Sunday 24th August 2014
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| Eladio and I celebrating our 31st wedding anniversary on Thursday 21st August |
Hi everyone,
It’s Sunday again and the time to write my blog. Today
is a quiet warm Sunday in August and the summer is still with us. I have been on my two daily consecutive walks
on my own and then with Eladio and the dogs, and after a quick bathe in the
pool, here I am ready to tell you all about this week which had its highlights
both at home and on the news front.
One item of
news I thought was rather silly is the ongoing story of celebrities pouring ice
cold water over themselves apparently to raise funds and awareness for some
sort of Sclerosis. In fact I got rather
tired of what I thought was a silly stunt.
There were more and more high profile cases which I just couldn’t relate
to, until a friend of mine on Facebook, Marianne opened my eyes to what it is
all about. She posted a video of a 26 year old American boy diagnosed with ALS which I learned is a terrible neurodegenerative
disease that makes you weaker and weaker until most of the sufferers die. The
most famous person afflicted with ALS is Stephen Hawking. In this video the devastated youth describes
just how happy the ice bucket challenge is making him and fellow sufferers by
raising awareness and more importantly funds to find a cure for an illness
which is just not profitable enough for pharmaceutical companies to bother
with. My only worry here is whether the people taking up the ice bucket
challenge are really donating funds to the cause. So here is my part in the awareness story; this is the website where you can make your donation.
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| The 26 year old American boy diagnosed with ALS and whose video made me understand the ice bucket challenge |
On Monday as
usual I fasted, did my two walks and enjoyed a quick bathe in the cool pool
afterwards, it was such a warm day. That
day and all of the week really Olivia was busy reporting for her afternoon TV
programme, Aquí En Madrid. I missed her
most days but watched her via streaming later whenever I could. On Monday she reported on a crime of passion
in a suburb of Madrid, Hortaleza. She
also reported on a very big story in Spain, about two Spanish couples who have
adopted a child each in Ethiopia, a process which took up to 6 years, only to
have the children taken away from them for political reasons; forces in the
north of the country are against international adoption.
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| Olivia adores children and this was clear in her report on an adoption problem case in Ethiopia this week |
Susana
meanwhile was causing a stir on Facebook when she published a lovely portrait
of herself which Gabor had taken. I can
only imagine it is for her CV. Nice isn’t
it?
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| A new portrait of my darling daughter Suzy |
Tuesday will
go down in history as the day the world learned of the fate of an American
freelance photo journalist called James Foley who had been kidnapped by IS
(Islamic State) “jihadists” in Syria. In
a gruesome video sent to the media and later thankfully removed from internet,
he is beheaded by an IS militant with a British accent, called John in
retaliation for American forces striking their targets in Iraq. This is a new kind of terrorism or indeed a
sophistication of what we have previously seen from Al Qaeda. The press says
the killer is British. He may well have
a British passport but he is of Asian origin. Governments around the world are
very worried about the IS a new Islamic terrorist group which frighteningly
aspires to governing the whole Muslim world. I very much fear that James Foley
will not be the only western victim of this very extremist western hating group
of jihadists. In the video there is promise of a second beheading of another
American journalist.
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| James Foley the ex American photo journalist sadly became very famous this week |
In any case
life goes on and on Tuesday Eladio and I went into the quiet and empty streets
of Madrid to look at some vintage bathroom suites for the house we are building
in Montrondo. They are empty as August
is the holiday season in Spain and most people living here want to get away
from the oppressive heat. Meanwhile Olivia was reporting on the atmosphere
outside the Real Madrid Bernabeu stadium ahead of the first leg of the Spanish
super cup against their city rivals Atlético de Madrid. Her English came in handy during the report as
she spoke to foreigners who had come especially from places like Miami, Brazil
or Newcastle to see the match. We didn’t
watch it as it started really late at 11 pm.
The result was a draw 1-1 which would favour Atlético on aggregate in
the second leg two days later.
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| Oli reporting from the Real Madrid stadium on Tuesday ahead of the first leg of the super cup trophy against rival city club Atético de Madrid. |
That night I
made a special dinner for Olivia and Miguel her boyfriend who had come to stay
for the week. Evening meals outside are
so nice at this time of year and when I can I love to make family meals.
Nothing much
happened on Wednesday which was a repeat of Monday and Tuesday for me. Olivia that day reported on yet another
summer fire, this time in Aranjuez in the south of Madrid.
Thursday was
our big day, our 31st wedding anniversary. 31 is not a significant number; it’s not 25
or 50 but in my mind, you never know what life is going to bring, so it is
better to celebrate every year. We have
done so right from the start and always go out for dinner somewhere nice. It’s amazing to think that we have been
married for such a long time. When I posted on FB that it was our 31st
anniversary some joker friend wished us another 31 years together. That is not going to happen unless Eladio
lives till he is 100. Someone else told
me that in Spain at least there were now more divorces than marriages in one
year. So yeah, 31 years together is
definitely something to celebrate. You
may want to know what the secrets of our successful relationship are, so let me
tell you. Basically it is mutual
admiration, physical attraction and above all respect. Eladio and I rarely argue (we both hate
conflict) and one thing we never do is insult each other. Then again maybe I am lucky as it is nearly
impossible to argue with my tranquil husband.
It sounds simple to me but maybe it’s not so simple.
Feeling very
happy I went off to a meeting with my events agency to finalize details for our
big party at the beginning of September in Santander. Later in the evening Olivia sent us a photo
of her reporting on Madrid’s number one attraction for tourists, the modern art
museum, Reina Sofia. Here tourists queue
up mainly to see Picasso’s most famous masterpiece, “La Guernica”. Once again Olivia’s English came in handy
when interviewing foreign tourists queueing to enter the museum. The news was related to the record number of
foreign tourists to Spain and Madrid, Spain now being the number three hotspot
in the world. I would have thought the main attraction in the capital city was
the Real Madrid football stadium or the Prado, but no it is the Reina
Sofia.
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| Olivia reporting on Thursday from the Reina Sofia modern art museum in Madrid, the city's top tourist attraction. |
That night
both Olivia and Miguel joined us at dinner to celebrate our anniversary. We went to La Txitxarrería in Pozuelo where
we had an amazing dinner. We started off
with a plate of spectacular Spanish ham accompanied by grilled tiny green
peppers (actually chilis only one of which was hot and which landed on Oli’s
plate!). Then Miguel, Oli and I devoured
a plate of the most wonderful fillet steak you can eat in Madrid. Miguel took the photo of us which illustrates
this week’s post. Today as I was
choosing the photos for my blog, I decided to do a collage and add it to one of
our wedding photos and this is the result.
Yes we have aged of course and quite a lot but I think we look fine for
our age, don’t you think? I still find
Eladio just “drop dead gorgeous” even after all these years.
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| 31 very happy years separate these two pictures. Above 21.8.83, below 21.8.14 |
Meanwhile that
night in London Gabor had taken Suzy out for a romantic dinner to celebrate
their first anniversary as a couple. It’s funny it coincided with our day. They went to The Attic Bar which has some
great views of the city. So
congratulations go to Suzy and Gabor too this week.
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| Suzy and Gabor celebrating one year together this week, on the same day as our anniversary! |
On Friday
morning I was up early as usual and coincided with Olivia when I was about to
go on my first walk. She was just about
to go for an early morning run with Miguel.
So we took a selfie of the moment and here it is.
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| A selfie of Oli and I on Friday morning about to run (Olivia) and walk (me. |
Friday was a
busy day for me. Juana and Oscar, my ex
Nokia colleagues, were coming for dinner that night. They had just been to Israel on holiday and
we were keen to exchange impressions as we also went there just a few years
ago. Whenever we have guests the house
has to look its best which means a lot of preparations; Eladio had to cut the
grass, Fátima had to do extra cleaning to include the swimming and kitchen terraces
and I had to arrange the flowers and the meal.
Being summer and very warm I decided to make a light dinner and to
prepare cold dishes which could be made in advance and sit chilling in the
fridge. The first course was to be homemade
gazpacho which I wanted to serve in attractive individual little bottles as
once seen at a wonderful restaurant called Gecko Beach Club in Formentera. I found these at a Chinese “pound shop”. The main course was to be my chicken Waldorf
salad which includes mango instead of apple and the dessert was to be raspberry
syllabub. This is what the latter looked
like.
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| The new dessert (syllabub) I made for dinner on Friday when we had guests |
Whilst I was
whipping the cream which turned into butter as Fátima had stored it outside the
fridge and then sent Eladio out to get some more, Olivia was busy at work
reporting once again on the pre match atmosphere but the second leg of the
Madrid teams’ super cup match. She did
so riding a sort of “tuc tuc” type vehicle and sent us this photo. Like me Olivia loves sport and so of course
she enjoys reporting on it too.
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| Oli on a tuc tuc in Madrid on Friday reporting on the pre match atmosphere in the city that afternoon |
We didn’t
watch the second leg either as we were having guests but I was disappointed to
learn later that Atlético, supposedly the underdog, had won the cup. I sort of wondered whether there was some
sort of pact between the two teams for the latter to win after Real Madrid had
won the European Super Cup recently in Lisbon.
We will never know.
Meanwhile at
home everything was ready for the arrival of our guests. For once we were well ahead of time and spent
the half or so before they came putting finishing touches to the evening,
preparing a drinks tray, setting up the Spotify music on Eladio’s phone via our
wonderful blue tooth Sony portable speaker, lighting candles etc. This is what the table looked like.
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| The table I laid for our guests on Friday evening |
And then our
guests arrived and we welcomed them warmly.
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| With my dear friend Juana at home on Friday night |
The whole
evening was quite magical. We had a
great time discussing our visits to Israel which of course then focused on the
Israeli Arab issue. Another topic of
conversation was the crisis and how today’s generation are the lost generation,
in that there are few jobs and those that exist are meagerly paid and how that
leads to them neither getting married nor ever being able to buy a house. Yes the future is difficult for them. I just hope they rise to the challenge. Other topics of conversation were light
hearted, especially when Eladio spoke about how we used to sell beagle puppies
and with the money actually managed to build our first swimming pool. All in all it was a lovely evening and great
to see my ex colleagues from Nokia. Those
of us who worked at Nokia in its heyday used to add an inside slogan to the
more famous one: Nokia connecting people “and reuniting colleagues”.
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| Aselfie with our friends Juana and Oscar on Friday at home, a bit grainy but you get the idea. |
We didn’t get
to bed until nearly two in the morning and I was up again the next day at my
usual 7.30 which meant I only slept five and a half hours. But Saturday after my walks was to be quite a
lazy day. It was spent with Eladio,
mostly by the pool where we were joined by Olivia and Miguel. It was yesterday on Saturday that I sort of
first woke up to the fact that a young Spanish girl called Mireia Belmonte is
making history for Spanish swimming, a sport that this country has not usually
excelled at, excepting synchronized swimming of course. So we watched with great awe as she took the
gold medal in the 1.500m freestyle race at the Berlin European Swimming Championship. As I am writing today she
has just won another gold medal, coming first in the 200m butterfly race. Her fellow countrywoman Judit Ignacio won the
silver medal. This is certainly great
news for Spanish sport, excelling at swimming; which can be added to football,
basketball, formula 1, motorcycling, cycling, tennis at which Spaniards already
excel. Mireia Belmonte aged only 23 must
be the woman star of the championships, having also won silver and bronze
medals in other races. According to
Miguel, Olivia’s boyfriend who is a keen swimmer, she is Spain’s equivalent to
Michael Phelps.
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| Spain's best professional swimmer ever, 23 year old Mireia Belmonte |
Later we made
a lovely dinner all together after which Miguel, Oli and I played sevens, the
card game I learned from Sandra and Jeffer this summer.
And today is
Sunday and it has been quiet too. There
is really nothing particularly relevant to report. In a way no news is good news, it’s just
another lovely Sunday in August spent at home.
This week
coming will bring with it my Father’s operation on Tuesday afternoon, the most
important item in the week. I have lots
of faith in Spanish doctors and I’m sure it will all go well as we have been
told it’s a very simple keyhole type intervention. In any case I shall be telling you how it
went in next week’s post.
Meanwhile, I
wish you all a good week,
Cheers till
next time,
Masha
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