Tercero Mundo en Espana!

Victor Meldrew time..!.

Coincident with the kids going back to school, yesterday we encountered our first serious tormenta (thunderstorm) of the season in the Granada area where we live.

After a beautiful hot sunny morning the skies started to cloud over and by 2pm we had lots of what the weathermen describe as towering cumulus clouds, the sort that airplane drivers go out of their way too avoid. At 2.15 pm Sox one of our 'tres perros' started shaking and hyperventilating as she sought to hide behind the settee or more preferably inside the settee; always a good indication that we are in for some rough weather! She started off the other two hounds and within minutes the house was in total disarray as they each sought comfort and a hiding place...all this before the first roll of thunder! When the storm did kick in some 15 minutes later it was chaos as usual under these circumstances.

For the next four hours we were treated to Natures 'Son et Lumiere' at its best; continuous lightning, thunder like a continuous bass drum roll and pouring rainall accompanied by hyperventilating baying howling hounds.

One of the drawbacks about living in the campo is the unreliability of the water and electricity supplies under anything but ideal weather conditions; at three pm the lights flashed a few times totally screwing up my work on the computer (despite our recently acquired UPS) then the power went off and remained off or highly intermittent until around 7pm. Too dark to read a book other than by candlelight and to wet to go up onto the roof and watch the show, so its an involuntary siesta time. Just as well really because the water went off at 5pm. Our mains water is not potable ie non drinkable but we do need it flushing the loo and other bathroom activities. When we want drinking water its either a case of buy it in advance in 5 litre bottles or take a walk to the village well and fill up bottles from there. So we keep a standby supply of water in bottles in the bathroom specifically for bathroom ops.

The power came back on at around 7pm and stayed on but the water remained off until 9am this morning.

There are times when I think that we are in a Tercero Mundo here; the locals dont complain because they have never known things differently. It's a fact that when it starts to rain they get out the candles; they just know the power is going to fail!

The dogs finally settled down at about 8pm but hey guess what? Today is another day and Sox just started hyperventilating again; the lights have flashed a couple of times so I guess we are in for a repeat performance! Ive just checked and my ADSL line has failed so I guess we have no phone either.

Edit:  ADSL restored after 1 hour...

I blame all of this on an English guy who comes out a couple of times a year to check up on and work on his house in the village. Every time he comes here we get sh*t weather! Im sure he brings it with him to give England a chance to dry out!

I'd crawl back under my stone if I could but the ground beneath ii is waterlogged!

Oh the joys of campo living

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Ah the joys of the "real" Spain, eh? But don't kid yourself that it's just part and parcel of choosing to live in the campo. We're slap bang in the middle of one of the oldest tourist resorts in Spain, at the heart of the concrete jungle. The signs are ominous - looks like we're in for our first "tormenta" for months - indeed, the first rain at all, but it feels like it's going to be a big one. And torment is the right word. I'll be keeping a close eye on the water level in the underground garage, in case the car has to evacuate. Many years ago I was a backpacker trudging my way down Sudder Street in Calcutta knee deep in monsoonal flood water (and God knows what else) thinking to myself - so this is what the 3rd World is like? Now I read that (apart from changing it's name to Kolkata for reasons unkown) among other advances made, they've built a state of the art metro system - under the swamp that the city is built on. And yet......back in the real world of 21st century Europe, every time we have a bit of a downpour, our freaking garage floods.

Well, if you are not happy about living in "Tercero Mundo" go to "primer mundo" where you came from

Touchy? Where did either of us say we were not happy? Seems like you're the grumpy one, One.

One...

Echoing Roberto; Have I at any time, anywhere on this thread or anywhere on this forum ever knocked the Spanish?

Unlike some whose every entry is either to bitch about this or moan about that, I am always the optimist. We've had more than our share of knockbacks, but strangely enough they have all been brought about by other Brits or by our own lack of foresight or planning..

One has only to follow the national and local news to see that Spain is ill equipped to handle heavy storms; roads and farms (and underground garages!) get flooded, yet strangely enough whilst most of the Mediterranean coastline and up to 50 miles inland were being hamered by the sudden storms, some areas like Estepa were still subject to forest fires...

Insofar as flooding is concerned though, generally Spain performs much better than the UK; let's not forget just a couple of years ago when most of Oxfordshire and Worcestershire was underwater for weeks on end...And big city responses to flooding in Hull and Sheffield was farcical.

Regulars to this forum know that I am cynical in the extreme and I certainly wouldn't describe the UK under the present regime as primero mundo! It might have been at one time but when Thatcher came onto the scene all that went straight of the window and successive governments have just served to extend her dictatorial method of government.

We are perfectly happy with our lot here thank you, and despite the p*ss poor exchange rate we can still just about afford to llive here, which as a retiree is more than can be said for going back to and attempting to live in the UK. Someone once asked would I ever go back; my answer is the same as it was always was...only kicking and screaming.

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Hi

Well I was ofended when you called Spain tercer mundo but, anyway If I got it wrong I am sorry.

And everybody that loves this country is welcome, the same way that England welcome me

x

And my apologies also, in case I offended in any way.

If, as I suspect, One is Spanish, I can well understand how the theme of this thread may have been seen as offensive. However, it should be pointed out, perhaps, that negativity, cynisism and pessimism are common traits of the British psyche - that's why the Australians call us whingeing Poms! As can be seen from Foxbat's last post, we're equally happy slagging off our own country as any other, so if at times we seem critical of Spain, it's simply because that is where we are - it's not personal!

Anyway, good news sort of.......the local water authority have told us they are carrying out major works in the square down the hill from us, to alleviate the flooding problem in our street. They told us the same thing two years ago, mind. But they now have funds from the govt's economic stimulus program, so maybe we'll see some improvement. Cracking timing - they start work Oct 1st (right after the Feria finishes!) and expect to take 3 months. When do we always get the heaviest rain? November, of course!