Andalucid Again

This Cloistered Life: Reflections on the coronavirus lockdown

With thanks to Fred Shively for the photos in this post

This Cloistered Life

"For in this Rose containéd was / heaven and earth in little space.” (Medieval carol)

Today, as for the past fifty days, I am sitting in the bright ringing silence of our dining room in this town flat, where I also work and write.  Lunch is over, work becalmed, there is nowhere to go and no-one can visit. Day after day, my husband and I observe the ceremonies of breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner; go out separately for short walks with the dog, and watch a film or TV series at night. Twice a week, I carry out a masked raid on the nearest small supermarket.

I’m not unhappy.

And I’m not alone in this feeling. Several family members and friends admit to finding this new, more limited life not only bearable, but in some ways preferable.

“We don’t have to give or accept invitations to lunch or dinner.”

“We’re saving a lot of money, the days have more space for things we want to do, a rhythm and peace.”

“No-one else is doing anything exciting or going anywhere ‘awesome,’ any more than we are.” (No mo’ FOMO)

“I can watch Holby City in peace and without feeling guilty…”

I am finding the reduced demands on my time, attention, energy and money surprisingly liberating. I feel protected from the many calls the outside world made on these commodities. I feel cloistered.

The Order of St. Clare (‘the Poor Clares’) was founded in 1212. Inspired by the preaching of St. Francis, Clare of Assisi, an aristocratic young woman, refused the marriage planned by her parents and embraced a life of poverty, seclusion and contemplation.

The Poor Clares are members of the strictest order of cloistered life, the Papal Cloister. Here, “the presence of strangers can be admitted only in case of necessity…it must be a space of silence and recollection, facilitated by the absence of external works…”¹

Clare’s rules for nuns have come down through the centuries unchanged: “once her hair has been cut off round her head and her secular dress set aside, she is to be allowed three tunics and a mantle … she may not go outside the monastery except for some useful, reasonable, evident, and approved purpose.”²

Now my hair is growing out a fine penitential grey, and Clare’s ‘three tunics and a mantle’ have been transmuted into three interchangeable teeshirts and two pairs of jeans. As for ‘going outside the monastery’, my husband and I only emerge for the ‘evident and approved purpose’ of taking our dog on a toilet run, or buying ever stranger combinations of ingredients with which to conjure up cheering meals.  Our days are bounded by customs that have become traditions, in a cycle as sacred as the canonical hours.

In ordinary times, so much resource goes into how I look to the outside world. I am amazed at how well I can live without all the stuff – clothes and cosmetics; particular brands and types of food and drink; travel and entertainment choices – all the things I thought were the minimum for the good life, before Coronavirus captivity both narrowed and expanded my views.

I’m looking at photographs on a beautiful website called Cloistered Life. The nuns appear to live exclusively in ‘the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’. In her whitewashed room, a Sister kneels beside her narrow bed with its drab wool blanket, to pray. Above her, blessed light pours in through white-curtained windows. It is a scene from a medieval Book of Hours.

In another picture, a nun sits on a dark wooden bench, in a garden carpeted with lawn and furnished with flowers. Sunshine tints the mellow stone wall behind her copper-gold. Tranquility breathes from the very photos. Here in their different silences, “Vultum Dei Quaerere,” the nuns ‘seek the face of God.’ In the quiet of this warm-day siesta hour, I glimpse the healing force of peace and contemplation.

Back to the real (surreal) world, where to date nearly 3.5 million people have been diagnosed with COVID-19 and more than a quarter of a million have died. There is grief, anger and worse to come. Yet fragile but positive outcomes are also emerging. For the first time in 30 years, it is possible for the people of the Punjab to see the peaks of the Himalayas, over 100 miles away. Up to 100,000 deaths could now be prevented if China’s slowdown continues to clear away the deadly smog hovering over its industrial regions.

Towns and cities all over the world – even some banks and businesses – have breathed life on the embers of community spirit and some are practising practical compassion for vulnerable individuals. Hard-pressed workers are catching up on sleep, regular meals and family life. Yet I and everyone I know talks about ‘getting back to normal,’ as soon as may be.

I long for Spain’s ‘estado de alarma’ to pass. I envisage a fresh morning and café con leche by the fountain in the plaza, our streets full of familiar faces again, the shops full of exciting ingredients. People smiling again, shouting greetings across the road, kids playing, dogs walking their people into town. Perhaps one day, I will have a good laugh with my brother and sister once more, all sitting together in a favourite London bar.

But behind this healthy wish, I harbour a shadow desire - that things will never ‘go back to normal’. Greed of gain of those already drowning in wealth; politicians mouthing dangerous platitudes to hang on to power and governments that have been hijacked by corporate interests; healthcare that is more ailing than the patients who need it; a new cohort of slave-labour emerging from a numberless desperation; travel anywhere, everywhere and for no good purpose. The resumption of the oblivious rush to the deeper doom of accelerating climate change.

“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone,” wrote French philosopher Blaise Pascal (1623-1662). However that may be, I hope that when I emerge, when we all emerge from the ‘war on Covid-19’, that ‘peace’ and its attendant unleashing of appetites and activities, does not turn out to be the more dangerous outcome after all.

One of the Poor Clare’s four vows is the vow of poverty: “we are emptied of things to be filled with eternal riches; we are set free from slavery to materialism, secularism, and consumerism.” Denied the happy distractions of getting and spending, I have found the past few weeks to be surprisingly rich in moments of joy. Forced to turn inwards, I have found, at times, a “heaven and earth in little space.”

¹ https://cloisteredlife.com/introduction

² https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/inside-the-cloister

 

100 Days of Solitude: social distancing in small-town southern Spain, Week 2

With thanks to Matthias Boeckel and Pixabay for the picture of chive blossoms

 

WEEK TWO

 Sunday 22 March – Week Two, Day 1

I wake as daylight fills the bedroom window. For a moment, everything seems fine, then again, that startle of recognition: “This is really happening to us right now.”  This ‘after-the-bomb’ slow-motion transformation of our everyday routine and lifescape. People with shuttered faces hurrying past shuttered shops in deserted streets.

On the news, Chinese families emerge from their 'house arrest' for the first time in eight weeks. You can see their eyes smiling above their masks, as they take in the sun and fresh air. What will be the first signs of hope here? Perhaps our first coffee on the terrace at Galindo’s, every table full of friendly faces upturned to the sun.

Luckily, Fred has channelled his creative energy into cooking and baking. He is my secret weapon for making this situation much more than bearable. Today’s Sunday roast chicken will be turned into Monday’s curry and Tuesday’s stir-fry (helped along with a tub of Pot Noodles).  Even better, the last two prune and walnut muffins he made this week are crumbed into today’s classic Apple Crisp – a triumph!  I tell Fred there is no-one I would rather be trapped indoors with.

Tuesday 23 March – Week Two, Day 2

We’ve decided to plan menus more carefully and shop just twice a week for groceries. This morning’s ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ mission: go up the hill to the car, drive to vets for giant bag of wheat-free kibble and special diet tinned food for Eds. Stop at pharmacy for one missing medication; Fred assures me he will be a goner by Thursday teatime if it is not replaced. Drive past street door and dump food with waiting Fred. Park car even further than usual, walk to greengrocer, leave bag to collect on my way back. To supermarket to order half a corn-fed chicken for Friday. Return home via greengrocer’s, with siege provisions for rest of week.

Wednesday 24 March – Week Two, Day 3

There is a knock at the door after breakfast. Yolanda, who lives in our block, and who I never spoke to before yesterday, presents me with three handcrafted cotton face masks. A manly blue one for Fred, pink for me, faced with pink gingham, and a little baby size one – maybe it’s for Eds! How kind. Three guesses what I put in the inner panels to insulate the masks…

I think about getting the vacuum cleaner out and doing the rugs. Unfortunately, though the time available for housework has expanded significantly, my interest in doing it has remained exactly the same size as it was. The vacuum cleaner is left undisturbed, gathering dust.

I have found a hair colour I can live with, a dark blonde shade. According to the picture on the box, I will emerge as a pouting beauty with rippling golden tresses. I think it is just a serving suggestion.

Thursday 25 March – Week Two, Day 4

I talk to a friend living in London. She admits to being quite relieved at the lack of social obligations – nowhere to go, no-one to see. She can watch Holby City guilt-free; pollution levels are way down; people are rediscovering a sense of community; we are seeing how much the NHS really matters. The clamour of sports and celebrity trivia has dwindled to a whisper. If we are fortunate, we might look back on this strange few weeks and months and think it was not all bad.

Friday 26 March – Week Two, Day 5

I’m out with Eds for his teatime walk, and juggling a bag of fruit and veg from Antonio, whose stall is at the end of our block. I hiss my order at him as I go past with the dog, fling money on the counter and collect the bag at speed on the return leg. Often a local policia squad car is parked across the road, watchful. Hopefully this doesn’t count as a shopping trip, as I have the dog in tow. And Eds will never blab.

On this rare rainy afternoon, the Lujar mountains are slate grey against the pearl grey sky, white clouds billowing across them, a magical frame for our small, sleeping town.

It’s a local fiesta today, when the Alpujarras’ patron saint, El Cristo de la Expiración, is paraded from the church at sunset, accompanied by the Virgen de los Dolores. It is a matter of pride to Orgiveños that the ensuing hectic release of firecrackers, the ecstatic crescendo of  noise and dense smoke, are unrivalled in the many similar ceremonies that take place in Andalucia around this time. This year, it is all played out as usual, echoing eerily through the deserted high street.

Saturday 27 March – Week Two, Day 6

Every day this week has produced a record number of coronavirus fatalities for Spain. Madrid is the epicentre; here in our little town, the only infections we know about have happened to three members of the post office team. And yet the possibility of infection seems to lurk around every corner, the invisible item given out with the change in every shop. Our ‘estado de alarma’ seems to have been in place for a long time already, but we all know there is a long way to go. 

100 Days of Solitude: social distancing in small-town southern Spain

WEEK ONE

Sunday 15 March – Day 1

Our 'estado de Alarma' has already begun, eased in on a Sunday when shops are always shut anyway.

Today I went out only to take the dog for a walk.  The first rain in weeks had revived all the green growing things. Intense perfume of orange blossom with whiffs of wild garlic, raindrops still glittering on leaf and flower, the mild still evening. I could have walked for hours in near solitude. Stripped of possibilities for being anywhere to meet anyone, time feels expanded, I am less restless than usual on a Sunday. Should I feel this good?

I'm sad for our local bars, cafés and restaurants. They are the best part of our town, each with its own personality presiding over it, grumpy and grudging or warm and welcoming. Some, already trading on slim margins, will have closed their doors for good.

To bed, where all the baffled hopes and plans of all my family members, friends and complete strangers weave a veil of worry around my head.

 

Monday 16 March – Day 2

Cool and showery, this morning’s grey sky sets the new tone. Armoured in my beacon-red puffa jacket, I set off with shopping list and bag in hand. I need to reassure any passing Guardia Civil patrol that I am just an anxious housewife out to get basic supplies for my clamouring family.

On his usual corner, Andy, one of our street entrepreneurs, is scowling into a rubbish bin. He usually has a cheerful greeting to share, but this morning, he doesn’t even see me. The police won’t let Andy stay on the street all day now, and anyway who will pass by to give him change?

In my local mini-supermarket, staff are wearing masks and gloves. Usually, it’s a social hub, but no-one is even making eye contact today, as if glances could transmit. Shelves are still half-stocked, though choice is already more limited. I buy sliced bread, a big jar of Marmite, more baked beans and coffee.

I planned to use these weeks to get slimmer, fitter, by exercising every day. I would step out in Holy Week, toned if not exactly tanned, wearing my skinniest black jeans and a black vest, transformed. Instead, I go back to the supermarket this evening and buy a huge bag of salt and vinegar crisps for me, and the Thai flavour for Fred. And I seize the last-but-one packet of frozen crumpets with a secret, savage joy.

Rain stopped before lunchtime, but the bright air has turned sharply cold, with a sawtooth wind. I need comfort food to face our sad, diminished streets again.

Tuesday 17 March – Day 3

I’m starting to understand that the next two weeks are going to feel like one very long Sunday. Don’t think about it.

Poor Antonio – our greengrocer is wilting more quickly than his unsold lettuce, without the rain of social contact that he flourishes in. I usually hear his voice below my bathroom window every morning, booming out greetings to passing drivers and pedestrians, or hanging out loudly with ‘the Choir’ – five or six of his old friends, who gather around the bench opposite his shop.

Today Antonio is wearing a mask as well as gloves. He says almost no-one has been in, and is taking an unusually gloomy view of things. He could be right – there are fewer people than ever in the street, and no-one I know. When you do see someone, you feel abashed, furtive, as if they have caught you outside after curfew.

When I get back from walking Eddie, I see a message from a friend who lives in town. She’s getting cabin fever after a whole day indoors, so I offer up Eds to her for a bonus walk after dinner. He looks at me reproachfully, but I tell him we all have to do our bit right now.

Wednesday 18 March – Day 4

Reader, today we defrosted the freezer. Over the past year, a mini-Ross Ice Shelf had formed above the top drawer. After a long morning spent pouring away ice-melt, swabbing everything dry, and throwing out age-old packets of petrified proteins, we gazed on our depleted but orderly freezer with quiet satisfaction.

Later, I worked out how to use liquid detergent in the washing machine. I’ve had a big bottle of the stuff in the laundry for months but couldn’t work out the Spanish instructions. It took an hour, plus washing out the dispenser and polishing the top of the machine. And I caught up with all the laundry. By the weekend I will probably be scrubbing behind the toilets.

Thursday 19 March – Day 5

Sounds that don’t soothe: In the big villa opposite our dining room, someone is busy with power tools. I shut the windows tight against the fitful rattle and rasp of the drill. Later, our upstairs neighbour seems to be hacking at furniture. And every breakfast-time, a shower door (?) slams repeatedly, directly above us. Owing to the strange position of our corner flat, we are not even sure exactly who counts as our neighbour on one side. We are only sure that we wish they hadn’t started DIY projects this week.

Our US client sends a kind email, also asking us to hold all marketing activity on this year’s event until further notice. As for so many others, the next few months are shrouded in uncertainty about work and pay.

I delete my Guardian news app, which I have been checking around 20 times a day to get my next fix of shock and awe. It had to go and I feel better without it.

Saturday 20 March – Day 6

This time last week, I was sitting on a busy, sunny terrace having coffee with a friend, who was going to drive back to the coast afterwards.  It seems like another life, and I suppose it was. Yesterday, Spain suffered its highest 24-hour coronavirus death toll, with 235 fatalities and almost 20,000 confirmed cases.

In our small local supermarket I assess the remaining shades of hair colour with which to rescue my greying roots. Black seems improbable, blonde, impossible. I decide to let it go. When this is over I will emerge like Mrs. Rochester from her attic, clawing long grizzled locks aside and frightening the young.

With work currently on hold, I’ve tried to create some kind of daily timetable, to stop me binge-reading Edith Wharton novels on my Kindle App. There is Domestic Chores Hour, K.I.T. with Family and Friends Hour; Writing Hour ( or ‘Not Writing Hour’). Followed by Fitness Hour and Spanish Language Hour, then Dinner. Followed by Collapse In Front of Netflix Hour (actually 2.5 hours on average), and so to bed.

In practice, all these Hours tend to seep into each other, and I find myself doing KIT with FF in response to a random WhatsApp message, when I should be doing Domestic Chores, and so on. Anyway I should have plenty of time to refine and perfect my self-immolation routine over the next few weeks.

I reinstall my Guardian news app.

 

Alpujarra water gremlins at work

About two weeks ago, we noticed a smell of damp plaster in Fred's office and our big living room at the end of the hall. Our Spanish friends said it was just stuffy from winter and we should air the place. We duly flung open windows, relished the early warm spring and breathed deep.

The smell got stronger. A small patch of mould appeared above Fred's office desk. "It's where he breathes/vapes" said the clued-up locals. We sprayed the mould and it disappeared. Easy!

The smell got stronger still and last week, the plaster started to bubble unmistakeably. A few tears of water rolled down the office wall, straight into the plug sockets above the desk. This past weekend, two loud crashes announced the decline and fall of two framed posters, sliding down the wall and petulantly smashing their glass into a thousand shards. I was going to call M. Night Shyamalan with a new movie idea. (Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, Split, Glass, and now Water Gremlins).

Water began to pool, seeping at Olympic speeds until we were mopping on the hour almost every hour. Yesterday, the electricity kept cutting out every 10 minutes, then every five. We called in the cavalry. Our excellent landlord was on to it straight away. The insurers sent a builder and plumber round within hours. We kept smiling as they picked and hammered a large hole in the dividing wall and handed each other tools and advice through it.

Water ploshed and plaster flew (that wall is/was painted a tasteful cafe´con leche colour). The guys resisted all offers of tea, coffee, chocolate biscuits or even water. Within three hours, the water gremlins had been banished, and the walls in both rooms sported fantastic mushroom designs in fresh plaster. I am sure we will not even notice these in a day or two. 

Now we just wait two weeks and it is said that a painter will appear as if by magic, to make it all lovely again. The water gremlins have been wrung out - for now.

 

 

Blogging Tour: why I write

 

Dear Ruth Paris's persuasive email about this ‘blogging tour’ arrived to prick my conscience: I haven’t written anything on my blog for ages. And another age has passed since she asked me. 

Do visit Ruth's site - viewing her huerto (allotment) blog offers a refreshing shower for the overheated mind.

So, in answer to the four Big Questions:

Q1: What am I working on?
Peer into my mental tumble dryer today, and you’ll spot the following:
•    a case statement (a charity’s raison d’être) for a prominent school that gives BBB kids (Bright, from a Broken Background) a chance to shine.
•    An interview with a local lawyer who is going to help our hospice charity get more funding
•    An ad promoting our next expert forum for the tobacco industry
•    A downloadable pdf brochure lauding the latest triumphs of a special baby new potato from Pembrokeshire
•    A new blog post for my blog, Andalucid, about a day in Málaga with our noses in roses.

Q2: How does my work differ from others in the genre?
So many genres, so little space! The only common thread seems to be that whatever I’m writing, I want to play, with language and imagery and the rhythm of sentences. This tendency means I am often put on the naughty step by clients and editors until I promise to be less literary and more literal.


Q3: Why do I write what I write?
1) For a living. I get to work at home, take our terrier Eddie for walks in the woods and still pay the grocery bills.

2) For good. In case my words might move someone to care, donate or get involved with what matters – healing hurt and creating kindness in the world.

3) For fun. I love sharing what I love – the smell of a garden after rain, the absurd, overheard; biting into the crumbly cloud of a croissant.

4) Because I can't take photographs.

Q4: How does my writing process work?
A steaming mug of tea or coffee and a Sicilian lemon shortbread is a good start. A 0.7 gel pen gliding over a lined yellow pad. Powered by my anxiety to order and shape a swirl of ideas, research, words and phrases.

Two mugs of tea later, If I’m lucky, a little pile of yellow notepaper has caught and held a misty, messy version of the piece I want to write. Only then can I sit down at my Mac, run my fingers over the keys and hammer out a first draft. Typing the last few words brings a rush of relief. I’ve pinned myself down again, stilled my restless body and mind and captured an idea, a message, a moment I can share.

Some of  the best writers I know don't blog, but I'll namecheck you anyway, my friends: Rosie Miles, Shujata Luptajan, Carrie Saint Freedman, Helen Bell, Laura McFall - they are exceptionally witty, sharp and truthful about their daily lives.

Finally, I'd like to nominate one more: Karethe Linaae is an engaging and informative blogger bursting with enthusiasm about her new home, the beautiful mountain town of Ronda in Andalucia.

Karethe's life changed drastically in November 2013, when she and her husband moved from Vancouver, BC, Canada where she was working in film, TV and international media relations, to the small mountain town of Ronda in Andalucía. In the 19 months she has been living in Spain, she has learned Spanish, started an environmental organization, and is helping to organise another natural living event this July. In between mountain hikes and yoga, growing vegetables in their community garden, restoring worm-ridden farm furniture and organizing and volunteering on environmental clean-ups, Karethe tries to write blog stories about the wonderful curiosities of life, in Spain, in Norway or wherever she may be. 

 

A Tail of Two Eddies

It was a choice between Nickel and Dime: fluffy, feisty, Westie-looking brothers looking for fun and a permanent relationship with a new human. Dime was sweet, but with a soft coat and rather a long bod for his little legs. Nickel’s rougher coat gave him a loveable scruffiness, and his expression reminded us of Frasier’s doggy nemesis. We chose. Nickel would be ours when we got back from London.

We returned today to pick him up at the offices of ACE Animal Care near Fuengirola. We did all the paperwork and handed over the fee. Made sure he was chipped, and took possession of his Pet Passport. Signed his adoption papers. And fastened on his smart new red collar. Finally, in a simple ritual that was part admin, part christening, we all pronounced his new name.

Eddie.

After a quick photo call and fond farewells to ‘the Dog Formerly Known as Nickel’ from the staff, we headed for the car with our new prize. Funny though, his coat seemed to have grown out smoother. And his bobbed tail had made a remarkable recovery and now waved long and feathery over his back.

Fred called it first: “Are you sure we’ve got the right dog?” I felt silly going back to the office and returning our new mutt like a parcel from Amazon. A staff member ran the chip reader over him, and sure enough – they’d given us the wrong dog to take home! Poor Dime (see photo below) was whisked back into the shelter, while Nickel-now-Eddie, just coming out of sedation after seeing the doggy hygienist, was bundled into the back seat like a dognap victim or presidential candidate with an over-eager protection team. A bracing start to our new life together.

Well, he’s sitting at my feet under the dining table now, tired out after his big day – he’s already left a little pressie under my chair, been out for walkies four times, wolfed his food, and got into his basket. And out again.

Tomorrow he will be here to greet us, and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, all down the years we hope to spend together.  And every day, I think we’ll be glad we brought home the right Eddie.

PS: Real Eddie is the headline picture. The Other Eddie is below. He is a sweetie...someone please take him home and love him! You can call the office at: 669 018 736

 

Wet, woofy, wonderful: White Christmas in Cartajima

Outside, the wind howled and rain fell as if determined to make up for months of dry weather. Inside, Fred and I were playing Killer Scrabble in front of the big fire with two delightful families from San Francisco. A plate of freshly-baked mince pies had just appeared from the kitchen and dinner was not far away. Perfect.

Hotel Los Castanos stands opposite the ayuntamiento, right in the middle of Cartajima, one of the seven tiny pueblos blancos that make up the Alto Genal, north of San Pedro de Alcantara and about 10km south of Ronda, in Western Málaga. This region, the Serranía de Ronda, encompasses the Sierra de las Nieves, beloved of walkers, birdwatchers and at one time, bandits.

Di and John Beach gave us a warm welcome and our room was luxurious, huge and cosy, no mean feat on a wet December day. I decided to try our jacuzzi bath with results depicted above. As you see I am slowly sinking under foamy walls of Molton Brown's Warming Eucalyptus - what a way to go!

Christmas lunch was classic, delicious and nothing was missing except The Pud. Another plate of mince pies went some way to consoling me however. Throughout our stay, nothing was too much trouble for Di, John and Catherine. We genuinely felt that their casa was our casa.

To add to the fun, we were introduced to Di's Coton de Tolear canines, Kenny and Leo. They were white! They were fluffy! And they were like adorable Christmas teddies!

So. Warm welcome...big fire...friendly fellow guests...freshly baked mince pies....perfect Christmas dinner....board games involving words...fluffy white jacuzzi experience...fluffy white dogs. It all added up to the White Christmas I was Dreaming Of.

I hope your festive season has some or all of what you were Dreaming Of too. We wish you a very happy and hopeful New Year! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lights, camera, action I: Málaga's Christmas season begins

Friday night. I'd arranged to meet my friend Jude at jewel-box bar El Palco, across the plaza from Teatro Cervantes. I hadn't counted on meeting another 300 or so revellers packing the square around a newly sprouted mini-forest of scarlet poinsettias , nor the 70-strong choir swaying to their own jolly villancico carol rhythms on the steps of the Teatro.

Taking me by surprise, a single joyful moment, the sparkling promise of Christmas before the spending and scheduling and jaded feelings set in.

El Palco is a handsome little bar and Borja, the owner, is a handsome little man. (Sorry Borja, I will sacrifice anyone for a neat line).

Get there before 10.00 pm and bag the first-floor table in front of the long windows. From there, you can see the sparkly lights and hear the jaleo of Málaga life in the plaza below. Guaranteed to restore your Christmas cheer. (And the mushroom risotto will make you happy too).

Until soon!

 

Tapas like it used to be

The sun got up late today and so did we (our neighbours upstairs were having a chair-scraping party until 2.00 am). Skipped brunch and contemplated lunch. "Cheap and cheerful," I said to Fred. He duly led me down narrow shuttered streets to Taberna Cofrade Las Merchanas at C/Mosquera 5, off Plaza San Juan de Dios.

Forget the fuschia leather sushi bar and the polite vegan platters of the new city. Here, to the sound of solemn march music and surrounded by Semana Santa artefacts, we shared a traditional plate of fat chorizo sausage, pocket hanky-size seared pork lomo and a lacy fried egg nestling on chips soggy with olive oil. Washed down with icy dry fino manzanilla and cañas. Looked out at the hot white street from our cool dark passageway.

We paid the modest bill and stepped back out into the 21st century. If we looked back, would the bar still be there, or did we just stumble through a wrinkle in time?

See more pics of Taberna Cofrade Las Merchanas - if we see you there, we'll buy you a cold one!

 

The sun got up late today and so did we (our neighbours upstairs were having a chair-scraping party until 2.00 am). Skipped brunch and contemplated lunch. "Cheap and cheerful," I said to Fred. He duly led me down narrow shuttered streets to Taberna Cofrade Las Merchanas at C/Mosquera 5, off Plaza San Juan de Dios.

Forget the fuschia leather sushi bar and the polite vegan platters of the new city. Here, to the sound of solemn march music and surrounded by Semana Santa artefacts, we shared a traditional plate of fat chorizo sausage, pocket hanky-size seared pork lomo and a lacy fried egg nestling on chips soggy with olive oil. Washed down with icy dry fino manzanilla and cañas. Looked out at the hot white street from our cool dark passageway.

We paid the modest bill and stepped back out into the 21st century. If we looked back, would the bar still be there, or did we just stumble through a wrinkle in time?

See more pics of Taberna Cofrade Las Merchanas - if we see you there, we'll buy you a cold one!

 

It's a doll's life at Malaga's Botanical Gardens

If you go down to the Málaga Botanical Gardens today, you're sure of a big surprise. If you go down to the...etc, you'll never believe your eyes...

A team of clever and industrious elves has created recreated dozens of charming scenes echoing old photographs of the Marqueses de Loring family at play in their handsome country house 'palácio' in the late 19th century. The stars of the show are the Barbie and Ken dolls, over a hundred of them. Exquisitely dressed in handmade costumes, perfect down to the last button and frill, taking tea, riding out to pay calls, having a lazy summer lunch in the Wisteria Arbour...the little girl in everyone will be absolutely fascinated.

This magical exhibition will vanish into thin air on January 6th, so if you can possibly make it, I recommend you go.

The house is set in the dreamy, leafy Botanical Gardens, 4km north of Málaga centre. (The Málaga Tour Bus goes there from the Bus Station, and the No. 12 bus stops outside the gate).

Fred and I went on Boxing Day. Bright sunshine sifted through hundreds of palm trees and gilded the tropical plants. There's even a super café for quiche-y lunches and salads. It might look like a garden shed, but the owner prepares all the food herself, and it's excellent.

I'll sign off by wishing you all the best for 2013. May all your problems be doll-sized, and may you too find joy in unexpected places.  ¡Feliz Año Nuevo!