Mujeres que follan: Historias de sexo real contadas por ellas

by Adaia Teruel

I learned about this book quite by chance, thanks to an excerpt published in Pikara Magazine. Then I forgot all about it. And then I saw it in the library, leafed through it and knew that I had to read it.

The book includes interviews with 26 women in their forties who happen to live in Barcelona, although not all were born there. Plus two “bonus tracks”: Candela, a trans woman of 63, and Iris, a pansexual girl of 33. Single, married, separated, divorced, widowed, with and without children, straight, gay, bi, poly, vanilla, kinky, submissive, dominant, you name it — if you must.

Clasificar la sexualidad en función del estado civil o las preferencias sexuales tiene el mismo sentido que hacerlo en función del color de pelo de las entrevistadas. Si de algo me ha servido entrevistar a estas mujeres es para darme cuenta de que no hay una única manera de practicar sexo, sino tantas sexualidades como personas.

The Telling

by Ursula K. Le Guin

“We’ll be making love on a world nobody even knows the name of now, a thousand years from now!”

If this book was written by anybody else, it would likely be considered pretty good or at least promising. Compared though to the Earthsea cycle or, say, The Dispossessed, The Telling comes out as weak and, worse, unnecessary.

I liked the story. This is what it really should have been: a short story. As a novel, it doesn’t work for me. The characters are two-dimensional at best and one can see how it’s gonna end miles ahead. Cut, cut, cut. And yet... I feel that the subplot of Pao and Sutty could have been developed (was developing?) into something interesting. Something truly big. Alas, Ursula Le Guin is no longer with us so we’ll probably never know.

Pao had tried on Sutty’s old grey-and-silver saree once, to entertain Sutty while she was convalescing, but she said it felt too much like skirts, which of course she had been forced to wear in public all her life because of the Unist clothing laws, and she couldn’t get the trick of securing the top. “My tits are going to pop out!” she cried, and then, encouraging them to do so, had performed a remarkable version of what she called Indian classical dance all over the futons.

Книга бессмыслиц

by Edward Lear
translated by Mark Freidkin
foreword by Nina Demurova

In the first post-Soviet year, when we had no money and were surviving being permanently drunk on new, as we thought, freedom, I bought this book from a rickety stall somewhere in the vicinity of Park Kultury metro station. I loved it so much that I kept returning to that stall, so many of my friends and colleagues have got it as a gift. Some of its limericks (or parts thereof), in Russian translation, became our cultural references that stood the test of time.

A few years later, already in Leeds, I got hold of Edward Lear’s Complete Nonsense, a gorgeous edition by the Folio Society, with a preface by Quentin Blake.

Արշալույսի լուսաբացը

a film by Inna Sahakyan

An animated documentary based on the life of Arshaluys “Aurora” Mardiganian (1901—1994). It also includes interviews with Mardiganian and surviving fragments of the 1919 silent film Auction of Souls.

Here’s a bit of info that appeared in the end titles: it was not until 2021 that the United States recognised the the massacre of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire as genocide. Is it correct? I looked it up: yes, correct. Worse still: neither UK nor Spain, as sovereign nations, are there yet, although the parliaments of Scotland, Wales and six Spanish autonomous communities have recognised the Armenian genocide.

Aurora’s Sunrise was the last film of the cycle Tiempo de memoria, memoria en el tiempo, organised by Instituto Canario de Desarrollo Cultural (ICDC), the only one that I’ve seen. Before the screening, the Canarian flautist Cristian Suárez played three short pieces in memory of the war victims.

Ми не згаснемо

a film by Alisa Kovalenko

Five teenagers living in a small town in Donbass have a dream. Well, they have a lot of dreams, mostly about the end of the war, or about getting out of this arse end of nowhere. But the most outlandish one is to visit Himalayas.

As it happens, this is the one dream that actually comes true. Pretty unbelievable, I say. And the film, I’m afraid, does not make it believable — a fatal flaw in a documentary. Which is a shame. I can’t blame the director — she interrupted the work on the picture she had been filming for three years when the full-blown Russian invasion of Ukraine started in order to fight on the frontline. It could be that she lost the interest in the film, at least for a while. That she eventually managed to finish it, after coming back, is already a miracle. In any case, the film as envisaged does not exist. The war added a harsh epilogue: three protagonists became refugees; the contact with the remaining two who fell under occupation was lost.

We Will Not Fade Away (rendered in Spanish as “Nosotras, mañana”) was the last Documental del Mes of this year.

Un amor

a film by Isabel Coixet

Me sorprende cómo la gente juzga a este personaje desde una especie de atalaya de superioridad moral, desde una estupidez que me alucina.

From the interview with Isabel Coixet

If you are running away from somebody or something, a godforsaken village in the middle of nowhere should be at the bottom of your destination list. However, this is exactly where Nat (Laia Costa) finds herself, and, predictably enough, things don’t go well. The men in her way — the landlord (Luis Bermejo), Píter (Hugo Silva), and Andreas “the German” (Hovik Keuchkerian) — are all quite repulsive, albeit in their own ways. By embarking on an affair with Andreas, Nat is simply bound to be judged, by the villagers and the viewers alike. Isabel Coixet says in an interview that she is surprised by the latter’s reaction; on the contrary, I don’t find anything remotely surprising in that. Esto es lo que hay.

But wait. In Un amor, Coixet masterfully juggles the disturbing and the comic; the Riojan locations are breathtaking; and — a bit of a spoiler here — it all ends much better than expected. So long, assholes! The finale, with Nat reuniting with her true love, Sieso the dog, and dancing to Es wird wieder gut by Palast Orchester, is gloriously uplifting. It will make you (want to) dance too.

Live music and stuff in Santander, November 2023

Finally, some rock and jazz! This is what I’ve seen this month:

• 2 November: Could Seed & Stone From The Sky @ Rock Beer The New, Calle Peñas Redondas, 15, Santander
  Two psychedelic/prog rock bands from France. I asked for the names of the musicians and I’ve got the names although not surnames. Could Seed are Jordan (guitar), Dimitri (guitar), Thomas (bass) and Élie (drums); Stone From The Sky are Florent (guitar), Dimitri (bass) and Clément (drums).

  

• 3 November: «Aquelarre» @ Galería Este, Mercado del Este, Calle Hernán Cortés, 4
  Inauguration of the exhibition of the Cantabrian artist Nuria Velázquez, with live music by the artist’s group Concha Juana and some friends.
• 4 November: Peligro Ciervos @ Discos Cucos, Calle Santa Lucía, 41
  Cantabrian country music trio presenting their new album in my favourite record shop in Santander.

  

• 9 November: Safree @ Teatro CASYC, Calle Tantín, 25
  As it was a part of the cycle Excéntricos 2023, I expected some standard of quality. Instead, I found myself at the worst show I’ve ever paid money to see in Santander. Boring reggaeton from somebody who can neither compose nor sing. Best avoided.
• 16 November: Mujerklorica @ Teatro CASYC
  There was no better way to get rid of the bad taste in the mouth left by the preceding concert than to return to CASYC a week later for a healthy dose of flamenco. With Alicia Carrasco (cante), José Manuel León (guitar), Carlos Merino (percussion) and Sara Vázquez (baile).

  

• 16 November: Sebastian Raspanti @ Bar Bolero, Calle San Celedonio, 35
  Maybe not the best singer-sogwriter out there but the anecdotes he was telling were very entertaining.
• 18 November: «Danza de las Sombras» @ Eureka Santander, Calle San Simón, 8
  Pretty unlistenable music that might have been called avant-garde some sixty years ago and sounds awfully dated now. The dance was not so bad but not exactly engaging either. Featuring Cecilia Gala (dance), Marta Sainz (voice) and Enrique Zaccagnini (sounds).
• 23 November: Marathon Jazz @ Escenario Santander, Avenida de la Constitución 39 (Parque de las Llamas)
  Plenty of familiar faces paid a moving homage to Marcos Rvbicón.
  • Antonio Gamaza (piano) and Javier San Miguel (saxophones)
  • Javier San Miguel Quartet: Manuel Cavero (double bass), Antonio Gamaza (piano), Adela Green (drums), Javier San Miguel (saxophones)
  • Rafael Santana Trio: Toño Gutiérrez (electric bass), Rodri Irizábal (drums) and Rafa Santana (piano)
  • Toño Gutiérrez Sextet: featuring Javier Escudero (guitar), Chus Gancedo (drums), Johannes Gunkel (trumpet), Toño Gutiérrez (electric bass), Rafa Santana (piano, keyboards) and Chisco Villanueva (tenor sax)
  • Special guest: Francesco Bearzatti (tenor sax)

• 25 November: «Entre sombras» @ Palacio de Festivales de Cantabria, Calle de Gamazo
  A show by Compañía Sentidos dedicated to the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. Featuring Rubén Borjas, La Mimi, Jacqueline Borjas (baile), Borja Borja (cante), Antonio Domínguez (guitar) and Poncho (violin).

  

• 25 November: Blues & Jazz Jam @ Bar Bolero
  Later the same day, with Dany Garcia (guitar), David Costas (piano), Antonio Romero (bass) and the guests.

  

And two exhibitions:

• 10 November 2023 — 4 February 2024: «El agua espera» @ El Palacete del Embarcadero, Muelle de Calderón
  The last exhibition in El Palacete del Embarcadero before they close it for renovations next year.

  

• 24 November — 11 December: Tipos23 @ Muelle de Albareda
  The exhibition of posters dedicated to peripheries of Santander. Featuring works by Cristina Arce, Jesús Allende Valcuende, Celia Andrés Ruamayor, Natalia Andueza, Patxi Antxón, Javier Clérigo, Begoña Cueli, Isabel de la Sierra, Gorka Gil, Víctor Fernández, Carmen Gutiérrez Somavilla, José Antonio Quintana, Ruth Martín Casanova, Verónica Ruiz Vicente, Rafa San Emeterio and Manuel Teira.