Spanish Time Zones

Writing in the local paper. Local issues with a global take. I never translate literally and the editor trims at will to make it fit. Here's my version, then theirs.

One of my first memories of Spain is how time felt completely different here than it did anywhere else I had ever been. During my first few visits I remember feeling like I was always an hour or two ahead and it couldn’t have been the jetlag because most of the times we had just come from France or Belgium. True, this was almost twenty years ago while I was touring with a band from New York City called Little Mike and the Tornadoes. I can remember being thrown off by the late dinners and starting concerts around midnight whereas we would normally start around nine or ten in the United States and would have probably eaten two hours before stepping on stage. I recall getting a few hours sleep and getting up early to explore the streets and wondering where everyone was at nine and then being confused when they disappeared again at two. That was a long time ago and now my stomach doesn’t start to rumble til two and my wife complains that I eat dinner later than most Spaniards on holidays do. It now no longer seems strange to me to say buenos dias at 1pm and buenas tardes at 9pm and I definitely think twice before calling someone at 4pm (siesta?) but there are still times when I feel an hour or two off. That is until this recent time change. The other day when the clock fell back, it seemed to slide into place. True, my two and a half year old daughter hasn’t recognized the change and is now getting up at seven rather than eight but when we step outside, the light seems just right for going to school on a brisk autumn morning. One thing I am sure of, tomorrow night, two decades later, I’ll step back on stage at 11.30 here in Caceres with my old New York friend and I’m sure it will feel like time hasn’t gone by at all.

Pay as you Pick Trust in the Okanagan Valley, BC

Your automatic gut reaction is to peep over your shoulder and think, 'Okay, where are the cameras?' But out here on these lush green hills rising up from the deep blue of Skaha Lake, the only CCTV eyes trained on you are those of the sleepy horse shading under the leafy cherry trees. During the summer all along this bucolic valley near Okanagan Falls that stretches more than 90 miles, crowded supermarket aisles and churlish check outs are replaced with self-serve fruit stands complete with colorfully painted honesty boxes. The produce is fresh and in season, you pay for what you take, and the only carbon footprints are those you leave in the dust. As for trust, surely they haven't taught the horse to count, have they?

#unusual #lakes #market #summer #roadtrip #valley #farm #roadside #fruit #food #produce #farmersmarket #rural #cheap #countryside #quirky #fruits #hills #fresh #offbeat #trust #painted #verdant #tasty #artsy #stand #fruitstand #honesty #veggies #self-serve

Originally published on Trazzler

The views from the Alcazaba de Reina

The Sierra Morena wrinkles behind off into Andalusia while the patchwork plains of Badajoz merge with the sky in front. Depending on your perspective, this is either the beginning or end of Extremadura. The Romans would arrive at this crossroads (complete with amphitheater entertainment, good luck finding it open) while trying to catch a ride to either Merida or Cordoba. Centuries later, when the Muslim armies came storming northward, they knew a good thing when they saw it and built an enormous adobe castle to keep the sometimes unruly locals from their nasty habit of rebellion. Though an ocher shell of what it used to be, just the fact that you can see the castle from more than 20 miles away makes the detour worthwhile.

#archaeology #architecture #history #mountains #plains #views #historic #roadtrip #farms #castle #roadside #getaway #ruins #muslim #castles #romans #war #detour #offthebeatenpath #remote #forts #hills #amphitheater #crossroads #andalusia #moorish #rebellion #ancientrome #panoramic #battles #islamic #muslimspain #battlesites #conquest #sierramorena #muslims

Originally published on Trazzler

Do Booze Border Runs Still Exist?

What's the difference between an A and an O? Cross the border at Oroville and see how a thin line can change more than just the spelling of a valley. North of the 49th parallel in the Okanagan lies a string of some of Canada's premier tourist resort cities. Canadians migrate here every summer to enjoy the sun and sand in one of the warmest areas of the country. To the south, in the Okanogan, you suddenly find yourself in a quiet corner of the United States where fruit trees outnumber people ten to one. Canadians no longer flock across the border for cheap booze and tobacco due to stricter controls and higher cigarette prices, but some real Mexican food, followed by a visit to a real roadhouse in an old gas station just across the line, still makes the border guard's grilling well worth the effort.

#bar #valley #roadhouse #escape #getaway #fruit #quiet #isolated #food #rural #resorts #border #secluded #countryside #offthebeatenpath #authentic #remote #mexicanfood #orchards #localculture

Originally published on Trazzler

Ironman in Penticton B.C

The last Sunday in August sees Penticton pretty much shut down as even the geese flock to Lakeshore and Main Street to watch the thousands of competitors in this grueling event that turns everyday muscle into metal. The alchemy in question is in fact a punishing triathlon that includes a 3.8 km (2.4 mile ) swim, 180 km (112 mile) bike race, and finally, a full marathon of 42 km (26.2 miles), clearly brutal enough to make the transformation. If the ancient science of turning flab into flat isn't your thing, volunteering is a great way to get up close and personal to those who do. Remember to book early as the fowl may have a place to stay but if you don't plan ahead, your only place to sleep may be on the beach with them.

#festival #outdoors #nature #race #competition #triathlon #ironman #event #running #august

Originally published on Trazzler

Fire and Water

Writing in the local paper. Local issues with a global take. I never translate literally and the editor trims at will to make it fit. Here's my version, then theirs.

I remember watching with amazement, and not just a little discomfort, as the young men in pointy shoes leapt through the air over the huge bonfire. One slight misstep or worse, one glass of vodka too many, would have meant a trip to the one and only hospital in the city. It was spring and my neighbours were gathered in the warm night air in the courtyard of our flat in Baku, Azerbaijan. They were celebrating Noruz, a spring festival shared throughout the region. When I questioned them about what they were doing, they told me that they were following the dictates of their religion and placing wishes as they jumped. True, Islam had only recently been reintroduced to the area after the fall of the Soviet empire, but I don’t recall anything about fire jumps in the Koran, let alone vodka. No matter the case, spring is welcomed with open arms around the globe and is always a time of renewal. Even in tropical countries, the equinox is greeted with the washing of temples and your neighbours dousing you with water when you leave the house. A rather difficult proposition when I was walking to work in Laos but at times a welcome relief from the suffocating heat of the end of the dry season. Here in Extremadura it’s the carpet of green rolling out under a limpid, clear blue sky. Dehesas spotted with wildflowers and migrating birds, and of course the deep thud of the processional Easter drums. However, this year both processions and blue sky were rarer than spotting the elusive black stork. The whitewash in my patio has turned a golf green and there are flowing rivers where I once rode my bike. I tremble every time it rains when I think of the UNESCO age of my rickety roof and can only guess where the next leak is going to spring. If this rain doesn’t stop soon I’m going to have to adopt the Azeri way and jump over a few flames and be thankful that the hospital is nearby.

Enter At Your Own Risk

Time ago I took a walk through the many castle ruins that scatter the hilltops of Extremadura, Spain. Where the pictures the paper chose to accompany the piece came from? Well...mine are of Caceres and the bull. I can't say I know who the other people are? Click over to the piece in the Khaleej Times.

Gone but not Forgotten

I've been writing for a Spanish paper for the past while and haven't put up any posts because...well...the articles are in Spanish! To make matters worse for blogging, the pieces only appear in the print section or the pay section online. As soon as I can get ahold of some of the material, I'll put it up.
'Til then...still lots to see 'round here!

What's the Secret Password?

Writing in the local paper. Local issues with a global take. I never translate literally and the editor trims at will to make it fit. Here's my version, then theirs.

I tell my North American friends that I live inside a castle and I suppose that I’m not technically lying, though I suppose fortress would be closer to the truth. My house is across a narrow lane from those crumbling walls that the Romans built so long ago that encircle the old town of Caceres. Ochre coloured earthen barriers that once proved extremely problematic to attacking armies and now prove to be the same for urban planners. As recently as the the 19th century, politicians of the day decided to knock down a stretch of the wall near the Plaza del Socorro in order to 'let the bad winds out' (and no, it's not some sort of proveb), not to mention to enable one of their benefactors to build a huge palace along the wall.

The more things change, the more they stay they same it seems. 

Thanks to that brilliant bit of early urban planning, evil winds and just slightly less evil cars now have four ways in and out of the UNESCO core and if you aren’t a taxi, one way in and two out. Gone are the days of sentries at the gates, now bollardoes stand guard and decide who comes in and who doesn’t. I once watched as a fire truck sat and waited for the police to open the old city to them. I have since found out that every emergency vehicle has a card to let them in, but that day it must have been left in another pair of pants. But this is the problem, who can come in and when. Understandably, the town hall has passed a law mandating that deliveries can only be made in the morning. A good policy for the bars, offices and government buildings that are found in the old city, but what about the people who actually live here? In a country with just under 6 million unemployed, there are still people who do work and contrary to what some believe, not all are civil servants who fit the black legend profile and can leave work to do the shopping or wait at home for their latest Amazon order without fear. The newly appointed commission to better the Old Town's problems rightly worries about the state of the wall and the ways to pretty it up at night, but before doing so, maybe we need to make it a little easier for those who do live inside this fortress before they, like the 19th century evil winds, are forced to move out.

Christmas Light

Writing in the local paper. Local issues with a global take. I never translate literally and the editor trims at will to make it fit. Here's my version, then theirs.

For some, the holidays are a welcome time of routine. Of doing what you've always done and feeling a sense of security in knowing that the gravy is going to be lumpy, tending towards mediocre and the turkey, tough but good. For me, the glow wore off the moment Santa lost my address and since then I've either searched out or simply have found myself in different places on this equinoxal event. I mean, when I was young, I spent many a Christmas way below 30 in my hometown, wondering if even the man in red himself was going to bother venturing outside. Since leaving that northernmost outpost, I've seen things like more than a metre of snow fall in NYC over the holidays, painting the town white while people x-country skied up Madison avenue. I spent one x-mas eve swimming with dolphins off the coast of Yemen, camped out on the beach below the ruins of the town from where it is said that one of the three wise men departed.  I've eaten a Christmas curry in Bangkok, toasted with aguardiente in Bogota and skirted disastrous floods in Venezuela over the holidays but I can’t think of anywhere where the holiday season lasts as long as it does here in Spain. Once upon a time the season began here with the mega long weekend but it now reaches further back to the day after American thanksgiving whose shopping holiday now echoes along the display window of Pintores Street. The first cold snap to give Extremadura its extreme has finally come to a city where the stores look to a very recently illuminated sky while the sellers of nativity scene pieces wonder why the man in Rome has decided against the donkey and ox. Civil servants check their accounts now and then, wondering if it is in fact true and there won’t be coal in their stocking while people passing through the Plaza Mayor wonder if the curiously angled xmas jaima will slide further downwards. Cuts are everywhere and everyone will accuse each other of starting them but believe what you may, Saturnales was a time for the slaves to receive extra rations and free time. Personally, I always look forward to the day when the sun starts to make its come back and try as they may, no one can stop that...yet.

Overhead Snakes

Writing in the local paper. Local issues with a global take. I never translate literally and the editor trims at will to make it fit. Here's my version, then theirs.

I suppose that they had been slithering along the margins of my subconscious for some time but were recently brought into focus by a picture my sister-in-law sent the other day from her home in Katmandu. They are everywhere in Caceres, creeping up the sides of walls and leaping across streets in coiled licorice-like ropes with the occasional pair of shoes dangling from them. When I first arrived in Caceres my eye would always trace their outlines and be inexplicably drawn to their sinister bondage look but time seems to blur the edges of what is novel and new and with its passing can make everything routine. Yet every so often I’d be reminded that they were there, like that occasional whiff of tobacco that brings back the urge to the ex-smoker, and dread what would happen to if they were suddenly freed by a strong wind. Then one August, I was threading my way home in the thin ribbon of shade thrown by the beautiful palaces in the old town when I noticed that, like other reptiles, these wall snakes preferred the sunny side of the street. Puffing up the calle Amargura, I saw to the right that familiar extra bit of shade thrown from the ribbons of black stuck to whitewashed walls of people’s homes but noticed that to the left along the earthen wall of the Diputacion’s immense parking lot, not a one (the provincial seat of government). The absence continues through Santa Maria until you reach the Plaza, where the braids seem to congregate once again around every door and window. Since moving into the old town, I have read several times in these very pages that these pests would be exterminated and buried in the ground along with their water carrying cousins. It’s now some five years later and even in the autumn cool, there they are, drawn to the white and, strangely enough, absent from the brown.