Sunday 7th October 2012
1st October anniversaries, a coincidental TV appearance, recipe
for Spanish oxtail, “the path to Spain”, a Nokia girly lunch, on a yacht in
Valencia, moon lit and red sky at night walks, a surprise visit and other
things.
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| Oli with Gustavo on Monday - they surprised me and made my day. |
Hi again
This week the
weather has been wonderful. We are
experiencing what is known as an Indian summer or in Spanish “el veranillo de
San Miguel”, so different from the storms and floods of last week where so much
damage was done in South East Spain.
Monday was 1st
October and whilst golf fans on the this side of the ocean were reveling in the
win of Europe vs America in the Ryder Cup, captained by the dashing Spaniard José
María Olazabal, who dedicated the win to the legendary Seve Ballesteros, my
thoughts were elsewhere. For me the 1st October is the anniversary
of the death of my amazing Mother and also the anniversary of my start with
Yoigo, already 6 years ago; a bitter and sweet date. These thoughts remained with me most of the
week. It is a date I can never forget
and which is always recorded in this blog diary. My Father will have been thinking my Mother, his
wonderful partner too and it was about one year ago when he had his fall and
broke his hip. Thankfully those days are
over and he is much recovered and well looked after. Today whilst my men were
reading the physical papers, I was reading the Daily Telegraph online and was
astounded to read just how badly elderly people are treated in English
residences and hospitals. I read too how
Rumanian and Spanish nurses were appalled at the treatment. So I am really glad my Father is here with
us, safe and well looked after. Looking
back over my 6 years with Yoigo it has been good, although times are changing
now.
On Wednesday
Olivia made my day in a way with a special and rather coincidental appearance
on television. In the morning she sent a
photo via whatsapp of herself with a professional friend of mine Gustavo who
used to work on the Yoigo account at my PR agency Ketchum. He has since moved
to Ogivly and works on the Ford account there.
I couldn’t understand why they would be together. The coincidence was explained by them both in
successive photos and messages. The
photo illustrating this week’s blog is of the two of them.
Ford had
agreed with her programme, La Mañana de la 1 that they would do a piece on
suits worn by their engineers when designing and producing cars. The suits simulate typical disabilities in
people over 70 and the engineers wear them to understand better these people’s
needs. I think that’s a great idea, one
that could be emulated let’s say by engineers designing mobile phones. They might then understand that people over
40 start to lose their eyesight and bear that in mind when coming up with new
ideas for phones. Gustavo was delighted to see that the reporter covering the
issue was Olivia, my daughter and I was equally delighted to hear that the two
of them were involved in this piece of news.
Gustavo sent me the picture below of Olivia fitted out with the engineers’
suit, ready to go live from the Ford factory in Madrid.
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| Oli live or ready to go live on Monday on a piece about suits Ford engineers wear when taking into account elderly people's needs in cars. |
We watched the
piece of news live at 11.45 and you can see the piece here if you fast forward
to 11.45 of course. All in all this
really made my day.
On Wednesday I
sharpened my cooking skills. I haven’t
cooked seriously for a long time as of course Ivanka makes our meals and I have
been on my protein based Dukan diet. But
now that my weight is fine and I had some time on my hands and after having
spied and bought some very nice looking oxtail at the local supermarket, I decided
to cook for the family and for us to enjoy this great Spanish recipe from the
1080 recipe book. I should add that this
is a typical dish from Córdoba. This is what it looked like.
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| My oxtail dish based on the Spanish recipe - a dish originally from Córdoba |
If you are
interested, this is how you make it.
Place the cut up oxtail pieces (I used two tails) into cold water until
it boils. Then remove the foam, add big
pieces of chopped onion, three or four whole carrots, salt and pepper and cook
slowly for at least 3 hours. Once the
meat is soft you drain the water and place the meat in a dish in the oven
sprinkled with a little oil so that it browns on both sides. Then you make a puré out of the carrots and
onion and some of the stock which is served separately with the meat. This dish is typically accompanied with sauté
potatoes or fried potatoes but not in the shape or chips, more like the size of
small roast potatoes. And voila, there
you have Spanish oxtail ready for eating.
We all loved it, Ivanka too and Suzy took some when she visited us that
evening.
The biggest
news on Wednesday was the first of three presidential debates in the US between Romney and Obama. I didn’t watch it,
except for some parts of it on the news that day. Everyone seemed to coincide that surprisingly
Romney had beaten Obama. But the news in
Spain was of Romney’s comment to the current President: “I don’t want to go
down the path to Spain” in clear reference to our financial crisis. The Spanish news was very critical of this
comment, so bad for Spain’s image abroad.
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| The Romney Obama debate this week |
I wrote last
week about the controversial photos of Spain’s supposed poverty in the New York
Times. It is certainly the fashion and
very newsworthy for the foreign press to dwell on this subject. In reference to this issue Olivia told us
this week that a journalist friend of hers had been contacted by a journalist
from the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation – Canadian state TV) wanting to
do a piece on how badly Spain is suffering. The journalist, a she, insisted on
being taken to the poor areas and interviewing beggars!. However much Olivia’s friend tried to tell
her this wasn’t the true picture of Spain, the Canadian journalist was only
interested in portraying the disastrous “path of Spain”. This is a very dangerous path for the country
whose government is totally unable to improve Spain’s brand awareness. Whilst
it is true we are suffering a crisis, the reporting is very biased and only one
side of the coin. It’s a question of
give a dog a bad name and the name stays.
After all, it’s all about perceptions.
The image most of us have in our heads about Africa, for example, is
that everyone is starving, when that is hardly the truth. My conclusion then is that you cannot believe
everything you read; things are not black and white, but of course stories like
these are what people want to read, so journalists, like sheep, churn them out
and this way become biased themselves, like the lady from the CBC.
On Friday in a
girly Nokia lunch with Juana, Jill and Zenaida at Sibara in Aravaca, we
discussed this issue as of course we discussed Nokia’s fate. I had read on Wednesday and commented to them
that there was news that Nokia was selling off its assets in order to save money. There was also a rumour that it was selling
Nokia House, its amazing flagship headquarters in Espoo just outside Helsinki. When I posted this on Twitter I actually got
a message from Nokia to say this wasn’t true.
So I breathed a sigh of relief, as for me that would have been the end
of Nokia. I well remember that beautiful
glass building which I visited many times in my 6 years at Nokia. The glass gives it light in the winter and
the wood inside adds warmth. It is
perhaps the most beautiful modern building I have ever been in. Every time I
went there I couldn’t help feeling proud of belonging to that amazing
company. Today it is the shadow of what
it was but Nokia House remains, for the moment.
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| Nokia House, Nokia's worldwide HQ in Espoo (Helsinki) thankfully is not for sale. I have visited it countless times. |
The girly Nokia
lunch was great as it always is, although Fátima, Susana and Ana couldn’t make
it. Really it is only Jill, Zenaida,
Juana and I who are always faithful to our lunch appointments. We also talked
about past colleagues, so many of whom have left Nokia and also about our
families. My friends have much younger
children and I often feel like the grandmother of the group, although luckily I
don’t look like one. We agreed to meet
again at the end of November. We had
such a nice time (great restaurant with superb fish and chips on the menu!)
that I completely forgot to take a photo for this week’s blog and kicked myself
for not doing so afterwards.
Olivia had
left on Thursday for Valencia, Friday being a free day for her. She went to stay with her boyfriend Miguel
and the two of them have spent the weekend on a yacht. This is Olivia’s first yachting experience
and despite initial worries of seasickness, the first night was fine, although
she is not too keen on the vessel’s movement.
Her Father is not a good sailor and we were worried she wouldn’t be
either, but so far so good. Here is a
picture of her on the yacht before they set off and I think it is taken in
Denia.
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| Oli has spent the weekend on this yacht near Valencia |
Meanwhile we
have been left alone again with no girls to brighten up our weekend. Suzy went
off to Santa Pola with her Russian friend Emil on Wednesday and we have had no
news since. The weekend then has been
very quiet. Eladio and I went out to
dinner on Friday night, not to noisy Friday’s like last week, but to another
American establishment called Foster Hollywood and it was fine although I felt
a bit guilty having a brownie and ice cream for dessert!
Being on our
own means sticking to our routines and we have been reading a lot by the pool
in the late afternoons. I finished the
harrowing “Five chimneys, the story of Auschwitz” by Olga Lengyel, a survivor from Cluj in Transylvania. It is one of the most vivid stories by
survivors of the holocaust. Then I
started on Blonde by Joyce Carol Oates which arrived from Amazon this
week. It is a novel about Marylyn Monroe
and had been recommended to me by Adele, but so far the prose is a bit uphill,
so I may not finish it.
Sticking to our routines, means a walk each evening with the dogs and
this week, because of the weather they have been lovely. One day this week I captured the moon on my
camera when it was bright and seemed so near.
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| The moon on our walk one evening this week |
The walk was almost moon lit.
Then yesterday I captured an amazing red sky. I always remember being told as a child on
walks with my Father that a red sky at night meant shepherds’ delight in that
the next day there would be good weather. Whereas a red sky in the morning,
meant shepherds’ warning, in that bad weather was coming. My experience has
taught me that shepherds are nearly always very right.
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| The red sky on our walk yesterday |
I mentioned to
Eladio whilst walking with the dogs, Norah our beagle and Elsa our Labrador,
that nowadays, as the girls so seldom here, they have become substitute “daughters”
which of course they haven’t but they certainly are company. On Friday after my Nokia girly lunch I went
to the Corte Inglés department store to pick up a watch strap and whilst there
bought the dogs a new red collar each and also a rug type bed for them to lie
on in the kitchen when it’s cold. They
tend to destroy most of their beds or Norah grabs Elsa’s bed and puts it on top
of her own, leaving Elsa to lie uncomplainingly on the cold floor. So with this in mind, I decided on buying a rug
big enough for them both to lie on and with no filling for them to
destroy. So far so good, although I did
see Norah trying to bag it for herself this morning to which I immediately put
a stop.
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| Elsa our labrador on the new rug I bought for the dogs. |
This weekend
they both got their fortnightly bath, as they had to be clean to lie on the new
rug for the first time. And this is
Eladio’s job, one he does a little reluctantly but very well. The dogs are a little reluctant too but once
inside the bath seem to even enjoy the experience.
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| Eladio drying Norah after her bath yesterday |
Yesterday,
Saturday, was a quiet day too and again I put my hand at a bit of cooking and
made lasagne, something I haven’t made for so long I couldn’t remember certain
things and had to ask Juana on whatsapp for some instructions. As I made it, Ivanka looked on, learning to add
this dish to her good but limited repertoire, as she did when I made the
oxtail. We ended up making far too much
just for the four of us, so we will be having it again for lunch today. But I must say it was delicious.
Of note yesterday,
Saturday, one of the reasons we didn’t go out in the evening is that we wanted
to watch a wonderful Spanish film called "Lavida que te espera", called “Your next life” in English. It was starting at 11pm very late for me and
I was worried I would fall asleep, but I didn’t as I find this film riveting. Set in the remote valley of the Pas in
Santander in northern Spain, it is a rural drama of love and death and passion and
old fashioned traditions and hard work which has you on the edge of your seat
until the very end. The film was made in
2004 by the director Manuel Gutiérrez Aragón who is actually from the Santander
province. We saw it when it first came out in 2004 and have wanted to watch it
ever since. So you see it isn’t only
Pedro Almodóvar who makes good Spanish films.
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| The great Spanish film we saw last night |
And today is
Sunday and I am at the end of this week’s tale, but not quiet. Nothing special was going to happen
today. That’s not quite true as the
first clásico (Barcelona Madrid football match) is taking place tonight but
unfortunately it’s only available on pay per view channels which we do not
have. Something special was going to
happen on the home front but Eladio didn’t know. Juan, his nephew and godson
was coming with Cristina, his girlfriend, to bring him a belated birthday
present. I knew about it because Juan
needed some advice on what to get but I kept the visit secret so that it would
a pleasant surprise for my husband. And
indeed it was. They came mid-morning and
stayed for coffee and we sat in the sun by the pool catching up on their news
and ours and the of course the news of other members of our mutual family. Eladio was tickled pink and I think
delighted, so when his Mother, Dolores reads this, she too will be pleased at
Juan’s gesture and with the photo below.
For the record they bought Eladio one of his favourite fragrances by
Loewe. The visit was lovely and the
thought behind it even more and a memory we will treasure. Thanks Juan and Cristina.
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| A surprise visit this morning from Juan our nephew and godson and his girlfriend Cristina |
Now I am at the
end of this week’s tale and it’s time for me to heat up yesterday’s lasagne and
set the table for us three oldies.
That’s it from
me for this week my friends. I wish you
all the best, good reading until we meet again next Sunday.
Masha
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