Tuesday in Holy Week

It's been interesting to follow today's news stories in the aftermath of the Notre Dame Cathedral fire - with half a billion euros for restoration funding pledged by big corporations, some in the construction industry. They have an eye on investing in skills training for historic conservation projects by the sound of it, although it seems France is already well blessed in this employment sector.

This crisis offers a public opportunity to celebrate the bravery and persistence of firefighters whose untiring efforts prevented total destruction of the building. It's astonishing that the ancient organ has survived, despite the deluge of water and molten lead. It's damaged no doubt, but hopefully it can be restored. How good to hear different voices expressing what this sacred edifice means to them, even if they never darken its doors to worship God. Interesting to hear commentators speaking about people grieving at the loss of a building. 

Photos of the fire damaged interior are remarkable - the cross suspended in the sanctuary over the high altar defiantly still in place. And people again out on the streets, singing and praying, city church bells tolling, acts of public witness by the faithful minority in a secular society, where many ancient church buildings are now monuments to a Christian past, museums of cultural history.

Interesting too, how this has awakened memories of the York Minister fire, and the Windsor Castle fire, affording an opportunity to review the fruit of post inferno restoration work, and speak to some of those responsible. It's raised discussion about the Houses of Parliament, needing restoration after only 150 years of life, subject to the same vulnerabilities, before restoration and eventually during the process. There doesn't need to be a lightning strike to start a fire. A faulty electrical connection will do, either in permanent or temporary lighting, not to mention neglected gas powered appliances. Nothing can be taken for granted when working in these conditions. 

Thinking about 'building grief', it seems to me that destruction of heritage architecture awakens more of a sense of loss nowadays than it did fifty years ago. Modernising our cities led to redevelopment plans that sacrificed many ancient buildings in those days, perhaps because they were too expensive to conserve or find a place in new grand urban schemes. Much was lost due to wartime bombing, but not always rebuilt from old plans, as happened across Europe, but rather replaced. The emphasis was 'out with the old, in with the new'. It gave us Basil Spence's masterpiece Coventry Cathedral, but also an ugly unappealing neighbouring town centre with few reminders of what had been lost.

Apart from walking to the wound clinic, and walking to church this evening, I didn't do much. I don't know why, but I lacked energy. I'm waking earlier as the days lengthen, and getting to bed earlier to compensate, though not always successful in getting off to sleep, and some days miss out on a siesta. I need a total of 7-8 hours daily one way or another, and if I don't, I can expect to pay for it. There were seventeen of us for this evening's Benefice Eucharist at St John's. It was quite late when I got around to looking at today's Málaga Semana Santa photos and video on the Diario Sur website, plus my own from last year. I'll pay for it tomorrow, no doubt.

A striking difference

A mild day, with clouds and sunshine, good for walking, and after a housekeeping morning, I did a circuit of the port and the Old Town, and simply enjoyed being back in this wonderful city, with so much happening to notice.

The quayside Palmeria de Sorpresas seems strangely empty now last summer's exhibition of thirty odd life size bronze sculptures by Elena Laverón under the banner Caminantes en el Puerto has moved on. They attracted a great deal of positive attention from passers-by who now can only walk, and pause less often to take pictures with the life sized oeuvres. Back last summer, I walked that route several times a week. Their absence has given me a far better idea of both the social impact and the value of good public art. How will the cultural commissars of the Ajuntamiento de Málaga follow on from this, I wonder?

International Women's Day is being celebrated today, I don't know about elsewhere, but here it's accompanied by advocating a 'Huelga Feminista' - women on strike, refusing to go shopping, and conform to the common stereotype.

It made me smile, then laugh out loud. Listening to the early news, we were reminded of the many outstanding achievements of women in our time, and how far from genuinely equal opportunity we still are, but, as ever in the mass media, it was all talk within the media bubble about the educated privileged elites of society.

Women worldwide still take most responsibility for obtaining everyday food provisions, and home making. Shopping in all its forms, whether for basic essentials or for rare luxuries is part of a woman's daily routine. The notion of a shopping strike is quixotic, whimsically comic, but makes the point about something all too easily taken for granted, a systemic part of existing inequality. Thank heavens for a little anarchic provocation! But can we think of what a world would look like where all women and men have, make use of equal opportunities, while at the same time valuing the different approaches and priorities women and men have in life? This isn't impossible, but essential to my mind. In every generations, women and men have so much to learn from each other about how to address the issues threatening our very existence today.

Unusual port visitor

With nothing planned to do today, I started work on next Sunday's sermon, wrote a few emails and did domestic chores until well into the afternoon. When I finally set my mind on walking over to El Corte Ingles, I noticed from the end of the street the five masts of a big sailing ship above the trees along the sea front, so climbed the steep path up the Gibralfaro for a better view and a photograph. It's a luxury cruise liner which supplements its ship's engines with sails when weather permits, the largest of a series built in France for Club Med in the late 1980s, but now run by Windstar Cruises.

I then continued walking to El Corte Ingles, through the back streets of the Old Town. Much of this is now quite familiar from spending time here last autumn. It takes under half an hour on foot to reach here from the apartment, which is what Clare wanted me to find out.

I visited the store's electronic gadget department, and was mildly disappointed to see very little that was different from what's on offer in John Lewis and PC World back home. Sometimes in the past I've seen new products brought to market in Spain well before the UK, and things brought to market there which are never seen in a British High Street. Demand for new domestic computers, whether desktop or portable, has levelled off in recent years with the rise of tablets and smartphones, and with the latest arrival of voice activated devices delivering information services into the home. It's no something which interests me much. 

No matter how clever it all is, it's potentially intrusive, and may prevent users from making an effort to find out things for themselves rather than wait for the helpful suggestion from a worktop device. I feel the same about SatNavs too. I'd rather learn for myself how to find my way around a place or around a map, by observation, and only use a location sensing device in support, if needed.

The return trip took me to the Palmeria de las Sorpresas quay to inspect the ship I'd seen from afar. It's the MVY Wind Surf, with room for over 300 passengers in spacious accommodation. There are cruise ships which take 5-10 times that number of passengers, catering for the mass market with high standards, in not so much private space, and these are extremely popular for those who cannot afford premium prices. These ships are all interesting from an architectural perspective, but for my own needs, I happy with river cruising on an altogether much smaller scale.

While I was there, I took photographs of the fourteen 'Caminantes en el Puerto' sculptures by Elena Laverón on display as part of the 200th anniversary celebrations for La Farola, now destined to become a maritime museum, walking past them in both directions. The results are here.

It's unlikely I'll be about when Wind Surf leaves harbour, or that I'll see it with its sails unfurled. That would just be too lucky on my part.

   

  

Getting there

Today is the anniversary of my ordination to the Diaconate forty seven years ago. It remains for me a key day in my life, receiving authority from the Church to proclaim God's Word and preach the Gospel. I'm still at it, and still look forward to the challenge scripture presents each week, to relate what's said in the readings to what's happening around us in the world. For me it's still a pleasure and privilege for which I am most grateful to God, and to the Church for putting up with me for so long.

The weather was warm, but pleasant enough for walking, so as well as going out to get some batteries, I walked the main street and the promenade before lunch. Again, after siesta, I went out for a much longer walk along the coast path, the full length of La Cala del Moral, and on to La Araña, the next and much smaller bay hosting the cement works. That's roughly half the distance to Málaga.

The N340a main road runs through La Cala del Moral about 200 metres inland. There are houses, some with gardens, down to the beach promenade, which runs roughly where the old railway line used to be. It's a good hundred metres from the promenade to the shore, and close to the promenade are some grassy areas palm trees and an asortment of beach restaurants. It's less built up and more spacious than Rincon, and that's more congenial.

La Araña, the next cove is such a contrast. Here the four lane highway cuts the heart of the original coastal village, from top to bottom. There are houses right on the beach, then the rest of the village is across this busy noisy road. The entire place is dominated by the cement factory, looming in the background. It's now owned and worked by a Chinese company. The village looks tired and drab, perhaps because of pollution from traffic and from the cement works. There were just a few people on the beach, but now it's no longer peak holiday season, and thee are more congenial places nearby for recreation. It felt like rather a sad place ruined by industry and not benefiting from it.

I'd been walking for nearly two hours by the time I got back, and really felt the benefit of a longer walk than usual - in all, eight kilometres.

  

Malaga on foot II

I took the bus into Málaga at the end of the morning to visit the church and use the fast broadband to upload photos of last Thursday's fiesta, and rummage through some online files to retrieve old information to work on. The cenetery fates were locked and the gatehouse closed, as the place is not open to visitors on Mondays, but I had the chaplain's keys and could let myself into the cemetery and the church, to work undisturbed by tourists.

Jobs done, I set out to go to a part of the Old Town where I hadn't been before, following the valley road down below the ridge on which the Gibralfaro fortress sits, above the Alcazaba Palace. I bought myself picnic lunch of turkey rolls and sat to eat them in a park opposite a small church, which later I visited.

This church is the first station in the Way of the Cross Via Calvario, as it's called here. There's a Cofradia de Monte Calvario that takes care of Via Crucis ceremonies, and this is one of its places. Next to the church, a devotional souvenir shop and next to that, a bar/restaurant. The church was open, and loud processional music was being played within. In front of the altar a large image of Our Lady of Sorrows, visited by devout passers by popping to pray. In a niche on the south wall, close by stood Jesús Cautivo, though not getting the same attention as his mother, I noticed. There was a crucifix too, somewhat smaller, tucked in behind, at the side of the high altar. The altar was illuminated by two dozen pairs of candles in tall candlesticks. All part of the festivities for Mary's birthday last week perhaps?

I thought I'd follow the way of the cross but couldn't find stations Two and three in the next street. I came instead to the Sanctuario Real de Neustra Señora de la Victoria, a huge magnificent church set in the lower reaches of the hillside with a open plaza climbing up to the entrance, perfect for spectacular liturgical theatre events. Behind the church, and actually joined to it, a large modern hospital complex. The church's ministry of healing expressed today in glass and concrete.

Further up the hill behind the hospital, I found station four of the Via Crucis, the Camino de Monte Calvario, and followed the path to the summit along the side of a valley filled with fragrant pine and eucalyptus trees. At the top, magnificent views over the city, a fine large 17th century Calvary chapel and behind it a large modern building without signage. It may be a day centre, a retreat house, an old people's home. Hard to tell. Our tourist signs still in place declare that there is or once was a Capuchin Sisters convent up here. But what now?

I came down the hill and found a network of small back streets in among apartment blacks, possibly quite old from the irregular street plan. Some of the houses looked run down. Some were being renovated and facades given a lick of paint. Remarkable was the amount of high quality street art on most workable surfaces. Not the ubiquitous comic strip pop art style graffiti, but portraits of heads and faces, with lovely gazing eyes. Some creative people are taking a lively interest in this barrio. I wonder if it attracts tourists?

I emerged from this zone of old streets close to one of Málaga's recommended tourist venues, the stylish modern Mercado Merced and the Teatro Cervantes adjacent to it, a national institution. It's Málaga's version of London Covent Garden. Half the market is given over to the usual range of fresh foods. The other half comprises an open plan area of small bar/restaurant outlets selling speciality gourmet foods and drinks to eat or take away. Madrid has one, so Owain tells me, and I've visited another in Cordoba.

La Merced is I believe the colloquial name for the barrio dedicated to Nuestra Señora de la Mercedes - definitely not a sponsorship deal with a German car giant - the English is Our Lady of Mercies. There's a barrio in Ronda with a similar dedication as I recall.

From here it was just a fifteen minute walk through shopping streets with many restaurants spilling on to street, and along Calle Molina Larios to reach the ferris wheel and a bus back to Rincon. Calle Molina Larios has shed its summer sun canopy since I was here ten days ago I noticed.

Such an interesting variety of places to see in just a few hours of an afternoon walk about town.