A meeting with the Mayor
as I entered the impressive patio that lead up,
by a sweeping marble staircase, to the office
of the Mayor of Loja. Perhaps because the doors,
I was told, were always open in this small provincial
town 20 minutes west of Granada. The secretary
welcomed me and I was shown a settee outside the
Mayor’s door. It was floral.
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The Long Journey Home
Migration Musings for North Europeans
Where do we come from? How did we get here? Where are we going?
If your answer to these three questions is the following:
1. North Europe
2. Ryan Air
3. To Mercadona for some chocolate biscuits.
The perhaps it is time to look a little deeper.
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Open wounds
One year ago the government promised to “restore the true history”
for those that died defending the democracy enjoyed by all today.
Because for whilst the Nationalists were honored as heroes,
the Republicans that died fighting fascism lie forgotten in hidden graves.
But the removal, earlier this year, of the last statue of Franco from the
streets of Madrid created an unexpected backlash amongst Spain’s
not-so-dormant Right-wing. Will the Government now continue
in its pledge to “honour the dead” and to “re-write history” or will it just let old wounds fester? Read More...
Howling for help
and although you may be a dab hand with a pair of secateurs,
and you may have had years of experience potting up spider plants
you are going to need a whole lot more knowledge,
expertise and sheer physical help over the years to come.
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Living on the edge
species propagation and yet again a summer without access to the sea.
This summer’s Jellyfish plague was nothing new, its happened before in cycles of seven to ten years. But the cycles are getting shorter and they are lasting longer, much to the horror of the coastal tourist trade as bathers find themselves stranded on the shoreline in sweltering mid-August.
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In need of energy
Learning about light in a world of Darkness.
At the end of the first year the novelty had become a chore.
We missed light switches - especially in the loo at midnight– and salivated over the thought of an electric toaster and watching the evening film without the use of a magnifying glass.
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The Malaga Exodus
The forgotten story of a city in exodus and the “foreign spy” who came to help.
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Today, accounts of the exodus are few. Survivors remember it as the “caravan of death”. They survived on sugar cane, oranges and the blind hope that they would reach safe ground in the republican city of Almería before the Italian troops caught up with them.
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Water wisdom
Jumping in at the deep end.
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Statistics need not necessarily be dry. As animals that are 65% water we are constitutionally more soggy than solid. Perhaps we should therefore be more sensitive to the scarcity of water on our planet, but the figures would indicate otherwise.
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Zen and the art of gorse clearance
Lessons in slowing down.
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Lets try and be positive about this. Gorse can provide a useful sanctuary for some animals and birds, I’ve seen toads and wasps for example happily co-existing within this hardy plant. Its presence, one has to admit prevents soil erosion in places that perhaps few other plants would grow. And it provides the rocky dry valley slopes of Granada’s coastal strip with a pleasant green appearance. But, alas this is about as positive as I can be because I have almost 10.000sqm of the stuff, and for me, that’s 10.000sqm too much. Read More...
License to burn
Forest fires in Southern Spain.
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I asked my neighbour what had caused the last fire in the valley. His gaze shifted and his shoulders twitched: “ Nunca se sabe” he replied, “ It could have been a broken bottle left on the ground, a discarded cigarette, an uncontrolled burning of “matorral”.
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El Sol
Sol Frankel came to defend the republic 70 years ago this year.
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