Happy Christmas to you all. Putting up the decorations, getting into the spirit of Christmas, making baklava with Suzy and Oli, the children's school concert, buying El Gordo lottery tickets, Dominique Pelicot to rot in jail and other stories of the week.

 Madrid, Sunday 22nd December, 2024

Happy Christmas to you all (photo taken in Ravello on the Almafi Coast during this year's road trip)

Good morning everyone and Happy Christmas to you all.  I can't believe it's only 3 days till Christmas. This time last week I was hardly prepared due to a lack of festive spirit. Slowly things got better and I had to make up for lost time. Thus I have been very busy and have had rather a pleasant week. 

Finally on Monday we put up the Christmas decorations which is always a big job. Suzy helped enormously for which I was very grateful. Eladio's main job, apart from bringing up the tree and the great big box of decorations, was to change the batteries of our countless Christmas gimmicky objects which I so love. It's difficult to show you the decorations as they are all over the lounges and dining room but here is a glimpse.

Some of our Christmas decorations

Suzy suggested we put on carols as we always did when the girls were young and the festive music helped the spirit of Christmas entering our house this year. 

In our Skype call that afternoon my friend Amanda was glad to hear my spirits had been lifted and that I was now looking forward to celebrating Christmas; something which has never happened to me before. 

On Tuesday we woke up to the news that a  Russian general, Igor Kirillov - now ex head of chemical weapons, had been killed in broad daylight from a bomb attached to a scooter. The Russians immediately blamed the Ukrainians and they were not wrong. There was also a lot of news this week about  the disgraced Prince Andrew being embroiled in a scandal to do with a Chinese spy. It's a good thing his mother isn't alive to witness yet one more scandal involving her supposed favourite son; not that I believe she had a favourite. Mothers can't. 

Eladio and I finally went Christmas present shopping that morning or rather he accompanied me. He must have been bored stiff going round perfume stalls at El Corte Inglés. We shall all smell very nice this year by the way. I haven't been very creative in choosing presents I'm afraid and I  did more than half of my shopping on Amazon - yes, feeding the monster again but it is so practical.

We stopped at Mercadona on the way back to get ingredients to make baklava. Baklava is a Middle Eastern dessert made with phyllo pastry, honey syrup and nuts.  From Turkey it spread to Greece, Bulgaria and even Hungary and my mother and Aunty Masha always adored it. I made it last year, under the watching eyes of my Iraqi guest Mohammad who declared my baklava to be as good as his mother's - high praise indeed. As we all love it in this house, I decided to make it again this Christmas. Oli wanted to make it as well as an entry for her language school seasonal cooking contest.  Later I heard she came second. This year I had Suzy to help me make ours and it took us a good two hours. The most tedious part is the buttering of 40 sheets of pastry and the trickiest part is cutting it before putting it in the oven. This is the recipe I used. If you decide to use it, add a bit more of everything as I ran short of syrup and butter. And voilá her is my baklava minus the chopped pistachios on the top which I got the next day.

My baklava 

I ended up making 56 pieces so will probably have to freeze some of it as that's  far too much. But, oh, it's so delicious. Suzy and I were very pleased with ourselves when we had finished and would have to repeat the process on Wednesday with Olivia.  She benefited from our experience and was able to pour on more syrup and add pistachios. My younger daughter was more ambitious and cut hers in diamond shapes.  Here is Suzy helping her. 

Suzy and Oli making baklava

Thus hers looked more authentic.

Oli's baklava looks more professional than mine but both taste divine

If I spent the morning making baklava and going for a walk, I spent most of the afternoon closing the books for this year's rental business and opening them for 2025. I have at least 15 upcoming reservations and just hope that 2025 will be as good as 2024. 

On Thursday our last guest of the year, Alan, who describes himself as "Irish and outdoorsy" on his Airbnb profile, left for County Mayo. I really hope he comes back as he was a joy to host as were most of my guests this year. But I have to say it's lovely to have the house to ourselves for Christmas and New Year when we shut down and I think we deserve to. 

That morning saw us out early. We went to the see our grandchildren perform in their school Christmas concert. Both of their classes had prepared two songs; one in Spanish and one in English, and were dressed as elves (Juliet aged 3) and with Father Christmas hats and red tops (Elliot aged 5). Poor Juliet froze when her concert started. She obviously got stage fright which I put down to her being overwhelmed by the lights and the public, poor lamb. She even cried at the end but she also looked gorgeous, don't you think? 

Juliet got stage fright at her Christmas concert this week, poor lamb

Elliot was on next and seemed to enjoy himself thoroughly although I remember him freezing on stage also when he was three. And here he is looking gorgeous too. 

Elliot enjoying his Christmas concert

Some people commented to me that he looks like both Eladio and Olivia. I think they may be right but I'm not sure who Juliet resembles; maybe me when I was very small.

There are a few Christmas traditions which we haven't kept up with this year, such as my yearly calendar, a family photo, putting lights in the garden or a trip to Madrid to buy lottery tickets for El Gordo which is taking place this morning. But of course we had to buy tickets, just not in the centre of the city. If you didn't know, El Gordo which is drawn always on 22nd December, is famous for giving out the most cash prizes per ticket purchased in  the world. The overall winnings come to 2.700.000 euros. Any Spaniard worth his salt buys at least one 10th of a ticket (un décimo) for El Gordo which costs 20 euros. If it gets first prize the winnings are  400.000 euros. When I first came to live in Spain in 1981, 2 years before I married, I was horrified to find out my husband had bought so many tickets and worried he was a gambler. It took years for this custom to become mine as well. And here is Eladio after purchasing our tickets, two of which are for the girls. 

Eladio buying lottery tickets for El Gordo which is drawn today

I doubt we will win but we can always hope. It's huge news today and all the reporters from Olivia's newsroom have been sent to the four corners of the country to cover the stories of ordinary people's wins which are much celebrated. She has been sent to Santander, a lovely city on the north coast.

Another Spanish tradition I have adopted  is buying a poinsettia (flor de pascua) to grace our lounge  and it looks splendid. Just let's see how long it lasts though. We got one that morning  after which we did the food shopping which I hope will be enough to last until Boxing Day. It probably won't haha. Gosh Christmas is all about eating isn't it? I don't think there was much food at the Inn where Jesus was born in Bethlehem but there you go.

Friday dawned and new painters came to repaint the cabin. Remember the last ones painted it too dark. Well these ones have painted it too light and the colour looks nothing like the one on the palette of colours I chose from. But c'est la vie and I refuse to get cross. 

What was not nice that morning was to read the news of the sentencing of France's most notorious rapist, 72 year old Dominique Pelicot. His wife, Gisèle, in her 70's found out not so long ago that her apparently loving husband had been drugging and raping her and inviting over 50 other men to use and abuse her for years. It is thoroughly disgusting and he deserves to rot in hell. This mass rape trial should have sent the man and his collaborators to hell. Instead, all he gets is a paltry 20 year sentence. That's because French rape laws are so lax. I just hope he rots in jail and doesn't get to eat turkey on Christmas Day. How can the man live with himself I ask? This case will go down in history which is why I am mentioning it here as one of the many objectives of this blog is tell the stories of my life in the context of world affairs. This sentence will not be much consolation for Gisèle Pelicot who has been so brave to come out of anonymity in a case like this. She did it to tell the world and to encourage other women to do the same. Like her, I am sure there are other perverts duping their wives in a similar way and just getting away with it. May they rot in hell too but may they first be found out and brought to the public eye. Bravo Gisèle and thank you. I only hope you can get some comfort out of your brave actions and enjoy the love of your family now that he is gone. 

I cheered up when I went out to do more Christmas shopping, this time on my own. I had to get a few more things for the children and for one of my daughters. While at Centro Oeste I also found a lovely black and white striped jumper for myself from Pull and Bear. Then I came across a jumper which I knew was just up Suzy's street and had to get it there and then. It's from a little boutique called "Algo Bonito". She was delighted. I was also delighted with a black sequin dress I got for myself at H&M. I had to invest in a cocktail dress as none of mine fit. I later showed it to Suzy who was enthusiastic about it. That's when I offered her some of my tiny size S party dresses which of course no longer fit. They fit her perfectly and she looked gorgeous in a long gold and sparkly blazer, a dark green velvet trouser suit and my mother's cocktail dress from the 60's which I have kept. I know I will never be a Zara size S again but I'm not fretting.

I am nearing 70, turning 68 in February, and was cheered up that day not just from the retail therapy but  from  an article published  in The Times reporting that 70 is the new 60. You can read it here if you can get past the paywall. It's based on a study that finds people in their 70's feel ten years younger as they enjoy better health than people born before them. That is so good to know. I refuse to see myself as an "old person" even if I am nearing 70. My body obviously says otherwise but it's how you feel that is important.

It was on Friday that I created my annual Christmas photo of Eladio and I. I may not send Christmas cards,  a tradition I gave up when I left England but I do love to make a Christmas photo. I made a few and chose the one of us in beautiful Ravello on the Almafi coast during this year's road trip for this week's feature photo.  A close second came one of the two of us in San Gimignano during the same trip. This is it.

Another Christmas photo of the two of us - in San Gimignano during this year's road trip.

I got quite inspired using the app and made one of Juliet and Elliot too.

Another Christmas photo, this time from our grandchildren, Juliet and Elliot

So you see, I am now finally getting into the spirit of Christmas.

I spent part of Friday afternoon finishing Season 6 of the new version of All Creatures Great and Small. It is based on the tales of Scottish vet, James Herriot's experiences as a young vet in Yorkshire. Oh how I love it. I also spent time writing this blog before having dinner with Suzy and Eladio. 

It was at about that time that a Saudi doctor purposefully drove into the crowds of a Christmas market in the German town of Magdeburg. He killed a nine year old boy and 4 women as well as injuring over 200 people. We all thought the man who is from Saudi Arabia was an Islamic fanatic. But it turns out he was a mixture of things so fits no profile. 50 year old psychiatrist, Taleb al-Abdulmohsen, who had been living in Germany for 10 years was on a Saudi list of  criminals for being anti Islam. Dr. Peter Neumann, professor of security studies at King's College London described him thus: "If anything, the Magdeburg attacker was far right: a self-declared Islam-hating, ex Muslim atheist, who despised German society not for being against Islam but for facilitating its spread. He also very much liked the AfD" (German far right party). As a psychiatrist his work helped drug addicts and after he was detained it was discovered he had drugs in his blood. Looks like he himself needed help. In my mind he is a terrorist and  lone wolf terrorism is the bane of our lives these days. 

Entertainment that night was a Norwegian film called La Palma about a tsunami in this island in the Canaries. It was probably inspired by the tragic volcano eruption that happened there not so long ago. I have to say it was well done and had us riveted until the end.

Yesterday, Saturday, was 21st December and the Winter Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere. That's basically when the day is shorter than the night. The 21st marks the shortest day of the year too while it was the Summer Solstice in the Southern Hemisphere. Apparently the solstices happen when the earth is at its most extreme tilt away or near form the sun and I read that scientists can't really explain why our planet tilts on its axis. What that meant for us was about 9h of sunshine or daylight and 8h in London. Slowly from today, daylight hours will grow at a rhythm of 3 minutes a day until we reach the summer solstice with 15 or 16 h of daylight. I far prefer the summer solstice don't you?  

I was up early cooking yesterday as I had to feed our grandchildren who were being dropped off at our house from 1 until 6.30 as Oli had to fly to Santander and Miguel was working too. I made meatballs which is their favourite dish. They love it so much they had it both for lunch and for dinner!

We had some time to ourselves though before they came and used it to go for our walk and have a coffee  at La Flaca. I needed the peace before the storm. They were having lunch when we got home and shortly afterwards Oli left for Santander and we had the task of entertaining them for the afternoon. They are very boisterous and tend to hit each other rather a lot. They certainly know how to wind up adults as do most small children. The highlights were pushing them on the swings in the garden and showing Elliot how to play dominoes. He loved it. 

Elliot enjoyed learning to play dominoes with Suzy and I yesterday

We played with a set Oli had as a child and it was wonderful to watch how he understood how to play immediately. You can tell he is competitive too by the way hahahah. 

After they left we had more peace time which I used to finish this week's post. I slept relatively well last night and woke up today, Sunday, at 8 am which is quite rare. We have no plans for today. Everything is ready for Christmas so I shall be going on a walk and putting up my feet. That's for sure.

Next week when I write Christmas will be over or rather Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. So all that remains is to wish you once again a very happy Christmas. I have noticed in many places, the word Christmas is substituted for Holidays and thus you see and hear "Happy Holidays" instead of "Happy Christmas". May we all remember that the real reason for celebrating Christmas is the birth of Jesus Christ so whether you are a believer or not, there is absolutely no need to change the name. Would anyone dare change the names of other religions' celebrations such as Eid or Hanukkah? I`ll leave you to think about your answer.

So once again Happy Christmas friends and readers. All the best till next Sunday,

Masha