Tapas Espagne

As I think I have said before, the best way to experience tapas is to let the Spanish organise it. 

Last night some of the team meet in a tapas bar and I was invited too. It is a Thursday, but people commute back for the weekend on Friday, particularly as Friday end early. So Thursday is the night out time. 

And a lovely mild evening it was. All of us live a short walk from the selected bar, my 400 yards was perhaps the furthest, and my walk boasted the only hill. The mild weather meant that coats were unnecessary but pullovers were advisable. 

As I had gone to get cash, I was a little after the stated time. I waited a while for someone to arrive and eventually thought I had missed them, but the first 2 had sneaked into a corner whilst I was not looking. I joined them, and 2 others arrived shortly after. 

Beer is small and fizzy, and there is a small plate of tapas with each one. But this team were here for more substantial stuff. 

As I hope you can see in the photo, here is meat and oil in abundance. Even the chips are covered in ham, oil, and mashed egg. It is all delicious, and this time I have the receipt so I can guess what they were called! 

The ladies passed by and stopped to say hello. They went off for more serious drinking, so I was told, but I was quite happy where I was. 

Terence Westoby

Sent from Samsung tablet

New things

Every time I come our to Spain, I have a new car to drive. Whilst arriving at the hotel now feels like coming home! the car experience is something to be learned every time.

This time the lady at the desk tried hard to ensure I had cruise control. I find this essential for traveling on the long empty routes through the middle of the country. She succeeded.

Indeed this car has almost everything except it is not convertible. There is a large touch-screen in the middle that does the air-conditioning. This then doubles as part of the cruise control, but I found that out only much later.

As usual with a new car, it takes time to find out how it all works. I got in all right but could not access a key. Still, since there was no ignition, all I had to do was leave the key on the passenger seat.

Now I had seen plans for this. The car detects the key and whether it is in or out of the car. In the car, you can start it (if you work out that you have to press the clutch at the same to was the start button). If out of the car you can open the locked car by pulling on the door handle, or lock an open car by pressing the back of the door handle.

Problem.
How do you check the car is locked? If you try the door it unlocks! But this one swings the wing mirrors in when it is locked so you can tell.

The lights are automatic, as is the hand break (a small switch). The car holds itself on hills and has proximity sensors front and back. The central display tells you how close you are. It is tempting to park without looking out of the windows! The rear mirror dims as required and the windscreen wipers are probably automatic, but this is Spain and I have had no chance to find out.

But starting the cruise control took me several kilometres. Part of the problem was that the error messages for my attempts were in German. And part of the problem was the control that was behind the steering wheel and out if sight. It had 3 switches and a rolling wheel. But 2 of the switches pushed in and pulled back. Once I pulled one back it all swung into operation.

But that was not all. I puzzled over the effect of pushing the switches. It caused the central display to change and offer lots of options. I tried one. It set the cruise control to a standard speed. I quickly found I could select the road speed when it changed and the car would adapt.

And then I came up behind a lorry. I lost power. What's up I thought, but nothing was up. The display over the steering wheel showed how close I was to the vehicle in front and the cruise control adapted to stay 2 seconds behind it. I adjusted that to 2 1/2 seconds- this car made you lazy and I wanted the extra time to be sure!

It is a little alarming coming up behind things and waiting for the car to slow up at the last minute. But it does. As you pull out in the dual carriageway to overtake, it notices the clear road ahead and accelerates. Freaky.

So I arrived at the hotel. As I stopped, the car turned the engine off for me and put the hand break on. I felt miffed at having to open the door for myself.

Now it is not a "drive it for you" car yet. And the headlamps don't notice oncoming traffic and darken parts of the beam to stop glare. These things are being worked on an will be coming one day.

I have a feeling it won't be long.

Cordialement
Terry

Envoyé de mon iPhone

Sorry for the last post

So those of you who saw the last blog (now deleted) will realise it was a bit spurious. It is so easy to publish a blog that I did it by accident. The information was stuff that I found and captured concerning French law of succession and so I sent it to myself .... but I chose the wrong email.

Now in addition to it being easy to publish the blog, many of you also get an email with the new blog post. That's easy too.

But if that is a little boring, here is something to make you think. At the French company I work for it advertised in English,

"There are more children leaning English in China than there are in England".

Those of you who live there may be able to tell me if they no longer teach English in school. But I suspect it is just a question of numbers really.

So now you know.

Hot springs

Now that I have lived in the outskirts of Paris for a while, I have noticed that it is a town which likes to boast a little. After all, it is Paris.

Certainly there are some lovely, or at least impressive, old buildings. Not to mention the Eiffel Tower, and there are modern ones too.

This town likes to be best at most things if it can.

But there are some things that are not usual in a town. One of these is a hot geyser. You see them in Iceland or the great parks in America, but not usually in the road!

But here in the outskirts of Paris they have achieved even that. I had noticed some geothermal activity at this manhole for a while. Now it has erupted and is a splendid display.

I suppose it has been a bit of a surprise, judging by the bollards in the road. A planned geyser would have been in a park. And now the geologists (I presume) are digging up the road to investigate.

I'll keep you posted if and when it becomes signposted as a tourist attraction, as I am sure it must be soon.

Cordialement
Terry

Envoyé de mon iPhone

No idea

I suppose that as I am getting older, it is getting a little harder to keep my weight down. So advises mother. But I intend to succeed whatever the scales say when I get home! 

Of course being in Spain conspires against me a little. Not only do I not speak the language, but I am constrained to "eat out" every day I am away. I combat eating out by buying snacks for my room, and I overcome the worst of the language difficulties with an on-line dictionary (Clare's suggestion). It works for the most part. 

And perhaps I am learning a little. I could see that there is a free town WiFi and the other day I tried signing up. Google helps, it translated the web page for me, so I invented a sign-in name and gave them my email. The next step defeated me! I had to retrieve a password within 3 minutes and sign in. With no Web available there was no way to receive the email with the code in it. I found the email much later in my spam box! 

But today I found I could see both the town Internet and the hotel one if I choose my location properly. With a bit of juggling between networks, I was soon a registered user of a Spanish site! And so a little earlier I was able to call my mum on Skype from the park. 

Tonight I took the easy option and ate in the hotel. I can order the main course and a glass of wine, but in Spain it is not as simple as that! What sort of wine is another question. Fortunately my host is very helpful and today he proposed wine from a bottle that I could see was exceptional. There was no boasting on the label, just a simple identification on a dark bottle full of promise. Uncharacteristically I was asked to taste it, either as part of the necessary ritual, or perhaps because my host was unwilling to part with the liquid if by some chance I did not like it! 

I did like it, it was instantly delicious. Soon along with the wine came the tapas. Impossible as it is (I am told) for the Spanish to drink without eating, so too the meals here come with tapas as a starter. It's automatic. 

But I don't order this dish, it is completely random. Today some toasties with orange paste on and a meat beside it was presented. I had it before and it is much nicer than it looks, and today a cup of something new came along too. I gathered it was a soup and very hot, the warning was in English.

The television is showing English football with Spanish commentary and I have no idea what I ate but I enjoyed it! So you see in the picture all sorts of things, the identity of which is a mystery to me, but they were all delicious. Mum says I am always going on about the food I eat, well it is true, but it is my adventure.

I wish I could point you to these delicious things, or be able to repeat them myself, but I can't. They remain a chance one-off to be enjoyed while I can.

And the brandy has arrived. Yesterday my host suggested this and it certainly was a good night's sleep afterwards! Now the brandy has returned but today it is the promised 1866 version. It is in my hand as I amend this post. 

I wonder what the scales back home are going to say? 

Terry 

Sent from Samsung tablet

Ados

You can see from the first photo, that all that is left from the wedding in the hotel are these flowers that fell from the bridal car. So for more a interesting image, here is a palm from the nearby park. Somewhere to walk off the night before.

Not that I was part of the wedding party. It is just that it started as I arrived at the hotel. I was tired and it was noisy. However, unlike most wedding parties, this one went quiet at about 11pm.

The person who told me what I should have expected from a wedding party, also explained what the Spanish think of when they use the word "adolescent".

It appears that to the Spanish, this word means "ado" as in adult, and "lescent" as in lacking something. So the word is full of meaning. It clearly states these are adults who yet lack a key "something". And this is a society that is very close as families all the way to adulthood; so I assume he knew what he was talking about.

Now I have to report that the 'key something' was never explicitly spelled out to me. It appears that this indefinable thing is both poorly identified and clearly obvious.

So this understanding, 'obvious' as it is, is still no help in coming through this awkward stage.

Cordialement
Terry

Envoyé de mon iPhone

Comments:
The explanation I saw said, “Adolescence is when you are expected to behave like an adult and let yourself be treated as a child!” So it’s not going to be any different any time soon.

White Night

Photo in the Jazz Club.

There has been another "nuit Blanche"here in Paris. I did not know it, but at church this morning, at the early service, it was mentioned. It appeared to me that the attendance was down- the night is an opportunity to visit lots of free events, all night if you want to.

But we did go down to Paris that night. It is our last weekend together and the best opportunity to celebrate the birthday that is soon to happen. So we ate out and then visited the Jazz Club near Montparnasse. Indeed we were out late just because of that. We caught the last fast train home and I wondered at the number of Parisians who crowded the train. I assumed this was normal weekend traffic at the time.

So today there was still lots of people about. On our walk back to the train station we passed dozens of coaches all parked in one street. Posters in the windows of some if these proclaimed a march for families. Details were unclear but it appeared that hundreds of people had arrived to make a difference.

The difference we noticed was that the temperature had dropped dramatically so we dived into the train station and headed home to warm up.

Cordialement
Terry

Envoyé de mon iPhone