Free Gillian Gibbons now

For various reasons I don't normally give political opinions on this blog, despite having, as you know, a great number of them. However, I feel incadescent with rage over the imprisonment of Gillian Gibbons and the threats on her life from the thousands (of men, do doubt) now apparently rampaging through the streets of Khartoum in the Sudan. Her "crime", in the unlikely event that you haven't heard the story, is that she allowed a group of young children in her class to choose the name for a teddy bear and that they chose the name Mohammed, thus, it is alleged, mocking the eponymous prophet. This was several weeks ago and it is unclear who complained but it is absolutely clear that the Sudanese government and Islamic clerics are using this silly incident (I refuse to call it cultural misunderstanding because I think they are inventing this culture as they go along and for their own ends) to deflect attention from their own actions in Darfur and elsewhere in Sudan where the peace between the south and the arabised north is far from stable. According to the BBC the majority of Sudanese bloggers feel the decision to jail Gillian Gibbons was wrong but at times like this (as with various events in Northern Ireland in the past, or the closing down of the Hindu play in Birmingham a couple of years ago) I feel my tolerance of religion as anything more than the most private matter stretched almost to breaking point.

OK. Rant over. Back to nice things in the next post.

?Por qué no te callas? Or how Hugo Chavez got a come uppance

We were watching the Spanish news last night when we saw the most amazing thing. There was an item about a summit of a conference in South America involving Spain and South American countries. It seemed like a plenary session since the Spanish King was there as well as the heads of state and Zapatero, the Spanish President. Anyway, all of a sudden Hugo Chavez of Venezuela began to rant (no other word for it) about the previous Spanish President, Aznar, calling him a fascist and lower than a snake. Zapatero responded in a sensible way by pointing out that although his party was not close to Aznar, Aznar was nevertheless democratically elected etc. Chavez started again, at which point the King leaned forward in his seat, glared at Chavez and said, using the familiar, "Why don't you shut up?" It didn't actually shut Chavez up and then Daniel Ortega, the Nicaraguan president, started having a go at Spain too (whereupon the king walked out) but you could almost hear the entire Spanish population cheering. Chavez is a dangerous demagogue and we should be worried when he takes photo opportunities with the President of Iran. Now, if only our own dear queen.........

Don(y)ana again

Don(y)ana is one of the most important wetlands in Europe and a National Park which can mostly only be accessed by boat up the river from Sanlucar. We visited a couple of year's ago and did the English tour and this year returned with Marge, Jens, baby Rodrigo and a lot of other Spanish people and did the tour in Spanish. It is one way to record some progress in this ongoing battle between us and the Spanish language.

We travelled on the boat which you can see behind Mike. It looks distressingly small......

Who'd have thought it?

You know those sticky things called dates that you buy in boxes at Christmas and throw out in April? Well, this is what they look like growing on a tree in my garden.

the child within......

The success of the season (summer, that is) here in La Barrosa have been these new jelly shoes. They are a bit like clogs but made of plastic and incredibly light. They cost 5 euros a pair (or two pairs for 9 euros), come in crazy colours and all the kids have them. And now, so do I. They are great for schlepping to the hot tub and back. Don't you wish you had some too?