Hola Funky Media listeners its Michelle/ Essex with this week's news on the Costa del Sol and it's day 205 in Spain of the current situation and to be honest, nothing much has really changed here over the last week, except for Storm Alex that blitzed through Malaga province this week. Its the first storm of the season that we've had, and didn't we know it. We went from 32 degrees on Thursday to a mere 22 degrees on Friday. Now, I know that doesn't sound really bad to those of you in the UK but 10 degree drop hit us like a brick. I went from my summer closet to my winter closet in a matter of hours. It was cold, it was massively windy. In some places the wind reached up to 70 kilometers per hour. Although we got hardly any rain. It sure did turn nippy, really really quick and then on Saturday we were back to sunshine and warmth. Now, I hope the sunshine and warm continues, but we could use some rain here, to be honest.

Now on a sad note the Hotel Yaramar in Fuengirola closed its doors on October the fourth, and is not due to reopen until April 2021, due to this awful pandemic. This is a first for the Yaramar, which is a very very popular adult only hotel. When I say adult only hotel I don't mean it's a kinky hotel for adults, I mean, they just don't take children under the age of 16 and it's normally open all year round, especially this time of year because you get your, what they call golden holidays. Your pensioners and stuff that are coming out to have a nice holiday, a bit of peace and quiet, not so many children around because they're back in school. So, it's really hard to see these giant chains closing down for the winter. I mean I can remember back in my days at Thomson holidays I booked a lot of people into the Yaramar over the winter. Now this of course is going to attack our economy even further here, and it's looking like tourism will be dead for the winter period here as well. Everyone seems to be focusing on Easter of next year and from what we understand the Spanish government is still in talks with the UK government to try and reach an agreement to ensure safe corridors of travel. Now, whatever that is, I hope they managed to sort it out, because they really need the tourism here it is really hurting out there there's a lot of places that are closing.

Now, moving on. There were some Syrian asylum seekers being left on the streets in Spain after being deported from the UK this week. The UK and EU governments are being accused of playing games with the lives of refugees. After asylum seekers were forced to spend a night on streets in Madrid, after being removed from Britain. Now, there's 11 men, all of whom recently cross the English Channel to Britain. I just want to reiterate that part, reiterate excuse me that part. Eleven men, all recently crossed the English Channel to Britain, and were forcibly removed from the UK on a charter flight last Thursday, under an EU law called the Dublin lll. Now, I completely get that you, from what I've heard you've got about 7000 asylum seekers, which are being housed in hotels, army barracks, and now they're even trying to figure out some sort of floating accommodation for them. So, I can, I could totally get, you know, but only 11, eleven out of 7000. My goodness, as I said, a few weeks ago, I always thought that you had to claim asylum in the first democratic country you came to. Now, one of the men filmed himself and other Syrian asylum seekers after arriving in Madrid. They were sitting on the ground with tarpaulin bags in broad daylight outside the airport. So that tells us that they've got smartphones, um they've got technology. I'm wondering where they're charging these things, to be honest. Another man said is, he has an aunt and cousins in the UK, but he's been refused entry. Immigration guards deported him to Spain, because he had an ongoing legal case here, that's fair enough if he'd already started the asylum seeking process off in Spain, then, yeah, absolutely. He should have continued here. He was placed in handcuffs and accompanied by five officers to the airport and placed on a flight. I think that was a little bit heavy handed personally, why they needed five officers, I don't know, I'm hoping he's not a danger that's been released in Spain but you know it's, it's just what you do with all these people it's just a really sad situation isn't it? The UK authorities told them the Spanish authorities would sort out their stuff in Spain. Good luck with that one because when you come to Spain, they are not going to put you in a four star hotel, they are not going to put you in army barracks, and they are certainly not going to put you on a cruise ship out on Malaga Port. So can't see that happening. The Home Office said it was under no obligation to monitor the treatment of asylum seekers who have returned to an EU country, which is responsible for their claim. I go along with a Home Office on that. Absolutely right they got claims in other countries, they should be deported back there.

Right, moving on. This made me laugh this week. A British Wildlife Park has removed five African Grey Parrots from public view, because of the fowls foul behavior. Now Lincolnshire Wildlife Park adopted the parrots about six weeks ago and put them in quarantine together and during their time together the birds have shared this ability to curse up a storm. According to Steve Nichols, the park CEO, he gets called a "Fat Tart" every time he walks past. Can you imagine. I mean, you wouldn't want to take a school trip up there and have little Barry and little Jenny called a "Fat Tart" as they are walking past these cages. Well, for the last 25 years they've taken in parrots that sometimes have a bit of blue language, but they've kind of gotten used to that and he says every now and then you'll get one this swears and it's funny, and they find it comical, and just by coincidence, they took in five parrots in the same week and because they were all quarantined together. It meant that one room was just full of swearing birds and the more they swear. The more, the employees laughed, which then triggers them to swear again and Nichols said that the cursing birds sounded like an old working men's club, they we just all swearing and laughing I mean can you absolutely imagine that, I bet that would be really hilarious. Although he and fellow Park employees found the whole thing funny, they did have to remove the cursing birds out of view before any visiting kids heard them. Ahh yeah, not very family friendly I gotta say. The birds have been moved now to different parts of the park. So at least they're like separated, lets separate the perpetrators. Nichols says that he hopes the cursing parrots learn nicer words from their new cage mates, because he dreads the alternative, and the alternative is, if they teach each other bad language, they will end up with 250 swearing birds and not a sign of a Partridge in a pear tree.

Right now I want to ask a question and this is something that really puzzles me and it's to do with vegetarians. Now, I don't want to offend any vegetarians, I personally am not a vegetarian. I eat what I want to eat but I understand why people become vegetarians, you know, it can be for a plant based diet because it's a healthy option or they're really dead serious about animal cruelty, but so far this week I've seen Burgers Sausages, Bacon, and "Tofurkey". Now, I understand that Burgers Sausages and Nuggets are shapes not animals, but what the heck is a Tofurky ? and how much nut roast can a person eat anyway ? Most of these products are wheat based which is no good for me cos I'm gluten intolerant so it wouldn't do for me to be a vegetarian. Although I do have a couple of vegetarian meals a week. You know, like a jacket potato with baked beans in it or an egg and cheese salad because to be honest, I'm a really lazy cow I hate cooking and if I don't have to cook I wont but I don't get why vegetarians need to make things taste like meat. I'd love somebody to explain this to me. For me, the big problem will start when they stop making wine, because of cruelty to grapes, all those people treading on them, its terrible. I might have to go on Twitter and start a new hashtag you know hashtag GLM, Grapes Lives Matter.

Well, that's it for this week. I'll be back with you next week with more stories and nutty news and of course, what's going on here on the Costa del Sol. Until then, I wish you all a great week. I hope you'll stay happy and healthy and from me Hasta Luego on the Costa del Sol.

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