Issue 32 - July 2009

WE ARE THE ONLY ENGLISH PUBLICATION WHO DELIVER TO THE WHOLE COSTA TROPICAL COAST AND INLAND

LA HERRADURA, ALMUÑÉCAR, SALOBREÑA, VELÉZ DE BENAUDALLA, ORGIVA, TORVISCON, MOTRIL, CASTELL DE FERRO,

TORRENUEVA, GUALCHOS, CASERONES, LA MAMOLA, LA RABITA, CADIÁR, ALBONDÓN, ALBUÑOL AND MORE...

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The publisher is unable to accept responsibility for the content and/or claims of advertisements or advertisers shown within and the views expressed are not

necessarily the views of the publisher. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher

Editor :- Simon Batchelor

Regular Contributors :-

Peter Webb - Swan Morrison

Gwen Boswell - Leslie Thomas

B. I. Shenman

To Advertise Call -

Mobile 620 676 843 - Office 958 069 058

info@costatropicalnews.com

Deposito Legal B - 51548 - 2006

Design & Pre-Print Production by Bad Attitude Designs

www.costatropicalnews.com

Contents JULY

2009

3

4 LIGHTER SIDE

The Best Humour in one place

8 ALL WOMAN

All you need to know about bad

makeup practices

18 ANIMALS & PETS

Pet Issues

20 PUZZLED

Crosswords and puzzles.

32 GADGETS & GIZMOS

The wildest, wackiest and probably the

most useless gadgets around

22 A LETTER

Letter from the Southern Hemisphere.

Views and opinions from Latin America 26 HEALTH MATTERS

Diabetes warnings and sleep away your

problems

40 THE COMPASS

More musings on life from Leslie Thomas

46 What are the

Odds of that?

Ridiculous odds of silly events.

42 Snakes & Jellyfish

Watch out where you tread!

36 AUTONOMOUS

A trip around Spain and the

autonomous communities

1 3 RECIPES

New quick and easy recipes - Char

Grilled Chicken and Mediterranean Turkey 14 BUSINESS NEWS

News and information from the local

Costa Tropical business community

The judge frowned at the tired robber and said, “then you admit breaking into the same store on three successive nights?” ”Yes, your honor.”

“And why was that?” “Because my wife wanted a dress.”

The judge check with his records, “But it says here you broke in three nights in a row!”

“Yes sir. She made me swap it two times.”

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A guy walks into a bar with his pet monkey. He orders a drink and while he’s drinking, the monkey starts jumping all over the place. The monkey grabs some olives off the bar and eats them, then grabs some sliced limes and eats them,then jumps up on the pool table, grabs the cue ball, sticks it in his mouth and swallows it whole.

The bartender screams at the guy, “Did you see what your mon-key just did?” The guy says, “No, what?” “He just ate the cue ball off my pool table - whole!” says the bartender. “Yeah, that doesn’t sur-prise me,” replies the patron. “He eats everything in sight, the little twerp. I’ll pay for the cue ball and stuff.” He finishes his drink, pays his bill, and leaves. Two weeks lat-

er he’s in the bar again, and he has his monkey with him. He orders a drink and the monkey starts run-ning around the bar again.

While the man is drinking, the monkey finds a maraschino cherry on the bar. He grabs it, sticks it up his butt, pulls it out, and eats it. The bartender is disgusted. “Did you see what your monkey did now?” “Now what?” asks the pa-tron. “Well, he stuck a maraschino cherry up his butt, then pulled it out and ate it!” says the barkeep-er.

“Yeah, that doesn’t surprise me,” replies the patron. “He still eats everything in sight, but ever since he ate that damn cue ball he meas-ures everything first!”

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A woman brings eight-year-old Johnny home and tells his mother that he was caught playing doc-tors and nurses with Mary, her eight-year-old daughter.

Johnny’s mother says, “Let’s not be too harsh on them...they are bound to be curious about sex at that age.”

“Curious about sex?” replies Mary’s mother. “He’s taken her bloody ap-pendix out!”

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A train hits a busload of Essex Schoolgirls and they all perish.They are all in heaven trying to en-ter the pearly gates past St.Peter.St Peter asks the first girl (from Southend), “Karen, have you ever had any contact with a mans thing?”

She giggles and shyly replies, “Well I once touched the head of one with the tip of my finger”

St. Peter says, “OK, dip the tip of your finger in The Holy Water and pass through the gate.”

St. Peter asks the next girl (from Chelmsford) the same question, “Joanne have you ever had any contact with a mans thing?”

The girl is a little reluctant but replies “Well once I fondled and stroked one.”St. Peter says “OK, dip your whole hand in The Holy Water and pass through the gate.”

All of a sudden there is a lot of commotion in the line of girls, and the girl from Romford is pushing her way to the front of the line.When she reaches the front of the line St. Peter says “Tracy! What seems to be the rush?”

The girl replies..”If I’m going to have to gargle that Holy water...I want to do it before Lorraine sticks her butt in it!!”

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A blonde gets a job as a teacher.

Watching the kids play she notices a boy in the field stood by himself while all the other kids are running around having fun with a ball.

She takes pity on him and decides to speak to him.

“Are you ok?” she says.

“Yes” he replied.

“You do know that you can go and play with the other kids” she says.

“Its best I stay here” he said.

“But why?” says the blonde.

The boy says “Because I’m the goalie!”

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A man and his wife walked into a dentist’s office. The man said to the dentist , ‘Doc, I’m in one hell of a hurry. I have two buddies sitting out in my car waiting for us to go play golf, so forget about the anes-thetic and just pull the tooth and be done with it. We have a 10:00 am tee time at the best golf course in town and it’s 9:30 already. I don’t have time to wait for the an-esthetic to work!’

The dentist thought to himself, ‘My goodness, this is surely a very brave man asking to have his tooth pulled without using anything to kill the pain.’ So the dentist asks him, ‘Which tooth is it sir?

The man turned to his wife and said, ‘Open your mouth honey, and show him.

§

Three mice were sitting at a bar talking about how tough they were. The first mouse slams a shot and says, “I play with mouse traps for fun. I’ll run into one on purpose and as it is closing on me, I grab the bar and bench press it 20 to 30 times.” And, with that, he slams another shot.

The second mouse slams a shot and says, “That’s nothing. I take those poison bait tablets, cut them up, and snort them, just for the fun

of it.” And, with that, he slams an-other shot.The third mouse slams a shot, gets up, and walks away.

The first two mice look at each other, then turn to the third mouse and ask, “Where the hell are you going?”

The third mouse stops and replies, “I’m going home to shag the cat.”

§

An old lady in a nursing home is wheeling up and down the halls in her wheelchair making sounds like she’s driving a car. As she’s going down the hall an old man jumps out of a room and says, “Excuse me ma’am but you were speeding. Can I see your driver’s license?”

She digs around in her purse a lit-tle, pulls out a candy wrapper, and hands it to him. He looks it over, gives her a warning and sends her on her way.

Up and down the halls she goes again. Again, the same old man jumps out of a room and says, “Ex-cuse me ma’am but I saw you cross the centre line back there. Can I see your registration please?”She digs around in her purse a little, pulls out a store receipt and hands it to him. He looks it over, gives her another warning and sends her on her way.She zooms off again up and down

the halls weaving all over. As she comes to the old man’s room again he jumps out. This time, he’s stark naked and has an erection!The old lady in the wheel chair looks up and says, “Oh no... not the Breathalyzer again!”

§

A man walks into a doctor’s office and says, “I have a problem with my dick!”

The lady at the counter says, “Sir, we do not say words like that at the doctors office! Now leave and come back and replace “Dick” with some other body part like “Ear.”

The man does as he’s told and comes back in and says, “I have a problem with my ear.”

The lady the says, “What is that?”

To which the man replied, “It hurts when I pee out of it!”

ONE LINERSI used to be a lifeguard, but some blue kid got me fired.

What has four legs and an arm? A happy pit bull.

If a mute kid swears does his mother wash his hands with soap?

JULY THOUGHT FOR THE MONTH

You have the capac-ity to learn from your mistakes, and you will learn a lot today.

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The age-old question of whether or not you should share your makeup should be one that you can an-swer without hesitation. Maybe you think sharing makeup is OK as long as it’s with your best friend or your sister, but the truth is that swapping makeup is always a bad decision. Infections can be transmit-ted from one person to another with bad makeup hygiene or by using makeup that’s too old. Think about it: You apply your makeup to the sensitive skin on your face, and the very susceptible areas around your eyes and lips, so if your makeup prac-tices are less than hygienic, it’s time you took these seven bad makeup practices seriously… Bad makeup practices might be something you haven’t given a second thought to before, but that doesn’t make proper makeup hygiene any less im-portant. If you employ bad makeup practices, you risk spreading bacteria and developing a serious in-fection. These bad habits include sharing makeup, using old makeup, not cleaning makeup brushes and other equipment, and storing makeup in the wrong places. Don’t invite bacteria to be a part of your daily makeup regimen; use these makeup tips to keep your makeup safe and your face beautiful.

Makeup Tips: Safety and HygieneYou might think that it’s common sense to keep makeup safety in mind, but many women – es-pecially teens who are just learning how to apply makeup – don’t realize how important it is to have good makeup hygiene. Are you guilty of these sev-en bad makeup practices?

Not Washing Your HandsClean your hands before using your fingers to apply makeup, including face creams and founda-tions. Fingertips are naturally oily and this oil can be transferred to your face and cause breakouts. Bacteria also like to roam under your fingernails, so clean them regularly by scrubbing under your nails with warm soapy water and a special nail brush, which you can find at most any beauty store.

Not Starting with a Clean FaceYou should wash your face every night before you go to bed to avoid transferring makeup to your pil-low, which then gets rubbed all over your face dur-ing sleep, causing blocked pores and breakouts. Be sure to wash your face in the morning before ap-plying your makeup to remove any dirt or bacteria that could get caught under the new application. Always start with a clean face!

Not Keeping Your Equipment CleanCleanliness is important for brushes and applicators, too. These should be cleaned regularly in hot soapy water, or if you use sponges for foundation or pow-der, they should either be cleaned after each use or discarded. Purchase a large container of sponges and use a new one each time. If you wash makeup brushes and other equipment yourself, be sure to get all the soap off since soap residue can also ir-ritate your skin and eyes.

Not Storing Your Makeup SafelyMakeup should be stored in a cool dry place, away from moisture and heat. Warm, moist makeup is a breeding ground for bacteria, which will be trans-

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Seven Bad Makeup Practices

Is Your Makeup Making You Sick?

ferred to your skin and can also enter through the lips and eye-lids, causing mouth and eye infections.

Not Putting Your Makeup AwayClean up after you’re done applying your makeup. Always recap makeup containers to prevent the product from drying out or being exposed to air-borne bacteria. And if you’ve made a mess, clean it up and use a disinfectant. If you’ve spilled some-thing in your makeup bag, take the time to remove all your makeup and clean out the bag with hot, soapy water. Let it dry completely before putting your makeup back in the bag to avoid creating a moist environment for bacteria to grow in.

Sharing Your MakeupYou already know that bacteria can be spread through inanimate objects, such as doorknobs, key-boards and telephones, and makeup is no different. Sharing makeup, applicators and even hairbrushes with someone else is risky and should just be avoid-ed. If your best friend really needs to borrow your mascara, either flat-out refuse or give it to her and go buy yourself a new tube – it’s not the cheapest way, but it is the safest. If you need more motiva-tion, know that eye infections, such as conjunctivitis (inflammation of the eye, also known as pink eye) can be spread through sharing eye makeup.

Not Tossing Your MakeupIf you have already sustained an eye infection – whether it was from sharing makeup or not – don’t wear any eye makeup until the infection is fully treated and cured. If you do apply eye makeup while you’re still infected, you need to toss it afterwards to avoid re-infection – it’s just common sense.

Long-Lasting Makeup? Or is it Time to Toss?When cosmetics start to show signs of aging, such as changing color, texture or smell, it’s time to throw them out. Even if your makeup hasn’t noticeably changed, it could still be past its due date. Use this table to help you decide whether or not it’s time to toss your old makeup:

Lipstick- Time to toss: 1.5 years after opening- Signs of Aging: Becomes discolored; may grow mold Mascara- Time to toss: Two months after opening- Signs of Aging: Starts to clump together; becomes dry Eye Shadow & Eye Liner- Time to toss: One year after opening- Signs of Aging: Changes color; shadow clumps; liner gets dry or moldy Blush & Face Powder- Time to toss: One year after opening- Signs of Aging: Changes color; may clump together By now you know that making your makeup safe takes a lot of work, but it’s worth the effort if you want to avoid nasty infections and unhappy skin. If you’ve been guilty of these seven bad makeup prac-tices in the past, we’ll forgive you as long as you promise to shape up and ship out any old, crusty makeup. Is Your Hygiene Heinous?When it comes to your hygiene habits, would those who know you praise your penchant for cleanliness or cry foul over your questionable ways? Good hy-giene cannot be underestimated - your health, not to mention reputation, depends on it.

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Only last month I was writing about the idiosyn-crasies of the autonomous community of the Basque Country in Spain. There is a cruel sense of irony, therefore, that it should be followed up by reports of a further bombing outrage and an attempted poisoning by the ultra-nationalist, separatist group, ETA (in the Basque language, Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (literally, Basque Country and Freedom).

The bomb was in a car that was literally blown to smithereens when its sole occupant, a po-liceman, was driving to work from his home in Arrigorriaga, near Bilbao. The police officer was named as Eduardo Puelles, a 49 year-old married father of two, who was on the eve of being promoted to the rank of chief inspector in Spain’s national police intelligence division. Only fragments of the car survived the massive impact of the explosion.

ETA has been blamed, but has not yet claimed responsibility for the killing. This is not unusual, since such claims often come several months af-ter the event. The terrorists often give a coded telephone warning call when planting a bomb, but do not do so when it is intended for a spe-cific target. In the case of officer Puelles, whose work involved the monitoring of ETA activity, he is believed to have been tailed by the extremists intent on learning his daily routines for several weeks.

The middle of June also marks the anniversary of one of ETA’s worst atrocities, when they explod-ed a bomb in a supermarket in Barcelona, killing 21 people. Since then, Spanish and French po-lice forces have smashed a number of cells and made arrests of leaders in both countries. Nev-ertheless, the group’s last victim was the murder of a Basque businessman in December and the terrorists continue to extort money from local

businesses by using death threats – these, the group claims, represent a “revolutionary tax”.

The recent murder of policeman Eduardo Puelles came only a matter of weeks after the authorities uncovered a plot to assassinate Spanish judges with French brandy laced with poison. The plot was revealed after painstaking piecing together of evidence collected after the arrest in south-western France in April of one of ETA’s commando unit leaders, Jurdan Martitegi Lisaso, also known by the alias of Arlas.

Documents discovered in the arrested leader’s possession included one describing plans to send expensive bottles of cognac, laced with a lethal dose of poison, to several judges, includ-ing the leading anti-terrorist judge, Balthasar Garzon. The gifts would purport to come from an admiring female law student, praising the judges’ stance against ETA. Although an at-tempt had been made to shred the document, investigators were able to carefully piece it back together again and discover the plot against Garzon and three other high court judges who had led investigations into ETA and had helped to ban other political organisations linked to it.

Other documents recovered at the time included a list of further targets for assassination, includ-ing the recently-elected president of the Basque regional government, Patxi Lopez.

Although unsuccessful, any attempt to murder through poisoning would represent a first for ETA. Bombings and shooting have been its pre-ferred methods to date and these activities have seen the deaths of some 825 individuals during the past 40 years or so of its campaign of terror.

- Peter Webb

ETA Back to Business

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Char-Grilled Chicken with Garlic Puree

Ingredients:

6-8 Chicken breasts2 heads of garlic350 ml Red Wine

220 ml extra virgin olive oil2 sprigs fresh thyme

Salt and Pepper to taste

Directions

Peel 8-10 garlic cloves and roughly chop. Marinate chicken in red wine, chopped garlic and thyme. Cover and refrigerate for 2-4 hours.

Roast garlic - preheat oven to 170 degrees. Spread the remaining garlic cloves (with skins) in one layer in a small baking dish. Cover with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and bake for 1.5 hours or until garlic is completely soft. Remove skins and puree garlic through a food processor. Reserve puree. About an hour before cooking chicken, take it out of the fridge.

Prepare your BBQ. When the fire is ready, remove the chicken from marinade. Pat dry, then season with salt and pepper. Cook chicken slowly for about 30 minutes, turning frequently. Chicken should be nicely browned when cooked.

Spread garlic puree over chicken and heat in a 200 de-gree oven for 5 minutes. Serve chicken on a platter with oven-roasted potatoes, lemon wedges and salad!

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Mediterranean Turkey Burgers

Ingredients:

500g turkey mince2 cloves crushed garlic

1/3 cup chopped parsley1/3 cup chopped basil

Salt and pepper to taste1 baby red pepper, finely chopped

1 onion, finely chopped2 rashers bacon, finely chopped

Directions

Sauté bacon, onion and garlic in a bit of oil and butter til onion is soft. Then mix this mixture with remaining ingredients. Using your hands, combine well.

Shape into the size burgers you like, then char-grill to your liking. Winners every time!!

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Cueva De Aladdin based in Cadiár are not just a charity shop. Based at the back of the Church in Cadiár they also have a cafe as well as printing, fax and skype available. English breakfasts are available all day, as well as freshly baked bread and cakes. Fish, Chips, mushy peas, bread and butter and a drink are on the menu for just €5.50 - amazing value. They also have curries and a takeaway service is available. They are open Mon-Fri 9.00-14.00 and 17.00-20.00 and Sat & Sun 10.00-14.00 So drop in, have a browse around their charity shop, bag a bargain and enjoy their relaxing cafe. For more information or directions call 958 850 903

For the fourth year now Isicola in Almuñécar is or-ganizing 4x4 adventures, luxury boat tours and days out for everybody.

You want exciting paintball games? Qualified ref-erees, professional equipment and full body protec-tion are included!

A beautiful trip in authentic 4x4’s to beautiful places with waterfalls and benevolent crystal clear pools. With opportunities for a swim and hiking? They do it! Besides that they have at their disposal luxury 45 foot cutters, speedboats and luxury “Gin & Tonic” boats to spend a nice time on the sea.

All 4x4’s and boats are guided by qualified drivers and skippers. One of them even has a water-ski instructor license which gives you the possibility to do waterski-ing or wakeboarding. You may not believe it but they worked for companies like Vodafone, Mercedes and International Universities.

So why don’t you treat yourself and your relatives to an unforgettable pampered day. All the tours include unlimited refreshments and tapas. Some tours even have an extensive BBQ included! Even pick-up and drop-off is not an issue to them. All this is very afford-able with prices starting from €25,- a person.

For bookings and more information look at their website www.isicola.com or call them at +34 670828420.

El Dragon Rojo, the Chinese restaurant in Castell De Ferro, has now been open for over two months and has gone from strength to strength. At a tradition-ally quiet time of year they are de-lighted with the start the restaurant has had and the management there would like to thank all their customers, many who they see regularly, for their support.

Chef Sang produces a huge rang of dishes, most of which are the traditional ones we all know and love but with his own touch of flare. All the sauces, even the sweet and sour on the table, are homemade by Sang in El Dragon Rojo’s kitchens.

Chef Javi cooks up the Spanish side of the Menu and tasty tapas. Javi will prepare you some of the best Paella available anywhere if you give him an hour’s notice. Roast chickens are also on offer to order. Hamburgers, bocadillos, sandwiches etc., are available. Or try the challenge of finishing the legendary ‘Capote’, a huge bocadillo with pork, egg, cheese, bacon, tomato and lettuce.

At El Dragon Rojo you’ll find a warm friendly atmos-phere and some very fine food and wine.

El Dragon Rojo have now launched their website www.eldragonrojo.com where you can read more in depth about the restaurant, chefs and owners, peruse the menu at your leisure or e-mail them with any comments. At the moment it is only available through Internet Explorer.

What’s on JULY at ‘Casa del Cafe’ Albondón.Wednesday 1st July. ‘Fish & Chip’ night. ( Please book)

Friday 10th July ‘Northern Soul’ night with ‘Happy Hour’ 8:30 - 9:00 All drinks 1€ (excluding pints) fol-lowed by Karaoke.

Wednesday 22nd July . Bingo Night. Come and have a laugh (Not for the serious Bingo Player).

Friday 31st July. An evening with ‘Phil’ singing fol-lowed by Karaoke for all

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Legends - Salobreña For entertainment schedule for July please telephone

958 612 853 or pop in for gig guide

Citibox, founded in London in 1988, opened its first Spanish branch in Puerto Banus in

2002. Since last year the branch network has been extended Eastwards to Mojá-

car and the latest office to open is In-mobilicosta Granada in Albuñol.

Offering a secure mailbox serv-ice, Citibox offices not only

stay open longer than the Correos but they can ac-

cept courier delivered parcels and they will

contact you as soon as a parcel arrives.

New for 2009 is the UK

A d d r e s s in Spain

s e r v -i c e

w h e r e C i t i b o x

holders are of-fered their individual,

unique and permanent address at the UK warehouse. Any post or parcel arriving at your UK ad-dress is then trucked down weekly to Spain and avail-able for collection from your Citibox, cutting out the Correos completely. The first kilogram each week is free and you only pay €1/Kg over that. So much is cheaper in the UK and, together with their partners, Formula Freight, you can now receive anything with complete peace of mind.

Citibox are the only FedEx Authorised Dropcenters in Spain and their massive volume generates huge discounts which are passed onto the public and busi-nesses for parcels sent within Spain or abroad. Get a quote, track a parcel, read their blog or learn more at www.citibox.es .

Cafe Bar Garcia in Castell De Ferro have now changed their opening hours for the Summer Sea-son. They are now open Tuesday-Sunday from 1pm-4pm and then 8pm- Late.

Their Summer Terrace is now open which has sea views and has plenty of shade. For the evenings the terrace has a wonderful candle lit atmosphere. For those who prefer inside dining the bar is air condi-tioned.

They now have 2 menus - the lunch time menu is smaller but still includes home made beef burgers, wraps, Salads, Giant Hotdogs, Homemade pizzas, Lamb Doner Kebabs, Full Rack of Sticky BBQ ribs, Lomo, lasagne and more.

Their evening menu has over 50 choices including the above as well as Indian food including Samosas, Kormas, Rogan Josh, Bhuna, Madras and home made Naan breads. The Mexican menu includes Burritos, Fajitas, Chilli con carne and the New Tex Mex pizza. There is also Cajun Chicken, Sticky BBQ Chicken and many other dishes. To check out their full menu see advert on centre pages.

If you have not yet visited Cafe Bar Garcia then com-ing from Motril on the N340 take the 1st exit to Castell (BP Garage), head into Castell and when you see the Farmacia take the next right. Then take the 2nd left

- Calle La Goleta and they are on the left hand side. If you are travelling from La Rabita direction take the 1st exit for Castell De Ferro. At the junction

head into Castell, stay on this road until you see the farmacia. Take the left junction just before the farmacia. Then take the 2nd left - Calle La Goleta and they are on the left hand side.

Their menu is also available for takeaway. To place an order, reserve a table or more information please call 650 921 132.

Are you looking to promote your business. Full colour adverts start from just €13 euros per month. Does advertising in the Costa Tropical News work? “Outside of Castell De Ferro the Costa Topical News is the only place we advertise and the only place we need to advertise. It is by far the best way of com-municating with the British ex-pat community on the Costa Tropical and many of our customers got to hear about us through the magazine. A little gem” - El Dragon Rojo - Castell de Ferro.

For more information or to place an ad call 958 069 058 or 620 676 843 or email us info@costatropicalnews.com

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Just like cat’s, dogs can get very sick when given foods they shouldn’t have. Children are often tempt-ed to give pets foods such as chocolate and other sweets. Pet owners should be aware of what their pets consume and avoid giving their pet the follow-ing foods. :

Chocolate/Caffeine

Chocolate contains theobromine, a compound that is a cardiac stimulant and a diuretic.

After their pet has eaten a large quantity of choco-late, many pet owners assume their pet is unaffected. However, the signs of sickness may not be seen for several hours, with death following within twenty-four hours. Symptoms include Staggering, labored breathing, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain, trem-ors, fever, heart rate increase, arrhythmia, seizures, coma, death.

Cocoa powder and cooking chocolate are the most toxic forms. A 10-kilogram dog can be seriously af-fected if it eats a quarter of a 250gm packet of cocoa powder or half of a 250gm block of cooking choco-late. These forms of chocolate contain ten times more theobromine than milk chocolate. Thus, a chocolate mud cake could be a real health risk for a small dog. Even licking a substantial part of the chocolate icing from a cake can make a dog unwell.

Semi-sweet chocolate and dark chocolate are the next most dangerous forms, with milk chocolate be-ing the least dangerous. A dog needs to eat more than a 250gm block of milk chocolate to be affected. Obviously, the smaller the dog, the less it needs to eat.

Raw Eggs

Raw egg whites contain an enzyme called avidin, which decreases the absorption of biotin (a B vita-min). This can lead to skin and hair coat problems. Raw eggs may also contain Salmonella.Chewing Gum

Gum contains xylitol, an artifical sweetener that’s also commonly used in human food. Xylitol is known to cause a rapid decrease of the blood sugar content and thereby potentially cause death.

Onions / Garlic

Onions and garlic contain the toxic ingredient thio-sulphate. Onions are more of a danger.

Pets affected by onion toxicity will develop haemolyt-ic anemia, where the pet’s red blood cells burst while circulating in its body. Symptoms include Hemolytic Anemia, labored breathing, liver damage, vomiting, diarrhea, and discolored urine.

The poisoning occurs a few days after the pet has eaten the onion. All forms of onion can be a problem including dehydrated onions, raw onions, cooked onions and table scraps containing cooked onions and/or garlic. Left over pizza, Chinese dishes and commercial baby food containing onion, sometimes fed as a supplement to young pets, can cause ill-ness.

While garlic also contains the toxic ingredient thio-sulphate, it seems that garlic is less toxic and large amounts would need to be eaten to cause illness. Milk

Some adult dogs and cats do not have sufficient amounts of the enzyme lactase, which breaks down the lactose in milk. This can result in diarrhea. Lac-tose-free milk products are available for pets.

Grapes and Raisins

As few as a handful of raisins or grapes can make a dog ill; however, of the 10 cases reported to the AS-PCA Animal Poison Control Center (APCC), each dog ingested between 9 ounces and 2 pounds of grapes or raisins. Symptoms include vomiting, diarrhea, ab-

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Dog Food Hazards

dominal pain, and lethargy. The mass consumption of grapes has been known to cause acute kidney fail-ure and eventually death. Mushrooms

Mushroom toxicity does occur in dogs and it can be fatal if certain species of mushrooms are eaten.Amanita phalloides is the most commonly reported severely toxic species of mushroom but other Aman-ita species are toxic. Symptoms include Abdominal pain, drooling, liver damage, kidney damage, vomit-ing diarrhea, convulsions, coma, death.

Raw Fish

Raw fish contains thiaminases, which break down Thiamin (Vitamin B1). Loss of appetite, seizures, and in severe cases, death are known problems associ-ated with raw fish consumption in cats. Avocadoes

Avocadoes contain persin, an oily toxin that causes both cats and dogs to vomit and have diarrhea. All parts of the avocado are toxic to animals as the pers-in originates in the pit but its oil spreads to the fruit and skin of the food.

Macadamia Nuts

Macadamia nuts are another concern, along with most other kinds of nuts. Their high phosphorus con-tent is said to possibly lead to bladder stones. Dogs develop a tremor of the skeletal muscles, and weak-ness or paralysis of the hindquarters. Affected dogs are often unable to rise and are distressed, usually panting. Some affected dogs have swollen limbs and show pain when the limbs are manipulated.

Cat Food

Cat food is generally too high in protein and fats.

Bones from fish, poultry, or other meat sourc-es

These bones can cause obstruction or laceration of the digestive system.

Plants

Dog owners should be careful of what plants they have around. Many plants can be harmful to pets if digested. One of the most common house plants is the Poinsettia. If you think your dog has digested some of the plant, a few signs to look out for include vomiting, anorexia and depression. Although the symptoms can be self- limiting and treatment is rarely needed, you may want to call your vet. Your vet may recommend limiting food and water intake for 1 or 2 hours.

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There’s a wedding to report this month from this Latin quarter of the southern hemisphere. All very exciting and out of the ordinary, especially for someone like me, who hasn’t a particularly full record of wedding attend-ance – here, or anywhere else for that matter.

Weddings, of course, are one of the mainstays of cultural identity in any part of the world. So, I think I’d expected something rather special out of this particular affair. For most of the time, however – and with my greatest re-spect to the happy couple and their guests – I had the feeling we were all part of some elaborate film set. There was the sneaking suspicion throughout the proceedings that the record being made had somehow overtaken the celebration itself. Tears of apparent emotion there certainly were, but it was sometimes difficult to be sure they were genuine, or more for the benefit of the con-stantly rolling cameras.

The church, for example, was quite intimately small. This would have been fine, but for the space occupied by two sizeable, tripod-mounted movie cameras and associated cables, plus the practically constant firing of flash-guns on hand-held still cameras. The priest seemed quite un-fazed by it all, so it’s presumably become something of a custom. The congregation, too, seemed not at all put out by the frequent panning of the lenses in their direction.

A staggering amount of care had been taken over the rest of the scene-setting arrangements. The reception – which in terms of only a hundred or so guests was rela-tively small by many lights – was lavishly bedecked with huge displays of cut flowers. Table cloths – and there many of them – were in horrendously expensive lace and crystal-ware was everywhere. A Latin American combo played quietly in the background and the gardens were especially lit with countless spotlights highlighting the lush vegetation. Oh, and the bride and groom, of course, looked straight from the pages of Vogue. All in all, thor-oughly reminiscent of my idea of a Hollywood film-set.

The couple are away on their honeymoon in Chile even as I’m writing this. I expect it to be time used by the crew back here to finish their film-editing, air-brush any pho-tographs that need it, bind the albums and prepare for what’s like to be a general release on the couple’s re-turn.

How jaundiced and cynical I’m sounding! I really hadn’t set out with that intention, but it’s funny the direction a stream of consciousness sometimes takes you when you’re writing this type of missive. Honestly, I wish Adri-ana and Breno (the lucky couple) all the very best in the world for a long and extremely happy marriage.

Having tried to reassure you that I’m not just a grumpy old man, let me revert to type, by displaying (yet again)

something of a twisted and potentially Francophobe sense of humour about French President Nicolas Sarkozy. I couldn’t help but laugh (well, at least, smile broadly) when I spotted a newspaper picture that caught him be-hind a lectern at the D-Day commemorations perched on a footstool.

The truly diminutive leader stands at just 5’ 5’’ – which without his well-used 2’’ stacked-heels leaves him of smaller stature than his illustrious compatriot Napoleon. The 4’’ footstool, therefore, was employed to hide his em-barrassment from having to share the same lectern with the less-challenged world leaders of President Barack Obama, Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French Pre-mier, Stephen Harper, all of whom are around 6’ tall.

According to the daily Telegraph newspaper on the 10th of June, one of the French film crew commented that “he knew he was appearing on the same podium as far taller world leaders and would have looked ridiculous using a lectern set at their height. You’d barely have been able to see Mr Sarkozy’s hair bobbing up and down. Combined with his stacked heels, the platform allowed Mr Sarkozy to look as though he was an impressive height, although there were sniggers from those of us who could see what was really going on.” Sniggers, indeed, it’s clearly not just modern-day weddings in Latin America that are stage-managed for filmed posterity.

You have to feel sorry for the French First Lady, Carla Bruni, whose statuesque 5’ 10’’ only serve to dwarf her partner whenever they appear in public together. Her own choice of footwear has to be limited to flat-heeled slippers in an effort to detract from the difference in their heights.

The Spanish royal household, however, has no such problems in maintaining the glamorous lifestyle that goes with their blue blood. King Juan Carlos, maintains a huge collection of an estimated 70 classic cars and mo-torbikes, according to a recently published book – The Business of Power: how politicians spend our money – by journalists Federico Ouvedo and Daniel Forcada. The collection apparently includes an extremely rare Rolls Royce Phantom IV which is one of only 18 made and was once owned by General Francisco Franco. It was inherited by the King when he ascended the throne following Franco’s death in 1975.

The 71 year-old King’s penchant for fast cars, de luxe yachts and glittering ski resorts is legend. But it has also been revealed that Queen Sofia, who is 70, also has a passion for speed. She is reported to have been taken aback by the level of fines imposed when she was caught speeding during a holiday on the island of Mallorca.

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Nibbles &

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hunky Chips

€ 5.95

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hips€ 5.95

Warm

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ith salad € 4.95

8 Chicken W

ings served with bbq dip

€ 4.95

Deep fried O

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ith bbq and sweet chilli dips

€ 3.95

6 Praw

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erones with sw

eet chilli dip€ 4.95

Chinese S

pring roll with sw

eet chilli and teriyaki dip€ 3.95

Large Portion of C

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€ 2.95

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ith Chunky C

hips and side salad€ 8.95

12” Pizza H

awaiian - H

am &

Pineapple

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12” Pizza M

eat Feast - Ham

, Salchichon &

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nchovy€ 8.95

12” Pizza B

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ushroom€ 8.95

12” (House S

peciality) BB

Q C

hicken€ 9.95

12” (House S

peciality) Doner K

ebab Meat

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12” (House S

peciality) Chicken C

urry€ 10.95

12” (House S

peciality) Bolognese w

ith beef and mushroom

s€ 10.95

12” (House S

peciality) Chilli C

hicken€ 10.95

Am

ericanH

omem

ade Cheese B

urger, Coleslaw

& C

hunky Chips

€ 5.95

Hom

emade B

acon & C

heeseburger, Coleslaw

& C

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Giant H

ot Dog &

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Cajun C

hicken, Chunky C

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Full rack of sticky BB

Q ribs, C

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Sticky B

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Chicken, C

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emade coleslaw

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Salads of the W

orld

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alad - mixed leaves, cherry tom

atoes, chicken, parm

esan and our creamy ceasar dressing

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alad - goats cheese toasted onto fresh bread w

ith mixed leaves, cherry tom

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alad - fresh chicken strips and crispy smoked

bacon on mixed leaves and served w

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Chicken “W

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with a m

ound of apple,celery,sultanas and walnuts in a yoghurt dressing

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Mexican

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Chicken Fajitas served in a sizzling skillet sizzling w

ith 4 wraps, spicy

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.€ 9.95

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Body chemistry changes that lead to type 2 diabe-tes begin several years before symptoms become apparent, research has shown.

The researchers pinpointed specific changes in blood glucose levels and sensitivity to the hormone insulin.

They hope this could eventually be used to help identify people at high risk of the disease earlier, meaning action can be taken to delay its progres-sion.

The Lancet study was led by University College London.

It was presented to a meeting of the American As-sociation of Diabetes.

The researchers followed 6,538 UK civil servants over almost 10 years, during which 505 cases of type 2 diabetes were diagnosed.

They examined how the volunteers’ blood glucose levels and the capacity of their tissues to respond to insulin - known as insulin sensitivity - changed over time.

They also looked at how the insulin-producing beta-cells of the pancreas functioned over time.

Rapid acceleration

The researchers showed that in volunteers who did not develop diabetes changes in body chemis-try occurred at a steady, even pace over time.

However, patients who developed diabetes showed a rapid acceleration in both fasting and post-meal blood glucose levels starting three years before they were diagnosed with the condition.

Insulin sensitivity decreased steeply during the five years prior to diagnosis among the diabetic group.

Their beta-cell function increased between years

four and three prior to diagnosis, as their body tried to compensate for the raised glucose levels, but then decreased in the three years up to diag-nosis.

The researchers said their work could help efforts to develop more accurate models to predict an in-dividual’s risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

They said most prevention studies focused on people in the earliest stages of disease, but by that stage changes to body chemistry were already well advanced.

Lead researcher Dr Adam Tabak said: “Our model may help detect people at high risk to develop dia-betes, so we can better target these people to pre-vent the development of the disease.

“We believe that an earlier intervention - before the conventional prediabetes stage - could delay dia-betes development substantially.”

More work needed

However, in an editorial in the same journal, dia-betes experts Dr David Matthews and Dr Jonath-an Levy, from the University of Oxford, warn that much more work is needed.

They wrote: “Does this mean that we find those who are about to get diabetes - perhaps even three or four years ahead? We fear not.

“The sensitivity and specificity of the forward pre-dictions would be poor.

“Now the hunt has to be intensified for the pathol-ogy that causes the decompensation that precipi-tates diabetes.”

Pav Kalsi, of the charity Diabetes UK, said: “Al-though these markers provide a good indication of future type 2 diabetes the lack of sensitivity and specificity means we cannot know for certain, so we’d welcome further research into this promising area of study.”

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Diabetes warning signs detected`

Judy O’Sullivan, of the British Heart Foundation, said: “This study provides better data than we have had before to show that those who are going to get diabetes have signs they are at risk for several years before the disease becomes clinically obvi-ous.

“This reinforces the view that more careful and frequent earlier routine screening could lead to a significant gain in preventing or delaying the onset of the disease.”

Sleeping on a problem really can help solve it, say scientists who found a dreamy nap boosts creative powers.

They tested whether “incubating” a problem al-lowed a flash of insight, and found it did, especially when people entered a phase of sleep known as REM.

Volunteers who had entered REM or rapid eye movement sleep - when most dreams occur - were then better able to solve a new problem with lat-eral thinking.

The National Academy of Sciences has published the US work and commented.

We propose that REM sleep is important for assimi-lating new information into past experience to cre-ate a richer network of associations for future useThe study authors

In the morning of the test day, 77 volunteers were given a series of creative problems to solve and were told to mull over the problem until the after-noon either by resting but staying awake or by tak-ing a nap monitored by the scientists.

Compared with quiet rest and non-REM sleep, REM sleep increased the chances of success on the problem-solving task.

The study at the University of California San Diego showed that the volunteers who entered REM dur-ing sleep improved their creative problem solving ability by almost 40%.

The findings suggest it is not merely sleep itself, or the passage of time, that is important for the prob-lem solving, but the quality of sleep.

Lead researcher Professor Sara Mednick said: “We found that, for creative problems you’ve already been working on, the passage of time is enough to find solutions.

“However for new problems, only REM sleep en-hances creativity.”

The researchers believe REM sleep allows the brain to form new nerve connections without the in-terference of other thought pathways that occur when we are awake or in non-dream-state sleep.

“We propose that REM sleep is important for assimi-lating new information into past experience to cre-ate a richer network of associations for future use,” they told PNAS.

Dr Malcolm von Schantz of the Surrey Sleep Re-search Centre at the University of Surrey said: “Whatever the importance of the dreams them-selves are, this paper confirms the importance of REM sleep, the sleep stage when most of our dreaming takes place.”

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Problems are solved by sleeping

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C0315 – ALBONDÓN

STUNNING 3 BEDROOM TOWN HOUSE WITH DOUBLE GARAGE, FITTED

KITCHEN, LOUNGE/DINER, BATHROOM, WC & 3 TERRACES. SITUATED WITHIN

AN URBANIZATION WHICH WILL HAVE COMMUNAL GARDENS & SWIMMING

POOL.

PRICE 165,000€

C0314 – TORVIZCON

BEAUTIFULLY REFORMED, 2 FLOORED VILLAGE PROPERTY WITH 3 BEDROOMS,

2 LIVING ROOMS, FITTED KITCHEN WITH DINING AREA, 2 BATHROOMS,

OFFICE, LARGE ROOF TERRACE, GARDEN & STORE ROOM.

PRICE 123,600€

P147 – ALBUÑOL

BEAUTIFUL ONE BEDROOM APARTMENT SITUATED IN THE CENTRE OF THE VIL-

LAGE. HAS A FITTED KITCHEN, SHOWER ROOM, LIVING ROOM & 15M2 TERRACE

WITH SPECTACULAR VIEWS.

PRICE 99,000€

AP0131 – ALBUÑOL

DELIGHTFUL 2 BEDROOM NEW BUILD APARTMENT WITHIN AN URBANIZATION WITH A COMMUNAL SWIMMING POOL.

THIS PROPERTY HAS 2 BATHROOMS ONE WHICH IS EN-SUITE, FITTED KITCHEN,

LOUNGE/DINER & TERRACE

PRICE 350€ /MONTH

CJ178 – RUBITE

LARGE CORTIJO WITH 6 BEDROOMS, 2 BATHROOMS, 2 LIVING ROOMS, 2 STORE

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CJ177 – RUBITE

WONDERFUL 220M2 CORTIJO WITH LAND & SPECTACULAR VIEWS. THIS

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SWIMMING POOL.

PRICE 325,000€

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In days gone by noblemen would cook their bangers, burgers and chops by skewering them upon their trusty swords and plunging them into a raging fire. Or did we just make that up? Who cares, because the magnificently silly BBQ Sword allows you to do exactly that. Well, sort of.

This brilliant BBQ accessory is actually a twin-pronged fork fashioned to resemble a musketeer-style sword. It even comes with a cut-out cardboard mask so you can spear treacherous chicken thighs and impale all the king’s hot dogs without revealing your true iden-tity.

The stainless steel hand guard protects you from the flames

As well as its utterly idiotic swashbuckling qualities, the BBQ Sword is a pretty nifty cooking implement. Its fat wooden handle will ensure you don’t drop your freshly barbecued nosh over the château parapet and its comedy hand guard will protect freshly laun-dered cuff ruffs from dripping fat. Maybe.

More importantly this magnifique stainless steel sau-sage stabber (try saying that after a few glasses of port) is infinitely more effective, not to mention el-

egant, than a regular fork or cumbersome BBQ prod-der.

Jagshemash! My name a Borat. In year 2006 my country send me to United States to make movie-

film. Its name Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glo-rious Nation of Kaza-khstan. If it not suc-cess, I will be execute. Lucky for me is great success. High five!

And now you can be owning one-piece bathing suit like lime green one I wear when try make sexy time with Pamela An-derson in my hit mov-ie-film. Borat Mankini Swimsuit is exact rep-lica of high fashion Ka-

zakhstan suit I use to cover my khram in movie-film. It official 20th Century Fox product and even have my Borat film logo stitched on back. One size fit all even if you like big can of Pepsi. Is nice!

It’s all laid out ready for you...go hit the beach!

With bathing suit like mine you can play ping-pong, disco dance, enter spitting contest and give as joke present for, how you say, Secret Santa. You can even wear in your pub bar for friends like very much.

Poos. We all do them (except Her Maj, of course). The trouble is when you’re enjoying the great outdoors and you get caught a bit short. Yes, you can make like a bear and poo in the woods, but doing one straight onto the ground feels a bit, well, dirty.

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Enter, with a snigger, a nudge and a somewhat aghast face, the S**t Box. As you can see, this charm-ingly named creation is a lightweight portable cardboard toilet, made specifically for outdoor use. Available in two sizes, the 14” original and a smaller ‘Little Jack’ version for nippers, it’s ideal for festival fans, campers, Portaloo-less builders, fishermen and kids caught short on long journeys.

Flat-packed, the S**t Box pops open to become a rigid but comfy loo into which you can do your busi-ness, again and again, without making a mess or gas-sing everyone within a 5 mile radius. That’s because it comes with 10 biodegradable poo bags. Genius! Simply pop one inside, pop a poo, remove the whole shebang, tie up the bag and shove it in your best mate’s sleeping bag… sorry, we mean dispose of it responsibly.

Sausages, chips and burgers will be unable to dodge the splodge once you arm yourself with a Condiment Gun. As you can see, this brilliantly ridic-ulous sauce dispenser looks just like a comedy car-toon six-shooter and it’s ideal for anyone who loves squirtable condiments such as ketchup, mustard and brown sauce.

All you do is load up the Condiment Gun’s cartridge (two supplied) with your favourite sauce, bung it in and squeeze the trigger. Satisfying? It makes wallop-ing the bottom of a regular sauce bottle seem about as entertaining as watching a tomato go off.

A h , the blaz-ing glory of our celestial orb is magnificent. We just can’t get enough of the stuff: those magnificent rays of light pouring down through the heavens to warm our chilly British bones. Some even say it makes us feel sexy.

Though when it turns your pallid skin into a saggy, crocodilian piece of limp toast, you’d think otherwise. What you want is an easy way to work out when the invisible UV rays that damage you are at their most destructive, and this is just the bally thing.

The UV monkey is a key-fob sized UV ray detector. Just expose it to sunlight and it’ll tell you how strong the devious rays are at that precise moment, taking just a few seconds to give you a simple read-out on its cute purple scale. Each part of the scale corresponds to the UV warning scales used in national forecasts too, so you’ll know precisely when to pop your hankie on your noggin and roll down your trousers.

Because it’s such a brilliantly handy size you’re more likely to take it everywhere with you – on your keys, attached to your beach bag, even hanging from your nose like a cyber-tribal warrior from the future. And we all know that post-apocalyptic warriors are going to worry just as much as us about keeping an attrac-tive skin tone.

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By Peter Webb

Our alphabetical tour of Spain’s autonomous communities takes us next to the Canary Islands. Hardly surprisingly, given their distant, off-shore location, the Canaries are Spanish only by coloni-sation – which did not begin until the beginning of the 15th century. Indeed, in terms of ethnicity, nearly three-quarters of the more than two million population are “Canarian” – a distinct local ethnic group known as guanches and believed to have been originally descended from the Berbers of neighbouring North Africa. Indeed, with 16.5% of the population drawn from foreign origins such as Germany, Britain and Italy, the Spanish ethnic

group comes in only third, at 12.5% of the popula-tion.

The archipelago is situated just 100 kilometres or so off the northwest coast of mainland Africa, about level with the disputed border between Mo-rocco and the Western Sahara. It is little surprise, therefore, that the islands were visited reasonably frequently by various Christian and Arab seafaring nations. It was not until 1402 that colonisation by the Spanish, in the shape of nobles from the court of Henry III of Castile began in earnest. Neverthe-less, there was surprisingly persistent resistance

Spain’s “autonomous communities”

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from the native guanches, especially in Tenerife and La Palma, so that complete conquest was de-layed until 1495. In that year, the Canaries were formally incorporated into the Kingdom of Castile.

Conquest also came on the eve of Spanish expan-sionism. The islands became the example for a new economic model, founded on reliance of the cultivation of a single cash-crop. In the case of the Canaries, this was first of all sugar cane, but then switched to grape cultivation for the wine that was a key item of trade with England.

In addition to the cultivation of such crops, how-ever, the islands also began to attract new wealth in the shape of traders and merchants. The cities of Santa Cruz de Tenerife and Las Palmas de Gran Canaria became staging posts for the Spanish con-quistadors, traders and missionaries en route to the Spanish possessions in the New World. During the 16th century, therefore, the islands became es-pecially busy and prosperous. On the island of La Palma, for example, the church of El Salvador re-mains one of the Canaries’ finest examples of 16th century architecture.

In the following century or two, both the Dutch and the British made attempts to occupy the is-lands, but were repulsed. It was in one of these at-tempts by the British admiral and future Lord Nel-son to capture Santa Cruz de Tenerife in July 1797 that Nelson lost his right arm.

Having enjoyed their period of prosperity and wealth, however, the Canary Islands fell into reces-sion during the 18th and 19th centuries in the face of competition from Spain’s colonies in the New World. With little option but to follow the direction of the economic threat, wave upon wave of Canary islanders emigrated to the Americas – mainly Cuba, Venezuela and Puerto Rico.

The Canary Islands largely missed out on the Spanish Civil War, since it was here that Francisco Franco was appointed as General Commandant in 1936. When the Spanish military revolt erupted in July of that year, the Commandant joined it and the Civil War began with Franco taking virtual con-trol of the entire archipelago. Nevertheless, as an off-shore, minority colony, the indigenous culture and population continued to be severely repressed after Franco’s victory. Noticeable opposition to Franco’s regime did not really surface again until the 1950s.

A natural and self-defined candidate for autono-mous community status, the Canary Islands in fact comprise seven major islands, one minor island and several small islets, in all supporting a total population of just over two million inhabitants. Al-though some people think that the name is derived from the distinctively coloured bird, the canary, the name Islas Canarias is more likely derived from the Latin, Insula Canaria, which in fact means “Island of the Dogs”. Indeed, the so-called “dogs” were prob-ably the species of Monk Seal (“sea dog” in Latin) which then abounded in the waters around the islands, but are now extinct. Nevertheless, the con-nection with dogs remains today, as two are seen either side of the community’s official coat of arms.

It will probably come as no surprise that the main-stay of the local economy is tourism, which ac-counts for about 32% of GNP and results in visits by an estimated 10 million tourists every year (ap-proximately one-third of whom come from Britain). Other principal economic motors however are con-struction (much of it fuelled by demands from tour-ism) and tropical agriculture. The latter includes in its principal crops bananas (introduced as a cash-crop by the British at the beginning of the 20th century) and tobacco. But, in addition, there is a huge range of other locally grown crops including tomatoes, potatoes, onions, cochineal, sugar cane, grapes, vines, dates, oranges, lemons, figs, wheat, barley, maize, apricots, peaches and almonds.

The single autonomous community nevertheless has two capital cities – Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and Santa Cruz de Tenerife. This continued rivalry between the two cities is a throw-back to the early part of the 20th century when both vied for the position of capital. Since the contest could not be determined, the archipelago was in fact divided into two provinces in 1927 and the rivalry contin-ues to this day.

Tenerife is the biggest of the Canary Islands and supports the largest population. Supporting a simi-lar sized population is the island of Gran Canaria. The second largest of the islands in land area is Fuerteventura, which is also the most geologically ancient of the islands (and therefore also the most eroded). La Palma can lay claim to the volcano Ten-eguía, which last erupted in 1971 (but has shown no recent volcanic activity). Lanzarote, of course, also has its volcano and that one has shown recent activity. El Hierro in the far west of the archipelago is the smallest of the major islands and the least populated (some 10,500 or so inhabitants).

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The hidden sentence is - IF YOU CAN COUNT YOUR MONEY, YOU DON’T HAVE A BILLION DOLLARS

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Northgate Information Solutions is a market leader in providing specialist software, outsourcing and infor-mation technology (IT) services to the human resources, local government, education and public safety markets.

Northgate, which is owned by private equity company Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR), currently employs over 6,000 staff and operates in 46 countries across 5 continents.

Northgate has approximately 4,500 large/medium customers and approximately 10,500 small to medium enterprise (SME) customers world wide. The many corporate organisations Northgate works closely with include over 20% of fortune 500 clients ,90% of the UK local authorities and all of the UK’s police forces.

We are expanding the scope of our Granada operation and creating a hub for Credit Management for Europe & UK and UK transactional activities and support. We are currently seeking graduates with fluent English and a “can do” attitude to come and work in our new Multilingual Finance Shared Service Centre which is situated in the heart of Granada on the Gran Vía de Colón.

The roles that we are currently recruiting for are:

• Transactional Processors for cash receipting and payments, reconciliation of data entered into sub ledgers and dealing with customer correspondence and general administration duties.

• Credit Controllers to proactively contact our predominantly UK based and English speaking customers.

• Team Leader positions for the above roles.

Hours of work will be 09:30 to 18:30 Monday to Thursday and 09:30 to 17:30 on Friday, you will be expected observe UK bank holidays.

Qualifications and Work Experience:• Finance or Business Administration, Translation or Tourism degree• Qualified by experience with at least two years experience in a multi national organisation• Demonstrate flexibility in style and approach to problem solving• Excellent customer services skills to proactively build and maintain relationships with customers

Knowledge (Language IT Skills etc)• Fluent and wide ranging vocabulary in English is absolutely necessary• Full class room training will be provided for systems, processes and commercial knowledge for the role• A basic understanding of Microsoft Office is desirable

Personal Skills• Willingness to learn• Strong, performance-orientated person, able to function in a dynamic environment• Customer-orientated and with strong personal empowerment skills• Good analytical skills, effective communications skills both oral and written

Please contact: Rosa CastillaPhone: 958 990790E-mail: rosa.castilla@northgate-is.com

Back in the 1960s I was on the staff of an open youth club to which teenagers came 4 or 5 times a week for all the usual indoor sporting activities or just to hang out with their friends. With the onset of the computer age such clubs appear to have lost much of their appeal in the UK, but here, it seems, they’re still something of a novelty. So I’ve been amazed to find 50 or more youngsters waiting on the doorstep every Friday evening impatient for our youth club in Salobreña to open its doors.

It’s also been quite an eye-opener for some of us. As our society becomes ever more fragmented and people ever more insular, it has been a real pleasure to watch as Eu-ropean, South American and North African youngsters have played together in an atmosphere of harmony. It’s also been a wake-up call about the genuine poverty that exists even here. We’ve decided to close our “tuck-shop” for the simple reason that it points up a division between the haves and the have-nots. Whilst some of the youngsters think nothing of spending several Euros on drinks, crisps or sweets, others look on wistfully and ask for a glass of water.

More poignant yet is the number of Moroccan kids who are genuinely hungry, some having eaten little or nothing for days. I really didn’t think I would see the day when the prospect of a free jam sandwich and a basic Spanish class would be so attractive to so many children.

But what really made me feel humble was the generos-ity of a number of South Americans, themselves in dire straits financially because of the collapse of work in the construction industry, who decided to share the little that they had – in terms of food, clothing and children’s toys – with people that were culturally very different but clearly even poorer than themselves.

I guess it has made me think again about the lust for more that we so easily accept as normality. Whilst I was on sabbatical nearly two years ago I went to a rural monastery for a silent retreat. It was a first for me and I went in some trepidation. Meals were provided by the bothers and eaten in silence. The many acres of wood-

I want it all and I want it now

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ed land were criss-crossed with paths for walking. The rooms were simple, each one having a bed, a desk, a chair, a lamp, and no more. The atmosphere was one tangible stillness and I soon found myself both relaxed and at peace. Soon I was asking the question, “Could I be content with just this?” I began to debate with myself the things I might add that I considered would be “nec-essary”, like a telephone or my books. Obviously a chair for a guest would be essential and maybe a CD-player or a computer, perhaps. The more I added, the more difficult it became to draw the line. Where did necessity end and excess begin? One of the world’s richest men was once asked, “How much is enough?” and, in total seriousness, he responded, “Just a little more.”

My experience in the monastery makes me realise just how difficult it is to answer that question, “How much is enough for me?” Even though I have often spoken out about the inequity and insanity of our consumer culture, I know I fall far short of the mark in practicing what I preach. I enjoy the comforts and conveniences of our hi-tech Western lifestyle. But it remains an enjoy-ment tinged with guilt – especially when confronted by hungry children on my doorstep.

Allow me to suggest certain qualities that would be good to cultivate if we are to come to the responsible place of knowing how much is enough for us. The first is to arrive at a sense of purpose larger than our own needs, wants and desires. The trouble with desires is that they are infinite. As soon as we fill one desire an-other one emerges. But a sense of purpose helps us to distinguish real needs from whims and fancies and fo-cuses our attention on just those things that really serve our goal, whether that goal be raising a family or a gar-den, money or awareness.

The second is accountability with respect to our money; knowing where it comes from and where it goes to. If we don’t know how much we’ve got we can never have enough. If we’re not truthful with ourselves on where it goes we can’t take proper responsibility for it. That ties in with having our own internal yardstick for fulfilment; a sense of “how much is enough” that is based on a ca-pacity to look inside and see if something is really adding to our well-being, or is just more stuff to store, insure, fix, forget about and ultimately sell at a car-boot sale. It lib-erates us from a sense of “how much is enough” based on what others have or don’t have (keeping up with the Joneses, or down with the Ethiopians).

Like my South American friends at the youth club, it begins to develop in us a sense of responsibility for the world, a sense of how our lives and choices fit into the larger social and spiritual scheme of things. We stop being like children for whom we are the centre of a universe that is designed to satisfy our desires and start becoming our brother’s keeper, conscious of the whole family of man.

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Forget the furry and cuddly, there were a couple of stories in the press recently about minor infestations in Spain of a more scaly and gelatinous nature. Snakes and jellyfish are not for the faint-hearted and even the macho Guardia Civil refused to intervene where the former were concerned.

The snakes in question were quite some collection – two pythons, five boa constrictors and a rattlesnake. They were all housed in a single apartment in a resi-dential apartment block in Madrid, to which the Guar-dia’s environmental protection unit had been called after their owner had been bitten on the hand by the rattler. The police officers, backed up by local zookeep-ers, refused to enter the snake pit, however, until an antidote had been flown in from Mexico.

According to one Spanish snake expert “these animals are dangerous and can devour a baby or asphyxi-ate adults”. Meanwhile, the hand-bitten owner was rushed to hospital, where he awaits possible prosecu-tion under laws which prohibit the keeping of non-na-tive snakes other than in authorised premises. There was no further report, however, on quite how the un-fortunate owner is faring.

From the scaly to the wobbly, we travel to the Mediter-ranean coast, where the summer may well be blighted for millions of beach-goers because of the reappear-ance – for the first time in 10 years – of flotillas of the potentially deadly Portuguese Man o’ War. These are beaches that often see infestations of regular jellyfish, but the Portuguese Man o’ War is certainly scarier. Its tentacles can stretch as far as 30 yards and are barbed with a sting 10 times more venomous than the regular variety. Those who are allergic to the sting risk sudden heart failure.

This colourful, if deadly, jellyfish normally lives in the northern part of the Atlantic, but has found its way through the Straits of Gibraltar and seems set to spread north along Spain’s coast and around the Balearic Is-lands. According to Xavier Pastor, the European Di-rector of the Oceana pressure group “the Portuguese Man o’ War hasn’t been seen in the Mediterranean for a decade, and its appearance off the Spanish coast could herald a process of colonisation, which has hap-

pened with other invading species. We can’t say with any certainty what has caused so many sightings but we are talking about thousands.”

The threat from the Portuguese Man o’ War comes hot on the heels of other invasions which the authori-ties are already attempting to combat. These include the delightfully-named but less positively-welcomed Mauve Stinger jellyfish, which is in fact a bright purple, but which emits a yellow glow at night, and has long plagued the Mediterranean beaches each summer.

The problem is that their numbers are growing. This is probably the result of global warming and the over-fishing of the natural predators of the jellyfish. It also results in tens of thousands of holidaymakers having to be treated for minor stings every summer.

Marine biologists have predicted that the numbers of jellyfish appearing off the coast of Spain this summer will be even higher than ever and the authorities have been planning new measures to try to protect unsus-pecting beach-goers. Along the northeastern beaches of Catalonia, for example, satellite imaging is being used to track the gelatinous flotillas and when they seem to be getting too close to shore, fishing boats will be despatched to scoop them up and transport them back out to sea again.

The environment ministry is also launching a public education campaign, including leaflets to warn beach-goers of the potential danger from jellyfish and what to do in the event of a sting.

Oceana’s Xavier Pastor, though, remains thoroughly unimpressed: “It’s a case of swim at your own risk” he says. “The measures in place are as useful as treating cancer with a sticking plaster. Until we tackle the en-vironmental issues that are causing the proliferation of jellyfish in Mediterranean waters the problem will only get worse.”

Boa constrictors in Madrid and Portuguese Men o’ War in the Med – it’s enough to make you re-think whether Europe has suddenly gone truly exotic and tropical.

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Snakes &

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The odds are 1 in 3,333,333 (.00003%) that you will be killed in a mass murder this year.

The odds are 1 in 4 (23%) that you have borrowed mon-ey from family or friends this year.

The odds are 1 in 9 (11%) that you live with your parents or in-laws if you’re between age 35 and 44.

The odds are 1 in 167 (.6%) that you have blood type AB.

43 children were on the business end of 50,000 volt stun guns when Florida prison officials had “Take Your Sons and Daughters to Work Day”

The odds are 1 in 3 (30%) that you have failed to pay a bill on time this year.

Despite the recession, vitamin sales have risen 8% this year.

The best selling vehicle in the United States in April 2009 was the Honda Accord. This was the first time in 18 years the Ford F-150 truck wasn’t the best selling vehicle in America.

The odds are 1 in 12 (8%) that you (if you’re over age 12) have used an illegal drug within the past month.

20% of 4 year olds in the United States are obese.

The odds are 1 out of 200,000 (.0005%) that you will die in an accident due to “drowsy driving”.

The odds are 2 out of 3 (67%) that you’re currently over-weight.

The odds are 1 in 3500 (.029%) that you will be injured this year by your pet.

The odds are 1 in 4 (27%) that your blood pressure is too high.

Every year, up to 10,000 steel shipping containers snap loose from the decks of storm-tossed ships, scattering their contents in the seas.

10% of all time spent online is spent on social networking sites (Facebook, MySpace, etc.).

68-year-old Linda Wolfe has been married 23 times, and is currently looking for husband #24.

The odds are 24 out of 25 (96%) that you can’t remember the last time you had a salad.

The odds are 1 in 520 (.192%) that you subscribe to an adult-content website if you live in Montana.

The odds are 1 in 182 (.547%) that you subscribe to an adult-content website if you live in Utah.

25% of the world’s construction cranes are currently in Dubai.

55% of all deaths caused by firearms in the United States are suicides.

If you are a pregnant woman, if you eat a bowl of cereal each week, it is 87% more likely that will give birth to a boy.

As of May 2008, 13% of the 100 top-grossing films of all time were made by either Steven Spielberg or George Lucas.

60% of Japanese people will not make eye contact with another Japanese person during a conversation. 60% of Japanese people will make eye contact during conversa-tion with a robot, however.

Fully 5% of England’s entire population own Keane’s “Hopes and Fears” CD.

20% of the human genome has been patented.

90% of Internet traffic today is SPAM related. It’s estimat-ed that 100,000,000,000 unsolicited commercial mes-sages travel the Internet each day.

20% of all road accidents in Sweden involve an elk.

10% of states in the USA have more gun dealers than petrol stations.

15% (estimated) of internet users don’t use search en-gines. They just type a subject, add “.com” and hope for the best.

10% of helicopters serving as air ambulances since 2000 have crashed, killing 60 patients on the way to the hospi-tal. If the same percentage applied to commercial aircraft, 90 passenger jets would crash each year

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What are the odds of that?

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