KLM thinks that California is bilingual: all the way from Amsterdam the "flight status" video screens have been cycling through Dutch-English-Spanish. They are right, of course. And I don't mind. But it wasn't something I was expecting...

Far stranger was the name of KLM's frequent-flyer program: "Flying Dutchman." I mean, what is this? Fly 100,000 miles on us and in return you get to be crew on a sailing ship doomed to try unsuccessfully until Judgment Day to round the Cape of Good Hope in a perpetually howling gale?...

Catalan cuisine: equal parts olive oil, tomatos, garlic, and salt. Very good. But the salt is quite a shock to the system...