THE IDEA – one year on: reflections on Vigo.

A year ago today we flew into Santiago de Compostela and caught a train to Vigo to put into action THE IDEA described in my very first blog. So here we are; we have spent a year in this city of granite, often reflected in other kinds of surfaces:-


in the strange metal constructions in the Plaza Elíptica;





in shaded glass windows on García Barbón;






in the windows of A Laxe Centro Comercial;





and even in puddles.



No-one could call Vigo a pretty or picturesque place. It is far too much of an imposing sprawl for that.

Aerial photos of Barcelona show symmetry, evidence of town planning with corner buildings angled to give maximum light and space. Similar views of Vigo show a mishmash, buildings constructed in whichever space became available, higgledy-piggledy all over the place. Streets have rooflines at all different levels as small old building have been replaced by larger ones and then by tower blocks, interspersed with the odd old one or two storey building stubbornly refusing to disappear. And yet in its way it works as the city staggers up the hillside, creating a city of ups and downs which must keep its citizens fit (or very tired) if nothing else.

Vigo remains, of course, a work in progress. We have seen advances (of sorts) in the work of mellorando o futuro but the obras still continue all over the city. The stone merchants must be making money hand over fist. Everywhere there are piles of paving stones, not concrete slabs but huge chunks of good solid stone!

Meanwhile the reformas in our building appear finally to be coming to an end. The expanded polystyrene protective covering in the lifts has disappeared as have the sheets of cardboard protecting the floor of the lobby as building materials were brought in and rubble taken out.

During the last week I have watched workmen abseiling up and down the patio de luces doing some kind of electrical installations involving a good deal of high pitched drilling and noisy hammering. The place is getting back to normal just in time for us to move out.

Moving out but not really moving away, we have spent the weekend shifting our clutter from one end of Vigo to the other. Our year in Vigo has been a good one and now we are getting ourselves ready for another year in a different part of the city to see what life has to offer us.