Interviews in the Spanish Press about the new Book

Stories Left in Stone, Trails and Traces in Cáceres, Spain

 

This weekend the regional and local press both published interviews with me (in Spanish) about my new book, Stories Left in Stone, Trails and Traces in Cáceres, Spain, published by the University of Alberta Press. 

The first interview in Avuelapluma is a very indepth deep-dive into the book and what brought it about.

The second is by the prolific local writer J.R Alonso de la Torre in the HOY. It goes a bit into my background and even lightly touchs upon some polemics that a few of the more 'sensitive' readers immediately took offense to. Something that is inevitable while they cling to an atavistic, outdated vision of the country.

One Person's Bread is Another's...

Traditional bread from the Algarve. How do you cut it?

Give us this day our daily bread, but just make sure it's Portuguese. A stale item makes a return this week in the Camino a Ítaca in the latest additions to a series of articles I have written on bread. A recent headline read that bread consumption has fallen 70% (!) in the region over the past 20 years and some of the possible reasons for this are explored in the piece. Click over to read the original version in Spanish published in the HOY or read the English translation below. (PDF en castellano abajo)

As much as it pains me to admit it, there are times when the market can be right. But I must stress that only sometimes, and of course not the free for all that some neoliberal evangelists advocate. Even if Wall Street traders, lunatic orange racists, quasi fascist Argentinian presidents with extraterrestrial haircuts and his sycophantic groupie in the Puerta del Sol would like you to believe it is always so, history and experience clearly show that this supposed axiom only holds true for them, those that already have the money in the first place.

But it was a headline, in this very newspaper, that reminded me that there are times when the market isn’t necessarily wrong. Or at least in this case, the consumer is the one who’s right. The headline intoned, “Bread consumption in the region falls 70 percent in 20 years.” The message was dramatic and signaled a sea change in society. Here we weren’t talking about a slight change in habits, but a complete revolution in the way people were eating.

Some tried to explain the change by highlighting recent lifestyle changes and the notion that more and more people were trying to lose weight by avoiding carbohydrates. Yet the pasta market continues to grow and more and more people choose pizza to treat themselves on Friday nights. No, that couldn’t be it.

Others blamed the near apocalyptic increase in the cost of living over the past few years. Electricity prices have gone through the roof and basic staples like flour have more or less doubled in price and these rises have obviously had a knock-on effect on the increased price of bread. But people continue to lavishly splurge money on much more frivolous things than bread. So no, that wasn’t the case either.

The reason was abundantly clear. It’s the product itself.

After having lived here in Extremadura for going on twenty years it’s still an ongoing mystery for me, one that rates up there with cognitive dissonance between the empty churches and sold out Virgin and Semana Santa processions. It’s something that the great Jose Ramon Alonso de la Torre and I have differed on here in the paper in the past, but that is still beyond confusing for me. How is it possible that in a land with some of the country’s most exquisite cuisine, fueled by some of the finest local ingredients, you still find yourself doomed to push sauces around your plate with the gastronomic equivalent of licking the flaking whitewash off of a crumbling adobe wall?

With few exceptions aside, like the Ecotahona del Ambroz or el Horno Tradicion and Amasamadre in Cáceres, the bread you see has become as dubious and industrial as a paella that you mind find in a vending machine on a train in Nebraska. You can say it’s from the remotest village and sprinkle flour on it to make it seem more rustic, but it’s still bread that neither rests nor sleeps and thus boasts the flavor equivalent of a napkin in a bar.

Until there is a return to bread that rests, consumption will continue to plummet. My question now is, what have people replaced bread with?

Stories Left in Stone Deep Dive Chapter 16

In the first of the #StonesDeepDive series, an indepth look into Chapter 16, Stone Cartoons from Stories Left in Stone, Trails and Traces in Cáceres, Spain published by the University of Alberta Press. This part of the adventure takes place in Monfragüe National Park and the Sistine Chapel of prehistoric rock art in the region. Click over to have a look.

The Virgin of Lithium

Celestial interventions in this week's Camino a Ítaca. And Virgins? Did I forget to mention Virgins? Click over to read the originally published piece in Spanish in the HOY or read the English translation below. (PDF en castellano abajo)

For the past few weeks the local papers in Cáceres have taken on a distinctly retro look, seeming more like throwbacks to the days when entire society page sections took up large portions of the ink printed. It’s as though the city was being visited by a foreign head of state or some extremely popular movie star and the media can’t get enough.

Pages and pages have been dedicated to her itinerary, who she was greeted by and even down to the last detail of what she was wearing and where she had acquired it. The ongoing genocide in Gaza (and now Lebanon) and Pedro Sanchez’s capitulation to thefugitive who has been living large in Waterloo, paid for by the Spanishtaxpayer have been pushed to the side by this, in some of the articles’ fawning words, momentous event.

One of the interesting aspects of all of this media attention, especially for an outside observer like myself, is that all of this hype and dedication has not been devoted to someone like Kamala Harris, Rosalia, Taylor Swift or even Queen Leticia and how she spends your hard-earned tax Euros on new outfits and shoes. All of this media hysteria has been given over to what is in effect an inanimate object.

Call it an icon, a totem, a figurine, a fetish or graven image but the extent of this fawning has been so great that I have even had to check twice when picking up a copy of the other newspaper in the region to make sure that I hadn’t picked up by mistake a parish magazine that someone coming from mass had left behind.

But the apparent frenzy that the centenary of the Virgin of the Mountain has sparked only scratches the surface of the debate that is really fermenting in the city. A closer look at the comments in articles and town hall posts, beyond those claiming that this statue represents all Cacereños or those rightfully questioning why article 16 of the Spanish constitution seems to have become a mere suggestion rather than law, shows that an entirely different polemic is happening.

It’s not a debate about Leviticus’ exhortation not to pray to idols or whether a sectarian religious figure should be feted by the local government and bestowed with the title of honorary Mayor, but rather a referendum on one of the most crucial challenges facing the future of the city: the lithium mine.

It seems that the faithful want to know where she stands on this issue, with many scandalized that this could even be conceived so close to her sanctuary.

The former mayor had his Pauline conversion after a mysterious occurrence when he did a complete about-face on his stance on the mine and as a result lost the election. While the current mayor twists himself into knots trying not to pronounce one way or the other on the matter until he too gets that same phone call, if he hasn’t already.

The question is if all of these prayers will convince the Virgin to intercede on the faithful’s behalf? And then perhaps more pertinently, what happens when she doesn’t?

On Sale Today!

My new book Stories Left in Stone, Trails and Traces in Cáceres, Spain with the University of Alberta Press is now available at fine bookstores everywhere. If not, don't be shy to ask them to stock it.

'A fresh and engaging outsider perspective on life in Spain.' -Kirkus Reviews