Recently I fell foul of La Ley de Falta Uno (The Law of One Thing Missing), which, as formulated by us, states that you can never ever complete a bureaucratic transaction in one go. Even something as apparently straightforward as picking up a registered letter at Correos is also subject to the law, as I [...]
We all know what a Garlic Moment is. Send us yours and we’ll post the best: they should not only be amusing but also helpful and instructive. To kick off, here’s Georgina Tremayne from Barcelona with – what else? – a telephone problem.
Fatal Construction
Moving from one apartment to another apartment in the same town isn’t [...]
The reservoirs have never been happier, but on a purely selfish level heavy rain in Spain is always a pain. In our case, a downpour in the middle of night means leaping out of bed and sprinting across a puddle-strewn, roof-leaking patio-cum-porch, tripping over a bedraggled cat or three, charging into the kitchen and rushing [...]
Throat-slashing Santa. There are 1001 stories about the exploits and origins of Olentzero, the Basque Santa Claus. In the oldest, he belongs to a tribe of beer-swilling giants. Despite his own gluttony, he gets in a tizz when the inhabitants of a nearby village gorge themselves the night before Jesus’ birth – and promptly cuts [...]
Yes, the shopping centres are crawling with Papa Noels and you can’t get through the door of the Euro shops for all-singing, all-dancing Christmas tree tack. True, El Corte Inglés seems to kick off the season a week or three earlier each year. And yes, the advertising on television for toys, perfumes, aftershaves and watches [...]
