Our friend Francisco's family live in Malaga, and he has brought me to Jaen, while he goes to see his mother.

I am here in Jaen with two friends, and we are at the studio of our mutual friend (another Francisco) who is a photographer. With all the tragedy in Spain just now we must earn some money to be able to afford the things we live on. We are looking to move from Xativa in the next few days, to find a more permanent base to effectively begin again, since in Valencia they are talking about months before things will start to be right, and we must earn a living now!

Jaén is a municipality of Spain and the capital of the province of Jaén, in the autonomous community of Andalusia. The city of Jaén is the administrative and industrial centre for the province. Industrial establishments in the city include chemical works, tanneries, distilleries, cookie factories, textile factories, as well as agricultural and olive oil processing machinery industry.

The layout of Jaén is determined by its position on the foothills of the Cerro de Santa Catalina, with steep, narrow streets, in the historic core. It's population is 112,757 (2020), about one-sixth of the population of the province. Recently Jaén has had a great increase in cultural tourism, having received 604,523 tourists along the year 2015, 10% more than in 2014.

The most important event is the International Piano Competition Premio Jaén (in Spanish: Concurso Internacional de Piano Premio Jaén) that is the oldest and most important piano competition in Spain. It started in 1953 with Pablo Castillo García-Negrete, an architect who began to donate the first cash prizes of only some thousands of pesetas. Nowadays the prize consist of €57,000 and the recording of classical music albums in professional studios. The last winner of this significant competition was the Chinese pianist Yin Yu Qin, in 2008, in the fiftieth competition. There are other events such as the Ciclos de Rock and the Lagarto Rock Festival.

We drove down from our temporary home early this morning, four hours on the road, from four a.m, to Jaen, Francisco has gone on to northern environs of Malaga. Photographer Francisco has offered to put us up for the night, so I will have a long day in the studio, perhaps.