Seriously Mum, Where's that Donkey?

by Parks, Alan

  I explained what had happened, and also that I had read somewhere that Pepto-Bismol can be given to alpacas if they have an upset stomach. Could I get something similar here?

  “No,” he replied. “The nearest equivalent would be Milk of Magnesia, which would help to settle his stomach.”

  I set off to the pharmacy.

  I drove round Montoro, pulled up outside the pharmacy, grabbed the Milk of Magnesia and drove home as quickly as I could, only being held up by an occasional old man in a miniature car.

  As I hit the brakes outside the gates, I could see Lorna was upset. She was expecting Manuel to be with me, and he wasn’t.

  “How’s Santa?” I asked.

  “Worse. I had to move him to the shelter away from Bermuda, so he is in here with Galaxy, but it’s not good.”

  I had a look over the fence. Santa was lying on his side moaning, still with green slime dribbling from his mouth. I thought he would be fine if we could just get the medicine into him, so using a syringe, we squirted it into his mouth. After five or ten minutes with no change we made the decision to load him into the car and drive to see Manuel. This would save an hour: by this time we were seriously thinking we might lose Santa. I phoned Manuel and told him to expect us.

  As Santa was only six months old and still reasonably small, I was able to lift him into the back of our car. He didn’t put up a fight, which was a worry as alpacas don’t like being man-handled.

  We got back to Montoro as fast as we could. But as we turned into the main street, we came to a grinding halt. It was 9pm and dark, but there was a wedding party coming out of the church on the main road – and a traffic jam. I raised my eyes to the sky, trying to figure out if it was worth parking and carrying Santa, but it would have taken at least ten minutes. We waited. Eventually, after what seemed like an age, a laidback policeman smoking a cigarette began waving people past and, in no time, we pulled up outside the surgery. There was a bar on the corner and, as it was a lovely warm evening, there were youngsters sitting outside enjoying cold beers. I went up to get Manuel: he was already armed with an injection.

  I lifted Santa out of the car. He was by now slightly more aware and a little less limp, and starting to put up a fight. We lifted him to a standing position. As Manuel injected him, Santa let out a terrible noise - a high-pitched scream crossed with a wail. He was probably a bit distressed because it was the first time away from his mum and of course his first time in a car. The whole of the bar turned to look at what was going on, and of course, much laughter and ‘aww-ing’ followed, although I am pretty sure none of them knew what on earth this animal was. After the injection, we loaded Santa back into the car hoping, like Manuel, that the drug would kick in by morning.

  With a sigh of relief, we headed onto the ring-road that circles Montoro, crossing our fingers that Santa would recover. As we reached the end of one of the side roads, we saw lots of people gathering. We got closer and closer, and would you believe it? There was a procession passing the end of the road. Once again, a smoking policeman waved to us, but this time he diverted us down a back road.

  Now, we don’t like the back roads of Montoro; they are very narrow and we drive a very big car. The one time we had tried to use these streets, we ended up lost for an hour and had to be guided out by a lad on a scooter. So, warily, we started following the narrow streets, always looking for a left turn to get back on the main drag. Eventually, after passing many an old lady sitting on a deckchair outside her front door, we emerged back on to the road and made our way home.

  By the time we made it to the Olive Mill, Santa was sitting upright in the back of the car of his own accord, and the green slime had stopped. We had readied ourselves for a long night of Santa-watching but when we put him back in his paddock with Galaxy, he started eating hay as though nothing had happened. He truly was like a child who had eaten too many sweets at a birthday party.

  This was the perfect time to wean him from Bermuda, so that was that. He was now officially a teenager. To this day Santa remains a pickle, and likes to jump over or crawl under any fence possible. In fact, I have just this minute come in from chasing him down the track outside our house as he made a dramatic bid for freedom.

  I just couldn’t resist it, they were just there, just out of my reach. Mum could reach over and pick them up from the ground, but I tried and I tried without success. Finally, after much pushing, a little gap appeared at the bottom of the fence and I squeezed under. Mum was going mad; she kept telling me to come back, and stop making a pig of myself or I would be sick. But they were soooo good. I ate them all and I was fine.

  But after a while I started to feel horrible. I felt sick and I wanted to go back to her, but I couldn’t get under the fence. Then the people came and let me back in with mum, but I started to feel worse. The lady took me away and gave me a bed, and I saw my cousin but I didn’t feel like playing. Then the people took me in the big machine, and we went to a place with lots of people and noise. I didn’t like it. Then a horrible man put something in me and I didn’t like that either. It hurt.

  We got back in the car and on the way home I started to feel a little better, in fact a lot better. I was hungry again. As soon as we got home, I went to see my cousin, Galaxy, and had some lovely hay. I haven’t seen my mum for ages, though. Sometimes I miss her, but I have more fun with my friends!

  Santa

  Chapter 10

  Zumba Wars

  By the end of our first summer of holiday rentals, we realised we were not going to be able to live through the winter solely on the income we had generated. Because of the electrics/solar situation, it would be impossible to let the apartments over winter as we could guarantee neither power nor comfort.

  My ever-supportive mum suggested that perhaps Lorna, being a former dance teacher, could start some kind of dance class in Montoro. After a bit of thought and watching from afar as a new exercise craze called Zumba began to flood the UK, Lorna thought that might be the route to take. We would have to pay for her to take a training course, but luckily there was one being held in Sussex during her next visit in November for her granddaughter Kaci’s birthday.

  As it had been a few years since she had taught - and, to be honest we had both gained weight since we moved here - Lorna bought the Zumba game for our Wii console. She worked hard over the next couple of months, initially struggling with the 20-minute workout but built it up to 45 minutes, then an hour, despite the heat.

  November and Brighton rolled around and Lorna was nervous. She knew that the class would comprise dance teachers looking to add a string to their bow, and her main concern was not to be the oldest, and not to be the fattest. Of course, she was neither (and very happy about that she was too!). The day consisted of about four hour-long routines and advice on how to teach the classes. Although it was tough, she got her qualification.

  On her return it was all systems go for getting Zumba Montoro underway. Lorna set up a Facebook page, and started adding local women of all ages. We visited the Town Hall to ask if there was a hall we could use. No good. We tried the swimming pool to ask there. No good either. Finally we popped in to the ‘casa de juventud’, the youth centre. Success! They had a room she could use with a wooden floor and, although slightly smaller than Lorna initially wanted, it would certainly do.

  “How much does it cost?” she asked.

  “Nothing. Nada,” replied Seba, the man who showed us the room.

  “But I want to charge for the class, is that OK?”

  “Of course,” he said. And that was that. Sorted. We booked the hall for Tuesday evenings and Thursday mornings, hoping that we would get the mums after the school run.

  We had two weeks to promote the Zumba course and then two weeks of classes before the centre closed for Christmas, so we hoped for a good initial turnout and then to pull in the ‘get fit in the New Year’ brigade. We even managed to persuade the town hall to post about the classes on their website and on electronic signs around
Montoro. We agreed the first two sessions should be free.

  On the night of the first class Lorna was, understandably, a nervous wreck. She had been working hard on her routines, but would anyone turn up? Would Montoro like Zumba? We arrived at the centre about 45 minutes before the class was due to begin with a printed sheet of information about Zumba and about Lorna in Spanish. Now all we had to do was wait.

  About ten minutes before the scheduled start, a woman arrived. She actually spoke a little English and said she was here to try it out. Then Manuela, the vet’s wife, turned up, so we had two ladies plus Manuel’s daughter. By 7.05, we had nearly 25 women crammed into the hall to see what it was all about. Lorna was delighted.

  She had been practicing an introduction for days. Using Google translate, she had come up with:

  “Hola, soy Lorna. Lo siento, sólo hablo un poco de español. Soy Inglés, pero que ahora vivo en Montoro. Ok vamos a tener un poco de diversion.” (Hello, I’m Lorna. I’m sorry, I only speak a little Spanish. I am English, but I now live in Montoro. Ok, let’s have some fun.)

  And that was it, the class was underway. I estimated optimistically that if we had 25 people turn up for two classes a week, that would go a long way towards our financial shortfall.

  Thursday morning was similar, about 22, and some of the same faces from Tuesday, so that was promising. The ages ranged from about 18 or 19, all the way up to an English lady in her 70s. We expected to lose a few when it came time to pay as obviously some of them were just there out of curiosity.

  The following week came round and again Rosa, the lady who spoke a little English, arrived first. She said she was a dance teacher in Montoro and how much she liked Zumba. It was nice for Lorna to have someone who spoke some English in case she needed any help communicating. Now that the classes were not free, however, the numbers dropped significantly. The second week we had maybe seven or eight in both sessions. We stopped for Christmas and looked forward to an influx in January after the festive period.

  On our return, Lorna was gutted. First class back, we had four people, and in the morning class, only three. Over the next few weeks the numbers continued to drop until we had only two ladies, Maria and Carmen. But we persevered. Even the woman who spoke English had vanished, and the couple of times we passed her in town she avoided us as though we had offended her. After a few weeks, we asked local friends why it was so quiet and were told, “Don’t worry. It is normal in January; no one has any money. In February it will be better.”

  But it wasn’t.

  After a couple of months of struggling on with only Maria and Carmen, we seriously considered giving up but Lorna felt obliged to continue as these two women had been so kind to her. It was not costing us any money so we decided to persist.

  One day, Maria came to class and had her customary ‘chat’ with Lorna which involved lots of sign language and slow talking, but somehow they understood each other. What she said was devastating: the dance teacher, Rosa, had started her own rival Zumba classes. After some discussion, we realised that Rosa must have thought: Wow, all these people in the classes, there must be money in it. We, however, were now making a grand total of 10 Euros a week.

  However, after Easter, more and more people started to turn up. Firstly a lady called Nieves, whom I like to call ‘Snow White’ (in Spanish nieve means snow). She was in her 70s and despite having no dancing ability at all seemed to enjoy it. I gave all the attendees nicknames as I could not always remember their real ones (there are a lot of Marias in Montoro!). There was ‘Tall Girl’, and her friends ‘The Sisters’. Then there was the woman from the Town Hall and one who ran a bar, whom I dubbed ‘Bar Lady’. Over the next few weeks, the class had built up to around 12-15 regulars. Lorna was happy with that and everyone seemed to be having a good time.

  But somehow, the atmosphere started to change: groups of women began to form huddles before and after class, speaking in whispers. Why they whispered we will never know; Lorna could not have understood anyway. One day, Bar Lady seemed to be nominated to speak for the group and was thrust forward to have a conversation with Lorna. Bar Lady is very friendly and sometimes speaks slowly, so Lorna can occasionally converse with her to a reasonable level.

  “Lorna,” she said. “Rosa, she is asking me to come to Zumba, but I said no. We all have.” She gestured to the group.

  There was much nodding in agreement and mumbling. At the next session the group huddle was back, but halfway through the warm-up, they all took off their jumpers to reveal T-shirts with ‘ZUMBA LORNA’ printed on them and started cheering. Lorna was embarrassed but overwhelmed by the support. Since then she has been asked to do a class in a girls’ high school. Lots of them turned up for the first session just to watch ‘The Crazy English Lady’, but then ended up staying and joining in.

  Zumba Lorna had officially taken over Montoro!

  Chapter 11

  Sarcoidosis and Dolores

  As some of you may already know, part of the reason we decided to move to Spain was because Lorna had developed an illness called Sarcoidosis which made her work-life impossible. The main physical problems for Lorna are with her eyes and her chest. When she first came down with Sarcoidosis, she would be out of breath a lot and her eyes would itch terribly. She even had a period of about three months where she had no tears. There was also an episode where her parotid glands (just below the ears) swelled up and she looked like a chipmunk. One of the symptoms that now causes the most problems for her is depression.

  Every so often, we have a few weeks where it is as though she is living under a dark cloud. There seems to be no trigger for this but it can be extremely difficult to get through. She becomes very quiet, does not really want to talk to anyone, especially me, and the slightest little thing will cause an extreme emotional reaction. After a few weeks, almost as suddenly as it began, the cloud will lift and Lorna will start to feel better. Now that we have experienced this a few times and we know there will be an end, it is easier to deal with. If Lorna tells me she thinks she needs to go to the doctor to have a blood test to see if anything is going on, the odds are that a few days later she will be back to her normal self.

  During one of the first bouts we made a doctor’s appointment. Our new friend Jorge had very kindly organised for us to be taken on by his GP, a family friend, and we had met him only once previously. On that occasion Jorge had asked politely if I could refrain from wearing shorts, as it would be more respectful to wear trousers. That was all the explanation we got, but Lorna even wore a skirt! The doctor was a very nice, but stern, man who insisted we needed to learn Spanish quickly as he spoke no English. This time, Jorge had come with us to translate. We explained the problem and the doctor agreed to do a blood test. We were told to come back on Thursday morning and go to the desk at the end of the hall.

  Thursday came around but Jorge was busy so we had to be brave and go for the blood test on our own. As we entered the medical centre there were a lot of people milling around and even more in front of the desk. There was no way to get through, and we didn’t want to miss Lorna’s appointment. Then, the nurse behind the desk called out a name and the person in question fought their way to the front and collected a few test tubes. Then another woman did the same: the penny dropped. We just needed to wait for Lorna’s name to be called, collect the test tubes and go to the room to have blood taken. We had to listen very carefully as the woman was calling out names very fast. Finally Lorna was summoned and collected four test tubes, all with different labels for different tests.

  A few days later we went back to the doctor’s office, this time with Jorge. He said nothing abnormal had shown up but to be honest, by that time, Lorna had turned a corner and was starting to feel better already.

  Despite moving to Spain, and of course not teaching 25 dance lessons a week has helped her deal with her illness, it continues to rear its ugly head from time to time. I know it is really difficult when Lorna is having a ‘down’ time as she cannot see the l
ight at the end of the tunnel.

  Something else that we have had to overcome since we moved here is Dolores. ‘Dolores’ is the name we have given to Lorna’s gallstone problem (Dolor is Spanish for pain, and when Lorna gets a problem, pain is the word!)

  Dolores had first occurred about a year or two before and started with Lorna having a bit of pain, quite bad for an hour or two in the evening, before it passed. Then it started happening pretty regularly and also occurring in the night much more severely. At the time we didn’t know what the problem was, but the first time it was so bad that Lorna was in tears, and awake for hours. We tried indigestion pills, Andrews Liver Salts, Milk of Magnesia and anything we could think of. Eventually the pain would subside.

  One Wednesday night it started again, and this time it was really bad. At one point I woke up, looked at Lorna and said, “Oh no, look at the state of you!” She had been crying in pain for hours while I had been asleep. So I stayed awake for a while with her. Although I knew she was in pain I thought it would ease eventually as it usually did. As dawn approached, we decided that I was going to have to go to town and tell Lorna’s Thursday morning ladies that she couldn’t do the class. There was also shopping to get, so I did that as well. I expected to get home and find her painless and fast asleep. No such luck. She was still suffering, still in tears, so I asked what she wanted to do.

  “If this was you, I would take you to the medical centre,” she replied.

  To be honest I would have to have cut off an arm rather than go to the medical centre, but I heard what she was saying.

  I helped her up, and she managed to gingerly walk to the car. We drove to town, and on the way I called Keith, our good Samaritan. Keith has been a great help to us since we moved to Spain, and if ever we have a problem he is only too happy to help. Keith said he would meet us there to help with the language. He arrived at the same time as us with a phrasebook in hand. Lorna got taken straight through to a room where nurses tried to take some details. Then they called the stern doctor out of his surgery to come and look. With one finger he pressed into Lorna’s right side, just under her ribs, and she hit the roof. Between the doctor, Keith and the nurses we managed to decipher that he thought Lorna had gallstones and we had to go to the hospital for an ultrasound. The doctor gave her an injection in the bum, and sat her up.