Bye, bye Cordoba

I got up yesterday morning for my constitutional run and decided to make it a “farewell to Cordoba” tour. The sky was grey and bloated with water and as I crossed a bridge over the Guadalquivir the rain began to pour, making my running shirt stick to my chest. The rain stopped as I ran around the cloisters of the cathedral/mosque, watched by a couple of bored security guards. Later I puffed and sweated through the narrow cobbled streets of the old city and up to the running track in the orange grove, before doubling back to Sue’s apartment via Cordoba’s social housing estate. Like everything else about the City the estate has a “toy” quality, social deprivation on a contained and picturesque scale. The balconies are full of washing, old bicycles and caged songbirds, while amongst the oldish cars a dilapidated horse drawn carriage is parked. Outside the “Hunters Bar” there is a knot of not too threatening drunks in stained open-necked shirts and trainers.

Now I am back in Italy and it makes me sad to leave Sue in Spain. She will be home soon and so probably I will never see Cordoba again. This thought also leaves me with a pang.

The picture opposite I took in Malaga on a day so damp that this building began to dissolve, like our memories I suppose.