FEATURE
euroweeklynews.com
LEAPY LEE SAYS IT OTHERS THINK IT O N C E again the festival of Ra madan has drawn to a close. Ten years ago, your average Brit in the street wouldn’t have had a clue as to the meaning or origins of Ra madan. This year you would have to be a recluse in a moon cave to miss out on what is actually the most impor tant Muslim celebration of the year. In fact, it now comes in as the UK’s third biggest religious event after Christmas and Easter. Appar ently some four million Muslims have been fasting this month, and consequently the news has been carried on just about every media outlet you care to mention; includ ing of course the projections and decorations that have flooded the West End of London. There has been a positive deluge of programmes on TV, explaining the custom and how it affects its followers. A number have shown special diets. Times to eat and sleep, and even a series of exercises designed to help the followers get through, what can obviously be an
27 April - 3 May 2023
VIEW I draw the line OUR TRAFFIC JAM BLUES
extremely taxing period. I did slightly twitch at one interview however when the interviewee sug gested it would be thoughtful if nonMuslims would try and avoid eating openly in front of anyone close by who was obviously Mus lim! Well I’m afraid I draw the line there. The idea of hiding yer actual ice cream or fish and chips, because you may ‘offend’ someone who is fasting, is just a step too far. Sorry about that. I actually spent eight years in a Muslim country, and con sequently saw the festival com pletely close up as it were. I do remember one fellow Brit walking through a supermarket in the day during Ramadan, scoffing bananas and telling me he couldn’t care less because he wasn’t actually a Muslim himself. I did feel this somewhat disrespectful, as we were guests in their country, but frankly being asked to refrain from eating openly in my own country because it may offend someone, in my opinion is a total liberty and the sort of inflammatory remark that
does nothing to improve under standing and acceptance of other people’s beliefs whatsoever. Incidentally, I do remember, dur ing my experience of those far off Saudi days, the whole month being great fun for those of the privileged elite, who would simply party it up all night and sleep all day. Nice work if you can get it. Even I enjoyed visiting offices and helping a somewhat devious associ ate deliver illegal alcohol in the middle of the night. After all most of us enjoy a drink at Christmas, I can categorically assure you that in the 70s, Ramadan was no excep tion. It may have changed now, but I very much doubt it. In fact I was in formed that during the 70s Saudi Arabia was the world’s biggest im porter of JW whisky. This couldn’t be shown on any books so they al ways paid cash. I wonder where all that disappeared to!? Keep the faith Love Leapy leapylee2002@gmail.com
Leapy Lee’s opinions are his own and are not necessarily representative of those of the publishers, advertisers or sponsors.
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EWN 23
Strand's founders Sirena and Anssi Kiviranta
AFTER years of pain following the 2008 banking crisis, much of Spain has seen a remarkable recovery as far as housing is concerned and in many parts of the country the sight of towering cranes indicates the amount of new accommodations that is being built. It’s good news for the economy as it creates employ ment and also generates income for local councils espe cially as many of the buyers, particularly in popular holi day areas, are foreigners either purchasing a holiday home or moving to Spain permanently. Whilst there are fewer British buyers there are large numbers of Germans and other Europeans who don’t need to follow the 90/180 day rule, so the market is cur rently very buoyant. There is however a major problem that certainly affects the Costa del Sol and we believe many of the areas where the seven editions of Euro Weekly News are distributed. Basically, the more new builds on previously vacant land, the more traffic and in many cases, the infrastructure is not keeping up with the developments, so that whilst each new urbanisation has brand new roads, they simply lead to existing roads which can no longer cope with the volume of traffic hit ting them. In addition, whilst the government is encour aging drivers to take public transport, there are whole ar eas where there are no trains and buses of course get caught up in the evergrowing traffic jams. Spain has a huge amount of EU funding and is invest ing left, right and centre, but with pressure to add or in crease costs on toll roads, the country will see empty motorways and even more traffic on the free roads.
