From the print edition of today’s Público newspaper, a double page spread on mixed nationality marriage; an assortment of news and commentary.
The left hand page is dedicated to the story that eight European states have agreed to make divorce easier with a new law that gives parejas mixtas the right to choose which law should be applied when they split up. It seems that there are 170,000 divorces between these so-called mixed couples in the EU each year, which is around 20% of the total number of divorces.
On the right hand page the main story is La odisea de las parejas mixtas with the subhead cerca de 24,000 españoles contraen matrimonio anualmente con un extranjero – that poor foreign guy must be exhausted and extremely grateful for easier divorce laws – and the piece talks about the inequality of the terms under which the 2,500€ cheque bebé financial award can be claimed after the birth of a child.
This page is filled up with a couple of human-interest stories, including one about an English guy living in Madrid with a Spanish woman. They met in the UK and had problems from the start with the geographical aspect of the relationship. When they lived together in Oxford it seems her biggest problem was the weather, “la falta de estaciones, sólo había dos semanas de verano, la primavera no existía.”
This seriously confuses me. There’s a refrán that describes Madrid weather as nueve meses de invierno y tres de infierno. With global warming, I think the balance has changed a bit, but it still doesn’t leave much room for spring, nor autumn, either.
I’m also confused as I reckon one of my own biggest problems with life in Spain is precisely that: the lack of seasons. It never gets dark early enough in the winter, but it’s not light enough in the mornings in summer. I’ve realised that if I don’t spend at least a week in the UK sometime in the middle of winter, my body doesn’t actually realise the year has changed. And when I go to the UK in the summer I suddenly discover that the days really do have 24 hours in them and you can get up and do stuff before breakfast and still be in time to get the 9 o’clock bus into town.
I’m not suggesting either of us is more right than the other, just intrigued that we should both identify the same problem but totally al revés. I guess it all depends on what you were brought up to. And surely the whole “it’s not what I’m used to” is one of the interesting things about setting up home with someone from a different culture, wherever you decide to do so.
don't confuse the narrator 