The Artist – Roger Cummiskey.

A Stroll through Ulysses

Naturally Joyce – an AIA ArtGroup Exhibition.

Photographs and Paintings by: Dr Venom and Roger Cummiskey

01/06 – 30/07

at galeria restaurante LUCIA, Maestra Angles Aspiazu, 17, Fuengirola.

Directions here

12-16 and 19-21 h. daily M-F; Sat. and Sun. Closed.

This new exhibition features 15 photographs and paintings by two members of the Andalusian International Artists Group will remain open until the 30th of July 2012.

Local Naturalist Dr Venom and Roger Cummiskey exhibit different techniques and styles, including wildlife photographs on canvas and oil paintings taking their themes and titles from the writings and wanderings of James Joyce.

The gallery owners congratulated the artists for the quality of the exhibits, and highlighted the good work being done by the AIA. “The artworks bring a fresh look for Summer. They are in complete contrast to each other and yet are in harmony. It promises to be a delightful exhibition.”

The AIA-Group was formed eight years ago by professional and dedicated visual artists from around the World, and is based in Andalucía. Further information is available from the AIA website or the Chairman at 679 923 955.

Art Roger Paintings

You are invited to meet the artists now being featured in CINCO MENTES at the Mijas Ayuntamiento at a special showing on Thursday, May 17th, from 6 to 8pm.

Discover how five artists use matter to communicate joy, movement, stillness and the love of nature. Meet them at a special evening showing on Thursday, May 17th, from 6 to 8 pm. In this exhibition, also open from 9 to 2 Monday through Friday until June 4th, the material realms of wood, graphite, iron, paint, clay and fiber are explored and celebrated by Jenepher Wendy Ross, Alexi Kruyt, Anne Hird, Mark Pirlet, and Pam Hendricks. These artists represent diverse international influences from Scotland, Belgium, Holland and California, reaching into Latin America, Africa and finally, southern Spain.

Jenepher Wendy Ross is an accomplished sculptor widely recognized for rendering horses and birds as pure movement. She often uses discarded iron, joining pieces of metal with a form of gas welding she finds very satisfying. Jenepher also uses other found materials to communicate meaning beyond their original purpose. Bits of iron and brass become cityscapes or even mythical ships.

When Alexi Kruyt discovered clay she immediately knew it belonged to her, evoking the same deep response that she had experienced working with her beloved plants and the soil. Ceramic glazes give her the opportunity to express and communicate her color memories from the years she lived in Africa and Latin America. She says she would not have become an artist without clay.

Teaching creative dance inspired Anne Hird to be especially aware of flow and balance in her drawings and paintings. This is dance on canvas. Twenty years in Nigeria added texture to this dance. Anne’s most recent body of work focuses on the Andalusian country side in both landscape and close up and details natural beauty as well as the passage of time.

The exhibition continues with figure paintings and sculptures portraying human flight by Belgian artist Mark Pirlet and little gems of dry wool felting and other materials by California fiber artist Pam Hendricks.

For further information call Pamela Dalton at 952.485.013 or 647.923.238

Dr.Felices Lago makes a free campaign for the prevention of glaucoma in his Clinica Internacional de Microcirugía Ocular del Sureste which is located at Avda Antonio Quesada nº 59 in the Centro Comercial Euromarina inRojales. The tests will be offered every Friday during the months of May and June 2012 from 9.00 to 13.30 and 16.30 to 19.30. This is by appointment on the following telephone numbers 902365845, 966717357 or 966731949 indicating that it is for the free glaucoma-campaign.

If you are older than 35 years remember it and mark it in your dairy and go to the clinic of Dr. Felices Lago.
The test we carry out is called “tonometry” and measures the intraocular pressure that must be less than 19 mm Hg in normal conditions, the examination is painless and lasts not longer than 3 minutes, you do not need any eye drops, except in boderline cases than it is taken with another machine. After the test you can proceed to normal activity. Most of the glaucomas are diagnosed with an intraocular pressure above 20 mm Hg. However some people with glaucoma have a pressure between 12 and 22 mm Hg. “The intraocular pressure is independent of the blood pressure” so that a good blood pressure does not mean not to have glaucoma.

It is very important to go when…
• someone in your family was diagnosed with glaucoma
• if you are suffering myopia or hyperopia
• if you have diabetes or high blood pressure
• if you suffer from astma and receive treatment with cortisone (steroid)
• if you are older than 60 years (the incidence of glaucoma is multiplied by 6)
• if you had an eye injury (which could damage the system of drainage of aqueous humor)

Why do we do it?
• Because glaucoma is the second leading cause of blindness in the world
• Because it shows no symptoms until it has progressed a lot
• Because the vision loss is “not reversible”
• Because there is still a serious desease that impedes
• Because early diagnosis is crucial

Don´t miss this opportunity to take the test that Dr. Felices Lago is offering at no charge

En colaboración con la Concejalía de Sanidad, ONGs y Voluntariado y N. Zoológico
Excmo. Ayto. de Torrevieja

Reasons for getting married in Spain

If you’ve just had a proposal and are wondering where to get married or what type of wedding you want look no further…. Making the decision to get married in Spain will fill you with delight and there are so many options to choose from. It’s not just about the weather, which is glorious offering approximately 320 days of dry weather per year, but a number reasons which make Spain such an accessible, romantic and alternative place to marry.

• Spain provides you with access to a choice of outdoor venues, you can hold your wedding party outside with beautiful scenery; your guests can dine and party long into the night in the warmth of the Spanish climate.

• If you are concerned about organising your wedding and getting to Spain, you need not worry; Spain is approximately a 2-hour flight from the UK and Ireland. You can easily organise your wedding whilst enjoying relaxing weekends away, book venues and meet the teams who will be helping to make your dream wedding in Spain come true.

• There are endless venues to choose from; castles, cortijos, haciendas, boutique stylish hotels, grand sophisticated hotels, cool and relaxed restaurants on the beach. Spain has such an array of venues to cater for your ideas and themes whether you would like relaxed and casual, traditional or a chic edge to your wedding party.

• Spain is quite a diverse wedding destination with fabulous locations to choose from. You can fly into Malaga and Seville and have your wedding in Andalucía which caters for beach, golf, mountain and traditional Spanish town locations.
Barcelona is a vibrant Spanish city with venues that show off the amazing architecture from years gone by and which also has a fabulous beach backdrop.
Mallorca one the Balearic Islands, offers turquoise coloured waters and is a beautiful relaxed and romantic setting for any wedding.

Sunshine Weddings Spain can help your dream wedding to become a reality!

As a country the culture is perfect for any wedding where traditions and the Spanish way
of life touch your senses. This can easily be incorporated into your wedding theme either
by introducing them into your ceremony or party, or by merely being in an environment
where guests can enjoy the sights, smells and sounds.
One of the most important factors of any wedding is the food. You have the advantage
of being able to offer your guests a choice of mouth-watering Spanish cuisine with tapas
style starters and freshly caught fish, or traditionally cooked meats for your guests to
enjoy. Their taste buds will be tingling.
Getting married in Spain opens the door to the most wonderful photographs, your
wedding can reflect the different backdrops that Spain has to offer, most of which are
within easy reach of each other. These range from natural lakes to picturesque towns
and stunning beach views: your album will show an abundance of colours, scenery and
settings and your wedding photos will be simply breath taking.

Finally your memories will be everlasting! You can transform your wedding celebrations
from a one-day event to a long weekend away or an annual holiday. Getting married in
Spain allows you time to spend with friends and family who can share in remembering all
aspects of your wedding celebrations for the rest of your lives.
Sunshine Weddings Spain can help your dream wedding to become a reality!

If your jokes translate badly and you find you’re a bore in a foreign language, don’t worry, you’re not the first.
By James Blick

I left New Zealand just over a year ago. Probably permanently. And as I suspect is the case for many expats, moving overseas became an opportunity for personal reinvention. Flying out of Auckland, I wasn’t coming to Spain to reinvent myself. I was moving here with my Spanish wife, Yoly. But the temptation to start afresh is compelling. And moving so far from home is the ultimate chance to break with the past.

So, two months after arriving in Madrid I became the new me. I gave up directing TV commercials, a job I didn’t enjoy in New Zealand or Spain, and I became a full-time writer. A bad cliché (and an even worse financial decision), I know.
But within a few months of my rebirth, the new me started to realise there was another identity crisis afoot. Bit by bit I was becoming conscious of playing two roles. There was the English-language me, a pretty true reflection of who I am, and the Spanish-language me, a fumbling shadow of my other self.

The problem comes when I speak Spanish. The complexity of my conversation and, more distressing, my ability to make a nuanced and well-timed joke, is gone. Speaking with Spaniards, I hear myself making statements just so I can make a statement or asking questions that aren’t quite the question I’m trying to ask. Or I might try a joke and get polite laugher, or no laughter at all.

The low point came on a night out drinking with some of Yoly’s friends. I cracked a few jokes in Spanish that I considered quite funny in English (they were scatological in theme). I thought I was on a roll. But Yoly told me on the bus home that the jokes hadn’t translated happily. She said at one point someone had rolled their eyes. I was horrified. The Spanish me was a bore.

Relief came when I met some other expats my age, a group of well-bearded English and Irish schoolteachers. I joined their Sunday morning football team. And within minutes of taking the pitch, we fell into a wonderful groove. The crass humour and bawdy male-bonding flowed and there was an easy, rolling conversation at after-match beers. It was like coming up for air.

With my wife the situation is different. Yoly and I spoke English in New Zealand but changed to Spanish when we moved to Spain. Now we speak mainly Spanish, with a bit of English – we’re probably working a 80/20 split. Which is fine, mostly. But then one day, over a semi-liquid lunch, Yoly said something like, “You remember those boozy lunches we used to have in New Zealand… in English?” She said she missed them. She asked if we could swap into English for the rest of the lunch. And she had a point. In my zeal to want to speak and learn Spanish, I’d forgotten that English remains our relationship’s mother tongue. It’s the language we revert to in cases of love and war because it’s where we feel most intimate. To cut it out is to cut out a part of us.

So, I figured, I just needed to wait. Someday the Spanish me would catch up with the English me. Two to three years, I gave it. In three years my wife would get the guy she fell for in either language and all her friends would finally know me for the first time.

Then one day at a bullfight, I mentioned all this to another expat friend, also named James. Tall, greying and healthy-looking in that American way, James has been in Spain awhile. In fact, the day we sat in Las Ventas bullring he told me he was crossing an equator of sorts, of having spent more of his life living in Spain than living out of it.

I told him what I was feeling. And I asked him how long it would take for these two me’s to converge. Without thinking, he told me they never will. There will, he explained, always be two “you”s in Spain. I was surprised. I hadn’t considered that option. But I figured he should know. Despite all the years here, and despite his fluent Spanish, there were obviously still two of him.

So how does that feel, I asked. I wanted to know what my future held. But he didn’t hear me. The bullfighter had done something good, to which the crowd and James roared “Olé!”.

James is a Madrid-based writer. You can follow him on Twitter at @jamesblick78

The article was first-printed in Iberosphere and is re-printed with their kind permission.

With English as your first language you will ideally have experience in financial services, property sales and possibly accountancy and live within a 20 minute commute of Calpe, Alicante.

Articulate, numerate and computer literate you should be comfortable dealing with members of the public and Spanish and UK legal professionals.

The role will include developing sales from qualified leads, improving conversion rates and providing consultancy services to existing clients from our Calpe office.

Initial and ongoing training will be provided.

A good basic salary plus established commission/bonus scheme is in place for the right candidate.

Please email your CV in the first instance.

Oval Racing reaches Spain

The new Velocity Racing Cartagena Oval motor racing circuit in Cartagena, Murcia, is now open and ready for action. The last section of track has been laid and new barriers have been introduced. This is the first short Oval Circuit in Spain and guaranteed to become popular with the Spanish, who have never experienced the delights of stock car or even banger racing. With a guaranteed 320 days of sunshine and located about 30-minutes from the site of the new Paramount Studios Theme Park, it’s also a perfect location for UK and Irish drivers looking to practice during the winter months. The organisers, Velocity Racing, were proud to have the one and only Mr Colin White, three times National Hot Rod World Champion, to officially open the track, with his national hot rod in tow!

Oval circuits can vary dramatically in length and physical layout and therefore each track presents its own unique challenges and demands on the driver. It’s no different in Spain, as the track drops and swoops and although only 400 metres in length, gives a lot of challenges to the drivers, especially when it comes to tyre wear. Velocity Racing Spain, intend to bring a range of formulas, including 1300 Stock Cars, 2.0 Hot Rods, Lightning Rods, Junior Rods, Rookie Rods and National Hot Rods, with Legends cars hopefully coming in the not too distant future.

They are seeking sponsors, volunteers, marshals, officials, medical staff and just anyone wishing to help, drive or in need of a car to race (they will build you a car to your specifications and budget), so please contact them on (+34) 674 256 147. There are more details to be found on their website or find them on Facebook.