Granollers

Amma is in Granollers

~ Kate Wilson ~ Leave a comment

Here are two images from my day.
I set off at 7.30am to queue for a ticket to receive a hug from Amma and here is the photo of my bike ride home at 3am

Granollers is heaven for cyclists being so flat and it is especially wonderful at night when there is no traffic and no people getting in your way on the main shopping street.
Amma is here for three days and the sports centre where she can be seen is right down the road from our house. It is a long straight road with a breast shaped mountain at the end.

It was a good day.  I felt more at home there than the first time I went two years ago.
It is hypnotic watching the people receiving their embraces.
She is incredible – I left just now around 3am and she was still receiving people, still smiling.
There is live music and chanting throughout the day – again it felt more familiar and less alien than last time. Something has changed for me in these two years! 
I found myself thinking that perhaps at last I am ready to visit India!
One thing that has not changed is my love of a masala dosa.

All the food was wonderful.  Made by volunteers in huge kitchen tents.
Some women sitting opposite me smiled across the table seeing how happy I was to be eating it in Granollers.   The drink is a mango lassi. Oh Indian restaurants – I miss you.

And home again

~ Kate Wilson ~ 3 Comments

Back in Granollers.  And it is good here too!
I went to my first Catalan class of the year, actually the first in two years.
I am now doing Elemental 1 which sounds high level to me but someone  asked me  ‘is that all?’
This time my class is over the bridge in Canovelles. It’s like a different village, like going from Penzance to Newlyn. They are joined up but not the same.
The class was nice, The others were very friendly and even when the teacher wasn’t there they spoke CATALAN!  In my other class everyone couldn’t wait to revert to Castellano which meant I was at a disadvantage. Perhaps it is because we are paying for this course. It’s only 30 euros or so but still we pay so we are keen to succeed.  Class makeup – all women: one African, four Moroccans, one Valencian, two from other parts of Spain and one Scottish. A good group.

On the way home I looked again at the fields of yellow plants and still can’t identify them but now I am sure they are not Jerusalem artichokes. And I saw lots of fish in the river – so it must be fairly clean.

Then Bonnie and I walked to the Casino to meet a friend, we talked Catalan and nothing else for two hours, Bonnie didn’t bark at anyone and on the way home there were still bands of screeching swifts high above us.  Today is October 3rd and they are still here or at least some of them are. They must be the last broods, preparing to fly off to Africa.  And I am the only person in Granollers who stops mid conversation to point up at the sky and scream ‘Mira!  Falciots!  Encara!’   (Look!  Swifts!  Still!)

Walking from Granollers to Milpins

~ Kate Wilson ~ 5 Comments

We have often gone with the dogs to Milpins – a park with woods not too far from Granollers. We always drove there but today I wanted to see how long it takes to walk all the way.
The great thing about Granollers is how quickly you are out in the countryside

In spite of the industry and the pollution here, there is another side to Granollers which sometimes pokes out from under the concrete and tarmac. This hidden side is like a ghost of times past, it is country rather than town, it is quiet with birds flying past and only a brush of wind through the leaves breaking the silence

 One moment you are walking alongside a busy dual carriageway and then you dip under a bridge and there is a stream, wild flowers by the roadside and the noisy road has turned into a dusty track.
This is what happens when you walk to Milpins via Corro´ D’Avall.
Even the people I met were from another world.  They were page`s – country people.  I had to ask the way twice and they were friendly and open in a very different way from people in the town.
At the water fountain Bonnie managed for the first time to drink directly – a great step forward.

Milpins means a thousand pines

But in the woods there are also native deciduous trees and the oaks – roure – were laden with acorns

Coming back we took a different route through Les Franqueses. Some interesting buildings amidst the new blocks
And at the roundabout near our home there are great fat olive trees looking healthy but slightly out of place in such an urban landscape

Oh and today I saw a group of swallows – still here!

Independence and other things to do

~ Kate Wilson ~ 1 Comment

I want to write about Catalunya and independence but I keep getting distracted.

Perhaps it is because I don’t feel I know enough yet.  I listen and strain to understand the news in Catalan, I hear conversations around the table and try to get a better grip on what people are thinking and saying. I buy newspapers and spend an hour or two slowly translating for myself and hoping I am not missing something important.

There are lots of flags still hanging from windows and so far, everyone I have spoken to is pro independence.  Almost everyone went on the demonstration in Barcelona on September 11th.
People are talking about it.

It feels like an exciting and important time and I will write about it – soon!
I wish my language skills were better – it’s so frustrating to know there is something going on and yet not be able to really really understand the details.

Meanwhile ….life continues in Granollers.
Today I went to the dentist – a visit to the hygienist cost 20 euros.

The sun shone on the Porxada and some people were still wearing shorts

I unpacked some more sculpture tools and created some stone dust

Ah the smell of wax crayons! I always have to bury my head in them and breath in.

Nature Notes

~ Kate Wilson ~ 2 Comments

So, I am back in Granollers and as I am finding it hard to feel settled and that is not an easy thing to write about, I decided to post some words about what is going on in the natural world.
Pathways
I am out walking Bonnie every day and as we meander along the paths which are edged with plastic bottles and beer cans and strange fluffy red sponge things, (it makes a change from the brambles and honeysuckle we were forced to endure in Lamorna), I try to find some way of encouraging my roots to sink down into the dusty earth.
Birds
It’s always good to watch the birds.
Amazingly the swifts are still here. Not so many, not so often seen but as of yesterday there was a crowd of them shrieking above the city.
By the river which is very low after a long and unusually hot summer, I saw a bird with a large yellow patch on its tail. I can’t identify it. I didn’t see it for long enough to describe it better. I looked  at images on Google and found one almost identical but it too had evaded identification and was only named ‘Bird with yellow marking on tail’ .
It was lovely though.
The heron is still feeding on the river in spite of the mass of floating plastic bags and we also saw fish – quite large ones – swimming near the bridge
Weather
At 6pm this evening the temperature was 24C. The last two days have been cloudy which has meant Bonnie and I could walk in the morning without having to get up at some unearthly hour to avoid the sun. It doesn’t really feel like Summer but neither is it Autumn yet.
The Streets
The trees have blossom in the streets around our home. Yet again I must confess to not knowing what sort of trees they are. The flowers are pink and large and plentiful. I have realised one tree near the house is a pear tree as it suddenly dropped lots of fruit on the pavement. Or was it someone with a broken bag coming home from the market?
The River
The most wonderful thing about the river just now is the field of yellow flowers on tall green stems. What on earth are they?  Surely not Jerusalem artichokes but they remind me of that kind of wild abundance.

Well, that is today’s nature diary.  I am ashamed of how much I don’t know the names of what I see. That somehow reflects my general feeling of ignorance at the moment. In answer to almost any question I feel the most honest reply is ‘I don’t know’