December 2017 – Quite Contrary

There are other Christmas greetings here but that’s the only one I can reliably remember how to pronounce, even though I have to sing that slightly annoying song in my head first and it leaves me with the earworm for about an hour afterwards.

The Costa Tropical has its own English news magazine, the Sentinella, and I recently waited at the dentist long enough to read it all the way to the smalls at the end – including church services. There are two Anglican churches on the Costa Tropical. Well, I say churches – there are two Anglican services every Sunday in Catholic churches borrowed for the occasion. So, since I am a lifelong if not fervent Anglican, I felt a bit obliged to check at least one of them out. First Christmas in Spain, and all that – plus I like Anglicans. They don’t nag, they don’t fuss, and if you avoid the ones who are too quick and too loud with the responses, and a little too intense (I imagine that’s true in every church) they’re nice people. And, by definition, speak English …

The first decision was which service. Almuñécar is closer, but the service is at 9.30. Nerja has a very civilized noon service – but Almuñécar’s church is virtually on the beach, and the town has an enormous Sunday street market. I set the alarm for 8.

My Satnav had never heard of the Fisherman’s Chapel, even under its sonorous Spanish name (Capilla de Nuestra Senora del Carmen (Los Marinos)), but the Sentinella had helpfully added that tea was served afterwards in the Chinasol Hotel. The Satnav agreed to take me to the Chinasol Hotel.

I’m posting photos of the outside of the chapel in the hope that others can find it before the service and not 10 minutes after the service starts.

Oh, and one other thing you should know. I have been to churches where you open your mouth for the wafer and it is laid delicately on your tongue. Munch, swallow, wait for wine. I have been to churches where you cup your hands and the wafer is placed in them. Lift, munch, swallow, wait for wine. In Spain – well, in the Fishermans Chapel – you dip your wafer in the wine.

Sign the book on your way out. I won’t be burning up the 22 kilometres often but it’s obscurely comforting to know it is there, and the same service I attended as a restless 6 year old and as a rebellious teenager, and intermittently throughout my adult life, endures. I’ve been an Anglican in South Africa, in England, in Scotland and now in Spain. Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

(That’s apparently “Cuantas más cosas cambian, más es lo mismo” but I’ve learned not to automatically trust online translations … )

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I just finished re-reading the entire Belgariad, having taken one of the ten books as part of my camper library. David Eddings says almost in passing of a couple of minor characters that they were born because they were needed to be in the right place at the right time to perform a simple task. Well, we’ve all created characters like that, at the time I nodded respectfully at the way he explained them into the story and carried on reading.

In the complicated tangle of my own life story, I had a long-distance relationship – gee, couple of years ago now, doesn’t time fly? And he lived in a permanently-hot part of Spain and was coming to Scotland for two weeks in December and I thought oh help this poor guy will freeze and I bought a fluffy-lined soft thick jersey with a fluffy-lined hood. Much appreciated and it kept him toasty and he left it in Scotland for his next winter trip. I borrowed it a couple of times myself when I had to walk the dog on particularly cold days in Scotland, and when I packed for my own move to Spain this year I shrugged and threw it in. You never knew, I might be whizzing up the nearby Sierra Nevada to admire the snow and then it could be very handy.

So glad I did, the weather here in Velez de Benaudalla has thrown in an unexpected, uncharacteristic cold snap, and I have lived in it for the last three days. So it seems that entire relationship – his entire reason for being born – was to provide me with the kind of jersey I would never have bought for myself.

Okay he was probably also indirectly responsible for me being here at all, because without the trips to Spain to be with him I’d never have thought of moving here myself, so really his life wasn’t wasted at all. I shall have to let him know, everyone likes to know they had an important reason for being born.