Holiday Snap: A granny for a penny

Getting busy doing holiday

Coming into our fourth day of holiday, we have been taking things quite easy, but it is about to get a bit frenetic.

There are many things I would like us to do, but the shortness of this break means we have to choose what to do and what to leave to another time.

Already, we have been booked to go to Tenerife which is a 70 minute boat ride from Puerto de las Nieves on the north-eastern coast of Gran Canaria, this is to go to Loro Parque and what a long day it would be. The bus picks us up at 6:10AM.

For a pound and more, these fakes

Meanwhile, we have concentrated on Playa del Ingles, a walk up to Yumbo Centre where the shops stock imitations and counterfeits of brands names made to look like original and properly sourced products with such sweet-talking merchants who would at a whim sell their grandmothers at a discount if it would leave them with a coin of currency richer.

On Saturday, we went to Maspalomas and walked some 3 kilometres up the promenade from the lighthouse to Meloneras where the competition from the somewhat isolated restaurants was brisk and almost aggressive.

Food cooked with calumny

In a stretch of hardly 100 metres we were accosted by waiters selling their fare so well by disparaging their competition. Our hands were filled with restaurant business cards that by the time we reached the end of the promenade, the last card handler quipped that the cards of the other restaurants were bigger, but in his restaurant, the plates of food are bigger, the quality fresher and much else.

It was all too much for me, I hate having food forced down my throat and most especially bargain food. When we turned round to walk back, I could not run the gauntlet of that crowd again, we walked that part in front of the restaurants on the beach. Phew!

Then Sunday, we headed for the beach negotiating the dunes following the red-marked pillars. It takes just about 30 minutes to make it to the beach from our hotel. For the very first time, I did get my feet wet in the sea, I might get more wet next time.

Holiday Snaps: The scandals and sandals

The wonder of dunes

The sand dunes of Maspalomas in Gran Canaria one of the Canary Islands are a wonder of nature. Lifeless as they seem, the sands shift sculpted by the wind to living expressions of nature, undulating landscapes, curves, arcs and bends that would defeat the construct of any calculus expert.

To walk these sands, you need very good footwear, a pair of good fitting sandals. The ones I wear, I bought from a shop in Berlin over 12 years ago, lots of leather and Velcro grips with hard wearing soles that have been trusty and trusted to handle each climb and descent, round the nature reserve, to the beach or just on the random loiter.

Other footwear

Shoes don’t do it, they get filled with sand making your walk impossible as you take them off every few steps to empty them of sand.

Bare feet in the cool of the day could be good but there are parts with spiky seeds that you do not want to step on, there are times sandals gather so many of those seeds that they become platform shoes of sorts.

Some people walk the dunes in trainers and socks, dumb does not begin to describe the fact that practical trumps fashion sense in this case.

Crocs are a downer

Talking of fashion, the new kinds of footwear sported by some people are called Crocs, whilst they might have ergonomic wearing potential, they are so dastardly ugly, it appears that is their selling point – ugly is the new beauty.

The range of colours have a spectrum of sickly to hallucinatory, if I were shod with those in my coffin, I would sure resurrect for the purpose of taking them off and return to my eternal repose.

Heel and heels deep

When I thought I had seen it all, there came this lady, or was it a man, I could neither tell whether he or she were a female impersonator in drag or a transvestite, it did not matter but walking the dunes in stilettoes was a scandal beyond the topic of sandals, the way she struggled, I was caught between the extremes of empathy and sheer derision.

You almost want to have a spare pair of sandals for the stoned and deranged that wander those sands wrongfully shod and learning no lessons from the fact that they are walking with great difficulty.

Thought Picnic: The sands of light

A longer walk than most

On my walk to the beach which took probably twice the time it takes for people to cover the distance, I decided to do it in silence, in contemplation with deep reflection.

Thinking about how fortunate I have been in my life and experiences even when things have seemed so seriously out of control and beyond me, there has always been some hope, some inspiration, some angling for change and possibilities that in the depth of those situations is far from view.

The grains of sand that make up the living dunes of Maspalomas revealed a part to them that I had never before noticed. Innumerable as they are and brown as they seemed, in the high sunlight of the day grains glistened and reflected back the sunlight in thousands or more of mirrors.

Each had a light for me

All those evident from my moving through the dunes, as I looked in every direction there was a flicker of light and I could imagine there could be millions of reflectors reflecting heat and light at my body from all angles just because I was there.

The grains were self-existent and mutually supportive creating this amazing landscape constantly sculpted by winds and other weather conditions the dunes experience.

In general the grains would remain unmoved and untouched except when affected by external stimuli which includes the many feet that walk those sands creating tracks some well tread and some very new soon to disappear as if no one was ever there – a clean slate every few days that would make a novice of an expert bush tracker after a while.

Dunes of memory

And so, I wondered about how we live our lives sometimes not affecting or affected but there for circumstances and situations to give meaning to our existence as each grain of sand became a reflector to me even though without my noticing this before, the grains were reflecting regardless of what I thought about the composition, the refractive index and all other optical components of sand and silica.

Each significant bit becomes part of the whole and so does the memories of the many who have come and gone, who have touched my life in many ways innumerable to mention, they will not be forgotten but each reflection and thought is replayed over and over again forming the dunes of my own personal experiences and more.

Hotel life: $1 to swim in Togolese waters

Easy regimen

You may wonder if there is something called hotel life – a life almost regimented but leisurely, where people are paid to be obsequious and even though it could be a luxury you hardly think of it until you return home.

The regimen as far as my hotel is concerned centres around meal times, with breakfast being a free seating arrangement that last until 10:30AM and dinner being two fixed seatings at 06:00PM and 08:00PM in the winter time and thirty minutes later for the summer months with variations for special days.

Hotel life revolves around the comforts and ease of life, the new people you meet, the conversations and stories that ensue depending on where you are staying and long for, the staff that give you recognition and time to even make your stay more pleasurable ensuring that you return again.

Unstable tables

I am now on my third table after first sitting alone in crowded area but without the ability to communicate with neighbouring tables – just because I am alone does not mean I also want to be lonely in a crowd.

So, I let the maître d’hôtel know that I would prefer to seat where I could interact with other guests over dinner and he went one better that I am now sat with couples that speak English.

Almost 7 days through my holiday they needed to join up tables for a group of 7 and had successfully kicked me off to a lone table unbeknownst that it was the New Years Eve gala, by then the first couple had left and they seized the opportunity to make me an unwilling participant in a their musical chairs charade – once I cottoned on what they were up to, I remonstrated; kept my table and still ended up isolated – the guests on other adjoining tables had left too.

After that day, I was assigned another table that would be mine for the rest of my holiday, 2 tables in the open with a couple occupying the adjoining table for that duration of time.

Hampshire recordings

The first couple; say Paul and Penny were from Hampshire and ran a scientific video management company; it was their first time at the Riu Palace Maspalomas and they were on holiday for a week.

We were talking about embryology, in-vitro fertilisation and animal testing for a while as they also produce educational video for medical purposes. They seemed to be quite well travelled very knowledgeable and regaled me with their adventures of sailing in storms, mountain climbing and other hair-raising stuff.

They probably were in their late fifties had been married 30 years and they would have enriched the lives and experiences of anyone who encountered them – it was a pleasure to have them for company.

unClassy looks in Nottinghamshire

At my next table and next couple, it was their second time at the hotel and they had been around for over a week on a 2-week holiday and I was to spend 5 nights with them. Robin and Rachel ran two companies, one to do with light haulage and the other to do with “classy” furnishings in Nottinghamshire.

They were going to celebrate their 27^th wedding anniversary and though they were an interesting couple it was obvious that they had worked hard to arrive where they were, probably quite hard-nosed and ruthless too.

Robin had piercings and tattoos whilst Rachel would clothes that were quite expressive bordering on the indecent – our conversation never got elevated beyond people, events and ideas were difficult going.

Robin also had the most unadventurous diet, they could not enjoy the New Years Eve gala because it was not roast beef and they returned from the fusion kitchen because he could not stomach what was on offer.

I was tempted and voiced the idea of taking Rachel to an exclusive Spanish restaurant whilst sending Robin off to ten-pin bowling – nice people in general though they had so much to complain about the hotel I thought I was staying in another one.

Retired but not tired

Now, I am with William and Ingrid, they must be in their mid to late seventies and they are here for 2 months. Ingrid has limited mobility but she is able to get around.

As I initiated conversation, I learnt they were from Kent, in fact, William had been retired for 23 years having retired at 53 – now there aren’t many who can confidently retire at that age today.

William used to work in the City running training programmes for accountancy firms and within the accountancy professional body, this made the conversation quite engaging because my father is an accountant, a fellow of the professional body and had won the Foulks-Lynch prize in 1969.

That impressed William no end as he said my father would have been a very smart and intelligent man considering that was one of the most competitive at that time.

We talked about how the accountancy profession had changed and the names then had merged or disappeared – Deloitte, Haskins & Sells, Coopers & Lybrand, Arthur Andersen were examples.

The private seas of Togo

One story that was as astonishing as it was laughable was one where they joined a working freighter travelling the world and docked at the main port in Togo. Whilst they were still out at sea, they were asked if they wanted to take a dip in the sea to which Ingrid happily assented.

In the evening at dinner, a representative of the Togolese tourism board arrived in the company of the captain and asked everyone who had swum in their sea meaning Togolese waters to raise their hands.

For all hands raised, he demanded a dollar each, William had no change and offered a $10 bill which the representative tried to pocket without offering change – William refused to give up the $10 bill and successfully persuaded everyone else not to pay the greedy opportunist official.

But then most tourism organisations in Africa are there to discourage, dissuade and frustrate prospective tourists and like they learnt from some remote Brazilian port – no tourists, no banditos.

I think we are going to have some really interesting conversations at dinner, I have 5 more nights of that.

The three kings are in Spain

Today is the Epiphany (Pertaining to the visit of the magi with gifts to baby Jesus) holiday in Spain and going to the reception yesterday I ask for the opening hours of El Corte Inglês the huge shopping concern in Las Palmas and they were going to be open ntil midnight.

Epiphany in Spain is very much like the English Boxing Day when we are supposed to open our presents but most people do that on Christmas Day now due to a lack of knowledge of traditions and purposes of those days.

On receptionist gave me that information and this is where Javier the Duty Manager is a class act, he said it was better for me to visit Las Palmas on Thursday. Epiphany Eve is usually full of shoppers that roads have to be closed off; the shops would be heaving and it would probably be a harrowing experience.

I took his advice and well, I am off to Tenerife on Wednesday.

Hotel life: Sometimes highly fed and lowly taught people

Elvis lives

Hotel life also brings another dimension to the observation of people. Many of these people one would not meet in the course of everyday life.

The hotel provides all sorts of entertainment, imitation acts of the Drifters, the Platters, Abba and Boney M, then serious stuff like Flamenco dancers who really have to perform or the Chinese acrobats who do daring-do things almost beyond belief.

The obligatory Elvis Presley in his dying years, it makes you wonder if you can really take anyone in an Elvis costume and hair-do seriously, all that hip gyration, the mock hiccup and the leg in an epileptic fit, at least he did not end up singing Heartbreak Hotel.

Ghetto skins and rotten kids

The dress code at dinner seems a bit dumbed-down, men are supposed to be in smart casual with long-sleeved shirts but many appear in jeans and T-shirts.

Tattoos all over the body the face escaping pin-torture but no different from an inner-city graffiti wall, if it were any more appealing one would have one’s head in a sick bag for hours.

When we were kids we behaved, but the kids of today run around the place, holler at the top of their voice the unruly brood of a highly fed and lowly taught parenthood you cannot blame the kids entirely but the resulting adult of such an upbringing would be a nasty plague on society.

I scream for brandy

One other place the observation of hotel life is amusing is at the show desert table where the chef serves ice cream some hot fruit and dashes of brandy or some other strong drink.

The fruit is usually not in the debate, it is more the ice cream or the brandy where the guest battles between serving the sweet tooth or getting smashed with drink – in one instance Penny just did the fruit and the loads of brandy, she had us believe that the sauce was more syrup that alcohol – we believed her – Not!

So, the guests gesticulate for ice-cream, accept a piece ot two of fruit and then play dumb for the whiskey or brandy and finally with contritely pretension almost suggest it is too much with the waving of the hands and a big chuckle – free brandy, let’s get legless – I read from their eyes.

Living up to great aspirations

Quite fascinating stuff but we still have the lobsters and pandas to contend with; sunburnt to medium-rare and sunglasses blotting out the even tanning to the eyes – a spectacle of utter disdain – sometimes one does wonder if the hotel is losing its sophistication or many more just have the money to pay into their aspirations of the circle of decent people.

Meanwhile, the few who have been staying here for years find ways to make management know that things are not like they used to be; spare a thought for William and Ingrid from my last blog who when they first came to this island some 40 or so years ago, the site of this hotel was a rubbish dump – things are really not like they once were.

That is how hotel life changes.

The verge of pleasurable disgust

No care for the body

Overheard as I wended my way to the beach through the Maspalomas dunes, he said, “Is that a man or a woman?”, “Maybe a man,” came the response and then the conclusion, “He looks like a very fat woman.”

This is not to be disparaging, but in general men and women are not taking any care of themselves anymore, it is not a case of if you’ve got it, flaunt it; but one of whatever you have just let it droop.

It is more than an eyesore, the possible David of Michelangelo that walked the dunes is now cloaked in layers and layers of lipidinous (An adjective of lipid, if I could be excused this licence) excess, bloated and drooping almost to the ground.

Sharing the unwanted

The dunes are some sort of nudist reserve where ones reserve is taunted to the unacceptable that one is on the verge of being sick.

Halfway down, there was one man who appeared to take some care of himself and was in full view spanking the macaque; monkey would be have been overly generous, as one resisted the tendency to be indecent he beckoned as it were for one to offer a service to his lady.

Just as a wave of charitable concern was about to engulf me to allow for becoming a eunuch so that I could be castrated to help this man, I realised that even if I were Tarzan I would never be a swinger if I could help it – the revulsion of the thought allowed me to close my eyes 5 metres to the scene and close my ears to the giggling as I paced 5 metres after.

Give me oxygen

The thought crossed my mind of protuberances cosmetically enhanced by donations from Africa but what would the pleasured do with an amalgam of ebony and ivory all for the sake of the climax they once knew.

Suffer me no more the decadence of men but what people get up to on holiday leaves one completely astonished.

Back hand to the brow of a head tilted backwards, I sigh and beckon for a dose of pure oxygen.