De Perros y Limones

Spring Steps

A big few weeks for the Byatt/Abeyawardene household during March, the main one being that Sonalee is back here in Spain!  She told me that she would only be here for a week but took something called ‘Recruitment Leave’ (we hadn’t heard of it either) so that she could be here for a whole fortnight! 

  • Luna is in there somewhere

She told me as we were drinking coffee at a restaurant near the airport and as a way to make up for completely forgetting my birthday last month.  I knew she’d forgotten when I video called her that day and I was a bit mean because I wanted to see her facial expressions when she finally realised.  She didn’t disappoint.  

So, anyway, we’re into her second week at the moment; the sun is shining; we’re eating great food and drinking great wine; the dogs are extremely happy and we know that when she goes back this time we will only have a three months until she, Bibi and Sparky (the cat) will be here in Spain for good!

The colours of the campo

I say for good but that may change.  We’re applying for positions in the school in Lisbon that I finished working for the day before Sonalee came over – great timing for a change. 

I was a bit choked up on the Friday that I finished, I’ll admit that.  It wasn’t easy to say goodbye to the kids so I kind of bottled out of it and left them a message on their virtual classroom board.  Some of them left me some lovely messages to say thank you, which didn’t help me not choke up.  What to do?

Luna likes helping with the washing up

I admit it was nice to be appreciated.  And by the staff as well.  My head of department said some lovely words as did the head of the senior school.  Actually my HoD has been lovely all along.  On our first ever meeting online we did the serious-faced discussion about expectations, curriculum etc until the discussion came round to pooches and “Do you want to see my dogs?”  So we both ended up with sheepish looking hounds being held in front of the laptop camera whilst we gassed away saying how naughty they are.  Predictably, Luna got the most ‘Aahhh’s. 

The civil war fortifications

Everybody loves Luna.

Looking south

My boss is also a football fan.  Yes, she’s a Man Utd fan but we all have our crosses to bear.  She claims she got it from her dad.  Her husband is also a professional footballer in Portugal. What to do?   Well, when I explained that Sonalee is far more experienced and far more qualified to teach English (and much prettier) than me, it was noted down.   Noted down because they have a position for an English teacher for next year.

  • This is Priego de Cordoba

I think we would enjoy a year in Lisbon.  The kids say the salted cod is amazing, the beaches are beautiful and the football is good.  We would be working in a real classroom so we wouldn’t be sat down for 5 hours a day – I had an extremely painful back from it all – and we would finally get to meet the various Marias and Pedros (there seemed to be loads of them) that I taught for a brief few weeks.   We shall see.  If that doesn’t work out then we may have to go to plan B, which involves chicken farming.

In other news, I’ve finally gotten through all of the lemons on the tree – it only took three months of giving them away, drinking lemon squash every day, making lemon chutney, making lemon marmalade, making Moroccan preserved lemons, drizzling lemon juice on every meal.  The next crop will be ready in six months.  Honestly, it really is never-ending but in a good way.

Looking north east (I think)

The biggest news that we have from the village is that we now officially have an enemy!  I know!  At last!   Everyone else has at least one and we were kind of feeling left out because whilst we met some real miserable sods, no one seemed to actively dislike us.   We have a dog hater who is now our official enemy.  He’s hugely overweight, wears clothes that are even skankier than what I wear, lives on his own on a street that seems to be infested with ‘special’ men (we call it Nutter Lane) and drives a battered old breadvan that leaks oil all over the place.  He’s a real catch.

  • you know what she’s thinking…
  • I married this?

We went for a walk in the middle of nowhere last week, came up this huge long steep slope to find him waiting there to tell us to put  the dogs on the lead.    We’re in the campo, not a soul anywhere and he’s waiting to tell us that (he must have seen the car parked a mile up the road).  He was the bloke who threatened our house-sitter Tony last summer – fortunately Tony wasn’t intimidated at all.  Literally no one else gives a flying one that our dogs go off lead in the campo and many other people let their dog out into the village to wander round as they please.  It is quite bizarre.

We had a cold snap for a few nights

Andalusia is still grappling with the pandemic, as you would imagine.  Our lockdown has been relaxed somewhat so that bars are now open until later in the evening, a massive step given the cultural and economic importance of eating and drinking out.  More shops in Priego have sadly closed, schools have remained open throughout and the numbers have been going down steadily.  The vaccination program is going ahead cautiously and our village government have produced a leaflet telling us all just how wonderful they are – which is nice of them.

It doesn’t look like we will be getting a flood of tourists here in the summer despite the hopes of many on the coast and it means that the economy will take another massive hit.   Other British immigrants here in Andalusia have been complaining about a lack of British food available in supermarkets and that “It’s just not good enough”.  No, really.  And, somehow, you know that they were probably also the ones who voted Leave in the referendum – UKIP had an office in Malaga specifically to get the ‘expat’ vote. 

The only problem, as I see it, is a total lack of piccalilli which I think is an absolute scandal.  I have contacted my UK MP about it but have yet to receive a reply.  I’m thinking of writing to the UN to complain about it but I can’t seem to find the right department to hassle. There’s no use having a go at the Spanish authorities since they don’t actually have a word for piccalilli nor do they have a clue what it is.  I might start an online petition, they seem to be quite popular at the moment.

Our car has passed its ITV, the equivalent of an MOT.  It was a very efficient system where you drive through a series of testing areas (wheel alignment, brakes etc) to see if your vehicle is safe.  All done within 30 minutes.  The highlights of it included the instruction from the testing guy to turn all four of the front lights on, which was news to me since we never realised that we had four front lights.  You learn something every day.  I also liked the assumption that of the two of us, it would be me, the man, who would be doing the driving through. 

An old favourite – Zuheros Castle

So Spring has officially arrived at the same time that my wife arrived for her two weeks holiday (and job hunting).  The olive harvest has been collected – a good one this year apparently – and the fields reverberate to the sounds of chainsaws being used to trim the trees ready for the Autumn growing season.  The campo looks more ‘meadowy’ than ever with lots of yellow and red flowers tempting the bees to stop and take a look and the weather is getting more cheery every day.

We have spent many hours walking in the campo, visiting pretty villages within the subbetica, hosting a curry night and visiting Jan who does an excellent Sunday Roast (with horseradish sauce!) and catching up on village gossip with Ken and Maria.   I think I can honestly say that this is the happiest that Sonalee and I have been for a long time. 

Naturally, this will all change next week when Sonalee goes back to Morocco but hopefully it will be less traumatic than before because we can finally see an end to it.  It is only a couple of months.  I am not quite sure how we both got through the last seven months but we did and I am sure the next few will go very quickly indeed.  Sonalee will be doing all the stuff you need to do to finish off the academic year and to get ready to make the permanent move back to Spain and I will have a host of DIY jobs that are always necessary when you own an old house, especially an old Spanish house.

Carcabuey Castle

We will be busy. 

Stay healthy.

Hasta Luego, inshallah

Ayubowan

Paul

PS  Very easy to forget just how good this lot were.  And they really were very good.

Paul

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