Arrested, Charged With Grooming A Minor And Labelled A Paedophile !!

Now you probably will not believe that I had any real intention of going for nearly a month without publishing another ramble, but quite honestly, I genuinely had not expected to have anything to actually ramble about until the New Year, after we had returned from Germany. However, I had forgotten to allow for the ‘Shazza Min-Adventures’ which can be just as spontaneous as her other much bigger versions !! Additionally, and for me at least, they can sometimes be just as bad as the surprise ambushes from the ‘Dark Forces’, and yes, to be honest, there are times when I never really know which is the worst of the two. But yes, I know, you don’t really have to say what it is that you are already thinking, ‘Surely Eric you should know her by now’ 🙄 So, where to start 🤷‍♂️

In the first week of December there had been another two ‘Public Holidays’ one on the Wednesday and the other on the Friday, although these were not marked by any ‘Fiesta’, although one was a Religious Holiday so there was the usual Mass held in the churches. During this week the Spanish Office and School workers also take the Thursday off in between the two official holiday days, so that they can enjoy a five day break from work, unless of course they are unlucky enough to have chosen employment in the Retail, Tourism, Hospitality and Catering sectors, as the normal retail stores, Cafe/Bars and Restaurants all remain open as normal. Shazza had read on one of the local forums that on the Thursday the local dignitaries, Mayor and general hangers on, would be turning on the Christmas Lights within our Municipality, at 6pm at the Castle in the former fishing village, then at 7pm in Sabinillas and finally at 8pm up in Manilva. We had of course seen the Christmas lights on previous Winter periods when we had been here on our brief visits but we had never actually bothered going to see them ‘officially’ switched on. “Perhaps it would be nice to go and watch the Mayor switch on the lights tonight” she says, “Why ?” I responded in a bit of a ‘not really bothered’ sort of tone, “Oh it might be nice now that we are part of the local community” she says, in a cheery voice, in an attempt to muster some enthusiasm within me. ‘Do you think anyone will actually recognise us and say, Oh look it’s Shazza and Eric, those two Brits who have just taken up permanent residency here“, I could sense that her cheery demeanour was rapidly turning into an irritated one. “So, which lights do you want to go and see being switched on ?” I ask in a more conciliatory tone, although that, I was quick to discover, was a mistake as I had now shown the slightest acceptance at her suggestion, the floodgates had been opened much like a dam that had shown a slight weakness before succumbing to the almighty force that would soon breach its defence 😲 “Well, I thought that we could first go and watch the lights being turned on at the Castle, then we could walk along the promenade through the Marina and into town and watch those lights being switched on, then it would be around 8:30pm so we could find somewhere to go and have dinner, how does that sound ?” She said with a big victorious smile on her face, for she knew that we would not normally go out and eat dinner mid-week, and that I would certainly be tempted at the prospect of some additional doses of Anti-Covid Vaccines, she knows me so well and knew that she would have exploited my weakness. “So does that mean that we will not be going out this morning for our usual walk, as it will be the same route and distance, so you won’t want to do it twice in one day, will you ?” I ask. She looked over her glasses at me with her school teacher gaze, “No, we will still do our normal daily walk, it won’t kill us”, I kept looking down at my iPad screen and muttered quietly “Speak for yourself”, she asked me what I had just said as she hadn’t heard me, “I said best we better get ourselves ready then” 🤭

It was a nice bright and sunny morning, the temperature was already a balmy 19 degrees, which is above the normal for this time of year and with the previous couple of days being much cooler with grey leden skies, with intermittent periods of light drizzle throughout the day and night, so this was actually a much welcomed opportunity to get out and go for our usual walk, you never know, I thought to myself, the drizzle may start again later and prevent us from going to watch the Christmas lights being turned on, now that really would be disappointing, well at least for one of us 🤭

Now normally we would just walk from the village, through the Marina and on into the town, stop and have our usual Cafe and Tostado and then return, but it was such a nice warm day, from the 19 degrees(c), and just a very gentle breeze when we first set out, to a much warmer 22 degrees(c) by the time we had walked into town. The sea was like a mill pond, so calm and flat and sparkling blue, rather than the wintery grey colour with large white-capped swells that we had looked out upon over the last couple of days. So we decided that we did not want to rush straight back and so, after having enjoyed our coffee’s and Tostado’s, we just decided to have a wander into the main part of town, to look at the streets, all dressed up in their festive garb, and just to while away some time really, but also to take the opportunity to relieve the ATM outside our bank of some Euros, ready for our Christmas trip to Munich. But before returning home we retraced our steps back to our usual Spanish Cafe, and to coin the old nautical phrase, with the ‘Sun being over the yardarm’ we sat and enjoyed a couple of nicely chilled Anti-Covid Vaccines whilst sitting and enjoying the warmth of the sun, and somewhat unexpectedly finding ourselves watching a yacht regatta, around eighteen small sailing yachts, taking place right in front of us, and of course enjoying our more usual pastime of conducting a spot of both people watching and listening, well it would have been rude not to 🤭 The young daughter, probably around 6-7 years old, of one of the two ladies who own and run the Cafe/Bar, was sat on the small sea wall on the promenade with a small toy guitar, she was strumming away and singing to herself. I went and sat next to her and asked if she knew the Christmas song, “Feliz Navidad”, which she did, so we sat and sung a couple of sentences together, after which I clapped my hands and said “Bravo” and gave her some money, well you have to encourage these young performers from an early age don’t you, although in the UK we would call them ‘Buskers’ 😂 She excitedly ran in to the Cafe shouting ‘Mama, Mama’ and holding the Euro coin outstretched in the palm of her hand. It was only afterwards when I thought to myself, my god, if I had done that in the UK I would probably have been ‘Arrested, charged with grooming a minor and labelled a peadophile’ 😲

Later that same evening, around 5:45pm, the sun was setting and it would not be long before the darkness would fall and with it, a 10 degree(c) drop in the temperature, so we got wrapped up in more appropriate clothing for our second venture out of the day. The lights at the castle had been scheduled to be switched on at 6pm, at 6:30pm we were still stood around waiting, there was a modest group of people and several were checking their watches, the Mayor was already there so the delay wasn’t due to him. Finally a coach arrived and off got a small group of children, dressed in all the same colour uniform and holding tambourines with blue and yellow coloured ribbons, they assembled, a whistle sounded and the children sang a song, in Spanish, and we couldn’t understand a word but it was a rousing sort of tune and we all applauded when they finished. Then their was a countdown, we could join in with that, “Cuatro, Tres, Dos, Una” the switch was pressed and the Christmas tree lit up, as did the brightly coloured overhead street festive themed lights, and that was it. By this time we were feeling quite chilled so we were quite pleased to get moving again and so we headed along the promenade towards the Marina. We realised of course that because of the delay with turning on the lights at the Castle, then there would be a knock on effect for the turning on of the lights in our local town, we had been told, whilst we were stood waiting, that the Mayor would be driven to the town, the children would get on the bus and be taken to the next gathering point where it would then be exactly the same format. We both agreed that we didn’t really need to go and stand around again just to see exactly the same thing, and we were both hungry, so we got as far as the Marina and decided to stop there, where we enjoyed a Pizza, and Anti-Covid Vaccine of course 😂 Oh well, Shazza had got to see the Christmas Lights turned on and, to be completely honest, it was she that suggested that we stop and eat rather than walk any further, if it is a contest between eating, or standing around aimlessly waiting for something to happen, then eating will always take precedence, especially with Sharon and, at the end of the day, it was a win-win situation, Shazza got to do her bit and show her support within the local community, I got to enjoy another dose of Anti-Covid Vaccine 👍

Now you may think that that would be the end of it, the last of the ‘Shazza Mini-Adventures’, as perhaps I too had hoped, thinking that now I may be able to just enjoy a relaxed period, doing a lot of nothing, until the time arrived to get ourselves to Malaga and onto our flight to Munich. Well both you and I would be again proved wrong, for Shazza already had something else up her sleeve 🤔 It appeared that on the same social media forum that she had read about the Christmas Lights turning on ceremony, she had also read about a Food & Produce festival taken place the following weekend in the small hillside town of Manilva, just a 10-15 minute drive away, although she had omitted to tell me about it during our discussion on attending the Christmas Lights event.

However, I was quite happy to go and take a look at this Manilva event as it is a nice small town, just the size of a village really, but our Town Hall is located there so everybody refers to it as a ‘town’ 🤷‍♂️ It is in a wine growing and agricultural region, even having it’s own wine named after it ‘Nilva’, so I was looking forward to perhaps enjoying a bit of wine tasting, with perhaps some different meat and cheese products, well it would be very rude not to. The event started at 11:30am on the Saturday so we still enjoyed a leisurely morning before getting ourselves ready. Once again the weather was kind for us, although to be honest, after the couple of grey and drizzly days that we had had, thereafter everyday was back to being sunny and warm again, with the afternoon temperatures even getting as high as 25 degrees(c). It is just one of the many things that we like about this part of Spain, although now, with it being Winter, we do get more grey overcast days and the daily temperatures can vary from anything between 16-25 degrees(c), sometimes with heavier downpours of the wet stuff, although that has not happened so far this year, but even when we do, it isn’t often that we get more than two, or perhaps three, days without sunshine. I talk about it getting chilly, but that in reality for us means having to put a jumper, or fleece top, on over our shirts and at the time of drafting this ramble it is 11th December, and we have only had to put our two-bar halogen heater on in the living room on three evenings, between 6pm and 9pm, just to take the evening chill off when the sun has set.

Anyway, I digress, we drove to Manilva and parked up on the rough ground which acts as the main car parking area, but as usual we were early and rarely do events here in Spain actually start at the advertised time. It wasn’t going to be a big event, no food stalls lining the narrow streets or any of that, no this event would be held under the white canvas of a very large Marquee type structure and it was erected on the large central Plaza at the bottom end of the town.

We decided to visit our favourite Cafe here, and to of course partake of our now customary morning Cafe and Tostado. Normally we would sit outside at a table at the front of the establishment, because they were in the sunshine, but inside the Cafe, right at the bottom end their are tables right next to a large window, with lovely views over the rooftops, the land and the mountains, we had never managed to get a seat here before, but on this particular morning we struck lucky.

Now Manilva is really lovely and it has many small shops and services to meet the daily basic requirements, although no large supermarkets, or banks, so to access those, residents have to make the short journey down to the town of Sabinillas. After finishing our breakfast we wandered back up the small main street towards the town Plaza and enjoyed the fantastic views.

As we were entered the large tent one of the Organisers approached us and told us that there was ‘Free’ food tasting taking place and we could put our names down inside if we wanted to have a place at the tables. We started off by just wandering along the variety of produce stalls, although many did not have any ‘taster’ plates to try before you buy, which was a bit disappointing, although you could purchase a plate of Salmi or Cheese for €5, I did however get a free small taster glass of one of the local wines and, although their was no pressure whatsoever to purchase, we just thought, support your local supplier and all that, but at €10 for a bottle we agreed that we would be sticking to our usual Supermarket Anti-Covid Vaccines at €3 a bottle 😂

After wandering around every single stall we were getting ready to leave when a lady asked us if we wanted to partake of the local produce sampling, thinking that this would be my only opportunity to get a free taste of various cheeses and meat products, I eagerly put our names down. There were six rows of tressel tables and every seat was occupied and not one other English voice did we hear. First we had to sit and listen to a man talk endlessly about all the produce that is grown within a 10km radius, each vegetable product on standby at a table within his arms reach, ready to be hoisted in the air and talked about for several minutes. Then a video which basically just said exactly what he had said, but accompanied by pictures. Then after the video finished, he started talking again, now this was all done in Spanish of course, and although we could pick up some key words and get the general just of what he was saying, a lot just went over our heads. As I looked around at some of the faces there were obviously a lot of us who were having the same train of thought, “Where is the bloody food !!” 😂 Eventually, he must have seen everyone beginning to wilt, just like the lettuce leaves on the table beside him under the hot spotlights, so the small, and I mean small, plates of produce came out one by one, first it was a Chinese Lettuce Leaf, chopped up and drizzled with a vinegar dressing, next was some other sort of green leaf, three small pieces, drizzled with an olive dressing, then what turned out to be the best plate of the whole thing, no not meat, or cheese, but a slice of Avocado with finely chopped tomato and white onion, next up two slices of tomato, then what looked like a small piece of Orange, but it certainly didn’t taste of orange and then finally a splodge of very bland tasting sweet potato. I said to the chap who was sat across the table from me, “No se crien Pollos, Cerdos, Vacas u Ovejas en Manilva ?” (Do they not farm Chicken, Pigs, Cows or Sheep in Manilva ?), he laughed and then told the person next to him what I had said and he laughed as well. Even Shazza, who is very much more into this ‘Plant Based’ produce than myself, was disappointed too, not particularly on the products themselves, but at how they had presented them, I have to say, I much prefer the way Shazza presents our Plant Based menu options and, if we had come to an event like this almost 5 years ago, when we first started our new dietary regime, then right now I would still be very much 90% Carnivore, as it is, and with all credit to Shazza for the time she puts in to researching tasty ways of preparing and cooking our ‘Plant Based’ menu’s, I am probably around 75% Plant Based, 20% Fish and Chicken and 5% Red Meat. Now just to put the icing on the cake, so to speak, as we left the large tent to return home, right on one corner of the outside of the tent they had Sausages, Ribs and Chicken cooking on a large Barbecue Grill, it smelt absolutely fantastic, perhaps we should have arrived a little later and put our names down for the second food tasting session 🤔

Just by way of finishing off, what really was an unanticipated ramble, which I guess you could consider as being a surprise ‘Christmas Stocking Filler’ 😂 I remember during the Covid outbreak here in Spain, in 2021, that some British Expats were saying that they had difficulty in getting the Covid vaccinations from their local Spanish Health Centre, even though they were officially registered. It did make me wonder whether we, even as ‘Official Residents’ now, would be at the end of the queue when it came to preventative treatments for one thing or another. Well I can certainly dispel any myths about that, as within only a week of being ‘officially’ registered, back in July, we both got letters from the Andalusia Health Authority, inviting us to go and be routinely tested for any early indications of ‘Bowel Cancer’ and, just this morning (11th December), we have both received separate Emails and Text messages inviting us to go and get the latest Covid Booster Vaccination. So for us, down here in the region of Andalusia, and our Province of Malaga, it does not appear that we are being treated any differently to the local Spanish residents 👍

Until my next ramble (whenever that may be 😂)………………..

Hasta Luego mi Amigos, “La Vida Es Buena”