Book Fair of Madrid (take 1)

Well, it's already here, the 2007 edition of the Book Fair of Madrid...

It's fantastic, 344 book booths, from ministries and other official places editors, editorial booths and many, many bookstores... A huge offer and lots of authors signing in their books, round tables, etc... Really stimulating!

I was there yesterday, but in the two hours I was, I barely managed to see (or should I say 'glance') 1/3 of it... I got some books for my cousin, she's going 14 next month, and one beautifully ilustrated book with tales from all over the globe for my 3 year-old nephew...

I saw lots of really interesting books, including a study of Visigothic tablets and the evolution from Latin to Romance languages all over Hispania (although pretty centered in Castilia), a couple of History books about Persia and Iran, one pretty interesting book about the islamic period in Spain (califates and Taifa kingdoms), some good ones about the History of Africa, some were general while others were a little bit more specific; a book about the Roman army and battles, written by a Spanish writer, a novel about the Varus's Disaster (also by a Spanish writer, I may get this one) and a limited, numbered special edition about the Cantar of Myo Çid celebrating the VII centenary of Per Abbat's manuscript (1207)... Oh, it was awesome! I was drooling all over the booth... ! Facsilime edition, plus a modern version and corresponding study by a modern academic, all in a nice estouche... Ah!!

It's pretty expensive, though (~ €1,200), so I think it's bye-bye for now, and being just 800 exemplars, I don't think I'll be able to get it anymore... Oh, well!

I got a book about a Tuareg's point of view of our modern world, and a couple of language books (Arabic and Italian, for me and my S.O., resp.) hehe...

Once I glance all over the catalogs and references I took, and check the rest of the booths, I'll probably have a really nice bounty for the Summer... hehehe :-)

After reading Curtis's The Sword of Attila (which was pretty good overall, although I will never buy into the 1,000,000 Hunnic army!) I'm now reading Valle's Al-Mayurqy, which is proving really interesting so far!

(Yes, I should be studying for my Irish exam, but I'm doing so as well... I ndáiríre!... After it, I plan on getting back to my books, before I get more plot-vampire-bunnies biting my ankle!)

Anyway, after a quick forth-and-back trip to my homeland, I'll surely have more to tell during the weekend, so stay tuned!

Kallisti!

BDay

Yep, that's mine... :-)

Let's aim for a new year full of History and writing!

For a starters I got a nice food, picnic-like bag to take my food to the workplace, really nice... :-D

Then I gifted myself some books:

• Rubicon, by Tom Holland, about the End of the Roman Republic and the Beginning of the Empire, one of my favourite time periods...
  
• The Sword of Attila, by Michael Curtis Ford, which looked really promising, and thus I got it...
  
• Africanus, el hijo del cónsul, by Santiago Posteguillo, a Spanish writer about P. Cornelius Scipio son, and the Second Punic War... This looked very interesting, and you know I like Hannibal's story so much... OTOH, it will help me to explore Spanish editorial landscape, which is always useful, uh? ;-)
  
• A cooking book by Jamie Oliver, one of my favorite cookers: he's great and really fun to watch and easy to follow... I enjoy his cooking programs a great deal, and my S.O. does as well...
  

Finally, I got a Nintendo Wii and the Zelda game... Way cool, but how the hell do I get a fish for the cute, damn cat?? I've already spent hours and it's getting really boring... :-/

Well, I hope you are having a nice day, I have certainly had one... :-)

KALLISTI!

PS- after a nice, sunny weekend, we are having a huge storm over Madrid, with great electric apparatus, lots of water and a pretty strong wind pushing the trees over the rooftops... Impressive power demonstration by Father Nature!

Dia das Letras Galegas

Today is a very special day, so please allow me to get a little bit patriotic and endure a bit of multilingualism with braveness and patience... If I get enough requests (or I have some free time) I'll provide an English translation, but the subject is the celebration of Galician culture and language, May 17th is our Day! Thanks!

Hoxe é o Dia das Letras Galegas. Os galegos de todo o mundo celebramos o aniversário da publicación do libro Cantares gallegos da gran autora Rosalia de Castro, en 1863, como cúmio do Rexurdimento da cultura e a língua galegas.

É para poñer-se a pensar, non? Unha língua falada na remota Gallaecia, no fin do mundo (un dos moitos Finis terrae ficou en Fisterra, na galega Costa da Morte), por apenas poucos millóns de persoas, asoballada durante séculos como un triste dialecto pobre do castelán, cando, en realidade, incluso o mais célebre escritor castelán antigo, o rei Afonso X o Sábio (autor ao que se lle adicou o Dia das Letras Galegas en 1980), escrevera en galego as suas Cantigas a Santa Maria: a língua do Camiño de Santiago era a língua dos homes cultos e sofisticados; que ironia!

Tras séculos de persecución, polos de fora, mas tamén polos de dentro, dende os Reis Católicos até o golpista, dictador, galego Francisco Franco Bahamonde, o galego rexurdiu como a revindicación dun pobo pobre mas traballador, loitador, mariñeiro e poético. E tras moitas aventuras chegamos ao punto en que o galego vive, e vive moito, e esperemos que por moito tempo.

Primo pobre do catalán, esquinada língua romance que todos esquecen, falando do dialecto maior, o portugués, produto direito da interacción entre lusitanos, mozárabes e galegos "reconquistando" a Hispania, Portugal --e a sua língua-- naceron como unha província galega, logo como reino independente tras separacións e herdanzas... Mentres os portuguese se espallaron polo mundo con galeóns, pólvora e comércio, os galegos o fixemos con emigrantes, fame e soidades (ou 'morriña', que é mais familiar)... Se o portugués, fermoso, musical, tan familiar (home, logo!), se fala en Brasil, Mozambique e tantos outros sítios, o galego se fala en Santiago de Cuba, na Habana, en Buenos Aires, en Xinebra...

Este momento no que os fillos da democrácia estamos, falamos, lemos, escrebemos, ouvimos, vivimos galego, en galego, incluso fora da terra, é o noso momento: nosa é a tarefa de levar a língua aos nosos fillos, de que non somentes viva, mas que sobreviva, que contribua coa sua particular riqueza à História Universal, à Literatura Universal, como fixera, como fai... Eu usarei as miñas armas, a pluma, a mente e o corazón; e as miñas modestas forzas e enxénio para facé-lo.

Animo, dende aqui, aos xóvenes e vellos, que se unan no esforzo: ningunha língua, por pequena que sexa, merece desaparecer sen loitar, sen pegar un berro de indignación pola indiferéncia dos poderes económicos dos fortes, que impón as suas línguas ou deixan que sexan impostas polo Poderoso Cabaleiro...

En fin, viva a língua, viva a cultura, e vivan as xentes galegas: tontos como somos, perduraremos por honrados e auténticos...

A modo de despedida, deixo-vos a letra do himno de Galícia (en galego a Galiza, en portugués a Galiça, mas na pobre língua asoballada nosa, a Galícia, asi como o "galego" é un préstamo lingüístico do portugués, e nós lle decimos "gallego"). Queixumes dos pinos foi publicado o 22 de maio de 1890, como colaboración entre Pombal e o maestro Pascual Veiga, que pós a música.

Este é o texto orixinal, extraido da Wikipedia en galego, e tamén en castelán (irónico, eh? Claro que considerando que o galego tamén é español, quizáis non tanto...), hoxe en dia é un pouco diferente, mas o senso é o mesmo. O himno oficial é a primeira metade do poema.

É difícil expresar só con palabras a profundidade coa que este poema toca o meu ser, asi que non direi mais.

Queixumes dos pinos
Eduardo Pombal e Pascual Veiga, 1860

Que din os rumorosos
Na costa verdecente,
Ó rayo trasparente,
Do prácido luar...?
Que din as altas copas
D'escuro arume arpado,
Co seu ben compasado,
Monótono fungar...?

Do teu verdor cingido,
É de benígnos astros,
Confin dos verdes castros,
E valeroso clán,
Non dés a esquecemento,
Da injuria o rudo encono;
Despérta do teu sono,
Fogar de Breogán.

Os boos e generosos,
A nosa voz entenden;
E con arroubo atenden,
O noso rouco son;
Mas, sós os ignorantes,
E férridos e duros,
Imbéciles e escuros
No-nos entenden, non.

Os tempos son chegados,
Dos bardos das edades,
Q'as vosas vaguedades,
Cumprido fin terán;
Pois donde quer gigante,
A nosa voz pregóa,
A redenzón da bóa
Nazón de Breogán.

KALLISTI!

When History Meets Paper

Well, I warned you, and, finally, I did it!

Today, bank holiday in Madrid (also a catholic festivity to St. Isidro, the town's saint), I went to the Old and Sale Book Fair in Madrid, last day!

There were 46 shops in a beautiful, sunny avenue, a classical Paseo de Recoletos, with trees and, right when it starts, the spectacular statue to the Cybeles Goddess, one of my favourites!

Some locals were dressed in the typical chulapo fashion (couldn't find any quality pictures, you better search them yourself) and quite a bit of people were pekking for books here and there; not as many as I would have feared, many peple probably left for the long weekend (they did ' bridge', as we say here).

The less the better, anyway... :-)

Well, it was nice. I usually get a bit nervous, because I cannot even scan over 1/10 of the books, and I usually have to leave behind a good number of interesting titles... This year, however, I was lightheaded, nothing in my sight, no goals, no expectations...

Therefore, uini, uidi, uici... :-)

I got a 1966 edition of an anthology of writings by Alphonse X of Castilia, a.k.a. "the Wise", including his songs to the virgin Mary (Cantigas a Santa Maria) and some others which were written in my native language (one of them, anyway, galician; or the medieval galician-portuguese variation if you want to be a bit anal retentive :-P ) and then some texts including part of his General History... Pretty interesting, in ancient Galician and Spanish, very cool, indeed... :-)

The other one I got is a Historical Foction novel written by Juan José Valle, Al-Mayurqy (the Mallorcan, which is the isle of Mallorca, in the Mediterranean), which is a book about Yahya ben Ganya al-Mayurqy, who was (as described in the book cover, not that I knew!) a hero who faced a similar adventure to Hannibal Barca's in the Almohave Empire (it starts in 1184, but you never know...) Apparently a cool Spanish character not widely known because he was a muslim. I thought it sounded cool enough to deserve a chance. The author is a Spanish Navy Colonel (which would be a Navy O-6 in the NATO ranking) and a specialist in the muslim world of the X, XI and XII Centuries.

They both look promising, uh? :-)

Finally I got a house of minibooks about farm animals for my little daughter-in-moon, just because...

So, do you have any book fair in May to celebrate this beautiful Northern Hemisphere Bealtaine-tide? Any comments on my selection of books?

Kallisti!

When You Are Ill, You Play

Yup,

I've been most of the weekend home-bound, with a stupid cold/cough that won't let me go, and feeling pretty miserable.

It was a good time, thus, to rescue my favourite games and install them in my less-than-brand-new laptop and play in the sitting room, while cudling my cat and watching some movies.

Thus, I rescued from oblivion Praetorians, Chariots of War, Gates of Troy, Centurio, and Rome:Total War (not in that particular order, actually, but, well... Also, I feel bad enough to ask you to search their webpages yourself, sorry)

Let's go in that particular order (which is memory, not preference):

• Praetorians is a RTS game where you are one of Iulius Caesar's legati (generals), through several missions, during the War of Gaul and the Civil War. You also play a legatus of Crassus in his particular catastrophic Eastern campaign. Things I like about this game is the feeling of being there you sometimes get, plus action, when happening, is really thrilling, specially the siege missions (both the ones where you gotta take a fortress or where you gotta defend your camp). The battle system is comfortable (similar to Warcraft, but you don't get resources, instead you occupy towns, and people is there slowly growing over time, which simplifies things), but not quite realistic, particularly because troops don't run away (most of your units will stick fighting to the death, which is particularly frustrating, specially with cavalry, because you know they could get away easily... grrr). The units aren't particularly realistic, and cohortes are of 30 units, while alae are of 12, where you will need a fairly big scenario to complete a 10 cohortes legion, so you don't really have great battles, but brief combats... It's cool, anyway, and artillery rocks ;) I didn't really played a lot to this one this time, because I had the others, and it requires a fairly constant attention, which my brain wasn't ready to provide...
  
  
• Chariots of War, one of my favourites, indeed, simple yet thrilling. It's a turn-based strategy game, which is easier to follow when your brain's gone jelly; I started a Complete Campaign as the Kushites, and so far I am virtually master of all the South Nile: problem is I gotta get out of there by fighting Egyptians and other tribes, and resources are scarce once you venture far from the river... It's actually harder when you start on a corner, because no matter what you do, all your neighbours end up hating you, hehe...
  
  
• Gates of Troy it's the continuation (actually a patch, enhanced version of Sparta) of CoW, and it's so much better in many things: you get ships and navy battles, better diplomacy and trade, and finer control over units, plus fighting grounds are huge in comparison: still, it's pretty Greek-centric to me, when I like to play as so many Asian cultures, sigh. I played one of the big campaigns with the Romans, who start from Illiricum/Epirum, and actually managed to win, with lots of cheers and whistles... Next time I'll get the opposite corner and play the Persians... ;-)
  
  
• Centurio is an old DOS game where you start in Italy and gotta get the whole Roman Empire, provice by province... It's kinda fun, specially because battles are based on morale, and you generally have little control over it, beyond the local neighborhood of the general, who has charisma and voice; it's descriptions are a bit silly, and it's diplomatic system is, well, silly, but it's fun, and if anyone knows how to finish a chariot race, please tell me!
  
  
• Rome: Total War, well, I have Shogun: Total Wars and it's Mongol expansion (I have lost the first CD, grrr...) and I liked it quite a bit, specially some Mongol cavalry missions... Could be better, but it's okay. R:TW, however, is nonexistant: I have yet you find a computer that has enough graphical support for it: I would sacrifice some graphics and play the rest of the game, I don't need the uber-super-trooper graphics, damn!

Well, also managed to read a bit, and study even less... My brain is still, basically jelly, and I feel like... you better don't know...

Anyway, what about you? Do you have any opinions on those games, do you have any srtategy games of your own into your favourites? I'd love to get one of these to let me script it somwone to simulate some battles, it would make writing The Lybian and Revolt! so much easier and fun! hehe...

Lastly, also watched some Jamie Oliver programs over the TV, (you have his webpage in www.jamieoliver.com), he's absolutely brilliant, and a delight to watch: direct, simple, effective, and fun to watch and learn! You'd really like to taste my Caesar's Salad now that I know how to do them (yum!)... Completely superb.

Well, that's all, happy Summer (Bealtaine and that, Samhain for those in the South, hello over there!) and take care...

KALLISTI!