My Marbella Moment

mentioning that the mayor would be there and our councillor for the Foreigners Department too, so I did put it in my diary with every intention of doing my best to attend.

On the day of the event Marbella was covered in a thick mist and I knew it wasn’t going to be good for my hair with all the damp and standing around in a park. It was at this moment that I got another phone call from Oti, as if she read my mind. “Just checking that you’re coming” she said, followed by a long pause and then the words “you’re getting an award so please be there.” She knows me too well and was obviously taking no chances.

plause from my colleagues.

That was a very special moment, they were so clearly happy for me and proud of me. Nine years ago I was ‘the guiri’, now I’m ‘their guiri’; another reward in itself.

Linda Hall

THERE were things that ‘nice’ girls and women didn’t do more than half a century ago.

But men encountered restrictions too, although these centred on etiquette rather than morals.

Things like never carrying any kind of package, parcel, luggage or ­ heaven forbid! ­ a shopping bag in the street. Like only wearing navy blue or black socks. Always walking on a woman’s outside on a pavement and never letting her pay for anything in public, in case he looked like a gigolo.

Of course, men were also burdened with the millstone of being his family’s sole provider although this automatically allowed them to avoid all involvement in domestic affairs.

That included pushing a baby’s pram as well as holding an infant anywhere except in the home, as I discovered when our daughter was a couple of months old.

We were shopping in Alicante and had left our 600 in a back street. Baby

I think a version of the