Busy again, The Hispanic Bank Holiday, San came for lunch and Henry/Courtenay and Mao Tse Tung!

Hello again,

This week was busy work wise which was quite expected. Tuesday was my first public appearance with the press and I must say it was lovely to see the familiar faces of those I consider my “friends” – Ana, the 2 Antonios, Balta, … It was on the occasion of our first public phone call on the Xfera network, quite a milestone on the way to the commercial launch in December.

Luckily we got a break this week as Thursday was a bank holiday. It was the Pilar (Saint – and there are many in Spain thank goodness!) as well as the Hispanic day when the Spaniards celebrate Columbus discovering America (In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue …). Eladio and I went to the cinema with Roberto and Mari Carmen to see the new film about the Borgia family. It was pretty violent with some quite incestuous scenes but on the whole a good historical film. Afterwards we went to the Alpargatería, as usual, for dinner.

And this weekend we had the joy and privilege of meeting San again. San is the adored Chinese (Manchurian to be correct) son of Mar and Mariano, our journalist friends and neighbours. They work for La Vanguardia where Mariano is the chief editor for Madrid. We hadn’t seen San since last Christmas which is when he was adopted. He was 3 and a bit then and didn’t know any Spanish, of course. He has come along so well, gained 10cm at least and speaks Spanish perfectly. In fact his parents are worried about his forgetting Chinese and yesterday he was taken to the Chinese school in Madrid for his first lesson there. It turned out to be a traumatic experience. San wanted to leave as soon as he saw the place and it was so obvious it reminded him of his orphanage days in China. So from now on he will be having private lessons at home.

We enjoyed lunch together (cocido madrileño plus tiramisu) and a great afternoon with San on the swings and best of all on Susi’s boyfriend Gaby’s motorbike. That was San’s maximum pleasure of the day. Just look at that smile!! In the photo on the table he is flanked by his Mother, Mar, on the left and Gaby on the right.

The funniest bit of the day was when Mariano was talking to my Father about Mao Tse Tung and Mariano was calling him Henry (our cat’s name) instead of Courtenay (his real name). I am still laughing at the memory of it. I had to remind Mariano that my Father’s name was Courtenay. What a laugh!

Cheers till next week my friends
Masha