Life in Cartagena

It was lottery day here yesterday, well maybe the day before yesterday if I type as slowly as usual and I end up posting on Saturday. Thursday was the day of the  fat one; el Gordo. As usual the number singing children of San Ildefonso and who would carry away the new fatter than ever prize was  the big news story for the morning news. We have a new president though. Mariano Rajoy. Señor Rajoy and his new ministers had been sworn in the days before. The media stuttered but there was no doubt in my mind that the lottery ended up being relegated to second place. Something almost unheard of. The lottery here is huge. What I found even more impressive though was the support for the new man. Not necessarily a political support but just the hope - the hope against hope - that this man and his new team can pull the country out of the deep hole that it's in. A hope that had the left leaning press pulling their punches. A hope that had hard bitten radio journalists finishing t...

This is playing havoc with my cleaning. The radio people have just interviewed a woman from a bank who is hanging around the draw somewhere ready to offer big winners preferential interest rates for putting the winnings in her bank. In the process of talking to her it turns out that money launderers also hang around the draw. They offer to buy winning tickets for more than their winning value as a way of laundering and legitimising dodgy money.

I'm cleaning the flat now and still listening to the draw. The lottery draw is made up of two "tombolas" one spits out the winning number (and as there are numbers 00000 to 99999 there are a lot of balls!) and the other spits out a prize amount. One of the two children sings the number and the second sings the amount. When it's a big winner the children have to sing the number and amount several times as they show the numbers to the crowd, the judges etc. Singing the numbers in the format seventy eight thousand two hundred and ninety four time and time again must be quite stressful. Plenty of room for error. Just now a another fifth prize was drawn. The number singer stopped before she should and, quite clearly on the radio I heard the amount singer say "canta" sing, quite forcefully to her partner. I think that young lady may grow up to be a good person in a crisis.

I'm just pottering around the flat and, in the background, the youngsters of San Ildefonso school are singing out the winning numbers in this year's Christmas draw, El Gordo. It's almost like plain chant "such and such a number miiil euros" - the prize that gets you 100€ for your 20€ stake. As a foreigner it's definitely one of the most Spanish sounds I know and an absolute sure sign that it really is Christmas here in Spain. Just as I was about to publish they've drawn the first of the big prizes, fourth, worth 20,000€ per tenth of a ticket. Not mine I'm afraid. They must be keeping the fat one for me. And there goes the fifth prize, just 50,000€ or 5,000€ for a decimo. Still not me. And yet another fifth prize, I may never get to finish this post!