The Trip to Spain Page #9

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then he incorporated the fake

sequel into his real sequel,

so he made that part of the story.

So when he's out, was on his

travels in the second book,

he bumps into people who'd

read the fake sequel,

and so he can slag it off

within the pages as Don Quixote.

That is so bold and innovative,

and it's 500 years ago.

So, effectively he was postmodern,

before there was any

modern to be post about.

- Amazing.

- Cervantes, of course, when he was 37,

he married a 19-year-old.

- Impressive for a man with one arm.

- 30 years ago, when I came to Spain,

I was 18 years old, and I was

pursuing a 37-year-old woman.

- She was 37, so the reverse.

- The reverse, the reverse.

- I wasn't doing that kind of

cliche with a younger woman.

- No, absolutely not.

- She was older than me.

- Would you now be with

a woman 20 years older?

- Well, I don't, that's, I

think that that's, that's...

- I'll ask again.

Would you now be with a woman 20,

a 70-year-old?

- Honestly that's academic.

That's academic.

- She could be in any

profession, it doesn't matter.

- He imagined that the inns

were castles, didn't he?

In his imagination.

- Indeed.

- We've been staying in inns.

- Well, we've been literally

staying in castles.

- Sorry, we have, yeah.

We've been staying in

castles, I think they're inns.

He stayed in inns, but he

thought they were castles,

so it's, uh, like, uh...

- The other way around.

- Circle in a spiral.

Like a wheel within a wheel.

- Yes.

- Never ending or beginning

on an ever-spinning reel.

- Yeah.

- Like the circles that you find

in the h-windmills of your mind.

- H-windmills.

- H-windmills.

- That could be a postmodern manifesto.

It really could.

- Or a lovely song

from the '70s.

- Spanish Fly, Rob

Brydon, Steve Coogan.

Wonderful stuff from them.

Now don't forget come along

with us this morning...

- Let me just interrupt you there,

Old Kineebles, me old friend.

- Ah.

- Because anyone who is anyone will know

that the title of the song by Herb Albert

is Spanish Flea, not Spanish Fly.

- May I be so bold as to

put you up on a wee point,

that it's not Herb Albert,

it's Herb Alpert, with a P.

- Ah, yes.

- You've got your Ps

and your Bs mixed up there.

- You've got your fleas

and your flies all over.

- And you've got your

- And I've got me

- Ps and our Bs.

- Ps and me Bs.

I threw you a little

bone with a mistake there

so that you could pick

me up, so we're all,

so we're all Even Steven.

- Although we'll probably never know

if that was the truth, though, will we?

I mean, that...

- Bs, flies, Ps, Bs.

- You put a P in the wrong place.

I had a pee in the wrong place once.

They won't let me back in

that supermarket again.

- Yes, and don't forget that you know

time flies like an arrow,

but fruit flies like a banana.

- This is beautiful, very calming.

- Yeah.

- It's wonderful.

It's interesting, isn't it?

We started in the birthplace

of King Ferdinand,

and here we are at the place

where they were buried.

- Here?

- Yeah, in the hotel.

- It wasn't a hotel then, though.

- No it wasn't then.

- That'd be awful wouldn't it?

Dreadful.

You have a reservation.

Uh, Smith.

- Corpses of.

- You wait a moment please,

we are about to bury the king.

Please, what?

Yes, we have a gymnasium.

- Why are they buried in Granada then.

- Because this is the last

town to fall to the Catholics.

That's why they call them

the Catholic king and queen.

The thing about the Moors is

they were way more tolerant

than the Catholics that came after them.

- I'm a big fan of the Moors.

Oh, Dudley Moore, Christy

Moore, Patrick Moore?

- No more, please.

- Roger Moore.

- No.

- Now when I think back to

the Moors being here in Spain,

I can honestly say we

had a wonderful time.

Mother booked a holiday, and we arrived,

and found the hotel to be to our liking.

- Of course, what you're

forgetting to point out

is that the Moors, when

they conquered Spain

in the early 8th century,

were encountering a Europe

that was still very much in the Dark Ages.

- It was pitch black.

- But they of course build

beautiful palaces like this.

They were very ahead of their time.

- I have to tell you, when we

were building these palaces,

my fellow Moores, mother,

father, and sister,

sometimes we would encounter a workman

who perhaps wasn't working quite

as quickly as I would want.

Then I would say to him...

- Move!

- Move!

- Move!

- Move!

A lot of them thought

they were hearing cows.

- The thing about doing Roger Moore.

Yes?

- Less is more.

- Ah, you've met my brother Les.

- If you can let him...

- Les, come in.

That's right, I'm also a Moore.

Les Moore.

- I was trying to hint

that you should always leave

your audience wanting more.

- My audience constantly wants more

and that's what I give them.

Roger Moore.

- Moore, quit while you're ahead.

- They introduced the orange to Spain.

- The Moors?

- Yeah.

- Really?

- Yeah.

- From where?

- I guess Morocco, that's

where they're originally from.

- Right.

- I can explain it to you,

if you like, it was my mother.

She packed one into her hand luggage.

- He didn't get the hint, did he?

- No.

- On one of her holidays.

To which I said, Mother,

what are you doing?

She said, shush, Roger,

I'm going to introduce

the orange to Spain.

- And another thing the Moors introduced

was, of course, our numerical system.

- That's right, we brought

a calculator with us.

- Because basically we

used to use Roman numerals,

and it was only when they brought

the Arabic numerical

system that developed that

into the numerical system we use today.

- Mother said it would never work.

- This is really crazy.

- Father said it will.

- The fact is that the Moors

were far more sophisticated.

- Yes.

- They knew about medicine,

philosophy, mathematics.

- Yes, correct.

- Astronomy.

- We love looking at the stars

- Very, very, way more advanced than,

and also managed to marry.

- My parents did marry,

you're quite right.

They married at a young age,

they had me and my sister.

- Rob, Rob, seriously.

He's got, like, Tourette.

- The wonderful day my uncle

Bertie gave the sermon,

he was a preacher, you see.

- The Greek philosophers were translated

into Arabic by the Moors.

- That's right.

- It was only

- Thank you very much.

- During the Crusades,

when they invaded Toledo...

- It was a pleasure to do it.

And father, sitting at his desk,

translating night and clay.

My mother would say to him,

- So they translated

- Aristotle's

- when are you going to take

Roger to the park?

- teachings.

- Aristotle's teachings

were translated into Arabic

by the Muslims, and then during

the Crusades the canvas...

- Why didn't you say they

were clone by the Moors?

Are you trying to discourage me?

- What, what?

- Please, yes.

- You've stopped saying Moores,

and you've started saying Muslims.

And I find that a little

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