Christmas Day – and the cold/sore throat/headache which has
been lurking underneath my insistence on good health has chosen today to come
to the surface during Day 1 of our annual visit to Terrassa. Merry bloody day indeed.
However,
such minor inconveniences to enjoyment must not be allowed to interfere with
the inexorable progress of Family Entertainment. The Grand Gathering of the Clans is set for
lunchtime and I am hoping that a liberal application of Cava to my internal
parts will see me through the experience.
Christmas
Eve, which is when Catalans give presents, was fine with a meal that included
my favourite concoction of a salmon, cream cheese, tuna and ham layered bread
that goes down a treat – with the previously mentioned Cava.
The most
intriguing of my presents was an ancient looking pot with two spouts and a
circular carrying handle on the top. It
was decorated with Catalans dancing and I was informed that it was hand made
and of tradition design. It is of
earthenware and the theory is that in some magical way it keeps the water or
wine inside cool in spite of the ambient temperature. As Toni immediately informed me, it will be
ideal for the Third Floor and I rather like the idea of drinking water from something
that looks like a modified poron. I
realise that the last word of the last sentence may also need some explanation,
but there again that is why Google exists!
I have
brought my OU books with me and, perhaps more compellingly my drafts of the
poem on which I was working in Castelldefels.
It remains to be see if either of these worthy projects gets a moment of
my attention while here!
The poem is
proving to be much more difficult to cope with than the continuing chapters of
the OU course books. In the poem I have
an image that I am loath to leave out, but I am not at all convinced by its
inclusion at the moment. It is one of
those nice ideas (at least to me) but one which is too strong to stand alone
and I am struggling to find a development which will justify its use. Who was it said that it is sometimes
necessary to ‘kill your darlings’ when writing?
Well, this may well be one of those times. We shall see.
Terrassa is
cold, or rather, colder than Castelldefels.
The sun is shining, the sky is blue and the temperature may well be in
double figures, so we can’t really complain.
But one still needs to be fortified to meet the demands of the day and,
to my horror, I have discovered that Toni’s mum only has herb and green
tea! Even as I type I am waiting, vainly
I fear, for two green tea teabags to give a bit of colour to the minute amount
of milk added to the mix. At the end of
this paragraph I will attempt a few sips and hope for the best.
I did. And, while not exactly to my taste, there is
enough of a suggestion of that smoky Chinese dustiness to the flavour to make
me believe that it is a valid taste experience.
There are also, I now discover after further sips, overtones of cut
grass. Ah well, perhaps it is doing something
for the list of symptoms that I started the day with. One can but hope.
The
political situation in Spain continues to defy settlement with some of the
Barons of PSOE (the equivalent of the Labour Party) speaking out forcefully
against any possible pact with Podemos because of the insistence of the
leadership of Podemos of making a referendum on the future of Catalonia within
Spain an essential element for any pact agreement.
I have a
fear that the fears of Catalonia breaking away from Spain may well be used as a
(cynical) reason for other pacts. I also
fear that if agreement on a government is not made within the statutory period
outlined in the Constitution then the ‘Unity of Spain’ banner may well be
unfurled by the two major parties to get their lost voters back and we return
to a bipartisan political system which has allowed the two major parties to rip
off the public purse since the foundation of democracy in this country after
the dictatorship of Franco. Although the
placing of what turns out to be far too much power in the hands of the
political parties was understandable as a bulwark against the past, there is a
real need now for the relationship between politics and modern life in Spain to
be redefined. The present situation is
an ideal moment for that to happen, but the giving up of power is never easy
and is never voluntary – so the next few months in this country are going to be
replete with screams of anguish as power bases are threatened.
An
important, if not key, player in this new and exciting situation is the
so-called King of Spain. After the
abdication of his elephant killing, philandering and hypocritical father, the
present ‘king’ was installed on the throne by the machinations of PP and PSOE. There was no provision in the Constitution
for abdication and so the two political parties took it upon themselves to
invest the new King. The request (which
I fully supported) for a referendum to find out if Spain actually wanted a
monarch was ignored by the king-makers and it will be interesting to see what
their creation says in the ‘King’s’ Speech today.
Presumably
the ‘King’ (who appears to be a perfectly charming and tall man) will aspire to
find his moment, just as his father did during the attempted coup by the
colonels when he told the soldiers to return to their barracks and accept the
young democracy. The present ‘King’ has
the Constitutional duty to call on the winner of the election (PP with 29% of
the vote) to form a government. If Bromo
is unable to do that, then the ‘King’ will call on the leader of the opposition
to try and form a government. After
three months if no government has been formed then the nuclear option is to
call another general election.
The leader
of the C’s (a particularly nasty right-wing party) has called for a Grand
Coalition of PP, C’s and PSOE to unite as a front to exclude Podemos (which got
more seats and votes than the C’s) to defend the unity of Spain. In my view, such a grouping would be a
disaster of monumental proportions with Old Corruption winning and continuing.
Meanwhile,
life goes on of course, and people are more concerned about family, presents,
eating and how to get rid of the kids than Grand Questions about the political
state of the country. That may be a
cynical view of mine, and it is certainly true that more people are talking
about politics in an urgent and exciting way than they did previously, when
they merely shook their heads over the new stories of rapacity that emerged in
every television broadcast. The times
have changed and I hope to god that the people of Spain do not throw away an opportunity
to make the transition to a new and potentially refreshing political situation.
By way of
contrast (or is it a sort of comment on the situation?) I am re-reading The Portrait of Dorian Gray on my
smartphone. While waiting for my padel
lesson I pass the time by reading the lapidary prose of Dear Oscar and relish
the exhaustingly bon mot stuffed ‘dialogue’ that his deracinated characters
lavish on the intimidated reader. I must
admit I am reading it from the point of view of an English teacher, as I
remember that the WJEC once set it as a set text. It was a choice rather than obligatory, but
as I am reading the book I am wondering exactly what teacher would choose such
a book and, having chosen it how the hell they would teach it to, say, a mixed
class of Cardiff school kids?
The story
itself is simple and the mechanics of the plot are melodramatic and rely on the
sort of coincidence than Dickens would have relished – that is easily
taught. But the style and the range of
reference is much more difficult to teach in any meaningful way. Well, such concerns are behind me now and
only present themselves as abstract conundrums to be teased at leisure. That is the sort of luxury of feeling which
permeates the whole novel! I am
thoroughly enjoying it!
And now to
prepare myself for the Christmas Meal.
What this means, in effect, is ensuring that my smartphone is fully
charged so that I can carry on reading when the opportunity arises!
