Sabino the Cow Man

Sabino was standing at the bottom of the ladder in his madreñas or clogs that add another couple of inches to his already large stature. He was leaning on his stick watching me struggle with the foam gun I was using to replace tiles that had been lifted in the gale. My hands were covered in a sticky paste that was gluing my fingers together.

Sabino speaks Asturianu or Bablé, the local language, and although he speaks in Castellano to me I find it difficult to follow sometimes because of the accent. Vacas (cows) become bAH-kes and words that end in 'o' in Spanish end in 'u' (oo). All those oos make the cooing language sympathetic with the sound of surprise in every sentence.

A village stalwart, Sabino doesn't drive and rarely leaves the mountain valleys. The first time I met him he asked where I was from. 'Ah, las Inglaterras,' he said and paused. 'They don't have cows there, do they?' He paused again. 'At least not like the cows here.'

Asturian cows are big, beautiful jersey-type cows with wide noses that snort a stream of hot air on your outstretched hand and look at you with seductive brown eyes rimmed with black and cream. When they get frisky they jump over the fences and dry stone walls and mill around on the roadside until Conchi or Sabino comes along to round them up with a few touches of the switch and some shouting.

He complains that people don't want to work with cows any more. The village is suffering a decline in population that leaves me puzzled when I stop to think about it. The village houses with their well-worked stone doorways and their solid walls of mampostería or unworked stone, tell you that once this land supported many families not just at the subsistence level of a small-holding, or minifundio, but with a surplus that allowed decorative extras. Now it seems the same land does not give enough even to live poorly.

Tino, who was a lorry driver but now owns a furniture shop near Cornellana and dedicates his spare time to small-scale market gardening, knows the reason. 'La gente es zoqueta,' he says. 'People are stupid. They don't want to work and when they work they want it all to be easy. They think they can just make a living with cows, but it never used to be like that. You need to diversify. The land is good. You can grow anything here and all they want is a cash crop and go live in the city.'

Sabino has other ideas. I'm up the ladder and my hands are turning into paddles with this sticky foam so I have to come down and give him my full attention. The real problem these days, he tells me, is that all these city types are a bunch of maricones who don't know the front of a cow from its rear end.

Bride of Smelly- for My Mum

Smelly is Carmen's cat. His real name is Tin but I've been calling him Smelly since he came to the flat in Avilés and left us a gift right in the middle of the bed. And Carmen's cat is smelly. After a week in the flat there was a catty odour that pervaded everything.

He comes to visit from the village periodically because he is not neutered and goes out at night to fight with the other toms. Since he is not a good fighter he comes back with scratches all over his head and ears, miaows pathetically and requires medical attention. Being a patient animal, he allows us to wipe him down with betadine and wash the seeds and cowshit out of his fur in the shower without complaining.

I've grown quite fond of Smelly. This is a big surprise to me because I have never wanted pets and was initially a little dismayed by Carmen's evident desire to mount a small menagerie with Nicolás.

The latest addition is the rabbit whose name is Nube or Cloud. He is white with black rims around his eyes and is completely devoted to Carmen whom he follows around the patio, tripping her up as he runs in front of her feet. Carmen calls him Nubecita, which is a very girly name for a rabbit with eyes that look like they have been painted with mascara. I prefer his other name- El Bandido or The Bandit- which gives his eye patches another connotation. As he watches me with his nose bobbing up and down I get the feeling he is planning something evil.

The affection that Carmen has for the animals and the affection and devotion they return to her is charming. Even when she is pushing El Bandido out of the flowerpots with a broom she shows nothing more than a slight passing irritation and within a few moments will be crouched down caressing his ears. Initially nervous, he has learnt to be more trusting and affectionate from her.

I suppose that goes for me as well. When I was a student I ribbed my mum that she wrote a letter to me all about the cat and, being young and cynical, couldn't imagine being a pet-lover. Being cynical can seem smart but it is rarely wise: my mum stopped writing about the cat and, to be honest, I missed it. When I told Carmen about the cat letter, she said, 'Claro. ¿Y qué imaginabas? Of course, and what did you think would happen?'

The other day another cat appeared on the terrace. It was Smelly's girlfriend. I had seen her before. She came down over the roof and miaowed at Smelly then he got up from his bed and followed her off over the houses. That makes it sound as if he is a romantic but, when I gave her milk and some food this time, he showed every sign of being annoyed at me.

'That's my bowl,' he seemed to be thinking. 'And what's more, you don't give me milk in it.'

I don't give Smelly milk because Carmen insists that I have to warm the milk in a saucepan first. 'You can't just give him milk straight out of the fridge,' she says. 'He won't drink it. We've always warmed his milk.' This seems to be carrying devotion to your animals too far but, as I find Carmen's attention to these little things so enchanting, I don't discount the possibility that I might find myself warming the little prince's milk one of these days.

As you have probably noticed, finding the right name for an animal is important to me. Bride of Smelly tickles me because it sounds like the title of a horror film and the cat is hardly cute. She has a weak eye so she looks as though she is about to wink at you. Winky and Squint don't quite do it for me so I am still looking for the right name.

Of course Carmen finds it highly amusing that I am putting out milk for Bride of Smelly. 'I bet you never imagined you would be digging a vegetable garden and caring for cats,' she laughs. It's true. If I could be a little less smart and a lot more gentle I think I would enjoy life a lot more. It's a piece of good luck to have found someone I admire so much to learn these things from.

Driving in Spain- or the Koala in the Monkey Cage part II

It's a little too much to say that the Spanish are bad drivers, because they spend their driving lives performing dangerous operations that require considerable skill and coordination. Hurtling along the road too fast and too close, they like to move without indicating and overtake with warning on tight bends.

There is a surprising level of tolerance generally for this egotistical behaviour. Carmen even referred to it as 'good driving' once which was so counter-intuitive that I had no reply. If you have never driven in Spain you might find these pointers useful.

First, the speed limit is a suggestion unless there is a camera about and, since these are almost exclusively on motorways, you can drive as fast as you like through mountain villages. The normal speed for built-up areas is 50km per hour, but if you are on the main road passing through a village you can add another twenty to this.

You may feel a little nervous at roaring past the front doors of houses. They almost invariably give directly onto the road, because pavements are rare in the country and front gardens rarer. You can be confident that the residents are aware of the dangers, however, and will take precautions against getting squashed.

It can be more dangerous if, in English fashion, you stick religiously to the speed limit. Any drivers behind you will start to do dangerous things out of impatience at this unexpected behaviour: driving too close in an attempt to push you to go faster, for example, or overtaking in the middle of the village.

Considering the dangers of country roads people are remarkably blasé about going for a walk along the highway. As I said, there are few pavements in villages and the corollary of this is an almost total lack of footpaths for walking in the country. It is not at all unusual to come around a tight bend and see some old fellow taking his wheelbarrow for a walk or a couple of old ladies in wellies and aprons chatting as they stroll along. The normal response is to veer into the other lane without touching the brakes: you wouldn't want the car on your bumper to crash into you.

As you approach a town there are a couple of things that are immediately apparent. First, there is no culture of 'letting someone out'. If you are half out of a parking space you can expect the traffic to swerve around you rather than wait for you to finish the manoeuvre. Likewise, if you think you are being polite by letting someone out, think again. The cars behind will think you are waiting for the space and will swerve around you as well.

You are probably getting the picture that what you consider to be polite and 'good' driving is actually unexpected and dangerous in Spain. No example of the difference in culture is clearer than the use of roundabouts. On a roundabout it is perfectly acceptable for someone to roar around on the outide lane and beat you to the exit. In the UK this would be called 'cutting up' and would be a justifiable cause for road rage.

Lane discipline does not exist: a car in the right hand lane could be taking the first, second, or third exit. This means that if you are in the left hand lane you will probably have to cut across the traffic. For this reason, Carmen always sits in the right hand lane no matter where she is going, even if there is a huge queue of traffic- most people agree with her.

On the open road you need to get used to people driving close to your bumper. No one is aware of the three second rule here. Ricardo, who learnt to drive in Finland, asked a friend of his why he was driving so close. What would happen if the car in front suddenly braked? 'But he would have to be crazy to do that!' was the incredulous reply.

People are working on the assumption that you can drive fast and close if everyone shares the same expectations. Don't get all nervous and English: it makes it dangerous. You can have a car on your bumper for many miles on a road that is deserted and far too windy to overtake. There is no benefit in driving so close, people just like it that way.

Conversely, if you leave a space between you and the car ahead of you, you can expect a succession of cars behind you to see that as an open invitation to overtake. There may be little to gain in a queue of traffic miles long but there is a general rule of the road that if you see an opportunity you should take it, even if it makes no sense and is dangerous.

Modern technology has made a great impact on the fatality rates in Spain: new brakes are better than the old ones and the steering in a new car is much more responsive. There has also been a concerted campaign to reduce drink driving, although it continues to be surprising that there are bars in service stations. You can expect to have a number of shocks and surprises driving here, but you should return in one piece. Just don't be too English about it and you will be just fine.

Monte do Gozo- or Shouting in Public

Monte do Gozo is the last stopping point on the Camino before you head into Santiago da Compostela and it is the first place you get to see the spires of the Cathedral. There is a chapel dedicated to St Mark and a hideous concrete, glass, steel and bronze monument that commemorates the symbolic pilgrimage of Pope John Paul II.

I always feel excited and happy at Monte do Gozo. We have successfully brought a group of pilgrims 160 km across rural Galicia to this point. The pilgrimage is nearly over and the sooner we get into the city the more time I will have to explore a city whose granite heart hides an endless variety of charms and hidden corners. It bubbles with life and happiness, particularly of the pilgrims for whom this part of their camino is over.

This time I found myself in a grumpy mood as I shepherded the group down the last stretch on account of a group of cyclists who had camped themselves on the path between the monumnent and the chapel. They had pulled out a leg of Spanish ham and were busy shouting at one another over the loud American music that was pumping out of their support van. There is a Spanish word for this- jaleo- and like many words it is hard to translate because armando jaleo or making an offensive racket is not offensive here.

People frequently shout at each other in the street, for example, not in anger or aggression but simply because it seems better to call out, 'Hombre!' at the top of your voice than to walk a couple of metres further and talk. No one minds this, just as no one minds children running riot in restaurants, or the ever present television that fills a bar with noise even when there are no shouting locals to do it.

'Somos así,' said Ria my fellow guide. 'That's the way we are. You don't know what it's like to complete a pilgrimage like they have. They are just excited and happy. That's all.'

When I mentioned it on the phone to Carmen, she said something similar: 'Es nuestra naturaleza. Somos más expresivos que vosotros. It's in our nature. We're more expressive than you are. Here if you feel angry you give three shouts and get it out. Not like you. You walk around with a black face and don't say anything. You English are far too polite. You just hold it all in.'

Carmen has a way of turning things around so that I feel wrong-footed and defensive.

'So, I should have gone over and shouted at them?' I asked ironically, but really I knew she was right. In England I also object to people who shout at each other in the street when they could easily be understood talking and groups of young men and women making an offensive racket in public always make my hackles rise. The difference is that here no one agrees with me.

It seems so obviously a bad thing to be loud-mouthed and coarse that it makes me feel even more grumpy when I notice that no one else cares about it. Then I start to feel like the koala in the monkey cage. I get a similar feeling driving in Spain, but that will be another blog.

The herb garden

Valentín has a dry sense of humour. And like many of the villagers he looks at me struggling in the garden with Carmen with a mixture of puzzlement and condescension.

'There's hardly enough work here for two people,' he says laconically, leaning out of his car and watching us fighting with the raspberries that have run wild in the vegetable patch. This is country machismo. For him a spade is just a toy shovel: the Spanish male likes to heft a weighty tool and the pica they use is an impracticably heavy chunk of metal on a crude post. It is curved and pointed: great for digging holes; lousy for anything delicate.

Gracina is out in her vegetable patch as well and Severo, walking by to tend his horses, looks at me then across at her. 'I've always looked after the animals,' he says. This is the village wisdom. The huerto is the kitchen garden and, as an extension of the house, it is female territory. The men look after the big animals like horses and cows. The women deal with the lambs and the chickens.

Everyone knows that if you want to find out when to plant or pick you should go look at what the older women are doing, because they are the guardians of all the traditional knowledge.

Valentín is a burly man with sandy hair and a blue eyes. His face turns pink in the sun. He could be English. 'What's that?' he asks Carmen.
'It's supposed to be a laurel,' she replies, 'but Severo keeps cutting it back with the scythe. It's never going to grow.'
'What do you want that for?'
'Well, you can use the leaves for cooking...'
'It's a weed. Anyway, there's loads of it up the mountain.'

The very idea of ornamental gardening confuses the villagers, so when we dug over part of the field to start a flower garden it fell well outside of the expectations of our neighbours. Flower gardening is limited to the omnipresent hydrangeas, the occasional rosebush and a few potted geraniums.

We could justify nasturtiums or capuchinas because you can eat both leaves and flowers. Even so Severo's face was a picture of bewilderment when he saw me put one in my mouth. It is eccentric to plant things just because they look good. God knows what people will think of the flower garden if it starts to come together. And if I work in the flower garden I will be some kind of pansy.