First the volcano, then the floods. What next? Plague of locusts, anyone?
To say that the first working day of the season was a damp squib would be an understatement. It was horrific. The coast road from Puerto Pollensa to Alcudia was bad enough, but the bypass at the back of Bellevue. Man alive. Waterfalls cascading like giant bathroom overflows down the side of the Sant Marti mountain, bringing with them detritus, mud and water, water and more water. When finally I reached the haven of close to home, I abandoned the car because my road was impassable, and trudged back with what felt like several inches of water inside my shoes, past the poor suckers who have garages below ground. They must now appreciate that such garages are in the class of being a completely crap idea.
Here are some photos and vids from Ben:
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/mallorcaben/FloodsAlcudiaMay2010
And so to why I had been in Puerto Pollensa. Well, one port of call was a place that has, open for barely a couple of days, already shot to the top of the local controversy charts. It's called Match Point. Pub and sports bar. Raul from Eolo. Nice chap. Very enthusiastic. Why the controversy? It's hard to understand, to be honest, but it has gone in with a bullet at number one, toppling Bony and the entire Boulevard Group from their normal positions, which takes some doing.
The pub is on two floors, it will have an inner terrace once the debris is removed and it will boast multi-screens for different sports. The upper floor in particular is impressive, and will be even more so once everything is installed. The pub looks towards the nautical club and is thus in a great location. But it is this which seems, as much as anything, to have caused the unrest, as in it shouldn't be there. And what the place looks like. Which is? A pub. Heaven forbid. Around the old resort of Puerto Pollensa, the jungle drums of discontent were beating yesterday.
Look, one has to be sensitive to cherished impressions and memories of Puerto Pollensa. It would be fantastic had the place had a preservation order slapped onto it and had it been kept in some quaint time-warp of the Illa D'Or and Sis Pins (which is rather charmingly of course boarded up). I would have applauded such a move. But it has not been subject to any such preservation. Witness the mish-mash of architectural styles dotted around the resort. Unlike the old town, which has this sort of order (not that this is to everyone's liking), the resort is an altogether different beast. It is a commercial centre, and the fact is that it has changed. To the physical change can be added shifting demographics, both tourist and local.
Into this change come new businesses. Some people don't like them, and they have every right not to. Yet these businesses demonstrate at least the application of ideas, and Raul is not short of them. Some would rather they kept their ideas to themselves. This is not going to happen.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Tuesday, May 04, 2010
Monday, May 03, 2010
The Silly Season: British election and the new tourism season
There was a long article in yesterday's "Diario" which was its introduction to the new season. I've linked it below. For many of you it will probably make no sense, but just a look at its length will indicate the significance of the start of the tourist season. Tourism is not only news in Mallorca, it is the inspiration for comment, letters, angst, anxiety, hopes. The prominence given to tourism in the local press is deserved. It is just a pity that it isn't necessarily mirrored at governmental level. However, in one municipality, Calvia, the mayor, Carlos Delgado, has assumed responsibility for tourism. Calvia, remember, is the home to Magaluf, Santa Ponsa and other resorts. After Palma, it is the single most important tourism town in Mallorca; it might be argued that is more important than Palma.
While Delgado has taken on the tourism brief in an act of politicking - stripping the British-born Kate Mentink of the duty, given her support of his rival in the recent election for leader of the island's Partido Popular (a contest that Delgado lost) - the grafting on of tourism to his mayoral role makes much sense. I have argued, on more than one occasion, that tourism should be firmly in the office of the regional government's president. Delgado may have done something along these lines in Calvia for the wrong reasons, but he is still right to have done so.
Turning to the "Diario" article, there is stuff here about the prospects for "new" markets, most significantly the Russian one. To this end, you may (or may not) be interested to learn that there is now a Russian bar/restaurant in Puerto Alcúdia. It might be a tad more sophisticated than a cult Russian restaurant I used to frequent years ago in Kensington: no alcohol licence so you brought your own, and when you asked the waiter what "red sauce" was, the reply would come: "it's red."
Also buried within the article is a reflection on the British election. See, British politics spreads its tentacles far and wide. There is some optimism for a recovery of both the German and Spanish tourism markets this season, while there is also hope that a change of government in the UK - from Brown to Cameron - will result in a strengthening of the British market on the back of a further strengthening of the pound. This hope might be misplaced, while a hung parliament, so we keep being told (by the Tories if no one else), could be detrimental in terms of markets, the pound more than anything.
It's hard to imagine there being much interest in the UK where an election run-off between Zapatero and Rajoy is concerned, but in Spain, British politics (and French and German) is followed keenly, and not only by some expatriates. It is curious to observe the election from a distance, but it is no less fascinating, even if it seems to matter less than it does to a disillusioned electorate in the UK. Oh, the memories of that glorious spring day of 1 May 1997 and the equally glorious 2 May when one had a skip in one's step despite the hangover. What a shame that we were sold such a pup.
I know what I'll be doing on Thursday night, hoping for a Portillo moment, a Goldsmith-Mellor moment, or something equally as delicious. Bye, bye, Gordy. Hello, Dave. Now, there's a good name for a comedy channel.
The "Diario" article:
http://www.diariodemallorca.es/mallorca/2010/05/02/queda-inaugurado-verano--recuperacion-dicen/566700.html
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
While Delgado has taken on the tourism brief in an act of politicking - stripping the British-born Kate Mentink of the duty, given her support of his rival in the recent election for leader of the island's Partido Popular (a contest that Delgado lost) - the grafting on of tourism to his mayoral role makes much sense. I have argued, on more than one occasion, that tourism should be firmly in the office of the regional government's president. Delgado may have done something along these lines in Calvia for the wrong reasons, but he is still right to have done so.
Turning to the "Diario" article, there is stuff here about the prospects for "new" markets, most significantly the Russian one. To this end, you may (or may not) be interested to learn that there is now a Russian bar/restaurant in Puerto Alcúdia. It might be a tad more sophisticated than a cult Russian restaurant I used to frequent years ago in Kensington: no alcohol licence so you brought your own, and when you asked the waiter what "red sauce" was, the reply would come: "it's red."
Also buried within the article is a reflection on the British election. See, British politics spreads its tentacles far and wide. There is some optimism for a recovery of both the German and Spanish tourism markets this season, while there is also hope that a change of government in the UK - from Brown to Cameron - will result in a strengthening of the British market on the back of a further strengthening of the pound. This hope might be misplaced, while a hung parliament, so we keep being told (by the Tories if no one else), could be detrimental in terms of markets, the pound more than anything.
It's hard to imagine there being much interest in the UK where an election run-off between Zapatero and Rajoy is concerned, but in Spain, British politics (and French and German) is followed keenly, and not only by some expatriates. It is curious to observe the election from a distance, but it is no less fascinating, even if it seems to matter less than it does to a disillusioned electorate in the UK. Oh, the memories of that glorious spring day of 1 May 1997 and the equally glorious 2 May when one had a skip in one's step despite the hangover. What a shame that we were sold such a pup.
I know what I'll be doing on Thursday night, hoping for a Portillo moment, a Goldsmith-Mellor moment, or something equally as delicious. Bye, bye, Gordy. Hello, Dave. Now, there's a good name for a comedy channel.
The "Diario" article:
http://www.diariodemallorca.es/mallorca/2010/05/02/queda-inaugurado-verano--recuperacion-dicen/566700.html
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Sunday, May 02, 2010
Early Doors: Shut on the first day of the season
Yesterday was the first day of the season - I think I might have mentioned this in the previous entry. First day of the season and the first day when tourists flock in. Or so one might hope. But even if they do or don't suddenly descend on the resorts en masse, the instruments of tourism should, you might also hope, be fully functional.
It's a Saturday in Alcúdia, the old town. I am passing what was the tourist office near to the town hall building. It has closed and will re-open some time as a health centre, or so I am told. There are notices informing visitors that there is a new office. This doesn't prevent one set of tourists and then another, a few moments later, trying to get into the silent office. I am in full being-helpful-to tourists mode. I may not actually hug them, but I am on hand to give them a hand. Lucky them. There is a new office, I explain, and give directions, even if they are also on the notices. Thank you, say some Germans. Thank you, say some French. And off they go. I'm the tourists' new best friend. I wish I hadn't bothered.
I remembered that I had to go to the horror that is the redeveloped Can Ramis building, the one that houses the new tourist office, and take some photos. So off I go, thinking that I'll have a word with the tourism folk while I'm there. Can Ramis may be a disaster in terms of architectural misplacement, but as I near it I think that the tourist office looks quite impressive. Big I's in blue making it clear what it is. Lots of glass showing its interior. This is a good idea. Not intimidating. However ... It's the first day of the season, and the office is shut. To be fair, it does say, on another notice, this one on the door of the new office, that it is closed on Saturdays, but surely, I also think, they could have made an exception on this, the first day of the season.
Having taken a couple of snaps of the rotten building, having been startled by an art exhibition in one of the display areas that looked like it was stuffed full of merchandising for sports companies, having gone upstairs to another exhibition that might just as easily have been housed in a potting shed - given the number of pots that were the exhibits - I head off towards the auditorium. I walk past the reception to the Roman ruins. A group of Swedish tourists are trying the gate. They shouldn't have bothered. There is, after all, a bloody great padlock on it. First day of the season, and Alcúdia's main tourist attraction is shut. To be fair, there is a notice saying that it is closed on holidays, and the first of May is one such, but I can't help but think that they might have made an exception on this, the first day of the season.
It has been remarked before now that at times an impression is given that Mallorca does what it can to put off tourists. This would be unfair to the Pollentia site and especially to the Alcúdia tourist office, but why close on this day, of all days? But them's will be the rules. Working hours, union regulations, the stiff arm of bureaucracy. Yet here, with this closed office and this closed attraction, you have everything that isn't quite right with attitudes towards tourism.
QUIZ -
Yesterday: Bruce Springsteen, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_JxD0l2uPo
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
It's a Saturday in Alcúdia, the old town. I am passing what was the tourist office near to the town hall building. It has closed and will re-open some time as a health centre, or so I am told. There are notices informing visitors that there is a new office. This doesn't prevent one set of tourists and then another, a few moments later, trying to get into the silent office. I am in full being-helpful-to tourists mode. I may not actually hug them, but I am on hand to give them a hand. Lucky them. There is a new office, I explain, and give directions, even if they are also on the notices. Thank you, say some Germans. Thank you, say some French. And off they go. I'm the tourists' new best friend. I wish I hadn't bothered.
I remembered that I had to go to the horror that is the redeveloped Can Ramis building, the one that houses the new tourist office, and take some photos. So off I go, thinking that I'll have a word with the tourism folk while I'm there. Can Ramis may be a disaster in terms of architectural misplacement, but as I near it I think that the tourist office looks quite impressive. Big I's in blue making it clear what it is. Lots of glass showing its interior. This is a good idea. Not intimidating. However ... It's the first day of the season, and the office is shut. To be fair, it does say, on another notice, this one on the door of the new office, that it is closed on Saturdays, but surely, I also think, they could have made an exception on this, the first day of the season.
Having taken a couple of snaps of the rotten building, having been startled by an art exhibition in one of the display areas that looked like it was stuffed full of merchandising for sports companies, having gone upstairs to another exhibition that might just as easily have been housed in a potting shed - given the number of pots that were the exhibits - I head off towards the auditorium. I walk past the reception to the Roman ruins. A group of Swedish tourists are trying the gate. They shouldn't have bothered. There is, after all, a bloody great padlock on it. First day of the season, and Alcúdia's main tourist attraction is shut. To be fair, there is a notice saying that it is closed on holidays, and the first of May is one such, but I can't help but think that they might have made an exception on this, the first day of the season.
It has been remarked before now that at times an impression is given that Mallorca does what it can to put off tourists. This would be unfair to the Pollentia site and especially to the Alcúdia tourist office, but why close on this day, of all days? But them's will be the rules. Working hours, union regulations, the stiff arm of bureaucracy. Yet here, with this closed office and this closed attraction, you have everything that isn't quite right with attitudes towards tourism.
QUIZ -
Yesterday: Bruce Springsteen, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_JxD0l2uPo
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Saturday, May 01, 2010
Dancing In The Dark: The Mallorca season 2010 starts
The first of May. Onto the pagan and Germanic roots of the day have been grafted a labour symbolism, originally an American phenomenon, now celebrated all over the place, including Spain. It is a day of demonstration as much as it is one of celebration; it also marks the month of "Mary" in more religious Spanish circles. For the Mallorcans, it holds another meaning - the first day of the summer season.
Paganism, the labour movement, the Virgin Mother and holidays. Four seasons in one day. And the most important is the latter. Few "seasons" can have been anticipated with more trepidation and uncertainty than this one, and that includes last year. Season 2010 was always likely to suffer the after-shocks of the quake of confidence collapse of 2009. There may be grounds for optimism, but try telling some and they'll laugh - or more likely cry - in your face, while the damn volcano didn't do anything to set the hats of business owners at a more jaunty angle. The deteriorating situation in respect of the Spanish economy and the breach of the 20% unemployment rate just add to an atmosphere of tension. Every season can seem like make or break, but in some instances things are already broken. They should erect some maypoles and let everyone have a dance to keep their spirits up, even if it might seem like whistling or dancing in the dark.
The season begins with the pathetic sight of hotels boarded up. The collapse of Globespan and the impact on its hotels in Puerto Pollensa is a fable for the current malaise and worries. Like consumers and businesses were caught out by and caught up in the incomprehensible workings of an out-of-control and distant banking industry, so the company was brought down by the e-commerce and distant banking tangles of a credit-card processing concern, one that was, to all intents and purposes, unregulated. The financing food chain has starved many, Globespan among them, and at the bottom of this chain, the small businesses of holiday resorts are forced to eat the thin gruel of a creditless holiday consumer market.
But there have always been collapses: Clarkson, Laker, Intasun, similarly the victims of recession if not of the pagan rituals of the current-day finance industry. We'll get over it, like we always get over it. Hard though it may seem, when a psychology of fear takes hold, to smile in the face of adversity is what has to happen. For the tourists' sakes, if no one else's. They come to enjoy themselves, not to be told about "cree-sis" and how tough things are. They know this anyway.
However, one can predict, with some degree of certainty, that the season will be littered with stories of high prices, poor service, things not being as they used to be and the end of tourism civilisation in Mallorca as we know it. And some tourists will be the ones relating the stories, selectively, anecdotally and prejudicially. One can also predict that the tourism ministry and other authorities will issue statistics that no one believes; that there will be voices of complaint regarding all-inclusives; that the car-hire agencies will be the whipping boys of the price agitprop; that the authorities who must always do something will be pressed to act by a groundhog-day press.
Yet amongst all this negativity, one thing will be overlooked, and this is that thousands, millions of people will start arriving as of today, and that they will leave happy but also sad, because they are having to leave. But they will know that they can come back, and they do.
The first of May. Hug a tourist day. Hug a tourist every day. Today is when things get better.
QUIZ -
"Dancing in the dark" - who?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Paganism, the labour movement, the Virgin Mother and holidays. Four seasons in one day. And the most important is the latter. Few "seasons" can have been anticipated with more trepidation and uncertainty than this one, and that includes last year. Season 2010 was always likely to suffer the after-shocks of the quake of confidence collapse of 2009. There may be grounds for optimism, but try telling some and they'll laugh - or more likely cry - in your face, while the damn volcano didn't do anything to set the hats of business owners at a more jaunty angle. The deteriorating situation in respect of the Spanish economy and the breach of the 20% unemployment rate just add to an atmosphere of tension. Every season can seem like make or break, but in some instances things are already broken. They should erect some maypoles and let everyone have a dance to keep their spirits up, even if it might seem like whistling or dancing in the dark.
The season begins with the pathetic sight of hotels boarded up. The collapse of Globespan and the impact on its hotels in Puerto Pollensa is a fable for the current malaise and worries. Like consumers and businesses were caught out by and caught up in the incomprehensible workings of an out-of-control and distant banking industry, so the company was brought down by the e-commerce and distant banking tangles of a credit-card processing concern, one that was, to all intents and purposes, unregulated. The financing food chain has starved many, Globespan among them, and at the bottom of this chain, the small businesses of holiday resorts are forced to eat the thin gruel of a creditless holiday consumer market.
But there have always been collapses: Clarkson, Laker, Intasun, similarly the victims of recession if not of the pagan rituals of the current-day finance industry. We'll get over it, like we always get over it. Hard though it may seem, when a psychology of fear takes hold, to smile in the face of adversity is what has to happen. For the tourists' sakes, if no one else's. They come to enjoy themselves, not to be told about "cree-sis" and how tough things are. They know this anyway.
However, one can predict, with some degree of certainty, that the season will be littered with stories of high prices, poor service, things not being as they used to be and the end of tourism civilisation in Mallorca as we know it. And some tourists will be the ones relating the stories, selectively, anecdotally and prejudicially. One can also predict that the tourism ministry and other authorities will issue statistics that no one believes; that there will be voices of complaint regarding all-inclusives; that the car-hire agencies will be the whipping boys of the price agitprop; that the authorities who must always do something will be pressed to act by a groundhog-day press.
Yet amongst all this negativity, one thing will be overlooked, and this is that thousands, millions of people will start arriving as of today, and that they will leave happy but also sad, because they are having to leave. But they will know that they can come back, and they do.
The first of May. Hug a tourist day. Hug a tourist every day. Today is when things get better.
QUIZ -
"Dancing in the dark" - who?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Friday, April 30, 2010
Copy Cats: Internet and other rip-offs
Es Turó. It's a restaurant near Santa Margalida. It is part of a famous old building - S'Alqueria. I like the place immensely. And I must declare an interest - the restaurant is a client.
I googled Es Turó and S'Alqueria yesterday because I wanted some background information on a feature about the old building. I stumbled across an entry for the restaurant. Clicked. Seemed familiar. Very familiar. I recognised the words. I had written them. I went further. Very, very familiar. Restaurants, bars, other places. Alcúdia, Pollensa. Very familiar. My words, my photos. Many of them were mine, except for the logos or photos that clients had provided.
I'm not naming the website for the simple reason that I have no desire to publicise it or to give it houseroom. Am I bothered? Up to a point, but more than anything I just felt it was pathetic.
It's easy enough to lift from other websites. Often it goes unnoticed because the sites are unnoticed. I only found this particular one by chance and because Es Turó is rarely mentioned; it stuck out like a sore and copied thumb. I shall send the site an email, if I can be bothered. Depending on the response, I might let you know how I get on.
Lifting stuff from other sites, stuff that is proprietary in that it has been originated, is hardly unusual. It happens all the time. There isn't a lot you can do about it, unless you're a big or litigious organisation, of which there are some. But there is copying onto another site, and then there are other types of copying.
A while ago, I held back on doing a blog item, but I'm resurrecting the theme now, as it seems apposite to do so. It had to do with the excellent puertopollensa.com. The owner of the site, on its forum, mentioned an article from "The Sun", which - in part - bore similarity to the blurb on the home page of the site. Not intimate with this blurb, I had a look, and I had a look at the article. The two were indeed similar. Too similar for the article's reference to Puerto Pollensa not to have been based on it. In mitigation, it is just possible that this reference was found on another site, or indeed on more than one. So it may have seemed to have been somehow without origin. But this would not negate the similarity.
Plagiarism is something no journalist or writer ever wants to be accused of. It is also something that makes no sense. If you are a writer, you write - your own words. That's why you are a writer, or a journalist. You want to use your words, paint your own pictures. Yet the journalist in this instance was well-known, well-respected. I could hardly believe what I was reading when comparing the article and the site's home page.
I emailed the owner, Zelda, and told her that I was staggered by it. I can understand websites taking stuff (though I don't approve of it, anything but), but I can't understand a journalist doing the same. My impression was, and I apologise in advance if this was not the case, that the journalist had not even been to Puerto Pollensa. Had she, she surely would have penned her own words. Because Puerto Pollensa demands one's own impressions, and because this is what writers do.
Or so I thought.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Index for April 2010
Allergies, pollen and - 6 April 2010
April fool - 1 April 2010
Beach bars, Alcúdia - 5 April 2010
British election - 24 April 2010
Buses, fumes from - 21 April 2010
Car-hire prices and fleets - 7 April 2010
Corruption: Operación Bomsai and caso Plan Territorial de Mallorca - 15 April 2010
Corruption: Operación Voltor and Pollensa's mayor - 29 April 2010
Golf development, petition against - 21 April 2010
Holiday lets, Joana Barceló and - 18 April 2010
Internet advertising - 23 April 2010
Internet, copying material from the - 30 April 2010
Jaume Matas - 10 April 2010
Judge Baltasar Garzón - 16 April 2010
La Gola, Puerto Pollensa - 3 April 2010
Mobile information - 14 April 2010
Motor bike "volta" of Mallorca - 20 April 2010
Opening hours - 13 April 2010
Picnics and fairs - 11 April 2010
Pine trees - 8 April 2010
Playback - 4 April 2010
Pollentia, ancient port of Alcúdia and - 9 April 2010
Prices in Mallorca - 2 April 2010, 28 April 2010
Restaurant closure - 25 April 2010
Roundabout sculptures - 27 April 2010
Smoking ban - 17 April 2010
Swedish tourists - 28 April 2010
The Hustlers - 26 April 2010
Tourism minister (Joana Barceló) interviewed - 12 April 2010
Tourist publications/information - 26 April 2010, 27 April 2010
Volcano, impact of the Icelandic - 17 April 2010, 19 April 2010, 20 April 2010, 22 April 2010, 25 April 2010
Watchtowers - 27 April 2010
Zumba in Alcúdia - 29 April 2010
I googled Es Turó and S'Alqueria yesterday because I wanted some background information on a feature about the old building. I stumbled across an entry for the restaurant. Clicked. Seemed familiar. Very familiar. I recognised the words. I had written them. I went further. Very, very familiar. Restaurants, bars, other places. Alcúdia, Pollensa. Very familiar. My words, my photos. Many of them were mine, except for the logos or photos that clients had provided.
I'm not naming the website for the simple reason that I have no desire to publicise it or to give it houseroom. Am I bothered? Up to a point, but more than anything I just felt it was pathetic.
It's easy enough to lift from other websites. Often it goes unnoticed because the sites are unnoticed. I only found this particular one by chance and because Es Turó is rarely mentioned; it stuck out like a sore and copied thumb. I shall send the site an email, if I can be bothered. Depending on the response, I might let you know how I get on.
Lifting stuff from other sites, stuff that is proprietary in that it has been originated, is hardly unusual. It happens all the time. There isn't a lot you can do about it, unless you're a big or litigious organisation, of which there are some. But there is copying onto another site, and then there are other types of copying.
A while ago, I held back on doing a blog item, but I'm resurrecting the theme now, as it seems apposite to do so. It had to do with the excellent puertopollensa.com. The owner of the site, on its forum, mentioned an article from "The Sun", which - in part - bore similarity to the blurb on the home page of the site. Not intimate with this blurb, I had a look, and I had a look at the article. The two were indeed similar. Too similar for the article's reference to Puerto Pollensa not to have been based on it. In mitigation, it is just possible that this reference was found on another site, or indeed on more than one. So it may have seemed to have been somehow without origin. But this would not negate the similarity.
Plagiarism is something no journalist or writer ever wants to be accused of. It is also something that makes no sense. If you are a writer, you write - your own words. That's why you are a writer, or a journalist. You want to use your words, paint your own pictures. Yet the journalist in this instance was well-known, well-respected. I could hardly believe what I was reading when comparing the article and the site's home page.
I emailed the owner, Zelda, and told her that I was staggered by it. I can understand websites taking stuff (though I don't approve of it, anything but), but I can't understand a journalist doing the same. My impression was, and I apologise in advance if this was not the case, that the journalist had not even been to Puerto Pollensa. Had she, she surely would have penned her own words. Because Puerto Pollensa demands one's own impressions, and because this is what writers do.
Or so I thought.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Index for April 2010
Allergies, pollen and - 6 April 2010
April fool - 1 April 2010
Beach bars, Alcúdia - 5 April 2010
British election - 24 April 2010
Buses, fumes from - 21 April 2010
Car-hire prices and fleets - 7 April 2010
Corruption: Operación Bomsai and caso Plan Territorial de Mallorca - 15 April 2010
Corruption: Operación Voltor and Pollensa's mayor - 29 April 2010
Golf development, petition against - 21 April 2010
Holiday lets, Joana Barceló and - 18 April 2010
Internet advertising - 23 April 2010
Internet, copying material from the - 30 April 2010
Jaume Matas - 10 April 2010
Judge Baltasar Garzón - 16 April 2010
La Gola, Puerto Pollensa - 3 April 2010
Mobile information - 14 April 2010
Motor bike "volta" of Mallorca - 20 April 2010
Opening hours - 13 April 2010
Picnics and fairs - 11 April 2010
Pine trees - 8 April 2010
Playback - 4 April 2010
Pollentia, ancient port of Alcúdia and - 9 April 2010
Prices in Mallorca - 2 April 2010, 28 April 2010
Restaurant closure - 25 April 2010
Roundabout sculptures - 27 April 2010
Smoking ban - 17 April 2010
Swedish tourists - 28 April 2010
The Hustlers - 26 April 2010
Tourism minister (Joana Barceló) interviewed - 12 April 2010
Tourist publications/information - 26 April 2010, 27 April 2010
Volcano, impact of the Icelandic - 17 April 2010, 19 April 2010, 20 April 2010, 22 April 2010, 25 April 2010
Watchtowers - 27 April 2010
Zumba in Alcúdia - 29 April 2010
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Dance Till You Drop: Pollensa mayor's problems and Zumba
The corruption cases - one in particular - are moving a little closer to home. At today's plenary session at Pollensa town hall, much other business is being withdrawn by the opposition parties, in order to focus on asking questions of and seeking explanations from the mayor in respect of what may or may not be his links to the Operación Voltor. This is the one to do with the goings-on at Inestur, the strategy institute within the tourism ministry. Its former director, the Pollensa politician Antoni Oliver, a member of the Unió Mallorquina like the mayor Joan Cerdà, has been implicated in the case, and what interests the opposition are telephone conversations between Oliver and the mayor. These conversations have been mentioned in the case summary. There is also the matter of the accounts for the Pollensa music festival, for which Oliver was responsible. In February, a call was made to conduct an audit of these accounts. The mayor stood up for Oliver when this call was made, implying that any accusations regarding irregularities were a slur.
Zumba in Alcúdia
At the same time as the mayor is being grilled, there will also be something demanding taking place in Puerto Alcúdia; demanding in a rather different way. We're talking serious fitness stuff. Pant, pant. However, Zumba, so we are told, feels less like the onerous pursuit of an earnest fitness session, more like just getting down and partying. The Zumba slogan is, after all, "ditch the workout, join the party!"
Zumba is basically Latin dance adapted to a fitness environment. And why not. Dance is every bit as beneficial to health as many other forms of exercise, and it is also often more fun. And that is part of the deal with Zumba. It puts the fun back into getting fit. On the Zumba website - http://www.zumba.com - there is a video by a reporter from "The Wall Street Journal", eulogising the benefits of Zumba and concluding that, at the end of an hour's session, she has "a feeling of deep joy and happiness"
If you can get over the trademark obsessions with Zumba, and there seem to be a number (though I guess this is fair enough), the site will tell you all about it, and then the question may be - where can I do it? And that's where the Puerto Alcúdia angle comes in.
There are two Zumba instructors in Puerto Alcúdia, and Alcúdia is the only location in the Balearics which offers official Zumba instruction. Emma, who many might know from Sea Club, and Angel, who others might recognise from the drag troupe at the old La Belle and elsewhere. The sessions take place at Sea Club and at the Calypso fitness centre, and I shall be going along this evening. To take a look. You think I'm doing it, then think again. For now!
Zumba has gone massive in a very short period of time. And to have it right in the heart of Alcúdia. Well, this seems like quite a coup.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Zumba in Alcúdia
At the same time as the mayor is being grilled, there will also be something demanding taking place in Puerto Alcúdia; demanding in a rather different way. We're talking serious fitness stuff. Pant, pant. However, Zumba, so we are told, feels less like the onerous pursuit of an earnest fitness session, more like just getting down and partying. The Zumba slogan is, after all, "ditch the workout, join the party!"
Zumba is basically Latin dance adapted to a fitness environment. And why not. Dance is every bit as beneficial to health as many other forms of exercise, and it is also often more fun. And that is part of the deal with Zumba. It puts the fun back into getting fit. On the Zumba website - http://www.zumba.com - there is a video by a reporter from "The Wall Street Journal", eulogising the benefits of Zumba and concluding that, at the end of an hour's session, she has "a feeling of deep joy and happiness"
If you can get over the trademark obsessions with Zumba, and there seem to be a number (though I guess this is fair enough), the site will tell you all about it, and then the question may be - where can I do it? And that's where the Puerto Alcúdia angle comes in.
There are two Zumba instructors in Puerto Alcúdia, and Alcúdia is the only location in the Balearics which offers official Zumba instruction. Emma, who many might know from Sea Club, and Angel, who others might recognise from the drag troupe at the old La Belle and elsewhere. The sessions take place at Sea Club and at the Calypso fitness centre, and I shall be going along this evening. To take a look. You think I'm doing it, then think again. For now!
Zumba has gone massive in a very short period of time. And to have it right in the heart of Alcúdia. Well, this seems like quite a coup.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Thai (Price) Massage: The Swedish and beer prices
The Scandinavians, and the Swedish in particular, are generally looked upon as being a good-spending tourist market; indeed they have seemed to have kept the more diverse resorts, such as Alcúdia, buoyant while the Germans and the British have been floundering. However, a rather alternative take came from someone who, while not Swedish, is all but Swedish - by marriage and business. What he was saying to me the other day was quite surprising.
The assumption that the Swedes, and other Scandinavians, still find the resorts cheap by comparison with their own countries is no longer necessarily valid. Alcohol is expensive in Sweden, and the Mediterranean, not just Mallorca, has been highly attractive to the Swede who fancies getting off his or her face for a fraction of what it costs in Stockholm or Malmo. But now the Swedes are, so I was told, starting to turn their back on resorts like Alcúdia because prices, for example of a "pint", are comparable to those "back home". Typically, a pint will cost around the equivalent of five euros in a Swedish bar (and the Swedes, like the British, are subject to exchange fluctuations as Sweden is not in Euroland; and it might be noted that the krona has shown a downward tendency, just like the pound). When this sort of price can be demanded by, for instance, an Alcúdia beach bar, the attractions of getting bevvied on holiday diminish, especially when there are destinations which are far cheaper. And here, we are not only talking other Mediterranean countries, but also the likes of Thailand.
The argument has long been that, despite apparently increased prices, Mallorca still holds an advantage because of its relative proximity. Thailand is a further seven or eight hours by plane from Sweden, and the Swedes seem to be willing to put up with this if they can be assured of lower prices and also service with a smile. And Thailand, notwithstanding the current unrest, can offer both. Closer to home, a flight to Croatia takes the same sort of time as one to Mallorca. The Swedish tour operators have, it would appear, been adjusting their supply to take account of the greater value for money that competing destinations have, confirming what should already be known, namely that the tour operators hold the aces when it comes to deciding where people go on holiday.
But as ever, citing isolated examples of high prices in Mallorca don't really make the whole case; they may make a case, but it isn't the complete picture, be it one being viewed by a Swede, a Brit or a German. There's a website - http://www.pintprice.com - which gives examples of pint prices, as you might expect, in resorts and town and cities in a whole host of countries. The examples are hardly scientific, but for the most part they bear out the fact that the Swedish is around five euros or pounds, the Thai pint is very cheap and the Spanish/Mallorcan pint is ... well, quite a bit less than most of the Swedish towns (except for eight quid in Ibiza, which is clearly exceptional). What has happened on this particular site is that visitors have cited their individual experiences, of individual establishments in most cases. And that's the problem with all of this price talk. The Swedes are right to find that Mallorca's prices have gone up from the days of a handful of pesetas, but a beach bar in Alcúdia does not prove the case one way or the other. Nevertheless, perceptions are all important, even if they may be wrong.
What I'm going to have to do, I can see, is schlep around a whole load of bars, note the prices for the same "pint" in all of them and then post them here. Then we'll see what pint prices really are.
And apropos prices, my thanks to Geoff who, only delayed for three days because of volcanic ash in Lanzarote (Icelandic ash and not any from a Lanzarote volcano), has reported on the situation there. Roughly the same sort of prices as the UK, but they seem higher because of the pound, for which you can say ditto for Mallorca. But an English breakfast can cost as little as two quid.
Rikki Lash
No, not that one. There is another one, with two k's. She's American, she's young, and she's really quite good: http://www.myspace.com/rikki_n_zach_forever
And further to the very strange thing by the Lash with one k about Mike Smith of the Dave Clark Five, a comment has pointed out that: "Mike Smith has been dead now for 2 years. Sax player Denis Payton is also no longer on this mortal coil. There is less than no chance of any kind of DC5 re-union."
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The assumption that the Swedes, and other Scandinavians, still find the resorts cheap by comparison with their own countries is no longer necessarily valid. Alcohol is expensive in Sweden, and the Mediterranean, not just Mallorca, has been highly attractive to the Swede who fancies getting off his or her face for a fraction of what it costs in Stockholm or Malmo. But now the Swedes are, so I was told, starting to turn their back on resorts like Alcúdia because prices, for example of a "pint", are comparable to those "back home". Typically, a pint will cost around the equivalent of five euros in a Swedish bar (and the Swedes, like the British, are subject to exchange fluctuations as Sweden is not in Euroland; and it might be noted that the krona has shown a downward tendency, just like the pound). When this sort of price can be demanded by, for instance, an Alcúdia beach bar, the attractions of getting bevvied on holiday diminish, especially when there are destinations which are far cheaper. And here, we are not only talking other Mediterranean countries, but also the likes of Thailand.
The argument has long been that, despite apparently increased prices, Mallorca still holds an advantage because of its relative proximity. Thailand is a further seven or eight hours by plane from Sweden, and the Swedes seem to be willing to put up with this if they can be assured of lower prices and also service with a smile. And Thailand, notwithstanding the current unrest, can offer both. Closer to home, a flight to Croatia takes the same sort of time as one to Mallorca. The Swedish tour operators have, it would appear, been adjusting their supply to take account of the greater value for money that competing destinations have, confirming what should already be known, namely that the tour operators hold the aces when it comes to deciding where people go on holiday.
But as ever, citing isolated examples of high prices in Mallorca don't really make the whole case; they may make a case, but it isn't the complete picture, be it one being viewed by a Swede, a Brit or a German. There's a website - http://www.pintprice.com - which gives examples of pint prices, as you might expect, in resorts and town and cities in a whole host of countries. The examples are hardly scientific, but for the most part they bear out the fact that the Swedish is around five euros or pounds, the Thai pint is very cheap and the Spanish/Mallorcan pint is ... well, quite a bit less than most of the Swedish towns (except for eight quid in Ibiza, which is clearly exceptional). What has happened on this particular site is that visitors have cited their individual experiences, of individual establishments in most cases. And that's the problem with all of this price talk. The Swedes are right to find that Mallorca's prices have gone up from the days of a handful of pesetas, but a beach bar in Alcúdia does not prove the case one way or the other. Nevertheless, perceptions are all important, even if they may be wrong.
What I'm going to have to do, I can see, is schlep around a whole load of bars, note the prices for the same "pint" in all of them and then post them here. Then we'll see what pint prices really are.
And apropos prices, my thanks to Geoff who, only delayed for three days because of volcanic ash in Lanzarote (Icelandic ash and not any from a Lanzarote volcano), has reported on the situation there. Roughly the same sort of prices as the UK, but they seem higher because of the pound, for which you can say ditto for Mallorca. But an English breakfast can cost as little as two quid.
Rikki Lash
No, not that one. There is another one, with two k's. She's American, she's young, and she's really quite good: http://www.myspace.com/rikki_n_zach_forever
And further to the very strange thing by the Lash with one k about Mike Smith of the Dave Clark Five, a comment has pointed out that: "Mike Smith has been dead now for 2 years. Sax player Denis Payton is also no longer on this mortal coil. There is less than no chance of any kind of DC5 re-union."
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
All Along The Watchtower: And roundabout sculptures
I was out on the hunt for information again yesterday. What I wanted to know about had to do with the watchtowers that are dotted along the coastline and the background to sculptures on roundabouts. Why would I want to know this? Because the information could form further articles for this newspaper thing. And because no information seems to exist, well not in any detailed form.
First stop, the Playa de Muro tourist office and the ever-helpful Cati. The towers, she thought, stemmed from the Civil War, which sounds right but I had an idea that they were older. There's a historian chappy at Muro town hall apparently. So she phoned him up. I'm waiting to collect the info he's going to provide. He said that the towers do indeed pre-date the war, but that was about as far as I got for the time being. What I was also told was that questions about the watchtowers are not uncommon, as in tourists ask about them, which did rather make me wonder why there isn't anything that gives their history. The towers seem, to me, and have long seemed like an obvious subject of interest, and yet they have been ignored where it comes to information provision. In Playa de Muro, other than Albufera, there isn't exactly much by way of "attractions". Except for the towers.
As for the roundabout sculptures, there was an explanation as to their "symbolism", which will be largely obvious, assuming you know what they represent, such as the tangle of eels by Albufera. But there was also some confusion as to sculptures outside of Muro, such as the one in Puerto Alcúdia. What is it? A horse, I said. Even other tourist offices don't know what it's supposed to be.
Second stop, the tourist office in the port of Alcúdia and the ever-helpful Cristina. These roundabout sculptures, I asked. The two famous ones are in fact included in a leaflet produced by the town hall, though the information is only very brief. The linkin' donuts one, that on the Magic roundabout; when was it put there for example? She wasn't sure. Why did I want to know? Well because people like to know this sort of thing, don't they?
Coming back to the watchtowers, I was told that they were "faros" (lighthouses). "Faros?" No. Surely not. During wars, you wouldn't light up beacons to guide ships in or away, unless, I suppose, you did want to guide them in and then take a pop at them. I would be most surprised if they were ever lighthouses, except possibly that they, at some point, doubled up as such during peaceful times.
How do you find out more information? That's when you run up against uncertainty. Do you talk to the heritage departments at the town halls? Or to the Council of Mallorca, given that the sculptures appear on main-road roundabouts? And if the latter, then who do you contact? There is nothing on the Council's website, for example, which leads you to information about roundabout sculptures.
I don't want to be critical, especially as the tourist offices are always helpful, but it seems a little odd that they are not themselves better informed. However, maybe this is understandable, because the tourist offices, like the whole tourism authority set-up on the island, are geared to a kind-of top-down information provision, that of what it has been determined that tourists should be told about - food, produce, historic buildings, walks and so on. But no one, it seems to me, has stopped to think about the curios - the watchtowers, the sculptures; the very things that can startle a visitor because they are a bit weird. The tall Dalek-pronged towers, the incomprehensible horse, if it is indeed a horse. Why are they there? How did they get there? When did they get there? Who put them there? The questions are very simple. But the answers are far from being so.
The season about to kick in, let's re-introduce a previous theme but with the emphasis on "holiday" in music, in whatever form. An irregular item no doubt, but here is the brilliant Chambao, "Ahí Estás Tú" (otherwise known as the Andalucia advert song). Not Mallorca, but who cares:
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
First stop, the Playa de Muro tourist office and the ever-helpful Cati. The towers, she thought, stemmed from the Civil War, which sounds right but I had an idea that they were older. There's a historian chappy at Muro town hall apparently. So she phoned him up. I'm waiting to collect the info he's going to provide. He said that the towers do indeed pre-date the war, but that was about as far as I got for the time being. What I was also told was that questions about the watchtowers are not uncommon, as in tourists ask about them, which did rather make me wonder why there isn't anything that gives their history. The towers seem, to me, and have long seemed like an obvious subject of interest, and yet they have been ignored where it comes to information provision. In Playa de Muro, other than Albufera, there isn't exactly much by way of "attractions". Except for the towers.
As for the roundabout sculptures, there was an explanation as to their "symbolism", which will be largely obvious, assuming you know what they represent, such as the tangle of eels by Albufera. But there was also some confusion as to sculptures outside of Muro, such as the one in Puerto Alcúdia. What is it? A horse, I said. Even other tourist offices don't know what it's supposed to be.
Second stop, the tourist office in the port of Alcúdia and the ever-helpful Cristina. These roundabout sculptures, I asked. The two famous ones are in fact included in a leaflet produced by the town hall, though the information is only very brief. The linkin' donuts one, that on the Magic roundabout; when was it put there for example? She wasn't sure. Why did I want to know? Well because people like to know this sort of thing, don't they?
Coming back to the watchtowers, I was told that they were "faros" (lighthouses). "Faros?" No. Surely not. During wars, you wouldn't light up beacons to guide ships in or away, unless, I suppose, you did want to guide them in and then take a pop at them. I would be most surprised if they were ever lighthouses, except possibly that they, at some point, doubled up as such during peaceful times.
How do you find out more information? That's when you run up against uncertainty. Do you talk to the heritage departments at the town halls? Or to the Council of Mallorca, given that the sculptures appear on main-road roundabouts? And if the latter, then who do you contact? There is nothing on the Council's website, for example, which leads you to information about roundabout sculptures.
I don't want to be critical, especially as the tourist offices are always helpful, but it seems a little odd that they are not themselves better informed. However, maybe this is understandable, because the tourist offices, like the whole tourism authority set-up on the island, are geared to a kind-of top-down information provision, that of what it has been determined that tourists should be told about - food, produce, historic buildings, walks and so on. But no one, it seems to me, has stopped to think about the curios - the watchtowers, the sculptures; the very things that can startle a visitor because they are a bit weird. The tall Dalek-pronged towers, the incomprehensible horse, if it is indeed a horse. Why are they there? How did they get there? When did they get there? Who put them there? The questions are very simple. But the answers are far from being so.
The season about to kick in, let's re-introduce a previous theme but with the emphasis on "holiday" in music, in whatever form. An irregular item no doubt, but here is the brilliant Chambao, "Ahí Estás Tú" (otherwise known as the Andalucia advert song). Not Mallorca, but who cares:
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Monday, April 26, 2010
Do The Hustle: Tourist publications and dead pop stars
I went to see The Hustlers the other evening. When I say "see", I actually went to talk to them. If you don't know, The Hustlers are one of the very few jobbing live bands that play locally. There is plenty of live music and live entertainment during the summer, but very little by way of what you might think of as pub bands and hardly any who ply their trade by playing rock-to-Latin-to-pop classics - in English. A question I asked was why did they think that their style of music, i.e. one that is authentic in the sense of playing instruments - and in not being a tribute act - was so rare. They weren't sure, but suggested that it might be because it's easier to just plug in a machine and play backing tracks, which can often be the case.
The reason for talking to them was that the interview, if one can call a fairly casual chat over a pizza and a beer just prior to their performing an interview, will form the basis for an article about the band that is set to appear in what will be a new publication this season. This "newspaper" is intended to be quite different to much of what goes around as tourist literature. But it still hasn't got a title. Well, it has had several - as working titles.
Coming up with a name is not straightforward. You might think it is, but it isn't. You want impact, but you also want sense or context. You might also want something that is understandable to or pronounceable by the natives. You might also, despite the tourist focus, want to avoid the words "tourist" or "holiday". Someone said to me that tourists don't like to be identified as tourists, and he's one who is working with them every day. I know what he means. If I'm in a foreign place, in a foreign land, I'll usually write down what I need to know and leave the publication behind, or if I have it with me, I'll go and hide somewhere and consult it. You won't find me on a busy street corner, a map unfolded and a baffled expression as I try and make out the road signs, with an even bigger sign above me and pointing down at me saying "clock the tourist". Nope, I'll be in a darkened doorway somewhere.
Everyone has an opinion as to the title. It's good in one way. They are interested. But everyone tends to be an expert when it comes to publications. Why not call it this, or that? Why not do this, or that? I may occasionally volunteer some comment about a bar name or what a bar or restaurant or attraction is doing, but what the hell do I really know? It's not my business after all.
And also on newspapers ...
It may not have escaped your attention that I do occasionally refer to some of the stranger things that emanate from "The Bulletin" and from Riki Lash. There was a piece yesterday that left me wondering if I had imagined that someone had died, namely Mike Smith, once of the Dave Clark Five. In the Lash column, it was going on about Smith having recovered from the accident which had left him paralysed, to the extent that he would be taking part "in a 40th anniversary tour next year with the original Dave Clark Five", a tour which apparently includes a date in Palma.
It will take some doing, I would suggest. Smith's wikipedia page; the websites of the "Daily Telegraph", the "Daily Mail", "Rolling Stone"; the Dave Clark Five website: maybe they're all wrong, but they all say the same thing. Smith died at the end of February 2008. Yet in Lash land, Smith has not only miraculously recovered from being a tetraplegic, he has also miraculously risen from the dead. And another thing ... were Mike Smith to in fact be taking part in an anniversary tour, why would it be the 40th? When, for example, was "Glad All Over" a hit? 2011 minus 40 = 1971, i.e. eight years after "Glad All Over" was released.
Bizarre.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The reason for talking to them was that the interview, if one can call a fairly casual chat over a pizza and a beer just prior to their performing an interview, will form the basis for an article about the band that is set to appear in what will be a new publication this season. This "newspaper" is intended to be quite different to much of what goes around as tourist literature. But it still hasn't got a title. Well, it has had several - as working titles.
Coming up with a name is not straightforward. You might think it is, but it isn't. You want impact, but you also want sense or context. You might also want something that is understandable to or pronounceable by the natives. You might also, despite the tourist focus, want to avoid the words "tourist" or "holiday". Someone said to me that tourists don't like to be identified as tourists, and he's one who is working with them every day. I know what he means. If I'm in a foreign place, in a foreign land, I'll usually write down what I need to know and leave the publication behind, or if I have it with me, I'll go and hide somewhere and consult it. You won't find me on a busy street corner, a map unfolded and a baffled expression as I try and make out the road signs, with an even bigger sign above me and pointing down at me saying "clock the tourist". Nope, I'll be in a darkened doorway somewhere.
Everyone has an opinion as to the title. It's good in one way. They are interested. But everyone tends to be an expert when it comes to publications. Why not call it this, or that? Why not do this, or that? I may occasionally volunteer some comment about a bar name or what a bar or restaurant or attraction is doing, but what the hell do I really know? It's not my business after all.
And also on newspapers ...
It may not have escaped your attention that I do occasionally refer to some of the stranger things that emanate from "The Bulletin" and from Riki Lash. There was a piece yesterday that left me wondering if I had imagined that someone had died, namely Mike Smith, once of the Dave Clark Five. In the Lash column, it was going on about Smith having recovered from the accident which had left him paralysed, to the extent that he would be taking part "in a 40th anniversary tour next year with the original Dave Clark Five", a tour which apparently includes a date in Palma.
It will take some doing, I would suggest. Smith's wikipedia page; the websites of the "Daily Telegraph", the "Daily Mail", "Rolling Stone"; the Dave Clark Five website: maybe they're all wrong, but they all say the same thing. Smith died at the end of February 2008. Yet in Lash land, Smith has not only miraculously recovered from being a tetraplegic, he has also miraculously risen from the dead. And another thing ... were Mike Smith to in fact be taking part in an anniversary tour, why would it be the 40th? When, for example, was "Glad All Over" a hit? 2011 minus 40 = 1971, i.e. eight years after "Glad All Over" was released.
Bizarre.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Don't Live Here Anymore: Tourists returning and businesses closing
Activity in the hotels, as in how many guests there are, where they're from and so on, is a familiar enough "game" that many a bar, restaurant or whatever owner plays, especially during the phoney season (i.e. now) and then in the first days of the real season, from 1 May. Much time is devoted to quizzing receptionists and other hotel staff as to occupancy levels in the anticipation that these levels will mean, or may mean, folding notes being handed over in the bar or restaurant or whatever.
The wrath of Iceland, and therefore the absence of guests, has introduced new games. One is spot the tourist coach and spot how many are on it. A couple of days ago hardly any. But now, hmm, starting to look good again. Or so it can be hoped. A second game is check the arrivals at the airport. Flights from here or there. How many flights. Looking good again now. Just depends how many are on the flights and where they're going to.
Over the past few days you couldn't go anywhere without questions being asked as to what is happening with flights from the UK or from Germany. All sorts of half bits of information, misinformation, pessimism, optimism have resulted from the constant quest for some reassurance that there are indeed people coming to Mallorca again.
If you've ever wondered as to the sheer dependence on tourism, the reliance on it, then these questions will have convinced you. It's all that business owners have been able to think about, and any source of information has been clutched at: bodies on a bus, flight boards, rumours as to Thomas Cook this or EasyJet that. Total dependence.
One of the inevitabilities, like night following day, is that a place will suddenly go out of business. Sometimes you wonder why. Other times you can nod wisely and say that it was bound to have happened. This inevitability tends to occur, however, later in the season or once the season has finished. Usually it doesn't occur before the season has even got under way. However.
Let's try this little game. You have, from the following information, to identify somewhere that has closed. Suddenly. All locked up. Chef arriving for work and finding there's no one around. One day there, next day not there. Gone. Finished. Through. Finito.
It's a sort of no-tourist land, as in there are no hotels nearby. Not that sort of area. Not in one of the resorts. Not even in a town. But by an urbanisation that forms part of a town that isn't a tourist town, even if it, the town, is near to local tourist towns. Big. Very big. Lots of bits to it. Lots of land being covered by the lots of bits. Needed a lot of work doing to it as well. All the bits, and not just the restaurant. Well known, they who were running it and who had planned this and that. Gone. Not there. Locked up. Finito.
What?
QUIZ -
Yesterday: Well, you've already got a quiz, but yesterday's reference was to "The Cloggies", Bill Tidy's cartoon.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The wrath of Iceland, and therefore the absence of guests, has introduced new games. One is spot the tourist coach and spot how many are on it. A couple of days ago hardly any. But now, hmm, starting to look good again. Or so it can be hoped. A second game is check the arrivals at the airport. Flights from here or there. How many flights. Looking good again now. Just depends how many are on the flights and where they're going to.
Over the past few days you couldn't go anywhere without questions being asked as to what is happening with flights from the UK or from Germany. All sorts of half bits of information, misinformation, pessimism, optimism have resulted from the constant quest for some reassurance that there are indeed people coming to Mallorca again.
If you've ever wondered as to the sheer dependence on tourism, the reliance on it, then these questions will have convinced you. It's all that business owners have been able to think about, and any source of information has been clutched at: bodies on a bus, flight boards, rumours as to Thomas Cook this or EasyJet that. Total dependence.
One of the inevitabilities, like night following day, is that a place will suddenly go out of business. Sometimes you wonder why. Other times you can nod wisely and say that it was bound to have happened. This inevitability tends to occur, however, later in the season or once the season has finished. Usually it doesn't occur before the season has even got under way. However.
Let's try this little game. You have, from the following information, to identify somewhere that has closed. Suddenly. All locked up. Chef arriving for work and finding there's no one around. One day there, next day not there. Gone. Finished. Through. Finito.
It's a sort of no-tourist land, as in there are no hotels nearby. Not that sort of area. Not in one of the resorts. Not even in a town. But by an urbanisation that forms part of a town that isn't a tourist town, even if it, the town, is near to local tourist towns. Big. Very big. Lots of bits to it. Lots of land being covered by the lots of bits. Needed a lot of work doing to it as well. All the bits, and not just the restaurant. Well known, they who were running it and who had planned this and that. Gone. Not there. Locked up. Finito.
What?
QUIZ -
Yesterday: Well, you've already got a quiz, but yesterday's reference was to "The Cloggies", Bill Tidy's cartoon.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
The Cleggies: The British election from Mallorca
If you live in Mallorca, do you care about the British election? You might be interested, but do you really care? You might actually exercise your vote, but why, If you don't live there, or go there only now and then? Do you care more about Zapatero and Rajoy? Because perhaps you should.
Nevertheless, it is entirely understandable that the election should generate interest and column inches in the local English media. Of course it is. It is something of the old country, something actually quite important of the old country. But, to varying degrees for individuals living in Mallorca, it is the old country, as in the former country. Not the current. Moreover, at a distance - of the miles (or kilometres) that divide Mallorca and the UK - can one really appreciate the issues of the election? Many will say they can, but many may be deluding themselves. Many will be acting on received wisdom, or lack of wisdom.
It is a curious phenomenon, that of commenting on an event that is intrinsically important - as a Briton - and yet one that one is not a part of. The heritage, the past, the growing-up; these all qualify such commenting. But somehow there is a disbarring through voluntary exile. Pity the political commentator who is an outside observer of his own country and its politics.
"The Bulletin" has been going fairly big on Nick Clegg. Many have been going big on Cleggy. The power of previously having been anonymous. There was a yes-no in the paper. Clegg as Prime Minister? As meaningful as an argument over a Saint Mick in an expat bar. And ... And oh dear. Let's get things right shall we. It was implied in this exchange that Clegg is following in a line of great Liberals, well one. Winston Churchill. Oh dear. Oh dear, oh dear.
Churchill was a member of the Liberal Party for twenty years. He was a political opportunist who left the Conservatives and then rejoined them. What he was never was a Liberal Prime Minister. He was also described in the paper as Britain's greatest Prime Minister. Oh dear, oh dear. This was meant to further big up Cleggy. But it was plain wrong, and one might recall Churchill's own argument about being over 30 and having no brains if one is not a Conservative (not one, I should add, that I agree with).
Churchill's reputation is founded on his role as a war-time leader, but he was a poor Prime Minister in his peace-time government after 1951. He treated Eden as an idiot and thus undermined him (though he may have been right to have done so). He was ill for much of this time. He was too old. He was antagonistic towards the creation of nascent European integration.
Churchill rejoined the Conservatives in the mid-1920s, following his sojourn with the Liberals. Only in his advocacy of free trade could Churchill truly be said to have been a liberal in terms of political philosophy as it is broadly now understood. Otherwise ... . He loathed Gandhi. In this regard, he proved to be as antediluvian as Thatcher was in her disrespect of Mandela. He was highly pro-American, he would never - had he been alive today - have opposed Trident. In all these things, he was the antithesis of what we imagine Clegg to be. The comparison is absurd.
Why not go back further? Clegg is the new Gladstone. It might actually make greater sense, though Gladstone would probably in fact have been an old Labour politician today (as with his support of the dockers' strike). But any comparison with the past is a nonsense. If there is to be some exiled comment on the election, it might at least be accurate. Or maybe, if you do care, leave it to the likes of "The Sun", "The Mirror" or "The Guardian". They may all talk bollocks, but it will be bollocks in which you can trust. Sort of.
QUIZ -
Yesterday: Tears For Fears, "Head Over Heels", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMBbJ_l0Tb4. Today: not the "cleggies", but who - as in they who appeared in "Private Eye"?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Nevertheless, it is entirely understandable that the election should generate interest and column inches in the local English media. Of course it is. It is something of the old country, something actually quite important of the old country. But, to varying degrees for individuals living in Mallorca, it is the old country, as in the former country. Not the current. Moreover, at a distance - of the miles (or kilometres) that divide Mallorca and the UK - can one really appreciate the issues of the election? Many will say they can, but many may be deluding themselves. Many will be acting on received wisdom, or lack of wisdom.
It is a curious phenomenon, that of commenting on an event that is intrinsically important - as a Briton - and yet one that one is not a part of. The heritage, the past, the growing-up; these all qualify such commenting. But somehow there is a disbarring through voluntary exile. Pity the political commentator who is an outside observer of his own country and its politics.
"The Bulletin" has been going fairly big on Nick Clegg. Many have been going big on Cleggy. The power of previously having been anonymous. There was a yes-no in the paper. Clegg as Prime Minister? As meaningful as an argument over a Saint Mick in an expat bar. And ... And oh dear. Let's get things right shall we. It was implied in this exchange that Clegg is following in a line of great Liberals, well one. Winston Churchill. Oh dear. Oh dear, oh dear.
Churchill was a member of the Liberal Party for twenty years. He was a political opportunist who left the Conservatives and then rejoined them. What he was never was a Liberal Prime Minister. He was also described in the paper as Britain's greatest Prime Minister. Oh dear, oh dear. This was meant to further big up Cleggy. But it was plain wrong, and one might recall Churchill's own argument about being over 30 and having no brains if one is not a Conservative (not one, I should add, that I agree with).
Churchill's reputation is founded on his role as a war-time leader, but he was a poor Prime Minister in his peace-time government after 1951. He treated Eden as an idiot and thus undermined him (though he may have been right to have done so). He was ill for much of this time. He was too old. He was antagonistic towards the creation of nascent European integration.
Churchill rejoined the Conservatives in the mid-1920s, following his sojourn with the Liberals. Only in his advocacy of free trade could Churchill truly be said to have been a liberal in terms of political philosophy as it is broadly now understood. Otherwise ... . He loathed Gandhi. In this regard, he proved to be as antediluvian as Thatcher was in her disrespect of Mandela. He was highly pro-American, he would never - had he been alive today - have opposed Trident. In all these things, he was the antithesis of what we imagine Clegg to be. The comparison is absurd.
Why not go back further? Clegg is the new Gladstone. It might actually make greater sense, though Gladstone would probably in fact have been an old Labour politician today (as with his support of the dockers' strike). But any comparison with the past is a nonsense. If there is to be some exiled comment on the election, it might at least be accurate. Or maybe, if you do care, leave it to the likes of "The Sun", "The Mirror" or "The Guardian". They may all talk bollocks, but it will be bollocks in which you can trust. Sort of.
QUIZ -
Yesterday: Tears For Fears, "Head Over Heels", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMBbJ_l0Tb4. Today: not the "cleggies", but who - as in they who appeared in "Private Eye"?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Friday, April 23, 2010
This Is My Four-Leaf Clover: Internet advertising
I find myself increasingly and variously intrigued and infuriated by internet advertising.
Let’s take the infuriation first, if we may: the invasive pop-ups or the things that somehow float across the screen or some video demanding to take me away from what it is I actually want to look at. I’ll give you a good example. The "Diario de Mallorca". Good paper and pretty good website. Better than its main Mallorca-based competitor, "Ultima Hora". It’s easier to navigate and is better laid-out. However, it has this regular tendency, once you’ve clicked on whatever it is you want to read, to take you to an advert - often for some Seat or Peugeot you have absolutely no interest in. This obliges you to either unclick it or wait till it goes away.
There does of course have to be advertising, which opens up the whole discussion about newspapers, their ad revenues from the web and whether they should be free online or not. But this is not something for here. There is advertising, which is a business necessity for a website to function, and there is advertising - of the intrusive variety. To what extent is this intrusive advertising counter-productive? Out of principle, I refuse to click on it, and only have done so by mistake. Out of principle, I would never buy a Seat, if it’s being forced onto me when I have something better to do, like reading about what shenanigans such-and-such a local politician has been up to. And when it takes an age to load a page because of the damn floating ads, or whatever they are, there is further counter-productivity. I go somewhere else. I may not like "Ultima Hora" as much, but it doesn’t hack me off.
You have to presume that this intrusion doesn’t come cheap and also to presume that it works, even if referrals may be a low percentage and actual conversion (assuming this can in fact be measured) far less. But the potential to alienate readers cannot be underestimated, and then there are those, like myself, who form a negative image of a brand because it’s getting my back up.
Web advertising is a curiosity because it is an experimental work-in-progress. Unlike TV advertising, the model of which has remained pretty much unaltered since the first days of commercial television (in the UK at any rate) in the mid-1950s, advertising on the net has been in a constant state of flux since it was first realised that here was the brave new world of promotional opportunity. The cost can be high, but it all depends what is being advertised and how. The "how" is arguably the most interesting aspect, especially since the inception of social networking. Facebook and the rest may not be for everyone, but its potential - cheap promotional potential - is significant.
In Alcudia there is a bar, Shamrock. Facebook has transformed not only the bar in terms of its income and profitability, it has transformed the bar completely - in terms of its market and product. Yes, there have been, and are, other promotional tactics, but it is Facebook that has driven the change. I’m not going into detail, this may be for another time or place, but if there is such a thing at Harvard Business School as case studies on the role of social networking in marketing, then Shamrock might well form one of them. To emphasise - not just greater success but also a change in the business itself, all stemming from Facebook. It’s fascinating stuff.
The essential ingredient with the Facebook approach is that it is a form of push marketing - or poke marketing if you prefer. It is proactive and can create a rapid response. But this proactivity isn’t aggressive, as with so much unwished-for promotion, because of the very nature of social networks and their built-in likemindedness. Moreover, Facebook is without pretension in its marketing style. Some advertisers, or so it has appeared to me, have a kudos mentality that demands they pay fairly substantial amounts to appear on a particularly grand site. This may be beneficial to them, or it may not be, but for many, a complementary approach using social networks would almost certainly be beneficial, if not more beneficial. It does rather depend on how broad the marketing scope needs to be and therefore how much the initial contact or interest via the internet needs to be made, which is where paid-for representation can be, and often is, important.
What we’re moving towards is businesses adopting a bundling approach, of different types of site, with different styles. The only fear with the likes of Facebook is that its success, and that of those who use it creatively, will result in the sort of intrusive advertising that can deter. I, for one, hope not.
QUIZ -
It doesn't have to have four leaves, but what the ... "This is my four-leaf clover." Where's it from? Great song. Great band - IMO.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Let’s take the infuriation first, if we may: the invasive pop-ups or the things that somehow float across the screen or some video demanding to take me away from what it is I actually want to look at. I’ll give you a good example. The "Diario de Mallorca". Good paper and pretty good website. Better than its main Mallorca-based competitor, "Ultima Hora". It’s easier to navigate and is better laid-out. However, it has this regular tendency, once you’ve clicked on whatever it is you want to read, to take you to an advert - often for some Seat or Peugeot you have absolutely no interest in. This obliges you to either unclick it or wait till it goes away.
There does of course have to be advertising, which opens up the whole discussion about newspapers, their ad revenues from the web and whether they should be free online or not. But this is not something for here. There is advertising, which is a business necessity for a website to function, and there is advertising - of the intrusive variety. To what extent is this intrusive advertising counter-productive? Out of principle, I refuse to click on it, and only have done so by mistake. Out of principle, I would never buy a Seat, if it’s being forced onto me when I have something better to do, like reading about what shenanigans such-and-such a local politician has been up to. And when it takes an age to load a page because of the damn floating ads, or whatever they are, there is further counter-productivity. I go somewhere else. I may not like "Ultima Hora" as much, but it doesn’t hack me off.
You have to presume that this intrusion doesn’t come cheap and also to presume that it works, even if referrals may be a low percentage and actual conversion (assuming this can in fact be measured) far less. But the potential to alienate readers cannot be underestimated, and then there are those, like myself, who form a negative image of a brand because it’s getting my back up.
Web advertising is a curiosity because it is an experimental work-in-progress. Unlike TV advertising, the model of which has remained pretty much unaltered since the first days of commercial television (in the UK at any rate) in the mid-1950s, advertising on the net has been in a constant state of flux since it was first realised that here was the brave new world of promotional opportunity. The cost can be high, but it all depends what is being advertised and how. The "how" is arguably the most interesting aspect, especially since the inception of social networking. Facebook and the rest may not be for everyone, but its potential - cheap promotional potential - is significant.
In Alcudia there is a bar, Shamrock. Facebook has transformed not only the bar in terms of its income and profitability, it has transformed the bar completely - in terms of its market and product. Yes, there have been, and are, other promotional tactics, but it is Facebook that has driven the change. I’m not going into detail, this may be for another time or place, but if there is such a thing at Harvard Business School as case studies on the role of social networking in marketing, then Shamrock might well form one of them. To emphasise - not just greater success but also a change in the business itself, all stemming from Facebook. It’s fascinating stuff.
The essential ingredient with the Facebook approach is that it is a form of push marketing - or poke marketing if you prefer. It is proactive and can create a rapid response. But this proactivity isn’t aggressive, as with so much unwished-for promotion, because of the very nature of social networks and their built-in likemindedness. Moreover, Facebook is without pretension in its marketing style. Some advertisers, or so it has appeared to me, have a kudos mentality that demands they pay fairly substantial amounts to appear on a particularly grand site. This may be beneficial to them, or it may not be, but for many, a complementary approach using social networks would almost certainly be beneficial, if not more beneficial. It does rather depend on how broad the marketing scope needs to be and therefore how much the initial contact or interest via the internet needs to be made, which is where paid-for representation can be, and often is, important.
What we’re moving towards is businesses adopting a bundling approach, of different types of site, with different styles. The only fear with the likes of Facebook is that its success, and that of those who use it creatively, will result in the sort of intrusive advertising that can deter. I, for one, hope not.
QUIZ -
It doesn't have to have four leaves, but what the ... "This is my four-leaf clover." Where's it from? Great song. Great band - IMO.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
The Nuclear Option: What if ... the volcano?
Something approximating normality is beginning to return, though normality will only resume when tourists start coming in and are not departing - finally.
These have been extraordinary days. And their impact will slowly diminish, as the ash starts to fade or heads off in the direction of Canada. Sorry, Canada, but you shouldn't feel that you can escape the problems. The good news is that tourists tend to have short memories and to not be deterred by extraordinary events. Except. Whereas an extraordinary happening, such as 9/11, brought chaos, such an occurrence is somehow manageable. There is a degree of control that can be brought to bear. It's not the same with nature. It is the sheer unpredictability, with no hope of control, that heightens a sense of uncertainty.
April is going to be a wash-out, despite the good weather. May? The hotels, we understand, will be making "super" offers, largely because the tour operators are forcing them to. To get confidence back, there has been a grand meeting involving the tourism minister, hoteliers, tour operators, travel agencies, airlines and other transport operators, from which will come a concerted spate of PR to get the British and the Germans to travel. Let's just hope those memories are indeed short.
Someone said yesterday that it's like last year. The volcano is this year's swine flu. By implication, the effects of the ash - on jet engines - have been exaggerated, just as the flu's impact and diffusion was. Maybe it has been, and I guess we can be assured that any way in which planes can be kept in the air will be being looked at, in the event that there is another eruption, but you wouldn't count on there being a solution. The comparison with swine flu isn't valid. That didn't stop people flying. And the effect was minimal.
The good news is that volcano Katla shows no sign of doing a copycat eruption. We can but hope that it doesn't. While the airline engineers study the data and ways to mitigate the effects of volcanic ash, we have to suppose that there is some serious consideration being given, in governmental circles, to what would happen if the worst case did happen. Now that the effects of one, not-that-massive eruption are being digested, the scenario planning for something altogether more cataclysmic has to be undertaken. Gloomy would be an understatement as a prediction.
Were the worst case to occur, God forbid, and were it prove impossible to fly, except perhaps intermittently, for months, then the prognosis would be dire. The tourism market would collapse, along with what currently remains of the property market and much of the island's economy. Unemployment would be unprecedented. It might be possible to enjoy the sun - and the roads - untrammelled by hordes of tourists, tourists buses, rented cars, but the reality, for all but those with plenty stashed away, would be horrendous. Businesses failing. People on the streets. Soup kitchens. Riots. Curfews. Initially, people would doubtless help each other, but a time would come when they wouldn't; when survival takes over. Society would, if not collapse, then be deeply and angrily polarised. The centre would be unable to hold.
It would be the nuclear option, or rather the nuclear possibility. It might not be nuclear winter, because the sun would still shine, but then when winter returned, it would be colder and wetter because of temperature cooling caused by the ash clouds, and there would be even less work and even more on the streets or leaving to head back to what would be uncertainty elsewhere.
One can over-exaggerate, but foolish would be the Mallorcan politician who isn't having sleepless nights as to what might happen and who isn't establishing contingencies. Of course nothing might happen. Or not for many, many years. But the fact is that it has happened; just that we may have got away with it.
There would be one solution. Oh, that there were. "Beam me over to Mallorca, Scotty." Or there's another one - that all the panic over the ash was just that, panic, and that there was not the need to be as cautious, as the British Government now seems to be admitting.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
These have been extraordinary days. And their impact will slowly diminish, as the ash starts to fade or heads off in the direction of Canada. Sorry, Canada, but you shouldn't feel that you can escape the problems. The good news is that tourists tend to have short memories and to not be deterred by extraordinary events. Except. Whereas an extraordinary happening, such as 9/11, brought chaos, such an occurrence is somehow manageable. There is a degree of control that can be brought to bear. It's not the same with nature. It is the sheer unpredictability, with no hope of control, that heightens a sense of uncertainty.
April is going to be a wash-out, despite the good weather. May? The hotels, we understand, will be making "super" offers, largely because the tour operators are forcing them to. To get confidence back, there has been a grand meeting involving the tourism minister, hoteliers, tour operators, travel agencies, airlines and other transport operators, from which will come a concerted spate of PR to get the British and the Germans to travel. Let's just hope those memories are indeed short.
Someone said yesterday that it's like last year. The volcano is this year's swine flu. By implication, the effects of the ash - on jet engines - have been exaggerated, just as the flu's impact and diffusion was. Maybe it has been, and I guess we can be assured that any way in which planes can be kept in the air will be being looked at, in the event that there is another eruption, but you wouldn't count on there being a solution. The comparison with swine flu isn't valid. That didn't stop people flying. And the effect was minimal.
The good news is that volcano Katla shows no sign of doing a copycat eruption. We can but hope that it doesn't. While the airline engineers study the data and ways to mitigate the effects of volcanic ash, we have to suppose that there is some serious consideration being given, in governmental circles, to what would happen if the worst case did happen. Now that the effects of one, not-that-massive eruption are being digested, the scenario planning for something altogether more cataclysmic has to be undertaken. Gloomy would be an understatement as a prediction.
Were the worst case to occur, God forbid, and were it prove impossible to fly, except perhaps intermittently, for months, then the prognosis would be dire. The tourism market would collapse, along with what currently remains of the property market and much of the island's economy. Unemployment would be unprecedented. It might be possible to enjoy the sun - and the roads - untrammelled by hordes of tourists, tourists buses, rented cars, but the reality, for all but those with plenty stashed away, would be horrendous. Businesses failing. People on the streets. Soup kitchens. Riots. Curfews. Initially, people would doubtless help each other, but a time would come when they wouldn't; when survival takes over. Society would, if not collapse, then be deeply and angrily polarised. The centre would be unable to hold.
It would be the nuclear option, or rather the nuclear possibility. It might not be nuclear winter, because the sun would still shine, but then when winter returned, it would be colder and wetter because of temperature cooling caused by the ash clouds, and there would be even less work and even more on the streets or leaving to head back to what would be uncertainty elsewhere.
One can over-exaggerate, but foolish would be the Mallorcan politician who isn't having sleepless nights as to what might happen and who isn't establishing contingencies. Of course nothing might happen. Or not for many, many years. But the fact is that it has happened; just that we may have got away with it.
There would be one solution. Oh, that there were. "Beam me over to Mallorca, Scotty." Or there's another one - that all the panic over the ash was just that, panic, and that there was not the need to be as cautious, as the British Government now seems to be admitting.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Sign Here: Petition against the golf course
I'll forgive you for switching off now. It's the golf course - again.
Still with me? Ok, here goes. All manner of political wrangling has occurred since the subject last appeared on the blog. The might of the centre-right (the Partido Popular and Unió Mallorquina) has combined to pass a motion in parliament to the effect that the Muro course should go ahead, as it is in the interest of the island for it do so. The left has retaliated by attempting to get the Son Bosc finca brought under the auspices of the Costas' authority, that which "protects" the coastal areas. This despite the fact that the finca isn't actually by the coast. There is also the matter of the bee-eater bird that breeds on the finca during the summer. This, in itself, is enough to bring any work to a halt.
More than the political to-ing and fro-ing, the environmental group GOB has been soliciting tourist support for the finca to be included as part of the protected area of the Albufera nature park. At the weekend it got tourists coming into Albufera - some 400 or so - to sign a petition against the course. These tourists were then also told about the hotels who were behind the development and given a card to deliver to their hotels (assuming, presumably, they were ones involved in the project) in support of the anti-course position.
What good, frankly, does this do? For one thing, it has the effect of driving a wedge (sand or otherwise) between guests and their hotels. Maybe GOB hopes that the petitioning tourists will go to a different hotel in future. Or a different resort, thanks a lot. Or that the hotels suddenly think: "oh my God, 400 tourists, we must abandon all thought of a golf course". One imagines not.
Getting some nature-admiring tourists to put their mark on a petition would hardly have been difficult. Visitors to Albufera are, pretty much, a captive market for an environmental campaign. Easy-peasy. One doubts that the tourists were given a balanced argument to consider. Of the 400, nine, apparently, admitted to being golfers, and only one of the nine, a Mallorcan, declined to sign the petition. GOB, as stated in the report from "The Diario", reckoned this was "curious". It might also be that the Mallorcan knew a bit more about the story - from both sides.
What was curious about the report was that there was reference to there being hotel companies behind the golf development, but it did not identify them. Why is there such a reluctance to name them? GOB does. Go to its website, and you can discover, under Golf Playa de Muro S.A., the names of hotels associated with Grupotel, Garden and Iberostar. It's common knowledge in the public domain.
Right, finished that bit, you can switch back on again now.
Still with an environmental theme, let us turn, shall we, to pollution from vehicles, in particular that from buses. And one bus in particular.
Driving along the main road through Puerto Alcúdia yesterday, I was forced to slow down and drop back, for in front was a bus belching out rather unpleasant fumes. You'll know the one I mean. Blue, tourist, sight-seeing. What a splendid advertisement this is, and how splendid for those that advertise on the bus. Come take a trip around the sights of Alcúdia and hopefully the fumes will blow - volcano like, one might also hope - in the opposite direction; otherwise a no-drive zone should be declared.
To be fair, this is not the only bus that offends in this way. When the older buses get pressed into public service during the season, there are some frightful old boneshakers billowing bluey stuff in their wake. So if you happen to see drivers putting many a metre between themselves and a bus, you will know why. Perhaps pedestrians should be issued with face masks.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Still with me? Ok, here goes. All manner of political wrangling has occurred since the subject last appeared on the blog. The might of the centre-right (the Partido Popular and Unió Mallorquina) has combined to pass a motion in parliament to the effect that the Muro course should go ahead, as it is in the interest of the island for it do so. The left has retaliated by attempting to get the Son Bosc finca brought under the auspices of the Costas' authority, that which "protects" the coastal areas. This despite the fact that the finca isn't actually by the coast. There is also the matter of the bee-eater bird that breeds on the finca during the summer. This, in itself, is enough to bring any work to a halt.
More than the political to-ing and fro-ing, the environmental group GOB has been soliciting tourist support for the finca to be included as part of the protected area of the Albufera nature park. At the weekend it got tourists coming into Albufera - some 400 or so - to sign a petition against the course. These tourists were then also told about the hotels who were behind the development and given a card to deliver to their hotels (assuming, presumably, they were ones involved in the project) in support of the anti-course position.
What good, frankly, does this do? For one thing, it has the effect of driving a wedge (sand or otherwise) between guests and their hotels. Maybe GOB hopes that the petitioning tourists will go to a different hotel in future. Or a different resort, thanks a lot. Or that the hotels suddenly think: "oh my God, 400 tourists, we must abandon all thought of a golf course". One imagines not.
Getting some nature-admiring tourists to put their mark on a petition would hardly have been difficult. Visitors to Albufera are, pretty much, a captive market for an environmental campaign. Easy-peasy. One doubts that the tourists were given a balanced argument to consider. Of the 400, nine, apparently, admitted to being golfers, and only one of the nine, a Mallorcan, declined to sign the petition. GOB, as stated in the report from "The Diario", reckoned this was "curious". It might also be that the Mallorcan knew a bit more about the story - from both sides.
What was curious about the report was that there was reference to there being hotel companies behind the golf development, but it did not identify them. Why is there such a reluctance to name them? GOB does. Go to its website, and you can discover, under Golf Playa de Muro S.A., the names of hotels associated with Grupotel, Garden and Iberostar. It's common knowledge in the public domain.
Right, finished that bit, you can switch back on again now.
Still with an environmental theme, let us turn, shall we, to pollution from vehicles, in particular that from buses. And one bus in particular.
Driving along the main road through Puerto Alcúdia yesterday, I was forced to slow down and drop back, for in front was a bus belching out rather unpleasant fumes. You'll know the one I mean. Blue, tourist, sight-seeing. What a splendid advertisement this is, and how splendid for those that advertise on the bus. Come take a trip around the sights of Alcúdia and hopefully the fumes will blow - volcano like, one might also hope - in the opposite direction; otherwise a no-drive zone should be declared.
To be fair, this is not the only bus that offends in this way. When the older buses get pressed into public service during the season, there are some frightful old boneshakers billowing bluey stuff in their wake. So if you happen to see drivers putting many a metre between themselves and a bus, you will know why. Perhaps pedestrians should be issued with face masks.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Motor Bikin'
"At the speed of lightning". Thus sang Chris Spedding. He sped.
In Mallorca, not really the speed of lightning, well not at all. The speed of speed limits, just about. At the speed of sound? No, wrong again. The sound of sedate speed. Loud nevertheless. Over and over. Again and again they come. More and ever more pass. Rumble, rev and growl.
This was Sunday. Not the ghostly Mile but the main road through Alcúdia and Playa de Muro. Each year, the motor biking "volta", a tour of Mallorca, a round trip of some 300 kilometres. Didn't think you could go that far in Mallorca? You can, and on a motor bike is probably the best way. From Palma by the big El Corte Inglés department store, to Andratx, into the mountains, across the top of the island, down to Llucmajor and back again. Hundreds of them.
The volta has been taking place since the mid-1970s. Sunday's was the 34th. It has become an international event, bikers from here, there and wherever roaring along the roads of the island. It is a spectacle. It is also very loud. So much for noise abatement or pollution. But it doesn't matter. The sight of Harleys, Yamahas, Suzukis is remarkable, and so is the sound. Doing Mallorca on a motor bike cannot be beaten. The mountain roads, for example, are much easier on two, motored wheels than four. It is easier, even as the easy rider, to take in the views than as a car driver. And though noisy, the sheer volume is reassuring. It is the sound of something happening, of something moving.
It is a fine event.
The volcano - more fallout
Along the Mile yesterday, there was more sign of life, but much of this life is of those who have been forced into spending what they can to stay in accommodation. The package holiday-ists have less of a problem. The booking-direct-ists have a big one. They have to keep on paying for somewhere to stay, such as Bellevue. There may be people, but they have barely anything left over once the apartment has been paid for. It's a lousy situation.
Businesses are jittery. You can understand why. One owner along the Mile - and I won't identify him - was saying he was keen to press ahead with publicising a restaurant in the interior, but he can't get his head around what is happening at the moment. You can understand it. The uncertainty is certain.
Meanwhile though, thanks to Steve at Little Britain for this observation from the Glasgow Herald re the volcano, the name of which is of course unpronounceable:
"Eyjafjallajökull? The last time I saw that typed was when I came back to the office drunk and fell asleep on the keyboard."
QUIZ -
Yesterday: REM, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eyFiClAzq8.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
In Mallorca, not really the speed of lightning, well not at all. The speed of speed limits, just about. At the speed of sound? No, wrong again. The sound of sedate speed. Loud nevertheless. Over and over. Again and again they come. More and ever more pass. Rumble, rev and growl.
This was Sunday. Not the ghostly Mile but the main road through Alcúdia and Playa de Muro. Each year, the motor biking "volta", a tour of Mallorca, a round trip of some 300 kilometres. Didn't think you could go that far in Mallorca? You can, and on a motor bike is probably the best way. From Palma by the big El Corte Inglés department store, to Andratx, into the mountains, across the top of the island, down to Llucmajor and back again. Hundreds of them.
The volta has been taking place since the mid-1970s. Sunday's was the 34th. It has become an international event, bikers from here, there and wherever roaring along the roads of the island. It is a spectacle. It is also very loud. So much for noise abatement or pollution. But it doesn't matter. The sight of Harleys, Yamahas, Suzukis is remarkable, and so is the sound. Doing Mallorca on a motor bike cannot be beaten. The mountain roads, for example, are much easier on two, motored wheels than four. It is easier, even as the easy rider, to take in the views than as a car driver. And though noisy, the sheer volume is reassuring. It is the sound of something happening, of something moving.
It is a fine event.
The volcano - more fallout
Along the Mile yesterday, there was more sign of life, but much of this life is of those who have been forced into spending what they can to stay in accommodation. The package holiday-ists have less of a problem. The booking-direct-ists have a big one. They have to keep on paying for somewhere to stay, such as Bellevue. There may be people, but they have barely anything left over once the apartment has been paid for. It's a lousy situation.
Businesses are jittery. You can understand why. One owner along the Mile - and I won't identify him - was saying he was keen to press ahead with publicising a restaurant in the interior, but he can't get his head around what is happening at the moment. You can understand it. The uncertainty is certain.
Meanwhile though, thanks to Steve at Little Britain for this observation from the Glasgow Herald re the volcano, the name of which is of course unpronounceable:
"Eyjafjallajökull? The last time I saw that typed was when I came back to the office drunk and fell asleep on the keyboard."
QUIZ -
Yesterday: REM, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eyFiClAzq8.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Monday, April 19, 2010
The End Of The World As We Know It: The volcano and Mallorca
Sunday. Two in the afternoon. The Mile in Alcúdia.
Competing attractions there may be - the fairs in the port and the wine do in Pollensa - but this seems unusual. It is two o'clock. There is barely a soul to be seen. Barely anything is open. The Chinese, ever the Chinese, wave their leaflets around. Well they would, were anyone passing. The fairs aren't really competition to the Mile. Mile-ists tend not to do fairs.
Sunday at two o'clock in the afternoon. The airport in Palma has been closed for two hours. It is the latest one to suspend operations. Barcelona did likewise on Saturday. Nothing is coming in. The Mile might not be expected to be busy in April, but there is not busy and there is nothing, or barely anything.
A reps evening was due to take place later. It still will have done, but with vastly reduced numbers. The rest are stuck in England. No one is coming in.
This is serious. Not because some reps can't make it, but because it has the feel of the last straw. The saving grace is that this is April, when there are only limited numbers. But April isn't the point. What is, is if the volcano keeps on erupting. It almost doesn't bear thinking about. All those last-minutes that are meant to be booking. They won't be if flights keep being suspended. Or if travellers reckon that there might be a risk of Iceland wreaking its vengeance again. Last-minute, booked well in advance; neither here nor there if flight paranoia invades the traveller's psychology. The bombs didn't stop the visitors and nor were they going to, but an exploding volcano, miles and miles away ... ? It doesn't bear thinking about.
Just imagine it for one moment. A terrible act of God puts paid to flights. No one coming in. For weeks or months. Who can be sure this won't happen? This is not serious, it is tourism apocalypse. The end of the world as we know it. On the mainland of Europe it would be bad enough, but on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean, it would be even worse. Ferry connections there are, but disruptions to flights on anything like a prolonged basis would be nothing short of disastrous. Even if there were periods of clear skies, the uncertainty, the possibility of the skies darkening again with ash could create mayhem.
We've become used to the idea of, the possibility of man-made interventions, such as terrorism, but we've forgotten about the capability of nature. Worry there may be about climate change and the havoc this might cause on a tourism future, but volcanoes? Who would ever have thought about volcanoes?
When the strategists do their plans, create their scenarios, they should always take into account "threats". Natural events are threats, as much as sudden economic shocks. But which of the strategists would have written on their brainstorming-session flip-charts the word volcano? Perhaps they will in future. For now though, the biggest question is what might happen next. According to a scientist writing in "The Sunday Times", there "remains a very real possibility that the volcano will continue to erupt on-and-off for months to come". Weather will play a part if there are indeed further eruptions - as in wind directions would influence the ability to fly - but there is also the possibility that a bigger volcano in Iceland will go off. It did so on both the previous occasions that Eyjafjallajökull erupted in 1612 and then in 1821-1823. Just look at those dates, and then add 2010. The strategists might, actually, have been wise to have referred to patterns of volcano eruptions. This bigger volcano, Katla, also once erupted in a truly catastrophic fashion, on a worse scale than yet another volcano in the late eighteenth century which caused a three degree reduction in temperatures, bringing extreme cold and record rainfalls as far south as northern Africa.
Apocalypse.
QUIZ -
"I feel fine." That was the corollary to "the end of the world as we know it", but who was it?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Competing attractions there may be - the fairs in the port and the wine do in Pollensa - but this seems unusual. It is two o'clock. There is barely a soul to be seen. Barely anything is open. The Chinese, ever the Chinese, wave their leaflets around. Well they would, were anyone passing. The fairs aren't really competition to the Mile. Mile-ists tend not to do fairs.
Sunday at two o'clock in the afternoon. The airport in Palma has been closed for two hours. It is the latest one to suspend operations. Barcelona did likewise on Saturday. Nothing is coming in. The Mile might not be expected to be busy in April, but there is not busy and there is nothing, or barely anything.
A reps evening was due to take place later. It still will have done, but with vastly reduced numbers. The rest are stuck in England. No one is coming in.
This is serious. Not because some reps can't make it, but because it has the feel of the last straw. The saving grace is that this is April, when there are only limited numbers. But April isn't the point. What is, is if the volcano keeps on erupting. It almost doesn't bear thinking about. All those last-minutes that are meant to be booking. They won't be if flights keep being suspended. Or if travellers reckon that there might be a risk of Iceland wreaking its vengeance again. Last-minute, booked well in advance; neither here nor there if flight paranoia invades the traveller's psychology. The bombs didn't stop the visitors and nor were they going to, but an exploding volcano, miles and miles away ... ? It doesn't bear thinking about.
Just imagine it for one moment. A terrible act of God puts paid to flights. No one coming in. For weeks or months. Who can be sure this won't happen? This is not serious, it is tourism apocalypse. The end of the world as we know it. On the mainland of Europe it would be bad enough, but on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean, it would be even worse. Ferry connections there are, but disruptions to flights on anything like a prolonged basis would be nothing short of disastrous. Even if there were periods of clear skies, the uncertainty, the possibility of the skies darkening again with ash could create mayhem.
We've become used to the idea of, the possibility of man-made interventions, such as terrorism, but we've forgotten about the capability of nature. Worry there may be about climate change and the havoc this might cause on a tourism future, but volcanoes? Who would ever have thought about volcanoes?
When the strategists do their plans, create their scenarios, they should always take into account "threats". Natural events are threats, as much as sudden economic shocks. But which of the strategists would have written on their brainstorming-session flip-charts the word volcano? Perhaps they will in future. For now though, the biggest question is what might happen next. According to a scientist writing in "The Sunday Times", there "remains a very real possibility that the volcano will continue to erupt on-and-off for months to come". Weather will play a part if there are indeed further eruptions - as in wind directions would influence the ability to fly - but there is also the possibility that a bigger volcano in Iceland will go off. It did so on both the previous occasions that Eyjafjallajökull erupted in 1612 and then in 1821-1823. Just look at those dates, and then add 2010. The strategists might, actually, have been wise to have referred to patterns of volcano eruptions. This bigger volcano, Katla, also once erupted in a truly catastrophic fashion, on a worse scale than yet another volcano in the late eighteenth century which caused a three degree reduction in temperatures, bringing extreme cold and record rainfalls as far south as northern Africa.
Apocalypse.
QUIZ -
"I feel fine." That was the corollary to "the end of the world as we know it", but who was it?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Open House: The holiday-lets nonsense
There was an open letter the other day to "The Bulletin" from the boss of a UK holiday-let company. It was addressed to the tourism minister, was not without merit and has, seemingly, attracted support, to the extent that the same writer is now wanting to form some sort of pressure group. It was, as you would realise from the nature of the company, about the lunatic situation regarding holiday lets. Fair enough, and a fair way of generating publicity, you might imagine, but let's not be cynical.
The open letter is a familiar enough technique. One of the most famous was Zola's "J'accuse". It acquired fame not only because of the accusations made but also because of Zola's standing and influence in France. And it is this, standing and influence, that makes the open letter powerful. Moreover, the fact that it might actually be read by those for whom it is intended, makes it doubly powerful, which was the case with "J'accuse". Zola had to flee to England.
I had heard of neither the author of the letter nor of his company until the letter appeared. No Zola, in other words. It might have been considered rather self-serving. Yet, it was a reasonable letter, one that expressed well the frustrations surrounding the confused holiday-let situation and the antagonism shown towards a sector of the tourism industry in Mallorca that has enormous potential for good. I might not go along with the technique of the open letter - and don't - but the sentiments cannot really be faulted.
The problem is though, has the intended recipient - the tourism minister - read it. Will she read it? If the answer is no, then what was the point of it? Even if she has, or does, would she be likely to respond? Doubtful. But were she to respond, what would she say? Thanks, but no thanks, or something along those lines.
You have to go back to June last year to get a real handle on this. On 19 June ("But You Can't Come In"), I reported on the agreement between the Balearic Government, business (hoteliers) and unions to tackle the principal problems with tourism, one of which was - so they reckoned - illegal holiday lets. And many holiday lets are illegal, because there is no mechanism to make them legal, which is how the government seems to want it. It is government strategy to outlaw as much of the holiday-let business as it can. It is also government wish to pursue ever greater standards in hotel stock. It should not be forgotten that, of the leading Mallorcan companies, several are hotel chains; they are extremely powerful. They are also highly organised and represented on all manner of tourism bodies. The holiday-let sector, on the other hand, is not organised, lacks representation, has no lobbying power, is fragmented. When the press come calling to ask for reactions to the appointment of the latest tourism minister (and they've had to do this a few times over not so many months), to whom do they talk? The holiday-let business? Of course not. It is to the hotel associations, those who always seem to express their full confidence in a new minister. They express confidence, not because they necessarily have any, but because they want they want to establish who wears the tourism trousers, and to let ministers know who not to antagonise. Get a campaign going for holiday lets, get a tourism minister listening, sympathetic even, and what do you reckon would happen? "Now then, Sra. Barceló, a little word in your shell-like over this holiday-let nonsense ..."
Try starting a campaign if you are some small holiday-let business from the UK or another foreign country, and where do you reckon this will get you? Foreign companies can exert pressure, if they are powerful, the tour operators most obviously. And maybe it is these, the likes of TUI and Thomas Cook, who should be the real recipients of the open letter, for they want a flourishing holiday-let market as much as they want to be able to extract every last concession from the hoteliers. They also want to sell flights.
Joana Barceló will take precisely no notice of this "campaign", because it would be politically unwise for her to do so. But if there is to be an open letter to her, then rather than "The Bulletin", try the Spanish press. She might then read it.
I am, however, not unsupportive of the letter and of the writer, because he has done what the paper singularly failed to do when the tourism minister was interviewed, namely ask what the hell she's going to do about holiday lets, other than place them outside the law. It is an issue that affects many and is important in the context of the total tourism scene; one also that is regularly aired in the paper - by letter-writers. But why does it fall to a letter-writer to raise the subject or to start a campaign?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The open letter is a familiar enough technique. One of the most famous was Zola's "J'accuse". It acquired fame not only because of the accusations made but also because of Zola's standing and influence in France. And it is this, standing and influence, that makes the open letter powerful. Moreover, the fact that it might actually be read by those for whom it is intended, makes it doubly powerful, which was the case with "J'accuse". Zola had to flee to England.
I had heard of neither the author of the letter nor of his company until the letter appeared. No Zola, in other words. It might have been considered rather self-serving. Yet, it was a reasonable letter, one that expressed well the frustrations surrounding the confused holiday-let situation and the antagonism shown towards a sector of the tourism industry in Mallorca that has enormous potential for good. I might not go along with the technique of the open letter - and don't - but the sentiments cannot really be faulted.
The problem is though, has the intended recipient - the tourism minister - read it. Will she read it? If the answer is no, then what was the point of it? Even if she has, or does, would she be likely to respond? Doubtful. But were she to respond, what would she say? Thanks, but no thanks, or something along those lines.
You have to go back to June last year to get a real handle on this. On 19 June ("But You Can't Come In"), I reported on the agreement between the Balearic Government, business (hoteliers) and unions to tackle the principal problems with tourism, one of which was - so they reckoned - illegal holiday lets. And many holiday lets are illegal, because there is no mechanism to make them legal, which is how the government seems to want it. It is government strategy to outlaw as much of the holiday-let business as it can. It is also government wish to pursue ever greater standards in hotel stock. It should not be forgotten that, of the leading Mallorcan companies, several are hotel chains; they are extremely powerful. They are also highly organised and represented on all manner of tourism bodies. The holiday-let sector, on the other hand, is not organised, lacks representation, has no lobbying power, is fragmented. When the press come calling to ask for reactions to the appointment of the latest tourism minister (and they've had to do this a few times over not so many months), to whom do they talk? The holiday-let business? Of course not. It is to the hotel associations, those who always seem to express their full confidence in a new minister. They express confidence, not because they necessarily have any, but because they want they want to establish who wears the tourism trousers, and to let ministers know who not to antagonise. Get a campaign going for holiday lets, get a tourism minister listening, sympathetic even, and what do you reckon would happen? "Now then, Sra. Barceló, a little word in your shell-like over this holiday-let nonsense ..."
Try starting a campaign if you are some small holiday-let business from the UK or another foreign country, and where do you reckon this will get you? Foreign companies can exert pressure, if they are powerful, the tour operators most obviously. And maybe it is these, the likes of TUI and Thomas Cook, who should be the real recipients of the open letter, for they want a flourishing holiday-let market as much as they want to be able to extract every last concession from the hoteliers. They also want to sell flights.
Joana Barceló will take precisely no notice of this "campaign", because it would be politically unwise for her to do so. But if there is to be an open letter to her, then rather than "The Bulletin", try the Spanish press. She might then read it.
I am, however, not unsupportive of the letter and of the writer, because he has done what the paper singularly failed to do when the tourism minister was interviewed, namely ask what the hell she's going to do about holiday lets, other than place them outside the law. It is an issue that affects many and is important in the context of the total tourism scene; one also that is regularly aired in the paper - by letter-writers. But why does it fall to a letter-writer to raise the subject or to start a campaign?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Ash Wednesday: Volcanoes and smoking
"Here come further hurricanes."
When I said this a couple of days ago, in the context of the new corruption cases, little did I know that a major natural event had occurred - on the Wednesday. Hurricanes, well very strong winds and storms, have been known to hit Mallorca, but the fallout - if not literally, then metaphorically - from a volcano blowing its top is the last thing you expect. As though things couldn't get worse - cree-sis, cree-sis still persisting - along comes an event on a biblical scale. Act of God, as the insurance companies will be insisting. One should appeal to a Higher authority. Please, God, don't give the locals any more excuse to reach for the blades. "Un desastre." When isn't it "un desastre"? Actually it isn't un desastre - in Mallorca. What would be, would be a volcano suddenly erupting in the centre of Palma. That would be a disaster. But un desastre it is, because flights have been grounded across northern Europe. And this means that tourists have been grounded - in other countries. For one car-hire agency at least, the volcano has been un desastre. That was how the boss described it to me, at any rate. No tourists arriving, no vastly inflated hire-car charges to be made - allegedly. Un desastre.
What could though be a greater desastre would be if this damned volcano decides to carry on exploding. Iceland has form in this regard. Long it may have been since the last great outpouring of ash, but it continued to do so for a couple of years. The Mr. Spocks, the vulcanologists, cannot be sure if the pattern will be the same this time around, but if it were to be and were those shards to be knocking around in airspace, then regular "desastres" might just be on the cards.
Poor old Iceland. Cod war. Lousy weather. Bloody big blokes who haul cars. Bank failures. Frozen foods. Not a lot going for it, other than Björk. So they take it out on everyone else.
Volcano - all that's needed.
Meanwhile ... more ash. The Spanish health minister has said that a total ban on smoking in public places will be implemented "from June". No precise date, just from June (so maybe, say maybe, that 22 June date was right after all). This, at any rate, was how "The Diario" had it, referring to the fact that the ban would come in prior to the completion of other "sessions", meaning ... who knows. Elsewhere though, it is said that there will be a period prior before the full introduction of the ban, i.e. after June. Yet again, smoke rings of confusion waft into the air. The reporting is contradictory, but this is probably because the messages coming out of government are. There needs to be a clear announcement about this, but you wouldn't bank on there being one. I'm sorry to have to say this, but this confusion is typical of Spanish legislation. Badly communicated, unclear, added on to something previous that may or may not still apply. Poor. Very, very poor.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
When I said this a couple of days ago, in the context of the new corruption cases, little did I know that a major natural event had occurred - on the Wednesday. Hurricanes, well very strong winds and storms, have been known to hit Mallorca, but the fallout - if not literally, then metaphorically - from a volcano blowing its top is the last thing you expect. As though things couldn't get worse - cree-sis, cree-sis still persisting - along comes an event on a biblical scale. Act of God, as the insurance companies will be insisting. One should appeal to a Higher authority. Please, God, don't give the locals any more excuse to reach for the blades. "Un desastre." When isn't it "un desastre"? Actually it isn't un desastre - in Mallorca. What would be, would be a volcano suddenly erupting in the centre of Palma. That would be a disaster. But un desastre it is, because flights have been grounded across northern Europe. And this means that tourists have been grounded - in other countries. For one car-hire agency at least, the volcano has been un desastre. That was how the boss described it to me, at any rate. No tourists arriving, no vastly inflated hire-car charges to be made - allegedly. Un desastre.
What could though be a greater desastre would be if this damned volcano decides to carry on exploding. Iceland has form in this regard. Long it may have been since the last great outpouring of ash, but it continued to do so for a couple of years. The Mr. Spocks, the vulcanologists, cannot be sure if the pattern will be the same this time around, but if it were to be and were those shards to be knocking around in airspace, then regular "desastres" might just be on the cards.
Poor old Iceland. Cod war. Lousy weather. Bloody big blokes who haul cars. Bank failures. Frozen foods. Not a lot going for it, other than Björk. So they take it out on everyone else.
Volcano - all that's needed.
Meanwhile ... more ash. The Spanish health minister has said that a total ban on smoking in public places will be implemented "from June". No precise date, just from June (so maybe, say maybe, that 22 June date was right after all). This, at any rate, was how "The Diario" had it, referring to the fact that the ban would come in prior to the completion of other "sessions", meaning ... who knows. Elsewhere though, it is said that there will be a period prior before the full introduction of the ban, i.e. after June. Yet again, smoke rings of confusion waft into the air. The reporting is contradictory, but this is probably because the messages coming out of government are. There needs to be a clear announcement about this, but you wouldn't bank on there being one. I'm sorry to have to say this, but this confusion is typical of Spanish legislation. Badly communicated, unclear, added on to something previous that may or may not still apply. Poor. Very, very poor.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Friday, April 16, 2010
Here Come Da Judge: The Garzón affair
In a café - Spanish - the other afternoon, the television was on. Nothing unusual in this. What was, was what was on. There was a platform of serious-looking speakers. Sounds dull? A party conference maybe? No. It transfixed me. This was an event in support of a judge. It is difficult to imagine a conference either taking place, let alone being televised, in support of "m'lud" in England. But this is Spain.
The event was organised by two of the main unions. Those from the world of the arts and culture were on hand as well to show support for Baltasar Garzón, the most celebrated of Spain's investigating judges.
Back in October 2008, Garzón announced that he was ordering an investigation into crimes committed by the Franco regime. As part of this investigation, graves were due to be dug up. The Spanish attorney-general opposed the investigation, and ultimately Garzón was ordered to call it off. But it didn't stop there. He is now being investigated by the Tribunal Supremo de Justicia (supreme court) in Madrid, accused of "prevaricación" (that word again), manipulating the course of justice and even of some financial wrongdoing. Under the terms of the amnesty of 1977, it is argued (with justification), that Garzón had no right to go around digging up the past.
That he may have exceeded his powers, for which a formal slap on the wrist might have been thought sufficient, has not stopped a process of bringing him to book, one inspired mainly by the far-right in Spain, including the Falange. Didn't know that the Falange still existed? Well they do. The leader of the centre-right Partido Popular, Mariano Rajoy, called the conference in support of Garzón "anti-democratic". The actions of the supreme court have been described, by the left, as "fascist". Forces across the political spectrum are adopting their positions in respect of a judge who, in theory at any rate, acts independently of politics.
For some, Garzón is getting his rightful comeuppance. Others will be revelling in the schadenfreude of a judge with such international celebrity being investigated. Yet more will see the case as an attack on judges' independence. Garzón has not exactly been reticent in courting his celebrity, which, in itself, may be a problem with the system of investigating judges. His attempt to extradite Pinochet was, and remains, his best-known moment in the international spotlight, and international is apt as he seems wedded to the notion of international jurisdiction, something that the Spanish Government has acted to limit.
There is a line of argument that Garzón, in seeking to investigate Franco's crimes, was acting in accordance with law on human rights. The amnesty of 1977 not only heralded a period of collective national amnesia it also undermined any attempt at indicting those who had committed atrocities. This may have suited the immediate post-Franco Spain, but it can also be argued that it left a festering sore, one that has been opened - politically - by the current administration's law on historic memory. An amnesty, so one view has it, cannot rule out a requirement to investigate when the issue of human rights is at stake.
But more than anything, and notwithstanding the accusations against Garzón that he exceeds his powers and is over-zealous, the current case against him highlights the hold that the Franco period still has over Spain. Additionally, one can set the Garzón affair within the context of the spate of corruption allegations. Despite claims that these have been politically motivated, independent investigators are crucial to the exercise of Spanish democracy. If politicians, by their indiscretions, cannot adequately support that democracy, then the judges have to do it for them. A curb on their powers, and this is how one can assess the Garzón affair, might be welcomed in certain quarters, but those powers have never been more important than at present in rooting out the malaise that weakens democratic institutions.
Garzón did go too far. That is the problem. Perhaps he felt emboldened by a political atmosphere, one created by the law on historic memory and not averse to rummaging through the Francoist past. This would have been his first mistake, as it would have politicised, albeit indirectly, his investigation. It may sound unpalatable to those who seek to right the wrongs of the Franco period, but his second mistake was in choosing the wrong investigation and in lining himself up against some still powerful, one might even say dark, forces. And for this, he may end up stripped of his powers. A question will be, will others?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The event was organised by two of the main unions. Those from the world of the arts and culture were on hand as well to show support for Baltasar Garzón, the most celebrated of Spain's investigating judges.
Back in October 2008, Garzón announced that he was ordering an investigation into crimes committed by the Franco regime. As part of this investigation, graves were due to be dug up. The Spanish attorney-general opposed the investigation, and ultimately Garzón was ordered to call it off. But it didn't stop there. He is now being investigated by the Tribunal Supremo de Justicia (supreme court) in Madrid, accused of "prevaricación" (that word again), manipulating the course of justice and even of some financial wrongdoing. Under the terms of the amnesty of 1977, it is argued (with justification), that Garzón had no right to go around digging up the past.
That he may have exceeded his powers, for which a formal slap on the wrist might have been thought sufficient, has not stopped a process of bringing him to book, one inspired mainly by the far-right in Spain, including the Falange. Didn't know that the Falange still existed? Well they do. The leader of the centre-right Partido Popular, Mariano Rajoy, called the conference in support of Garzón "anti-democratic". The actions of the supreme court have been described, by the left, as "fascist". Forces across the political spectrum are adopting their positions in respect of a judge who, in theory at any rate, acts independently of politics.
For some, Garzón is getting his rightful comeuppance. Others will be revelling in the schadenfreude of a judge with such international celebrity being investigated. Yet more will see the case as an attack on judges' independence. Garzón has not exactly been reticent in courting his celebrity, which, in itself, may be a problem with the system of investigating judges. His attempt to extradite Pinochet was, and remains, his best-known moment in the international spotlight, and international is apt as he seems wedded to the notion of international jurisdiction, something that the Spanish Government has acted to limit.
There is a line of argument that Garzón, in seeking to investigate Franco's crimes, was acting in accordance with law on human rights. The amnesty of 1977 not only heralded a period of collective national amnesia it also undermined any attempt at indicting those who had committed atrocities. This may have suited the immediate post-Franco Spain, but it can also be argued that it left a festering sore, one that has been opened - politically - by the current administration's law on historic memory. An amnesty, so one view has it, cannot rule out a requirement to investigate when the issue of human rights is at stake.
But more than anything, and notwithstanding the accusations against Garzón that he exceeds his powers and is over-zealous, the current case against him highlights the hold that the Franco period still has over Spain. Additionally, one can set the Garzón affair within the context of the spate of corruption allegations. Despite claims that these have been politically motivated, independent investigators are crucial to the exercise of Spanish democracy. If politicians, by their indiscretions, cannot adequately support that democracy, then the judges have to do it for them. A curb on their powers, and this is how one can assess the Garzón affair, might be welcomed in certain quarters, but those powers have never been more important than at present in rooting out the malaise that weakens democratic institutions.
Garzón did go too far. That is the problem. Perhaps he felt emboldened by a political atmosphere, one created by the law on historic memory and not averse to rummaging through the Francoist past. This would have been his first mistake, as it would have politicised, albeit indirectly, his investigation. It may sound unpalatable to those who seek to right the wrongs of the Franco period, but his second mistake was in choosing the wrong investigation and in lining himself up against some still powerful, one might even say dark, forces. And for this, he may end up stripped of his powers. A question will be, will others?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Bung-Sai: What? More corruption
It's all kicking off. Again.
To add to the previous and various corruption "operations" and "cases" - vulture, make-up, Palma Arena - there are now two more, the "Caso Plan Territorial de Mallorca" and "Operación Bonsai", or "bomsai" if you prefer. You say bomsai, I say bonsai. Let's call the whole thing off. Fat chance, now that the anti-corruption boys have started digging around in the pot plant earth of paper trails. They're going to need more than the 55 additional investigators, the cavalry from the mainland, to pick over the rotting body politic of Mallorca - like vultures. All these operation and case names, it's like the monikering of hurricanes. And here come further hurricanes, we can but presume.
It's hard to keep track of what's going on, especially as some of the same names keep cropping up in dispatches. Whether the minutiae of the cases really matter - to anyone other than the legal eagles (and vultures) - is a moot point. You're probably not interested, and I'm not sure that I am either, other than in the fact that the same sort of charges are being levelled and that these charges involve, for the most part, politicians or those involved with government or quasi-governmental organisations and projects. These charges include bribery, false accounting, diversion of funds and something known as "prevaricación", which is only partially similar to the English meaning. Getting to a precise understanding in Spanish isn't easy, but various options are - the deliberate avoidance of telling the truth and a breach of duty.
Of the two latest cases, the Caso Plan Territorial de Mallorca (PTM) relates to developments in different parts of the island, including those of the apparent conversion of "virgin" land into developed land in Alcúdia and Pollensa. Caught up in this are some old friends. Naturally enough, the former tourism minister Miquel Nadal is one of them: no corruption case would be complete without him appearing on the cast list. Also starring are ex-Enviro Man, Grimalt, and the Partido Popular's former president in the Balearics, Rosa Estaràs.
The little ornamental tree case centres on a company within the Balearic Government, CAIB Patrimonio, the function of which is the acquisition and sale of land and properties. So nothing strange about this, as corruption cases usually have to do with land and properties and who has trousered a wedge of illicit moolah. One of the figures in the Bonsai case, and we haven't heard from him or about him for a while, is Vicente Grande. Yep, he who was the president of Real Mallorca football club and helped turn it into the basket-case it remains, and who is implicated in the PTM case. More significantly, of those detained, one is Jorge Sainz de Baranda who was the director-general of taxes (!) under the administration of ... Jaume Matas.
So here we go again. Another boring day in Mallorca. Nothing much happening, only a bunch of politicos and chums being hauled in to explain how a whole bunch of public money ended up somewhere it wasn't meant to. Oh, and just in case you are wondering how a case comes to be called Bomsai, this is because it relates to the building of the "parque de bomberos" (fire-fighters) and the headquarters of the ministry of health in the islands ("salud-islas") in Palma. Bom. Sa. I. Geddit? Bomsai (aka Bonsai). Gosh, there are some clever folk in the police or judiciary who come up with these names. Maybe there's a department devoted to the naming of cases. There should be. There's enough work for there to be one.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
To add to the previous and various corruption "operations" and "cases" - vulture, make-up, Palma Arena - there are now two more, the "Caso Plan Territorial de Mallorca" and "Operación Bonsai", or "bomsai" if you prefer. You say bomsai, I say bonsai. Let's call the whole thing off. Fat chance, now that the anti-corruption boys have started digging around in the pot plant earth of paper trails. They're going to need more than the 55 additional investigators, the cavalry from the mainland, to pick over the rotting body politic of Mallorca - like vultures. All these operation and case names, it's like the monikering of hurricanes. And here come further hurricanes, we can but presume.
It's hard to keep track of what's going on, especially as some of the same names keep cropping up in dispatches. Whether the minutiae of the cases really matter - to anyone other than the legal eagles (and vultures) - is a moot point. You're probably not interested, and I'm not sure that I am either, other than in the fact that the same sort of charges are being levelled and that these charges involve, for the most part, politicians or those involved with government or quasi-governmental organisations and projects. These charges include bribery, false accounting, diversion of funds and something known as "prevaricación", which is only partially similar to the English meaning. Getting to a precise understanding in Spanish isn't easy, but various options are - the deliberate avoidance of telling the truth and a breach of duty.
Of the two latest cases, the Caso Plan Territorial de Mallorca (PTM) relates to developments in different parts of the island, including those of the apparent conversion of "virgin" land into developed land in Alcúdia and Pollensa. Caught up in this are some old friends. Naturally enough, the former tourism minister Miquel Nadal is one of them: no corruption case would be complete without him appearing on the cast list. Also starring are ex-Enviro Man, Grimalt, and the Partido Popular's former president in the Balearics, Rosa Estaràs.
The little ornamental tree case centres on a company within the Balearic Government, CAIB Patrimonio, the function of which is the acquisition and sale of land and properties. So nothing strange about this, as corruption cases usually have to do with land and properties and who has trousered a wedge of illicit moolah. One of the figures in the Bonsai case, and we haven't heard from him or about him for a while, is Vicente Grande. Yep, he who was the president of Real Mallorca football club and helped turn it into the basket-case it remains, and who is implicated in the PTM case. More significantly, of those detained, one is Jorge Sainz de Baranda who was the director-general of taxes (!) under the administration of ... Jaume Matas.
So here we go again. Another boring day in Mallorca. Nothing much happening, only a bunch of politicos and chums being hauled in to explain how a whole bunch of public money ended up somewhere it wasn't meant to. Oh, and just in case you are wondering how a case comes to be called Bomsai, this is because it relates to the building of the "parque de bomberos" (fire-fighters) and the headquarters of the ministry of health in the islands ("salud-islas") in Palma. Bom. Sa. I. Geddit? Bomsai (aka Bonsai). Gosh, there are some clever folk in the police or judiciary who come up with these names. Maybe there's a department devoted to the naming of cases. There should be. There's enough work for there to be one.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
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