Last night there was a big jazz band playing at the Casino and about a 100 people came to dance Swing and Lindy Hop. As you might know, I am learning Swing in Barcelona but I don’t have much chance to practise so I was quite excited. Granollers swinging at last.
And the best thing is that my friend Montse Marti is going to start teaching classes here in Granollers. After Easter I will be going there and am very happy that Pep is going to come too!
For more information go to Bigpotters Swing on Faceboook.
This is a Virtual Vermut so here is a sign I saw in Barcelona last Monday when I went up for my Swing class.
Vins Cava Vermut i Petons! Wine Cava Vermouth and Kisses!
This tiny bar with the sign is in the Barri Gotic and is owned by a Scottish lady called Katherine who has a cheese shop and decided to expand into the the space next door to create a simple bar with wine and cheese. After many many years of living in Barcelona, she still has a beautiful rich Scottish accent. And of course she speaks Catalan and Spanish as well.
Sometimes I take Bonnie for walks around the town, looking for old buildings and signs of Granollers history. This was an old liqueur factory, now derelict. I like this style of sign writing; there is a lot of it in Granollers. It’s in Spanish as you can see from Montaña which would be written as Montanya in Catalan.
An Arab woman happened to be passing by when I took the photo. I read in the local paper today that while the last ten years have seen a huge increase in the number of immigrants here in Valles Oriental, in the last year there has been a decrease. This is due to the fact that people who came from Latin America are now returning home. Work is hard to come by here and in Latin America there is a strengthening economy. Over 18% of the population of Granollers are from other countries originally. By immigrants I mean all people who are not of Spanish nationality, including me!
Two other stories from the week
1/ Ant invasion
The ants have come back. We have tried everything but they are winning. Sometimes they withdraw to build up strength and numbers for the next campaign. But they never really go away.
We cleaned out the cupboards yet again
We spread cinnamon around all the entry points
We hung bay leaves as apparently they don’t like the smell
We squished with our fingers the scouts that they send out in advance of the main army
And of course we have tried to negotiate and ask them to go away.
They are fascinating creatures – if you get down close and watch them it becomes very hard to do them harm.
2/ Drawings
Pep did a clown performance and helped present prizes at a drawing competition for the local cancer charity. Before Christmas children had done drawings of…..guess what? Yes, caganers, the Catalan addition to all Nativity scenes. So we wandered around looking at about one hundred depictions of little red capped men – shitting! I am sure the children had a great time!
So that’s it for this week. Happy March to you all!
