A video and some tragic news

This video I made to show you some sceneries around Villahermosa. I was driving around to see the nearby towns and mountains and made this video by mounting a camera inside my car while descending down a mountain road. To make it shorter the video plays back at double speed.

This week has been the festival -or "feria"- of Villahermosa and the town is full of people, attractions and life. One thing shaded the beginning of the feria on Monday though, as a young man with 26 years of age from the neighboring block was killed by a lightning during a thunderstorm while he was on a fishing trip in the nearby village of Montiel. A 13-year old brother, a girlfriend and the families were left missing him. Things like this leave you without words... Respect the nature and take care of yourself and those around you!

A shot of a lightning during a recent thunderstorm in Villahermosa, taken from the house.

Video of the mercadillo

Today, as we were returning home from the Ayuntamiento, the mercadillo happened to be on our way and I decided to make a video of it for you to see. Of course its not the greatest movie spectacle ever witnessed, but maybe it'll serve some purpose. In the latter part of the video you will also see a little bit of the house we're living at and some people as well. I'll make a more comprehensive video of the house later.

Siblings, cousins, uncles...

This family has been at least as active in spreading around as has mine in Finland ;) There are relatives in Barcelona, Bilbao, Valencia...



These are the three siblings on the side of Rocío's mother (from left to right, youngest to oldest): Antonio, Encarnacion and Maria Luisa. Antonio lives in Barcelona with his wife Mari and daughter Ana, whereas Maria Luisa with her family have remained closer - as the next-door neighbors to Rocío's family. In addition to Maria Luisa there are her husband Lorenzo and their son Luis Lorenzo. Their daughter Maria Monserrat lives in Villahermosa but works in the nearby village of Montiel, which is why her daughter Maria Lucia - the grandchild of Maria Luisa and Lorenzo - spends most of her days here. She appears to be a real favorite of all the village!

Here are the aforementioned siblings again, joined now by their mother Felipa, representing the oldest end of the family, and Maria Lucia as the youngest.

In this photo on the left Felipa, leaning on the car Maria Luisa and her son Luis Lorenzo who happens to be almost the same age as me. The man in the green shirt is Javi, the husband of the sister of Antonio's wife Mari. With his wife Mari Angeles they have two daughters, who are the two girls in white and gray clothes in the photo, Eva (the younger) and Marta. They also live in Barcelona, but like Antonio and his family, also come here to Villahermosa for the vacations during the summer. The last two remaining are again Maria Lucia with her back facing the camera and Ana, the daughter of Antonio and Mari, in the red shirt.

To make things just a little more complicated, I present to you another Antonio and his family :) Antonio is the husband of Eugenio's (Rocío's father, that is) sister Alberta. They are the two persons on the right. On the left are two of their five children: Paqui (white shirt) and Inmaculada - or Inma for short. In the middle is the boyfriend of Inma, Juan. In addition, Alberta and Antonio have three sons that are not in the picture: Antonio (one more!), Alberto and Jordi. The whole family lives in Barcelona also, and we have been invited to visit them when we go there in September. Invitation is gladly accepted :) Juan is a man of football (FC Barcelona) and wants to take me to the home stadium of the team...

Oh, and one more thing... There is the saying that every rule has an exception, right? Well, here we have one example of that. In Spanish, the equivalent of my name Ville is Guillermo and that is what Antonio (on the right) has been calling me ever since he learned that! Normally, I prefer my real name to be used, but with him we have an agreement to use the other, as there needs to be an exception. By the way, as simple as my real name is, to the Spanish people it is difficult to pronounce correctly, as they tend to say "V" as we say "B" and two "L"s become how we say "J" in Finland... "BIJJE" is what it sounds like without instructions on how to say it :)

Family photos and an anniversary

For once, the whole family was available at the same time for a group photo :)

If it still is unclear who is who, from left to right: Encarnacion, Felipa, Eugenio, Beatriz, Rocío and Maria Isabel. The photo was taken at the front door of the house in Villahermosa, after an afternoon trip to the fair of a nearby village Villanueva de la Fuente.

On August 22nd, Encarnacion and Eugenio celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary - and 33 years of life together in total. 33 years! Man, I haven't even lived that long yet ;) Such a time is definitely worth a little fiesta, so we went to dine to a restaurant in the village with the whole family... If someone is wondering, the color of Eugenio's face is not - even though we enjoyed some - from too much wine, but from working outside in the sun for years and years :)

One more time, the "core" family. Next I will present some of the relatives I've met so far...

Two were missing...

Here are the two missing persons from my earlier presentation of the family:

Beatriz - the equivalent of my soon-17-year-old sister Silja. Despite being more calm by her character overall, she does from time to time remind me of [QUESTIONABLE HUMOR]what I would not be missing were I to live with my mum and Silja... [/QUESTIONABLE HUMOR]. You know, the obligatory conversations about money, household work etc. :)

So far I haven't gotten to know her too well, as we tend to go around at different times and to different places, and maybe there is also a hint of shyness from her part, but I hope -and know- that this will be fixed in no time :)

This is Maria Isabel, the middle one of the three sisters with 20 years of age, with her dog Rex. At the moment they are both staying at the house in Villahermosa as she doesn't have work for August, but normally she lives in Ciudad Real. Her I already know a little bit better as Rocío and I have been spending time at her place in Ciudad Real. : she reminds me of my dear sister Heta, if not by looks or some other way, but by her temper. And no, I haven't experienced that personally, but witnessed some "sisterly negotiations" or something ;)

I made a rubber carpet for the boot of my car to protect it from dirt that dogs might bring with them. Rex was the first one to try it, here he's checking out the material. I guess the verdict was "approved" as he next made himself comfortable in there by lying down :)

Panoramas

I was speaking with my mother on the phone this morning. She asked me to put more pictures of the people I've come to know and write about the everyday life here. That I will do next, but bare with me for this one post more, as I will introduce you a couple more landscapes. These are in panoramic form, and by no means perfect as such, because I haven't had the patience (or the skills, yet) to start tuning the color differences etc. between the photos. Anyway, I hope these give a broader look to the wonderful sceneries I've found very close to where I live. Click on the photos to go to their folder and see them separately.

P.S. If some of you know a good, free panoramic photo compiler with options to adjust the colors etc. let me know! Currently I'm using Photostitch which came with my camera, but that is a very simple and limited program as can be seen...

An earthquake in Spain

Well, now it is official: I can sleep through an earthquake!

A rare event happened yesterday on Sunday, August 12th in Spain. At 9:47am the country was struck by an earthquake, the epicenter being right here in Ciudad Real. The magnitude of the 'quake was 5,1 on the Richter scale. At this hour I was happily asleep, and I must admit that when I woke up an hour later or so, I had no idea whatsoever of an earthquake. The rest of the family was talking about it, how they felt their beds shake and heard a rumbling noise, and soon the tv was also with it. Luckily the quake didn't cause any casualties or damage to property. Should I consider buying a more effective alarm clock than my mobile phone?!

Here's a few links to information about the event:
CNN
Wikipedia (this one in Spanish)

Views of La Mancha - The setting sun

The sun offers magnificent scenes above the horizon before going down for the night.



This abandoned piece of old farming equipment has seen quite many sunsets from where its resting. In the old days it was used to lift water up from the well, powered by donkeys.



No comment :)

A display of colors that I don't have words to describe.

Views of La Mancha - In larger scale

The scenery, smooth in it's form...



... but go closer and the smooth may turn to sharp.



The scenery often lush and green, despite the general dryness.



A stereotypical image of a Mediterranean country?

Views of La Mancha - The other side of the nature

On the other hand, despite the dryness and seemingly hostile plants, the nature is persistent and turns what might be a desolate and empty place into a beautiful scenery with many rich details.



A sunflower in the wild.



"Trespassers will be pinched."



Sometimes the nature is very fragile. A slightest touch and this dried flower would crumble to pieces.



Many different kinds of bugs visit the plants. Most of them I've never seen before. Great coloring on this fellow :)

Views of La Mancha - The nature

Now a glimpse to what the nature of the region looks like in general:



Strange for the Finnish eye, the color of the soil is red...



... and during the summer it can be very dry. It has rained once or twice during the last three months here.



Therefore, the vegetation is dry as well and often quite hostile by it's appearance.



Its better to change the sandals for proper shoes when you're heading out to the countryside... if your feet are dear to you.

Views of La Mancha - El huerto

Some products of the land:



Paprika.



Tomato.



Pear-shaped tomato.



Pumpkin.

In addition to these there also grows cucumber, water melon, sunflower, squash, beans, almonds etc.

Views of La Mancha - Las olivas y el huerto

Olives are an important product of the La Mancha region. Rocío's family grow them like many other families here as well. They belong to a collective that delivers the crops to the factories which purchase the olives and also provide the products to the participants - olive oil and wine for example.



These are the olive trees.



The olives. These are still young, the season to collect them is around December.



The Olive Inspector at work ;)

This is "el huerto", the patch of land where the family grows vegetables and fruits for their own use. In the next post I'll show what grows there.

Views of La Mancha - Ciudad Real

These photos are from my first visit to Ciudad Real, the city where we will be settling in once the school continues again for Rocío and/or I find work.

This is the main square of the city, Plaza Mayor. Across the square you can see the Ayuntamiento of Ciudad Real.

One of my favorite spots in the city, a small park with palm trees next to a beautiful old church.

A random street view of the city. There's a lot of greenery in the city, trees lining the streets, parks and recreational areas here and there. One park I like especially, Parque Gasset, but that I don't have photos of yet.

This is Calle Calatrava, the street where Rocío's sister Maria Isabel lives and where we have been staying during our visits to Ciudad Real. The view is from the terrace of the apartment.

Views of La Mancha

The following posts will be more about the photos than writing, as the proven formula of "1 photo tells more than a thousand words" tends to hold true. Here are some sceneries and details that have caught my eye and that of my camera during the first couple of weeks here:



Antennas over the rooftops of Villahermosa.

The patio of the house.

Viñas - these you can see everywhere, as the region produces a lot of wine.

The Lost Highway - why does this photo remind me of that movie? The full moon lighting our way in the dusk of La Mancha.

More animals

This is the German Shepherd of Rocío's sister Maria Isabel. He's called Rex and is four years old. At first, he can be quite reserved towards new people and show some guarding instinct, as was the case with me also, but in no time we became friends and now he's just a playful, happy dog that enjoys the company of the people he knows (the secret to this might be the chicken treats and sausages I took with me the first couple of times ;)...

Something you won't see in Finland are geckos, that during the night come out of their shelters and can be seen on the walls of the older houses. They do not present any harm - on the contrary they provide a useful service to people by feeding on unwanted or harmful insects. If you want to know more, click here.

In the corner of the utility room in Rocío's house lives the family-spider... Well, perhaps its not really considered a pet by anyone, but an impressive web-maker he/she is!

The Animals

"The Animals"... was there a band that went by that name when our parents hadn't even thought about thinking about us?! Ah yes there was, in the year 1964. But these animals I'm about to present to you are of a completely different breed :)

First up, is the cat with the blue eyes. Maybe some roots to Finland in the past, who knows... This one is the older one of the two cats that live around Rocío's house (I don't say "in" because they never come in - the patio is their place. This one doesn't like to be touched, but is social still, coming to lay down close to you if you sit down in the yard.

Another one of this handsome fellow, observing his kingdom from the shadowy side of the yard.

And this here I like to call "Pequeñita" -"The Little One"- as she's almost small enough to fit in one hand of mine. This one likes to play a lot, of which I've made a video for you to see. A cat this small does although have a small head and therefore attention span also, which can be seen in the video, as she suddenly forgets she was playing and concentrates on her rear end... :) Take a look in Youtube!

The Family

Allow me to present the family Gig... errrmmm... well, let's just call it The Family, as I wouldn't know which surname to use (here in Spain, people have two surnames - one from their mother and the other from the father). Of course it has been impossible to get the whole family in one photo, but let's begin with what I've got:

Here we have Rocío with her parents, Eugenio and Encarnacion.

And here are the previous ones minus Rocío, having a breakfast on a Saturday morning - churros con chocolate. It's something that resembles the Finnish "munkki" and usually is dipped in hot chocolate while eating... delicious!

La abuela - grandmother, that is - sitting in the chair in the hallway doing her handcrafts. She's called Felipa and is a very lovable person, although I find it hard to understand a single word that she speaks ;) She takes turns month at a time to stay the days either with the family of Rocío or that of her aunt. She joins us for the breakfast, then sits in the living room watching tv or doing those handcrafts, eats lunch with us and then goes to her house next door to have a nap during the siesta. In the evenings, she comes back, sitting either in the living room or in front of the house, dines with us and for the night again goes to her house. This is how the elderlies are often taken care of here in Spain. If you'd ask me, I'd say she is just what I would imagine a Spanish grandmother to be :)

Eugenio driving back to Villahermosa from Valdepeñas, where we took Rocío's youngest sister Beatriz to catch a bus to Ciudad Real for a visit to the middle one of the three sisters, Maria Isabel. Of these two I'm yet to have a photo, so I'll have to get back on them later. Next, I will introduce you to the pets and other animals I've encountered...