Nameless friends and public works

...There are many Dutch ex-pats in and around Benidorm. A few frequent the Marina bar. Often when you sit on the bar terrace looking into the bay you are unaware who is behind you. A group of ex-pats congregate with mixed nationality it seems some are dutch and some Norwegian. Their common language is always English. They tend to be coming towards the end of their session when I arrive, their volume is quite high and they obviously have had a good time. One of the group, an elderly lady with blond hair easily into her seventies, always shouts "Yuppie" when she is either trying to attract attention or just when she is exclaiming joy, but to the rest of us she has now been christened "Yuppie".

This is very much the trend amongst ex-pats, we don't know anyone's second name, it is either Brian, nicks partner, the other Brian being Uncle Brian, and due to a plethora of Trevor's, its either Birmingham Trevor, or Company Bar Trevor, etc. Some may be named after what they do, Jeff the window cleaner or Sally from the shop.

The benefit of this however, is we tend to know someone who can provide a service to help you if you need it. We have plumbers, electricians, painters, carpenters, etc. all British to do the odds and sods around your apartment, but we are all too aware some are apt to rip you off too. So word of mouth is the best way of getting a craftsman to help you out. There is nothing wrong with Spanish workmanship, but the Manana mentality can drive you to distraction. And you don't really want to try and explain to a Spaniard that the hinges on the oven door are distorted and the door won't shut, all because your wife opened it to take something out and the door bell rang she forgot it was open and fell on it. Fortunately I read the instructions discovered I could easily remove the door and with a pair of adjustable pliers managed to repair it.

On the theme of work, it is interesting to watch the public works in and around the bay. Outside the Marina bar is a street which comes from a roundabout under which there is a culvert. The culvert is to take rainwater out to sea. 90% of the year there is no substantial rain. But when it decides to rain it torrents and Avenida Marina Baixa becomes a river. The reason being that the culvert is in fact taking the full effect of a river which only forms when there is a deluge. Rain to Spain is like snow is to England.

The council (Ajunamiento) in Finestrat decided they would fix it by making a stone base and walls along the beach in order to aid the progress of water. The real problem is that the culvert is too small, it can't take the force and the water has to go somewhere and the road being the best path so that's where it goes.

We all watched the tractors and diggers bring stone and lay it to form a three sided water chute. This took several weeks. And when they had finished they piles tons of sand on the beach to replace what was washed away. We were somewhat mesmerised when they piled sand into the channel they had just made. We knew what would happen when the next rain water came down the river bed, and into the culvert, it would hit the sand, then back up then cascade over the road.

The Summer season came and the rain didn't come through out the season.

In October we were in the Marina and the rain clouds formed. The chair cushions were quickly gathered in and the todos awning was quickly wound out. when the rain starts its a bit like someone turning on a tap. It rained very hard, the thunder and lightning was nearing. We all got ringside seats just in from the awning drips, replenished our glasses and waited.....

....One, then a second and a third manhole cover erupted like a fountain, the rainwater had started to stream from the Puig Campana mountain, all focusing on the bay to get to the sea, the water level raised. The sand on the beach was washed into the sea and the riverbed formed by the large boulders were once again revealed, the Police cordoned off the road either side of the deluge. The buses were re-routed and drivers were abandoning cars caught in the flood water...then past our very eyes floated two large refuse bins (the type you see in England behind restaurants) up the street sailing towards the roundabout was a white Mercedes, which fortunately came to rest after colliding with the telephone box, because the driver was still in it looking very pensive. It was there he abandoned it and waded to higher ground. The rain then subsided, and we waited whilst the river ran dry, doing a kind of ex-pat postmortem on the naivety of the boulder river bed, the luck of being marooned in a bar, and thinking we all might profit from becoming dealers in sand...