Andaluc铆a, Espa帽a
Hola a todos!! 馃槉
Compared to Italia
and France, Spain seems to be the quiet-but-fetching sister in that love story
where we’re only now discovering her wonderful charms.
One such charm is the
beauty of C贸rdoba, a city whose population in the year 1000 (over 1000 years
ago) numbered more than 500 000 …. when today’s great cities like London and
Paris were home only to a paltry 15, 000 or so.
Like most
important and strategic areas around the Mediterranean, C贸rdoba was first
founded by the Romans, and for that, we still have some incredible reminders.... like these columns....
...... or this water mill which we ended up visiting quite often....
.
... for some obvious reasons. Yes, Linda still loves cats.
However,
C贸rdoba’s Golden Age came with
the Moors who made it their capital.
Actually, it’s importance and size grew to rival that of Baghdad and Constantinople …
...the two biggies of the Western World
back then ...
….. leaving us today with a city well worthy of “must-do status” on anyone’s bucket list.
In
fact, one morning, as I was walking down one of the many narrow alleyways of C贸rdoba’s
historic centre, ....
...the sun just starting to make its way down the white stuccoed
walls of the tight passageway, ...
I realized that these cobblestones were much more than indispensable corridors to get from one place to another.
Indeed, each narrow streets was a recording, a page of history, …. and more than likely, were it able to speak, an adventure novel.
Just
imagine a 10th-century C贸rdoba, with street lighting, over 500 mosques, schooling for all while 99% of Europe was illiterate, 50
hospitals … with running water!,...
... 300 public baths (at a time when cleanliness in Christian Europe was
regarded as a sin), 4,000 public markets and 70 libraries – one of which
held some 500,000 books!
All of this, at
a time when cities in Northern Europe were largely illiterate and unhealthy, and
at intervals ...
.... struggling with catastrophic diseases like the Bubonic Plague.
.... struggling with catastrophic diseases like the Bubonic Plague.
In fact, during these “Dark Ages”, Europe had
all but forgotten the technical advances that even the Romans had left them some
600 years earlier.
The Moors are
credited with reintroducing scholarship to Spain, something which eventually
percolated up to the rest of Europe,....
.....providing it with the impetus to lift itself out of the “Dark Ages” and start its all-important journey into the Renaissance, that “gateway” period into the modern world.
.....providing it with the impetus to lift itself out of the “Dark Ages” and start its all-important journey into the Renaissance, that “gateway” period into the modern world.
During Islam’s Golden Age (750 – 1258), learning and scholarship held such a place of importance that rulers across the Arab world competed to develop great centres of learning.
What is
interesting for all of us today, is that this mindset was and remains consistent
with the teachings of Islam and Mohammad, who believed ...
.... that “the scholar’s ink is holier than the martyr’s blood” and...
.... that “seeking knowledge was a requirement for every Muslim”.
.... that “the scholar’s ink is holier than the martyr’s blood” and...
.... that “seeking knowledge was a requirement for every Muslim”.
So dynamic was
Islam during this period, that Arabic became the international language of
scholarship.
Manuscripts from all the forgotten Greek,
Latin, ancient Egyptian and even Chinese scholars were translated into Arabic….
.... creating an environment that generated great intellectuals and promoted the
development of higher mathematics (the word algebra
is Arabic), medicine, navigation, agriculture, and architecture.
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This was the Christian cathedral built
inside the Great Mosque.
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And so, Cordoba
became a world centre of knowledge and a magnet for scholars and business men
of all faiths...
.... and from both Eastern and Western Europe.
Still a great lesson for us all today.
.... and from both Eastern and Western Europe.
Still a great lesson for us all today.
Today we see only
the vestiges of all of this but in a word, the city remains captivating!
And by the way:
We came upon some some Spanish “false friends”
Learning
Spanish can be tricky. For example:
a) ropa
is not rope, it means clothes
b) sopa is not soap,
it means soup,
c) 茅xito is not exit, it means success,
d) and you’ll
get yourself all tied up in a knot if you think nudo means nude.
e) And oh yes, emabarazada might only at times have something to do with embarrassment because it means pregnant.
To remember: Sometimes you can play with
words to remember them. Here is one:
butter is mantequilla (meant-to-kill-ya). ☺
Two Spanish jokes:
In
Spain, a lot of joking goes on between the fans of different soccer towns. Here are two about Cordoba aficionados whose
team is renowned for losing:
Q: What is the difference between a Cordoba
fan and a baby?
A: After a while, the baby stops whining.
Q: Why is a new Cordoba CF official
cologne creating a lot of buzz?
A: You wear it and the other guy scores.
We had the opportunity to watch a combination of equestrian horsemanship and flamenco dancing. Have a look!
A
meeting in Fuengirola:
For those who remember, we had a chance
meeting in Seville with Bob and Joce’s friends, Chuck and Beverly. We had a wonderful day together here in
Fuengirola which included lots of talking, eating, and watching the waves. A huge thank you to all for coming over.
A
family visit:
We were most fortunate to also have a visit
from my brother, James, and his wife, Sally.
We did a review of some our favorite haunts like Mijas and Ronda ...
and
spent a full day in Gibraltar ....
with some other monkeys as well, way up on the top of the mountain.
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| A baby's kiss! |
Thanks for reading along and “Hasta la pr贸xima”
when we’ll invite you to see Granada with us.
A lot of monkeying around......
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