Let’s have a party.

I read today about the village of Candeleda in the Ávila region of Spain which is taking steps to boost its population. There are fewer than 6000 inhabitants in this place and they are concerned that if the exodus continues the village will disappear altogether. As there are cave paintings around there suggesting that the place has been inhabited for a good while it would be shame for it to just fade away. So they have organised for a coach load of ladies from Madrid to visit the village and have a kind of dating party. 

 

It’s not the first time this sort of thing has happened. There is an organisation called Asocamu which makes all the arrangements and romance and eventual marriage has been known to result from it. 

Meanwhile on the other side of the Atlantic they are having parties for other reasons. All the rage amongst young parents-to-be at the moment are what they called “Gender Reveal Parties”. Apparently when the couple go to the hospital for a scan which reveals the gender of the baby they don’t look at the result immediately. Oh, no, nothing so simple. They are given a sealed envelope with the results in. They take this along to a cake shop which specialises in fancy cakes for events such as this. The baker then makes a cake according to the info in the envelope. At the “Gender Reveal Party” the couple cut the cake. If the interior is blue, they are expecting a boy; if it’s pink a little girl is on the way. So twee it makes me feel quite ill!! I suppose that then you follow this with a “baby shower” so that all your friends bring you appropriately coloured outfits for you gender-revealed baby. 

What is wrong with waiting until the baby arrives to find out what type it is? Personally I am getting a little agitated about the whole gender labelling business. 

I grow tired of pink and frothy clothes for little girls, aggressive toys for boys and the suggestion that bad behaviour can be expected Billy but not from Betty because the former is just “being a boy”. Grrrrr!!!