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’

NB: If there’s a RV in brackets after a (paywalled) link, you might be able to read it via a Reader View extension to your browser, avoiding the paywall. If there is no RV, it will mean that the article is free to view or listen to. If there’s RV2, it means a second click on RV might let you see the article though the first RV click didn’t work.

Cosas de España/Galiza

Politics and The Property crisis:

• Tens of thousands of people have taken to the streets of Madrid ⁠and other Spanish cities as they step up demands for action to tackle ⁠a mounting housing crisis ⁠after ​government measures were struck down by the opposition.
• The major trade unions have announced there’ll be a general strike some time this autumn.
• There was a major protest in one of Pv city’s square last night. So great was the attendance that it overflowed into nearby streets. I can only recall only one bigger such display in 26 years, the spontaneous anti-Iraq-war demonstration of 2004. Some of the points made made the demonstrators last night:- 1. Rents have doubled in 10 years, rising far more than salaries; 2. The brought-forward general election responds more to a “political marketing” strategy than to an intention to solve the housing problem; 3. There will be no camps in central Pv city -as seen in Madrid and elsewhere – but there will be further mobilisations.

As regards voting intentions . . . Things will surely move one way or the other in the next 6 weeks but, as of now, the right-wing coalition of Right+Far Right would have an absolute majority and would take over from the current Left+Far Left+Far right (Catalan nationalists) coalition. Which, by the way, has failed to get a budget passed in 3 years.

Back to trivia . . . Crossing O Burgo bridge in a thunderstorm at midday today, I was passed by Caminoers swathed in rainwear going north to Santiago de Compostela and locals wearing little protection heading south to Pv city. Including one youngish chap in just a T-shirt and shorts. As the temperature had plummeted to 22, I had forsaken shorts for jeans, and given my summer linen jacket possibly its last outing of the year.

My YouTube and podcast ads – deliberately more invasive than ever? – have recently included some in Spanish, Gallego, French, Italian and even Basque. It’s hard to be over-impressed by AI, if this is the best it can do.

The United States of Trump America

Still more drivel . . .

• The Mobile rally was sold out and MAXED OUT. The upper sections were vacant because rallygoers always migrate down to the Main Floor. In actuality, my Events for very good Republican Politicians are probably more crowded than ever. There are no empty seats, there haven’t been for years, and there never will be. The Rallies are ‘HOTTER’ than ever.
• What’s driving up Gasoline is no longer the Strait of Hormuz, because Record Numbers of Barrels are coming out now on an almost daily basis, but the word, ‘Refineries,’ – where Russia’s are being blown up by Ukraine.

Seven AI engines assess Trump’s IQ and deliver a universal opinion, which might just surprise you. You can jump to a summary at min17.14s

This issue has to be addressed . . . As a non-stupid person who can’t understand stupidity, I am – stupidly? – reluctant to attribute widespread impossible-to-understand actions to it. But, in the end, how can one attribute to anything else the acceptance of Trump’s claims that prices are coming down and the Ukraine – not he and/or Russia – are responsible for the rise in oil/gas price? The USA might well have the same IQ spread as elsewhere in the world but the seemingly inescapable conclusion is that – possibly owing to poor education and excess religiosity – the percentage of stupid folk there is higher than in any other democracy. Which the elite might well have taken advantage of for quite some time now. The un-wisdom of crowds, I guess.

As usual, this eloquent drummer puts his finger on the real issues here.

Trump’s worst scandal is about to haunt him. As ever, excellent commentary from David Rothcopf

Relevant Books

• Betrayal: Trump, Putin and the New Age of Conquest
• To be published in October 20. Can be pre-ordered now: Wtf America?!: The Way Out of This Hell and Back to Democracy. On Amazon or here. This is not simply a book about Trump. He is the vessel, not the disease – the product of a system decades in the making, fueled by powerful interests, weakened democratic institutions, and a media ecosystem that too often chose access and complicity over accountability. The book confronts the defining questions of our time: How did we get here? Why did so many institutions fail when they were needed most? And what must we do now to defend democracy before it is too late?
• The final pages of Kurt Andersen’s fascinating run through the USA’s history – Fantasyland: How America went haywire. A 500 year history.
• Profiles in Cowardice, by Jacob Weisberg. Cited in this podcast.

Russia

Reported to be gearing up to smash a Ukraine left pretty defenceless by Trump during the coming winter.

Spanish

• Repicar: To ring, chime
• Arrendatario: Tenant, lesse, renter
• Consiga: Slogan, motto, watchword, chant. Password. Consignment. Locker, left luggage office.

English

• Rokker (also rocker or roker): A Romani word meaning ‘to talk/speak’. In Britain, some Gypsy and Traveller communities use (capitalised) Rokker as a name for their mixed speech, Angloromani – Romani vocabulary used within English grammar.
• Polari: A ‘cant’ or secret language used by some actors, fairground people, sailors, and particularly by Britain’s gay subculture. Some common words:-

• bona = good
• vada = look/see
• eek = face
• omi = man
• palone = woman
• riah = hair
• naff = bad, inferior, uncool [now very much in general use]
• lallies = legs
• troll = walk.

Did you know?

If I’d ever heard of it, I’d clearly forgotten but I heard a description of the Olmec people in a podcast about the earliest civilisations in North and South America and was astonished by their achievements during many hundreds of years BC. Says Wiki: The Olmecs were an early major Mesoamerican civilisation, flourishing in the modern Mexican states of Veracruz and Tabasco from roughly 1200 to 400 BC. They are known as one of the cradle of civilisations. By 400 BC the major centres of the Olmec civilisation had been abandoned, and the population of the eastern half of the Olmec heartland dropped precipitously. But, although the Olmec cultural style waned, elements of their tradition lived on in successor societies. Far more on them here.

You Have to Laugh

These are clips from a radio show from a time – 1955-1968 – when homosexuality was illegal in the UK. Two things shock: – 1. the hilarious double-entendres they got away with back then (when humour – not just Spain – was different), and 2. the prices of everyday items/services and properties in London 60-70 years ago.

Finally . . .

An oldie but goldie on the difference between various isms . . .

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

The Usual Links

This – from veteran blogger Lenox Napier – is an excellent weekly newsletter (Business Over Tapas) on all matters Spanish. Indispensable for those who need insights on how and why things happen here.

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 X at Thoughts from Galicia. And on Substack here. I no longer post on Facebook.

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.

If you´re thinking of moving to Spain, this link should be useful to you. And this, on the annual costs of owning property here.