Stuff you find in Spain.

Looking for something to settle a delicate stomach - Phil's not mine for I seem to have the stomach of a concrete elephant, unless I get really drunk, which happens very rarely these days - I visited several chemists in search of Enos or similar. In the UK I would be able to find this in any supermarket but there are strict demarcation lines here. Nobody is going to accidentally buy too much aspirin or paracetamol in this country. 

Anyway, I was having no luck and explained to one chemist what I was after. She was all set to sell me a product called bio-something or other that you can add to water, to milk, to your breakfast cereal, according to your preferences. It was going to cost in the region of €25 to do the same kind of job as Actimel. Then, at the last moment she decided she could not sell it to me as it was "caducado", past its sell-by date. So she wrote the name down and told me I could get it anywhere, well, in any chemist's shop. 

In the next one, I found the expensive product but I also found Enos. So I opted for that, still more expensive than in Tesco but closer to what I wanted to spend. If it had not been for the super-expensive bio-whatever, I would have said that the moral is not to look for UK products in Spanish pharmacies. Strepsils, for your sore throat, are quite extortionately expensive! 

Mind you, I can now buy PG Tips tea in the local supermarket at a perfectly reasonable price. This does not, however, mean that the Spanish have learnt to MAKE tea. It is still quite usual to be served with a tea bag in a cup, accompanied by a pot of hot water, hot but not boiling! But then, what do most British folk know about making coffee? 

Today I was in a store which has not existed in England for donkey's years, at least 25 I think, but which still appears to be going strong here: C & A. I was looking for short sleeved shirts in a traditional cut, without any of the fancy foll-de-rolls that trendy shops like to add to their designs. I found some, very reasonably priced as well. 

While in the store, I could hear drumming, very rhythmical and getting louder and louder. Leaving the store, I found out what it was: a marching drumming group from Viana do Castelo, across the border in Portugal. Dressed in black and white, with red sashes and black hats of the sort that flashy Seville horsemen wear, they had formed a circle and were gradually reaching a crescendo. 

As the volume increased and the rhythm grew faster, they tightened the circle on one of their number who was doing really fancy drumming in the centre. Hats were falling off all over the place. It was most impressive. 

But, boy, was it good when they stopped! 

Now, you don't see that sort of thing on Market Street in Manchester!