The Fool On The Hill

Two of the most important articles required for life in Spain are a pair of scissors and a small pot of glue.

Let me explain. Spain is a country of collectors, not only of stamps as my previous post can painfully detail but just about anything. While my mother-in-law has an impressive collection of silver spoons in a glass cabinet hanging on the wall, the man in the house opposite has the most mind-boggling array of metal pimenta tins of all colours, shapes and sizes placed on purpose-built shelves all around his house. I'm afraid my famous english phleg didn't allow me to ask what on earth his wife thought of the decor

Anyway, back to the glue. In order to increase volumes of sales ( why is money always involved ) the daily newspapers have got in on the addiction habit and every day 'give' away a vast collection of items. On Sunday, for example, ABC contained coupons for a childs bicycle, a series on the worlds' most famous musuems and a book collection covering the history of Spain. The previous day they were selling volume 30 of a CD set of classic music.

As if all this was not enough, also included with the paper on Sunday was a brand new 'cartilla', a vital part of everyone's life. This is a A4 sized folded pull-out promoting the virtures of their latest 'give-away' on the front cover while inside are neatly arrayed in lines several easy-to-follow numbered squares to which the reader is invited to cut out and stick the subsequent 10, 20 or 30 little coupons depending on theb length of the promotion.

Thats where the scissors and glue come in. Just like the cigarette cards that we used to collect back in the sixties showing drawings (!) of our favorite sporting heroes , we are now invited to cut out the daily coupons from the newspapers in order to collect our 'prize'. Such is progress, once upon a time it was the children now its the adults.




Sundays' new promotion is offering the '2006 Michelin Guide to Spain'. Not something I really want but the thought of cutting out and collecting the daily little coupons already has me in an excited state and I can't wait to get started.

A closer inspection of the abc.es web site shows an amazing display of items and collections - it lists all of the promotions currently running, 8 in all, although some have obviously passed their sell-by-date. So as well as reading your daily news you can also collect the following,

1) Book collection of the History of Spain in novel form - End Date 24 Sept
2) Michelin Guide to Spain - End Date 25 July
3) Phillips 32" TV - End Date 10 May ( Damn missed it)
4) Childs Bicycle - End date 23 May (didn't want it anyway)
5) PlatStation - End date 7 May ( Damn, missed that as well)
6) Childrens cinema set of DVD's - End Date 19 April (haven't got kids)
7) Classical CD Collection - End date 29 July ( must buy that new shelf)
8) Book Collection of the Worlds Musuems - End date 28 May

And ABC are not the only ones. elmundo lists no less that 11 promotions, while elpais comes a dismal third with only 6 current collections.

So don't just sit there, start a new life. Find a suitable item that you never wanted anyway, hunt out those long-lost scissors, buy that glue and start collecting.