Green Lemons are Limes

Didn’t See That Coming

Things had settled down, the village was back to being a peaceful and kind place to live. The roof on the house opposite had started to be put back on and as a result, the dust was less and my cough was starting to get better.

Barry had started to make plans for his new job as an outdoor activity manager and was busy planning routes and finding the best walks and activities in the area.

Then it came, totally out of the blue, a strange phone call from our landlady. ‘You need to move out within a week, the owners want their house back’, I was gobsmacked ‘But you are the owner’ ‘No, and you have to leave as soon as possible, let me know when you are moving and come to me and I will give you the deposit back.’ Then she hung up.

I was in a spin, how can we have been renting a property from someone that didn’t own it? My mind went into overdrive, who did the house belong too? If they wanted back so fast, it could be anyone, even a terrorist group.

I phoned one of the estate agents that we had been dealing with, as she had already told us she had sold the house. She told me that our landlady had paid a deposit but never paid the final amount, so yes the property was still owned by the vendor. I was in a state of total shock and bemusement but at least the owners were a local couple and not going to show up in the middle of the night with guns, to throw us out, my imagination can get a bit carried away at times!

Knowing how hard it was to find this place to rent we needed to start looking now, the first port of call the bar and our Spanish friends. 

Thankfully they did know someone who rented out flats mainly for teachers but she may have something, although we were warned she was an eccentric with rather a lot of cat’s. 

I went with our friend to meet the cat lady, she lived in an amazing house, totally beautiful and in need of a really good clean. I really wanted to clean the house for her but my friend assured me that if she wanted it cleaned, she had more than enough funds to hire someone to do it for her and refused to let me offer. She had a three-bedroom flat in the village which was empty, we went with her to see it and I signed the contract on the spot. The flat was not ideal but it was better than where we were being forced to move from. The moving day would be fun, moving from a house you couldn’t get a car close to into a flat on the third floor. But at least we had a roof over our heads and would be out within the week.

Less than three months of us living in Spain we were on the move again.

A Village Terrorised  

Time went by, Dad had been and went, the house was almost liveable. 

Dad had not been overly impressed by our new home, but he loved the village and the local people even with the communication barrier, made us all feel welcome.

The house directly in front of our new home was being renovated, as they took the old roof of our home became full of dust, dust that got into everything and was impossible to remove. It sat heavy on my chest giving the most hellish cough, nothing could be done apart from live with it.

The girls were enjoying school apart from one aspect, the two other English kids. These children were from a troubled background and it showed in their behaviour. They had tried to create an English Spanish divide in the little school but my girls didn’t want to know. When they wouldn’t comply things took a nasty turn.

I had to communicate with the school somehow, so spent hours with the English to Spanish dictionary writing a letter explaining the situation and asking if where possible my kids could be kept away from them. I understood that it was impossible to keep them away at break times but if I could at least make the school aware they could move them in the classroom.

Things went from bad to worse, when I was called into school because Loreena had been cornered in the toilet and now had a black eye. The English girl was responsible and the school would deal with it.

The problems with these two children were escalating in the village with them running riot and even torturing and murdering cats. 

It was a far cry from what I had hoped Spanish life would be like. The whole community was up in arms and before long the authorities were involved. It wasn’t long before the family left our village and returned to the UK. 

Bringing a new sense of peace to the village.

It is my hope that the family got all the help they needed in the Uk to turn their lives around and become the people I know that could have been. 

To see children struggle in such a way is so horrible.

First Day of School

As all parents know your children’s first day at school is hard, maybe even harder for the parents as the children. Add to the mix that you couldn’t speak the language and although they had been having lessons in the Uk their language skills were very very basic.

Both the girls were keen to attend school and although they were understandably nervous they were well up for the challenge. Barry took Mysty and I took Loreena because of all the issues I had had getting her to go into school in the Uk.

We were shown which lines to join and a few other parents waited in line with their children.

Then the bell, well more of a siren went and it was time for the children to go in and the adults to melt away.

Barry continued in with Mysty, but for Loreena I felt it would be better if I handed her to her new teacher and left. As we reached the door the teacher who was waiting to take the now crying and shaking Loreena by the hand, at that moment a beautiful smiling little girl appeared and took Loreena’s other hand. I took my chance and left for a bit of cry.

It turns out that the little girl was an orphan and her sister was in Mysty’s class and had done the same thing for her. Both these wonderful children had taken it on themselves to sit the new girls next to them and look after them.

They would be strong friends for that first term, right up to the time when the sisters were adopted and went to live in a city far away with their new parents.

I was lucky enough to meet them with their new family before they left and you could see that they already loved the girls and would give them a wonderful life.

We as a family will never forget the kindness given by two beautiful children who had suffered so much.

The girls came running out of school with smiling faces that day, even though they didn’t understand much, they were ok. The system was based around play so the perfect environment for my girls to learn the language quickly.

Even at that young age, they decided that at school they would only ever talk to each other in Spanish.

I was also paying for them to have school dinners, so they would become more integrated with both the other students, culture and food.