A blog about our new life in Sant Cugat, strange discoveries, amusing local news, politics, economics and cute stories about kids.
The Mosses proudly arrested a gang of four thieves for armed robbery of apartments in the Barcelona area. I’m sure there was some brilliant detective work involved, since the gang apparently had 51 previous arrests for similar offenses.
The police has quite firmly told them that if they don’t stop, they run the risk of being arrested again. Meanwhile the parliament is considering a tough new 50-strikes-and-you’re-out law.
An issue we’ve been struggling with over the last three years is how to deal with family members that come to visit for long periods of time.
The problems revolves around food and meals. In our house, food is a communal effort, with everyone pitching in at some point, either in shopping, cooking, cleaning up, etc. When someone is here visiting for a longer period of time, we expect them to pitch in as well. If they want to eat something from the fridge, sure, go ahead, but next time maybe you can bring a replacement.
I mention that there is no such thing as a free lunch (or dinner), that someone (ie us) needs to go shop for and make this food, and that there’s a lot on our minds with the new baby and all that. Sure, our nanny could go and try to figure out what to buy, but she’d probably buy the wrong stuff. Hired help is not a magic solution that makes work go away, especially in things that require independent initiative and thinking. What you gain in less grunt work, you lose in needing to micromanage.
Unfortunately, any discussion around this topic goes bad very fast. Umbrage is taken and I usually end up playing the UN negotiator trying to get everyone to kiss and make up.
I think there is an added cultural dimension, since Spanish hosts are required to be so overly pushy and generous. When combined with Anglo-Saxon guests who don’t know how to say no, I think this leads to long term resentment.
A pretty amazing story from NPR about how the private prison industry was one of the drivers behind Arizona’s tough new anti-immigrant laws:
According to Corrections Corporation of America reports reviewed by NPR, executives believe immigrant detention is their next big market. Last year, they wrote that they expect to bring in "a significant portion of our revenues" from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency that detains illegal immigrants.
So you have private for-profit companies running prisons. Then they use the money they got from the government to lobby to get more people locked up. Nice.
My four year old today:
“I want it right now! Or else I will only talk to you in Catalan.”
“Ok. Say something in Catalan”
He thinks for a while.
“I want it right now! Or else I will only talk to you in japonés.”
The PP mayor of Valladolid, Javier León de la Riva, had some wonderful things to say about the new health minister, Leire Pajin:
He described her as "a girl, very ready, skillful and unobtrusive," who will "distribute condoms to right and left" and whose "face" and "lips" causes you always think "the same."
Aguirre was ready to defend him, complaining that when Pedro Castro, the socialist mayor of Leganes, wondered why there were so many “tontos de los cojones” (dumb fucks) who always vote for the right-wing, nobody on the left condemned him.
De la Riva’s apology was somewhat half-hearted, saying that it was “verbal excess” and that he had no objection to apologizing to her.
Over the last couple years, both Santa Claus and Halloween have been slowly making inroads in Spain. (Santa Claus definitely has practical advantages, due to kids getting their presents at the beginning of the Christmas vacation vs at the end.)
It has been popularized both by UK and American influence, but also by South Americans who have already absorbed this little piece of Celtic culture due to the proximity of the US.
Spanish people still are under the impression that the only proper costumes for Halloween involve zombies or vampires, which probably makes sense since having to be creative about a costume for Carnival AND Halloween would probably make life too difficult.
We’re definitely encouraging our kids to get excited about Halloween, and today they got to try out their little Jedi outfits. You wouldn’t believe how excited they are.
We were hoping for the baby to join in with this:
But it was sold out…
This weekend we got to try out the emergency medical system here in Sant Cugat.
Unlike the US and Canada, where 911 is the only number you really need to know, in Spain emergency each service has its own direct dial number in addition to the general purpose 112.
061 is a good number to know, since it connects you directly to the emergency medical service. By directly, I mean, one ring and the guy is talking to you. Unfortunately they don’t seem to have the ability to pull up the address from your land line as in the US, so it’s good to have your address written on a whiteboard in your home in case guests need to call in an emergency.
In our case, I was off in Sabadell when I got a call from home along the lines of “OMG! there’s blood everywhere!” I phoned 061 and gave them my address and home phone number and they had an ambulance on the way right away. It’s probably a better idea to phone 061 directly, rather than phoning someone and having them do it.
The ambulance people were super-nice and it was off to Mutua Terrassa (again). I stayed behind and packed a couple things plus the baby, and showed up about half an hour later.
They had me a wait for a bit at the hospital until the doctor came out. He came to me with a serious expression, and put his hand on my shoulder and I thought “holy shit”. But he just wanted to tell me that he was planning on doing some minor surgery and that he thought everything would be ok.
I find doctors here don’t tend tell you what they are doing, or why they are doing it. What has worked well for us is to tell the doctor right away that we are well educated big shots with serious enchufe and would very interested that they tell us all the gruesome details. It was amazing how this previously grumpy doctor’s demeanor changed and he came back after the operation to give us all a hug and wish us the best.
Once the surgery was complete, they moved us to the “planta” for recovery. If you have insurance, make sure you mention this *before* you run downstairs to do the paperwork. With insurance, you get a single room and towels. Otherwise you might share a room with a gypsy clan (there was actually one on our floor… we felt sorry for the other room occupant).
In any case, we are all safely back home now recovering.
