Signs of Fall

Autumn has always been my favorite season. I was one of those children who liked school, and while I remember with fondness long afternoons at the community swimming pool during the summer, an almost-annual car trip to New Hampshire for vacation, and a formative final summer week at Tar Hollow church camp in southern Ohio, I was still glad when September rolled around. The day after Labor Day always brought a return to the freshness of a new school year and lots of extracurricular activities. It may have also helped that September brought the new television season (we had distinct TV seasons back then, with 39 weeks of new programs each year, followed in the summer by only 13 weeks of re-runs--now that ratio seems to be reversed).

Later, during the many years I was living in New England and working year-round, without the summer off, I still appreciated fall. Certain professional and social activities started up again after their summer respite to accommodate various vacation schedules, and the air took on a crispness and clarity that had been missing in the summer. And then there was the glorious foliage and the perennial joy of visual splendor, always for an undetermined but brief time, depending on whether or not the wind and rains came to wash the red and orange and yellow leaves from the trees before they dropped naturally and shriveled.

Here on the Mediterranean coast of Spain the autumn starts later, but now we are in October, and the signs are evident. The first thing I noticed was a few weeks ago, when I woke up early to let Goldie out onto the upstairs terrace, and the air was actually cold! Soon I began to realize that occasionally I would awaken in the night feeling chilly from the draft of the overhead fan. (So did Johannes, apparently, because sometimes I would awaken stifled to find out that the fan had been turned off.) It has now been three weeks or so since I turned on the air conditioning in my office, or the bedroom, or the downstairs living-dining area, but I find myself jumping up and down frequently to adjust the fans.

It is still warm, even hot, during the day. We eat our lunchtime salads in the downstairs sun room, and if the awnings are not pulled out and two glass panels open to catch a cross-breeze, it is too warm. While I am comfortable in capri-length pants inside the house, they get a little too hot even in the short period of time it takes me to hang out one load of laundry on the outside line. Going out for shopping and definitely for petanque, I still need shorts and a skimpier top than I ever would have worn inside or out in New Hampshire. It will still be some time before I need to remove the white silk flowers that earlier this summer I arranged in the living room fireplace insert to brighten up its black hole, so we can start the gas fire.

Fall activities are also beginning. Summer holiday-makers with children have gone back to England and Denmark or wherever they need to go to get the kids in school, and have been replaced by pensioners who have enjoyed the cool weather in their native lands and now return to Spain, at least until Christmas. Our Tuesday petanque group has burgeoned from two or three to 16 or more, and the Friday group has swelled from its low of 8 to almost 80. The Danish club has announced plans for its fall excursion and dinners for the fall holidays, I saw Christmas cards on display at the English card shop this week, and in what I now, in my second year here, recognize as a tradition, our homeowner association has scheduled its annual meeting on the fourth Thursday of November.

Biking to Guardamar

I think I have finally recovered from our bike trip a week ago to Guardamar. Saturday morning was a crisp fall day, and it just seemed perfect to go out biking on the path that follows alongside the Rio Segura to Guardamar and the Mediterranean. I had a semi-new bike, which I had bought several months ago and tried out quickly on a street near the cycle shop in Ciudad Quesada. I soon discovered,though, that a graded pavement in a town is not quite the same as a packed and rutted river bed. Smooth this trip was not.

Nevertheless, the 20-kilometer ride to Guardamar was enjoyable.  We found a wonderful Mas y Mas supermarket, with cafetería, for a cup of café con leche on the outskirts of the city. After tanking up with caffeine and cooling off with the air conditioning, we continued biking through the almost deserted streets of the city (at 11:00 AM Saturday morning) and came to the fishing pier and the pleasure boat marina. I wandered down to a small swimming cove for my annual dipping of the toe into the Mediterranean. It was delightfully warm, but the uneasy sensation of sand breaking away from beneath my feet as the tide swept out reminded me without a doubt that I learned to swim in a pool, not in the ocean.

We watched dozens of people fishing on the dock that juts out toward the lighthouse, and then, as we came back to the mainland, the clock struck 12:00 and we needed a little something to eat. We shared a Mediterranean tuna cazuela with delicious just-heated baguette--if I had known how good the bread would be I never would have said "no" to the offer of extra.

Then we headed back, but not without a detour through a brand new park project that had just been created from January through April of 2010. Actually, the new project is an elevated wooden walkway through the Alfonso XIII park on one side of Guardamar, shown here with a view of the usual photographer of Sundays in Spain.

After that green respite, we were back on the bikes for some serious pedaling. Twenty kilometers to Guardamar also means twenty kilometers back from Guardamar. We stopped once for another agua con gas--the weather had turned hot in the early afternoon. Not counting the stop, it took an hour to get back to our car in Rojales, but then it was only a ten minutes' drive home. My backside was really sore. Neither one of us did much of anything for the rest of the day. I'm not sure when my next bike ride will be, but I didn't suggest anything this weekend.

Moda La Finca

A larger-than-normal roadside sign sprouted at the roundabout between the highway and the entrance to our Montebello urbanization last Friday: Moda La Finca. An arrow pointed beyond our neighborhood toward the golf resort about three miles away through the orchards. La Finca, literally a country farmhouse, is a beautiful green area between Montebello and the town of Algorfa, to which we technically belong. In addition to the golf course, there is a luxury resort hotel, which we toured a year ago when we dropped in one day out of curiosity and encountered staff who were inclined to give us the grand tour, out of boredom.

In a rare coincidence, I had already read in the weekly RoundTown News that Moda La Finca was a new clothing shop, scheduled for a grand opening on Sunday at 10:00 AM, with free cava, the effervescent Spanish answer to champagne. The shop was reported to be German-owned and would offer only clothing made in Germany, for men and for women.

So off we headed this morning at a little past ten o'clock and sure enough, there is a delightful and unusual new clothing boutique and outlet in the commercial area at the entrance to La Finca.  The shop was full of people and I looked around and found several things I was interested in, though I did not make any purchases at the time. This is a good place to come when you have something you want to match a new accessory to, I told myself, or when you want to buy something to wear for travel. Styles are different whenever you go away from Spain, or even away from the Costa Blanca area where we live. Quality and variety were evident in the unusual selection of moda, and I will definitely be back.

The shop is indeed German, and Johannes enjoyed practicing his German. He was also more decisive than I was--he found a sweater that will be perfect for our trip to Frankfurt early next month. As we checked out, the attendant told us that her boss was married to an American, who was outside at "the beer place." It's a good thing we looked for him. We didn't find him right away, but we found the German beer they were offering, and then we found the small bratwurst in fresh baguettes, and the chips and Danische-style cookies. And then we spied the man in charge of the cava and mimosas, and that was Al, the American. We had a pleasant chat. Al was familiar with upstate New York and Pennsylvania, as we are, too, since we have driven across those two states often as we traveled from New England to Ohio and back.

It was a grand opening for a promising new business. We see far too many businesses start here and then, a few months later, fail, often for lack of market research. This one seems different. An upscale clothing boutique in a golf resort makes sense; good quality and good taste at higher, but affordable, prices, makes sense in this area that is home to thousands of northern Europeans. Advance publicity in the newspaper, and detailed road signs pointing the way...these people have done their research in planning this business venture. Maybe it's the German-American combo.

Como Agua para Chocolate

Last night I finished reading Como agua para chocolate (Like Water for Chocolate), or at least, I finished reading it for the first time. It's an assignment for my Spanish class, so I will have to go back and review a few sections to refresh my memory and make sure I understand it correctly, before the discussions with my teacher in the next couple weeks. 

Surprisingly, I looked long and hard--and  without success--to find a copy of this book in Spain, in Spanish. Ultimately I had to resort to Amazon, which advertised several editions, new and used, and also a DVD of the movie. How could I resist? True to form, the DVD arrived first, but I promised myself not to see it until I had finished the book--and I kept that promise. The book, when it came, was a real disappointment. Arriving from amazon.co in the UK, the text was Spanish, but the notes were in German! After carefully working my way through Amazon's return procedures, I packaged it up in the same box in which it arrived to send it back, but the Spanish postal system refused to accept it as long as there was publicidad (advertising) on the package. That publicidad would be the name "Amazon." Fortunately my Spanish teacher, who also knows German, took my book, and I borrowed hers, so we could get on with the project.

I was hoping to find several authentic recipes that I could use, but I don't think I'll be following those recipes any time soon. They are more like the directions found in an early Fanny Farmer. Measurements are practically non-existent, the Mexican food terms are different from what is used in present-day Spain, and I don't intend ever again to cook in the quantities that Tita does (for Chiles en nogada she had to multiply the recipe by ten, meaning she had to clean 250 chiles and crack 1000 walnuts). But I do love Tita's love of cookery as an essential life force. She starts with the most basic of ingredients, and works through hours and hours to produce surreal food experiences, sending her guests--and herself--into ecstasy. Usually.

Tonight, after resisting for two and a half weeks, I will finally allow myself to see the DVD of the movie Like Water for Chocolate. We'll probably watch it while eating dinner in front of the TV. We seldom eat beef in Spain, but I've made a beef stew. I started it yesterday, browning the meat with lots of onion and two large garlic cloves, then allowing it to barely simmer for three hours. Now I've parboiled small onions that I found at the market this morning; I'll add the onions and mushrooms after I make a thick gravy with red wine and the bouillon from the stew. Then carrots and potatoes, and finally some green, tonight in the form of broccoli. And I think I can find a bit of chocolate for dessert.

Salad Days

Photograph printed by permission of Tony Jurich.

You may be thinking, "ah, the salad days of summer," but truth be told, nearly every day is a salad day for us in Spain. That's because our standard lunchtime meal is a vegetable salad, followed by a fruit salad for dessert. It doesn't get boring.

I start with a crunchy lettuce (iceberg or romaine or the small, firm cogollos), mixed with fresh spinach, though spinach doesn't last long in the heat of the summer, so I've omitted that for a few weeks now. Onto this base goes carrot, either shaved with a vegetable peeler or sliced thinly. Then thinly sliced mushrooms and a handful of corn kernels. Protein comes usually in the form of tuna, out of a small can of tuna packed in olive oil (I use the oil for my dressing, and Goldie cleans the can before it goes to the recycling station). Protein may also be garbanzo beans, hard cooked eggs, or the occasional leftover chicken from dinner earlier in the week. A diced tomato forms the outer circle on our salad plates; tomatoes are especially delicious at this time of the year, though they are often good even in winter, even though they may cost a little more. Frozen peas, rinsed under the water tap to thaw, for color and potassium.

Those are the staples, but there is almost always some more: diced red, green, and/or yellow pepper, red radish, cucumber, onion. Green beans, judias verdes, Brussels sprouts, or whatever vegetable is left from dinner the night before. And herbs--I haven't had much luck in keeping herbs alive for very long, but at present I have some thin chives, parsley, thyme, and a red sage--and sometimes I resort to dried hierbas de provence or treat myself to a good sprinkle of Penzey's Sunny Spain seasoning.

This month I have been adding chunks of alpicoz, the funny-looking light-green vegetable pictured at the forefront above. A friend of a friend, a high-school student, took this picture at a market when he was visiting Valencia earlier this year. My friend sent me the photo and asked if I knew what the strange snake-like vegetable was called. I had never seen it, but I went to the Benijofar Tuesday morning market and found a vendor, who consulted with his whole family and told me they thought it was alpicoz, a type of cucumber. Back home to do some research on the Internet and then the following Sunday I found one at my Sunday market. It is indeed a "fine" cucumber, more delicate than a regular English cucumber, and without the dark green skin. It tastes refreshing cut up in small chunks for the lunchtime salad, and also was a wonderful addition to the chicken-grape-almond main dish salad I made last week from a traditional family recipe. I have yet to try it in the Gazpacho Extremeño recipe I found on the Internet.

Or were you thinking of the traditional meaning of "salad days" when you started reading this post? In addition to enjoying summer salads, I also have been thinking back to the "carefree innocence" of my youth. My high school reunion was held this past weekend, and even though my body spent this Sunday in Spain, my thoughts were in Sidney, Ohio, with the friends who had gathered there, and those who had not, who I knew from way back in my "salad days."

Flamenco My Way

Friday evening we went to La Herradura, an old farmhouse restaurant in the neighboring town of Los Montesinos, for a celebratory dinner with friends. We had been there for a lunch before, as well as a tapa during the Montesinos de Tapas, so we knew the food would be good. We had booked the last table available, and were pleased that it would be under the stars--or at least outside in the cool of the evening, starting at 8:30.

The special draw, however, was the intimate flamenco show, done only on weekends, and due to start at 9:00. What we didn't know was that the show would not be traditional flamenco, but "contemporary flamenco," or flamenco contemporaneo. The announcer told us this as he introduced the two dancers. They were proud of the flamenco tradition, he said, but young Spaniards preferred it a little bit different, and that's what we were going to hear and see tonight.

Flamenco originated in the Andalusian part of Spain, with heavy gypsy influence, and is traditionally characterized by three elements: guitar music, emotional songs (often mournful), and the very colorful and heavily stylized dance.The first difference this evening was that there was no live guitar player. The dancing couple were accompanied throughout by recorded music. And it was not the blaring, wailing songs on which so many gypsy flamencos are based. First up, and quite appropriately,was Frank Sinatra's My Way. True, it was not Frank singing--the words were in Spanish, though I didn't recognize any phrases as direct translations of the words I knew. But the music is powerful, and so was the dancing, All the body whirling and twirling of the skirt was still there, as well as the stomping and posturing, but with just a little less attitude than one might expect from flamenco or even this particular song.

The evening continued with flamenco their way, or a su manera. There were touches of ballet and reflections of Irish Riverdance, as well as Strauss waltzes--a stupendous number with the female dancer showing incredible command of the traditional castanets.

It was over too quickly, but the evening star had come out, the moon was moving toward full, and the clock was approaching midnight. I've checked Google and found lots of information under flamenco contemporaneo and even some under "contemporary flamenco." If the performance we saw was a true indication, the contemporary movement is preserving and reinterpreting many of the best elements of flamenco, but opening it up to many more dance traditions and making it much more international, as Spain itself is becoming.

Spanish Eyes

                                                        "Blue Spanish eyes...
                                      Teardrops are falling from your Spanish eyes ..."

Well, it's only one Spanish eye, and it's not teardrops that are falling, but eyedrops.

I had a cataract operation this past Wednesday, and now I have a new left eye lens, courtesy of the excellent Spanish health care system. The operation went well and was over before I knew it: "Finito" said the surgeon, while I was still waiting to be told to open my eye wider.

It was physically painless, and after I had spent four hours waiting in three separate waiting rooms, I was beyond any anxiety about the procedure--I just wanted it to be done! Between the time I was finally(!) wheeled out of the third waiting room to a gurney near an operating room down the hall, approached by the anesthesiologist who gave me dos pinchitos (two pinprick injections) and connected an IV, was wheeled into the operating room, greeted the doctor, felt a little scrape-scrape and heard "finito," I don't think that more than twenty minutes passed. Back to the prep room, which I now realized was also the recovery room, an orange juice (first sustenance of the day) and a precautionary pain pill, and soon I was dressed and walking out with a smile.

My right eye vision is poor, so with a patch over the left, I endured 24 hours of near blindness. I listened to more local radio (Spanish and English) than I ever had before, as well as a downloaded book (Liberty, by Garrison Keillor) through my library and OverDrive, and All Things Considered and Morning Edition--thank you, NPR, Thank goodness for the Internet!

Now, with the patch removed, we are into aftercare, a tedious regimen of three different kinds of eyedrops, one of them every eight hours, two every two hours. Eyedrops will be regulating my life at least for a week. It takes two to three weeks for vision to stabilize after this procedure, I understand, and right now I have periods when I can see well, but progress is not consistent. Just when I think I'm getting the hang of coordinating my eyes well, the two-hour timer goes off and it's time to drop the left one full of liquid medication so it looks as though I'm peering out of a rainy windshield for the next 15 minutes.

But they are eyedrops, not teardrops. I am grateful for my new Spanish eye, and I give thanks to the Spanish health care system, San Jaime hospital, Dr. Fernandez, and the anesthesiologist who gave me the pinchitos. I don't remember her name, which means she did her job well.

Thanks also to my aftercare provider, who is calling me now for the next set of drops.