In this best of all possible worlds!

There are those who aver that programmes like “This house is a ruin” are unspeakably vile and useless. These programmes are where a gaggle of self congratulatory mawkish opportunists descend on some unfeasibly large family living in squalor; rip their house down and rebuild it in as consumeristically vulgar a way as possible and then stand back and collect the communal tears of gratitude before moving on and wiping their victims from their minds, before settling vulture-like on the next bunch of wastrels.



This programme is the apotheosis of the “deus ex machina” much beloved as a narrative device by Dickens where, having got his hero into an impossibly difficult situation, resolves it by having a long lost uncle or distant relative suddenly appear, promptly die and leave all his money to the hero so that he can live in genteel, jobless comfort.


In the same way “This house is a ruin” showers consumer durables on one deserving family to the greater glory of the television company which produces their meretricious trash and to the accompanying glory of the system that produced the poverty in the first place.


Useless, vile and positively bad one may think. But not by me.

As soon as the programme started on the television I made my excuses and decamped to the Third Floor. I would, I thought, reclaim my Bryson book (“At Home: A short history of Private Life”) which I had lain at the side of the sun bed as I lay out in the gentle heat this morning. As I opened the door to the terrace rain started and I was able to rescue the book with only a few drops of moisture on the back cover. So expeditious was I that there was not even a suggestion of the horrible warping that detracts from the pleasure of page turning if what you are turning is like a thin piece of corrugated cardboard.


I am prepared to bet that saving my book is the one positive effect of the programme. I am sure that they do not revisit their victims and show how they are coping a year or two on. How the family, suddenly at the cutting edge of technological innovation, copes with things going wrong and breaking. I wonder what the repair and replacement policy is for poor families suddenly gifted with high value, high maintenance equipment with a very finite life!


But they can rest assured that they have one grateful “viewer” because as soon as I saw the programme I was driven from the living room and was able to save my book two floors above. Well done! And thank you!


I refuse to see today as merely Saturday; I prefer to think of it as Day 1 of a four day holiday. As I have already done a little light sun bathing one aspect of any real holiday has been fulfilled already and I feel myself positively refreshed in my determination to get some “tasks” done.


By way of a change we went to Cubellos for lunch. This is a smallish town whose name has been hijacked and affixed to a sprawling new (seemingly relatively empty) residential development stretching along the sea coast.


We chose a restaurant next to the beach with a clear view of the sea and also with what seemed like a reasonable menu del dia for €10.50. It was a meal of mixed fortunes. The paella starter was shockingly bad with the rice dry and the whole thing absurdly salty. The wine was watered! But the chicken main course was tasty and succulent a piece of fowl that I have eaten in years. The sweet was as immediately forgettable as one would expect with a normal menu del dia.


The fact that we were sitting outside in a brisk wind but also generous sunshine and a view of waves crashing (for the Med) on a breakwater was almost enough.


Our way back was interrupted in Sitges for an orgy of buying in the cheap German supermarkets which included (as by law you must) an Object of Doubtful Use But Bargain Price.


Today this took the form of a box containing three or four door hooks of the sort that fit over the top of the door and which you therefore don’t have to screw in: a good thing when your property is rented. These have already been “installed” and look to be more than decorative. Give me a few days and I might be able to upgrade adjectives to the coveted “useful” status!


Tomorrow The Family descends. If the rain does as well I may have to take semi-permanent refuge on the Third Floor!


I have just checked the weather and, although there is scattered cloud, the rain has stopped and I can clearly see stars or planes, or possibly both – I am no expert in this area of ariel identification.


This could mean that tomorrow, like today, could defy the gloomy prognostications of callow weathermen and be bright and sunny rather than stormy.


One plan for the morrow is to go into the Garaf National Park and search for mushrooms. This is a national pastime and there are television programmes devoted to sad folk with wicker baskets pouncing on various fungoid growths with expressions not unrelated to some sort of sick pleasure.


As I am sure that this activity necessitates walking; and walking in places where paths are bent grass rather than carefully laid paving stones, I am not totally convinced that this sort of thing is necessarily better than finishing off my Bryson.


Still, as one says about all those things that one will not want to do again, “It will be an experience, won’t it!”


Which sentiment, when you think about it, is hard to gainsay.


Bring it on!

To refuse is churlish

If one may paraphrase the words of Noel Coward (and who wouldnt?) “Extraordinary how potent cheap chocolate is.”



These words came to mind when a small bar of Cadbury’s Dairy Milk was thrust into my hands from a pregnant colleague whose lust for the dark stuff knows few bounds.

As a devotee of the more enterprising flavours of chocolate in the cheaper stores I have been generous with my offerings to frantic staff as yet another test has to be marked.


I have introduced numerous disbelieving colleagues to the delights of dark chocolate with chilli and even darker chocolate with black pepper. The latest discovery was very dark chocolate with a “suggestion” of sea salt which I gave to pregnant colleague as a gift just to see her reaction. The mere suggestion that I might have such an exotic blend was enough to get the Cadbury’s bar; I can only imagine what her response will be when she actually pops a piece into her mouth.


It turns out that we have Monday and Tuesday off and she has taken the opportunity to book a flight back to raid Mothercare – I hope that she brings back a selection of the more notorious chocolate bars for which our country is justly famous.


I well remember the fury (probably whipped up by the Daily Mail, the Daily Express and other distasteful rags) when some obscure committee of the EC gave a pronouncement which decreed that all British “chocolate” did not contain a sufficient quantity of coco beans to deserve the title of chocolate and therefore had to be re-labelled as “chocolate type confection” or some such nonsense. Talk about straight bananas!


I prefer quality dark chocolate with coco content of 80% and above but who can deny the “potency” of a single square of Dairy Milk!


The taste is not that of a “chocolate type confection” but of childhood and comfort and security and memory and all the other soppy words that relate to something which is so much a part of you that it is hard to put into words. Dairy Milk is Proustian and no mistake!


The day seemed interminable with kids and teachers thinking only of the extra days that are to be added to the weekend to give us a mini break.


The weather looks awful, but we are relying on the eagerly believed delusion that Castelldefels has its own micro climate which might see some sun drying the tempests that have been forecast for the whole of the “holiday” period. I may have to adopt the unflinching approach to weather that I displayed during the less clement days of my highly expensive stays in Grand Canaria over the Christmas period. I can remember lying on my sun bed with more hope than heat on some days. On one particularly bad day I lay with gritted teeth during one rain shower thinking back to the innumerable assemblies to which “This too will pass” was the aphoristic highlight.


To be fair it always did and I was always able to march into the staff room in January with acceptably crisped arms and face!


I must remember that I still have the Fry and Bryson books to read which is a sure way of making me forget about the weather until a loo break forces me to consider the climatic reality with which I am surrounded.


Knowing that one has a four day break ahead gives an added impetus to one’s swim and I think that the first few lengths were completed with a richly languorous stroke which suggested space and time available more clearly than returning home and merely flopping into an armchair.


We had a meal out before which I was able to buy a new belt to replace the one which has served me faithfully (and is one of the few that can get round my waist) for many years. It was with a sort of regret that I threw it away in spite of the fact that it is out of shape; lacking some of the loops and has lost most of the surface sheen and looks frankly leprous. Belts are like dishcloths and are not to be thrown out unless some cataclysmic change occurs.


I also took the opportunity to lavish money on some eau de toilette which only needs a few squirts to achieve the required degree of opulent olfactory niceness rather than the stirrup pump which is needed for the cheap stuff which I have used lately. That is now gone and Chanel can now take its place!


The petty inconveniences of my day faded into insignificance after listening to a phone call from Paul about his week as headteacher in his new school. I do wonder how my colleagues would react if they had to teach in a school to which the police had to be called in to sort out disputes and restrain pupils and parents alike!


Still such thoughts will not sully the silky surface of my holiday mind as I read and study the sky for opportunistic breaks in the cloud!


I might even consider “tasks” if the weather is really bad!

I know my rights!

All the old prejudices are resurfacing.



All I want to do when I go to the swimming pool is swim. Not in itself an unreasonable desire: the clue is in the title of the building. Another clue is found by looking at the pool itself. It is neatly divided up into lanes with colourful floats clearly delineating the long thin divisions up and down which people are encouraged to swim.


And swim I do in spite of the irritating distractions that fling themselves into my path. Unfortunately I have cut my nails so I am unable to cut those flounderers who get in my way.


Today I chose the end lane next to the steps. This is a narrower lane than the others and only allows one swimmer to plough the watery furrow. I duly ploughed with the sort of determination and savagery that discourages any other mere paddler from daring to encroach.


Not so some sort of female child (in a totally unnecessary bikini) who cavorted in MY lane in what can only be described as frivolous and provoking manner. When I had reached the end of one length I turned and saw futile splashings at the other end of the pool. Nothing daunted I commenced my take-no-prisoners crawl and made for the hapless human.


The child had the bare faced audacity to swim towards me in a thoroughly uncoordinated parody of the forward crawl stroke that I was executing with grace and elegance. Just before the inevitable crash she had the cheek to swim under me in an ungainly frog-like kick stroke which, in my experience, has usually led to the crushing of various male appendages of passing importance. So as I was passing over her I instinctively adopted the save-the-bits convulsive crouch which took away somewhat from the dignity of the swim.


As the child showed no signs of being cowed by the increased intensity and splash of my next length I gave up and moved to the next lane.


In the complex hierarchy of the pool the lane into which I retreated was designated the “up” lane of a two lane complex with, as you may have guessed, the lane next to it designated the “down” lane.


Somewhat thwarted by this retreat the little minx then stood on the ledge at the end of the pool in her lane and swung her legs under the floats into my new lane!


Needless to say my next turn included a chopping motion of the arms which effectively removed the offending limbs from my section of the pool.


All was now fine.


Fine, until my empty lanes were invaded by a lady of a certain age but ungainly stroke whose progress up the pool could be described as “stately” in terms of speed but certainly not in execution. As is common with women of that sort she refused to let me pass as the stronger swimmer and kept to her snail like crawl through the water.


This was not a problem. With two swimmers in a two lane circuit it is easy for the faster swimmer to cut under the floats and leave the slower swimmer still making for the end of the pool while the stronger swims a shorter length to have a complete length available at the next turn.


All was fine.


Until the male equivalent of the woman appeared and joined our little circus.


He was a head-up and slow progress swimmer who made my cutting of lengths more difficult because I might loose the woman but a few strokes brought me up to the flailing feet of the man. He even had the overweening pride to cut a few lengths himself and thwart me! I was reduced to swimming breast stroke.


Although I have improved this stroke it is not my favourite and I find it draining and frustrating. I have no other real strokes: my back stroke is something of a joke and my butterfly has to be seen to be derided. My attempt at what I take to be side stroke fails to convince so the crawl is the only form of locomotion in the pool which does not destroy what is left of my street cred. after users of the pool have seen my swirling orange bathing costume!


My leisurely breast stroke did, however give me an opportunity to relish the Apocalyptic Swimmers who were destroying the lane next to me on the “down” side of the circuit. I have capitalized the swimmers because I am convinced that they form a world-wide club.


These swimmers are those, usually men though not infrequently women who have developed a leg action which I find impossible to duplicate. In essence it demands the raising of one foot out of the water and then smashing it down on the surface of the pool to create a spume heavy fountain effect which makes the slap of the tail fin of a disappearing sperm whale look like a discrete and furtive exit.


The water explodes from the surface and lashes swimmers on either side of the foot flapper. The hands of these people tend to be somewhat random as well and often encroach into the water of surrounding lanes.


The only approach to dissuade such people is a carefully calculated kick disguised as the requisite foot action to the breast stroke. As I was not wearing contact lenses and as the glass in my goggles had not been cleaned for a week, I felt that such precise counter measures were too risky for the myopic.


The real challenge of swimming should be to keep up a steady rhythm and not drown by the end of the period that you have set aside for the exercise; but I find dealing with my fellow swimmers to be much more of a burden. But it does pass the time!


I lost a free period today in the nicest possible way. The missing teacher was supposed to be taking football and when I appeared the first period had passed and I was told that the kids in 4ESO knew what they were supposed to do. I therefore fetched a chair, sat in the sun and watched in a disinterestedly paternal way the kids get on with it. As lost free periods go, that one went well!


Dinner was in a “new” bar in town to which we had not previously gone. We had three tapas and they were more than enough. The house wine was young, rough and assertive, but it went well with the tapas: small pieces of pork in an almond sauce: patatas bravas and bunyols with cod.


I am glad to report that I am typing this in the office on the third floor with the portable air conditioning machine going at full blast: long may such October days continue!


Tomorrow we can look forward to a long weekend as Monday (and possibly Tuesday) may be fiestas and bank holidays.


I think I shall sleep!


Oh Joy!

Seeing is believing!

If you ever want to feel sympathy for a pupil, simply look at the way that their parents park.  And then imagine what it is like to be brought up with role models like that!



More than anything else (with the possible exception of behaviour in a supermarket queue) this is as clear an indication of real character as you are likely to find on open display.


It is impossible to for me to find any further derogatory comments to make about the selfish, dangerous and the-world-only-exists-for-me attitudes that predominate in the mornings when the affluent deposit their offspring at our school.


Today I saw an example of double parking over a parking space – which has to be something of a first, even with the grotesque approach to parking that our self-centred parents have!


I think that it is a deleterious part of the journey to school that I have to pass parental parking before I start my day. We should be paid extra for the emotional wear and tear that comes with observing the truly selfish approach to road use that characterizes some of the more thoughtless clients of our establishment.


While the rest of the day was exhausting the evening was truly stimulating. When Irene called we make for our usual watering hole which is the local restaurant on the sea front. To our horror it had stopped serving meals by 8.30 pm. Disaster faced us until I remembered an almost forgotten determination to visit the Indian restaurant in Port Ginesta. This turned out to be an unexpected delight: from the spicy popadoms to the fresh juicy prawns in the biriani it was all excellent. And spicy. That probably explained why we were the only two people in the restaurant for most of the evening.


Our waiter seemed equally uncomfortable in all the languages that we could muster and I suspected that he was a relative of the owner who had just paid him a visit when we arrived and was pressed into service as they actually had customers! He did however, answer “Yes!” in resounding English to all our questions and orders. A place to return to!


I have now finished the next book in the summer reading library of one of my colleagues. “The White Woman on the Green Bicycle” by Monique Roffey.


This is set in Trinidad and the four sections of the book are dated 2006, 1956, 1963 and 1970. They chart the fortune of a couple, George and Sabine Harwood, as they cope with and in Sabine’s case fail to come to terms with living in Trinidad as white settlers.


The political overtones and the discussion of colonialism were interesting, but the book reminded me strongly of “Wide Sargasso Sea” and I am sure that there was a direct quotation from the novel at one point. The book uses multiple narrators and also the device of quoting from a series of unposted letters that Sabine writes to the charismatic political leader and eventual prime minister of Trinidad, Eric Williams after the British hand over power.


The echoes of “Wide Sargasso Sea” do this novel no favours as the power of Rhys’s work is through powerful selected detail, searing characterization and suggestion. There is too much in “Green Bicycle” which is derivative and overwritten. This novel takes over 400 pages to make fewer points than Rhys.


And it’s yet another reason not to visit Trinidad!


The pupils who have spent a month in Canada returned to school today and will rejoin my English class tomorrow. It will be interesting to see and hear what impressions they have brought back from this first attempt at a one way exchange with a foreign school.


Meanwhile we are that much nearer the weekend. Which is a good thing!

Absence makes the ear grow quieter

There is much truth in the old saying about the hammer hitting your head; it is indeed worth being hit just for the absolute delight of it stopping. So with children: two small kids are worth tolerating if only for the seraphic peace which comes with their removal!



To be fair the kids of whom I speak are delightful - if evil. The smile that the smaller of the two can give melts hearts and curdles milk; but then what child worth his salt cannot reduce blood relatives to a state of gibbering soppiness at the elegant curve of a lip or the arch movement of an eyebrow. I am not a blood relative and can therefore take a more measured approach and can watch anguish and anger over a carelessly spilt bottle of chocolate shake be transformed in the twinkling of an eye by the twinkling of a juvenile eye!


Admittedly we had ten to dinner, but only two of them made the crowd!


My class doing a translation of a children’s story from Spanish into English has now produced the finalish draft and the writing will now have to be considered by others in the school. The original story was published to produce funds for Haiti and it is hoped that the English version will appeal to another section of the buying public who will not only want to read the story but will also feel that warm glow of self satisfaction that only comes with doing good unto others!


For my own part, with the exception of Winnie the Pooh I do not think that I have ever read a children’s short story as many times as this one in the whole of my life.


The end of this class will mean that the children who have been working on the translation will now rejoin the class from which they were taken and the team teaching of the History of Art will now commence with the Art Teacher and me! This should be interesting!


The rest of my teaching does not occupy my mind much and I look forward more to the summer reading books that one colleague is allowing me to borrow one at a time. I am also conscious that I have my stash of books from a last foray into WH Smith’s in Bristol before I got on the plane for Barcelona waiting to have their pages turned.


So many books; so little time!


The ordering of the internet radio has turned into a fiasco with emails flying right, left and centre about the validity of my card. The fact that the expiry date has changed has thrown the whole of the organization of Amazon into complete confusion and I have clicked so many buttons that I am sure that I have paid for the damn thing three times over already and it is still not listed as having been sent!


Each moment that passes seems to mock me with its golden radiance: the sun grows in strength and potency and we have even had to turn on the air conditioning in the staff room. And I am not out on the Third Floor wallowing in the unseasonal heat. It is too, too cruel and my skin is becoming pastier each time I look at it!


Perhaps I should be aiming to swim in the outside municipal pool – though I hope to god that they have closed it thus allowing me the luxury of feeling that I would if I could but I can’t sort of thing.


I am steeling myself to visit the municipality to denounce the actions of my neighbours in destroying the poles which have recently been set in the pavements to discourage the indiscriminate parking in streets close to the sea.


I have, I must admit, little intention of being explicit (in spite of the witness that I could call!) and merely want to suggest in a directed way where the guilt for this criminal damage should lie. But I do want the posts replaced as the depredations of the neighbours have opened up a whole section of the road which now positive invites cars to park illegally and block our driveways.


This will be another test of my scanty Spanish and god alone knows what the poor people in the town hall will understand by the time that I have finished with them.


As is usual for me, my Spanish is given a status by other people (who can speak Spanish) which it in no way merits. My linguistic status is officially designated as a “false beginner” but that doesn’t stop people speaking to me as if I am completely fluent.


While I am in school the chances of my taking lessons are virtually nil and when I leave school I will not be able to afford them. And before anyone suggests that I do all this learning of the language myself I would ask them to take a good, long draught of reality!


Roll on the Kindle and a daily dose of The Guardian!

The days slip by slowly

I am not given to lie-ins and I had one on Saturday which I think speaks volumes for the way in which this term has started. God help us all when we finally fall comatose at the end of term in late December.



Here, at the beginning of October we contemplate the long slog to the Christmas holidays without a half term to lubricate the dagger – and I’m not sure that the metaphor is actually going anywhere, but it does give you some idea of the arid waste which stretches ahead!


On the plus side, of course, there is the weather. How can I be negative when a day affords me the opportunity to lie out on the Third Floor in a pair of shorts and soak up the sun. Saturday was a delight and I even managed to prop my somnolent eyes open for long enough to get thoroughly stuck in to my latest read, “Lacuna” by the rather wonderfully named Barbara Kingsolver.


The book is the life story of a young Mexican-American from his first formative years in Mexico with his fortune hunting mother through the years in America to his final return to Mexico.


This is a novel told in various voices using the notebooks of the main character Harrison Shepherd with interpolated comments from his stenographer/editor; book reviews; letters and other salient pieces of writing.


The action is enlivened by the fictional Harrison being involved with the real painters Diego Rivera and his wife Frida Kahlo – though they, and Trotsky, are used as essential elements in the narrative rather than window dressing to give weight to the story.


The essential action of the story is set in Mexico in 1935 and America in the late 40’s leading up to the Committee on Un-American Activities in the early 50’s. By this time Harrison has become a popular writer using the ancient civilizations of Mexico to provide the background for a rip-roaring story whose story line could be said to echo the political events of the present day.


The writer obviously delighted in writing in various voices and the pace of the novel is as much conveyed by personal development in a political context as by the momentous historical events through which the hero lives.


Although the ending is pleasingly ambiguous it suggests a positive view of development through adversity that is a just reward for following the hero though some 700 pages!


Would I recommend this book? Probably yes; though I think that its length is a little self indulgent.


Talking of self indulgence I have decided to give in to the new blandishments of Amazon and the Kindle. All the functions of the machine are supposed to work in Spain, specifically in Castelldefels (all checked out) and I look forward to the “free” internet connection which is supposed to be paid by Amazon.


This will be my third e-book which, given they can contain up to 4,000 books may appear to be a little excessive – but at least they will still be fewer than the number of cameras that I possess!


Toni is going to buy me a portable internet radio for my birthday, or at least refund me for it, as I am attempting to buy one on the internet (poetic!) at the moment. The major problem that I am experiencing is that I have a new card: the same details but a different expiry date.


This has thrown the whole of Amazon into confusion and I have had an increasingly strident series of automated emails from Amazon desperate for the money. It remains to be seen if Amazon can get this sorted by United Nations Day!


Meanwhile to bed as tomorrow is an 8.15 start!

How many ends are there?

The real problem with this week was The General Strike.



Not because of my shameful non-participation, but rather because it was on a Wednesday.


A school week is only tolerable because it is part of a known sequence: things happen according to a timetable.


Any major interruption to this schedule is dislocating. The General Strike cause major imagined disruption: not that many kids were absent but the unsettling effect with some classes collapsed, others rearranged and people talking about burning tyres on the Diagonal made this a day unlike others.


And there were two days left of the week after it was all over.


Thursday was long and there were class changes because one of our colleagues is absent for a week and of course no supply teacher has been employed.


Wednesday and Thursday both felt like Fridays and it is never a good thing to have three Fridays in a week! The actual Friday was something of an anticlimax.


That’s a lie actually. Friday is never that, unless you have a meeting on Saturday. And we have two this year! In a school with a 35 period week and one which does not finish until 4.45 pm. You can understand that they are pushed for time!


I don’t know why I am bitching when Actual Friday is my early finish and I went to El Corte Ingles at the end of school.


I am trying to find a truly portable internet radio so that I can take Radio 4 with me where ere I go. My researches so far have discovered a suitable machine but the comments on the internet suggest that while the radio works well, it does not manage to pick up Radio 4 from countries other than the UK. As listening to Radio 4 is the sole reason for buying the thing, it does not seem like money well spent.


Back to the internet.


The weather looks reasonable for tomorrow so it appears that I might be able to top up my vitamin D.


In October as well!

Always something new - if you look for it!

I have been in Spain and Catalonia for a couple of years and it has taken me all this time to discover that there is another classical music programme on the radio.



I have been struggling to understand the comments that the announcers make when they gabble on in Catalan on the station that I have been listening to up to now. I desperately use what musical knowledge I have to try and fit together what I can understand with what they are saying. I can follow the basic descriptions but any further analysis leaves me floundering. During the General Strike my usual Catalan classical music station was playing pop music which drove me to press the buttons and search for something more congenial.


It was thus that now I have discovered a classical music station which uses Spanish and now a whole world of comment is now within reach. Almost! Spanish speakers do tend to get carried away and start speaking with scant regard to the slow understanding of those whose first language is not theirs!


The day in school has seemed interminable, starting has it has at 8.15 am and with a meeting in the evening it promised to stretch to infinity.


Finding the art shop for Toni in a street near the Diagonal was something of a nightmare and even when found the idea of parking anywhere near was a mere fantasy. It was therefore fortuitous that the GPS having got us within a stone’s throw of the shop a van stopped, blocking the road, to tow away a wrongly parked mini.


This allowed Suzanne the opportunity to jump out of the car and rush to the shop while I waited with unaccustomed patience for the van to drive off with the Mini attached.


When the way was cleared I was even able to lurk in an entrance to a parking place and pick up Suzanne with the art stuff that Toni wanted.


Our visit to El Corte Ingles to change a book was necessarily hurried at the time for the meeting was approaching and we needed to have something to eat before the start.


We eventually decided on an up-market looking café where a miniscule cheese bun was a resounding €3!


Throwing caution and money to the wind we decided to have tortilla with a soft drink. When we had finished our food a plate of exquisite biscuits appeared. When those finished we were presented with a new plate of more biscuits and chocolate cake. This munificence was as welcome as it was inexplicable. And it made us late for the meeting.


Which was conducted exclusively in Spanish.


We were given a guided tour of the computer benches which illustrate the aims, objectives and interests of the gallery – and of course, the obligatory visit to the showroom of toilets, baths and sinks which is the stock in trade of Roca.


The drive back through Barcelona was horrific with solid traffic and the usual suicidal and terminally irritating motor cyclists weaving their way with complete disregard for the fatal possibilities of car contact. One of the little buggers had the temerity to beep me for getting in his way! My hatred of the whole race of helmeted psychopaths on two wheels has almost reached meltdown!


The meeting meant that I could not go for my swim, so I will have to make up for this backsliding by an extra effort tomorrow.

These are my principles, and if you don't like 'em . . .

You can’t tell me that swimming for 50% longer than usual is not a form of expiation.


Today was the day of the General Strike and, to my everlasting shame, I went into school.


It turned out that there was only one worker in the whole school who was prepared to go on strike. None of the cleaning staff nor the catering staff nor the maintenance staff nor the office staff nor the nursery staff nor the primary staff nor the administrative staff: just one member of the secondary staff. Me.

For once I have declined to place my neck on the chopping block so that it can be served up on a plate thus allowing me to live my first name. Again.


Driving to school this morning was akin to driving on a Sunday; I allowed an hour (as I always do) to get to school and I actually got there in fifteen minutes. I passed nothing which gave any indication that there was a General Strike, apart from a distant plume of smoke which, to my lurid imagination suggested vast unrest and the image of the proletariat rising against their unjust masters who, having failed to deal in any adequate way with the rapacious and uncaring bankers have turned their administrative attention on the hapless workers.


Once in school I sulked. I was ashamed of myself for not taking pointless action in my group of one; and I was ashamed of my colleagues for doing nothing except congratulate themselves on the ease in which they came to work.


I don’t do a very good “Achilles in his tent” act and I was soon jollied out of my depression, though the extended swim at the end of the day shows that the pangs of guilt gave added strength to my arm!


We went out into town to see what affect the General Strike was having and, to our immense astonishment, we discovered that the effect amounted to round about nothing. Everything was open and people were sitting around as though nothing out of the ordinary was happening. For a town so near to Barcelona we often seem to be leagues and leagues away from what is going on there!


Just like town, school was virtually unaffected. Most of the kids were in their classes and I was only asked about the strike and my (non) participation in it in one class – and that was more to distract me from the work in hand than to discuss politics!


This has been a truly unsatisfactory day with the only positive aspect being that I was able (vide. one early morning start) to leave half an hour before the end of school. And have as uneventful a journey home as I had hours earlier when I drove my route of shame to school.


As if sharing my mood, Barça failed to do more than draw in the latest stage of the Champions’ League.


On the domestic front we are now trying to work out how best to deal with intentional vandalism and sabotage by our neighbours (allegedly). The town council has at last decided to do something about the chaotic way that visitors (and inhabitants) park on the streets – especially the streets near the sea front.


On our road (at least our bit of it) metal posts have been driven into the pavement to stop cars parking half-on and half-off. To protect our driveways further metal posts have been set between our houses drives to prevent easy parking across the entrances.


This is obviously a good thing, but some of our neighbours who park (illegally) on the pavement entrance to their houses have not been happy with these metallic reminders of proper manners and have been edging into the posts.


Toni recently witnessed our neighbour’s progeny drive his car and topple the post. The hole has been filled in and the remains of the post have disappeared. As indeed did his car until it reappeared recently with the back bumper looking suspiciously pristine.


The post at the other end of the shared driveway of our neighbour’s house has also disappeared.


This is, of course, criminal damage and theft – though I have to say that I am loath to get further involved in the legal system of this country as my previous experience with The School That Sacked Me does not encourage active participation – and I would like Something To Be Done.


I think that my first port of call will be the town hall and I shall endeavour in my halting Spanish to explain the situation. I am not inclined to make accusations and I am sure that my attempting to “drop” hints in the way that I use Spanish would be as subtle as Jack the Ripper giving household hints to Mrs Beeton on better ways to carve the Sunday roast, but I am determined not to let the matter rest. And our neighbour owns barking dogs so she deserves everything that she may get!


Tomorrow a meeting in the Roca Gallery of Toilets behind El Corte Ingles on the Diagonal.


Never let it be said that living in a foreign country does not open one up to new and exciting experiences!

A short trip indeed!

It was only when I was swimming on Monday evening that I fully realized just how tired I really was.

It is true that you can tell (if you are a regular swimmer) that you have not been swimming for a few days; but when those days have been as full and exhausting as they were over the weekend then the resultant sluggish crawl up and down the pool is, to put it mildly, marked.


Not, you understand that I would have had the long weekend any less exhausting – exhaustion from satisfaction is something I can live with.


The only change I would make is that the performance of Fidelio that I saw would be better. It was undoubtedly the worse, most ineptly thought out performance that I have ever seen. It was made all the more disappointing by the stark and effective image of a tubular steel cage gleaming on stage that greeted the audience as they made their way into the auditorium.


From the frankly amateur playing of the horns in the overture to the embarrassingly trite spotlighted glare of the two main protagonists at the end the performance was a disaster. Not something that I expect from Welsh National Opera, but a performance that I will remember if only for its lack of quality.


The hymn to the sun was lacklustre and the singing of the principals lacking in the sort of intensity that I expect from this opera.


The direction tended to the melodramatic cartoon level and rarely rose above the trite. Even the lighting was poor and contradictory.


To be fair the musical level of the show rose a little in the second half but not enough to save this doomed production.


It’s a good thing that the rest of the weekend was much more enjoyable and satisfying: I even managed to go into the new Apple store in the centre of Cardiff and walk out again without buying anything! This either shows strength of will or a woeful lacking of sobriety.


The fancy dress party on the Friday night into which I was catapulted by the late arrival of the plane and the usual traffic hold up around Newport was a delights with Shrek and his misses, Empire Storm Troopers, Dracula, Arthur Dent, Austen Powers and various other characters jostled their way through a startled crowd of people in the lower bar before they attained the sanctuary of the upper floor where the party was held.


This being Britain the party had to end at eleven thirty but due to popular demand it continued in Alison and Bryn’s house with the result that I did not tumble into bed before three in the morning.


I (unlike my hosts) rose bright and early (a phrase rather than reality) and made my way to town to fulfil the request of a colleague to change a top for his wife. There was none in her size and so I took an executive decision to buy two others for roughly the same price in a sale: a decision doomed to failure.


A nostalgic visit to Tesco prompted me to buy cheese (which I have left in the UK) and cookies (which were eaten before I returned and so had to buy more) and regret that all the supermarkets in Spain are not as good!


Louise was the next port of call and the weather was good enough for us to eat out of doors before the next visit had to take place.


Ceri’s studio is large enough for him to have a variety of pictures on the go and is in marked contrast to his more cramped conditions at home in the converted garage!


Fidelio was almost a total disaster as even by the middle of the interval I still had not seen anyone I knew. I know that I have been out of the cultural loop in Cardiff for a few years but I do expect to see at least one member of my peer group in an opera!


Eventually I did see two friends and we were all able to decry our cultural experience over a pint of bitter.


Our late night meal was an Indian Take Away and vastly satisfying it was too.


Another late night made getting up the next day difficult but not impossible and I managed to finish my book in the continuing sunshine that was a feature of my stay in the UK.


There was just time to re-visit Tesco to replenish my supply of cookies for the folk in Catalonia before rushing over to Alison to wish her felicitations on her actual birthday.


Lunch was in a Carvery and had a sign which said “The Best of British Cooking” which Catalans might find accurate but only in an ironic way!


A late panic about my coat necessitated another visit to Louise where I was able to point out the location of Assyria on the map which accompanied the description of the antiquities of the Near East in the Guide to the British Museum which I had loaned her.


The drive to the airport was almost tediously uneventful with only a passing worry about the effects of the Ryder Cup in Newport causing any concern at all.


The plane was, of course late, but only an hour and I made a disastrous discovery.


Drawn, as I always am towards the W H Smith bookshop in the departure lounge I asked a fatal question: “Could you take a carrier bag from the shop on board the plane as an extra piece of hand luggage? The affirmative answer means that I spent far more than I intended buying the latest Bill Bryson book and a small statistical book published by the Economist.


And a Stephen Fry autobiography and an “interesting and unbelievable facts of science book” for the common reader.


And that is not counting my impulsive purchase of Blair’s autobiography at half price in Tesco.


The taxi ride saw me DOA at the house and I could barely hand over the cookies before decamping to my bed.


Monday, with a teaching start at 8.15 in the morning (having got up at 6.30 am) was a long, long day.


Tuesday is now a better day and I have to say that the lingering effects of alcohol are appreciably less. It is my intention to have an alcohol free week though meeting Irene on Friday (can I count that as the end of the week?) will test my resolve.


Thursday sees a return to the remarkable building (I’m told) of the bathroom supplier Roca which has a gallery at present hosting an exhibition of the devastation of the Aral Sea. This is for a Teachers’ Meeting with the gallery staff to discuss future developments and to make sure that our names are closely involved in the planning.


Wednesday is the day of the General Strike on which, to my everlasting shame, I am not giving my striking support. For once in my life I have declined to make a noble gesture which would have been unique in the school of withdrawing my labour. The school (qua private school in Spain) has been pretty decent in its approach to the government inspired 5% pay cut and an attack on the school would have been seen as ungrateful if not downright inexplicable.






I will not, of course cross a picket line, but the chance of any at the entrance to our school is slight to the point of invisibility.


School buses for the primary school have been cancelled; rain transport has been cut to “minimum services” whatever those are; the tram service will be cut and the roads will be total chaos.


We have had an indication of what happens when any part of the transport system is hindered when we had to cope with the cut in rail services because of the collapse of the tunnel on the main line – with services terminating in Gava. That was a disaster.

I am going to leave school at the same time as usual but as my first lesson is at ten in the morning I expect to make it in, even if I am not there for the normal start of school.

It promises to be an interesting period until the end of the week and I think that the stresses and strains might justify breaking my alcohol abstinence.

At least.

Release!

A dull, sullen day which is almost made bearable by the fact that this is a honorary Friday by virtue of its being the last day of the week because tomorrow is a Fiesta and we in Barcelona have the day off.



This means that I am able to go to the UK tomorrow with an easy conscience – or at least what passes for an easy conscience in my case!


I am frightening well prepared for this little jaunt except in the major case of money. Not that I don’t have any, no, my British bank account is far healthier than it was when I was actually living in the country. The problem is how to get at it.


My card, although fine for any internet purchases seems to be disinclined to let me get at any cash. I may even be forced to cash a cheque: a touching reminder of past banking days when each month I used to get all my cheques sent back to me for me to check against my records! It is more than frustrating to have a couple of month’s salary safely tucked up in a British bank account, with that very security precluding my touching the stuff!


As it is now years since I have entered my British bank, I fear that my card will be rejected right left and centre by all known machines. Time will tell.


The cost of my daily swim has now shrunk to a much more reasonable €37 as I have now swum for four days this week! As today is the start of a mini holiday and I will be absent for three days I had an extra long swim.


In spite of the fact that I would class myself as an experienced swimmer I found that there was a “hump” for me after about twenty minutes when the urge to call it a day almost brings me out of the pool. Today I persevered and I must have swum well over a metric mile.


When I finally dragged myself out of the water I slumped in the steam room and dissolved quietly until I felt that the invigorating cut of a cold shower would bring me back to reality.


I have to say that the cafe in the pool make a satisfyingly strong cup of coffee which is my reward for the number of lengths that I do.


My bag is almost packed. Almost.


I couldn’t actually bring myself to pack it completely – that would have been far too much of a departure from my usual dilatory way of going abroad.


It seems strange to refer to one’s home country as “abroad” but I no longer live there so I suppose the designation is partially correct.


And now, perhaps, a reasonably early night to give me time tomorrow to do all the things which I have omitted to do before I go!

How deceitful are bathing costumes!



I chose what I thought was a rather fetching and newish costume for my second foray into the municipal pool. I packed it carefully into a more commodious back pack and waited impatiently for the day to end so that I could go and have a swim which would be priced at only €75 (the original €150 now being divided by two).


Wednesday is one of my early finishes and so I was able to join the motorway without the interminable crawl that fumes its way slowly along when the parents add their massive cars to our miniscule roads.


I have now learned how to get changed without balancing on one leg and seeing all my clothes fall onto the unspeakable wet and dirty floor of the changing room and in double quick time I was striding purposefully towards where I now knew the pool lurked.


Swim hat on head, flip flops on feet and loins girded with bathing costume and clutching my goggles I approached the lanes with a little more confidence and plunged in.


As a concession to the concept of “warming up” I started a length of breast stroke but my bathing costume seemed reluctant to follow me!


Like the Wife of Bath I am “nat undergrowe” and I assumed that the generous curves of the lower part of my body would dissuade the material from declaring UDI. However, my stroke and frog like splaying of the legs was more directed to modesty than speed and I made my ungainly and careful way back down the length to the relative security of the swimming ledge at the edge of the pool.


The solution, fairly obviously, was to tighten the draw string of the bathing costume. But thereby lay a problem: it was already tied in knot which tended to the Gordian.


I realized after a few minutes that standing in the water with hands submerged groping at my groin was not, to say the least, decorous.


I tried a length or two with buttocks tensed and a sort of undulating jerk of the body to keep the recalcitrant bathers in place, but eventually had to admit defeat and retire to the showers to give the knot the attention it deserved.


With the help of broken nails and teeth (and a few odd stares) I eventually got the knot untied and put the costume back on.


At which point one end of the drawstring disappeared through the hole which is supposed to be too small to allow that sort of thing to happen.


Off came the costume again and what should have been a fairly easy “push along and grab” operation turned into a major effort and which almost had me tearing the material apart in naked (and I mean that very literally) frustration.


Brute force eventually got the end out again and, after tying large knots at the end of each end of the drawstring I replaced the garment yet again and tightened the waist.


Unfortunately my grappling with the thing had upset the equilibrium of the material so that the costume now had all the leaden grace which would have accompanied it had it been knitted with wool. I know of what I speak as photographs exist of a far younger and more innocent me looking hapless in a one-piece garment which appeared as though it had been created by a character from “The Vicar of Dibley”.

By this time I was in that mood of excited, trembling, suppressed frustration where if only the drawstring had survived my ministrations I would have walked fearlessly and defiantly into the pool.


My modesty was, however churlishly, covered and with the vague feeling that my bathing costume was acting as though it belonged to somebody else, I completed my swim, with extra minutes thrown in to cover the hiatus of structural stress.


By the time I got out into the café I felt that I fully deserved by coffee and croissant.


I have decided not to join the General Strike which has been called for the 29th of September. Was the only teacher in the entire school to have voiced support for the venture and I am not prepared to put my head on the chopping block in a costly gesture which I fear will achieve nothing. On the day of the strike my first lesson is at 10 am, so even if I am delayed by heavy traffic on the roads I will still probably get there in time.


It will be interesting to see if our parents, who tend to own rather than work for, make it to school with their offspring. If I had framed that last sentence as a question, it would have been entirely rhetorical as I am sure that the parents would move heaven and earth to make sure that their kids are out of the house and in the care of others!


I am not sure if I am doing the right (how many sense that word can be taken in) thing, but I am past the point where I feel like drawing my glittering sword of truth and exclaiming “Excelsior!” on a deserted mountain top of probity with only the echoes of my own convictions to keep me company!


I must cultivate my garden or at least keep on swimming!

All change!

There is nothing quite so satisfying as people watching.

Especially when those people are swimming.



I have now paid my first visit to our local municipal pool and therefore my twenty minute swim cost something like €150. The final straw was having to buy a padlock to secure the door of the lockers that signally did not lock; on sale at €5 a pop from the slot machine in the café. Over priced maybe, but at least you get an armband on which to keep your key included in the price!


This part of my visit to the pool was conducted with my glasses on so at least I could see what was and wasn’t there. When I finally got to a locker and began to divest myself of the accoutrements of civilized society I also had to pack sight into the locker as well.


For the myopically inclined (wearing only a bathing costume and clutching goggles and swim cap) the real adventure of trying out a new pool now starts. How to get there.


Designers of swimming pools seem to go out of their way to construct an obstacle course of increasing difficulty when trying to get from changing room to pool. Toilets don’t link to showers and you actually have to go out into a corridor before you get anywhere near to the water. There is also an off chance that, if you don’t know the Catalan word for women, you could turn into their changing room. Which I almost did in spite of knowing the Catalan word for women!


I eventually made it to what looked like the pool. This was entirely laned off. Previous experience suggested that these would be divided into “fast” “medium” and “slow” and I looked for some indication of level.


I have been caught out before by my assumption that my years of swimming would entitle me to at least survive in the “medium” section of any multi lane pool. I vividly remember my almost immediate state of physical collapse when I tried to keep up with the steam driven maniacs who occupied this “middle” designation.


I therefore crept to the only lane which appeared to be unoccupied which also had various machines for helping the disabled into the water. These machines were not being used but their bulk had the advantage of restricting the lane to a single swimmer: me!


I spent most of the time worrying that I was swimming in a reserved lane, or worse in a lane for the very fastest swimmers. But, as I only swim for twenty minutes before I get terminally bored I banked on the fact that by the time anyone got round to telling me that I was doing something wrong, it would be time for me to get out.


I made an executive decision to have a coffee and croissant in the café and look at the pool with eyes in sharper focus.


There still appeared to be no indication of what level of swimmer swam where, but it was a great opportunity to observe my fellow swimmers.


Swimming styles are as distinctive as fingerprints: no two swimmers are entirely identical. They may be elegant – one swimmer’s hands entering the water were as elegant and precise as if he was threading a needle; while the person next to him looked as though she was crawling along the surface of the water.


Some people looked as though they were going through a protracted process of drowning while others glided along with the minimum visible effort. Hand flailed, splashed, jerked, swept, fell and scooped. Faces were set in grimaces and in utter serenity. Whatever techniques they were using they all got their lengths completed.


I did wonder what I looked like. I have spent the summer swimming in our pool where one decent push-off from the side could get you to the other end. A 50m pool needs a different approach and in spite of my daily exercise a larger pool is instant exhausting.


I look forward to finishing each day with a visit to the pool so that the initial cost is gradually reduced to a bargain price for each swim.

Everything changes - again!

A sullen start to the day.



One could tell even though one was up and doing before dawn. This is obviously pay-back time for the glorious day yesterday!


With the way that the timetable has worked out I have my first lesson at 8.15 in the morning and then have nothing until 1.05 pm.


One could say that this is an ideal time to catch up on marking or producing teaching material for the ensuing week: or you could say it is pretty poorly organized in a day which is absurdly over-long.


Amazingly I did manage to get some packing done yesterday evening including the wash-bag which is the one thing which always lacks something essential when you reach your destination. For example I now realize that while I have filled all those little bottles that one has to use if you are only travelling with hand luggage and even remembered the dental floss, I have omitted to pack a razor. As I have now remembered that, I am starting to muse about what obvious other thing I have forgotten.


The UK wallet has been found and packed. This contains all the out of date “gift” cards that UK shops have given me in lieu of money. Reading the small print I noticed on one that after 24 months the company would make a charge of £1 a month for each extra month until the money is gone! You have to admire such greed. I think the answer is to spend things like that immediately even if it’s only buying batteries – they always come in useful.


More importantly I am not sure that my debit card is working for the holes in the wall machines. As I will be there for a weekend when the banks are most emphatically closed I am relying on the card to get me money and the last time I attempted to use the card the machines refused point blank to recognize my plight and steadfastly kept my money safely away from my admittedly grasping hands.


The other point of panic is the hired car. I am only hiring some insultingly basic vehicle and there is always a moment of horror when the people in charge start rejecting all the cards that I have and demand that I show them a true credit card.


As is well known, I am far too young and immature to be trusted with a credit card (even one linked with Amnesty International which was my last excuse for getting one) and I well remember the moment when I cut up the bloody thing with shaking hands and sharp scissors.


It usually ends up with the car hire people taking my Spanish card rather than my British one, but I keep telling myself that it will not be used and is only a precaution so I can rest secure. As long as I remember to take my Catalan wallet too!


I think that the highlight of the weekend will be the taxi ride from Church Road to the party with a car filled with a Roman Emperor, Dracula and Austin Powers – as well as a taxi driver. I will not have any pockets on my costume and I am already worrying about where to put the camera and other necessities.


The last time we had a fancy dress party in Cardiff we also went out and about in the streets and I at least was warm and snug in my Cardinal’s rigout. I fear that the flimsy gold lamé of my admittedly full-length costume will be insufficient to keep out the rigor of a late September night in South Wales.


Meanwhile there is the matter of four days of teaching to get through. Ah well.

I have informed the school that I intend to join the ranks of the workers and participate in the General Strike on the 29th of September. I fear that I will be a lone worker in our school to make this decision which is more a function of the emasculated power of the unions in the way in which they have to operate and their consequent distance from the workers that they are supposed to represent than any cowardice on the part of the teachers in school. I think. I am always prepared to give the benefit of the doubt to the powerless rather than the powerful: though in this case I am not sure which is which!


I have just had a short meeting with the IT teacher to try and find out why my computer refuses to work with the white boards whose use is now mandatory in our school. Even on the first day (the first day mind you!) I attempted to add the computer and white screen to my first class. As is usual with technological equipment in the classroom it was an abject failure; a failure, however that was kept away from the pupils by my furtive attempt to make it work before the class started.


What do I find out now? The pressing of two buttons was all I had to do to make the system mine own. The function button and F5 brought up an icon to change screens; a further press of the F5 brought up the screen which was recognized by the system. And that was it!

There is something immensely satisfying about a meeting which takes virtually no time whatsoever and makes your teaching easier. This meeting ranks as one of the most “time as a function of utility” positive meetings I have ever had. I will use it as a measure of the usefulness of all the other meetings to which I have to go in the rest of the year.


Or perhaps not as that way madness lies!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

The third Floor is open for vitamin D donations!


As if in shamefaced compensation for the abject weather we have had for the last couple of days, Saturday dawned bright and sunny and so far the day has been flawless with perfectly blue skies and more than acceptable amounts of sunshine.


As a partially hysterical reaction to the weather I agreed to go for a walk, something I usually spurn as if it were a rabid dog.


Today however the sun drew me out and putting on a new pair of slip-on sports shoes (wonderfully under priced in Carrefour’s) I put the best foot forward and strode out into the further reaches of Castelldefels and on to Gava.


I regretted my impulse almost immediately but trudged on if only to see what the Socialists were doing.


Every year at this time the ruling party PSOE, which calls itself socialist for no doctrinal reasons that I can discern in their policies, has a Grand Gathering of the Political Clans in a tree shaded stretch of road next to the motorway a few streets away from us.


There is a stage and long undulating lines of tables around which the faithful sit and make merry and listen with humility (suspending their disbelief) to the speeches of their political masters.


Phalanxes of Catalan police with their lop-sided caps were in abundant evidence, their numbers greater than the total of police we normally see in our part of the town over two or three years – or indeed more.


All the Catalan and Spanish television and radio stations were represented in the lines of OB vans along the road making me wonder if the national president as well as the Catalan president was going to be there.

Bus loads of party members were being unloaded when we, only momentarily amused by a small but vocal anti-nuclear demonstration, made our way to the beach paseo.


The paseo and beach road which runs parallel to it for a part of its length are undergoing changes. Part of the road has been made into a two way cycle way with a number of what look like dead striped armadillos keeping cars from meandering into the cycle path. This cycle way is gradually getting longer stretching from the central part of Castelldefels Playa until it stops abruptly (with no warning) nearer to our house.


The paseo has been growing over the years until the Castelldefels part linked to the Gava section. This latter section was interrupted by a sort of river and cyclists had to go up the length of the river to the road and there chance their survival with cars which gave no mercy until cyclists could escape back to the side of the beach and dedicated cycle lanes.


No longer! Spurning financial crisis our local authority has constructed a bridge so that cyclists and pedestrians can now walk in relative safety over the stagnant interestingly coloured waters on a newly constructed bridge. This has increased the numbers of walkers and cyclists and is a true boost to the facilities in the area. One is loath to admit it, but it does seem like public money well spent!

Lunch from our local chicken “pollo a last” was worse in every respect to the quality that we get from the establishment we used to patronize when we were in the flat. This should have been an ideal opportunity to use my bike to get the food from a better place but, as usual, indolence triumphed over future gratification.


The “little light tidying” has now almost been done as it certainly wasn’t done last night. The thought of packing my case so that there will be no last minute panic as “Something Important” cannot be found.


I am looking forward to my visit to the UK on Friday and trust that I will have dried out sufficiently to take coherent lessons by Monday!