Enormous, impersonal mail from Valencia, Spain. Part 1.

First things first: apologies for the radio silence of the last few weeks. It's been manic. As some of you will know, myself and the senorita moved into a flat about two weeks ago. At first glance all seemed fine. A bit grotty, a bit run down but it had as they say, 'character'.

It fascinates me just how much you can delude yourself when you are desperate for somewhere to live. Two nights in this place and we were no longer using such words as 'rustic', 'character' and 'authenctic', but instead found ourselves using words such as 'hole', 'sh*t', 'stinking' and assorted variations on the theme of 'me', 'the', 'fu*k', 'out, 'get', 'of' and 'here'. It is difficult to write with any degree of dispassion regarding the unimaginable farce that living in this toilet has been. I shall, in chronological order list the grievances which we had.

Exhibit A: the cracked window which torrents of rain and howling wind poured through, turning our bedroom floor into a slithery, damp mess.

Exhibit B: the leaking toilet which had to be flushed by pouring a bucket of fetid water down it.

Exhibit C: the shower. Never, in my life, have I seen anything like this. When I say 'shower' I actually refer to a small square of tiles, mounted with a nozzle from which great gushes of foul water would occasionally burst forth and freeze/scald me. I actually came out of this thing feeling dirtier than when I went in.

Exhibit D: The washing machine. Oh yes, folks. The WASHING MACHINE. On our firsat night, myself and the missus decided that it was about time that we washed our enormous butter-mountain sized heap of underwear and set at the task with a degree of guarded optimism. But then, the WASHING MACHINE intervened. Washing the clothes was no problem. It was getting the fuc**ng clothes out that caused the unpleasantness. The machine was refusing to drain the water (caused by, I later discovered, the neanderthal plumber who had been around earlier, disconnecting the pipe at the back). I literally had to prize the machine door open. Of course, cue the torrent of water across the kitchen floor and about an hours mopping. Then we had to hand rinse and wring the clothes. Of course, it was hammering rain and I had to hang the clothes inside. This, of course, led to the clothes drying out like slabs of concrete and smelling like the lower intestine of the last corpse in a mass grave. Of course.

Exhibit E: the flat mates. Now, I try. I really try. I try to be a good christian, love my fellow man and chortle in a benevolent fashion when someone does something that could be considered irksome. But this bunch of useless, dribbling, bovine morons have driven me to a point of exasperation which words fall short of describing. There's Christian the perpetually stoned hippy from Bilbao, who is basically alright, except that it is near on impossible to have a lucid conversation with, on account of the fact that he is continually monged out of his brain. Then there's Valentina the Italian student. Basically Christian with breasts. However, where as Christian is just a bit dim, Valentina is a pouty-mouth, ill-mannered ingrate with the social charms of Donald Rumsfeld with a hangover. Next we have Stefan the Romanian, who, truth be told, is the nicest of the three, but is congenitally incapable of thinking for himself. I have never met three more useless people: incapable of conversation (in any language), incapable of cleaning or even taking the slightest shred of responsiblity for anything in the flat. Hamsters could look after themselves better than this bunch.

So. Last night we bailed. Enough, was enough. Ya Basta, as they say in Spanish. We have found a wonderful new flat about five minutes away and we moved in last night. It's brand new, beautiful, clean, spacious and has a rather benevolent washing machine. We think. We're having our house warming tonight, which should be fun.

The job is going well - most classes are a doddle to teach. Except of course, for one bunch of hooligans who I have for two hours on MOndays and Wednesdays. However, a couple of sinister Damien stares and a few choice expulsions later and the little gits were trembling in their Nikes.

Right. Better go. I have to go back over to the pit and reclaim the rest of my worldly goods before they dissapear in a deluge of urine, faeces and cigarrette ash.

More soon.

Adios...