Home  >> Stories  >> The Tale Spinner #2011-47

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IN THIS ISSUE

• Lyle Meeres explores more of southern Spain
• Carol Dilworth comments on Dalton Deedrick´s closing comment
• Mike Yeager marches briefly with the OWS
• The editor describes the latest adventures in her apartment building
• The editorial explores some of the reasons for the Occupations
• Sites are suggested by Catherine Nesbitt, Don Henderson, Tom Williamson, and Tony Lewis

Lyle Meeres continues his story of the rights and wrongs of

SOUTHERN SPAIN

SOUTHERN SPAIN

Click on any image to enlarge.

At Cordoba, we tried a parking space and then realized it was for the handicapped. As soon as we pulled out, a Spanish car pulled in. It seemed odd to see cars parked on the same side of the street but headed in two different directions. At times they parked on sidewalks. Even the space created by white lines at a roundabout would be used for parking. Cars parked legally could be blocked in, which usually resulted in blasts of the car horn when the owner wanted to move.

The Mezquita at Cordoba

We ended up walking a distance to the Mezquita. Even for Islamic architecture, the Mezquita is strikingly different because it has a second set of Moorish arches built on the first set, both with candycane stripes at the top. The repeated arch-above-arch pattern is effective. Possibly the idea is related to Roman aqueducts, but builders created a huge, unusual and very beautiful mosque. The unusual columns vary in height because they came from different places. Unfortunately, Charles V was persuaded by the Church to allow a cathedral inside the Mezquita. Supposedly when it was done, Charles V said, "You have destroyed something unique to build something commonplace."

After the Mezquita, we walked the Zoco, the old Jewish quarter. In a square we saw a little girl in a special traditional dress with ruffles, reminiscent of the flamenco style. When we left the Barrio, we walked to the old Roman bridge, which looked good despite the flood waters roaring around.

Pat Davies made a reservation for us at "La Almazara," a house built as a summer palace in the 16th century for a cardinal. It was within walking distance of Toledo. On March 3 we drove to Toledo. We walked from our hotel into old Toledo. Unfortunately, on Mondays many Spanish museums are closed. However, Toledo is worth the uneven walking.

The Plaza Mayor in Madrid

March 4 was a black day in Madrid. We drove through fog to our Ibis hotel at Mostoles, just outside Madrid. We took the bus and then the Metro (subway) to Madrid and walked the old town. The Plaza Mayor was large and interesting. During our walk, Pat Meeres fell on one of the posts that were sunk into sidewalks to block cars. If you´re looking up, these two-foot-high posts trip you. We made it to the Prado Museum with its incredible art collection.

We walked to a metro point for the first of three subway train rides to our bus stop. The train cars were full and people were standing. At our second change, Gordon and the two Pats got on but two young men ahead of me blocked both doors. Finally, having no desire to be left behind, I pushed forward, as did a fellow behind me. Early in the ride I checked my right front pocket because it didn´t feel right. It was empty. My wallet had been stolen by a professional pickpocket team. We didn´t find police so we returned to our hotel to get some English-speaking help.

I phoned to cancel my Visa card. On my second try, the woman who cancelled our cards said there was a $20 pharmacy purchase in Madrid. I said "That´s not ours." She said, "Oh, here comes another one. This one is for over $1000 ... and the transaction has been blocked."

Because our B&B had insisted on cash, I´d had more than usual in my wallet. Normally I´d have moved the money to a money belt, but I´d been careless. As well as money and credit cards, I lost my driver´s licence, birth certificate, and medical insurance cards.

The next day was a strange one. In Madrid we found a police van and a Metro police station, but no one spoke English, so we had to locate a different police station where we could report the theft. The policeman in the entrance held a shotgun, but he got us to a machine dispersing numbers, like a busy bakery. 163. The sign in the waiting room said the current number was 155. We waited.

Finally Pat Davies and I got to see a policeman who spoke a little English. We got the stolen wallet on computer and I got a copy of the report for insurance. The police station was actually interesting, but I wouldn´t recommend it. The waiting room crowd got a laugh now and then as someone´s cell phone played the theme from the Pink Panther when there was a call. One woman whose purse had been snatched had a sore shoulder. We realized there was no hope of getting back my wallet.

The Palacio Real in Madrid

We walked to the Palacio Real (Royal Palace) and were fortunate to see an event that only takes place on the first Wednesday of a month: the changing of the guard. Pat and Gordon were not impressed, but with the marching band and guards on horses as well as on foot, we found the ceremony visually pleasing. As EU members, Pat and Gordon got in to the palace free, whereas we had to pay. Many rooms were distinctive but I was particularly impressed with the double staircases in marble, and the state dining room.

The Roman aqueduct at Segovia

We left Mostoles and headed for Segovia. We arrived about an hour and a half later, but there was no parking, so we drove up a hill, found a space, and walked into town. What an impressive sight! We gradually saw more and more of the Roman aqueduct. No wonder it is one of the trademark images of Spain. The aqueduct carried water nine miles at a maximum height of 92 feet, rising on two tiers of arches, and yes, the arches were reminiscent of Cordoba.

We stopped at the tourist bureau (strangely these places don´t have bathrooms) before we walked up the street to a cafe, where we had churros and chocolate. This common Spanish breakfast was new to us, though we had seen churros being made by street vendors. These churros were a bit like doughnut sticks, and we dunked them in the thick chocolate. The taste was good but rich.

The Alcazar at Segovia

As we walked further, we found that many of the old buildings had patterns carved on the outer plaster or concrete. One that is well known, the Casa de los Picos, was covered with large diamond shapes. When we arrived at the Plaza Mayor, we found a market in progress and Pat Meeres bought a tablecloth with serviettes.

After going down narrow roads, dodging mirrors on vehicles, and buying wide scarves, we arrived at the Alcazar, an intriguing castle that blended fairytale, Disneyworld, and Gaudi. The turrets were capped with dark slate, emphasizing the castle´s dominance on the hill. We toured inside, where we admired the armour and the ceilings. We were told that an infant royal prince died from a fall, and according to the story, the woman who dropped him jumped to her death, because she knew what her fate would be.

To be concluded.

CORRESPONDENCE

In concluding his story about volunteering in Africa, Dalton Deedrick wrote: "In retrospect, I have a hard time deciding whether these ventures are worthwhile or not. Certainly we brought some relief of pain to a few people, but it was not just a drop in the bucket, but a drop in the ocean of need in that vast continent. The items that come to mind as being barriers to progress include overpopulation, universal corruption, tribalism, ignorance, and disease. There are certainly more one could cite. The AIDS catastrophe is decimating the young adult population which should be the leaders in education and progress, but now we have nations predominantly of children and grandparents."

Carol Dilworth replies: You will never know what happens as a result of your visit. But there is one child who will improve the world in ways that we cannot begin to forecast. Someone treated / cured / taught / inspired that child, and it may have been you. That´s why I believe that these ventures are always worthwhile.

From Mike Yeager´s blog at http://www.aretiredboomer.blogspot.com, here is a reprint of his article on

BRIEFLY MARCHING WITH THE OWS

Katie and I were in Tucson a few weeks ago for the Tucson Meet Yourself Folk Life Festival. After I performed with the Chinese Martial Arts Club, we walked around to take in the rest of the festival. We ran across the "Occupy Wall Street" protesters who were marching through the streets of Tucson, so we joined them. I didn´t know much about the movement at the time. We thought it had something to do with the rich getting too rich and too powerful in this country and influencing our politicians too much. We agreed with that, so we entered the slow-moving stream of people.

I don´t like being part of any large movement or organization. There is always something I don´t agree with. I´m sure it´s related to my experience in the Army and more specifically in Vietnam. We wreaked havoc on that beautiful country and its people and I was part of that effort. When I got back and decided to join the protest against the war, I found out that to the protesters I symbolized what they were against. I didn´t feel welcomed by them and didn´t like many of the things they were saying.

I recently allowed my membership in the American Legion to lapse for that very reason. For example, I didn´t agree with their efforts to amend the constitution giving Congress the power to prohibit the desecration of the American flag. The Legion is very hung up on the flag. I don´t want to burn a flag, but I believe in my right to do so. If I can buy one and own one, then I can burn it. Strangely I supported the right of that wacko preacher who wanted to burn the Koran. I also have a right to burn a Bible, which I don´t especially want to do either, but I don´t think the preacher would have agreed with that. The issue is individual freedom of expression. The flag is a symbol of that freedom, not the freedom itself.

When Katie and I fell into step with the marchers, I felt slightly uncomfortable. There was a young man directly behind us yelling about the greed of the fascist capitalists, etc., and he kept stepping on my heel, causing my shoe to come off. He did that twice. Finally I turned around and gave him a dirty look. He looked back at me, but didn´t seem to care. He was too busy yelling nasty remarks for the cause. I feel these demonstrations should be peaceful and not have any destructive behavior or aggressive words, at all. But my wanting to turn around and knock that asshole down on the ground and give him a memorable experience with my shoe didn´t seem in harmony with my message. So instead we dropped out of the procession.

The Occupy Wall Street movement was started by a group out of Vancouver, BC, called Adbusters. I´m not sure how it made the transition from Canada to the US, but on July 13, 2011, they put out a call to those who read their website and publications to: Occupy Wall Street!, and the following statement:

"In Solidarity, and as a response to this call, a planning group was formed [occupywallst.org], and an info-sharing site established. The participation of every person, and every organization, that has an interest in returning the US back into the hands of its individual citizens is required.

"Our nation, our species and our world are in crisis. The US has an important role to play in the solution, but we can no longer afford to let corporate greed and corrupt politics set the policies of our nation.

"We, the people of the United States of America, considering the crisis at hand, now reassert our sovereign control of our land. Solidarity Forever!"

The first OWS protest was on September 17, 2011. Wikipedia says that within one month there were similar demonstrations in 70 major cities and 600 communities around the country. World-wide protests similar to these have happened in over 900 cities.

This movement has obviously struck a chord with people and during the first month it grew very fast. The protestors call themselves the 99% ers. This alludes to the fact that 1% of the population has a disproportionate amount of the wealth. The 99%ers believe that because of the way our politicians are elected, they become beholden to those with the most money. This highly influences how these politicians govern and the laws they pass. We can´t trust the government to change this because they are the very ones perpetuating it.

Only time will tell whether this movement will continue to grow and effect some kind of change. Much of the third world is rapidly trying to become more capitalistic while the OWS movement is saying we all need to be less capitalistic. The western world has lived this wasteful consumer lifestyle for a long time now. We are in no place to tell the billions of people in the third world they can´t have it too. It seems pretty clear that if the billions of people in the third world do become affluent in the same way that we are, the earth will not be able to sustain all the waste and pollution and the energy demands will be astronomical. It´s apparent that we are heading for a big change.

With all these huge problems facing the world, do we want big business calling the shots? Capitalists are most concerned with making a profit and less concerned about the welfare of the people and the environment. So even though I support much of what the OWS movement stands for, I don´t think I´ll be marching with them again any time soon. Well, maybe I will if they get rid of those angry, nasty, shoe-destroying assholes.

THE LATEST ADVENTURES IN FAULTY TOWERS

Last week the elevator went down on Friday, and it was not fixed until late Monday afternoon.

Wednesday it developed some very odd symptoms. When the button was pushed for ground floor, it went up to sixth, came back to third, stopped, and finally went down to ground. Later it became much more erratic: it would go up one floor, drop down a couple, go up again, the door would open, it would go up again.... All the time it was doing this, it made odd noises, grinding and clanking. I thought it was being operated by dissatisfied ghosts of former tenants; Charlotte thought the elevator had become sentient and was expressing its anger at always being at everyone´s beck and call.

All this happened after 5:00 o´clock when the manager was officially off duty, and he wasn´t answering his phone. People coming home from work tried to use the elevator, but usually it did not answer calls, and they grumbled their way up the stairs. One couple managed to get onto it somewhere on the upper floors, and after being thoroughly shaken if not stirred, they finally arrived on the ground floor with their eyes as big as saucers.

One of the tenants on the seventh floor was going to make a sign warning people not to use the elevator because there was no telling what was going to happen next.

Also on Wednesday, I noticed that things stored under the bathroom sink were getting soaked. We cleared out all the things we had stored there, and I called the manager. He said he´d get there when he could. Wouldn´t you know it - he knocked on the door just as I was about to use the loo. Talk about being caught with your pants down!

The manager looked at the plumbing under the sink and said it was rusted out. It had probably been there since the block was built in the ´50s. He said, "You need a new sink. We have a new one downstairs. Do you want it?" Of course I jumped up and down and clapped my hands, exclaiming, "Oh yes! Please!" He further compounded my shock by saying, "You need a new tub too. We also have one of those. Do you want it?" Yippee!

How often does one get satisfaction so fast from a manager? I thought he would advise packing the leak or something strictly temporary, but Charlotte thinks he was trying to hold onto a solid tenant, as opposed to the drug users and dealers who seem to infiltrate the building. I´m nothing if not solid!

I´ll keep you up to date on the next exciting chapters in the ongoing saga of Faulty Towers.

And here is my rant of the week:

FROM THE EDITOR´S DESK

Lately I have been receiving posts deriding the objectives of the Occupy movement in Canada, claiming that those involved are people who already have much and are demanding more. Most of my readers are retired quite comfortably and have no fears of losing their pensions or savings or the roofs over their heads, and have no idea of the conditions others not so well situated are facing.

For those who believe that Canada has escaped the meltdown that the US and Europe have suffered, here are some facts that do not paint quite so rosy a picture:

There are 1.5 million unemployed people in Canada.

Statistics Canada reported that in October the unemployment rate rose by 0.2% to 7.3% as employment fell by 54,000 - 72,000 full-time jobs lost, compensated partly by more part-time jobs. Ontario, British Columbia, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island all showed employment losses in October, while Newfoundland and Labrador had gains. The bulk of the decline in October occurred in manufacturing, followed by construction.

Canada relies on the US and other countries hard hit by the economic situation to buy our products, and when they can no longer do so, our exports suffer. We are not self sufficient - far from it. Instead of manufacturing goods and growing food at home, we export our raw materials and import our food. We are not insulated from the woes of the world.

I have first-hand knowledge of the job situation in Canada. A long- time friend, finding herself unemployed through a combination of circumstances, has sent out 65 resumes in the past two months for advertised jobs. She has credentials in several fields: a doctorate in psychology, a pharmacutical diploma, experience working with police in tracking down scammers, addiction counselling, managing a group home....

She has received not one answer to her applications.

When she went to the local Shoppers Drug to apply for a posted position, she was told she would be hired at once if it were within their power, but all positions were rotated among their stores. Even an application for a drug counsellor position in Fort St. John, in the far north of BC, has received no answer.

Giving up on getting a job that would use her skills, she applied for a job at a coffee shop and the local Safeway. No replies.

If a person with her qualifications cannot find a job - and she has applied across Canada - consider what obstacles the graduating university students face. As for those with only high school graduation.... It is no wonder that so many young people - and not so young - are living with their parents!

People who have jobs are holding onto them like grim death; even those of retirement age are working because they cannot afford to retire. Many jobs do not have pension schemes now. Advertised jobs in many cases are mandated by law, but are filled from within the companies. Many times terminated employees´ jobs are added to the responsibilities of other employees. Companies are closing because people are no longer buying their products or services because they can´t afford them, and their employees are added to the ranks of unemployed.

Instead of spending our tax dollars on creating jobs by repairing crumbling infrastructure and looking after our more needy citizens, governments are buying 60 new fighter planes and more naval vessels to meet some nebulous enemy; building more prisons to house the dwindling number of criminals; sponsoring a two-week Olympic party which overran its projected costs by millions of dollars; covering a sports stadium with a retractable roof, no less; and ignoring all the signs of global warming and atmospheric pollution to build a pipeline through pristine country in northern BC to carry crude oil from the Alberta tar sands to China. The Occupiers have nothing to complain of?

Before you dismiss the protesters in the Occupy movements as malcontents looking for handouts, consider what they face: No jobs, no income, high rents, ever-climbing prices of everyday commodities. Walk a mile in their shoes, and you too may find yourself in an Occupy movement.

SUGGESTED WEBSITES

Catherine Nesbitt sends the URL for a video of a dog show in Germany in which all the performers are rescue dogs and the extraordinary man who trained them:

Catherine also suggests this site in which the challenge was to create an image of a word, using only the letters in the word itself:

Don Henderson forwards this link to a BBC video showing the human world in three minutes:

Tom Williamson sends this link to a video of a man exercising his 16 dogs. Those dogs surely slept well that night!

Tony Lewis forwards the URL for a video showing the fascinating flight of a murmuration of starlings:

In Rajasthan, India, an extraordinary school teaches rural women and men - many of them illiterate - to become solar engineers, artisans, dentists and doctors in their own villages. It´s called the Barefoot College, and its founder, Bunker Roy, explains how it works:

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