Pause for culture!

The Sybaritic life of food and fulsome appreciation of the nearest star must surely be tempered from time to time with a soupçon of culture.  Yesterday it was with a visit to La Caixa Forum in Barcelona and a viewing of the exhibition “Portraits of the Belle Époque” – a period defined in this exhibition as the years from the 1880s to The Great War.

As is my wont I led Emma into the shop to buy the catalogue and was rather staggered to find that it was only available in hardback and cost a healthy €58!  On the positive side though, it was also available in English for once so I felt fully justified in buying it!

The exhibition was divided into sections from “Self-portrait” to “Crisis” which included a typically assured portrait by John Singer Sargent in the first section to a primitive mask-like painting by Kirchner in the last in the year of the start of World War I.

This was a fascinating exhibition with a stimulating selection of works.  It was not overwhelmingly large but gave enough to justify a self-congratulatory menu del dia in the restaurant attached to the gallery.

Highlights for me included the extraordinary portrait of Asher Wertheimer the art dealer by his friend Sargent which could almost serve as a portrait for Nazi anti-Semitic propaganda as Wertheimer is presented as a shark-like business man whose cold calculating stare makes you feel that you are unlikely to get the better of him!

Asta Nørregaard’s “In the studio” is an exceptional painting of great stillness with a delicacy of lighting effects which are captured with amazing confidence.  It is a subdued canvas but immensely satisfying with the tress seen through the barred window of the studio counter balancing the trim figure of the artist in a harmonious composition.

Munch, Sorolla, Casas, Zoen, Boldoni, Repin, Kokoschka, Schiele, Anglada-Camarasa and Toulouse-Lautrec all figured in an exhibition that I would recommend without reservation.  And it was free!

After lunch we wandered around the Gothic Quarter where I bought more books and Emma bought a pair of embroidered pumps made by the Barcelona house of Cuesto.

In spite of being prostrate with exhaustion on our return to Castelldefels, the invigorating effect of a shower enabled us to attempt more of the Ruta de Tapas with the result that I am down to single figures of those tapas which are left!

We were frustrated in our attempt to get one of the more “distant” establishments ticked off the list when we found, after scaling the one-in-one heights of upper Castelldefels to find the obscure restaurant that it was closed on Mondays!

The end though, is in sight and I am bolstered in my determination by the stated support of Andrew and Stewart to aid me in my quest!

Although it is sunny at the moment we are promised (well, 40% promised) thunderstorms at some point in the day.  Yet another case of the Pathetic Fallacy as the summer holidays come to an end!

Stamp them all!

Last night’s effort towards completion of the Ruta de Tapas was revealing.  I am now some 66% of my way through the list and soon I will be down to single figures!

We got through three more establishments and they showed the best and worst of what the Spanish eat.

The first of the tapas was a pizza: good pizza base, fresh and light but a rather stingy allocation of topping.  It was unimaginative and dull.

What wasn’t dull was discovering on the next table to ours a whole group of young and enthusiastic diners who were flamboyantly waving their ruta maps in the air exulting in the fact that they had marked off another tapa on the list!  This is opposition and, as I feared, there are many people out that who are as compulsive as I!  The odds-on winning of a gastronomic meal are receding!

The second was a complete contrast.  We failed to get into one of the bars on the ruta because, like so many in Castelldefels, its opening times are a mystery known only to god.  I do not understand the logic of a bar that does not open on a Saturday night; perhaps their guiding theory of economics is one which governs the working of the financial institutions of the world and we therefore should not be at all surprised when the whole edifice crashes into the walls of reality!

The bar which was open gave us a spectacular tapa of scallop on a bed of Spanish ham served on a piece of melt-in-the mouth bread enlivened with olive oil.  Delicious!  And the waiter seemed genuinely concerned about our reaction to it!

By this point we were determined to make the tapas into a trio of culinary experiences and so we traipsed off to a Mexican restaurant for their offering.

To my horror, as we were walking towards the restaurant, the merry band of eaters that I had seen in the first café we went into were walking confidently away from the place!  This determined approach on the part of other competitors has given me fresh impetus to complete my list.  I am sure that there will be one or two establishments which are outside the easy walk of the centre which will be a real test for the casual eaters!

In spite of our being after the stated hours, we were served a pastry wrapped chile con carne served on a bed of lettuce and garnished with tomato.

It was tasteless.  


The pastry, I have to say was light and delicate but the meat was tasteless.  When the waiter asked me how I had enjoyed it I replied that it was “interesting” – always a danger sign in my responses - and then I ventured that as a British person I would have liked it to have been a little more spicy.  The waiter’s response was a tired revelation!  There was no chile in the chile con carne because that was not to the taste of the indigenous population!

One is tempted to ask why then the restaurant bothered to put chile at all in the description of the tapa – but let it pass, let it pass.  


The glass of wine which accompanied this tapa was also startlingly awful, but I have drunk much, much worse in my life and I regarded its consumption as something of a challenge!

The lightness of our evening meal was in sharp contrast with the “light” lunch we had in a Japanese restaurant at lunchtime.

The restaurant that we eventually patronized, after a search for a parking place (which was like a scene from a Kafka novel) was a place with an excellent buffet.  


But this buffet is not one that the customer can raid to serve himself, it is a buffet where you reel off the items you wish to consume to the patient waiter and then it is all brought to your table in a startlingly unexpected order.

It is quite a cunning ploy as I am sure that they rely on the fact that most people will not have the barefaced effrontery to sit at their tables and drone on through an embarrassingly large number of dishes.  


I am sure that it works with most but not with Emma and myself.

By the time we had consumed the umpteenth maki and sushi we were praying that the olives and soup that we had ordered would never be brought to the table.  


I managed to forestall further food by suddenly ordering a coffee that signalled to all the end of the meal!

Today we are going to ration ourselves and, as long as the rain holds off, we are going to christen (with fire) the new barbecue.

Clouds threaten!

Food isn't everything - I suppose

Last night’s effort towards completion of the Ruta de Tapas was revealing.  I am now some 66% of my way through the list and soon I will be down to single figures!

We got through three more establishments and they showed the best and worst of what the Spanish eat.

The first of the tapas was a pizza: good pizza base, fresh and light but a rather stingy allocation of topping.  It was unimaginative and dull.

What wasn’t dull was discovering on the next table to ours a whole group of young and enthusiastic diners who were flamboyantly waving their ruta maps in the air exulting in the fact that they had marked off another tapa on the list!  This is opposition and, as I feared, there are many people out that who are as compulsive as I!  The odds-on winning of a gastronomic meal are receding!

The second was a complete contrast.  We failed to get into one of the bars on the ruta because, like so many in Castelldefels, its opening times are a mystery known only to god.  I do not understand the logic of a bar that does not open on a Saturday night; perhaps their guiding theory of economics is one which governs the working of the financial institutions of the world and we therefore should not be at all surprised when the whole edifice crashes into the walls of reality!

The bar which was open gave us a spectacular tapa of scallop on a bed of Spanish ham served on a piece of melt-in-the mouth bread enlivened with olive oil.  Delicious!  And the waiter seemed genuinely concerned about our reaction to it!

By this point we were determined to make the tapas into a trio of culinary experiences and so we traipsed off to a Mexican restaurant for their offering.

To my horror, as we were walking towards the restaurant, the merry band of eaters that I had seen in the first café we went into were walking confidently away from the place!  This determined approach on the part of other competitors has given me fresh impetus to complete my list.  I am sure that there will be one or two establishments which are outside the easy walk of the centre which will be a real rest for the casual eaters!

In spite of our being after the stated hours, we were served a pastry wrapped chile con carne served on a bed of lettuce and garnished with tomato.

It was tasteless.  The pastry, I have to say was light and delicate but the meat was tasteless.  When the waiter asked me how I had enjoyed it I replied that it was “interesting” – always a danger sign in my responses and then ventured that as a British person I would have liked it to have been a little more spicy.  The waiter’s response was a tired revelation!  There was no chile in the chile con carne because that was not to the taste of the indigenous population!

One is tempted to ask why then the restaurant bothered to put chile at all in the description of the tapa – but let it pass, let it pass.  The glass of wine which accompanied this tapa was also startlingly awful, but I have drunk much, much worse in my life with wine and I regarded its consumption as something of a challenge!

The lightness of our evening meal was in sharp contrast with the “light” lunch we had in a Japanese restaurant at lunchtime.

The restaurant that we eventually patronized, after a search for a parking place which was like a scene from a Kafka novel, was a place with an excellent buffet.  But this buffet is not one that the customer can raid to serve himself, it is a buffet where you reel off the items you which to consume to the waiter and then it is all brought to your table.

It is quite a cunning ploy as I am sure that they rely on the fact that most people will not have the barefaced effrontery to sit at their tables and drone on through an embarrassingly large number of dishes.  I am sure that it works with most but not with Emma and myself.

By the time we had consumed the umpteenth maki and sushi we were praying that the olives and soup that we had ordered would never be brought to the table.  I managed to forestall further food by suddenly ordering a coffee that signalled the end of the meal!

Today we are going to ration ourselves and, as long as the rain holds off, we are going to christen (with fire) the new barbecue.

Clouds threaten!

The Pilgrimage continues!

Last night’s effort towards completion of the Ruta de Tapas was revealing.  I am now some 66% of my way through the list and soon I will be down to single figures!

We got through three more establishments and they showed the best and worst of what the Spanish eat.

The first of the tapas was a pizza: good pizza base, fresh and light but a rather stingy allocation of topping.  It was unimaginative and dull.

What wasn’t dull was discovering on the next table to ours a whole group of young and enthusiastic diners who were flamboyantly waving their ruta maps in the air exulting in the fact that they had marked off another tapa on the list!  This is opposition and, as I feared, there are many people out that who are as compulsive as I!  The odds-on winning of a gastronomic meal are receding!

The second was a complete contrast.  We failed to get into one of the bars on the ruta because, like so many in Castelldefels, its opening times are a mystery known only to god.  I do not understand the logic of a bar that does not open on a Saturday night; perhaps their guiding theory of economics is one which governs the working of the financial institutions of the world and we therefore should not be at all surprised when the whole edifice crashes into the walls of reality!

The bar which was open gave us a spectacular tapa of scallop on a bed of Spanish ham served on a piece of melt-in-the mouth bread enlivened with olive oil.  Delicious!  And the waiter seemed genuinely concerned about our reaction to it!

By this point we were determined to make the tapas into a trio of culinary experiences and so we traipsed off to a Mexican restaurant for their offering.

To my horror, as we were walking towards the restaurant, the merry band of eaters that I had seen in the first café we went into were walking confidently away from the place!  This determined approach on the part of other competitors has given me fresh impetus to complete my list.  I am sure that there will be one or two establishments which are outside the easy walk of the centre which will be a real rest for the casual eaters!

In spite of our being after the stated hours, we were served a pastry wrapped chile con carne served on a bed of lettuce and garnished with tomato.

It was tasteless.  The pastry, I have to say was light and delicate but the meat was tasteless.  When the waiter asked me how I had enjoyed it I replied that it was “interesting” – always a danger sign in my responses and then ventured that as a British person I would have liked it to have been a little more spicy.  The waiter’s response was a tired revelation!  There was no chile in the chile con carne because that was not to the taste of the indigenous population!

One is tempted to ask why then the restaurant bothered to put chile at all in the description of the tapa – but let it pass, let it pass.  The glass of wine which accompanied this tapa was also startlingly awful, but I have drunk much, much worse in my life with wine and I regarded its consumption as something of a challenge!

The lightness of our evening meal was in sharp contrast with the “light” lunch we had in a Japanese restaurant at lunchtime.

The restaurant that we eventually patronized, after a search for a parking place which was like a scene from a Kafka novel, was a place with an excellent buffet.  But this buffet is not one that the customer can raid to serve himself, it is a buffet where you reel off the items you which to consume to the waiter and then it is all brought to your table.

It is quite a cunning ploy as I am sure that they rely on the fact that most people will not have the barefaced effrontery to sit at their tables and drone on through an embarrassingly large number of dishes.  I am sure that it works with most but not with Emma and myself.

By the time we had consumed the umpteenth maki and sushi we were praying that the olives and soup that we had ordered would never be brought to the table.  I managed to forestall further food by suddenly ordering a coffee that signalled the end of the meal!

Today we are going to ration ourselves and, as long as the rain holds off, we are going to christen (with fire) the new barbecue.

Clouds threaten!

Do I smell autumn!

Cumulus!  The curse of the sunbathing classes!

Clouds do look pretty set against a bright blue sky – but when they get in the way of the sun they are vile.  No matter how often one tells oneself that even with cloud cover it is quite possible to get brown under a hazy sky, it simply does not feel the same.  And it adds an unwelcome air of desperation to the whole sunbathing business.

I remember on my expensive sojourns in Gran Canaria during the Christmas period that I would lie on my sunbed on the beach sometimes with gritted teeth trying to ignore the cutting winds or even rain and willing the sun (for which I had paid lots) to reappear and tint my skin to the exact colour of brown guaranteed to make my colleagues in Cardiff look at me with envious hatred when I turned up in early January for the start of term!

Today I could say that my dissatisfaction with the fluffy whites is not personal but a disinterested response because I am thinking of the limited number of days that Emma has to boost her Vitamin D levels!

We do have a Plan B – and that is to go into Barcelona and have a wander in the Gothic Quarter and perhaps take in an exhibition.  But I for one prefer the beach, swimming and lazing to a late attempt to find culture in my holiday!

The one thing about living where I do is that clouds are not usually the end of good weather.  They appear, fluffy and extensive and then disappear to allow sunshine to flow around and make the folk glad.  I have every faith that the present indicators of flying moisture will dissipate and allow normal service to resume.

Which they did to a certain extent, but not before the skies darkened to that threatening shade of blue which portends precipitation.  The rain has lasted at least five seconds leaving things glistening though hardly damp.  It is supposed to rain on Monday and not today!  I trust that this little spat of rain was only a teasing foretaste and not a harbinger!

We have been promised sun for today and tomorrow.  I have faith!

This evening Emma and I completed another few venues on the Ruta de Tapas which included snails (which Emma ate for the first time) and mussels.  Sadly, we finished the evening by going back to the place which, up till now has been holding on to first place in my opinion, but this time it was not as good as on the previous occasions.

The snails were presented in an inverted pyramid-like plastic container and had a surprisingly spicy sauce for this area.  That particular tapa has come up on the rails as it were and is now a contender!

With typical dedication and single-mindedness I am now more than half-way through the 30 featured tapas – but the time to complete the full range is fast running out: I have until the 15^th of September to eat my way through the rest of the tapas and submit my form for entry into the prize draw to join the restaurateurs for their gastronomic feast.

Toni has pointed out that the number of people actually finishing the whole 30 has got to be severely limited so the odds on winning have to be a damn sight higher than for the lottery!  But I thought the same about the absurd competition run by the Russian radio, television and camera makers. 

It was only when I returned to the shop where I had bought a Russian radio and considered it such good value that I had decided to buy another one for my father for Christmas that the shopkeeper fixed me with a steely gaze and accused me of buying a radio previously.  I stuttered out my guilt and then the man said, “As you have bought two, you are entitled to enter a competition!”

It turned out that entry for the competition was only open to those purchasers who bought two radios or two televisions or two movie cameras etc.  “This,” I thought to myself, “is a competition where the odds have to be stacked in my favour!”

The competition itself was not one which demanded a great deal of intellectual prowess: it asked you to list a number of attributes of your product in order of importance and then think of a slogan to go with it.  Before you even think about asking, I have had a long series of psychiatric sessions to bury my contribution deep in my subconscious and therefore I cannot repeat my contribution to advertising history.

I had moved from Kettering to Cardiff after waiting in vain for the letter of congratulation to drop through my letterbox in Barton Seagrave and had already started my new job in Llanedeyrn High School when I received a telegram (ah, time for a moment of historic wistfulness) informing me of my success.

My prize was a trip to Russia (all expenses paid) but it had to be taken at a time when part of the trip would have been in school time.

The head teacher at the time, a man of discernment (he did after all appoint me) and liberal sensitivity (he did after all support my application for leave of absence) said that even without pay it was too good an opportunity to miss. 

So, with the totally false justification that I was not merely going on an all-expenses jaunt, but was rather going on a scouting trip to suss out whether or not it would be possible to take a school party to the Moscow Olympics, my local authority not only gave me leave of absence to go on the trip but also gave me PAID leave of absence!

You can tell by the reference to the Moscow Olympics just how long ago all this was, but there are colleagues in Llanedeyrn High School (now retired) who still throw back the “paid leave” part of the story in my face as one of the great crimes in educational history.

On the first night of the holiday we were in a nightclub on board a boat anchored in Leningrad harbour admid oceans of Russian Champagne and piles of black and orange caviar – both of which I tasted for the first time on that trip.  Emboldened by drink and the general air of louche debauchery I engaged the competition organizer in conversation about the extraordinary set up of the thing.

He told me that, far from receiving merely a trickle of entries as sense might suggest, there were masses of them.  I took it that it was the genius of my carefully crafted (but totally forgotten) slogan that made me a worthy winner.  Not so, I was told.  I hadn’t in fact won – a woman had beaten me, but as all the rest of the members of the trip were blokes she had been given a camera and was more than please with her success and I, because of my sex, was boosted to the premiere position!  Happy, unenlightened days!

So, even if I complete the complete Ruta I will probably find out that thousands of people did the same.  And I fear that I can expect no advantages from my sex this time!

Nothing is easy

Cars get small stones in the same way that adolescents get spots; it’s one of the forces of nature. 

The stones that cars accumulate are of the small variety and usually of an indeterminate grey colour.  They are small enough to fit neatly into crevices and can travel easily underneath car mats.  It is only when they are raised that, rather like a neglected stone in the forest when turned over, a whole world is revealed.  In the forest it might be organic; in a car it is geologic.  And therein lies the real problem for their being cleaned away.

There is no such thing as an effective car vacuum cleaner.  I know.

I have now wasted two individual sums of money on machines which have promised suction and not delivered. 

The latest one, which I am ashamed to admit was a Hoover gave a new meaning to the word pathetic.  It did indeed suck up dust which it immediately expelled through the air outlet!  The little stones stayed stubbornly on the carpet.  When I finally deployed the “crevice tool” (I have no intention of explaining) it did less!

When a machine made by a firm whose name has become a generic name for the device it makes one expects more.  Luckily the box, although thrown into the bin, had not been taken out to the skip and so the hapless machine has been repackaged and will be taken back to the store as something not fit for purpose!

Emma arrived on time and, as is now traditional, was taken to the Maratime for a meal and a chat.  A bottle of wine and a considerable amount of gossip later we fell into our respective beds – but not before the Magic of the Coin was explained.

Emma is prone to mosquito attack and therefore our newfound knowledge about the amazing characteristics of coin-on-sting amelioration was a necessary part of the useful knowledge that any sleeper in these parts needs to know!

The morning was spent at the beach where the number of people enjoying the end of their holidays does not seem to have lessened.

What might have been a jellyfish brushed by right knee and I spent the next few hours having hysterical phantom sting pains.  After the kiss of the medusa last year where I ended up with an almost perfect circle of sting points which took a hell of a long time to diminish, I was more than eager not to suffer the same fate again. 

I may have faith in the power of The Coin but I would not like to put it to the test with the assertive pain of a jellyfish.  As the web page which talks about remedies for stings says, the best remedy is not to have the sting in the first place.

Our leisurely evening of sitting outside a café and having just a few tapas was stymied by the limitations of my two companions: the bad tummy of one and the wheat intolerance of the other, meant that I had to eat an entire plate of chocos myself because of the composition of the batter.  This meant that the plate of pimentos del padron was sent back to the kitchen with some left on it – a high crime and misdemeanour!

Tomorrow more beach time.

tonuight

Other people give in and buy a dish, but we spurn such easy solutions and instead watch British television via a single set in Rumney in Cardiff.

This morning we bought a lead which has now linked one of my portables computers to the television and through the magic of “Slingbox” we are allowed to see the programmes which the Pauls can watch on their television at home.

That is we could see a picture but sound was denied us.  So, to compensate for the lack of sound we have added one of the micro-speaker sets that I bought to listen to my I-pods which boost the sound from the portable so that we can hear as well as see.

Or at least we could when I went up stairs; now that I have come back nothing seems to be working – in the best traditions of computers.  And of course for no reason whatsoever.  Each of the components is working (allegedly) but not when linked together!  I suppose that we shouldn’t be surprised, because what technological innovation actually happens without some heartache?

I can cite (as who cannot if you are of a certain age) video recorder after video recorder that quite simply did not do what it said on the box.  Even the machines that were supposed to set themselves up (including setting the time) when you plugged them in did nothing of the sort.

So, as the television in working and the computer is working, it is, I suppose logical to surmise that the lead connecting both these working machines is the thing at fault.  But it does relay the “desktop” picture from my machine – but nothing else.

Toni is, at present, attempting to make some sense of what is going on.  I am restricted to making vague sounds of encouragement in the hope that when everything has been worked out I will be treated to some sort of condescending explanation about how simple the basic problem actually was if you knew anything about computers.  Sometime ignorance (pretended or real) is a very useful protection against IT angst!

Even as I type the problem is being dealt with as the screen on the television alternately goes black and then lights up while I am asked technically rhetorical (or possibly the other way round) questions.

As it is now after 5 pm we note with dread the arrival of a French family to take their places around the pool.  I am not going to use their arrival to indulge in a typically British condemnation of the whole race, but I would surely like to condemn this particular fragment of France.  More specifically a small sliver of the family: to wit, a small girl child.

The idea that children “should be seen and not heard” is a sound one (apart, of course from the “seen” part of the saying) and this is particularly so in the case of the small French girl child.

She does not communicate via the language of our enemies for the last millennium but rather though the language of a acoustically stunted bat – in other words her screams are just this side of human hearing, and shockingly painful withal!

And in a relationship that I understand well from the little darlings that I teach, the parent does nothing to soften the sheer cutting quality of the piping voice; no word of discouragement to the hysterical screams that seem completely disproportionate to the little body that produces them.  It is a relief to us when she merely shouts: it is far less painful!

I thought that I was impervious to the criminal stupidity of some sections of this country when it comes to the treatment of bulls. 

Living in Catalonia one does not often have to put up with ones fellow citizens being beastly to bulls.  After all, in Barcelona in the Plaza de España (!) the bullring there has been converted into a shopping centre!  I don’t think that the attitude of the Catalans can be more clear.

Further down the coast however in the troubled province of Valencia, which has only recently been released from the leadership of a very questionable gentleman, showed that there were lower regions of animal cruelty that I had not previously seen.

I have become hardened to other parts of Spain finding pleasure in taunting bulls to run around the streets, sometimes with burning torches attached to their horns! 

We have had the usual number of deaths from some of the taunters not being quite as quick on their feet as the bulls – and Spanish television takes great delight in showing the maulings they happen with bulls’ horns embedded deeply into the hapless failed bull runner.

On television this afternoon there was yet another variation. 

In some towns barricades are put up; shops are boarded up and metal cages constructed along the streets with bars far enough apart to allow humans through but not bulls.  For those not brave or stupid enough to run with the bulls there is tiered seating at strategic positions to allow spectators to “enjoy” the event.

All of the preparations were in place for the televised event but with the added element that this took place near the sea. 

The bulls were tempted towards idiots who were provoking them with the expectation that the bulls would charge and the impetus of their charge would take them over the high quayside and into the sea!  The young men (it’s always young men) were so near the edge of the quay that they too had to jump, dive or fall into the sea themselves to escape the mass of meat hurtling towards them.

The bull was “rescued” by men in a motorboat who grabbed the bull’s horns and pulled it alongside the moving boat and thus dragged the poor beast to shore.

It was a repulsive sight – and some parts of society here are trying to get bull fighting classed as a cultural even so that it can be “protected” from perfectly justified accusations of the ugliest form of animal cruelty.  Ah well.

The six-day weather forecast is for sun.  You have to take the smooth with the rough!