Is a (power-mad) trump even more crazy now than he was back in 2015? If so, Is dementia playing a part or not? Of course, one other question is How can a third of US voters think he’s doing a great job? I guess we’ll have answers one day.

The Way of the World

When I ask the Perplexity a question, the answer always takes a second or two and is preceded by Thinking . . . But, of course, this is exactly what an AI engine isn’t doing. Large language models don’t “think” in the human sense—when you ask an AI engine a question, it draws from the data sets it has been trained on and builds an answer based on predictable word patterns. 

Spanish

A New Year treat, to equip you on how to properly insult a Spanish neighbour or friend . . . 12 Spanish insults that will make you sound like a native. Generally, for maximum effect, you should direct your insults towards someone’s upbringing – and especially their mother.

Did you know?

That article cites the worst thing you can call a man – cabrón. Which just means billy-goat in English. The writer says that goats are traditionally associated with stubbornness, stupidity, bad smell, and aggression, so comparing a person to a one is disparaging.​ But this is not the real reason. It’s because the goat has horns and poner los cuernos on a husband is to cuckold him. So you are attacking both his dignity and his masculinity. This metaphor is rooted in medieval European folklore and animal symbolism.​ The insult implies that the man is foolish or passive enough to tolerate being cuckolded.

You Have to Laugh

I can’t resist the temptation to show this restored fresco yet again. But reading this left me feeling a tad guilty about having done that.

Finally . . .

My Xmas Eve dinner was in nearby Marín, in the port area. I checked the exact location on Google Maps but, as I knew 98% of the way, I didn’t turn it back on until was I almost at the dockside. Whereupon, Google advised me to backtrack towards Pv city and the hills beyond it. I wouldn’t mention this irritation but for the fact that, today, Google thanked me for contributing to improvement of Google Maps. From which I conclude that you can unwittingly do this by shouting obscenities at your phone while on the app.

Finally . . . Finally . . .

Two years ago, when my younger daughter was diagnosed as bipolar, I became interested in the role of poor mitochondria in the brain as the root cause of all mental illnesses. The leading practitioner in this field – and author of ‘Brain Energy’ – has advised that: In 2025, psychiatry crossed an important threshold. Large genetics studies, completed ketogenic trials, and expanding clinical programs all point to a shared metabolic foundation of mental illness. In this end-of-year reflection, I outline what changed—and why it matters for patients, clinicians, and the future of care. Important milestones are on the horizon for 2026. There’s more info in this Newsletter.

Finally . . . Finally . . . Finally. . .

As it’s the start of the month (year, even) . . .  Some readers, I hope, will know that the verse I cite at the top of my posts is the opening quatrain of Fitzgerald’s wonderful – but very ‘free’ – translation of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, which you can read about here. Some verses are well known, of course, eg:-

The moving finger writes; and, having writ,
moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit
shall lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.

My favourite:-

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
doctor and saint, and heard great argument
about it and about: but evermore
came out by the same door as in I went.

If you enjoyed any or all of that, here’s an article on the Persian poetic tradition.

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

The Usual Links . . .

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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.