A 'Sub-Saharan' was knifed last night in Roquetas by 'a person of the Gypsy ethnicity' as the Spanish press likes to say. Drugs, apparently. Anyway the dead black fellow's friends rose up and fired a couple of Gypsy houses, two firetrucks and six cop cars. Several arrests and so on. Roquetas has about 25% foreigners living there, working in the plastic farms and (were) in construction. About 20,000 Moroccans, black Africans and Eastern Europeans. The last ethnic flare up in Western Almería was in El Ejido in February 2000 after a Moroccan farm-worker killed a Spanish woman.

World of Water

Heavy rains across the country have left communities devastated and five people dead. In Morpeth, Nothumberland around 1000 households were flooded while RAF helicopters made countless trips to the area to rescue people stranded by the rising flood waters. Flooding also hit parts of Shropshire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Yorkshire.

Morpeth became a virtual island as rains pounded the town and the River Wansbeck burst its banks. Isolated and drenched Morpeth became a town cut off form the world, local residents were taken to rescue centres where they were fed and given sleeping areas, families forced to bed down for the night on wooden floors. As the flood waters immersed the town in rising water, two bridges had to be closed.

The floods are the worst in Britain since the 1960's and have caused the death of five people. In Powys, Mid-Wales a 17 year-old girl from south London died when her 4x4 plunged into floodwater. In Stroud, a 27 year-old man was killed when a trench he was working in at a construction site collapsed. In other accidents caused by the rains a couple's vehicle ran into a fallen tree on a road near Plymouth and a motorcyclist also ran into a tree, this time on a road near Scotch Corner.

Despite further severe weather warnings the floods seem to have abated for the moment, leaving residents of towns all over the UK to count the cost of yet another environmental blip.

The environment agency pointed out that the wet summer had left the soil saturated and was therefore vulnerable to flooding.

One story emerging from the floods was that of emergency service personnel at Kirkley Mill, Northumberland. The team from the RSPCA had been called out to rescue some distressed horses. To their amazement they arrived just in time to save a baby trapped in a car in danger of being swept away. The horses were also taken care off.

Doesn't it just make you think about fate and destiny?

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It is of course well known that the Spanish media are not the least bit interested in the goings-on of the Northern Europeans who live in this country as ex-pats and émigrés (short of a creature like Tony King) and it is also a 'given' that the Northern European media, newspapers and televisions, are continually and endlessly fascinated by what's happening in Spain.
Probably because so many people have abandoned their own country in favour of living here.
The result is a stream of emails from the London media arriving in our office (and everyone else's) looking for interviews and other material.
However, we must remember that these requests are not always for impartial programes and articles. Take the following from ITV.

I'm working on new TV series for ITV in the UK. Please would you consider writing an editorial or feature piece about our programme to help with our search for stories?
We are looking for stories for a new primetime TV series. Do you know of any British expats whose home abroad has become a living nightmare?
We want to hear about homes bought to start new life abroad that have proven disastrous. Do you know of anyone who has had problems with nightmare builders or is the house they’ve ended up with not what they signed up for?
If you have VIDEO FOOTAGE of your home then we are definitely interested! Please contact:
homes@itv.com
Many thanks and best wishes,
Rebecca Fleckney

Well there you go, Rebecca... Perhaps the consumption of a series such as is under suggestion here would somehow help stop the haemorrhage of citizens departing from the UK.

The judge who originally stopped the building of the El Algarrobico hotel in February 2006 has now ruled that it is totally illegal and should be pulled down without compensation to the owners. The owners, Azata del Sol, were claiming as late as last month that the government was going to give them a hundred million in compensation plus spend another hundred million in demolition and returning the sorry location back into pristine scrub and rock.
It never seemed all that likely even if both Carboneras and the Junta de Andalucía are PSOE.
The judge says that the original licence was "incontestably wrong" and that the hotel was located on land which was "de forma clamorosa" en "espacio protegido y no urbanizable" (nice turn of phrase there, Judge) and, further, that the promoters do not have the right to any indemnisation whatsoever (a big phew! from the politicos. That judge is gonna go far!).

Later: Salvemos Mojácar, who had placed the original complaint against the hotel, has called for the immediate sacking of Luís Caparros (he of the Priors in Vera demolition) who, they say, has defended the hotel unconditionally.

A recent Vera court decision regarding a separated couple’s fight over their son has surprised some observers by awarding custody of the child to a known alcoholic with a long history of substance abuse, who lives in Turre and who had abducted the boy from his mother’s home in Ibiza earlier this year.
The presiding judge based his decision on a report prepared by a nearby town hall social services employee who hadn’t bothered to interview the British mother.
Nor was the social services aware, or so they claimed, that apart from the last few months following the abduction, the child had been supported by and cared for solely by the mother.
The judge also cited an interview with the six-year-old, who holds a British passport, as relevant in the decision – an interview held several days after the judge’s ruling.
What six-year-old after half a year of not being allowed to see his mother would not say he wanted to stay with the brainwashing, manipulative other party who’ll buy him pizza and chocolates on demand? (From Tiki Talk)

We get all kinds of offers on the office e-mail - from Nigerian scammers to 'please send your bank details' phishers to please press this button and see some famous film star in the nude. Bad idea.
But today, we got this one. I don't know if your Brazilian/Portugese is any better than mine...

Brasilia, 02 de setembro de 2008
Informamos que seu titulo eleitoral teve um Cancelamento provisório.
O motivo do cancelamento foi uma irregularidade em seu Cadastro de Pessoa Física (CPF) a qual motivou o cancelamento do mesmo, e também de seu título eleitoral.
Para saber mais detalhes sobre esta irregularidade, e quais providências tomar, leia o regulamento clicando no link abaixo.
Após clicar no link, será exibida uma janela, onde a opção "Abrir" deve ser clicada.

It appears that my name has been taken off the Rio de Janeiro voting register. The very idea! This Means War!!!

I was in Cantoria today, where the British residents are planning a demonstration for Thursday September 18th against the threat of 23 demolitions. How can people live under the stress of losing their home, because of greed, politics or lassitude? See my report on Spanish Shilling.

Fly Me to The Zoom...

Try to imagine. You have boarded a flight to Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. You relax, adjust the seat to your satisfaction, pull a book from your hand luggage and despite a short delay wait patiently for the plane to take off. You sit on the runway for an hour and a half and begin to hear rumours, then the rumours become facts. 'The company' you are eventually told by the shaken pilot, 'has folded'. You disembark, your mind a muddle, the long awaited trip to Canada cancelled, your hard earned cash lost.

The above was the predicament of travellers with the low cost airline Zoom. Around 40,000 of them were left with a hole in their budgets as Zoom went bust! The airline had become the latest victim of soaring oil prices which had put an intolerable £25 million on to their running costs.

Great activity behind the scenes had endeavoured to keep the airline afloat, to keep it solvent but to no avail. Only now, however, are we being told of the precursors of this collapse. Previous signs that the company was in deep trouble, and most of those who had signed up to travel with them knew nothing about.

A Zoom flight from Paris to Calgary on Wednesday, just days before the collapse, was prevented from taking off because the lease on the plane hadn't been paid. Another airline stepped in to take the passengers to Vancouver. On Thursday a Zoom flight was held at Glasgow Airport because charges hadn't been paid in full and yet another Zoom flight, this time in Cardiff, had been grounded.

The owners had desperately tried to put together a rescue package but were unsuccessful and were forced to admit defeat. They apologised to their 600 staff and those passengers that had been let down.

It placed many holidaymakers in an impossible position; some had to simply write off their two week breaks, unable to afford an alternative. One holiday couple said they had booked accommodation and car hire in Canada and had even paid for parking at Glasgow airport for 15 days. They had tried to get alternative flights but with the other airlines quoting £2,500 they were unable to even contemplate taking this route, neither were they sure if they would be entitled to any refunds.

It seemed ironic to me then that on opening Saturday's Independent Traveller I saw an ad for... Zoom??? Yes, you tell me. 'Where do you want to Zoom?' the ad blurb gurgles... I'll wager there are many let down passengers who would like to tell them.

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Residence Cards are now no longer available in Spain - thanks apparently to the European Union and pressure from the absurd British DooDah Club which thinks that ID cards are just... not on. As readers know, this means a useless bit of paper, a NIF card and a passport should all be about one's person when in Spain. Very twenty first century too.
A friend from Italy (another country that likes its paperwork) writes:

About ID cards. The Italian authorities insist that foreign nationals including EU citizens be in possession of a 'permesso di soggiorno' which is a folded-up paper with photo and address, etc, on it. Normally valid for five years, you can get an indefinitely-valid 'permesso' eventually.
Many other Italian govt. organisations (other than the Min. of Interior) are bemused when you show them the 'permesso', e.g. to obtain a public health card, and wonder why you have one, pointing out that it shouldn't be necessary if you are an EU citizen.
You can also obtain an Italian ID card which, if you are not an Italian citizen, is not valid for foreign travel. It's practical in case you are asked for ID. However, if I don't have my passport with me I show my Italian driver's licence, which has my address on it.
In short, confusion reigns. Remember that Italy is still fundamentally a dictatorship in matters of ID and 'permessi'. This arises not only from the Fascist legacy but also from the 'years of lead' during Red Brigade terrorism of the 70s, and which still resurges from time to time. And nowadays, there is wide public concern over insecurity and the crime rate, attributed to citizens of certain new EU countries. Romanians, especially gypsies from Romania, are widely distrusted.