Notes, from Ben.

1. I’m glad I don’t want an iPad. I can’t see it doing anything for my life that my Macbook doesn’t do already! And I still just love paper books, as opposed to the e-versions…

One thing that strikes me though: imaginary conversation 20 years hence…

Son: Dad, what did you do in the evenings when I was a baby?

Dad: Well son, like millions of others around the 1st world, I found that pretty much nothing beat sitting in front of the computer watching second-hand coverage of a sales pitch from a guy in jeans for a brand new shiny object that wouldn’t even be available for another two months, and I really didn’t need. Now that was the way to spend an evening!

Son: Oh.

2. My yearly ‘blogging crisis’ set in this month, when I have no idea what to write about any more – or, more to the point, I have had nothing to say about Spain for a while…

So I start thinking about starting other blogs, then procrastinate for 2 weeks, then watch a great video on why it’s bad to have too much choice, and realise having multiple blogs is a nightmare, and decide to keep on writing about whatever I like (not just Spain) here again.

3. Why, shockingly, do I occasionally have nothing to say about Spain for a while?

After eleven years, Spain spends a lot of time being my background, not so much the foreground any more. What does that mean?

When you first move to a new country, every sight, smell, meal, encounter, taxi ride, confused shopping experience, language cock-up, weekend road trip, every time you step out onto the street in fact, is a wonderful, wild adventure.

The new country and culture is in the front of your mind every second of the day, it’s the chief stimulant, a constant cafe solo, perking you up, setting your eyes sparkling as you continue to discover new delights.

If 2010 is the year you are thinking of moving to, or spending a long time in, Spain, then don’t hesitate. I have a friend who moved here recently, and after 4 months he still glows with the excitement of a new life abroad.

But after eleven years my relationship with my ‘new country’ has changed somewhat. The constantly new has become the happily familiar. What jumped out at me as ‘different’ for years, is now, except for when I’m travelling, quite normal.

Does that mean that life in Spain is suddenly dull? Not at all! On the one had in makes it harder to communicate the joys of this country to you with the same regularity, and the same perspective of discovery as before.

On the other hand, it means that Spain can now become the background to new projects other than just ‘Spain’, which was my chief preoccupation for so long.

4. New projects, like what?

Still thinking about that a lot, but…

5. Cooking.

I’ve had a two bad habits for most of my life. One, letting other people do most of life’s domestic stuff for me, if I see they don’t seem to mind, and I can be lazy about it. Two, having an encyclopaedic (British?) knowledge of things that are bad for you, but not spending enough time learning about what is actually good for you.

Doing more cooking helps with both of these. Regarding point one, by doing as much of the family cooking as I can, I can take a lot of the weight off my wife, giving her more freedom, while also dealing with point two: I want to understand healthy food, and see how it makes us healthier as we eat it.

So I’ll be cooking mostly vegetarian food, trying my best to source organic, ‘eco’ ingredients… which still isn’t as easy here as it is in the UK.

I have always, yet reluctantly, loved cooking, usually picking one dish and cooking it repeatedly for six months, until we are both so fed up with it, that I never cook it again.

When we first lived together, I cooked so much chicken for 6 months, that Marina couldn’t touch it again for nearly 5 years! (This was mostly because I couldn’t understand the Spanish names for all the different cuts of other meats, so I only bought chicken!)

6. Writing and recording more – but not necessarily about Spain.

Self-explanatory. Watch this space I suppose. We continue to record Spanish-learning conversations at Notes in Spanish, but I hope to write more here again, about all these projects!

7. Cosmos

I have an increasing interest in understanding the nature of the cosmos – life, the universe(s), etc. Perhaps it’s because I was afflicted early on in life with a philosophy degree. I find that reading Discworld novels helps. Well, I read two, and to my surprise, they were rather good. Third one on the way, to continue my cosmic education.

7.b. Who knows this lovely beach?

8. Dickens.

Speaking of reading, I’ve just finished The Pickwick Papers and Oliver Twist, both incredible. Despite having a fairly sophisticated culture and system of law, the Victorians really treated poor people and debtors like total sh*t. Inhumanely in fact, and Dickens portrays the horrors vividly (he’d experienced them first hand in earlier life).

But it makes me wonder: In 150 years, what will make people raise their eyesbrows in amazement when they read about social conditions in our times – what is normal to us now, but will seems absolutely unthinkable to them in terms of treatment of our fellow humans?

The fact that people are left to sleep on the streets perhaps, or overcrowding in hospitals … who knows…

9. Thank you…

This post breaks all good blogging rules by being too long, and covering multiple subjects. If you got this far, you are great :) Comments are back on, they had to go off as the amount of email I was getting was detracting from my peace of mind! Please do comment if you like!

10. Here are some nice links:

Top Walks – Nice walking routes in Spain, with photos.

Secrets of Spain on a road less travelled – Guardian article on amazing Asturian route.

Delokos.org – Spanish site about vegetarian cooking. I met Eugenio over Christmas, a very lovely man with a total passion for vege food, that he passed on to me (see point 5 above!)

Spanish illness and doctor phrases and vocabulary – Fun bit of audio at notesinspanish.com

24 thoughts on “Notes, from Ben.”

  1. dimonio

    Agree with you about the feel and experience of real books. Each one has its history – where did you buy it, who were you with, what was happening in the world around when you got it. It’s now the same with downloads. I feel the same way about records / CDs. Call it sad but I can remember pretty well where I bought each of the ones I’ve got – and I’ve got 1000s. Back streets in NYC, Paris,London, Stockholm, Palma and others. Local stores long since closed in the UK. It’s just not the same when you download something while you wait for the kettle to boil.

    Is the beach La Concha in San Sebastian? I will find out when I go there for the first time in May.

    Best wishes to you and your family.

  2. Jessica

    This is a wonderful post, Ben, especially considering you’ve been having a blogging crisis!!! I myself have been having a “creative block” recently, which has been discouraging seeing as how I’m in the middle of writing and recording songs for my album!! My very artistic husband has told me that it takes just as much work and effort to NOT create as it does to create. We can’t force the stuff out if it’s not coming out! But we need these downtimes to explore new hobbies, new songs, new books, new foods, and anything else to spark our imagination. Much love to you and Marina as you’ve helped me re-discover the beauty of Spanish. Life would be boring and we’d be in constant “blocks” of all sorts if God had created us all the same and we couldn’t inspire one another! So I guess we all need each other, and we all need to be authentic to who we are, and then we end up inspiring each other!

    Well, i’ve probably broken the cardinal rule of leaving too long of a comment… But I have no idea what beach that is!!

    Jessica

  4. Ben Curtis Post author

    @Dimonio, yes, I know what you mean about music, though I have to say that downloading hasn’t bothered me so much as I imagine the loss of books would. Thougn in the end, I guess we’ll all end up with an ereader of some sort – certainly not having to wait for the post to bring you a new book from Amazon would be convenient at times – getting instant access to any book you want over the net is tempting when you run out of good reads!

    @Jessica – I’m glad you know where I’m coming from with the creative blocks, and your husband is right – it’s hard work when the creativity isn’t flowing!

    @Shenani – G.E. is a wonderful book! I think you are right, people won’t believe how badly we distribute world funds and resources – at least I hope that is the case by then… Wonderful photos by the way!

    And yes, it’s La Concha in wonderful San Sebastian!

  6. luke

    Hi Ben, Just looking at an article about the ipad, which reminded me of the Kindle, which reminded me of your mp3 ‘El Kindle’. So I’m reminded to check your site and the first thing I see is ‘I’m glad I don’t want an ipad’. It seems even you have lost the geeky interest you had for knew gadgets. I feel the public are getting weary of this too. The Kindle hasn’t taken off, now they’re trying to sell us touchscreen desktop computers which would kill my shoulders. We used to by TVs that could last 20 years, radios that would last a lifetime and cameras that you could pass down to your children. Now a computer over 3 years old is ancient etc. I’m all for innovation but have we reached a technological plateau where we are paying out more than we receive?
    As for becoming overly familiar with Spain. I think I’ve also got to that point. I guess it’s a bit like romantic love, after the intial excitement you get into a comfortable relationship.

  7. Ben Curtis Post author

    @Graham, thanks!

    @Luke – “We used to by TVs that could last 20 years, radios that would last a lifetime and cameras that you could pass down to your children.” – Quite right!

    I bought a Nikon FM2 about 12 years ago, a totally mechanical wonder of a 35mm camera, thinking it would last forever – ha! Now it’s pretty much useless, even thought is would keep on working perfectly with film for another 30 years!

    The terrible thing now, is that the marketing of these devices is so good, and the upgrades so often, that we have to keep changing to make ourselves feel better. I hope I am somewhat out of that trap now, and intend to keep using things til they break or are incompatible with the world around them. I must be getting old…

  8. delokos

    Thank you very much for the link, Ben

    I feel happy if I encouraged you to cook again, especially vegetarian and healthy food.

    Few things give more satisfaction than a nice meal cooked by yourself :-D

    Best wishes for you and the family

  9. Andrew

    Surely Dickens won’t be the same on the iPad? If you’re physically turning the pages you feel like part of a long, unbroken tradition… I think it puts you in touch with the writer (but then I’m a bit of a dreamer). Great Expectations definitely my favourite Dickens book. Never tried Pickwick Papers, but will give it a go. Cheers.

  10. Ben Curtis Post author

    @delokos – thanks for the comment!

    @Andrew – Pickwidk is good, you really see Dickens coming into his own in the second half though.

  11. Geoff Harrison

    Nice post. As always, thought provoking and refreshingly honest.

    Regarding the dilemma on whether to start a new blog, as someone (probably Confucius) said… “The man who chases two rabbits, catches none!”.

  15. MrMark

    Good to see you back Ben. One area where Spain is generally more expensive than the UK is the price of books. Maybe reading e-books will take off more quickly in Spain?

  16. dimonio

    Hi MrMark – Books are more expensive than in the UK as I think there is still a law to maintain prices within 5% of the Recommended Retail Price. Whilst this may look like a bad deal for the consumer, it does mean a lot of Spanish cities still have independent book retailers – something that has all but disappeared from the UK. I spent a few hours wandering round 4 different ones in Palma 2 weeks ago and to be honest I would happily pay a little more to ensure their survival as they add to the cultural life of the city.

  17. MrMark

    Dimonio – Yes I think you have a point. It’s interesting though that recently Borders shut down in the UK. I think it’s also partly down to the fact you can get books cheaper on Amazon. Plus, if you want a cheap read you can always pop in the High Street charity shops. The end effect is I suppose that all UK high streets look the same, either big national chains, bookmakers or charity shops.

  18. Jonk

    Given I’ve stood on that beach I possibly should have recognised it…

    Re: electronic books, I used to be the same way until I tried it. Then I realised that what we talk about – the smell, holding the book – are all just positive associations we have derived from the pleasure of reading. That is, they have no value in and of themselves.

    I read the Harry Potter series in Spanish on my laptop (reclined on the couch) and it yes was weird at first but after about 10 pages it wasn’t anymore – all those same positive emotions had returned. Because the pleasure comes from the reading.

    And @luke, the Kindle “hasn’t taken off”? What?? It’s been a spectacular success for Amazon.

    Now Ben, there’s three things which spring to mind that I believe our grandchildren will have difficulty fathoming.

    First, our willingness to tolerate pollution. Our grandkids most likely will never see smog in their lives. What an exciting thought. I believe they will see our world much as we see the pollution drenched world of Dickens.

    Second, the snail’s pace of awarding of rights to gays.

    Third, that we took so long to wake up to the insanity of prohibition.

  20. Ben Curtis Post author

    Dimonio – Yes, those small bookshops do add character to towns, just as the small butchers, bakers etc do… long may they survive in Spain, despite the onward march of Carrefour etc…

    MrMark – Wow, can’t believe Borders has shut, I loved going in there in Oxford while Marina goes clothes shopping, what a shame!

    Jonk – I think you are right about pollution, though it comes in so many shapes and forms, that no doubt we’ll never be rid of it entirely.

  21. Lucy

    Spain is my new country, I’ve been here for 7 months, so I have so much to blog about that I need to stay away from the Internet as much as possible or I’ll have trouble at work (btw, I work at home). I get to know a little bit about the food, the culture, the people every day and it’s so much fun! And surely, Spanish cuisine can make up for a blog of its own…

  23. angeles

    Hi Ben,

    Glad you’re back! If you want organic seasonal produce that doesn’t cost the earth, there’s a cooperative that delivers every fortnight not far from where you live:
    http://www.nodo50.org/lagarbancitaecologica/oscommerce-2.2rc2a/catalog/

    What’s happening with the move to Asturias? Are you less sleep deprived now?

    I love small shops (I particularly love my poulterer, fishmonger and green grocers), but it can be very confusing. And I’ve been highly recommended this children’s bookstore
    http://www.kirikuylabruja.com
    which has free events every Saturday.

    Okay, looking forward to your next instalment.

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