Author: Kate Wilson

Magical Places near Granollers

~ Kate Wilson ~ 1 Comment
You only need to drive a short way out of Granollers to find yourself in the countryside, in places of great natural beauty with hidden pools of fresh water and banks of aromatic rosemary and thyme. We came here last Sunday to walk and after a short climb up a steep path, found these two secret pools. The water was incredibly clear and foot numbingly cold.Total Solitude and Peace

We didn’t see anyone else in the time we were there – this area near Sant Feliu de Codines must be one of my favourite places to soothe my spirits and replenish my energy.

The swifts return

At this time of year I am waiting for them and back in Granollers they arrived on April 7th . They are now soaring high over the houses and streets screaming out in what sounds like glee. I stood for several minutes today in the main shopping street watching over 50 of them ducking and diving high above me. How amazing that no-one else seemed to notice they were there. They are called Falciot Negre in Catalan and Vencejo común in Castellano.

Watching them and listening to them is another thing that seems to be good for my soul.

Nice things to eat.

~ Kate Wilson ~ 3 Comments

There are so many of these that I have been collecting photos and thinking about them – and eating them too of course – for months. I had better start writing about them now or there will never be time to write about anything else! I am not smoking at the moment so food is even more important than ever so here are the first two servings…
A few months ago the shops started displaying a vegetable that was new to me – CalçotsIt is very seasonal and during the time when it is available people organise special events to eat them. These parties are called Calçotades and are usually organised to take place in the open air with a barbeque and a lot of friends. As this happens in the early Spring it coincides with a celebration of the warmer weather and thoughts of the summer to come.Best cooked on a fire the calçots are then wrapped in newspaper and distributed around the party to be stripped of their outer leaves dipped in a special sauceand then eaten in one long delicious mouthful straight from your handThe sauce is called salvitxada and is made from almonds, tomatoes, garlic, peppers, vinegar and oil.
The next recipe is not really connected with the first one except that is also totally delicious and to my mind a good way to end any meal.In case you can’t read Catalan here is my version of the recipe but it loses something in translation. If you click on the photo it will be large enough to read.
Put two egg yolks with 75g sugar into a saucepan, beat well then add 15g of cornflour. Add some warm milk (taken from a half litre) and throw in two sticks of cinnamon and the skin of a lemon. Put in the rest of the milk and put it all onto the heat. Keep stirring until it is near the boil then take off the stove but don’t stop stirring. Now take out the cinnamon sticks which you have been careful not to break up during the stirring process. If you want you can now strain the mixture through a sieve but it’s not necessary unless you have broken the cinnamon.
Put the mix into the serving dish and put in the fridge until you are ready to caramelise the top. Sprinkle sugar over the cream and then burn it until nicely crisp and brown. It will then have a wonderful combination of hot crust and cold centreWe only fire-branded half of the pudding as for some reason that I still can’t understand some of the women present prefered to eat it without the extra sugar layer!
And here is Delia meeting Cuinar és Senzill by Montserrat Segui de Queralt.I look forward to a happy relationship between the two of them!

First Visitors

~ Kate Wilson ~ 3 Comments

Wouldn’t you know it? We went to Cornwall and it rained until we left then it turned sunny. My first visitors arrived here in Granollers to see me and it rained….and a walk in Montseny was transformed into a soft meditation on the colour greyThese pictures are taken at Santa Fe in the natural park of Montseny. A wonderful place.

Having two homes is stressful

~ Kate Wilson ~ Leave a comment

The reality of having two homes is not so easy as you might imagine.

One of the things I have had to accept since moving to Catalunya is that the process of moving is slow and there is going to be a period of transition which is quite uncomfortable.  I love my new life but I also feel deeply attached to my old home and especially because my two border collies are still living there, being taken care of in their familiar home but without me.

I hope to resolve this as soon as I can but in the meantime, we went back to visit Cornwall for Easter
It was the first time my partner and his son had been in the UK and I felt responsible for making it a good trip.   So, what happened?
St Michaels Mount was still there and looked beautiful in the sunshine
We  got terrible colds which meant all our plans had to be changed
It also rained a lot and I felt sad that my new family didn’t see Cornwall at it’s best.
Spending time in my own cottage was wonderful and being with my dogs was bliss.

alt='two border collies'
my best friends
It is sometimes very hard having two homes and wanting to be in both of them.
We were still coughing on the ferry trip back  from Plymouth to Santander
I drove to Granollers in my little white van, bringing back essentials such as Twinings Earl Grey Tea and my blue Denby teapot, four fine china mugs and a very uplifting table clothBut two essential dogs had to be left behind … next time……… I hope… they can make the journey.

Remembrance of Lost Times

~ Kate Wilson ~ 1 Comment
The laws of balance mean that I must now write about homesickness. I have been reading lots of online articles about the experience. How it can either sneak up on you slowly or hit you in the face. How it affects everyone who lives for some time in another country and culture.

I am going ‘home’ soon to Cornwall with my new partner and his son. It will bring together two of my worlds and after the excitement of planning the trip I now find myself feeling nervous. And for the last few days I have felt a weird inexplicable sadness. A fullness in my head as if I can stuff no more new information inside without exploding. An inability to speak coherently in castellano. And a total absence of those warm fuzzy feelings that I described in the last post.
Strange!

There are hundreds of web sites describing the symptoms of homesickness – how it normally hits after three months in a new country. I used to think it was a feeling of wanting to go home as experienced by a child away at summer camp who lies in bed crying, but now I can see it is something else – something more complicated to do with our need for familiarity, for places and smells and tastes and sounds that link us to the past. And however much you like new places and people and experiences there is something inside that also craves the known and familiar.

It is hard to describe how tiring it is to be always having to think. Every little task can be a mountain to climb. Everything is new. No wonder babies sleep such a lot – learning new patterns is exhausting and you need to take regular breaks. Buying soap powder – no familiar names, no signs to let me know if it is for washing or conditioning, then it doesn’t seem to smell right and the clothes aren’t feeling the same as they did in Cornwall. Confusion, frustration, exhaustion and irritation.

In October three months after arriving in Barcelona I had a crisis of wanting to be at home – not to return to Cornwall but to find a quiet safe place to relax and just be. It became urgent to have a retreat from the world, somewhere to just be myself where noone would think me strange if I did things in my own way rather than the Catalan Way. That was one reason I started to write this blog – to try and understand rather than flail around in a sea of alienation. And now living here in Granollers I have a similar urge. I want to surround myself with some familiar things, to sit in a space that feels safe and known. Suddenly I understand why people buy some British things when they live abroad. Not because they reject the new ones but there is a deep need for tastes and smells and sounds that link you to your roots. Just sometimes….This trip to Cornwall is partly to bring back some of my things – I have a list that contains teapot, birdfeeder, mug, blanket, cookery books, baked beans! Not because they are better but because they link me to some deep inner current. Thank goodness for the internet and for being able to connect with friends and family regularly. And through the internet i can read about other people’s experiences and find out how normal these feelings are. For several weeks now I have been ‘seeing’ familiar people from Penzance walking the streets of Granollers. It is similar to when someone dies and you think you see them walking past – a trick of the mind. I know that when I am in Cornwal I will also start to ‘see’ people from here, magically transported across Europe.
And more thanks to the internet because I can listen to Radio 4 -feeling a little guilty when I do it, imagining I should be immersing myself more in Castellano/Catalan – I now realise it is a vital link and helps me stay sane.
As I have been writing this post I have been thinking of Proust and all his wonderful thoughts on memory and time and perception and yearning. I named this blog with a sideways glance at his book title Swanns Way. But no time to expand on this now as it is time to go….to the airport to fly to England.