Shopping with Susi, the ex-Motorola gathering and a relaxing weekend.

Hi

Friday I went speed shopping with Susi in Centro Oeste to buy a present for her boyfriend Gaby who is 21 today. The excuse was to buy him a present, but I managed to get in a red jumper from Cortefiel and a white one from Zara. And we also bought ourselves a lovely handbag each from Accesorize. Oli if you are reading this, we will do the same, I promise, when you come back from Falmouth for Christmas.

Meanwhile, 2 ex-colleagues from my Motorola days are organizing what they call the “First Analogue (Etacs) Generation Convention”. About 28 or 30 of the original staff will be meeting on the 16th November for a night out bowling and dining. We have been asked to send old photos for the occasion plus photos of how we look today. I have dug out quite a few out but the one I am most proud of is with Induráin (the five times winner of the Tour of France) where I am giving him a phone (the Flare) made specially for him. He was a guy who never smiled, but there he was smiling beautifully. The photo was taken at least 12 years ago.


This was the recent photo I chose to send in. It was taken in Arzuaga a couple of years ago.
The weekend has been quiet as usual with not much to report. We have been doing the usual, reading the papers, going for our walks and similar stuff I love and which gives me energy for the week coming.
Cheers till next week. M.

Miguel back from London, family gathering

Hello again

One of the highlights of the week was taking my favourite nephew out for lunch. Miguel works in London for City Bank and was here for a week’s holiday. We went to a place called Fast Good, a brilliant place for eating. It is owned by Spain’s top chef, Ferran Adria and it serves simple good quality, gourmet food in the same way fast food chains do. As don’t know anyone well enough at work to go out with yet, it’s where I eat alone the days when I don’t have a lunch engagement.

This weekend we had a lunch for Miguel and his parents, José Antonio (Eladio’s next brother down) and Dolores. Miguel hadn’t seen our new house, so this was the occasion. Just to be simple I made “cocido madrileño” again, my speciality and perfect for a wet Autumn day.

Today will be quiet: reading the newspapers, writing a post for my blog, making the lunch. Then I have to update Oli’s anti-virus programme and buy a ticket for Susi to visit Oli in November. Susi plans to go out on the 8th Nov to the 12th which is a bank holiday. We will be seeing her on the weekend of the 17th November where we will all meet up at Amanda and Andy’s place near London. CANNOT WAIT!

I have a very busy week coming up. Let you know all about it next time.

Cheers/Masha

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

My first week – just like I’d never been away. Plus Pedro, Ludy and Enrique.

Hiya

How would I sum it up? Exhausted but happy. The worst thing is the traffic. If I leave at 07.30 in the morning I get to the office at 09.20, nearly 2 hours! However if I work at home during the rush hour which I did on Friday it takes 30 mins.

On Wednesday I travelled to Stockholm for meetings with the Communications people on Thursday and it felt a bit like “going home” to my Nokia days. I rang Anne from the taxi who was in Salo (Finland) and I came back on Finnair so I felt quite at home. I must say though that the Swedes were very hospitable and much warmer than I had imagined. As one Spanish friend said to me: “ well they are a bit nearer the sun”.

I feel as though I have been operative from day one but then that is the only option. The new company is preparing to launch its services at the beginning of December so the preparations are very intense and I had no time to indulge in long inductions. No, I just had to start work which is just how I like to do things. My announcement went out on Thursday morning and I was quite amazed at the reaction from the press; just so positive and warm. They made me feel so welcome back to the “sector”, like I’d never been away.

The week was long and intense so I have been appreciating this weekend more than usual. Friday I took the family out to dinner to celebrate. We went to our usual restaurant where we always feel so at home – La Alpargatería. Oli was very much missed as was José Luis. However José was on his way at the time to Bristol to visit Oli so we knew she was going to be fine.

Picture taken after dinner - a bit dark I'm afraid.
Last night we went out with our dear friends, Pedro, Ludy and Enrique. Stubborn as usual, I insisted we went to La Vaca Argentina where, it turned out, we were not that well treated. We were 15 minutes late and they had taken the table away which meant they wanted to turn us away as the place was soooo full. We finally got a table but it was the lousiest they had. But, anyway, the food was good and it was great to see each other again. For those friends of mine who are reading this and don’t live in Spain, Pedro is actually Pedro Delgado, a pretty famous guy in Spain. He was a professional cyclist and won the Tour of France, Tour of Spain and many other races too. But apart from his sport’s fame, Pedro is what I think is charismatic. He is so sweet and normal that everyone is attracted to his personality. Ludy, his beautiful wife, comes from the same area as Eladio so they have a lot in common. Ludy is the wonderful Mother of 3 small children, including boy twins. So she has a lot on her hands. Enrique is their friend who is fast becoming ours too. Enrique is in the legal profession and got to know Pedro and Ludy through his love of cycling. But actually his love of cycling has had him housebound since the beginning of August when he fell off his bike and had to have his leg operated on and a plastic bone put in (prosthesis).

Today will be spent with the family resting in readiness for the hectic week coming up. On Tuesday I will make my first public appearance with the media which I’m actually really looking forward to.

Cheers till next week

Masha

Elena’s celebration – 50 years of religious life

Hiya

On Saturday, Eladio and I, as well as José Antonio and Dolores were invited by their cousin Elena to her “Bodas de Oro” which roughly translated, is the celebration of her 50 years devoted to Christ. We don’t see her much but when Eladio was younger, she and her family had quite a lot of influence on his life.

The celebration started off with a mass where Elena renewed her vows as a nun. It was funny to see how none of the nuns present were below the age of 60!! After the mass there was a lunch held in the convent which was actually quite raucous for a nun type event. We even heard shouts of “Viva la Novia” (Long live the Bride)!

The group picture is quite interesting. I hardly know any of the other people but Eladio does. In the middle you can see Elena to the right of Eladio.

I couldn’t resist taking this other picture of Eladio opposite the table to me at lunch. I think you will agree, he looks great in a suit and tie.

Cheers/Masha

The Housewarming party that turned into a celebration dinner.

Hi,

I had had a dinner party planned for Friday night for a few friends who didn’t make it to the first one. When I signed with Xfera I decided to turn the housewarming party into a celebration dinner. So I promptly doubled the numbers by inviting more friends. In the end we were 16 for dinner. It was the 1st indoor dinner we have had at the new house. We put 2 tables together and, of course, had to use 2 dinner services. One of them was my Grandmother’s which, according to my Father, had not been used in 60 years!!!!

The guests:


It was lovely to welcome darling Jill and her husband Paco. Jill is the HR Manager of Nokia Spain (I always introduce her as the friend who dismissed me from my job) and has become a good friend since I left. But she has also been a bit of an HR coach to me this year. So thanks Jill for your great support. It was also nice to welcome Zenaida and her dishy partner Tapani. Z works with Jill and has also been a great support to me this year. She is pregnant and expecting a little girl quite soon. Ana and Tommy also came as they are always included in our social events. Ana who I got to know in Nokia is the Legal Counsel for HP Spain. She and her amazingly good looking husband Tommy got married last year. Then came the permanent fixtures, Fátima and Julio who are my very best friends. Fátima and I go back a long way and became friends when we first worked for Motorola in the early 90’s. And, at long last, we had the pleasure of the company of my dear (photographer) friend Rafa. Rafa and I also go back a long time and met in my cycling days in the early 90’s. Unfortunately you cannot see how good looking he is, as he took the photo. You might remember him from one of my posts – as the spaghetti monster. Rafa, has a great appetite for food! And then came dear Alexander and Diane. Alex is a friend of Amanda and Andy’s. He works for the same company as Andy – Bertelsmann, is German and is based here in Madrid. We met at A + A’s wedding last year and have finally met up here in Spain. Diane is his lovely girlfriend, who, believe it or not is training to become a brain surgeon!!!

Alex and Diane relaxing after dinner
And, of course, we had the young contingent: Susana, my older daughter, her boyfriend Gaby (who doubled as a waiter that night) and Oli’s boyfriend José Luis. He is part of the family and although Oli is away in England, it seemed right to have him with us on Friday night.

I hope everybody ate well. We prepared home made gazpacho, boeuf strogonof and then a choice between trifle and tiramisu. We also drank quite a lot – or at least I did. For the occasion I opened the last magnum bottle of Quercus!!

The party began to break up at about 2 but Fati, Rafa, Alex and Diane stayed on for a while and Eladio and I ended up going to bed after 4 in the morning.

Needless to stay the next day I was in no good physical state to go to Eladio’s cousin, Elena’s 50 years celebration of religious life. But more about that in another post.

All the best/Masha

And then I got to choose – 2 jobs in one week, from the French to the Swedish!

Hello again,

I think most of you know that I have been looking for a job this year. You will have followed from my blog that my main activities this year were concentrated on selling our old home and buying a new house, amongst many other things. I devoted the time on my hands to my immediate family: we brought my Father from England to live with us – plus all his books and family furniture. Eladio and I had time to travel and took the opportunity to visit Istanbul and Rome in the autumn and the winter. I cooked endlessly, did many domestic chores but also kept up with friends and all in all spent a pleasurable and relaxed year with the family.

But once my personal objectives were achieved, I was itching to go back to work but finding a new job was not an easy task. My age was against me, plus the fact that there are very few Communications posts; just one per company and most of them are filled. Eladio is witness to the fact that I did all in my power to get my name and CV in the market and a good CV it was too, both in packaging and content.

And in the end I had 2 job offers that actually coincided in time. The worst thing was that they didn’t actually come at the same time, so I accepted the 1st one and started work last Monday with a French telecoms company. I worked 4 days only. On Wednesday I went to Paris to get to know the people and just as I walked out of the meeting I had a call from the other company. For the record I had given up on that company and thought they wouldn’t offer me a job which is why I accepted the job with the French!! The other company is Swedish and they are starting up in Spain as a mobile phone operator and will be the 4th operator. From a professional point of view working for this company was a step up in my career. Unfortunately the French company didn’t see it that way and went ballistic!!! In fact they were very rude and put the phone down on me. Their reaction was a bit of a damper but it was not unexpected. I did not, though, feel comfortable as quitting after 4 days is not my style, especially as they had treated me so well and had welcomed me with their arms open.

I have told just a few people, but word has spread and on Friday my mobile phone was jammed with messages from ex colleagues and journalists welcoming me back to the sector. I got the firm offer on Thursday night and agreed to start this Monday coming. So at least I had Friday to relax and celebrate.

One of the nicest messages came from a journalist who wrote: “justice has been done”.

Cheers/Masha

Eladio’s birthday and the broken cake!

Hi folks

So today was Eladio’s birthday. I don’t think he would like me publishing his age on my blog so I will refrain from doing so. Suffice it to say he looks as young and gorgeous as ever. My Ukranian cleaning lady, Zena, agrees!

Here’s the birthday boy opening his presents and here is the birthday boy sitting down to a groaning breakfast table, laid for best in our new dining room.

Susi and I went all out in our preparations as there is nothing we like better than organizing parties and special menus, as you will all have gathered from many of my posts. Lunch was itsy bitsy and included home made “humus” and pitta bread, gambas al ajillo (prawns cooked in garlic and olive oil) and many other delicacies.

The piece de la resistance was the home made chocolate, cream and m+ms cake which we had difficulty making yesterday. It’s a standard house recipe but yesterday it refused to come out as it should. Midway, the cream turned to butter twice while being whipped so Susi and I had to go out and get some more. When we got back she had to go and Eladio took her place, helping me. He promptly helped me by putting the top layer on without adding the cream. To remedy that he took it off again and, of course it broke into various parts!!! It then had to be reconstructed with more chocolate. We finally placed m+ms to hide the cracks but instead of hiding them, they sunk into the cake making the cracks even bigger.

Despite all the difficulties and mishaps, it tasted delicious, to judge by the long siesta we had afterwards.

Oh, yes and the presents. My Father bought him a lovely adidas track suit (for our daily walks), Susi bought him a practical gardening book – well he is the in-house gardner – and I bought him an indoor tropical plant, basically because I realized we might have a huge garden but we don’t have any vegetation in the house.

Olivia was dearly missed today. Love you darling.

Until next time/Masha

Seeing Oli off

Hi all,

It seemed the day would never come, but it did. On Tuesday 19th September, Eladio, Susi and I saw beautiful Olivia off at Madrid Airport on her way to spend an Erasmus year in the UK in Cornwall at the University College of Falmouth which belongs to the University of Exeter. She will be there for the academic year but will be coming home both for the Christmas and Easter breaks.

Here you can see the 4 of us, plus the trolley full of her huge suitcase (Samsonite’s biggest), laptop and rucksack. Along with the laptop, Oli also took a webcam and Skype phones to keep in touch with us all while she is away. She will be downloading films to see on the laptop and music for her mp3, so she couldn’t be more technologically up to date for her year away or more in touch thanks to the internet connection provided in her room at the student residence. It’s a far cry from when I went to University where we had to keep in touch using the local phone box and sending and receiving letters via Royal Mail. What a difference!!

She hasn’t taken too long to settle in and has spent the first few days on an initiation course with the other international students – from India, Norway, Japan, France, Germany, Indonesia and Spain. Last night she prepared dinner for a Japanese girl called Shiro in her flat – apparently spag bol. I wonder whether Shiro liked it or what she would prepare in return?

Tomorrow the English students will all be arriving and Oli and Rafa, her Spanish fellow student, will no longer be alone in their flat for 7.

We are not actually missing her yet (apart from today, Eladio’s birthday where her empty place at the table was very obvious) as we talk to her more than once a day. In any case, we shall probably be going to see her in the middle of November so her absence will be much more bearable.

Cheers for now/Masha

Life is beautiful! And I have some news … Read on.

Hiya again.

This weeks’ post was going to start off with other news but just as I began to write I got a message with some very good news from my best friend Amanda. Amanda and I go way back as we met when we were 11 and had just started at Grammar School in Bradford, dear old St. Joseph’s college. And we have kept up ever since and are there for each other in the good times and the bad.

It was her birthday last week and I rang to say Happy Birthday – the funny thing is I hardly ever ring her or send a card and this was the first time in years, but then again the birthday was a change of decade. So when she replied that she had had a nasty birthday present, in that she had a bad mamograph result with suspected breast cancer, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing – cancer is no stranger to either of us; her Father died early of cancer, her husband Andy lost his first wife to the same disease, my Mother died of lung cancer and not so long ago, my Brother too of skin cancer. So the news was serious. Amanda told me she would have the results today, Monday and meanwhile would postpone her birthday celebrations. Well, she probably had a horrible weekend but this morning she got the result and it was BENIGN!! And, as she says, “will live”. And,. So I say, “Life is indeed beautiful”. Congrats Amanda darling. Now, there is no excuse to come out and see us one weekend!!

Life is beautiful, and, as you will agree from the picture, my dear daughters are beautiful too (Susi on the left and Oli on the right). Oli is finally going to the UK tomorrow and is spending most of the day packing and unpacking until she gets the suitcase to the right weight of 25kgs. We will miss her but I just know she is going to get so much out of this.



And now for some news from me. Most of you know that after a year at home, or rather selling our old house, finding a new one and moving in, I was itching to get back to work. Well, I have been very busy with interviews in August and September. I was actually in 3 job processes. And now I have a very enticing job offer from a French telecoms company and will be starting work on Monday 25th next. Because I haven’t signed the contract yet, I won’t tell you the name until I begin. The job itself is, of course, the position of Communications Manager which, I’m sure is no surprise to any of you.

So, there you have it, Life is Beautiful.

Cheers Masha

Storks busy and romance in the air

Hiya all,

This post is dedicated to some of my girlfriends: Anne, Zenaida, Juana, Fernanda and Mónica. Obviously there is some romance in the air and storks have been busy or soon will be.

Anne has found someone special in her life and I am so happy for her. Zenaida is 6 months pregnant and looks radiant. Mónica will be getting married on the 14th October (but very unfairly the wedding will be in Germany in one years time). Juana is pregnant again – if you follow her blog you can see daily how far gone she is and also how old or big Santi is getting - and Fernanda has just given birth to Jerónimo in June in Mexico City. So, as you can see, a lot of good news all around.

Congratulations girls!

The picture is of beautiful Fernanda with her new born baby.

Cheers/Masha

The Gardner and a Full House

Hello again

Here I am writing again this Sunday morning. Last night Eladio and I watched the Constant Gardner. The plot doesn’t have much to do with gardening but the title fits Eladio quite well. Here is a great picture of him spraying pesticide on some of our plants.



The constant gardner!

One of the plants is the lovely Hibiscus which Ana Valdivieso brought us for our housewarming party at the beginning of July. Ever since it has produced a new flower nearly every day; quite incredible.



Ana's plant

I also wanted to show you this lovely single pear on the small pear tree we inherited from the previous owners. It has been growing for months now, getting bigger every day. I wonder who is going to eat it?




The pear tree


And today we have a full house as last night all the bedrooms were full. The girls had a dinner party and some of the guests slept overnight. They have all been waking up at different times this morning and they will all be staying for lunch. So it’s like a non stop party for them. And as I am writing, at least 20 chicken legs are roasting in the oven.

I’ll leave you now to attend them.

Enjoy the photos.

The lazy Summer days are coming to an end.

Hi again

Well, we are now well into September and the lazy Summer days are coming to an end. Soon the girls will be going back to University. Oli will be off to the UK for her Erasmus (exchange) year in Falmouth on the 19th September and Susi has been accepted at the Complutense University here in Madrid to finish her degree in Food Science. Olivia is doing a triple degree in Audiovisual Communication, Media Studies and PR + Advertising but will be concentrating on Film Studies in her year in the UK, lucky her! We are going to miss her so much this year.

September also looks like a very good month for finding a job and right now I have quite a few prospects open but more about that when there is some real news.

Meanwhile the weather has changed a bit and we have had quite a few thunderstorms this week where we all rush out to bring in the garden furniture, run round closing hundreds of windows and generally prepare the house for heavy rain. In his rush down some steps the other day poor Eladio fell and bruised his back quite badly but he refused to go the doctor and as is very typical of him suffered, “like a good beast”, in silence.

Eladio is forever outside in the garden and today he finally put up the swings we had brought from our old house. They were bought when the girls were 3 and 4 but are part of our family heritage so we brought them with us.

And, today, we had some old friends round for lunch, Benito and Loli. They were our neighbours when I first came to live in Spain and Eladio and I lived “in sin”. We have kept up over the years on and off, so it was lovely to welcome them to our new house today. The menu – very typical of me – was a Spanish first course of Gazpacho, a Russian second course of Boeuf Strogonof and a choice between an English or Italian dessert of home made Apple Crumble or Tiramisu made by Susana. Susi discovered how to make Tiramisu this week and has repeated the experience now nearly 5 times!!!


Benito and Loli at lunch today.

And, that, as I usually finish off, is all for the moment folks.

Cheers/Masha

A quiet and very hot week. Spain won the Basket Ball World Championship!

Hi again

This week has been very quiet, not much to report really. We’ve just been doing our usual things and enjoying the peace of the last week of August.

It has been the hottest summer in 45 years apparently. We had a break in the middle of August when we came back from Santa Pola but now the hot weather has returned with a vengeance. The forecast for today is 39º, just a bit too much. Thank God for the swimming pool I say. It might seem like a luxury to anyone living outside Spain, but here it is almost a necessity.

As a lot of you know, I am quite a keen sports follower (not a player which is different but a couch spectator) and yesterday it was great to see Spain beat Greece in the Basket Ball world championship final. The final was actually a bit of a walk over whereas the semi finals where much more exciting. Greece eliminated the US team quite amazingly and Spain beat Argentina, the reigning champions by one point only.

Here is part of the the family watching the final (Left to right: Gaby, Susi, José Luis and my Father).




That’s all for the moment folks!
Love Masha

Julio came to lunch

Hiya again

As I said in yesterday's post, Julio came to lunch today for the annual Summer "cocido". Here is a picture to prove it. It was lovely to see him again. Recently he seems to be having lunch around the world with his friends. So, if you visit Juana's blog, you will see he had lunch in Mexico City at the end of last week. Julio and I have very similar tastes and one is certainly sharing a meal around a table with good food and good friends and, of course, good wine.

All the best again

Masha

Cooking with the girls

Hiya again

I thought you might like to see this snapshot of the girls and I cooking in our fabulous new kitchen. We can be often found together making lunch and Eladio took this picture yesterday. We don't look that great, but he captured the atmosphere.

Until next time folks.

All the best/Masha

Pensión El Bosque open again – visitors from Yecla. Lazy August days, visit to Copenhagen.

Hello again

So when it looked like the whole family were back together again, my Father went off to Copenhagen for a week. Not bad for an 88 year old to travel that far on his own. Judging from the phone calls he’s having a great time. My father loves the Nordic countries and this must be his 3rd or 4th visit to the Danish capital. He will have visited Malmo across the bridge (the 3rd biggest Swedish town), Hamlet’s castle in Elsingor, the home town of Hans Christian Anderson and of course the museums, his favourite being one of Viking ships being an old “sailor” himself.

So the 4 of us were left alone together – the nuclear family, but not for long because a couple of days after my Father left, Merce and Josema from Yecla came to visit and The “Pensión El Bosque” was reopened after the holidays. Merce is a friend of the girls from their younger Santa Pola days. They come from Yecla, a smallish town in Murcia famous for furniture and wine, where, according to Josema, Merce’s boyfriend, there are more luxury cars per capita than any other town in Spain! They are guests we will love to welcome again as they came with their arms full of delicious local produce including 2 kilos of wonderful smelling home grown peaches.

So I have been very busy in the kitchen this last week cooking for many hungry young people, but also have had time to enjoy the afternoons spent lazily by the pool, reading, drinking tea and chatting with Eladio. I must add that this is always after a lovely long Spanish siesta.

Tomorrow there will be more cooking as my dear friend Julio will be coming for the now traditional summer lunch of “cocido madrileño”. He comes every year and I always cook his favourite dish, “cocido”. It is actually a very heavy winter dish; a sort of vegetable and meat stew where the main ingredient is the Spanish “garbanzo” or chick peas. So it’s a bit of a contrast to eat it in the summer, but then none of us are really very conventional in this home.

As they say at the end of the cartoons, “that’s all for the moment folks”.

All the best until the next post.

Masha
PS the picture is of Josema and Merce who came to stay last week.

23 years ago today

Today is our wedding anniversary. It’s hard to believe that we got married 23 years ago today! And here is a picture of the two of us on that happy day and another one of us celebrating our anniversary on Saturday night. Even though I say it myself, we do not look that bad 23 years later.

Suffice it to say and as a friend of mine once told me, you don’t get it much better than we’ve got it and that we apparently are one of the chosen few couples who will make it to our Silver Wedding anniversary in two years time, as now a days the divorce rates are so, so high.

Happy anniversary Eladio and roll on 2008 when we will go all out to celebrate our 25th.

Cheers/Masha

Eladio cutting the leafy tree

Hi again

One thing we had to attend to when we got back home was dealing with the bed of leaves on the garden outside the kitchen. Every day we have to sweep away loads of leaves from one very stubborn little tree which is a little too close to the house. It must have some sort of illness as it never stops shedding its leaves.

So the day after we got back we finally decided to do something about it and Eladio got out the ladder and saw and went to work. And here he is looking a bit like a Spanish mature version of Tarzan. I have to add he had help from Gaby, Suzy’s extremely fit and helpful boyfriend.



All the best till next time/Masha

The Mystery Play of Elche (Misteri d’Elx)

Hi again

The one exception to our routine at Santa Pola was when we went to Elche to see the Mystery Play. We go nearly every year so that is a bit of a routine too. It’s something we both look forward to immensely. It is held late at night because of the intense heat. It starts at 10.30 p.m. and finishes after one in the morning.

It’s difficult to explain but basically it is a sacred musical drama of the death, assumption and crowning of the Virgin. It has been performed since the 15th century in the Basilica of Saint Mary of Elche with special permission from the Pope. It is sung entirely and by men only. Small choir boys sing the part of the Virgin and angels. None of them are professionals and all of them are from Elche. They spend a whole year preparing for the event which has now become world famous. In 2001 it was awarded the title of Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by the Unesco.


If you ever get the chance it is something well worth attending.

All the best/Masha


This photo is of the golden palm tree (the Mangrana) holding an angel which descends from “heaven” (a hole in the dome) for the angel to announce the imminent death of the virgin and to give her a golden palm to take to her grave.



Here is a picture of Eladio and me next to the sculpture representing the Misteri.