Built to Last

You cringe, close your eyes, gasp, and think of the worst. That truck can't cross that bridge, it's 2000 years old! But wait, it's not turning back and is indeed crossing. Two millennia later, goods are still crossing the 71-meter (231-foot) high  bridge that spans the Tagus river, just shy of what is now the border with Portugal. Nature aside, the old timer has had its adversaries. First the Arabs tried to destroy it then the Portuguese, even the proper Spanish blew up a piece to stop the French. Makes it clear that the Romans were the first to come up with the motto, BUILT TO LAST.

#river #architecture #getaway #bridge #bridges #border #portugal #ancient #trucks #frontier #construction #oldandnew #empire #engineering #ancientrome #romanarchitecture #arch #thenandnow #romanempire #tagus #builttolast #romanarch

Originally published on Trazzler

Don't Eat the Brown Acid

Don't eat the brown acid... 'Who are you?' said the Caterpillar. This was not an encouraging opening for a conversation. Alice replied, rather shyly, 'I — I hardly know, sir, just at present — at least I know who I WAS when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then.' 'What do you mean by that?' said the Caterpillar sternly. 'Explain yourself!' 'I can't explain myself, I'm afraid, sir' said Alice, 'because I'm not myself, you see.' 'I don't see,' said the Caterpillar. 'I'm afraid I can't put it more clearly,' Alice replied very politely, 'for I can't understand it myself to begin with; and being so many different sizes in a day is very confusing.' 'It isn't,' said the Caterpillar. 'Well, perhaps you haven't found it so yet,' said Alice; 'but when you have to turn into a chrysalis — you will some day, you know — and then after that into a butterfly, I should think you'll feel it a little queer, won't you?' #mushrooms #mushroomhunting #mushroomhunter #amantiamuscaria #shrooms #amantia #toadstool #doyouhearthevoices #tripping #nonotfar #naturaleza_extremadura

Una publicación compartida por Troy Nahumko (@troynahumko) el Ene 6, 2018 at 8:50 PST

Cherry Trees in Bloom, Valle del Jerte, Spain

Yesterday's picnic in #valledeljerte enjoying the #cerezosenflor #cherryblossom #cácereswithkids #picnic #visitspain #total_extremadura #extremadura #turismospain #turismorural #extremadurafotos #lonelyplanet #lonelyplanetspain #nonotfar #lppostcardsnature #naturaleza_extremadura

Una publicación compartida por Troy Nahumko (@troynahumko) el Abr 10, 2016 at 10:47 PDT

Beyond the Golden Horn in Istanbul

A walk beyond the mosques in Istanbul. http://nonotfar.blogspot.de/2010/07/walk-in-istanbul.html?m=1 #fatih #istanbul #turkey #travelstories #ig_istanbul #ig_turkey #thestraitstimes #nonotfar

Una publicación compartida por Troy Nahumko (@troynahumko) el Dic 24, 2017 at 11:32 PST

A Bit of a Warning?

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.

The Queen paid a visit to Caceres the other day. Sorry, I should probably be more precise, I don’t mean the ex-journalist who is the darling of all the fashion magazines, but the one who, like me, can’t get rid of that stubborn accent from elsewhere. In these days of having two kings, two truths, two popes etc, things can indeed get a bit confusing. But as the refrain about the legendary Spanish generosity goes, donde comen tres, comen cuatro (where three can eat, so can four). Even in these difficult times when hospital beds are being cut back and people are expected to retire after they die, why not have two queens? And if the trains out to this part of her realm aren’t to her liking, well let's send a helicopter to pick her up. Anyways, don’t feel bad if you didn’t know about her visit, I only found that she was here when I saw the police towing my neighbors’ cars away for security measures, and I live in the old town. I had suspected something was up as I walked home and noticed more police that pedestrians but my suspicions were confirmed when I overheard an officer talking to a neighbor. The poor guy had just found out that his car had been towed away and the policeman was telling him that he shouldn’t be upset because he hadn’t been fined, though I’m not sure his taxi fare to pick it up will be included with the helicopter in the budget. It seems that la doña Sofia was here to attend a concert that in part was sponsored by the town hall and el Grupo Ciudades Patrimonio de la Humanidad de España. I found myself wishing that Iberdrola, the electricty company or even the water comany had also been part of this and the in the process they could have shown the town hall the way that they actually inform residents about something that is going to affect them a day or two in advance. The fact that TVE (Spanish National TV) was here with the queen will surely help promote our fair city but I’m sure that this wasn’t a state secret and a few signs the night before would have appeased even the most virulent republican.  

The Throat of Hell...and not what you think.

Cascading waterfalls, lush carpets of green, cherry groves, mischievous otters and picture perfect swimming holes aren't usually the first things that come to mind when you mention Extremadura, but that's exactly what you'll find up the Jerte Valley. From peaks as high as 2300 metres (7545 feet), centuries of gushing, spiralling water has carved out perfect bowls in the granite for taking a dip to cool off among the darting trout. Just two hours from Madrid, the Garganta de los Infiernos natural reserve just might be the best kept secret in Spain (but not for long). Maybe that's why they called it the Throat of Hell, to throw everyone off the scent?

#hiking #wildlife #river #outdoors #mountains #nature #swimming #park #valley #reserve #getaway #nationalpark #swimminghole #waterfall #cherrytrees #offthebeatenpath #otters #granite #gorge #erosion #hell #extremadura #route #valledeljerte #jerte #cerezos

The Token Guiri

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.

As the token guiri (nordic foreigner), I’m often asked what I think about certain Spanish traditions. From Semana Santa to bullfighting to the seemingly foreign meaning of the word resign, people are curious about how a foreigner might perceive things that fit inside Fraga’s famous tourist slogan, Spain is different. The thing is, I have lived my entire adult life outside the country of my birth and I can no longer say for certain if my recollections of Canada are still valid enough to be able to accurately contrast them against what I see around me. All the same, my surname is a long way from Gonzalez and I can compare and contrast what surrounds me against the many other countries that I have lived and spent time in. So the other day while I was talking with a friend and the topic of cleanliness came up, I happened to be in complete agreement with my interlocutor that Spanish homes are by far some the cleanest places on Earth. The eye-watering smell of beach that you often encounter as you walk the streets is proof positive of that. My curiosity, however, lies in the fact that this fastidiousness seems to end the second that they step out of their homes. Hours can be spent scrubbing tiles at home, but the street seems to be for someone else to clean. Out of the barely ten families in my neighborhood, at least four have the twice daily ritual of opening their doors to allow their favorite pet to do their business outside the family home, on other people’s doorsteps of course. No matter how often the street cleaners comes by. and here in Spain they come by often, they simply can’t keep up with the dogs and cats of my neighbors. I’ve actually never been inside their homes but I’m sure they live up to Spanish standards of cleanliness. What confuses me is the contrast between the bleach in their homes and their blithe disregard for the mess they leave in the streets. Could it be they simply want to create jobs? I guess this make-work project could be admirable but I am convinced that our money could spent on something a bit more productive than cleaning up after Fido.

Mending Wall

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.

They surround us for the better part of our days, whether we are aware of them or not. We shelter behind them during the brief winter and then take refuge behind them during the Spanish summer’s long assault. We raise them with bricks, drywall, words and sometimes just a look. The more famous run through places like the streets of Berlin, the more infamous divide olive groves on the road to Bethlehem and the more intimate record our children’s growth on their faces. An unpopular American president boasts of extending one from the Pacific to the Gulf of Mexico while long before a compatriot of his reflected upon repairing one because good walls make good neighbors. Homer, speaking of my namesake wall warned us of raising walls against the will of the immortal gods. When Pope Francis said that building them isn’t Christian, I’m sure he wasn’t referring to ours because I’m not exactly sure when a Spanish muro becomes a muralla. Whatever the case, I look out on one every day from my window as it slowly crumbles away. Its birth was pagan, its adolescence Muslim, its adulthood Catholic and it now languishes in its retirement in the limbo of the ill-defined secularism of the Spanish democracy. It may not be as famous as the one that crosses the mountains of China, those built around the same time, like that which surrounds Diyarbakir or even those that protect nearby Avila from the snows but that doesn’t mean it is less impressive. In many places its majesty is simply hidden, look up from the square and you only get a glimpse of it among the add-ons crowding out the Torre de la Hierba. As it encircles the old town, in some places it no longer only protects but actually forms part of homes and thus a part of our lives. In deciding to fix the wall, we no longer need to ask to know what we were walling in or walling out, and to whom we were like to give offense. By repairing the wall, we have a chance to redefine its use. I’d like to think we are no longer keeping people out but instead, inviting them in. 

In Search of Traces of Ibn Battuta in Malaysia

In search of traces of Ibn Battuta in #Malaysia. He crossed through the Strait enroute to China and we looked for a mosque from that time. http://nonotfar.blogspot.com.es/search/label/Ibn%20Battutah?m=1 . . . . . . . #malaytravel #malaysiatravel #malaysiatrulyasia #ibnbattuta #ibnbattutah #literarytravel #theworldsgreatesttraveller #nonotfar #islamicarchitecture #mosque #seasia #minarets #minaretsoftheworld #islam #muslims #greattravellers #kampungklingmosque #melacca #melaka #kampungkling

Una publicación compartida por Troy Nahumko (@troynahumko) el Feb 4, 2018 at 1:01 PST

Next Station...

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 had always imagined that we had done something terribly wrong, something so unpardonable that we were now suffering the consequences of this unnamed act. Something must have happened that I was unaware of. The good people of Extremadura must have committed some sort of heinous act, something so vile that we were being punished for our impertinence. Something so terrible that neither of the main political parties could remedy at the national level, even though their respective parties had enjoyed years of absolute majorities. After all, how else could it be explained? Here I was standing in Madrid at five thirty in the afternoon on a Saturday, after a long and exhausting training session, and there was no public transport home available. As my colleagues from Palma de Mallorca got ready to take the return portion of the flight that had taken that very morning and while others got ready to board AVEs for the costas, here I was contemplating another night in a hotel. I say anthoer after having been forced to stay in one the night before because it was simply impossible to get to Madrid for the 9:30 session. As I searched for a way home it came to me. The complete negligence of decades of elected officials couldn't be the reason for us having the inglorious distinction of being the only community without a single kilometer of electrified rail. The vicious circle of reduced services thus reducing passengers couldn’t be blamed on our officials who once-upon-a-pre-crisis time dreamt of airports with connections to London and Berlin. It had to be someone else’s fault and there the answer was on my mobile phone...the French! As they did during the War of Independence, the French were once again meddling in the affairs of Extremadura, making it so that only way to get home was by using their invention, BlaBlacar. An hour later I found myself in a shared car with three other people who had been in the same predicament. They had also been attending training sessions in Madrid and had no other way home. It’s people like this that politicians often say we need more of in the region, ambitious, industrious folk training to better themselves to help better our region. The least they can do is provide them with a lift home.

The Game of Thrones in Caceres

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.

The other morning as I was walking my two daughters to school, we were surprised by something you don’t see every day, even if you do live in Europe’s third largest preserved medieval city. As we crossed Santa Maria square and headed towards the Arco de la Estrella, twenty five men dressed in armor suddenly emerged out of the seasonal fog. The sound of their swords rattling along the paving stones added a new twist to the sonic landscape of our morning routine. One of calm that usually consists of the calls of storks, a distant harmonica played by a local girl or the click clack of the high heels of a civil servant rushing to work. Perhaps the most interesting thing is that my girls didn’t seem to find the foggy apparition out of the ordinary in the least. After all, we do live in a walled fortress and the pretend warriors did seem to be more congruous with our surroundings than the delivery trucks that we usually have to slalom around. In fact they didn’t even react until one of the soldiers stopped, clicked his heels and saluted them. Their lack of surprise is likely due to the fact that they have grown accustomed to the film set atmosphere that our medieval gem has taken on this year. I have to admit that the break in the morning rush also jolted me out of automatic pilot and reminded this Canadian of the very different surroundings that I found myself in. Some surprises are welcome and this apparition indeed put a needed positive spin on what was going to be a long day. That said, some surprises come as less welcome. It’s a good thing that I am a faithful reader of this paper because if I wasn’t, more surprises would catch me off guard. Hot on the heels of these saluting soldiers, the next invader to siege the old town for a few days will be the Game of Thrones. It’s a good thing the consortium has begun its well greased information campaign to let us all know when the streets will be cut and exactly what options will be available to us when trying to get our groceries around Jamie Lanister. Problem is, in the spirit of the staging, I think their carrier pidgeon got lost along the way.