Who pays for nice?

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You can tell that holidays in earnest have started in this part of the world because there were delightfully fewer people in the swimming pool today. 

Most of the population is either planning for or actually taking their annual holidays.  Amazingly, this also applies to restaurateurs in this holiday seaside resort!  You would have thought that the one time that people in Castelldefels connected to the tourist trade would not take their holidays was in August, or high season as we call it.  You would be wrong!  I am astonished at the number of locales that take their holidays in August.  I suppose if they have kids then they do not have over many options, but August would seem to me to be the one time when they would not, under any circumstances turn away trade.  But then, I am a teacher and not a small shopkeeper, so what do I know about the real illogicality of commerce?

My local swimming pool has a contract with a local garden centre to beautify the outdoor area with a profusion of plants.  The children’s playground and café area perimeter have been marked out with a collection of greenery that certainly adds to the quality of the place, but other areas are demarcated with large planters.  These have been planted with plants that thrive (or at least are supposed to thrive) in the semi-arid conditions that are the norm of these parts.  The plants chosen are the succulent (?) fat leafed varieties related to the cactus (I think) the sort of plants that thrive on neglect and can grow and develop with a lack of water as well as the occasional downpour.  I am sure that was the theory, but in practice the plants have yet (generally) to climb above the confines of their boxes.  As I have observed form my seat in the sun, they also have to contend with the occasional flicked fag end and the finger poking obtrusive attention of passing kids.

Today an employee of the garden centre has been turfing out and digging in, replacing the old abused and neglected with the burgeoning pot cosseted new.  As I watch the changing greenery I wonder about the economics of it all.  Does the pool have a monthly contract?  Did they pay a one-off fee?  Is it on an ‘if and when’ basis?  How much are they paying for what is, basically, ignored decoration?  Though, I hasten to add, not ignored by me!

I think that anything that makes my aesthetic experience more enjoyable has my vote.  I like the fact that many roundabouts hereabouts have ‘art’ in some shape or form in their centres.  Not always to my taste, but something which takes away from the monotony of a regular traffic moderator.  The (usually) metallic sculptural forms hark back to a period when austerity was not the only guiding economic power, though one does wonder about the detail of the commissioning of these municipal excrescences.  Given that corruption is the spice that heightens the appreciation of life in these parts, I do wonder how a thorough audit might change the point of view of a casual observer.  After all, most people glance at the ‘sculptures’ and either ignore them or wonder what on earth they ‘mean’ as they drive towards the beach.  Their perceptions might be appreciably different if they knew exactly how much they cost and how they came to be made.

 

Two cases of ‘public’ art come to mind.  Castelldefels was gifted an imposing circular metal sculpture of grasped hands by Lorenzo Quinn, but there was an almighty row about how much it actually cost to install it in its present location next to the beach.    

 

The other piece of art that intrigues me is the mural decoration in our local central church.  Who paid for it?  And who, while we are at it, paid for the hideous stage-scenery artificial looking façade on the church to replace the structure rightfully destroyed during the Spanish Civil War?  I have to admit were I Catalan I would never forgive the Roman Church for its hysterically enthusiastic support of the fascists and its bloodcurdling condemnation of the democratic government. 

I suspect that the rebuilding of the burnt church and the painting of the series of murals on the windowless east and west walls (the church faces north) was paid for by the government.  At the moment, I do not know the truth, but I have discovered that there is some sort of publication about the murals available from the Parochial Church House and I am more than prepared to spend 20 euros to find out a little more.  The only history of Castelldefels that I have is in Catalan, so that makes each paragraph painful linguistic deciphering - but this is an on going project, and now that there is a sort-of museum of Castelldefels opened in the centre, there may well be other sources of information now available.

Public art is always problematical.  Complex medical machinery is always pushed next to any street art object in the popular press with the implied suggestion that the money could have been better and more profitably spent.  How, goes the argument, could a twisted free-standing ribbon of metal possibly compare with a kidney dialysis machine?  How could a kidney dialysis machine possibly compare with the helicopter rescue of people on a sinking ship?  How could a helicopter rescue of people on a sinking ship possibly compare with emergency food aid to a population of starving people in sub-Saharan Africa?  And so on ad absurdum.

Someone once pointed out that there was no logical limit to the amount of money that you could pay into the NHS: whatever you give, the NHS could use more.  But there are not unlimited funds and so decisions have to be made, and decisions go on being made up and down the line of finance which mean that absolute judgements about ‘worth’ in spending are virtually impossible to make - but are made every moment of every day.

Erecting crash barriers along a road to restrain crowds wanting to see their successful football team parade the cup that they have won costs money.  That money is from a finite pot, and while the expense might well be necessary and useful it will, of course mean that money for something else will be limited.

I have a season ticket for the opera in the Liceu.  I pay a lot of money for my (frankly) very good seat, but I am aware that each performance I go to, my payment for the ticket is not the real price of the production.  I know that, as opera is such an expensive art form, my seat has been subsidised by a government grant.

I might, and do say that opera is a vital art form, it is a living sign of the cultural health of a city and country; I might say that life would be infinitely poorer without this art form, that a thriving opera scene in Barcelona is good not only for opera, music and the Liceu, but also for a host of people whose work is directly involved in the production, staging and managing of opera.  I might say that the tourist destination of Barcelona is made richer (literally and figuratively) by the fact that its opera house is one of the most important in Europe; I might say that although the majority of people in Barcelona do not get to see the productions, the economic, social and cultural effects of the shows directly support many more.

A few times a year, here in Castelldefels, we have public firework displays.  I love them and have spend many fruitless years trying to get a decent photo of them.  Now I just watch, open mouthed, and enjoy.  How can they be justified as a public expense?

I could go through a number of possible justifications from supporting local industry (we have a firework factory just up the road) to a necessary tourist attraction in a resort that relies on tourists - but, really I truly believe that fireworks add to the jollity of nations and that is justification enough!

Refuse refuse - it's all in the way you say it!

A short, sharp, apocalyptic, thunder and lightening storm yesterday afternoon has left the path strewn with pine needles.  Yet again.  From trees that are not ours.  This means that we have the imminent appearance of the noisy leaf gatherers to look forward to.

The invention of the leaf-blower has to one of the major banes of the modern urban leafy suburb - if our little zone could be called one.  As our area is named after the pine trees which are a characteristic of our streets, it is not surprising that we are well used to the howl of the leaf-blowers - both private and municipal.

It is not out of any aesthetic civic pride that the pine needles are gathered up; it is rather because of our inadequate road drainage system.  Fallen pine needles gather into impressive clumps and block the drains, so any delay in collecting the organic excess, when linked to a sudden downpour, will result in extensive flooding, or at least large areas of standing water on the roads.  The collection is therefore necessity rather than cosmetic.  Our economy relies on the tourist, usually the day tourists from Barcelona, so any discomfort and inconvenience has a direct relationship with the wealth of our municipality.  Our resort, through undoubtedly popular, does have rivals, and it doesn’t take much to persuade fleeting visitors to fleet elsewhere.

The one good thing about refuse collection here is that it is daily via the system of collective bins that are found along all the roads.  In addition, each Friday (in our zone) any pine needles or tree clippings or general plant waste will be collected separately.  On a Thursday evening, therefore, I brush together all our neighbours’ pine needles that have fallen in our back garden and sweep them into a neat heap outside our front gate.  And by Friday afternoon they are gone.

Although I know that the logistics of refuse collection are prosaic enough, I have always found the reality of rubbish collection almost magical: now you see it - now you don’t!  I also know that the reality of landfill and the general problems of disposal are rapidly assuming crisis proportions and we are probably living in the last age of the free-and-easy, throw-it-all-in-the-bin approach to refuse.  I know that Britain is gradually developing a fairly Draconian approach to when, when and how you throw things away, and I read with interest of local councils fining people for putting the wrong things in the wrong bins, or putting things out at the wrong times.  Here in Castelldefels while we do have bins for plastics, cardboard, glass and general refuse - there is nothing to stop you from putting veering in the same black bag and throwing it in the ubiquitous green bins.  I feel that this anarchic time is quickly coming to an end, and it is only a matter of (short) time before we too are dragooned (rightly) into a more caring attitude.

The Greek Way

On a related economic model, I have now reverted to something that I used to do years ago - make my own yogurt!

I used to own a rather nifty device which comprised a heated stand on which stood six yellow screw topped containers complete with overall plastic cover and which provided me with (though I say it myself) a rather fine yogurt.  I seem to remember heating milk with ‘starter’ yogurt in a saucepan while keeping an eye on the thermometer to ensure the reaction ‘took’.  That is obviously old school.  My new device comprises a cylinder inside what looks like a pressure cooker: you add the milk, add the yogurt, stir it a bit, turn the machine on and leave it for 10 hours or so.  Voilà!  It’s done!

The resultant yogurt was a trifle runny.  But the little book of instructions had advice (in Spanish) about making Greek yogurt - that, in theory should be more solid.  The complex instructions for adding this sort of value were merely to let the runny yogurt stand for 24 hours in the fridge then put it into a mesh strainer (provided) in the white receptacle (provided) and let that drain for a couple of hours in the fridge and the job is done.  And it worked!  And is delicious!

The next time I am in a supermarket I am going to look at the price of Greek yogurt.  My newfound machine makes 1ltr from UHT milk with the use of the machine (obviously) and 10 hours of very low-level electricity and the fridge.  I will have to start making ‘fruit’ versions and see how they go!

At the moment there is something very satisfying in having made a food that I eat every day, it is the equivalent to growing your own wheat for your daily loaf!  I am very smug about it all!

Slotting into place

When I was living in Cardiff, I could walk around town and sooner or later I would bump into someone who would say, “Hello!” with that element of genuine recognition that would suggest that we knew each other.  And to be fair, I am generally a good rememberer of faces to the same extent as I am an appalling rememberer of names.  My inability to recall names bordered, and continues to border on. the psychotic, but my ability to feel affinity with faces means that I am subject to an almost endless mental jigsaw as I attempt to fit the face into a pattern that never seems, at first glance to have the correct space to place it.

The last time this happened was in the changing room of my swimming pool.  I was about to walk to the pool for my swim when a naked young man came from the shower, saw me, smiled and said, “¡Hola!”  I replied with a smile and walked on to the pool, thinking as I did so, about where the hell I knew him from.

In Cardiff, as a teacher, you have a bewilderingly wide range of ways of knowing people they could, after all, be present pupils, past pupils, colleagues, past colleagues, Union Members, friends, family, shopkeepers, audiences (I had cultural season tickets) sports partners, parents (of pupils I mean - even my inability with names is not that bad!) and so on.  Here in Spain there are not quite so many possibilities, though I have taught here and the parents, pupils, colleagues thing can be brought into play here in Catalonia as well.

But this guy was in the sports centre.  He was slim and fit and so I tired to ‘dress’ him in the uniform of the centre, perhaps he was one of the summer guys brought in to cope with the summer schools being run.  But that didn’t really fit.  Past pupil didn’t seem right.  Customer?  Wrong time of the day for someone so young.  And so I went on, slightly resentful that he was naked as clothing would have been a clue!

Shops, supermarkets, opera houses, restaurants all went through my mind.  Not, you must understand because it was important to know where I knew him from, but because I was irritated by not knowing.  Wherever I placed his smiling and variously dressed face and body, he didn’t fit.  I made notes about him in my little notebook hoping 1) his habitat would come to me through the simple power of writing, and 2) if all else failed I could make a virtue of necessity and write a poem about it.  Neither occurred. 

As is usual in cases such as these it was while I was thinking about something else entirely that I got:  a) new waiter, in b) old favourite restaurant.  Of course!

And what have I got from expending a frustrating amount of time and mental effort in trying to remember something that is entirely unimportant? 

Here is where you, dear reader, can help me.  What have I gained? 

A quiet satisfaction in allaying the fear that my mind is losing its ability to organize information and bring past events to the surface when they are needed?  A triumphant reassertion of my capabilities of being able to deconstruct new combinations and find the essential truth behind them?  A complete lack of understanding of priorities?  A gleeful acceptance of mind-games displacement activity?  The lack of something better to do?

Who knows and, more importantly, who cares!

I Don't Believe It! Again

The prime function of a school is to separate children from human beings.  As any teacher will tell you, the inclusion of children in the designation of ‘human’ is as absurd as linking Conservatism with “strong and stable” government.  During the greater part of the year, with the exception of those pernicious periods when children are allowed, nay encouraged, to flaunt their otherness in public manifestations at Christmas and Easter, we denizens of the human world are able to live reasoned and reasonable lives.  It is the summer that is the most trying part of the year.  In Britain the so-called summer is mercifully confined to a few bright days, while the rest of this season is usually the sort of rain-sodden dullness that encourages children to stay indoors under the supervision of their keepers and plug themselves in to various electronic devices.

Spain is different.  As various people have pointed out: Spain and Britain both have seasons, but it is only in Britain that all four of them can (and do) occur on the same day.  You could say that summer in Spain extends from May to October - obviously there are rainy and dull days, but it is rare indeed that a whole day passes during these months without the sun at least showing itself for a brief moment.  Eating outside, sunbathing, visiting the beach or just promenading are all actions that our sunny months encourage.  Unfortunately, for two of the key months of July and August (with almost two weeks of June) these are the same months of schools failing in their duty of containing the childish hordes from being unleashed on the human population.  Swarming, as my grandmother would say, like “black pats” (on reflection I think that I will try and ignore the double racism suggested by that oft heard dismissal) children spill onto the streets, the beaches, the shops and my leisure centre.

That last one is interesting.  As a child of two teacher parents, holidays were never the problem that most of the non-teacher-parent population must have.  My childhood holidays coincided with my parents’ holidays.  The only disruption that I can remember was when I made the transition from Primary to Secondary school, when one holiday was slightly different.  That problem was solved by accompanying my father to his school and bouncing for most of the day on a trampet!  [I note, by the way, that the word ‘trampet’ has been underlined by Word, but I have never referred to the small angled mini-trampoline used by those foolish enough to vault over a horse as anything else.  Have I been wrong for the last fifty plus years of my life?  You will also note that I have been too lazy to look it up on line - though, oddly enough I did make the effort to look it up in my massive Encarta dictionary!  And it wasn’t there.]  We also lived with my paternal grandparents when I was younger and so there were babysitters at hand.  Upstairs.  So, it is perhaps a little disingenuous of me to harrumph about how some children are treated during the long holidays.  But it will not stop me.

As soon as the holidays (any holidays) start my local leisure centre springs into action with Summer School or Easter School or Holiday School.  As far as I can see, these estimable organized activities exist for one (or perhaps two) reasons.  The first and most obvious is that of commercial necessity: the leisure centre makes money out of the invading armies of kids that are contained by activity after activity to fill the day.  The second is, of course, to get rid of the kids.  The Spanish are a tactile people and leaving your child in the leisure centre is accompanied by much hugging and kissing and fond waving of goodbyes.  But I have seen the faces of the parents as they finally turn from their progeny and walk (or skip) towards their cars.  That look of delighted relief is one that I recognize.  And, another thing, I have seen parents leave their children at times when it would be difficult to imagine the workplace missing them.  In other words, I think that parents go back to something other than work when they leave their kids in the centre.  Those smiles are not of delighted expectation of what their profession might offer to fill the rest of their day!

And this is where things get difficult.  Not for them (parents and kids) but for me.  I go to the leisure centre from my swim each day.  I swim a metric mile.  I feel smug and exercised.  But now that schools have abrogated their incarceration duties their escaped inmates impinge on my life.  Because of the swarms of parents hurling their kids with shrieks of delight towards the welcoming doors of the swimming pool my swimming has become cabined, cribbed and confined - to quote a poet of my acquaintance.  Probably wrongly.

There are five lanes in our 25m pool and nowa-summer-days by 9.30 am four of the lanes are given over to the young pretenders to leisure time.  This morning, for example, there were three of us in a single lane.

Two decent swimmers in a single lane is easy, as it is quite possible to swim expansively and safely in parallel.  A third person necessitates swimming in a clockwise or anti-clockwise way.  This is fine if all three swimmers are evenly matched, but if one swimmer is substantially faster than the other two there are problems.  None of which are insurmountable with the application of Basic Lane Discipline.  BLD is the thing that keeps chaos at bay, but it is a fragile concept and swimming (just like driving) does not generally bring out the best in people - especially if they are, or consider themselves to be, Serious Swimmers.

Suffice to say that, of the three of us, I was the slowest (and indeed the oldest, now I come to think of it) swimmer.  There was a lady swimmer who was punctilious in her adoption of BLD and was content to swim in circles and adapt her swimming to compensate for speed differences, e.g. using a breaststroke or a backstroke from time to time rather than her speedy crawl.  There was however, a gentleman swimmer.  With a goatee beard. 

I have an unreasoning prejudice against this hairy excrescence and was therefore prepared to think the worst of my fellow lane sharer.  And his actions more than justified my concern.  For him, BLD was as a foreign language and he committed the signal swimming crime of overtaking at a crowded end.  Let me explain.  If you are a powerful swimmer and you are stuck in a lane with two slower plodders then BLD dictates that you can overtake a slower swimmer as long as you can get in front of your target swimmer without impeding the third swimmer.  There is also another approach that involves judging things nicely and then reversing course mid length into open space.  This swimmer did neither but swam parallel with another swimmer so that he could push off from the side first and thereby bumping in to the swimmer finishing his (yes, reader, ‘twas I) length.  Very bad form.

My mood was not improved by noticing that one swimmer from the aquacize class was given a created restricted lane to himself!  Not happy - in spite of the fact that I have had exactly the same thing done for me on some occasions.  It wasn’t on this occasion and therefore I felt aggrieved!  And on either side of us, occupying four lanes (or rather three and a half allowing for the restricted lane) the children continued to bray and howl and generally gloat in their exuberant there-ness.

And another thing.

We have a communal pool for the sixteen or so houses that form our little community.  Access to this private pool is via a garden door for about half of us, and a lockable gate from the street for the rest.  Imagine my disquiet on my return from the pool to find the silence of the afternoon - usually only broken by the sound of the sea and the various building work which seems to go on for ever accompanied as always by the howling banshees of the electric leaf blowers - augmented by the shouting of Strange Children.  These were leaping in and out of the pool with their towels and then whupping the wet towels on the pool surround to produce a deep, resonant and supremely irritating sound.  Then these imps rushed towards the gate that they found locked and proceeded to scramble over it.  One boy (they were all boys) indeed re-scrambled over the gate to have one last plunge and thwack before he left!

I must admit to my shame that the use of superglue and broken glass did flit into my mind before the word ‘curmudgeonly’ suggested itself to cover everything that I was thinking, and indeed everything that I have written.

But there is a serious point (ish) to this musing.  Since retirement I have been delighted at the spaciousness that having the whole of a day to do something allows.  No longer trying to get things done in a break-time or during lunchtime, or after 4 pm.  I can go (and park) easily and if something needs more time for it to be completed, then more time I have.  And it’s the empty shops, especially supermarkets that are the delights.  I sometimes forget and get to a shop at 5pm (when most shops re-open after the afternoon closure) and am horrified at the number or children-clutching parents who get in my way!

When I was with my parents, we rarely went anywhere on Bank Holidays, my parents rightly suggesting that the roads would be clogged and places crowded and, anyway, we had other holiday days to use and we shouldn’t make things even worse by adding ourselves when we had other opportunities.  I well remember, for reasons that I forget, going to Weston-Super-Mare on a bank holiday and being scarred by the whole experience.  I am well prepared to admit that I am hopelessly prejudiced against that ‘seaside’ (sic.) resort, and, to be fair, Burnham-on-sea on a wet Sunday was an even worse experience, but I was not prepared for the horrific tackiness and unpleasantness that Weston offered.  And the people, my dear!  And didn’t the odious ex-Chairman of the Conservative party and hack, Archer take his title (has he still got it?) from the bloody place.  ‘Nuff said.

I will now go out on to the terrace and take the sun and allow the golden rays to sooth me to better thoughts!