While I have been working most of my spare time, there are a couple of new experiences I am happy to share. Here is one of them.
Police. Or Policia Zaragoza. The other night I was driving home and turned left off the main street to my hotel. Just as I stopped in front of the underground parking gates of my hotel, a little police car pulled up behind with their lights flashing. Was I speeding? Did I cut someone off? Did I make a wrong turn?
The policeman spoke quite good English once I told him I did not speak castelliano (Spanish' that is). He asked me where I was from. Once I told him I was from Canada you would have thought the guy was a friend of mine from long time ago. He wanted to tell me that he heard lots of good things about Canada and one day he would like to go there. I told him I was from the west coast, Victoria, which just made him so much happier. Of course, being a polite tourist-like entity I am, I had to remind him that he does live in a very nice country, with lots of neat history, excellent food and cheap wine. He was still quite keen on visiting Canada, to which I had to remain encouraging and very pleased of his enthusiasm (I do already miss the greenery in Victoria, not the rain, yet).
In the end, after asking me a few more questions, he suggested an alternative way to turn to the hotel driveway and drove off with his cop-partner.
Conclusion: Spanish cops are much more forgiving and less materialistic than my Lithuanian cop friends. On my last trip to Lithuania just over a month ago I did have to volunteer some hard-earned cash in exchange for a friendly conversation about new Lithuanian traffic signal rules. I suppose Lithuania is further east and less people know about a country called Canada.
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