Speachless for a week

...LAURENCE AND TONY sailed their yacht from its berth to La Cala yesterday, the picture left is when it departed. We were having lunch with Jonathan and Duncan at the time, so the picture is from our balcony. I am looking forward to the next time Ange and I are aboard, it is a great day out on the yacht. Laurence and Tony are perfect hosts.

I knew they were on their way to La Cala when I received a phone call off Laurence. And trust me that phone call was the first one I had had for just over a week. No! that isn't because I am extremely unpopular, its due to me changing mobile telephone providers. I was using 'Vodafone ES', and a few people had transferred from their provider to one called 'Telitec'. It boasts 7 cents a minute to mobiles and landlines in Spain and 5 cents a minute to mobiles and landlines in the UK. There is a connection fee of 14 cents. Texts are also cheaper. So a number of us, maybe as many as 12 decided to do the change and Jonathan took the lead to get us all moved over as smoothly as possible. On the 30th march I sent an email to a lady at Telitec along with all the details they required. In Spain it is now necessary to register pay as you go mobiles which means providing a passport number and an NIE number (a Spanish requirement if you have any financial dealings in Spain). She said it would happen between 7 and 14 days. So in the meantime I was in the UK thinking the new SIM card would arrive during my absence. It didn't. So I left things a while and then Ange got a text from something called 'Hits' which unknown to me at that time is the name of the new network provider. It said in Spanish that her mobile transfer date was the 15th April and the SIM should arrive on the 17th April. I didn't get a message. so I telephoned Telitec on my landline because on the 17th my mobile SIM card from Vodafone was disabled. The lady at Telitec said she would contact the technical guys and they will respond to me. A chap from the technical side rang me and said he had despatched both SIMs on the 15th and it would take a couple of days to arrive. this was on Friday the 17th April. The weekend loomed so I thought it is likely to be Tuesday when it arrives so I decided to wait until then before calling back. On Tuesday 21st it hadn't arrived so I emailed the lady in sales, she replied saying she had forwarded it to a man in the technical department. He eventually rang me and said it had been despateched on the 17th and that I should try the Post Office in VillaJoyosa, the post man may not have been able to deliver it for some reason. The next day I took Andrea with me to the Post Office because she had a note in her mail box saying that she was out when the delivery of her SIM card was made and we needed to sign for the SIMs. When I got to the Post office I quoted a tracking number given to me by the technical guy. They had it and gave me the package.

I got home and inserted the SIM and keyed in the code number. The screen lit up and a message said 'SIM card registration failed'. I was now beginning to lose my temper. So I sent this email:

Dear Madam,

I am not sure that anything else can go wrong. After many phone calls and eventually getting a tracking number from you I discovered my SIM card was in Villajoyosa Post Office. I had not received postal slip in my post box to say that they failed to deliver. So after a long time without phone I eventually got the SIM card today. I came home and inserted the SIM keyed in the PIN number and the message on my screen was your SIM card registration failed. My phone is an Open phone I bought it as such to take my Spanish and UK SIM cards. I have telephoned a lady who told me that someone will call me back and will I be in all day? She added it may be the SIM card....! Great another 4 weeks no doubt.

Bob

You may sense a hint of sarchasm. Nothing much happened during the day and I was told to deal directly with HITS. After speaking with Hits I sent another email:-

Dear madam,

It is now day 26 since I requested a transfer to Telitec. Yesterday I had several telephone calls to the techie, still no phone. He then put me in direct contact with HITs, who asked me all the same questions and took me through the same procedure as the techie until they realised I am neither insane, incompetent or untruthful. They then said they are putting in an 'incident' to vodafone, who supply the signal (strange that I managed to get a signal when with Vodafone which was a week ago today). I telephoned HITS this morning and the lady said there is no solution yet it is in the hands of the technical people and she doesn't know when it will be corrected.

I have lost a week's worth of business and had to buy a vodafone SIM card so that I don't lose any more, and I have now got 2 phone numbers in the system which I was trying to avoid by asking you to transfer my original one.

I think your system is flawed, I think your people are insensitive, and HITS are uncaring. I wish I had never transferred over, and will certainly dissuade others from doing so.

regards

Bob

I got a phone call from the techie almost immediately. He said "I have been reading all the emails and I am doing all I can to resolve your problem" to which I asked "and what is the solution"? He said "Well I have made you another SIM card and I am going to post it to you and it should take 1 to 2 days to arrive" I thought Deja Vu! "Don't post it, I will come to your office in Moraira and get it directly from you I don't trust the mail." He replied "I will be right back I have to go stop the mail". We arranged to meet before 2.pm. So me and Ange drove all the way to Moraira, found the office and met up with the techie. I put the SIM in and I didn't get a signal. "No signal" I said somewhat frustratedly. He said "Let me have it" and he walked outside, then came back and said "You do have a signal, but its a crap signal in here you have to go outside"..... it gave me very little faith that statement!

Sure enough I had a signal. I received a text as soon as I got outside from someone complaining they couldn't contact me. The first person I rang was Jonathan. "Guess where I am ringing you from Jonathan" I said, "where?" "From Telitec at Moraira, I went for my own SIM".

When I got home Jonathan had written a status message on his facebook. "Good news, Bob is mobile again, (he went for his SIM card) Wonder what he has to talk about on facebook now"......

Mixed weather and mixed finances

...You can't live in Spain and fail notice that Spaniards have different habits than us Brits. For example in England you walk up to a Zebra crossing and expect the car to stop as soon as the driver sees you standing there. In Spain it's more like a game of dare. Its easy to spot a tourist, they are the ones who apply the Brit code in the Spanish world and discover that Spanish breaks are quite good and the horns work well too! Equally, we Brits queue up in Banks, bus stops, cash machines, taxi ranks and so on. The Spanish do too, but and this is a big BUT, when it is someone else's turn it's every man for himself. The Spanish love their dogs. Usually small yapping little things. And I am convinced that within a few generations, the Spanish dogs will no longer need legs and evolution will change their genes, because the Spanish carry their dogs around with them. Hence very few buy Geat Danes, Dobermans or St Bernards.

Occasionally you see something funny, yesterday I was having a Mahou in the Marina Bar and I saw a young girl riding a bike along the promonade and tied to her handle bars was a larger than normal dog (which made me think the girl may not be Spanish) everything was looking fine, the girl laughing and the dog loping after. I thought "This could end in tears" I didn't have to wait long. The dog decided it wanted to sniff a palm tree and stopped dead. The bike continued until the extent of the lead was reached, and the bike stopped dead, catapulting the girl from the bike but she was fortunate enough to be at the end of the bay and flew over the wall on to the sand. She wasn't hurt but she was certainly in shock and the dog was coughing due to the strangulation of its dog collar...

...As I am writing this I am able to look through the balcony patio doors at the Mediteranean sea, its a dull day and we are waiting for Neil to call as we are off to Dave and Pete's for lunch. Even thought its dull and rainy, people are still out and about walking across the beach, and this time of year is always prone to unsettled weather on the Costa Blanca. We had thunder storms last night and the temperature is down on what it was 2 days ago. None the less its still nice here and tomorrow or the day after we will be back to glorious sun once more and by June we will be expecting wall-to-wall sun until the end of September.

The former being said, tourists from colder climates such as the UK, the nordic countries, Germany and Holland, tend to feel warmer than us who have become climatised. So as I was sat yesterday in a Shirt and sweater, I could tell non-Spanish and ex-pats from tourists. Initially they sit in the sun, but as it was sunny interspersed, with short downpours, the awning was in and out like a yoyo, and the seat cushions on and off frequently, so they sit part in the sun and part under cover. For them it was warm enough to bask, and they tolerate being wet for a short time, but what they are blissfully unaware of is how cold it gets when the sun goes down combine that with wet and it can be a very miserable trek back to the hotel.

On that theme, trekking that is, Trevor and Andrew were here for Easter and we decided to go to the Chinese restaurant for dinner one night. They had a couple of friends stopping with them who are keen walkers. During the day they had been on a walk from finestrat to Villajoyosa which is around 5 to 7 kilometers. It was a very sunny day and I think they didn't apply much sun cream so when we met up with them they were glowing. We had a superb meal as per usual, and afterwards Andrew needed to use the cash dispenser. He went to the one next to the restaurant. He put in the card and it didn't go all the way in. The screen was blank and unlikely to do anything else. Andrew was concerned, quite rightly that someone could defraud him by finding the card and using it dishonestly. By the time we caught up with him he was trying to grip the card with another card he had. "It's stuck but I can see it" he told us, so we managed to go back and get a couple of tooth-picks, came back and used them like tweezers to grip the card. It dislodged and out it popped, the thing was that it wasn't his card!!! It was someone else's. Andrew decided to take it to the Bank and swap it for his in the morning.

In the meantime it did cross our minds that if they had closed circuit television on the machine, the Policia would see three men close up fiddling with the machine as if they were interfering with it. So we are now waiting to see if we make 'El Policia cinco' on Spanish TV....

All change including a fire

...Well 2009 has so far been a pain. I have spent most of it in the UK, but I now enter a period of stability, subject to a test I had which suggests I am leaking protein from my Kidneys, so yet another tablet looms. My wife Angela is going to the UK in May so hopefully she can liaise about my medication rather than me having to go.

...So what's new in La Cala? Well! Laurence and Tony have moved their Yacht closer to Benidorm, the travelling to Denia was interfering with valuable drinking time. And so far they have many excursions. Each trip is one of discovery, discovering which of their friends are sea sick. I am told that sales of 'Sea legs' and other proprietry medicines for 'Mal de mer' have increased around and about Benidorm. The last trip stunned everyone, with the old salty sea dog Graham doing a technicolour yawn! There is hope for us all yet.

..So more updates, Andrea 'Madonna, Cher & Just a girl' singer has changed venues, she no longer sings in the Marina, but sings three nights a week next door at La Cala Cala bar. Since she moved many of us from the Marina go in to see her and have made friends with more people, both Spanish and British ex-pats.

...The Amancio building is still standing, well teetering is more appropriate. It has been in a state of delapidation for 25 years, but bits are falling off it now, and still Finestrat council do nothing about it. They say it will cost two million euros to fell it. Well me and a few friends will do it for 500,000 and as much beer as we can drink, with a couple of sledge hammers, but I guess the Health and Safety fraternity wouldn't allow that.

..Colin and Jeremy are cureently back in the UK, and Dave and Pete are planning to go home on Tuesday.

We now have an Indian restaurant in the Bay and a new 'chippy', yes a 'chippy'! And after consuming a few yesterday me Jonathan and Duncan went to dine there, just like being in Bolton...! Just need a good donna Kebab place and we have cracked it.

...The Monika Hotel is back open, however, there was a slight snag when some of the Easter guests booked in, they had no running water. So I guess thats a few customers they have lost. And the erection called the Gran Magic Atrium (pictured above), is still idle and has been since last August. It is an eyesore, and must be costing Finestrat and Villajoyosa millions in lost revenue through people visiting elsewhere where they do not have to constantly look at a building site.

..That's the update done. Two new characters are soon to feature in my blog, meet John and Bob. They moved here 6 weeks ago. They have brought quite a lot of furniture with them but have had to buy bits and pieces, like kitchen furniture and cabinets etc. I got involved with the buying of a gas fire. I offered to drive them to Carrefour where they sell such fires, the fire is a stand alone one, fuelled by a calor gas tank. We went to get it and I drove them back home and left them to sort it out. A few minutes after I got home the phone rang. "Bob its John, I think we bought the wrong thing", "Why I said" he said "It says the fuel has to be Petroleum gas". "OK John we will take it back". So off we went up to carrefour. After a significant wait the two assistants tried to tell us it was for ordinary gas, but John insisted on getting his money back and we went to Ardy's , another 'Do it yourself' outlet. We bought the right thing and a valve for the tank. We already had a gas cannister so once again I dropped them off at home and went back to my apartment. The phone rang again. "Bob its John, I thonk this one is broken!" "I'll come round John and have a look" I replied. I went to their apartment, and I got the guided tour. It is a nice apartment overlooking the sea, and Benidorm Island quaintly known by locals as 'Bird s**t Island' because all there is on it is one cafe and millions of birds. Anyway back to the fire. I looked at the fire got the valve fitted it to the bottle turned the knob and fired it up. 'What was wrong then." said John. "Nothing much, you had put the gas bottle 'on' switch to off, the fire switch in the wrong position and the gas pipe wasn't locked"...... I am waiting to hear how the self assembly cupboard is coming along........