I don’t know about the rest of Spain but the Malaguenos LOVE their dogs. Unlike Zihua, you never see an abandoned or neglected dog. Unemployment may be over twenty percent here but the dogs rule--if you’re a vet, dog groomer , or dog boarder, you have guaranteed life time job security. And, in an ingenious twist, many of the groomers and boarders have their own tricked out doggy grooming or “pick up and drop off” vans and come to you and Rover.

Dogs are everywhere--all shapes, all sizes, and all breeds. You see them on the beaches, in the parks, downtown, uptown and in the outdoor cafes and restaurants .(Rumor has it that there is a doggy Midnight Mass in the Cathedral every Friday night; a large, rather intimidating German Shepard leads the mass and dispenses the sacramental doggie biscuits and dark beer, while six Jack Russell terriers collect the tithes. Far fetched, you say? Spell “dog” backwards.)

Dog watching on the beach is a trip and I grew to have my favorites. A big shaggy English sheepdog played “fetch the ball” every day with his human; he’d lumber off after the deflated soccer ball, lumber back and bark for more-he never seemed to tire. A chocolate Lab preferred “swim for the stick” and leaped into the water over and over again, paddling for his prize. Two small Boston terriers, unleashed, would race away from their owner as fast as they could go, stop when the guy whistled , turn, and run back, bowling each other over in a crazy doggie tag as they went. There was a beautiful Beagle whose life’s work seemed to consist of sniffing every square inch of the long beach. But the prize has to go to the two white toy poodles who sported hot pink highlights on their coats--you could tell by the way they strutted by that they thought they were the coolest dogs in town--watching them, I understood fully the term”high maintenance” (although I imagine the husband of the bejeweled matron walking these dogs has an even better appreciation of the term, poor guy.)

But my very favorite dog story involves Ada, who belongs to Juan’s wife. The first week I arrived in Malaga, I was sitting in my shoebox apartment, door open, working at the computer. Catching a movement out of the corner of my eye, I saw a handleless dust mop shuffle into my room and over to the mini refrigerator. It took a moment to register that this was not a cleaning tool but a dog--a dog who looked exactly like a dirty white dust mop but a dog, non the less. And this dog was either in love with my mini frig or very badly wanted a snack. Either way, she wasn’t leaving until she got what she wanted--although if the object of her affection was the frig itself, she was doomed to disappointment. Having been told by many friends that you do NOT feed someone else’s pet except by permission, I told her sorry and turned back to my computer. One hour later, Juan came looking for Ada, who had not budged from the mini frig. As he passed my room, I stopped him and said that Ada was with me--more accurately, with one of my appliances. Juan shook his head and told Ada to come. She sat. More forcibly, Juan said, “Come Ada, now.” Ada turned to stone. Juan sighed, stepped into my room and reached down to pick up Ada--and from that little ball of fur came the deepest growl I have ever heard from a dog--a doggie “Back off, Jack, until I get my snack.” Suffice it to say, Juan had me open the frig and feed Ada a couple of sausage bits, after which she strolled out the door and back to the house, Juan following humbly behind her. Juan, master of his domain, scourge of the purveyors and bureaucrats, bested by a little dog--see what I mean about spelling it backwards?

My landlord’s name is Juan--he and his family live atop the apartments in a very lovely, well appointed home. Juan is, without a doubt, one of the more interesting characters I’ve met in Malaga. He’s smart, bilingual (although he absolutely expects you to speak Spanish--and don’t forget to lisp!), very right wing in his politics (you can just sense him longing for those good old days of Franco, when rules were rules and strictly enforced), does not hesitate to tell you when he thinks you are an idiot and is the savviest landlord I have ever met--and by savvy, I’m saying that the guy gives a whole new meaning to “squeezing blood out of a turnip.”

You arrive that first day, jet lagged, grumpy, and in desperate need of a shower. You’ve just schlepped your bags from the airport to a bus that takes you downtown, where you get off, trudge to another stop, catch another bus which, according to Juan’s directions, has a stop right near the apartments. However, the tiny detail left out of his instructions is that if you don’t press the buzzer (and where the hell IS the bloody buzzer), the bus zooms right by said apartment stop and you are yelling “Stop, Stop” to an obviously deaf driver. A kindly rider points out the buzzer, hits it for you, and you get off with your heavy suitcase, your duffle and computer bags, and your purse at the next stop--half a mile from where you wanted to get off. No one has lived until they have hauled all that crap downhill--let me just say that those suitcases on wheels, such a clever idea in airport terminals, are not as much fun when they gain momentum and fly ahead of you down the hill.

I reached the iron gated door the the very small complex, pressed the buzzer, and waited--no one came. It was one of those moments we’ve all had, having reached the end of our tether, when we don’t know whether to cry or laugh maniacally like Jack Nicholson in “The Shining”, which ultimately leads him to try to kill everyone within reach. I pressed the buzzer one more time and--oh happiness--a slight, gray haired gentleman appeared. I identified myself--he asked to see my papers (I felt like I was going to have to produce letters of transit next). That bit of business done with, he let me in and helped me lug my crap (because that’s what it all was to me by that time) up the three flights to my shoebox room. Then he handed me the list of how to operate the room: this key opened the door; this latch locked the door from the inside--do not use your key. Another key turned on the power--that key needed to be removed when you left the room or the first key would not lock the room. This key turned on the hot water--make sure you wait five minutes for the water to heat up; it you turn the water on too soon, it will not heat up and you have to remove the key and repeat the process. Another key powered the TV set, although you did need to employ the two remotes--in a specific order. And the kicker--here is your towel--your one towel--for the week, after which you can request a new towel. (It became a real source of amusement to everyone living there that, on linen day, Juan was never around.) And let me say this about the thin, faded, pink towels--if you held them up to your face, you could see through them all the way to France.

But as the days went by, I gained more and more respect for Juan and the way he ran his business--he watched every penny and gave nothing away. Business was business--he was in it to make money and it was nothing personal. One day when my visiting friend Lois and I were staying at a hotel in Rondo for a day, the power went out and we looked at each other and said simultaneously, “Juan!” and burst out laughing. Our mantra became, whenever we debated spending money on one thing or another, “WWJD”--what would Juan do. We saved ourselves a lot of money that way.

Back here in Florida, WWJD is still my mantra--don’t think my tenants are going to be too thrilled when their leases come up for renewal. It’s nothing personal--just business--WWJD. I’m never too old to learn.

I’ve learned over the years that a woman traveling alone  attracts a great deal of attention--she gets a lot of advice about where to go, what to see, how to stay safe-- some advice is solicited, some not, but it is always appreciated. Sometimes,though, she’s just plain solicited--I have been hit on by cab drivers, waiters, and construction workers, to name a few, not because of my fatal charm but because, being single, from the US, and of a certain age, I must be desperate and thus, easy pickings (who knew the men here have read “Eat, Pray, Love” and “Under the Tuscan Sun”? Thanks a heap, ladies.) The pick up lines are concise and cut right to the chase--”You are very lovely. I can tell you are lonely. I would like to take you out for dancing and wine. Then I will make you very happy--you will never forget ______(fill in the hitter’s name).” The funniest time this happened to me was early one morning when I was out walking, trying to sweat out a mild bout of flu--my hair was wildly poking out from my baseball cap, I was sweating like a pig, and my nose was Rudolph-red. And still, a construction worker stopped me, told me I was a vision, a Venus, a blonde goddess and would I meet him that night for an evening to remember. He managed to say all this with a straight face--the guy would be unbeatable in a high stakes poker game. I thanked him for his kind words but that unfortunately I was suffering from a highly contagious form of dengue fever. He moved away faster than Usain Bolt.

However--and this is a big however--when it came to getting the complimentary little terra cotta bowl of olives that everyone else got when they ordered a beer, a glass of wine, or a club soda, I might as well have been invisible. All around me were people happily munching on the local olives--me, I was sitting at a table with my glass of wine and not an olive in sight--not even a bowl of olive pits. I became obsessed with the olives; why was I not olive worthy? It didn’t matter what I ordered--I got no bloody olives and everyone else did. And it didn’t just happen here--no matter what town, village or city I was in, I might as well have had a sign around my neck that said “You can pinch her butt but don’t give her any complimentary olives.”

Now, I figure a lot of you are wondering why I didn’t just ask for the damn olives; because it was a matter of principle, that’s why, and I don’t rise above my principles! And so, when my wonderful friend Lois came to visit, one of the first things I did was subject her to my olive rant and suck her into the abyss--I’m not proud of the fact but there it is. Now two of us were tracking the olives--many times we’d stop for a drink, not because we were thirsty or tired but because we were watching who got the olives and who didn’t--and we never did.  We got plenty of attentive service--but somewhere the olive Nazi had decreed “No olives for them!”  Finally Lois caved--we were sitting at this little outdoor cafe in the town of Ronda, oliveless, and Lois said,” I’m just going to ask for the olives”--she knew I never would. She asked, we received, and very smugly ate every single one. She said she had never enjoyed olives as much as she did that day. Well, Lois, true confession time--and I was going to take this bit of news to my grave--but the waitress charged us one euro for those suckers. So, to paraphrase, does an olive you pay for taste as sweet as a freebie? No flippin’ way.

To say that Lois and I had an absolutely terrific time while she was here in Spain would be a vast understatement--we had a blast, every day unique and special. But the belly laughs we shared one day at the beach have to be shared- in the interest of full disclosure, we jettisoned political correctness that day faster than a bucket of rotten fish, so this might be a good time for all you sticklers for correctness to stop reading now.

All along the Mediterranean in Malaga, small seafood shacks dot the beaches. Over open wood fires burning in decorative small wooden boats, men (always men) with asbestos hands lean skewered freshly caught fish against the pyramid of low flames and cook every order to perfection. You can eat either at a plastic table under the canopy or you can rent a palapa (palm frond umbrella) and chaise close to the water and eat and drink there. On a beautiful, lazy, perfect beach day, Lois rented a palapa and chaise space for us. She paid for the rental, the beer and the grilled sardines--but the entertainment, provided by the German tourists, was free--a gift that just kept on giving the entire afternoon.

A couple things about the tourist types I’d see--the skin tones of the British and the Germans were, without exception, impossibly pale-- Dracula would have been envious. And with these folks there was a lot of area this pale skin needed to cover--lots and lots of square footage. Put them on the beach, the women in their tiny bikinis, the men in their tinier speedos, and there was so much glare you needed sunglasses even on a cloudy day. (I am not exaggerating when I say that in some cases it was difficult to spot the suit.)

So Lois and I settled on our loungers, breakfast beers in hand (we were a bit peckish by ten am) and took in the view--the clear blue water of the sea, the coarse gritty sand, the beached whales frolicking in the surf--beached whales?! A quick double take and we realized we were watching two very large frauleins in very tiny suits rolling around in the water-- they were taking turns posing for their own version of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition. One of the women would snap photos while the other struck suggestive poses straight out of Playboy--if Hef ever published photos like these, you would definitely be reading the magazine for the articles. Lois and I were torn between admiration for the confidence of the two women and disbelieving hilarity--hilarity won in about two seconds. We laughed and we laughed and we laughed, the giggles punctuated by “Oh my” and “holy cow” and “what are they thinking?” And the women just kept on going, snapping photo after photo of each other in increasingly seductive poses. I just hope, when they download those photos, that their version of Photoshop has a “creative visualization” app attached; having downloaded my own beach photos, if there isn’t such an app, there damn well should be.

After having been in Spain for two and one half months, I’ve come to the conclusion that all Spaniards are enrolled--at birth--in the Evelyn Wood Speed-Talking course. Throw in the lisp and a tendency to drop word endings, and a non-native speaker is left with a big bowl of “Huh?” after a conversation, although in the beginning you couldn’t exactly call what I had a “conversation”--it was more like me desperately trying to read lips and facial expressions as I stood there silently (yes, I know, minor miracle there) nodding. Naturally, giving the “nod” without really knowing what was being said led to some unfortunate misunderstandings--like nodding when a neighbor asked me if I thought she was fat by US standards and when the owner of my local coffee shop asked if I took sugar in my coffee ( I don’t) and then watched in dismay as I shuddered after my first sip.

So, realizing I was in danger of reenacting the diplomatic equivalent of Sherman’s March to the sea all by my lonesome, I knew I needed an all purpose approach that could be interpreted either as assent or disagreement--but what the hell could it be? And that’s where, one day, as I was shamelessly eavesdropping on a conversation at the next table at an outdoor cafe, I had my “DUH” moment--in a word, “vale” was my salvation. “Vale” is the all purpose Spanish word--it can mean almost anything and can be used in any situation: “vale”--okay; “vale”--you think?; “vale”--come again? “; “vale”--I see. I realized you could carry on an entire conversation saying only “vale” and thus, say nothing at all, buying you time for the clarification of the question or the comment. This was a theory worth taking out for a linguistic test drive.

I tried it out that very evening; my landlord , who speaks faster than is humanly possible, stopped by for a chat--he ‘d talk a bit, I’d say “vale”, careful not to nod; pleased I understood, he talked some more--I responded with a double “vale”. This went on for about fifteen minutes--he’d talk, I’d “vale”. (Now, a bit of background is necessary for what happened next. Juan, my landlord, is a great guy but he could squeeze blood out of a turnip, as we say. He supplies you with clean linen but you are only allotted one large bath towel a week; if you’ve seen “The Lord of the Rings”, think Gollum and “my precious”--you could offer him a million euros and he still wouldn’t give you a damn clean towel if it wasn’t your day.) So, winding down the conversation, he said a bit more, me “vale-ing” all the way--and then he walked away, obviously satisfied with our “chat”. Not five minutes later, he showed up, a fresh clean towel in hand for me--two days early! I have no idea what actually went on but if any word is eligible for sainthood, that word is “vale”. I’m writing it in large block print on an piece of paper and lighting candles around it. Amen.

I know some of you aren’t crazy about the British--and you know who you are, Earl--but I love the folks.  They are low key and understated, a perfect foil to my tendency to go a bit over the top.  Traveling, they are unflappable--nothing fazes them.  I have been in small villages where , as I struggled up the steep cobblestones streets, elderly Brits using walkers (!) passed me by at a brisk pace , puffing on pipes, no less.  If the hot sun is beating down, they will fashion “Admiral Nelson” hats out of newsprint (you know, the kind you would make as a little kid when you are playing war games) and wear them without a thought that other people might pause at making such a fashion statement;  I saw a group of ten wearing them as they strolled and all I could  think about was the movie “Cocoon”, without the age reversal.  When the going gets tough, Shakespeare is frequently quoted--one of the funniest things I saw and heard was while I was sitting at an outdoor patio.  A small British tour group passed by, obviously the worse for wear from the heat and the sightseeing but trudging onward;  one old gent suddenly halted, swung his umbrella over his head (yes that stereotype is true--you will never see a Brit without an umbrella) and shouted, “A chair, a chair--my kingdom for a chair!”  I about fell out of mine, I was laughing so hard.

But, one might ask, other than hearing their speech, what else identifies these folks as British?  Well, for the most part, the British of a certain age  do have really bad teeth;  they are also Caspar-white and never tan, they are punctual to the point of fanaticism (but then you all knew Michele was Polish, not British) and they wear socks with their sandals--always.  And their humor is so dry and droll--I shamelessly eavesdrop if the table next to me is British. At one cafe, a young Spanish kid walked by, jeans slung way low to expos a pair , not of boxer shorts, but tighty whities.  The Brit at the next table said “I suppose we can be grateful that, if the lad is determined to display his underthings, they are at least clean.”

One other thing I’ve noticed and appreciated about the British travelers--they are incredibly resourceful, with a solution for any problem, great or small.  Over a coffee at an outdoor cafe (yes, I admit it-I pretty much live at outdoor cafes), I watched as two couples ordered beverages and breakfast pastries.  When their order was delivered, there was that classic pregnant pause--the pastries were very large and flaky, the cups of coffee and tea very small--a classic “dunk” was impossible.  Not a nano second later, each person picked up a knife and fork and cut the pastry into tiny bits.  I had never, until that moment, seen a fork used for the dunking process but , as a solution, it had a simple, odd elegance.  It’s no surprise that Britain prevailed in the WWII blitz--nothing, not a pastry, not a bomb, not even the Royal family, will ever defeat them.

Eleven am:  Hey, I think I’ll walk to the restaurant at the top of the hill.

11:15:  Trudge, trudge, trudge--how far can it be?

11:25:  Trudge, trudge, trudge--this is one steep hill.

11:45:  Trudge, trudge, trudge--it’s got to be close now.

12:oo:  Trudge, trudge, trudge--WTF?  Does this hill ever end?

12:15:  Trudge , trudge, trudge--shit. Where is this freakin place?

12:30:  Trudge, trudge, trudge--GDI (pause to wipe sweat for the millionth time)

12:45:  I made it!

12:47:  ”Closed for personal reasons”--definite bakery karma following me for all the times I closed on a whim.

One pm:  What an incredible view.

01:15:  Trudge down, trudge down, trudge down--I’d kill for a bus.

01:25:  Trudge a bit more--”no taxis?”

01:55:  Trudge, trudge, trudge--Well, it’s easier going down.

02:00:  Trudge, trudge , trudge--Made it back!  Stop at first bar--”Cold beer, please--before I die.”

Travel is relaxing and romantic.

Granada is a Spanish city world famous for the Alhambra, a huge fortress/palace that dates from the 9th century. It is considered by many to be one of the ten wonders of the world and you are continually told it is a “must see”. Well, I am nothing if not a believer in the “must sees”,” must experience” and “must eats” of the world, which is how one time I wound up on a working barge (Klaus my German friend said it was a “must experience”) slowly working its way down the Amazon; I immediately contracted a case of dysentery from the tainted water and, as there was no toilet of any kind, spent most of the six day trip with my bare ass hanging out over the piranha infested waters of the Amazon--gringa chum. I ran into Klaus a few weeks later and told him what had happened; he said, in his Klaus fashion, “But you do not drink the water-it is straight from the Amazon. You bring your own. Such a funny thing you did.” Poor Klaus probably still has my fingerprints around his skinny neck.

So, I had to go to Granada. Catching a bus was easy--they leave every hour from the bus station here and the trip only takes two hours. I’d been told you could walk to the center of the city so I set out, lugging my bag. An hour later, I was hopelessly lost as the place was not a big believer in street signs, and hailed a cab; he drove about four blocks and dropped me off in front of this graffiti covered alley and assured me my hotel was just down the “street”. Amazingly it was--nondescript on the outside, it was a mini paradise inside. There was a gorgeous patio with a lovely fountain and my room was a bit of heaven--the closet was bigger than my bed here and the bathroom was bigger than my apartment. I had fluffy towels and instant hot water in the shower, two things I sorely lack in Malaga. My first inkling of trouble was when the desk clerk asked if I had a ticket to the Alhambra--I said no, I figured I’d pick one up at the gate in the morning. I have never seen such a look of concern flit across someone’s face--turns out that over 7,000 people visit the Alhambra every day and tickets and times are carefully regulated and should be purchased several days ahead. Oh, oh--but with his help (he spoke perfect English) I was able to wrangle a ticket for Friday morning. The only wrinkle was that I already had my return bus ticket for Friday afternoon but he said I should have plenty of time.

So I had plenty of time to explore Granada and spent the rest of Wednesday wandering around the Arab market and the main plazas, which are quiet and surrounded by tapas bars. One of the best things about the tapas bars in Granada is that every time you order a drink, you get a free tapa; one of the worst things about Granada is that every time you order a drink you get a free tapa and you end up feeling like the proverbial fatted calf, ready for sacrifice. The free tapas are all starch and all fried--french fries, potato chips, deep fried squid, deep fried bread topped with ham and cheese, deep fried veggies--if I drank enough, I figured I’d get to the deep fried cigarette butts. I finally had to beg servers to give me “no mas”--I could feel my arteries going, “we will make you pay for this--thu-thunk, thu-thunk.”

Back at the little hotel--only thirteen rooms and so quiet--I sat out on the patio for a bit with a tapas-free glass of wine and this elderly German man asked if he could join me. We chatted for a while and it was soon apparent that this guy’s favorite song was probably “Springtime for Hitler”--and not as a joke. He began to elaborate on how Goebbels was so much greater than Obama because Goebbels could convince his people to figuratively commit mass suicide, while Obama just said “yes we can”, with no end game in sight. Gulp. Time for bed.

Thursday I walked up to the Albayzin, the old Arab/Moorish quarter that has existed since the 12oo’s. From the peak, you can get a panoramic view of the Alhambra across the river and I thought that would be a good place to get a cup of coffee and drink in the view. A steep climb later, I found the plaza overlooking the Alhambra and the river below. Ordered my cup of coffee, sat and relaxed, thought about a second cup, decided to give it a pass--Spanish coffee is strong! Asked for “la cuenta”--the bill--two Euros! That’s around three bucks US--I almost died. I sat a bit and imagined giving the coffee back to them, in a slightly processed state, but then just paid the bill--lesson learned.

Friday morning--Alhambra day--I couldn’t wait. It took about half an hour by bus to reach the entrance, where there was a line of people about half a mile long waiting to get in. Luckily if you were part of a tour group, which I was, you got in fast. Unluckily if you were part of a tour group, you were moved through the visit like steers on a cattle drive--I kept waiting for Rowdy Yates to show up with his bullwhip (and that reference is so dated that only a few of you will even get it--I am old.) Even at an accelerated pace, it took over three hours to see just a bit of the place--that’s how huge it is. The gardens were absolutely beautiful, the fountains and reflection pools gorgeous, the intricate carvings on the walls amazing, the marbled floors incredible--I could just picture the place as it had been centuries before, the walls hung with silken tapestries and the floors covered with woven rugs. It really was a “must see” experience and I wouldn’t have missed it for anything--I took a lot of photos for posterity but because I am short, my “must see” photos ended up to be of English, German and US posteriors . A butt shot is not “must see”, unless it’s George Clooney’s , naked, standing in my bedroom.

In Latin Catholic countries, the week between Palm Sunday and Easter is La Semana Santa--Holy Week--and it is a really big deal, like Mardi Gras, only instead of an excess of partying, drinking and bare boobs, it is an excess of religious fervor. Each church has its own “team”, as it were--each group has its own massive “floats” of Christ and the Virgin Mary that they parade through the streets all week long, led by their church bands--it is a very big competition and I imagine the winners get to forgo confessions for a week or two. (I have mentioned in emails how very hot the men and women are here--well, it turns out that less than physically perfect humans do exist here--they can all be found in the bands. Some things are the same all over the world.)

Anyway, La Semana Santa is basically a national holiday and the entire country almost shuts down--even Super Surly closed from Thursday to Easter Sunday and the buses stop running. What you do is go out and watch the processions and they are really quite something. Each float weighs--and I am not making this up--from one to two tons, supported by six stainless steel beams and carried by up to 200 men. The floats depict Christ in various stages of pre resurrection agony; the Mary floats are more serene and she looks like a goddess. Men in long robes and large pointy hats (think Monty Python’s “Ministry of Pointy Hats) with masks walk alongside, chanting, singing, and swinging incense. People cry, pray, and call out as the procession passes. (If you go to youtube and type in “La Semana Santa--Spain”, you’ll get a better visual of what I’m talking about--quite an amazing display.) So that’s what I did that week--with quick tapas bar breaks.

La Semana Santa received solemn, 24 hour coverage on quite a few of the television stations and I thought nothing could top it. And then came the British Royal Wedding--I had had no interest in the thing until I turned on Spanish TV that rainy day and realized every single channel was covering it--even the Disney Channel was showing everything nuptial ,with Mickey and Minnie as Will and Kate. (Good taste must have prevailed when it came to Las Semana Santa or there would have been a Mickey Jesus and a Minnie Mary.) Five minutes watching TV and I was hooked--the news anchors (think Katie Couric and Brian Williams) were dressed to the nines in elegant dresses with plunging necklines and morning coats. The females wore the flamboyant hats and the “fascinators” and everyone was drinking champagne--and these were the “serious” news channels. But best of all, every discussion panel included a drag queen in full regalia and everyone deferred to them for the fashion critique, which was withering. The Queen looked hideous in yellow (yellow is a very bad color for royalty in Spain, I learned), Prince Andrew’s daughter Sophie’s hat looked like a hubcap, Will was handsome but goofy and nervous--and what is going on with that bald spot? You’ll be relieved to know that Kate scored a perfect ten. The best moment came when it was time for the balcony kiss--”ooohhh, it’s going to be passionate.” They pecked, there was this audible beat of disappointment and then everyone started jumping up and down and cheering, confetti fell and more champagne was uncorked. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

So, educationally and culturally, I would have to pick the Las Semana Santa celebrations. For sheer, unadulterated, trashy delight, the marriage of Will and Kate wins hands down. Which rerun would I watch? Be still my tacky heart.

Although it may sound like it, I really don’t eat every meal out (really, truly)--with the dollar so weak against the euro (it takes 1.50 to buy one euro), I do eat in a lot, which is good. But I only have a mini frig in which to store food, which is bad. That means I have to shop frequently for fresh produce, which is good. But the main market with all the good stuff is a three mile walk, which can be bad because I have to walk by all these heavenly tapas bars in order to get there and usually I am a bit peckish half way there and have to stop for a snack, which leaves me less money for the market, which means I have to go back to the market the next day, which means......so, I’m caught in this infinite loop. My only other choice is to shop at the local grocery store half way down Heartbreak Hill--more about that in a bit.

I love the main market--Mercado Central de Ataranzas--which is smack in the middle of the city. To steal from Hemingway, it is a clean, well lighted place and is bursting with beautiful fruits, vegetables, olives, nuts, fresh fish and seafood, iberico hams (which always hang from hooks in the ceilings), and two types of meat stalls--the ones where I can identify the meats and sausages and the stalls I have mentally labeled “mystery meats”. The friendly vendors arrange the produce into these impossibly complicated stacks and pyramids and they are absolutely lovely. The first time I wandered the market, I wondered how the displays stayed so neat when people have to be pulling their choices from the stacks. I didn’t have to wonder long.

There was one produce guy in particular who seemed really proud of his product and kept tweaking his arrangements so they would be shown to their best advantage. He also seemed very friendly and approachable, so I decided to buy from him. I got as far as my hand reaching forward to select an orange or two when he just shouted, “NO!” I looked around, wondering who he was yelling at and reached again to grab a couple oranges--and then he didn’t just yell, he grabbed my hand and glared at me. WTF? I’m not allowed to buy? Did a bird shit on my head? He then proceeded to give me my first lesson in mercado etiquette. Never, ever, ever, get your own stuff--never, never.(The Spanish having raised the level of torture during the Inquisition to an art form, I had no doubt that a violation of this rule would bring swift and painful consequences.) When you want something, you point, say how many or how much, and the vendor pulls from his stock behind the counter; the beauty of this system is that the best looking and enticing stuff is on view and if you get an unscrupulous bastard, you get home and your bags are full of fruits and veggies teetering on the edge of expiration. So, the second mercado lesson learned that day was to always shop where the crowds are--you figure the vendor has a pretty good reputation and that his or her stuff has a faster turnover. But this guy, once I kept my hands to myself, turned out to be a real sweetheart, friendly and helpful, and steering me to the stalls that had the best products and prices. (Speaking of prices, gas here is over nine dollars a gallon.)

But one day I was unfaithful to the main mercado and paid the price. The tiny mini frig was empty; (if I drank chilled red wine, it would always be empty--of food). I had walked the beach for a couple hours and was tired and didn’t want to face the trip to the center. So I walked half way down Heartbreak Hill to the local grocery store called SuperSol. I picked up some staples and a couple Granny Smith apples and got in the check out line. The cashier is scanning my stuff, picks up the apples and then SHE starts barking at me, shaking the apples in my face. Again, WTF--what is it with produce around here. I’m looking at her blankly and she snarls, “Come”, stalks over to the produce area, shows me the scale and tells me I have to weigh the produce before I check out. So, in the mercado, if you touch the stuff you get your head bit off and in the store, if you don’t touch and weigh the stuff yourself, you get your head bit off. Got it.

It wasn’t until I took a few more trips to the grocery store that I realized the cashiers there were unfriendly and unpleasant no matter what you did--no hellos, no smiles, no help. And they were that way to absolutely everyone, all the time. My third trip there, I renamed the place “Super Surly” and never has a name been more apt. Their motto should be “We don’t care because we don’t have to”--just like Melbourne Waste Management. From now on, I trudge to the mercado, where, if you know the rules, the people smile and make you feel welcome--the market equivalent of “Cheers”. And they serve beer and wine there--it’s a big bowl of wonderful.