Sunday 1st May 2016
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| On my walk with the dogs on Friday afternoon in a field covered in flowers. |
Hi everyone,
Today is 1st May, Labour Day, a bank
holiday on a Sunday, Vappu in Finland (Walpurgis night), Mothers' Day in Spain but more importantly
for us it is my Father’s birthday. He was born on 1st May 1919 and
today turns 97, wow! I told him in his
birthday card that soon he will be 100 and I shall try to arrange a telegram
from the Queen if she still sends them. It
is also Russian Easter so Christos Vaskresi to any Russian Orthodox people
reading this. We have been invited by
our Russian neighbuor Ekatarina to join them in the celebrations at lunch today
which is something to look forward to for my Father and I.
Let me start from the beginning, from last
Sunday. This time last week we were in
Santa Pola. I spent the morning reading
on our sunny terrace.
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| The view of Alicante Bay from our flat |
We decided to
leave at midday and have lunch on our way which is just what we did. This time we stopped at possibly the best
motorway “café” on the A3 road between Valencia and Madrid, at Los Rosales.
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| Los Rosales, spot Pippa! |
Here they offer a stupendous set lunch menu for just
15 euros each. Below is Eladio at our
table in the lovely dining rom. Los
Rosales also has an incredible wine cellar and shop which offers all sorts of
local culinary delicacies. I can highly
recommend stopping there on the way to or back from Valencia or Alicante.
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| Eladio at our table in the restaurant dining room at Los Rosales on the way back from Alicante |
If it was our last day at our flat in Santa Pola, it
was the girls’ last day in London together.
Here is a photo of my two darlings, Suzy and Oli at some tube
station. I wasn’t to see Oli until the
next day.
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| The girls in London |
Monday was a quiet fasting day mostly spent on work,
reports and such.
Tuesday saw me in the office. I don’t go very often so when I do I am
always happy to have a coffee in Yoigo’s great cafeteria and catch up with
colleagues.
Tuesday was the 30th anniversary of the
Chernoby nuclear plant accident in the Ukraine which in 1986 of course was part
of Russia. At the time the Russians
tried to cover up the disaster and consequences but they failed as it was just
too big. It was the worst nuclear power
plant accident in history in terms of cost and casualties; not just the
immediate ones but those who have died since because of the radiation. Today
the city of Pripyat is abandoned, the residents having to move out beyond the
30km exclusion zone after the disaster and no one will ever live there again at
least in their lifetimes.
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| Deserted Chernobyl today |
Who doesn’t remember that day? I certainly do. And who doesn’t remember the
day of the Hillsborough football stadium disaster on 15th April
1989? That was 3 years later but this
Tuesday justice was finally done for the 96 people who died crushed against the
crash barriers. At the time the police
and authorities blamed the Liverpool football fans, whose team were playing
Nottingham Forest in the FA Cup semi-final at Sheffield Wednesday’s now famous
stadium, Hillsborough.
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| The Hillsborough disaster |
The fans were crushed in their stands with no way out
and it was the worst disaster in a football match possibly ever. They were blamed unfairly in newspapers like
The Sun, especially, but also The Times, both owned by Rupert Murdoch, who
supported this theory. But on Tuesday
the verdict that the victims’ families campaigned for in 3 decades brought
justice to the 96 dead as an inquest
jury ruled the victims had been unlawfully killed in a tragedy caused by police
blunders.
Ironically Tuesday was a big day for football. It was the first leg of the Champions League
semi-final at an English Stadium where Real Madrid was playing Manchester
City. Real Madrid fans were gutted to
see Cristiano Ronaldo on the bench because of a hamstring and to see Benzema
walk off in the first half for a similar complaint. The match was boring with a disappointing 0-0
draw at the end. Let’s hope the gods
smile on the Spanish team when they play the second leg next week at the Bernabeu
stadium and they win to get through to the final. The final may well be against their Atlético de Madrid rivals who beat Bayern de Munich the next day 1-0 with a superb goal
from 21 year old Saul Niguez. It would be a repeat of the final 2 years ago
in Lisbon where Real Madrid garnered their 10th cup. I think it would be only fair for Atlético to
garner their first so if there is an all Madrid final I shall be cheering for
the underdogs.
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| 21 year old Saul Niguez of Atlético de Madrid happy with his winning goal against Bayern Munich |
But there was far more important news in Spain that
day; political of course – most news here is about politics. The news was that there will be new general elections on 26th June after the hung parliament result on 20th
December. Since then no political party
has had enough support to form a government.
Most people are worried that new elections will only bring a similar
result and wonder how and when a new government will be formed.
On Wednesday I woke up to the news that Apples
revenues were down for the first time with not enough sales of their iPhone 6
or whatever. I think it is because they don’t have any middle or low end phones
to keep their competitive edge against Samsung and Huawei. When I worked for Nokia and they were the top
mobile phone manufacturer I well remember the day when their revenues went down
for the first time. From then on they spiralled down more and more until they
were finally out of the game. Perhaps
this could be a lesson to the guys at Cupertino.
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| Apple revenues for their iPhone sales were down for the first time in the history of the company this week |
On Wednesday Suzy had an important meeting with the
new company she will be working for. A
Spanish mushroom company from Galicia that produces organic mushrooms for
medicinal and beauty purposes, called Hifas da Terra which is a huge success in
Spain. It is making a break into the UK market where their products are even
sold at Harrods! So it will be goodbye
to Bare Biology where honestly I think the owners didn’t tap into Suzy’s great
personality and experience enough and hello Hifas da Terra. Suzy will be a nutritionist there with
responsibilities for training, fairs and exhibitions and even social
media. The latter will be totally new to
her but she has all my help if she needs it. If you have got as far as here I
would ask you a favour and that is to follow Hifas da Terra on their facebook
(https://www.facebook.com/hifasdaterraUK/?fref=nf) and their twitter page (@HifasdaTerraUK)
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| The new company Suzy is working for |
Meanwhile at home, my latest DVD purchase from Amazon
arrived; Series 5 of Homeland.
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| Homeland Series 5 arrived this week. I can't wait to watch it. |
I can’t wait to watch it. I didn’t start watching it
on Wednesday as Eladio and I were immersed in Julian Fellowe’s adaptation of
Anthony Trollope’s novel Dr. Thorne.
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| Watched Julian Fellowe's TV adaptation of Anthony Trollope's Doctor Thorne this week |
It’s his first TV series after Downton Abbey and is
not a patch on it. The story is good but
the characters a little over the top.
We watch TV from bed where Pippa sleeps with us. Here she is inside the sheets looking so
cute.
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| Pippa sleeping in our bed. Isn't she cute? |
Thursday was Suzy’s birthday and she was not to be
with us this year which was rather frustrating.
Wow that day 32 years ago I had given birth to my first daughter, tiny
little Suzy. She has grown up into a
beautiful, kind, charismatic woman with all the right values and I hope I have
had something to do with that. She wasn’t
to be alone though to celebrate as her flat mates, Vicky, Julieta and Anita,
together with Chati, organised a birthday dinner with all the trimmings. Here they are together. Today she will be hosting a big party at
their new house in Camden. I have certainly brought up both girls to make a
very special day of their birthdays.
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| Suzy celebrating her birthday this week with Vicky, Chati, Julieta and Anita |
That morning I went for my walk in the rain. My new sou’wester which I bought in London at
Urban Outfitters recently came in handy as you can see in the picture below.
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| Wearing my new sou'wester on a wet walk one morning this week |
Thankfully the rain has been quite scarce this week
with more sun than cloud. It was a quiet day.
I fasted, worked and in the afternoon went for another walk this time
with Eladio and the dogs. It was sunny
and it was amazing to see how much the grass had grown and how the wild flowers
had suddenly made their appearance on a massive scale.
That night we finished watching Dr. Thorne. We immediately started on my next TV series
called Granchester.
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| One of the TV series we have been watching this week |
Set near Cambridge in the 50s it stars the most
handsome British actor I have seen for a long time. James Norton is Sydney
Chambers, a young clergymen who gets involved with solving crimes, helping a
local detective. It was written by James
Runcie who says the role of the young vicar was loosely based on his Father,
the late Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie. I am thoroughly enjoying it.
Friday was a great day. I went for my walk then worked
most of the morning before going food shopping with Eladio. We had fish and chips for lunch made by Salu
who didn’t make them like I do: the chips were soggy and the fish too. But we still liked it. Later I went to the
hairdresser for a cut and came out with curly hair which Suzy said made me look
like the Queen hahaha. On our afternoon
walk the sun was out again and there were even more flowers in the fields. I just had to have the view on camera with
Norah and Pippa on a carpet of wild flowers, mostly giant daisies. I have
chosen it as the photo to illustrate this week’s post.
Friday ended with dinner out at La Vaca Argentina with
Eladio and Olivia where Oli and I drank half a bottle of wine between us and
ended up feeling just slightly tipsy hahaha.
It was a lovely relaxed meal. As
Oli was there I was able to get a photo of Eladio and I out for dinner on
Friday something we do most weeks.
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| At the Vaca Argentina with Eladio for dinner on Friday night |
If Friday was a great day, Saturday was too. José Antonio and Dolores were coming for
lunch. I did the cooking yesterday and made oxtail using Simone Ortega’s recipe
from her famous Spanish cook book; 1080 recipes.
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| Oxtail for lunch yesterday when José Antonio and Dolores came |
For dessert I tried out Jamie Oliver’s recipe for raspberry syllabub and it was delicious and looked just right. I got the desired
“ripple effect”.
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| Jamie Oliver's raspberry syllabub for lunch yesterday. I'm proud of how it turned out! |
And here we are at lunch yesterday. Thanks for the photo Oli.
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| The family lunch yesterday |
It was a sunny afternoon so we sat aside on the terrace after lunch.
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| Toño, Eladio and Dolores on the terrace yesterday after lunch |
At about 5 we had afternoon tea and the dogs joined us
as you can see in the photo below.
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| Eladio feeding the dogs crumbs from our afternoon tea yesterday. You can just spot little Pippa. |
Then it was time for our constitutional. We were keen to show José Antonio and Dolores
just how lovely the fields looked with long grass and covered in flowers.
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| Toño, Dolores, Eladio and Norah on our glorious walk yesterday afternoon |
The day ended with dinner at home which was really a
combination of tapas. Once in bed there
was time for one more episode of Granchester before we fell asleep.
And today is Sunday, my Father’s 97th
birthday. For some reason I have been
telling everyone he was 97 but he only turned it today. Whilst I am writing I have been up to lay the
dining room table, the croissants are in the oven and soon we will be having
the first of his birthday celebrations, a family breakfast.
And here is the "birthday boy" at the grand old age of 97 surrounded by flowers, his presents (Milk tray chocolates and history books on Norway and the Second World War) and cards from Suzy and us.
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| A special breakfast this morning to celebrate my Father's birthday, his 97th! |
I want to enjoy the day, so will get on with
publishing this and therefore will tell you all about today's events and how
we celebrated Russian Easter with our neighbours in next week’s post.
Meanwhile, cheers to you all and I wish you a great
week ahead,
Masha
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