Jeremy's at it again. At times, I do wonder if he tries a bit too hard at being contrary and offensive. Rather like Littlejohn, I'm not totally convinced that he believes half of what he says. But in Clarkson-land, the expat life is one, as he puts it, in which an expat has "a nose like a burst beetroot" and who wonders if "it's okay to have a small sharpener at 10 in the morning". There is a bit of familiarity about this. Did not A.A. Gill, in the same newspaper ("The Sunday Times"), make a similar observation about the early-morning drinking habits of expats on the Costas when he undertook his character assassination of Keith Floyd? And when, what must be about three years ago now, Alexei Sayle (in "The Independent") demolished Leapy Lee, there was reference, to "some minor expat singer with a criminal record and views tailor-made for his audience of drink-sozzled, golf-playing Costa Brits".
For Jezza, any expat in Spain is, basically, a criminal. Weighing up the options as to countries to which the British might wish to emigrate in order to escape Peter Mandelson, he rules out Spain for his reader on the grounds that "you're not called Del and you weren't involved in the Walthamstow blag". In fact, he rules out everywhere, but for different reasons.
This crim and booze image might be all a tad tiresome if it weren't for the fact that it is quite funny and not without some element of truth. I can think of at least one Del. When his bar had to be evacuated and some of the contents dispensed with, there was some slight apprehension as to the exact source of some of the items on offer. Del is an appropriate enough name, given the ubiquity of "Fools And Horses" and of DVDs bearing the title, not all of which bring with them a payment to BBC Worldwide. All these Dels selling dodgy Del DVDs to some bloke called Del. But whereas one who had committed the Walthamstow blag might be residing in Benalmádena, he would be most unlikely to be in Alcúdia or Puerto Pollensa as only people from Leicester or Hull live in Alcúdia or, for some bizarre reason, from Kilmarnock in the case of Puerto Pollensa.
Now that the season has finished, and the Dels have either had to make swift their escape from Spanish territory and its coastal waters, or handed back the keys, or sold off the Sky system, or all of these, there is the opportunity for those who remain to take to the only bars staying open and indulge in a little 10am sharpening, which can go on to, well, 10pm. Normally, such intake would be curbed by a couple of hours in season, but now they can join the retired Dels and Mrs Dels (Raquels presumably) who make no concession to hours by a bar; summer or winter, they are the same. Actually, I exaggerate. There may be a few soaks and the occasional burst beetroot but other than the odd beer or glass of wine, it is not that common to see your expat imbibing much more than a coffee in the mornings or indeed in the afternoons. The Jezza (and Gill) image is overstated, as is the crim angle. Yep, there are one or two of them, but sadly, though it's a funny line, I'm afraid I have to tell Jeremy that it's not strictly accurate.
Those of a criminal bent may have discovered that they can no longer use their mobile phones. As of yesterday, any unregistered mobile was cut off. This means that all those pay-as-you-go mobiles, which had not been registered (all phones under contract were and are registered), are now useless except for 112 emergency calls. The thinking behind this was that the unregistered mobile was the communication device of choice for the crim or terrorist, neither of whom would be likely to be making 112 calls unless they are issuing a warning as to a bomb going off. Some 25% of pay-as-you-go phones, representing some four million users, remain unregistered, so the Spanish government has extended by six months the period in which registration can be effected, allowing the user to keep his or her number.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Abba, "Waterloo", performing on German TV, and it's still this bad (the TV that is), http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gu1q17rUkVU. Today's title - line from something by one of the finest of indie bands. Very British, which is probably appropriate.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Monday, November 09, 2009
Napoleon Did Surrender
Good God, he's back again. Is there nowhere that does not provide a photo opportunity for Enviro Man? The latest jaunt? There amidst some scrubland in the S'Albufereta, along with the mayors of Alcúdia and Pollensa. Environment minister Grimalt sharing the camera lens with his mayoral compatriots in the Unió Mallorquina, all in the name of environmental recuperation.
Albufereta, in case you don't know, is the little Albufera to be found to the side of the coastal road between Alcúdia and Puerto Pollensa. Basically, it's much the same as the Albufera of Playa de Muro except much smaller, without a reception centre and without anything remotely worth looking at. It is an area that has, apparently, been classified as a recuperation priority by the European Union. Over a hundred thousand euros have been earmarked for the first phase - that of getting rid of rubbish that has accumulated and re-establishing the water land area known as Can Cullerassa which takes its name, or is it the other way round, from the stretch of beach and which also lends its name to the restaurant, albeit that this is called Can Cuarassa - not sure how that works, but apparently it is so.
It was reassuring that the photo opp in the "Diario" did not show Enviro Man and his fellow camera fodder wearing masks. Back in March, it was revealed that there was a bit of a problem with E.coli in the water of Albufereta, something which led to a sign being covered with the word "contaminado", which one assumed was not an official addition to the sign.
In a quite different matter environmental, Enviro Man's ministry, according to "The Bulletin", is coming in for a bit of a bashing from the local Chamber of Commerce for refusing to grant permission for the island of Cabrera to be used as a location for a film with Al Pacino about Napoleon. This is in fact the long-awaited adaptation of the children's book by Staton Rabin, "Betsy And The Emperor", which will also feature Emma Watson, as Betsy. I say "long-awaited" only because the film has been talked about for at least four years.
Cabrera is the largest of the small archipelago off the southern coast of Mallorca, all of which is deemed to be a nature reserve, one to which there is little by way of excursion. The regular population of Cabrera is under 100, and the ecosystem is considered that fragile that diving is forbidden. But the argument goes that filming there would not have any harmful effect, which may possibly be true, while production teams are generally pretty assiduous when it comes to tidying up after themselves and are also not unknown for being quite generous in terms of paying for locations, a possible additional source of revenue, therefore, for promoting the island, one might have thought. Moreover, goes the argument, using Cabrera would be beneficial in showing off some excellent landscape and thus attracting further tourism. Which may also be true, but not for Cabrera as such, while cinema-goers would probably need to know that Napoleon was on an island off Mallorca and not on an island in the Atlantic, as the film will be about his exile in St. Helena.
Maybe though the objection has to do with the fact that Enviro Man would not himself appear; for newspaper photographers read also film camera crews. But it might be possible for him to get a walk-on as an extra or something, planting a sign to the effect of "this scene sponsored by the Balearic Government's environment ministry on the island of Cabrera near to Mallorca". That might do the trick, so long as no-one comes along and adds "contaminado" to the sign.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Sugababes, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ns6SdC8TQuQ. Today's title - and it is on the night of their great win that a story does lie, but not one I'm about to tell you.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Albufereta, in case you don't know, is the little Albufera to be found to the side of the coastal road between Alcúdia and Puerto Pollensa. Basically, it's much the same as the Albufera of Playa de Muro except much smaller, without a reception centre and without anything remotely worth looking at. It is an area that has, apparently, been classified as a recuperation priority by the European Union. Over a hundred thousand euros have been earmarked for the first phase - that of getting rid of rubbish that has accumulated and re-establishing the water land area known as Can Cullerassa which takes its name, or is it the other way round, from the stretch of beach and which also lends its name to the restaurant, albeit that this is called Can Cuarassa - not sure how that works, but apparently it is so.
It was reassuring that the photo opp in the "Diario" did not show Enviro Man and his fellow camera fodder wearing masks. Back in March, it was revealed that there was a bit of a problem with E.coli in the water of Albufereta, something which led to a sign being covered with the word "contaminado", which one assumed was not an official addition to the sign.
In a quite different matter environmental, Enviro Man's ministry, according to "The Bulletin", is coming in for a bit of a bashing from the local Chamber of Commerce for refusing to grant permission for the island of Cabrera to be used as a location for a film with Al Pacino about Napoleon. This is in fact the long-awaited adaptation of the children's book by Staton Rabin, "Betsy And The Emperor", which will also feature Emma Watson, as Betsy. I say "long-awaited" only because the film has been talked about for at least four years.
Cabrera is the largest of the small archipelago off the southern coast of Mallorca, all of which is deemed to be a nature reserve, one to which there is little by way of excursion. The regular population of Cabrera is under 100, and the ecosystem is considered that fragile that diving is forbidden. But the argument goes that filming there would not have any harmful effect, which may possibly be true, while production teams are generally pretty assiduous when it comes to tidying up after themselves and are also not unknown for being quite generous in terms of paying for locations, a possible additional source of revenue, therefore, for promoting the island, one might have thought. Moreover, goes the argument, using Cabrera would be beneficial in showing off some excellent landscape and thus attracting further tourism. Which may also be true, but not for Cabrera as such, while cinema-goers would probably need to know that Napoleon was on an island off Mallorca and not on an island in the Atlantic, as the film will be about his exile in St. Helena.
Maybe though the objection has to do with the fact that Enviro Man would not himself appear; for newspaper photographers read also film camera crews. But it might be possible for him to get a walk-on as an extra or something, planting a sign to the effect of "this scene sponsored by the Balearic Government's environment ministry on the island of Cabrera near to Mallorca". That might do the trick, so long as no-one comes along and adds "contaminado" to the sign.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Sugababes, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ns6SdC8TQuQ. Today's title - and it is on the night of their great win that a story does lie, but not one I'm about to tell you.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Sunday, November 08, 2009
Same Old Story
Just as sure as night follows day and as Real Mallorca slump from one financial crisis to the next, so the winter tourism woes arouse a regular "Bulletin" statement about the need for a "bit of imagination". Oh, the imagination of calling for a bit of imagination. But against a backdrop of the regional government's tourism minister bemoaning the fact that he has only a mere 30 million or so to spend on promotion, I do agree with the view in the same piece in the paper that diverting a large part of that wad towards Rafa Nadal makes arguable sense. Has the presence of the Manacor muscle made any discernible difference to Mallorcan and Balearic tourism since he has been used for advertising? No, I don't imagine it has. Much as Nadal may be an obvious "face" of local tourism, perhaps that's the problem. It's so obvious, no-one takes any notice. There is also the problem that, Mallorcan boy though he is, his world is quite different to that of most mere tourism mortals who do not earn vast fortunes on the tennis circuit and take to yachts bouncing across the waves off the south coast of the island. It's all a matter of making a connection. They should scrap the whole thing; it isn't working.
The paper goes on by reckoning that half this promotion budget should be thrown at winter tourism. All well and good, but not much use if the airlines don't fly, the hotels don't open and bars and restaurants are shut. And doubly not much use when aspects of the winter scene are currently so poorly promoted. Let me give an example. The regional government's tourism website is meant to give information about the so-called "Winter in Mallorca" programme. This may not amount to a lot, but it still amounts to something. There is a PDF of the monthly schedule of events. For October. November's has still to be uploaded. That's how good promotion gets.
Whether winter or summer, the internet does, nevertheless, hold the clue to much promotional effort. Elsewhere in the paper, it says that the tourism minister is looking to exploit the internet. Good for him, even if the omens are not good. As ever, there is reference to cultural, gastronomic and sports tourism - all the same old thing - as well as to online reservations. It is not as if there are not already innumerable ways of booking via the internet. It makes one despair if this is all the tourism ministry has to say. Then there are the sites themselves. As with the Nadal advertising, which itself features on the Balearics tourism site, there is a sense of making people feel good about all this - the people being the tourism authorities themselves. Look at us! We're doing something!
The informational style of websites, allied to advertising, is largely old hat. For all the good it does, the tourism authorities would be better off placing promotions on the likes of Alpharooms and all the other booking agencies which are just as important, if not more, than the corporate websites for the Balearics and Mallorca. But for all this, there is a complete failure to recognise the shift in internet usage - towards Web 2.0 and towards social networks. Even if there were to be the odd myspace created, chances are it would be done half-heartedly and moreover with a non-native speaker controlling it and therefore communicating incorrectly with the target audiences, be they British, German, Russian or whatever.
Were the tourism bods to appreciate that there is a whole different way of conveying messages and interactively communicating with the markets, they could build a far more meaningful internet presence. But they are most unlikely to. And the reasons why not lie with, yes, that lack of imagination, but also the obsession with corporate-style sites that are operations in promotional self-aggrandizement.
I have a solution to the tourism minister's lack of funding. Slash the budget even more and then make them think how they can make their money work harder. Because currently, there is no evidence that throwing greater amounts at promotion would be any more valuable. You would end up with more Nadal, more elaborate promotional literature stacked up in the tourism offices, itself largely an exercise in job creation for all those who can find no other employment than design, and more of the same informational, corporate websites.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Guns N' Roses, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siBoLc9vxac. Today's title - from their first album when they were the babes and Siobhán was one of them.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The paper goes on by reckoning that half this promotion budget should be thrown at winter tourism. All well and good, but not much use if the airlines don't fly, the hotels don't open and bars and restaurants are shut. And doubly not much use when aspects of the winter scene are currently so poorly promoted. Let me give an example. The regional government's tourism website is meant to give information about the so-called "Winter in Mallorca" programme. This may not amount to a lot, but it still amounts to something. There is a PDF of the monthly schedule of events. For October. November's has still to be uploaded. That's how good promotion gets.
Whether winter or summer, the internet does, nevertheless, hold the clue to much promotional effort. Elsewhere in the paper, it says that the tourism minister is looking to exploit the internet. Good for him, even if the omens are not good. As ever, there is reference to cultural, gastronomic and sports tourism - all the same old thing - as well as to online reservations. It is not as if there are not already innumerable ways of booking via the internet. It makes one despair if this is all the tourism ministry has to say. Then there are the sites themselves. As with the Nadal advertising, which itself features on the Balearics tourism site, there is a sense of making people feel good about all this - the people being the tourism authorities themselves. Look at us! We're doing something!
The informational style of websites, allied to advertising, is largely old hat. For all the good it does, the tourism authorities would be better off placing promotions on the likes of Alpharooms and all the other booking agencies which are just as important, if not more, than the corporate websites for the Balearics and Mallorca. But for all this, there is a complete failure to recognise the shift in internet usage - towards Web 2.0 and towards social networks. Even if there were to be the odd myspace created, chances are it would be done half-heartedly and moreover with a non-native speaker controlling it and therefore communicating incorrectly with the target audiences, be they British, German, Russian or whatever.
Were the tourism bods to appreciate that there is a whole different way of conveying messages and interactively communicating with the markets, they could build a far more meaningful internet presence. But they are most unlikely to. And the reasons why not lie with, yes, that lack of imagination, but also the obsession with corporate-style sites that are operations in promotional self-aggrandizement.
I have a solution to the tourism minister's lack of funding. Slash the budget even more and then make them think how they can make their money work harder. Because currently, there is no evidence that throwing greater amounts at promotion would be any more valuable. You would end up with more Nadal, more elaborate promotional literature stacked up in the tourism offices, itself largely an exercise in job creation for all those who can find no other employment than design, and more of the same informational, corporate websites.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Guns N' Roses, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siBoLc9vxac. Today's title - from their first album when they were the babes and Siobhán was one of them.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Saturday, November 07, 2009
November Rain
The first cold winds blow. Like the sudden leap in temperatures in spring can catch you by surprise, so the transformation from pretend late summer takes you unawares. But unlike the spring, the change makes you wince and you remember how houses' heat retention in summer gives way to the inadequacy of insulation and the chill of interiors. Storms have different consequences. In November, they bring a fast descent in temperature and what can even look like snow but is in fact hail.
The air that in summer engulfs and smothers now just hangs, damp and rheumatic. Though the sun and warmth will return during the winter, the dampness is now a constant, insinuating into bones and brickwork. The floods of storms leave the streets and roads mud patches of piled sand turned a constituent of cement. Yet, the storms wash away and clean the sky of the last haze of summer; it becomes bright and transparent, late-afternoon sun wrapping the peaks of the Artà mountains in a fire glow, beacons across the bay where in the other direction the Tramuntana tops, in their barrenness, look to hold snow but is just light on grey that can make them seem snowy even in summer.
There is a smell of wood-burning. It competes with the shifting sulphurous scents of the wetlands, drifting into cracks and lying on the liquid atmosphere, awaiting a further smack of thunder and an avalanche of cleansing rain. Winter comes now. It makes moss and algae the flagstones and walls, a sign, though, of the purity of the air. The first cold winds of winter. And you think of spring and that first assault of heat and wonder how it can ever be winter.
TUI price reductions
TUI may not have had anything to add to the reprimand issued by Thomas Cook to the Spanish Government over the rise in IVA, but the company has reacted to the uncertain economic circumstances by announcing that prices for holidays to Mallorca will fall by some 5.5% next year. In Menorca, where the tourism market is considerably less favourable, prices will go down by 10%. Good news you might think, and it is, but the boss of TUI Germany, making this announcement (he was the one, you will recall, who helped to plant the first pine in the TUI forest) admits that there will be more tourists coming on an all-inclusive basis in 2010. But not all is lost as there won't be anything like the numbers travelling all-inclusive as there are to Turkey.
While there is all the angst about all-inclusives in Mallorca, one does wonder at the impact of such a style of offer across Europe and into Turkey. Greece, for example, has been hard hit by the increase in AI. Consumers may be demanding this undoubtedly cost-effective way of holidaying, but what type of tourism will this all lead to? It is becoming increasingly clear that holidays are being sourced less on the basis of resort or country but from the point of view of the best AI deal. The actual destination is becoming less relevant. It is often said, in criticism of AI, that the holidaymaker who stays largely within the confines of his or her AI complex, could be anywhere. And so it would seem. Mallorca, Greece, Turkey - it's all the same, just varies in how hot it is and what brands of booze can be obtained. Is this really what tourism should be? Destinations as dumping grounds for northern Europeans who hand over most of the holiday cost to tour operators and airlines? Most of Mediterranean Europe becomes a collection of resorts, polarised by those who live there and the wristband brigade who pay no attention to their surroundings. I'm not sure that this was how it was meant to be.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Rupert Brooke was the poet. And the band was Pink Floyd, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mV9AwB-DnoI. Today's title - hard rock goes orchestral.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The air that in summer engulfs and smothers now just hangs, damp and rheumatic. Though the sun and warmth will return during the winter, the dampness is now a constant, insinuating into bones and brickwork. The floods of storms leave the streets and roads mud patches of piled sand turned a constituent of cement. Yet, the storms wash away and clean the sky of the last haze of summer; it becomes bright and transparent, late-afternoon sun wrapping the peaks of the Artà mountains in a fire glow, beacons across the bay where in the other direction the Tramuntana tops, in their barrenness, look to hold snow but is just light on grey that can make them seem snowy even in summer.
There is a smell of wood-burning. It competes with the shifting sulphurous scents of the wetlands, drifting into cracks and lying on the liquid atmosphere, awaiting a further smack of thunder and an avalanche of cleansing rain. Winter comes now. It makes moss and algae the flagstones and walls, a sign, though, of the purity of the air. The first cold winds of winter. And you think of spring and that first assault of heat and wonder how it can ever be winter.
TUI price reductions
TUI may not have had anything to add to the reprimand issued by Thomas Cook to the Spanish Government over the rise in IVA, but the company has reacted to the uncertain economic circumstances by announcing that prices for holidays to Mallorca will fall by some 5.5% next year. In Menorca, where the tourism market is considerably less favourable, prices will go down by 10%. Good news you might think, and it is, but the boss of TUI Germany, making this announcement (he was the one, you will recall, who helped to plant the first pine in the TUI forest) admits that there will be more tourists coming on an all-inclusive basis in 2010. But not all is lost as there won't be anything like the numbers travelling all-inclusive as there are to Turkey.
While there is all the angst about all-inclusives in Mallorca, one does wonder at the impact of such a style of offer across Europe and into Turkey. Greece, for example, has been hard hit by the increase in AI. Consumers may be demanding this undoubtedly cost-effective way of holidaying, but what type of tourism will this all lead to? It is becoming increasingly clear that holidays are being sourced less on the basis of resort or country but from the point of view of the best AI deal. The actual destination is becoming less relevant. It is often said, in criticism of AI, that the holidaymaker who stays largely within the confines of his or her AI complex, could be anywhere. And so it would seem. Mallorca, Greece, Turkey - it's all the same, just varies in how hot it is and what brands of booze can be obtained. Is this really what tourism should be? Destinations as dumping grounds for northern Europeans who hand over most of the holiday cost to tour operators and airlines? Most of Mediterranean Europe becomes a collection of resorts, polarised by those who live there and the wristband brigade who pay no attention to their surroundings. I'm not sure that this was how it was meant to be.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Rupert Brooke was the poet. And the band was Pink Floyd, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mV9AwB-DnoI. Today's title - hard rock goes orchestral.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Friday, November 06, 2009
Grantchester Meadows
In Cambridgeshire there is a golf course which is completely organic. You'll have to forgive me, I missed the name of the course, but there was a report about it on Five Live the other day. I emailed the station to ask if they could send me the name, but ... . Anyway, the point about this is that it demonstrates the extent to which golf developments are being planned in a way that they have strong environmental elements. The course itself has separate meadows for flowers and birds, while a river attracts numerous types of wild fowl. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds has been involved in the planning of the course, and the representative from the RSPB said that, though golf courses can be harmful to the environment, managed correctly there is no reason why courses cannot co-exist happily with nature.
Instinctively, I'm inclined to believe this. A development that just ploughs up habitats unthinkingly is no good, and this may well have been the case in the past: one thinks of all the conversion of unproductive agricultural land in Britain that was turned over to golfers. Yet, why shouldn't the two make for environmental bedfellows? In the Cambridgeshire case, the golfers themselves are said to be all in favour because of the ambience created, while apparently the Royal and Ancient now have firm environmental management policies.
One says all this in connection with courses in Mallorca, especially those in the planning or to be developed, such as the one in Muro about which there has been such a protracted environmental hoo-hah. Things have gone pretty quiet on the Son Bosc development front, but the Gobby lobby have had its latest objection rejected, one that centred on a less-than-favourable report by its own people being ignored by the environment ministry.
I have never understood why there has been such a fuss, other than the fact that the course might turn out to be a white elephant. From an environmental point of view, it surely can be made to work. Perhaps the Muro developers should be talking to those in Cambridgeshire who are making it work.
Continuing Columbus
And ever more on the Columbus story, and once again thanks to Dom for his feedback on this. There is a blog site - http://www.medievalnews.blogspot.com - which would be good for any of you who might have a general interest in history, but specifically it ran a thing on 26 October entitled "Scholar casts doubt on claims that Columbus was a Catalan". This reports views of a Dr. Diana Gilliland Wright who questions the significance of a particular form of punctuation used by Columbus and said to be indicative of Catalan of the time. She says that this was used elsewhere, for instance by the Venetians who were of course Italian, even if Venice is some distance from Genoa. Moreover, she says that spelling at that time was "fluid", which does to a degree support my own view that Columbus could very easily have acquired a "polyglot tongue" especially if his written works were grafted onto what was effectively a blank canvas as native Genoese did not have a written language as such.
Light Up The Sky
'Tis that time of the year. There is even a Bonfire Night tomorrow night at the Mallorca Cricket Club ("the island's premier ex-pat community family event , it says: why do they spell expat with a hyphen; it's one word). But note that it is Bonfire Night, not Guy Fawkes. We've stopped having guys. We don't burn effigies. Or do we? Somewhere in Surrey, they put Jordan to the flame yesterday. What a splendid idea, all that silicone exploding, while a touch of satire, rather like the giant heads in Mallorca at fiesta time, are often satirical representations of local politicians and others. Makes me think. Who would I burn? A couple of clients I can think of could do with a good dousing. Who would you burn? Step forward - probably - Gordon and any number of MPs, but otherwise ... ?
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Police, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYZQYui8Svc. Today's title - well, don't know that it is Grantchester, but it'll do. Two questions - who was the poet who wrote about Grantchester - "stands the church clock at ten to three" - and which band did something with this title?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Instinctively, I'm inclined to believe this. A development that just ploughs up habitats unthinkingly is no good, and this may well have been the case in the past: one thinks of all the conversion of unproductive agricultural land in Britain that was turned over to golfers. Yet, why shouldn't the two make for environmental bedfellows? In the Cambridgeshire case, the golfers themselves are said to be all in favour because of the ambience created, while apparently the Royal and Ancient now have firm environmental management policies.
One says all this in connection with courses in Mallorca, especially those in the planning or to be developed, such as the one in Muro about which there has been such a protracted environmental hoo-hah. Things have gone pretty quiet on the Son Bosc development front, but the Gobby lobby have had its latest objection rejected, one that centred on a less-than-favourable report by its own people being ignored by the environment ministry.
I have never understood why there has been such a fuss, other than the fact that the course might turn out to be a white elephant. From an environmental point of view, it surely can be made to work. Perhaps the Muro developers should be talking to those in Cambridgeshire who are making it work.
Continuing Columbus
And ever more on the Columbus story, and once again thanks to Dom for his feedback on this. There is a blog site - http://www.medievalnews.blogspot.com - which would be good for any of you who might have a general interest in history, but specifically it ran a thing on 26 October entitled "Scholar casts doubt on claims that Columbus was a Catalan". This reports views of a Dr. Diana Gilliland Wright who questions the significance of a particular form of punctuation used by Columbus and said to be indicative of Catalan of the time. She says that this was used elsewhere, for instance by the Venetians who were of course Italian, even if Venice is some distance from Genoa. Moreover, she says that spelling at that time was "fluid", which does to a degree support my own view that Columbus could very easily have acquired a "polyglot tongue" especially if his written works were grafted onto what was effectively a blank canvas as native Genoese did not have a written language as such.
Light Up The Sky
'Tis that time of the year. There is even a Bonfire Night tomorrow night at the Mallorca Cricket Club ("the island's premier ex-pat community family event , it says: why do they spell expat with a hyphen; it's one word). But note that it is Bonfire Night, not Guy Fawkes. We've stopped having guys. We don't burn effigies. Or do we? Somewhere in Surrey, they put Jordan to the flame yesterday. What a splendid idea, all that silicone exploding, while a touch of satire, rather like the giant heads in Mallorca at fiesta time, are often satirical representations of local politicians and others. Makes me think. Who would I burn? A couple of clients I can think of could do with a good dousing. Who would you burn? Step forward - probably - Gordon and any number of MPs, but otherwise ... ?
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Police, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYZQYui8Svc. Today's title - well, don't know that it is Grantchester, but it'll do. Two questions - who was the poet who wrote about Grantchester - "stands the church clock at ten to three" - and which band did something with this title?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Thursday, November 05, 2009
So Lonely
Where are you planning on going on holiday in 2010? This might sound a daft question. Surely, you will be saying to yourselves, that here is this blog, purporting to have something to do with Mallorca, and I'm being asked where I might be going. The answer has, of course, to be Mallorca. Well, no, you would be wrong. "The Bulletin" is equally something to do with Mallorca, but it ran this thing the other day about the ten best destinations in the world, and not one of them was Mallorca, or indeed Spain. This was all based on what the Lonely Planet has to say.
Top of the list, apparently, is El Salvador, a country in central America whose only claim to fame is that it went to war with Honduras over a football match. There was a photo that supported El Salvador's bid for top place. Sun, sea, a few rocks, some sand and a part of a palm that, as always, is artistically shown in the foreground. Could have been anywhere really, except Morecambe. Or maybe they've got palms in Morecambe now, and even some sun.
And coming in second is, wait for it, Germany, a country that has much to commend it, but as a holiday destination? Actually, there are many places in Germany that would qualify. Freeze to death on the Baltic Sea for example, on that island to where nudists fly from Erfurt - kit off. And given that all Germans should be coralled onto other planes and made to fly to Mallorca, going in the opposite direction would be a case of taking former Chancellor Kohls to Neuerburg - or something like that.
One can't help but feel that there is something not quite right about a recommended list of holiday destinations in a Mallorcan paper that fails to include Magaluf as one of its top ten cities. Then there are the top "regions" in the world, as designated by the oh so Lonely Planet, one of them being southern Africa. What, all of it? Including Zimbabwe? You don't need to go that far to get some good, honest corruption. Just spend a few days in the political corridors of Palma, while it's far cheaper to travel, your money won't devalue by the minute and you won't be attacked somewhere that has no rule of law and that is run by a total lunatic; at least I don't think you would be.
Enviro Man
They see him here, they see him there, they see Enviro Man everywhere. Yep, it's him again. Hardly a day passes without the environment minister, Sr. Grimalt, being photographed at some event or other. At the weekend, he was at it again, this time in Albufera, where some rare ducks were being released. In the minister's favour, one can at least says that he does actually see a lot of the environment, which probably does come with the job. But what with a walkway opening one day, a tree planting the next and a duck flapping the following day, how does the minister's carbon footprint stack-heel up? Perhaps he takes the ministerial pushbike, though one doubts it. Could they not maybe have a pretend minister who attends these functions? A cardboard cutout and relay his messages of support from an organically controlled bunker somewhere in Palma. Or one of those local giant things that they have at fiestas, suitably adorned with an environment minister head. Or even an inflatable minister. In fact, why not have a cabinet of inflatables. Just pump them up wherever some event is going on. And then they may as well get rid of the real ducks as well, and bring on the rubber ones from Can Picafort.
Of course the minister might, in the future, have been able to have taken a more environmentally friendly train journey to Albufera. But not once his chum in the Unió Mallorquina, mayor Ferrer of Alcúdia, said not in my northern corridor, the mayor of course preferring the southern corridor, that which would have terminated by those rare ducks' patch and maybe terminated them in the process. Bring on the rubber ducks.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Laura Nyro, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch0e9l9V5Lc. Today's title - often misheard as "Sue Lawley", this was?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Top of the list, apparently, is El Salvador, a country in central America whose only claim to fame is that it went to war with Honduras over a football match. There was a photo that supported El Salvador's bid for top place. Sun, sea, a few rocks, some sand and a part of a palm that, as always, is artistically shown in the foreground. Could have been anywhere really, except Morecambe. Or maybe they've got palms in Morecambe now, and even some sun.
And coming in second is, wait for it, Germany, a country that has much to commend it, but as a holiday destination? Actually, there are many places in Germany that would qualify. Freeze to death on the Baltic Sea for example, on that island to where nudists fly from Erfurt - kit off. And given that all Germans should be coralled onto other planes and made to fly to Mallorca, going in the opposite direction would be a case of taking former Chancellor Kohls to Neuerburg - or something like that.
One can't help but feel that there is something not quite right about a recommended list of holiday destinations in a Mallorcan paper that fails to include Magaluf as one of its top ten cities. Then there are the top "regions" in the world, as designated by the oh so Lonely Planet, one of them being southern Africa. What, all of it? Including Zimbabwe? You don't need to go that far to get some good, honest corruption. Just spend a few days in the political corridors of Palma, while it's far cheaper to travel, your money won't devalue by the minute and you won't be attacked somewhere that has no rule of law and that is run by a total lunatic; at least I don't think you would be.
Enviro Man
They see him here, they see him there, they see Enviro Man everywhere. Yep, it's him again. Hardly a day passes without the environment minister, Sr. Grimalt, being photographed at some event or other. At the weekend, he was at it again, this time in Albufera, where some rare ducks were being released. In the minister's favour, one can at least says that he does actually see a lot of the environment, which probably does come with the job. But what with a walkway opening one day, a tree planting the next and a duck flapping the following day, how does the minister's carbon footprint stack-heel up? Perhaps he takes the ministerial pushbike, though one doubts it. Could they not maybe have a pretend minister who attends these functions? A cardboard cutout and relay his messages of support from an organically controlled bunker somewhere in Palma. Or one of those local giant things that they have at fiestas, suitably adorned with an environment minister head. Or even an inflatable minister. In fact, why not have a cabinet of inflatables. Just pump them up wherever some event is going on. And then they may as well get rid of the real ducks as well, and bring on the rubber ones from Can Picafort.
Of course the minister might, in the future, have been able to have taken a more environmentally friendly train journey to Albufera. But not once his chum in the Unió Mallorquina, mayor Ferrer of Alcúdia, said not in my northern corridor, the mayor of course preferring the southern corridor, that which would have terminated by those rare ducks' patch and maybe terminated them in the process. Bring on the rubber ducks.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Laura Nyro, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch0e9l9V5Lc. Today's title - often misheard as "Sue Lawley", this was?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Wednesday, November 04, 2009
Flim Flam Man
Something of a follow-up day today. Follow-up to two stories, one about Columbus, the other about "Sun, Sea and A&E". Both stem from comments received.
To Columbus first, and the piece on The Columbus Industry. The author of the comment describes much of the evidence that seeks to establish Columbus's place of birth as anywhere other than Genoa as "flim flam". A rather good expression. I must use it myself some time. Intuitively, I cannot go along with the non-Genoa hypotheses, while factually there is, as the commentator points out, much which does uphold the Genoa argument.
When the book by Estelle Irizarry and its findings were being reported, it was being said that it had been proved that Columbus was Catalan. The book has done no such thing. Had it been irrefutably proved, then there would have been one hell of a song and dance. But there wasn't, because it hadn't been. What the book has done is to advance an important contribution to the Columbus debate, one that underscores previous work that has sought to make the Catalan link. And it is genuinely important as it has addressed Columbus's use of language, one that has baffled historians and also baffled his contemporaries, such as Las Casas. Irizarry may have established a Catalan element and also established that Columbus spoke Catalan (or a Ladino variant) before Castilian, but this, in itself, does not mean that he might not have acquired this somewhere other than Catalonia or Aragon. Until it can be proved, indisputably, that Columbus was born somewhere other than Genoa, the debate will continue, and the Genoa argument will continue to hold sway.
Mallorca on the telly
And so to "Sun, Sea and A&E". I think I have upset someone, namely Gill Bucklitsch, the lady who works at Muro hospital, is featured on the programme and who was interviewed by "The Bulletin", something that inspired an earlier piece. She found it "rather insulting". In which case I apologise. It is not my intention to offend.
Moving on, the piece was one about the celebrity that comes from reality TV and also TV's portrayal of Mallorca, one that I described as "telly froth". I'm afraid that I don't buy the argument that reality TV is somehow promotion for Mallorca. That "Sun, Sea and A&E" shows local health services and staff in a positive light is commendable, but do people choose their holidays on the basis of medical provision? Perhaps they ought to, in which case they wouldn't go to Egypt if they heard of the story of the eight-year-old girl who was whisked away from her parents, suspected of having landed with swine flu.
When Clarkson and the boys came to do their "Top Gear" show, it was also said that this would be good for Mallorca. Why? It was a programme about cars and a rally, not a travelogue. The interest for some would have been heightened as they would have known the location, that I can see, but it would not necessarily result in a sudden rush of bookings from those who didn't. That there is now talk of a new race-track for Mallorca may be beneficial, though don't let's expect an Abu Dhabi and Button and Vettel haring around a Mallorcan F1 circuit any time soon. Nevertheless, with the sun shining, Mallorca did look pretty good during whatever it was the Top Gear trio were doing, and I can't pretend to understand what, other than the fact they were driving cars - some of the time.
Otherwise, what would make for good TV for Mallorca? Travel shows, yes, a decent drama series, yes. A soap might even do it. And then there might be historical dramas. Chopin's winter in Mallorca wouldn't do, as a truthful telling would reveal how much he disliked Valldemossa. Robert Graves possibly, though I'm not sure what. Or how about the Moors and the Christians? Shot on location around Pollensa, though the chances of a British production team doing it would be remote, on the grounds of religious insensitivity. Shame, it could make a rollicking good drama. The story of the reclaiming of Albufera? Shot on location around Alcúdia, Sa Pobla and Muro. There are probably any number of possibilities that would be genuinely meaningful.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Superb, The Decemberists. This is them on Letterman, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlb197LmwSw. And here is the shorter version of the O Valencia video.
Today's title - this was a film with George C. Scott, and there was also a song by one of the most distinctive female vocalists from the '60s and '70s.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
To Columbus first, and the piece on The Columbus Industry. The author of the comment describes much of the evidence that seeks to establish Columbus's place of birth as anywhere other than Genoa as "flim flam". A rather good expression. I must use it myself some time. Intuitively, I cannot go along with the non-Genoa hypotheses, while factually there is, as the commentator points out, much which does uphold the Genoa argument.
When the book by Estelle Irizarry and its findings were being reported, it was being said that it had been proved that Columbus was Catalan. The book has done no such thing. Had it been irrefutably proved, then there would have been one hell of a song and dance. But there wasn't, because it hadn't been. What the book has done is to advance an important contribution to the Columbus debate, one that underscores previous work that has sought to make the Catalan link. And it is genuinely important as it has addressed Columbus's use of language, one that has baffled historians and also baffled his contemporaries, such as Las Casas. Irizarry may have established a Catalan element and also established that Columbus spoke Catalan (or a Ladino variant) before Castilian, but this, in itself, does not mean that he might not have acquired this somewhere other than Catalonia or Aragon. Until it can be proved, indisputably, that Columbus was born somewhere other than Genoa, the debate will continue, and the Genoa argument will continue to hold sway.
Mallorca on the telly
And so to "Sun, Sea and A&E". I think I have upset someone, namely Gill Bucklitsch, the lady who works at Muro hospital, is featured on the programme and who was interviewed by "The Bulletin", something that inspired an earlier piece. She found it "rather insulting". In which case I apologise. It is not my intention to offend.
Moving on, the piece was one about the celebrity that comes from reality TV and also TV's portrayal of Mallorca, one that I described as "telly froth". I'm afraid that I don't buy the argument that reality TV is somehow promotion for Mallorca. That "Sun, Sea and A&E" shows local health services and staff in a positive light is commendable, but do people choose their holidays on the basis of medical provision? Perhaps they ought to, in which case they wouldn't go to Egypt if they heard of the story of the eight-year-old girl who was whisked away from her parents, suspected of having landed with swine flu.
When Clarkson and the boys came to do their "Top Gear" show, it was also said that this would be good for Mallorca. Why? It was a programme about cars and a rally, not a travelogue. The interest for some would have been heightened as they would have known the location, that I can see, but it would not necessarily result in a sudden rush of bookings from those who didn't. That there is now talk of a new race-track for Mallorca may be beneficial, though don't let's expect an Abu Dhabi and Button and Vettel haring around a Mallorcan F1 circuit any time soon. Nevertheless, with the sun shining, Mallorca did look pretty good during whatever it was the Top Gear trio were doing, and I can't pretend to understand what, other than the fact they were driving cars - some of the time.
Otherwise, what would make for good TV for Mallorca? Travel shows, yes, a decent drama series, yes. A soap might even do it. And then there might be historical dramas. Chopin's winter in Mallorca wouldn't do, as a truthful telling would reveal how much he disliked Valldemossa. Robert Graves possibly, though I'm not sure what. Or how about the Moors and the Christians? Shot on location around Pollensa, though the chances of a British production team doing it would be remote, on the grounds of religious insensitivity. Shame, it could make a rollicking good drama. The story of the reclaiming of Albufera? Shot on location around Alcúdia, Sa Pobla and Muro. There are probably any number of possibilities that would be genuinely meaningful.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Superb, The Decemberists. This is them on Letterman, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlb197LmwSw. And here is the shorter version of the O Valencia video.
Today's title - this was a film with George C. Scott, and there was also a song by one of the most distinctive female vocalists from the '60s and '70s.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Tuesday, November 03, 2009
O Valencia
There has been yet another demonstration. On Sunday. Not in Mallorca, but in Valencia. It was a demonstration against corruption.
As with the pro-Catalan march in Palma earlier this year, so there were again wild fluctuations in the numbers said to have been on the march. Something over 2,000, according to the police; 70,000, according to the organisers. How numbers can differ to that extent, heaven only knows.
The demonstration centred on the so-called Gürtel corruption case that has been rumbling on for several months. The background to the case was considered to be sub judice, so there was little factual reporting. But it has now all come into the open. It concerns a businessman called Francisco Correa who is alleged to have paid the Partido Popular party for favours. This was in Madrid, but the case has spread to Valencia where the regional president, Francisco Camps (also Partido Popular), is said to have accepted gifts of shoes and suits. There is quite a bit more to this, but it's not for here to go into it all.
While this may be viewed as just another case of alleged corruption, the fact that people have taken to the streets does make it rather different. It can be argued that the march was politically motivated, whipped up by the left-wing in Valencia, and there may well be some truth in this. However, the fact of there being a demonstration against corruption adds weight to a growing discontent directed towards the political class and also some elements of business. One might also place this in the context of the 19.3% unemployment rate that exists in Spain - the highest in the Eurozone.
In Mallorca, various prominent politicians have been implicated in cases currently under investigation. These include the former regional president (Jaume Matas, Partido Popular) and the former leader of the Unió Mallorquina, Maria Antònia Munar, now the president of the Balearic parliament.
With all this in mind, it was put to me on Sunday that the anti-Camps demo in Valencia is representative of a move which signals that people have simply had enough. The person who made this point then also went on to decry various practices by employers that fall into the category of fraud, about which employees can do little or nothing.
It is hard not to conclude that corruption, at different levels of society, is endemic. Many people would believe that all politicians are in it in order to line their pockets in some way. With such a mistrust of the political class, and of business, it is hard not to also conclude that the practice of democracy is partly illusory. There is more than an echo of the corrupt system of the "cacique" which emerged in the nineteenth century when Spanish sham democracy, with the collusion of a generally apathetic populace, was driven by the local political boss who delivered the results required and operated by a system of favours.
But the populace is no longer apathetic. It is educated and informed. It may have had enough, but there was a possibly instructive comment attached to a piece elsewhere about the Valencia march, which said, in effect, that while the demonstrators may have been voicing their repugnance at corruption, many of them would have gone back and looked at ways of fiddling their VAT. That, though, says it all. When political leaders, businesspeople and also occasionally some in the police get up to wrongdoing, it sets the tone. And so society at all levels is riven with something rotten at its heart.
Catalonian football team
Valencia is a Catalan-speaking region. It is not in Catalonia, but it shares a common language even if there is, as ever, a regional dialect - Valencian. But were you aware that Catalonia has a football team? Johann Cruyff, once a player and coach at Barcelona, has become its new coach. The team plays only friendlies as it is not recognised by FIFA or UEFA. Its most recent match was a 2-1 defeat of Colombia. Perhaps the most intriguing point about this team is that, unlike most things Catalan being banned during the Franco era, it was allowed to play, even competing against a Spanish national side and beating it (as well as being thrashed 6-0).
It would seem that all the regions of Spain can field teams, so long as they play only friendlies. The Balearics, from what I can see, has only played once, losing to Malta. Catalonia has tried, in vain, to be admitted to UEFA, arguing that if Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland can field sides in competitions, then so should it. God, if all the Spanish regions suddenly popped up with teams, qualifying rounds would take years. And the chances of Wales and the rest ever qualifying again would be even more remote than they are now.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Style Council, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElhC1jFz7-c. Today's title - one of this blog's favourites, one of the Oregon set.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
As with the pro-Catalan march in Palma earlier this year, so there were again wild fluctuations in the numbers said to have been on the march. Something over 2,000, according to the police; 70,000, according to the organisers. How numbers can differ to that extent, heaven only knows.
The demonstration centred on the so-called Gürtel corruption case that has been rumbling on for several months. The background to the case was considered to be sub judice, so there was little factual reporting. But it has now all come into the open. It concerns a businessman called Francisco Correa who is alleged to have paid the Partido Popular party for favours. This was in Madrid, but the case has spread to Valencia where the regional president, Francisco Camps (also Partido Popular), is said to have accepted gifts of shoes and suits. There is quite a bit more to this, but it's not for here to go into it all.
While this may be viewed as just another case of alleged corruption, the fact that people have taken to the streets does make it rather different. It can be argued that the march was politically motivated, whipped up by the left-wing in Valencia, and there may well be some truth in this. However, the fact of there being a demonstration against corruption adds weight to a growing discontent directed towards the political class and also some elements of business. One might also place this in the context of the 19.3% unemployment rate that exists in Spain - the highest in the Eurozone.
In Mallorca, various prominent politicians have been implicated in cases currently under investigation. These include the former regional president (Jaume Matas, Partido Popular) and the former leader of the Unió Mallorquina, Maria Antònia Munar, now the president of the Balearic parliament.
With all this in mind, it was put to me on Sunday that the anti-Camps demo in Valencia is representative of a move which signals that people have simply had enough. The person who made this point then also went on to decry various practices by employers that fall into the category of fraud, about which employees can do little or nothing.
It is hard not to conclude that corruption, at different levels of society, is endemic. Many people would believe that all politicians are in it in order to line their pockets in some way. With such a mistrust of the political class, and of business, it is hard not to also conclude that the practice of democracy is partly illusory. There is more than an echo of the corrupt system of the "cacique" which emerged in the nineteenth century when Spanish sham democracy, with the collusion of a generally apathetic populace, was driven by the local political boss who delivered the results required and operated by a system of favours.
But the populace is no longer apathetic. It is educated and informed. It may have had enough, but there was a possibly instructive comment attached to a piece elsewhere about the Valencia march, which said, in effect, that while the demonstrators may have been voicing their repugnance at corruption, many of them would have gone back and looked at ways of fiddling their VAT. That, though, says it all. When political leaders, businesspeople and also occasionally some in the police get up to wrongdoing, it sets the tone. And so society at all levels is riven with something rotten at its heart.
Catalonian football team
Valencia is a Catalan-speaking region. It is not in Catalonia, but it shares a common language even if there is, as ever, a regional dialect - Valencian. But were you aware that Catalonia has a football team? Johann Cruyff, once a player and coach at Barcelona, has become its new coach. The team plays only friendlies as it is not recognised by FIFA or UEFA. Its most recent match was a 2-1 defeat of Colombia. Perhaps the most intriguing point about this team is that, unlike most things Catalan being banned during the Franco era, it was allowed to play, even competing against a Spanish national side and beating it (as well as being thrashed 6-0).
It would seem that all the regions of Spain can field teams, so long as they play only friendlies. The Balearics, from what I can see, has only played once, losing to Malta. Catalonia has tried, in vain, to be admitted to UEFA, arguing that if Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland can field sides in competitions, then so should it. God, if all the Spanish regions suddenly popped up with teams, qualifying rounds would take years. And the chances of Wales and the rest ever qualifying again would be even more remote than they are now.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Style Council, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElhC1jFz7-c. Today's title - one of this blog's favourites, one of the Oregon set.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Monday, November 02, 2009
Walls Come Tumbling Down
Twenty years ago - on 9 November - the wall came tumbling down. The Berlin Wall. It was an event that had all manner of consequences. The East German football team, needing only a point to qualify for the World Cup, lost 3-0 against Austria on 15 November, the players' minds on other things, it is said. And so the bizarre prospect of the newly liberated East Germans meeting West Germany in the final never came to pass, and West Germany, of course, went on to win.
But more importantly, the fall of the Wall meant that Ossies could travel abroad freely, and not only those playing for the national football team and athletes pumped full of steroids by the Stasi-controlled coaching regime at the likes of the Berlin performance centre. And what was the first destination for many? You guessed it, Mallorca. The people of the later to be reunified country were reunited even before official reunification took place - on the beaches of Playa de Palma.
In April 1990, the first tourists from the DDR came to Mallorca. Ten thousand of them were invited - free of charge. Hotels and full board were provided by the Balearic Government, while the flights were paid for by the tour operators - TUI and Neckermann. Of course April was not high season, so finding the rooms was probably not too difficult, but it was still a considerable gesture, especially if it meant that a new market in the east of Germany was going to be forged over the following years. Perhaps it wasn't a completely altruistic exercise.
There is a fascinating article about this in the "Diario", one that refers to the fact that the visitors, used to being controlled and having to seek permission, couldn't quite come to terms with being able to come and go as they pleased from the hotels. They also, apparently, couldn't get enough of the oranges. Like Brits who pack their suitcases with sleeves of Lambert & Butler, so the original Ossie tourists went back, bags bulging with fruit.
Ten thousand holidays - free. Maybe they should think of something similar now, and not just for east Germans.
Yesterday was, depending on how you prefer to call it, All Saints, the day of the witches or the day of the dead. On 1 November, the cemeteries are packed with those taking their tributes. The florists of Mallorca do a roaring trade the day before All Saints. Day of the dead, though, seems somewhat apt. 1 November is also the first day after the season finishes. Being both a holiday, a Sunday and the morning after Hallowe'en festivities, had you been venturing out in the morning, you might have been shocked at just how quiet, nay dead, it all seemed. The season ends, and they celebrate it with the day of the dead.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - John Lennon, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAJ2AoEwDvY. Today's title - The Cappuccino Kid went political.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
But more importantly, the fall of the Wall meant that Ossies could travel abroad freely, and not only those playing for the national football team and athletes pumped full of steroids by the Stasi-controlled coaching regime at the likes of the Berlin performance centre. And what was the first destination for many? You guessed it, Mallorca. The people of the later to be reunified country were reunited even before official reunification took place - on the beaches of Playa de Palma.
In April 1990, the first tourists from the DDR came to Mallorca. Ten thousand of them were invited - free of charge. Hotels and full board were provided by the Balearic Government, while the flights were paid for by the tour operators - TUI and Neckermann. Of course April was not high season, so finding the rooms was probably not too difficult, but it was still a considerable gesture, especially if it meant that a new market in the east of Germany was going to be forged over the following years. Perhaps it wasn't a completely altruistic exercise.
There is a fascinating article about this in the "Diario", one that refers to the fact that the visitors, used to being controlled and having to seek permission, couldn't quite come to terms with being able to come and go as they pleased from the hotels. They also, apparently, couldn't get enough of the oranges. Like Brits who pack their suitcases with sleeves of Lambert & Butler, so the original Ossie tourists went back, bags bulging with fruit.
Ten thousand holidays - free. Maybe they should think of something similar now, and not just for east Germans.
Yesterday was, depending on how you prefer to call it, All Saints, the day of the witches or the day of the dead. On 1 November, the cemeteries are packed with those taking their tributes. The florists of Mallorca do a roaring trade the day before All Saints. Day of the dead, though, seems somewhat apt. 1 November is also the first day after the season finishes. Being both a holiday, a Sunday and the morning after Hallowe'en festivities, had you been venturing out in the morning, you might have been shocked at just how quiet, nay dead, it all seemed. The season ends, and they celebrate it with the day of the dead.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - John Lennon, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAJ2AoEwDvY. Today's title - The Cappuccino Kid went political.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Sunday, November 01, 2009
Starting Over
Today marks the blog's fourth anniversary - the first archives are no longer online, but they are still there, somewhere, on a disc. It is also two years and one month since the blog became a daily occurrence, save for the occasional planned or unplanned absence.
There are certain questions that you raise - what actually is the blog, how do I find the time, where do I get the "inspiration" to write something every day. Of these, the second is probably the easiest to answer. I just do. Rarely does it take a huge amount of time. What can is redrafting pieces and sometimes junking those I'm not satisfied with and starting over. I've started this piece more than once. The third is also quite easy. It boils down to being open to any sort of tag or lead, be it from the media (of all sorts), what someone says, what one observes. There is no shortage of "inspiration", so long as one keeps eyes and ears wide open.
The first question is the most difficult. Blogs vary in their style and purpose. Originally, many were in effect diaries. And that was pretty much how this one started out. But it has moved on, a long way from that original concept. What it is not, and has never set out or claimed to be, is a news service. That there may be news is generally the starting-point for something broader. But to give an exact definition is hard.
Much of what appears on the internet as personal contributions has found its voice through not only blogs but also social networks and now also Twitter. Defining any of them is not straightforward. Indeed one of the people behind Twitter told "Wired Magazine" recently that "I don't know" would be one of the ways he would define it. In other words, these vehicles emerge and are shaped by those who make use of them. It is the very looseness of purpose that is appealing and stimulating but also unfocussed and potentially dangerous. And by dangerous, I mean a tendency to vilification and vendetta. Blogs, social networks, Twitter are all means of expression and of self-publishing. They should all be approached with responsibility. Unfortunately, this is not always so. Publish and be damned? No. Publish and damn someone or something has become the principle.
But two words above tend to give a meaning as to what happens on this blog - looseness and the opposite of "unfocussed", i.e. focussed. These may seem contradictory, but there is looseness in the sense that subject matter is broad while focussed within a context, one of Mallorca and Spain. If one trawls through October's entries alone, there were few specific main features about Alcúdia or Pollensa. But as it says on the tin, the blog is not just about Alcúdia or Pollensa; the focus, the angle is wider. And the subject matters are equally wide - from abortion and smoking to football and the Olympics, but all within a Spanish if not a Mallorcan context.
In this respect, the blog is largely a series of observations - of society, politics, people, places and more. And one situates Alcúdia and Pollensa within a broader framework of these disparate elements. It is, for example, impossible to have an appreciation of local politics without some nod in the direction of what went before, no more so than the Franco period, and of the current politics of language.
More than this, however, I have come to realise that the blog is, to a great extent, a reaction against not only the lameness of much writing about Mallorca but also its sheer absence. To explain. There have been two recent stories - the BNP and Stephen Gately. I considered both of them, but apart from the fact that Gately just so happened to die in Mallorca, there was no obvious Mallorcan or Spanish angle. Why do them? In fact, I have a not uninteresting story about the BNP, one that I have outlined to more than one of you in an email, but I couldn't justify it as a blog story.
Yet both these stories have been given a good airing in the English-speaking press, as do, of course, all sorts of stories that have nothing to do with Mallorca or Spain. I don't criticise this as such, but what I do question is an over-abundance of British and international news and comment at the expense of the innumerable stories that exist either on the island or in the country. In this, there is an additional problem, and it is one of credibility. While I will take note of what a Simon Jenkins, a Matthew Parris or even a Richard Littlejohn might have to say about British politics, why should I take any notice of what someone living in Palma or Calvia might have to say? They are not credible witnesses because they are removed. Their contributions are the hard-copy equivalent of a blogger who wants to get something off his or her chest. In their physical, newsprint guise, they fill space to no great effect, other than as testimony to egoism.
It is this further realisation that draws me to conclude that there is little or no future for the hard-copy English press in Mallorca. The essentially regurgitated nature of British/international news and comment can be found on the internet, as can the primary contributions of Jenkins and the rest. The lack of a more local focus may indeed be better served away from the traditional press and tackled via blogs and the like. The newspaper has become simply a means of packaging or as a promotional tool for it in a different form or for advertisers. The real stories are to be found elsewhere.
I shall press on, but may soon be starting over ... watch out.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - P.J. Harvey and Thom Yorke, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99k8w65v3_I. Today's title - and this was?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
There are certain questions that you raise - what actually is the blog, how do I find the time, where do I get the "inspiration" to write something every day. Of these, the second is probably the easiest to answer. I just do. Rarely does it take a huge amount of time. What can is redrafting pieces and sometimes junking those I'm not satisfied with and starting over. I've started this piece more than once. The third is also quite easy. It boils down to being open to any sort of tag or lead, be it from the media (of all sorts), what someone says, what one observes. There is no shortage of "inspiration", so long as one keeps eyes and ears wide open.
The first question is the most difficult. Blogs vary in their style and purpose. Originally, many were in effect diaries. And that was pretty much how this one started out. But it has moved on, a long way from that original concept. What it is not, and has never set out or claimed to be, is a news service. That there may be news is generally the starting-point for something broader. But to give an exact definition is hard.
Much of what appears on the internet as personal contributions has found its voice through not only blogs but also social networks and now also Twitter. Defining any of them is not straightforward. Indeed one of the people behind Twitter told "Wired Magazine" recently that "I don't know" would be one of the ways he would define it. In other words, these vehicles emerge and are shaped by those who make use of them. It is the very looseness of purpose that is appealing and stimulating but also unfocussed and potentially dangerous. And by dangerous, I mean a tendency to vilification and vendetta. Blogs, social networks, Twitter are all means of expression and of self-publishing. They should all be approached with responsibility. Unfortunately, this is not always so. Publish and be damned? No. Publish and damn someone or something has become the principle.
But two words above tend to give a meaning as to what happens on this blog - looseness and the opposite of "unfocussed", i.e. focussed. These may seem contradictory, but there is looseness in the sense that subject matter is broad while focussed within a context, one of Mallorca and Spain. If one trawls through October's entries alone, there were few specific main features about Alcúdia or Pollensa. But as it says on the tin, the blog is not just about Alcúdia or Pollensa; the focus, the angle is wider. And the subject matters are equally wide - from abortion and smoking to football and the Olympics, but all within a Spanish if not a Mallorcan context.
In this respect, the blog is largely a series of observations - of society, politics, people, places and more. And one situates Alcúdia and Pollensa within a broader framework of these disparate elements. It is, for example, impossible to have an appreciation of local politics without some nod in the direction of what went before, no more so than the Franco period, and of the current politics of language.
More than this, however, I have come to realise that the blog is, to a great extent, a reaction against not only the lameness of much writing about Mallorca but also its sheer absence. To explain. There have been two recent stories - the BNP and Stephen Gately. I considered both of them, but apart from the fact that Gately just so happened to die in Mallorca, there was no obvious Mallorcan or Spanish angle. Why do them? In fact, I have a not uninteresting story about the BNP, one that I have outlined to more than one of you in an email, but I couldn't justify it as a blog story.
Yet both these stories have been given a good airing in the English-speaking press, as do, of course, all sorts of stories that have nothing to do with Mallorca or Spain. I don't criticise this as such, but what I do question is an over-abundance of British and international news and comment at the expense of the innumerable stories that exist either on the island or in the country. In this, there is an additional problem, and it is one of credibility. While I will take note of what a Simon Jenkins, a Matthew Parris or even a Richard Littlejohn might have to say about British politics, why should I take any notice of what someone living in Palma or Calvia might have to say? They are not credible witnesses because they are removed. Their contributions are the hard-copy equivalent of a blogger who wants to get something off his or her chest. In their physical, newsprint guise, they fill space to no great effect, other than as testimony to egoism.
It is this further realisation that draws me to conclude that there is little or no future for the hard-copy English press in Mallorca. The essentially regurgitated nature of British/international news and comment can be found on the internet, as can the primary contributions of Jenkins and the rest. The lack of a more local focus may indeed be better served away from the traditional press and tackled via blogs and the like. The newspaper has become simply a means of packaging or as a promotional tool for it in a different form or for advertisers. The real stories are to be found elsewhere.
I shall press on, but may soon be starting over ... watch out.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - P.J. Harvey and Thom Yorke, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99k8w65v3_I. Today's title - and this was?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Saturday, October 31, 2009
This Mess We're In
Real Mallorca. Pronounce "Real" correctly and it sounds "ray-ahl". Pronounce it incorrectly, in English, and it is real. Real mess, as in right mess. Not even a hundred days have passed since the new owner, Javier Martí Mingarro, took over, having paid something around 4 million euros for this basket-case of a club. Yet now, he has announced that he has nary a euro to spend. And so the club is up for sale - again. Part of the problem is that banks won't extend credit. Well, what a surprise. Perhaps someone might have asked them before pen was put to paper and the club went into new ownership.
Even less of a surprise is the fact that Real Mallorca is awash with debt. Anyone could have read the papers to learn that some 64 million euros (and rising) of short-term debt existed, to say nothing of the other 20 million or so. Anyone could have checked the books and discovered that monthly outgoings on first-team players and other staff amounted to 360,000 euros. Not everyone would have been able to say that other players and staff would not have been paid for two months.
A real mess. A real mess that has been gathering force for some time, thanks to the debt run up by the former owner, Vicente Grande. Force and farce, the latter surrounding the ludicrous episode with Paul Davidson who made a monkey of the fans, the club and his one-time cheerleaders in the local English-speaking press.
What is it with football clubs and pretenders to the ownership thrones? For Real Mallorca, read many others, such as Portsmouth or Newcastle United. Whatever one thinks of Mike Ashley, he did at least have money and did pay off the club's debts. Real Mallorca cannot even bank on this happening, because the banks won't chip in. And who can blame them?
Football appears to attract, more than any other "business", charlatans, dreamers, egoists and nutters. In England, there is at least more money sloshing around from TV. Not so in Spain, unless the club happens to be Real Madrid or Barça. What does Mallorca get from TV? 1.3 million a month. One comes back also to the fact that the club doesn't even own the stadium with its capacity not that much greater than that of ... hmm, Portsmouth's Fratton Park. There may be real estate lurking elsewhere, but what would be its prime asset, one that might act as collateral, is not its to put up as security. Again, small wonder that the banks are unwilling to play along. The only salvation is that the team, remarkably, is doing well this season.
The so-called "humid space" that is La Gola in Puerto Pollensa enjoyed a visitation a couple of days ago. Up popped the environment minister, Grimalt, alongside Mayor Cerdà to do some sort of topping-out ceremony on the parking area. For once, he wasn't cutting some tape or helping to plant a tree. The environment minister does get about. One day he's opening walkways in Son Bauló, then he's doing the same around Artà, the next he's giving the boss of TUI Germany a hand with the spade and planting the first pine in the TUI Bosc (forest). The latter is a splendid example of corporate sponsorship for parts of Mallorca. I am all in favour. Indeed, I have previously suggested that resorts could be sponsored. Maybe they will be. The sale of naming rights can bring in a pretty centimo. Just ask Mike Ashley who wants to flog off the naming of St. James's Park. But there is one more sponsorship that TUI should consider. Indeed one ownership it should consider.
TUI Real Mallorca. TUI-owned, lock, stock and barrel. There you go. Problem solved.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Mamas and the Papas, "California Dreamin' ", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN3GbF9Bx6E. Today's title - collaboration between miserabilist band singer and one of the finest "indie" female UK artists.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Index for October 2009
Abortion and assisted suicide - 19 October 2009
Andrés Montes - 21 October 2009
Camino de Ternelles re-claim walk - 14 October 2009
Can Picafort football tournament political spat - 13 October 2009
Christopher Columbus - 24 October 2009
City of culture and Olympics 2016 - 4 October 2009
Climate change - 17 October 2009
Council of Mallorca - 2 October 2009
Crisis in government averted - 15 October 2009
Fire-runs, European directive & - 23 October 2009, 26 October 2009
Golf in Campos - 15 October 2009
History and stories of Mallorca - 3 October 2009
IVA (VAT) and tourism - 7 October 2009, 8 October 2009, 9 October 2009
La Gola, Puerto Pollensa - 31 October 2009
Language learning - 20 October 2009
Malarial mosquitoes - 17 October 2009, 22 October 2009
October in Mallorca - 1 October 2009, 18 October 2009, 30 October 2009
Playa de Muro - 30 October 2009
Principe de Asturias awards 2009 - 22 October 2009
Real Mallorca for sale - 31 October 2009
Robberies from villas in Puerto Pollensa - 29 October 2009
Sa Pobla-Alcúdia railway - 5 October 2009
Season 2009 - 10 October 2009, 30 October 2009
Sephardic Jews, Ladino culture & - 16 October 2009
Ses Casetes des Capellans, Playa de Muro - 21 October 2009, 25 October 2009, 26 October 2009
Smoking in bars - 29 October 2009
Speed limits, driving - 27 October 2009
Temperatures exaggerated - 11 October 2009
Things that are wrong with Mallorca - 12 October 2009
Thomas Cook express concerns - 7 October 2009
TUI: trees, green hotels and state of tourism - 28 October 2009
Types you meet in a bar - 6 October 2009
Unió Mallorquina councillors' resignation - 2 October 2009, 15 October 2009
Even less of a surprise is the fact that Real Mallorca is awash with debt. Anyone could have read the papers to learn that some 64 million euros (and rising) of short-term debt existed, to say nothing of the other 20 million or so. Anyone could have checked the books and discovered that monthly outgoings on first-team players and other staff amounted to 360,000 euros. Not everyone would have been able to say that other players and staff would not have been paid for two months.
A real mess. A real mess that has been gathering force for some time, thanks to the debt run up by the former owner, Vicente Grande. Force and farce, the latter surrounding the ludicrous episode with Paul Davidson who made a monkey of the fans, the club and his one-time cheerleaders in the local English-speaking press.
What is it with football clubs and pretenders to the ownership thrones? For Real Mallorca, read many others, such as Portsmouth or Newcastle United. Whatever one thinks of Mike Ashley, he did at least have money and did pay off the club's debts. Real Mallorca cannot even bank on this happening, because the banks won't chip in. And who can blame them?
Football appears to attract, more than any other "business", charlatans, dreamers, egoists and nutters. In England, there is at least more money sloshing around from TV. Not so in Spain, unless the club happens to be Real Madrid or Barça. What does Mallorca get from TV? 1.3 million a month. One comes back also to the fact that the club doesn't even own the stadium with its capacity not that much greater than that of ... hmm, Portsmouth's Fratton Park. There may be real estate lurking elsewhere, but what would be its prime asset, one that might act as collateral, is not its to put up as security. Again, small wonder that the banks are unwilling to play along. The only salvation is that the team, remarkably, is doing well this season.
The so-called "humid space" that is La Gola in Puerto Pollensa enjoyed a visitation a couple of days ago. Up popped the environment minister, Grimalt, alongside Mayor Cerdà to do some sort of topping-out ceremony on the parking area. For once, he wasn't cutting some tape or helping to plant a tree. The environment minister does get about. One day he's opening walkways in Son Bauló, then he's doing the same around Artà, the next he's giving the boss of TUI Germany a hand with the spade and planting the first pine in the TUI Bosc (forest). The latter is a splendid example of corporate sponsorship for parts of Mallorca. I am all in favour. Indeed, I have previously suggested that resorts could be sponsored. Maybe they will be. The sale of naming rights can bring in a pretty centimo. Just ask Mike Ashley who wants to flog off the naming of St. James's Park. But there is one more sponsorship that TUI should consider. Indeed one ownership it should consider.
TUI Real Mallorca. TUI-owned, lock, stock and barrel. There you go. Problem solved.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Mamas and the Papas, "California Dreamin' ", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN3GbF9Bx6E. Today's title - collaboration between miserabilist band singer and one of the finest "indie" female UK artists.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Index for October 2009
Abortion and assisted suicide - 19 October 2009
Andrés Montes - 21 October 2009
Camino de Ternelles re-claim walk - 14 October 2009
Can Picafort football tournament political spat - 13 October 2009
Christopher Columbus - 24 October 2009
City of culture and Olympics 2016 - 4 October 2009
Climate change - 17 October 2009
Council of Mallorca - 2 October 2009
Crisis in government averted - 15 October 2009
Fire-runs, European directive & - 23 October 2009, 26 October 2009
Golf in Campos - 15 October 2009
History and stories of Mallorca - 3 October 2009
IVA (VAT) and tourism - 7 October 2009, 8 October 2009, 9 October 2009
La Gola, Puerto Pollensa - 31 October 2009
Language learning - 20 October 2009
Malarial mosquitoes - 17 October 2009, 22 October 2009
October in Mallorca - 1 October 2009, 18 October 2009, 30 October 2009
Playa de Muro - 30 October 2009
Principe de Asturias awards 2009 - 22 October 2009
Real Mallorca for sale - 31 October 2009
Robberies from villas in Puerto Pollensa - 29 October 2009
Sa Pobla-Alcúdia railway - 5 October 2009
Season 2009 - 10 October 2009, 30 October 2009
Sephardic Jews, Ladino culture & - 16 October 2009
Ses Casetes des Capellans, Playa de Muro - 21 October 2009, 25 October 2009, 26 October 2009
Smoking in bars - 29 October 2009
Speed limits, driving - 27 October 2009
Temperatures exaggerated - 11 October 2009
Things that are wrong with Mallorca - 12 October 2009
Thomas Cook express concerns - 7 October 2009
TUI: trees, green hotels and state of tourism - 28 October 2009
Types you meet in a bar - 6 October 2009
Unió Mallorquina councillors' resignation - 2 October 2009, 15 October 2009
Friday, October 30, 2009
All The Leaves Are Brown
Like the cicadas in their death throes, Playa de Muro falters towards its seasonal end. Whereas the cicadas, sucked of their greenness, hurl themselves pitiably into walls or onto terrace floors, Playa de Muro is still, silent almost in its last staggering moments. It just gives up. There's nothing left, or very little. The life that is left is equally pitiable. A supermarket with lilos that no-one needs, flip-flops flopping forlornly on racks, the Pepsi and soft drinks cabinets shuttered over as the stock had been allowed to run out days ago. The tabacs stopped bothering to order newspapers at the start of the week, the girls are at their busiest in compiling closing-up inventories; no-one is even buying sleeves of cigarettes. The flags on the beach indicate that lifeguards are still on guard, but there are ever fewer for them to watch over as the hotels limp on with their last remaining guests before the whitewash and brown paper are dragged out of the store-rooms and smothered across the insides of the glass facades. Boots of cars are open, revealing suitcases and boxes of small belongings, ready for transportation to who knows where. The apartments are emptying, the season's population moving on and the "for-rent" signs being hung up.
This is how it ends. The season just fades away but not without recriminations - someone's sold off the TV or taken the fridge, so it gets said, someone misunderstands the contract terms and is not entitled to the dole, so it gets said. The season fades away and things fall apart - the centre cannot hold, it has given up trying after the months of managing to hold things together.
The streets become ghostly. At night there is no-one, no-one wandering to or wandering back, no-one shouting or laughing. Gone is the tribute entertainment of the evening that blows on the breeze from the hotels and disturbs a now-forgotten hot night on the villa terrace. During the day, the little train has stopped and been shunted into its winter sidings, the trikes no longer squeak past, their drivers no more shrieking or screaming. The wire fences go up, creating no-go areas of hotel complexes, the pine needles get tossed and pile up against every wall along with sweet wrappers fallen from litter bins and a yellowing page of a newspaper taken on the wind. The garden lawns become a confusion of renewed grass but also brittle, colourless bracts of fallen bougainvillaea, the grey-sand decayed branches of palms, ever more brown pine needles and the similarly brown leaves of this tree and that plant. This is how it ends. Every year the same, and you somehow wonder if it will come back. But it does. Because in spring, this will be how it starts - they arrive and rent their apartments, sign their contracts, sweep the terraces, scrape away the brown paper, wipe away the whitewash, bring out the lilos and the flip-flops, stock the drinks cabinets, the tobacco shelves and the newspaper stands. Every year the same, the same cycle as every year.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - "I Think I'm In Love", Spiritualized, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjRXogjKHLk. Today's title - first line from one of the great songs.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
This is how it ends. The season just fades away but not without recriminations - someone's sold off the TV or taken the fridge, so it gets said, someone misunderstands the contract terms and is not entitled to the dole, so it gets said. The season fades away and things fall apart - the centre cannot hold, it has given up trying after the months of managing to hold things together.
The streets become ghostly. At night there is no-one, no-one wandering to or wandering back, no-one shouting or laughing. Gone is the tribute entertainment of the evening that blows on the breeze from the hotels and disturbs a now-forgotten hot night on the villa terrace. During the day, the little train has stopped and been shunted into its winter sidings, the trikes no longer squeak past, their drivers no more shrieking or screaming. The wire fences go up, creating no-go areas of hotel complexes, the pine needles get tossed and pile up against every wall along with sweet wrappers fallen from litter bins and a yellowing page of a newspaper taken on the wind. The garden lawns become a confusion of renewed grass but also brittle, colourless bracts of fallen bougainvillaea, the grey-sand decayed branches of palms, ever more brown pine needles and the similarly brown leaves of this tree and that plant. This is how it ends. Every year the same, and you somehow wonder if it will come back. But it does. Because in spring, this will be how it starts - they arrive and rent their apartments, sign their contracts, sweep the terraces, scrape away the brown paper, wipe away the whitewash, bring out the lilos and the flip-flops, stock the drinks cabinets, the tobacco shelves and the newspaper stands. Every year the same, the same cycle as every year.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - "I Think I'm In Love", Spiritualized, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjRXogjKHLk. Today's title - first line from one of the great songs.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Probably Just Thieving, Probably Just Smoking
If you happen to have a villa and rent it out, there are a number of things you need to bear in mind. One of these may not be the fact that someone might just be helping themselves to the contents. It is not the first time one has heard of such a thing, but a woman has been up before the beak, charged with 51 counts of theft from villas of a "high level", says the report from the "Diario". Apparently, she worked for estate agencies and cleaning companies, and had some 200 keys which were used to gain entrance to properties - and cleaning up, so she had hoped - in the Gotmar and Almadrava areas of Puerto Pollensa.
The report itself is quite funny, as it plots how the Guardia came to suspect the woman who has been detained. I say "funny" because, given the concentration of the sites of the robberies and the obvious similarity of circumstances - often empty properties where it would have been known when they would be occupied for rental or otherwise - it beggars belief that anyone could really have believed that they might get away with it. But then there are obviously those who do, like the woman who has been arrested.
Smoking
Whither smoking? And smoking in bars and restaurants? This is a subject, the exact rules about which have become more confused the more the law gets changed or imposed. The Balearics have their own interpretation, one that differs to national law. But this does seem about to all change.
At present, a bar in Mallorca, if it is less than 100 square metres, can opt - in its interior - to be smoking or non-smoking, which means, almost invariably, that it is smoking. More than 100 square metres and there are meant to be two zones. Strictly speaking, these should be physically separated, but often they are not, making the presence of two zones - next to each other - a nonsense, and also meaning that the division is often ignored.
Along now comes the idea that smoking inside will be allowed but only if food is not being served, and by food this would mean even something like a bag of crisps. As there are very few places that do not serve food, the consequence of this should be clear - there will be no smoking inside. Terraces would still be exempt, maybe.
Or at least, the above is what one is being told. Don't necessarily assume that this will all come about, or that, even were it to, it would be pursued with vigour. The separation requirement has not been the subject of great scrutiny, but one is led to believe that any further change to the law - one that would ban smoking in "public spaces" - would be implemented more strongly.
One is, though, as always, in unclear waters. The definition of public spaces would include terraces, as surely it would also include beaches. Or would it? To make matters more murky, or indeed smoky, restaurant owners are seeking compensation for work they carried out - in those instances where they actually did - to create physical barriers for smoking and non-smoking zones under law changes four years ago.
Whatever the final result of all this apparent uncertainty, it would seem that smoking in Mallorca is unlikely to ever be the same. Local government figures suggest that smoking is a habit of only some 25% of the population - figures one might find hard to believe - but one might also consider tourists, be they smokers or not. The fear might be that effectively banning smoking from bars would add to the hardships bars have had to endure over the years and that it would come in at a time of difficult economic circumstances. Perhaps. There again, perhaps it might prove positive.
For some tourists, however, this may all prove to be a step too far. Tough laws in the UK? No problem. Go to Mallorca and you can light up where you like - more or less. But if the law were to be changed? Cue voices of discontent, those of ones who still seem to believe that things should be different elsewhere. Like the fact that a three-course meal and wine should be less than a fiver (and I'm not referring to the menu of the day in the rare cases where such a price might apply), so the expectation is that similar rules to the UK shouldn't apply. Or the fact that tobacco price increases were, for some, scandalous. They weren't. The most swingeing increases were for particularly low-priced products, such as rolling tobacco. The scandal was those who were complaining because they had been paid for "orders" from people back home, only to find that their profit margin was eroded because of a sudden increase in duty.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Beatles (Sgt. Pepper's) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gP4apO4dbhw. Today's title - this comes from something quite staggering, and spiritual (clue's in the last word).
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The report itself is quite funny, as it plots how the Guardia came to suspect the woman who has been detained. I say "funny" because, given the concentration of the sites of the robberies and the obvious similarity of circumstances - often empty properties where it would have been known when they would be occupied for rental or otherwise - it beggars belief that anyone could really have believed that they might get away with it. But then there are obviously those who do, like the woman who has been arrested.
Smoking
Whither smoking? And smoking in bars and restaurants? This is a subject, the exact rules about which have become more confused the more the law gets changed or imposed. The Balearics have their own interpretation, one that differs to national law. But this does seem about to all change.
At present, a bar in Mallorca, if it is less than 100 square metres, can opt - in its interior - to be smoking or non-smoking, which means, almost invariably, that it is smoking. More than 100 square metres and there are meant to be two zones. Strictly speaking, these should be physically separated, but often they are not, making the presence of two zones - next to each other - a nonsense, and also meaning that the division is often ignored.
Along now comes the idea that smoking inside will be allowed but only if food is not being served, and by food this would mean even something like a bag of crisps. As there are very few places that do not serve food, the consequence of this should be clear - there will be no smoking inside. Terraces would still be exempt, maybe.
Or at least, the above is what one is being told. Don't necessarily assume that this will all come about, or that, even were it to, it would be pursued with vigour. The separation requirement has not been the subject of great scrutiny, but one is led to believe that any further change to the law - one that would ban smoking in "public spaces" - would be implemented more strongly.
One is, though, as always, in unclear waters. The definition of public spaces would include terraces, as surely it would also include beaches. Or would it? To make matters more murky, or indeed smoky, restaurant owners are seeking compensation for work they carried out - in those instances where they actually did - to create physical barriers for smoking and non-smoking zones under law changes four years ago.
Whatever the final result of all this apparent uncertainty, it would seem that smoking in Mallorca is unlikely to ever be the same. Local government figures suggest that smoking is a habit of only some 25% of the population - figures one might find hard to believe - but one might also consider tourists, be they smokers or not. The fear might be that effectively banning smoking from bars would add to the hardships bars have had to endure over the years and that it would come in at a time of difficult economic circumstances. Perhaps. There again, perhaps it might prove positive.
For some tourists, however, this may all prove to be a step too far. Tough laws in the UK? No problem. Go to Mallorca and you can light up where you like - more or less. But if the law were to be changed? Cue voices of discontent, those of ones who still seem to believe that things should be different elsewhere. Like the fact that a three-course meal and wine should be less than a fiver (and I'm not referring to the menu of the day in the rare cases where such a price might apply), so the expectation is that similar rules to the UK shouldn't apply. Or the fact that tobacco price increases were, for some, scandalous. They weren't. The most swingeing increases were for particularly low-priced products, such as rolling tobacco. The scandal was those who were complaining because they had been paid for "orders" from people back home, only to find that their profit margin was eroded because of a sudden increase in duty.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Beatles (Sgt. Pepper's) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gP4apO4dbhw. Today's title - this comes from something quite staggering, and spiritual (clue's in the last word).
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Getting Better All The Time
You may remember that the chief exec of Thomas Cook hit town a couple of weeks back and had some damning things to say about the projected IVA rise and the amount of money that is spent on promoting Balearics tourism. At the time, I wondered what TUI might have to say. Not very much, it would seem. Whereas Thomas Cook came to metaphorically partially bury the local tourism industry (well, I do exaggerate of course), TUI came to plant a tree in the same Mallorcan earth. The Germans wear their green credentials with pride, and so the boss of TUI Germany headed off to a nature park with a spade and a baby pine. There would appear to be a TUI forest - really, TUI Bosc it is called - in the Llevant park. From small pines do mighty tour operations grow. TUI has been banging on about sustainable hotels, or something like that, for a while, all part of making the über-green Germans feel at home when the recycling gestapo rifle through the hotels' litter bins.
The only slight drawback to this TUI forest malarkey is that some wag might append an "h" to the end of the Catalan word Bosc, and I make this point not with reference to a well-known German manufacturer of white goods and quality gardening equipment. As part of the TUI greening of Mallorca, the obermeister was also on hand to dish out prizes to local hotels that are doing their bit to save the world. TUI may be applauded for its environmental responsibility, but it doesn't stop them taking away in other areas - like launching an exclusively all-inclusive brochure.
In the circumstances, a troll off to the nature park with the environment minister was probably not the time to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Thomas Cook and have a go at the rise in tax. Instead, as reported in the "Diario", the TUI boss reckoned that this year had been "complicated" and that 2010 would also be complicated. The year of living complicatedly. Or two years of doing so. Swine flu, bombs and bad weather make life complicated, or in the case of the former some irresponsible, sensationalist reporting by the German red-tops make life complicated. The lousy weather in the second part of September, a time when the Länder normally disgorge great numbers of Germans to come for a late burst of Mallorcan sun, may have curbed these visitors' enthusiasm, but rubbish weather in September is hardly unknown. Maybe every year is complicated.
Fortunately, not everyone sees complications. Take the secretary-general of the World Tourism Organization. He's been on walkabout in Spain** as well, not with a Bosch spade and a bag of fertiliser, but with some reassuring words for Spanish tourism - to the effect that things will get better from the middle of next year. From which the tourism industry will doubtless take heart.
Setting aside the fact that "complicated" and "getting better" do appear to be at odds with each other, are these about it when it comes to pronouncements? One fancies that there is rather more to all this tourism bossery than offering vague statements about complication and getting better. If not, then I am at their disposal, willing and able. And I'll even bring my own spade.
** The WTO is in fact based in Madrid.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Simon and Garfunkel, "The 59th Street Bridge Song", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e36gLfrmRCw. Today's title - well, possibly. Which album was it from?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The only slight drawback to this TUI forest malarkey is that some wag might append an "h" to the end of the Catalan word Bosc, and I make this point not with reference to a well-known German manufacturer of white goods and quality gardening equipment. As part of the TUI greening of Mallorca, the obermeister was also on hand to dish out prizes to local hotels that are doing their bit to save the world. TUI may be applauded for its environmental responsibility, but it doesn't stop them taking away in other areas - like launching an exclusively all-inclusive brochure.
In the circumstances, a troll off to the nature park with the environment minister was probably not the time to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Thomas Cook and have a go at the rise in tax. Instead, as reported in the "Diario", the TUI boss reckoned that this year had been "complicated" and that 2010 would also be complicated. The year of living complicatedly. Or two years of doing so. Swine flu, bombs and bad weather make life complicated, or in the case of the former some irresponsible, sensationalist reporting by the German red-tops make life complicated. The lousy weather in the second part of September, a time when the Länder normally disgorge great numbers of Germans to come for a late burst of Mallorcan sun, may have curbed these visitors' enthusiasm, but rubbish weather in September is hardly unknown. Maybe every year is complicated.
Fortunately, not everyone sees complications. Take the secretary-general of the World Tourism Organization. He's been on walkabout in Spain** as well, not with a Bosch spade and a bag of fertiliser, but with some reassuring words for Spanish tourism - to the effect that things will get better from the middle of next year. From which the tourism industry will doubtless take heart.
Setting aside the fact that "complicated" and "getting better" do appear to be at odds with each other, are these about it when it comes to pronouncements? One fancies that there is rather more to all this tourism bossery than offering vague statements about complication and getting better. If not, then I am at their disposal, willing and able. And I'll even bring my own spade.
** The WTO is in fact based in Madrid.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Simon and Garfunkel, "The 59th Street Bridge Song", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e36gLfrmRCw. Today's title - well, possibly. Which album was it from?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Slow Down, You Move Too Fast
You know how it is. You'll be steadfastly and righteously observing the speed limit, and some twat appears in your rear mirror expressing paroxysms and gesticulating ferociously with an aggravated hand, or even both hands where the less diligent are concerned. Ever since they made the gloriously difficult-to-overtake-on new road layout through Puerto Alcúdia and Playa de Muro, the motoring psychotic and impatient have had to improvise methods of speeding themselves along without demolishing their cars and themselves on the inconveniently close-together central concrete islands. The favourite is to nip onto the parallel side road and race at great velocity to the next exit, cornering back onto the main road with a manoeuvre of which Jenson Button (aka Chris Martin of Coldplay) would be proud. And this in order to steal one place as part of qualifying for the grid. 50 kilometres per hour, an affront to motoring civil liberties, but a limit designed to protect erring tourists from being launched into the air and then making a wheel-on appearance in Muro hospital as part of an episode of "Sun, Sea and A&E", attached to a life-support machine and with a weeping spouse clawing at the lilo they had intended for the beach.
Apparently, things have got so good in Spain that annually fewer than 2000 people now lose their lives in accidents on main roads. The news is less good when it comes to towns and those side roads. An encounter with a bus or a souped-up mobility scooter can be fatal, so the traffic authorities are contemplating introducing a thirty kilometre speed limit in towns. Tee-hee, that should cause some fine sport. You know that place in Holland where they've done away with all restrictions, and motorists, pedestrians and cyclists just get on with it. They should do that here - in Alcúdia, for example. What fun that would be. Though my Dutch moles tell me that the Dutch driver can be a bit of an animal, there is aggression and then there is sheer lunacy. The Dutch are not known for their lunacy. Pragmatic, one can see them adhering politely to the non-restriction principle. "After you, Arje." "No, after you, Joost." And the traffic just grinds to a halt as caravans of schoolchildren on bikes collide with some old folk crossing the road.
No, such a civilised solution wouldn't have a chance where the mad of Mallorca are concerned. So, they have to try and impose ever-decreasing speed limits. They, the authorities, should come and hang around those side roads for a day or two. What with the irate overtakers (or should that be under-takers) opting for the side roads as a means of getting ahead of plodders such as myself with the cruise control on the limit and with coaches hammering past houses and divesting parked cars of their wing mirrors, those authorities would soon realise the forlorn nature of their plan. Which is probably why they'll introduce it.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Roberta Flack, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpNdMIAnKko. Today's title - first line from ... ah, but what was its main title?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Apparently, things have got so good in Spain that annually fewer than 2000 people now lose their lives in accidents on main roads. The news is less good when it comes to towns and those side roads. An encounter with a bus or a souped-up mobility scooter can be fatal, so the traffic authorities are contemplating introducing a thirty kilometre speed limit in towns. Tee-hee, that should cause some fine sport. You know that place in Holland where they've done away with all restrictions, and motorists, pedestrians and cyclists just get on with it. They should do that here - in Alcúdia, for example. What fun that would be. Though my Dutch moles tell me that the Dutch driver can be a bit of an animal, there is aggression and then there is sheer lunacy. The Dutch are not known for their lunacy. Pragmatic, one can see them adhering politely to the non-restriction principle. "After you, Arje." "No, after you, Joost." And the traffic just grinds to a halt as caravans of schoolchildren on bikes collide with some old folk crossing the road.
No, such a civilised solution wouldn't have a chance where the mad of Mallorca are concerned. So, they have to try and impose ever-decreasing speed limits. They, the authorities, should come and hang around those side roads for a day or two. What with the irate overtakers (or should that be under-takers) opting for the side roads as a means of getting ahead of plodders such as myself with the cruise control on the limit and with coaches hammering past houses and divesting parked cars of their wing mirrors, those authorities would soon realise the forlorn nature of their plan. Which is probably why they'll introduce it.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Roberta Flack, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpNdMIAnKko. Today's title - first line from ... ah, but what was its main title?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Monday, October 26, 2009
Killing Them Softly
Further to yesterday. There is some disquiet that there was not a cohesive message coming from the various political parties in Muro against the Costas demolition plan. Only the Unió Mallorquina got involved, something for which it was criticised as it appeared to make Ses Casetes the party's own issue. Maybe that's why others stayed away. Something else that came out was that, while Ses Casetes is threatened by the definition as to what is public domain or land, a hotel next to the area is excluded. One presumes that this means the Hotel Platja Daurada, a hotel operated by the EIX group, which so happens to have its offices next to the hotel.
Even if this not the right hotel - and there is no other hotel that joins onto Ses Casetes - it is hard not to get the impression that maybe Ses Casetes is something of a soft target. For the very reasons that it is not a hotel and is not an urbanisation of expensive real estate or of the fabulously wealthy, perhaps it is a convenient fall-guy in the Costas wish to do some cleaning up of public land along the shorelines of Mallorca. Killing the small houses softly.
Yet for all this, if one takes a stroll around Ses Casetes, and the photo from yesterday does give an impression of the place - unmade tracks as roads for instance - then one does wonder as to the legitimacy of the development. It does seem hugely anachronistic, which is of course part of the charm. That it has not been developed in terms, say, of roads, does not mean that it does not have legitimacy, but there is also something that is not quite right there. The original or oldest small houses around the parking area and just off are one thing, but some tracks go into the forest, and next to some tracks are houses that are not like the small houses. They are in fact new; certainly by comparison.
The land itself was ceded to the town many years ago. A question may well be what that land actually was. Some of the buildings would certainly appear to be in possible conflict with what is meant to be the wider nature park of Albufera.
Whatever the real legal situation, the people of Ses Casetes deserve support. One thing that came across vividly during the demonstration was the strength of the community that is Ses Casetes, of the vast age ranges that tell of the history of ownership and of the generations who have summered (and also wintered at holiday times) in the small houses. It is definitely a place worth preserving.
Some hours after the Muro demo, there was the other one - in Sa Pobla. This was a gathering of "demons" in a defiant act of fire-running against the European directive that would limit the participation of children and general interactivity during fire-runs at Mallorcan fiestas. 3,000 people are estimated to have attended. Further to what I said on 23 October ("Feel The Fire") when I wondered about the safety of fire-runs and of bonfires, I was told by Kevin at JKs about how the Santander bank in Puerto Pollensa nearly once copped for it, while John MacLean has sent an email specifically about fires in Sa Pobla during Sant Antoni. I quote: "We were absolutely gobsmacked to see a roaring fire, surrounded by the usual crowd of partygoers, slap bang on the forecourt of the Repsol filling station". (Yep, that's right, filling station as in petrol station.) "It could not have been more than ten feet from the pumps. At that point, I realised that the Mallorcans and the 'poblers' (as the folk of Sa Pobla are called) are not only a different breed but totally off their heads. Needless to say, we didn't hang about!"
And they're complaining about a bit of European health and safety that might stop kids setting fire to themselves during fire-runs. Tradition is one thing, but madness is another.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Simple Minds, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRpEeiZ8vqk. Today's title - variant on what?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Even if this not the right hotel - and there is no other hotel that joins onto Ses Casetes - it is hard not to get the impression that maybe Ses Casetes is something of a soft target. For the very reasons that it is not a hotel and is not an urbanisation of expensive real estate or of the fabulously wealthy, perhaps it is a convenient fall-guy in the Costas wish to do some cleaning up of public land along the shorelines of Mallorca. Killing the small houses softly.
Yet for all this, if one takes a stroll around Ses Casetes, and the photo from yesterday does give an impression of the place - unmade tracks as roads for instance - then one does wonder as to the legitimacy of the development. It does seem hugely anachronistic, which is of course part of the charm. That it has not been developed in terms, say, of roads, does not mean that it does not have legitimacy, but there is also something that is not quite right there. The original or oldest small houses around the parking area and just off are one thing, but some tracks go into the forest, and next to some tracks are houses that are not like the small houses. They are in fact new; certainly by comparison.
The land itself was ceded to the town many years ago. A question may well be what that land actually was. Some of the buildings would certainly appear to be in possible conflict with what is meant to be the wider nature park of Albufera.
Whatever the real legal situation, the people of Ses Casetes deserve support. One thing that came across vividly during the demonstration was the strength of the community that is Ses Casetes, of the vast age ranges that tell of the history of ownership and of the generations who have summered (and also wintered at holiday times) in the small houses. It is definitely a place worth preserving.
Some hours after the Muro demo, there was the other one - in Sa Pobla. This was a gathering of "demons" in a defiant act of fire-running against the European directive that would limit the participation of children and general interactivity during fire-runs at Mallorcan fiestas. 3,000 people are estimated to have attended. Further to what I said on 23 October ("Feel The Fire") when I wondered about the safety of fire-runs and of bonfires, I was told by Kevin at JKs about how the Santander bank in Puerto Pollensa nearly once copped for it, while John MacLean has sent an email specifically about fires in Sa Pobla during Sant Antoni. I quote: "We were absolutely gobsmacked to see a roaring fire, surrounded by the usual crowd of partygoers, slap bang on the forecourt of the Repsol filling station". (Yep, that's right, filling station as in petrol station.) "It could not have been more than ten feet from the pumps. At that point, I realised that the Mallorcans and the 'poblers' (as the folk of Sa Pobla are called) are not only a different breed but totally off their heads. Needless to say, we didn't hang about!"
And they're complaining about a bit of European health and safety that might stop kids setting fire to themselves during fire-runs. Tradition is one thing, but madness is another.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Simple Minds, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRpEeiZ8vqk. Today's title - variant on what?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Don't Take It Away - This Is Your Land
And the people of the little houses made their way to the little plaza in front of the Pedrissos bar. The man with the conch had blown his loudhailer trumpet. Everyone had searched in the bottom of wardrobes for a dispensable sheet and had blackened it with a slogan. Those without sheets had stuck brown wrapping paper together and had used biros. Two hundred or so formed a semi-circle and had their photos taken. One chap with long dreadlocks tied into a ponytail had the biggest photographic kit of all. Local TV smoked and waited for their interview. Small children, an afternoon spent with cardboard, sticks and marker pens, were thrust into the circle. One had her sign reversed, revealing a patchwork of different coloured tape. Someone helpfully turned it the right way. The conch was handed to a man with a grey goatie who started a song no-one seemed to know. There was some applause and he tried again with a bit more success, but maybe the people were shy when it came to singing for the telly. The local police, half-a-dozen strong, stood about and grinned. One came forward and took some photos with a small digital camera. Perhaps it was a requirement - evidence of the demonstrators - or maybe they were of his family. There was one of the girls from the Eroski near to Playa de Muro. Her family has a "caseta" and has had it for years. It's a place where children can play freely, as she used to, this Ses Casetes des Capellans. It's a place that's very Mallorcan, very Muro. One felt like an intruder into an essentially Muro occasion. Barely a word of Castilian was being uttered, just the chatter and chirrup of the Mallorcan char-char sound, but without any sense of choler - no anger as such, it was a pleasant afternoon in late season, the sun was out and warm, and the "cassettes", if one might call them that, took a stroll from their casetes and were taped for posterity and for transmission on the evening's news.
The signs said what the people thought. "We don't understand the Costas' criteria"; "We want to conserve Capellans as it is"; "Capellans is our Capellans, it is for the people of Muro and for everyone". Rather more politically, one read: "A golf course is for the rich. Capellans is worth much more". The latter sign was a reference to the permission granted to build the golf course on the nearby Son Bosc finca. Casetes is for the ordinary people, their summer homes of white-washed walls, their bungalows with green or red trimmings and brightly-coloured gates. And it is these curious and humble little houses that the Costas authority would like to see demolished. It may take years for that to happen, if happen it ever does. But the people of Ses Casetes have expressed their views. There is traditional Mallorca and there is traditional beach and summer Mallorca, not the beach and summer of the hotels and the resorts, but of holiday for the local people as it once was, and still is - for the children of the Murers and the owners of the Casetes. One boy's sign said that Capellans is "like a playground for the boys and girls, please don't take it away". This is their land. Please don't take it away. It brought a tear to the eye.
* This is a follow-up to the piece of 21 October.
QUIZ
Today's title - the second part; great, really great.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Saturday, October 24, 2009
The Columbus Industry
This is the thing about Columbus that appeared in "Talk Of The North" this week, the piece to which I referred on 16 October (Chris and Yasmin). I was thinking of reproducing another thing that went into TOTN - about the Ternelles carry-on - as it had, what I thought, a pretty good gag in the final paragraph which mysteriously didn't appear. But as I've done enough on that subject already, you'll never know the gag.
Anyway, here's the Columbus industry:
Christopher Columbus, Cristóbal Colón, Cristofol Colom, Cristoforo Colombo - take your pick. There is a Columbus industry in Spain, one dedicated to proving that the discoverer of the Americas did not come from Genoa. There is also a lot riding on Columbus not being Italian. So synonymous is he with Spain that the "Día de la Hispanidad" coincides with the day on which he made landfall at what he called San Salvador on 12 October, 1492. In the variants of his name, he is celebrated by streets, such as Cristofol Colom in Alcúdia old town; in Porto Colom he has been claimed as one of their own. DNA tests on those with the Colom or Colón surname have sought to prove his Spanishness or maybe his Catalan or even Mallorcan origins.
The traditional historical view of Columbus is that he came from Genoa, but there has long been sufficient mystery as to his background that his birthplace has been the subject of fierce and patriotic debate, and no more so than in Spain where the patronage of the Catholic Kings resulted in his discovery of the New World and heralded Spain's Golden Age. National pride, akin to Spain winning the Euros, would flow from it actually being proven that C.C. was a Spaniard all along, or you might think it would were it not for his tarnished image or that he was in fact Catalan.
Nevertheless, Genoa is usually accepted as being his place of birth, and the Genoese were merchant traders and familiar to the Spanish court of the late fifteenth century. In itself, it would have been no surprise had he, from Genoa, been hanging around in the general area of Isabel and Ferdinand. But the Columbus mystery remains and has largely centred on how he spoke and on how he wrote. The only real agreement is that his language has been hard to pinpoint. One argument is that he learnt a corrupted form of Castilian while in Lisbon some years before his first voyage. (His wife, indisputably, was Portuguese.) That he appeared never to write in Italian may have been due to the fact that his Genoese dialect, if this was indeed his "native" tongue, was a spoken and not a written language.
In seeking to resolve the Columbus mystery, a new book by Estelle Irizarry, emeritus professor of Spanish literature at the University of Georgetown in Washington, argues that Columbus was in fact of Catalan origin and that he spoke Catalan before he could speak Castilian. In "The DNA Of The Writings Of Columbus", Irizarry places Columbus as having come from Catalan-speaking Aragon, itself of symbolic importance to Mallorcans as this was the kingdom of the "conquistador", Jaume I.
Intriguingly, Irizarry has identified characteristics of linguistic use which point to Columbus possibly having been descended from the Jewish-Spanish race persecuted from the fourteenth century. The language of the Sephardic Jews in Spain was Ladino, a mix of primarily Hebrew and Spanish. Though Irizarry has identified use of Ladino by Columbus, she implies that there was also a variant - Ladino-Catalan - and that this usage indicates a Catalan origin. Sephardic Jews were to be found across Spain, but they were certainly prominent in Aragon and Catalonia, and even in Palma.
Claims of Jewish or Catalan lineage or birth are nothing new in the Columbus mystery. But if Irizarry has indeed managed, via a study of linguistics, to unravel the mystery and to establish a Catalan origin, how well would this all sit with Columbus and the Día de la Hispanidad? Not very well where more radical Catalan voices might be concerned, one would imagine. The Columbus industry, moreover, has scarred the reputation of the discoverer, which might make those who would claim "ownership" of him pause and consider him in terms of current-day political correctness. Not only was he a lousy administrator, he has been blamed for the wiping-out of the indigenous Taino indians. The Tainos may have bequeathed us certain words - hammock, hurricane, barbecue, for example - but they survived as a separate race for only a short period once Columbus had colonised La Española.
Yet for all this, how does it square with the fact that Columbus did have Genoese connections? With the fact this brothers came from Genoa to join him on voyages? Or with the generally held view that his father, Domenico, is meant to have originated from the village of Moconesi near to Genoa? Or that he himself once clearly stated that he was born in Genoa, despite his frequently being attributed with having said that he came from nothing?
Columbus, it is said, sought to hide his origins because they were humble. His father, if indeed Domenico was his father, was a mere weaver. It might be construed that he was ambiguous as to his background because of a possible Jewishness, even if it was not unknown for "conversos" from the Jewish faith to rise to positions of importance at the time of his voyages. But it is not inconceivable that he acquired what was a polyglot tongue. His time in Lisbon may be more significant than previously thought, as Portugal, prior to expelling Jews at the very end of the fifteenth century, had become something of a refuge for Sephardic Jews leaving Spain in the years before the final expulsion order of 1492. If it is true that Columbus acquired his Castilian in Lisbon, then might it be that this was influenced by Ladino? Columbus was clearly exposed to the Jewish community in Lisbon. In his will, he referred to the Jew who guarded the gate to the Jewish quarter. This all said, it is the Catalan element in Professor Irizarry's findings that is the wild card.
The Columbus mystery and the Columbus industry will continue. There's too much riding on them for his origins to be finally and irrefutably laid to rest.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - It was on my list of last year's songs of the year - Paul McCartney and Youth, "Sing The Changes", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wQmHhlZlfg.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Anyway, here's the Columbus industry:
Christopher Columbus, Cristóbal Colón, Cristofol Colom, Cristoforo Colombo - take your pick. There is a Columbus industry in Spain, one dedicated to proving that the discoverer of the Americas did not come from Genoa. There is also a lot riding on Columbus not being Italian. So synonymous is he with Spain that the "Día de la Hispanidad" coincides with the day on which he made landfall at what he called San Salvador on 12 October, 1492. In the variants of his name, he is celebrated by streets, such as Cristofol Colom in Alcúdia old town; in Porto Colom he has been claimed as one of their own. DNA tests on those with the Colom or Colón surname have sought to prove his Spanishness or maybe his Catalan or even Mallorcan origins.
The traditional historical view of Columbus is that he came from Genoa, but there has long been sufficient mystery as to his background that his birthplace has been the subject of fierce and patriotic debate, and no more so than in Spain where the patronage of the Catholic Kings resulted in his discovery of the New World and heralded Spain's Golden Age. National pride, akin to Spain winning the Euros, would flow from it actually being proven that C.C. was a Spaniard all along, or you might think it would were it not for his tarnished image or that he was in fact Catalan.
Nevertheless, Genoa is usually accepted as being his place of birth, and the Genoese were merchant traders and familiar to the Spanish court of the late fifteenth century. In itself, it would have been no surprise had he, from Genoa, been hanging around in the general area of Isabel and Ferdinand. But the Columbus mystery remains and has largely centred on how he spoke and on how he wrote. The only real agreement is that his language has been hard to pinpoint. One argument is that he learnt a corrupted form of Castilian while in Lisbon some years before his first voyage. (His wife, indisputably, was Portuguese.) That he appeared never to write in Italian may have been due to the fact that his Genoese dialect, if this was indeed his "native" tongue, was a spoken and not a written language.
In seeking to resolve the Columbus mystery, a new book by Estelle Irizarry, emeritus professor of Spanish literature at the University of Georgetown in Washington, argues that Columbus was in fact of Catalan origin and that he spoke Catalan before he could speak Castilian. In "The DNA Of The Writings Of Columbus", Irizarry places Columbus as having come from Catalan-speaking Aragon, itself of symbolic importance to Mallorcans as this was the kingdom of the "conquistador", Jaume I.
Intriguingly, Irizarry has identified characteristics of linguistic use which point to Columbus possibly having been descended from the Jewish-Spanish race persecuted from the fourteenth century. The language of the Sephardic Jews in Spain was Ladino, a mix of primarily Hebrew and Spanish. Though Irizarry has identified use of Ladino by Columbus, she implies that there was also a variant - Ladino-Catalan - and that this usage indicates a Catalan origin. Sephardic Jews were to be found across Spain, but they were certainly prominent in Aragon and Catalonia, and even in Palma.
Claims of Jewish or Catalan lineage or birth are nothing new in the Columbus mystery. But if Irizarry has indeed managed, via a study of linguistics, to unravel the mystery and to establish a Catalan origin, how well would this all sit with Columbus and the Día de la Hispanidad? Not very well where more radical Catalan voices might be concerned, one would imagine. The Columbus industry, moreover, has scarred the reputation of the discoverer, which might make those who would claim "ownership" of him pause and consider him in terms of current-day political correctness. Not only was he a lousy administrator, he has been blamed for the wiping-out of the indigenous Taino indians. The Tainos may have bequeathed us certain words - hammock, hurricane, barbecue, for example - but they survived as a separate race for only a short period once Columbus had colonised La Española.
Yet for all this, how does it square with the fact that Columbus did have Genoese connections? With the fact this brothers came from Genoa to join him on voyages? Or with the generally held view that his father, Domenico, is meant to have originated from the village of Moconesi near to Genoa? Or that he himself once clearly stated that he was born in Genoa, despite his frequently being attributed with having said that he came from nothing?
Columbus, it is said, sought to hide his origins because they were humble. His father, if indeed Domenico was his father, was a mere weaver. It might be construed that he was ambiguous as to his background because of a possible Jewishness, even if it was not unknown for "conversos" from the Jewish faith to rise to positions of importance at the time of his voyages. But it is not inconceivable that he acquired what was a polyglot tongue. His time in Lisbon may be more significant than previously thought, as Portugal, prior to expelling Jews at the very end of the fifteenth century, had become something of a refuge for Sephardic Jews leaving Spain in the years before the final expulsion order of 1492. If it is true that Columbus acquired his Castilian in Lisbon, then might it be that this was influenced by Ladino? Columbus was clearly exposed to the Jewish community in Lisbon. In his will, he referred to the Jew who guarded the gate to the Jewish quarter. This all said, it is the Catalan element in Professor Irizarry's findings that is the wild card.
The Columbus mystery and the Columbus industry will continue. There's too much riding on them for his origins to be finally and irrefutably laid to rest.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - It was on my list of last year's songs of the year - Paul McCartney and Youth, "Sing The Changes", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wQmHhlZlfg.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Friday, October 23, 2009
Feel The Fire
Another day, another demo. Actually, the same day as the demo against the demolition of Ses Casetes, just a different town - Sa Pobla - and a different matter of concern. And this is? Fire. Fire and fire-runs. One of the most traditional aspects of the Mallorcan fiesta is threatened (allegedly) by the European Union and its directive 2007/23/EC which comes into force at the start of next year - just in time, of course, before one of the biggest "fire" occasions in Mallorca, the Sant Antoni devils night of 16 January. And which town has the biggest of these occasions? Sa Pobla of course.
I have tried to read this directive. Have you ever tried reading European directives? As a cure to insomnia, they probably have some merit. Anyway, this one is all about fireworks and other pyrotechnics. At its heart is the free movement of pyrotechnic articles which, being European legislation, is anything but. Possibly; I did rather get lost at that point. But also being European legislation, it would not be doing its job if it didn't draw up volumes of law in respect of health and safety. It is this aspect, fundamentally, that could change the fire-run tradition. One says could. I actually doubt it.
Much as traditions should be preserved, I have long wondered about the whole fire-run and bonfire-lighting malarkey in Mallorca. In towns such as Puerto Pollensa, bonfires are lit in close proximity to houses and bars. There may not have been major conflagrations, but it's not hard to imagine that the fires might get out of hand. Then there are the fire-runs themselves. Advice is always issued as to the wearing of the right clothing and the like, but once again you do wonder.
In the directive, there is this thing about the observance of "festivities" in member states. It has not been drafted without acknowledgement of these traditions or indeed permissions issued by member-state governments. The fire-run itself does not appear to be endangered, but there are rules being set out about the handling of fire and fireworks and the ages of those doing so.
In May, the fire-run tradition was taken to the streets of Manchester as part of the attempt to drum up Mancunian business for the beaches of Mallorca. I'm sure that Manchester was impressed. Or maybe it wasn't. But it should have been. The fire-run is a spectacle. It should be left to continue. Also earlier this year, a delegation of mayors and others trotted off to Brussels to lobby against the directive and to also ask for more European money. There was some talk of legal action if the directive did actually impinge on the fire-run to the extent of it being outlawed. This, the outlawing, I cannot see happening. Apart from anything else, who - locally - would enforce the ruling? And, as I point out, there is this mention in the directive of observing local traditions.
The Sa Pobla demo may be a bit of an over-reaction. There seems to be an admission that the definitive ruling on the fire-run is missing, which maybe how Brussels wants it. Thataway, it can let the local traditions carry on while at the same time insisting that there is adequate safety, to which the locals would respond that there already is. But where kids of certain ages are concerned, the fact that the directive might lead them to handling nothing more incendiary than a sparkler may actually be sensible.
Don't let's get too worked up, though. The fire-runs will continue. And so will the devils.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Spin Doctors, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCjtRJkS85w. Today's title - which "Fireman" (firemen) included this in which song?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
I have tried to read this directive. Have you ever tried reading European directives? As a cure to insomnia, they probably have some merit. Anyway, this one is all about fireworks and other pyrotechnics. At its heart is the free movement of pyrotechnic articles which, being European legislation, is anything but. Possibly; I did rather get lost at that point. But also being European legislation, it would not be doing its job if it didn't draw up volumes of law in respect of health and safety. It is this aspect, fundamentally, that could change the fire-run tradition. One says could. I actually doubt it.
Much as traditions should be preserved, I have long wondered about the whole fire-run and bonfire-lighting malarkey in Mallorca. In towns such as Puerto Pollensa, bonfires are lit in close proximity to houses and bars. There may not have been major conflagrations, but it's not hard to imagine that the fires might get out of hand. Then there are the fire-runs themselves. Advice is always issued as to the wearing of the right clothing and the like, but once again you do wonder.
In the directive, there is this thing about the observance of "festivities" in member states. It has not been drafted without acknowledgement of these traditions or indeed permissions issued by member-state governments. The fire-run itself does not appear to be endangered, but there are rules being set out about the handling of fire and fireworks and the ages of those doing so.
In May, the fire-run tradition was taken to the streets of Manchester as part of the attempt to drum up Mancunian business for the beaches of Mallorca. I'm sure that Manchester was impressed. Or maybe it wasn't. But it should have been. The fire-run is a spectacle. It should be left to continue. Also earlier this year, a delegation of mayors and others trotted off to Brussels to lobby against the directive and to also ask for more European money. There was some talk of legal action if the directive did actually impinge on the fire-run to the extent of it being outlawed. This, the outlawing, I cannot see happening. Apart from anything else, who - locally - would enforce the ruling? And, as I point out, there is this mention in the directive of observing local traditions.
The Sa Pobla demo may be a bit of an over-reaction. There seems to be an admission that the definitive ruling on the fire-run is missing, which maybe how Brussels wants it. Thataway, it can let the local traditions carry on while at the same time insisting that there is adequate safety, to which the locals would respond that there already is. But where kids of certain ages are concerned, the fact that the directive might lead them to handling nothing more incendiary than a sparkler may actually be sensible.
Don't let's get too worked up, though. The fire-runs will continue. And so will the devils.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Spin Doctors, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCjtRJkS85w. Today's title - which "Fireman" (firemen) included this in which song?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Two Princes
In the current "Talk Of The North", there is mention of the death of Reinhard Mohn. Who he? Mohn was the former president of the German Bertelsmann media group. He was also fabulously wealthy. He owned a home in Alcúdia and had close links with the town, founding the library of Can Torró and being honoured by being named an "adoptive son" of the town. Rather more grandly - at national level - he was awarded a Principe de Asturias prize (for communications and humanities).
By coincidence, the 2009 event is currently taking place, as always in the city of Oviedo in the principality of Asturias in north-west Spain. The actual awards are to be handed out tomorrow evening.
Principe de Asturias is the title bestowed on the first-in-line male heir to the Spanish throne. The title dates back to the fourteenth century. Currently, this is Crown-Prince Felipe. His father, the current king, Juan-Carlos, was previously the Principe. It is akin to Charles being Prince of Wales. Rather like Charles, and his Prince's Trust, the Principe de Asturias awards have a charitable status - there is a foundation that oversees them. It also gives the heir to the throne something of importance to do, and the awards have become not insignificant in terms of international recognition and prestige.
One might have the impression that the Spanish, all sun, beach and sangria, don't stand too much on ceremony. Well they do when it comes to many aspects of life, including awards ceremonies. The Principe de Asturias prize-giving is, ostensibly, quite a serious do, but the Spanish royals have the knack of introducing light-heartedness into even more solemn occasions. I recall the time when the king and queen embraced and kissed Spanish gold-medal winners at an Olympics event. You wouldn't catch Elizabeth and Philip getting up to that sort of carry-on. But it is this that does make the Spanish royals rather endearing. and the Principe de Asturias ceremony, though formal, does manage to introduce moments of humour. It is all rather splendid.
There are various categories of award, and past winners, an eclectic bunch to say the least, have included the likes of Woody Allen, Bob Dylan, Google, Yasser Arafat, Mary Robinson, Sebastian Coe, Stephen Hawking and J.K. Rowling. This year, there are prizes for, among others, the architect Norman Foster, David Attenborough and two men who, it might be said, have shaped our modern lives more than most - Martin Cooper and Raymond Tomlinson. And they are? Respectively, it was they who - more or less - gave us mobile phones and email. So, it's they - these two princes of technology and the Principe award - who we have to blame.
More climate change and mosquitoes
Following the interview with the chap from IMEDEA (17 October: High In The Sky), the "Diario" has also been talking with the professor of zoology at the university in Palma. In answer to a question as to whether climate change may bring disease-imparting insects, he says that it could well do. The main immediate threat might be the appearance of the tiger mosquito - it has yet to be encountered in the Balearics - which is more aggressive than the current lot and can even bring with it the transmission of diseases such as dengue, which isn't a particularly reassuring prospect. Perhaps some scientists could turn their attention to the matter and get themselves a Principe de Asturias award in the process.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Pete Seeger, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AN3rN59GlWw. Today's title - the band with the lead singer who looked like Alexei Lalas, circa the World Cup 1994 (or maybe it was the other way round).
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
By coincidence, the 2009 event is currently taking place, as always in the city of Oviedo in the principality of Asturias in north-west Spain. The actual awards are to be handed out tomorrow evening.
Principe de Asturias is the title bestowed on the first-in-line male heir to the Spanish throne. The title dates back to the fourteenth century. Currently, this is Crown-Prince Felipe. His father, the current king, Juan-Carlos, was previously the Principe. It is akin to Charles being Prince of Wales. Rather like Charles, and his Prince's Trust, the Principe de Asturias awards have a charitable status - there is a foundation that oversees them. It also gives the heir to the throne something of importance to do, and the awards have become not insignificant in terms of international recognition and prestige.
One might have the impression that the Spanish, all sun, beach and sangria, don't stand too much on ceremony. Well they do when it comes to many aspects of life, including awards ceremonies. The Principe de Asturias prize-giving is, ostensibly, quite a serious do, but the Spanish royals have the knack of introducing light-heartedness into even more solemn occasions. I recall the time when the king and queen embraced and kissed Spanish gold-medal winners at an Olympics event. You wouldn't catch Elizabeth and Philip getting up to that sort of carry-on. But it is this that does make the Spanish royals rather endearing. and the Principe de Asturias ceremony, though formal, does manage to introduce moments of humour. It is all rather splendid.
There are various categories of award, and past winners, an eclectic bunch to say the least, have included the likes of Woody Allen, Bob Dylan, Google, Yasser Arafat, Mary Robinson, Sebastian Coe, Stephen Hawking and J.K. Rowling. This year, there are prizes for, among others, the architect Norman Foster, David Attenborough and two men who, it might be said, have shaped our modern lives more than most - Martin Cooper and Raymond Tomlinson. And they are? Respectively, it was they who - more or less - gave us mobile phones and email. So, it's they - these two princes of technology and the Principe award - who we have to blame.
More climate change and mosquitoes
Following the interview with the chap from IMEDEA (17 October: High In The Sky), the "Diario" has also been talking with the professor of zoology at the university in Palma. In answer to a question as to whether climate change may bring disease-imparting insects, he says that it could well do. The main immediate threat might be the appearance of the tiger mosquito - it has yet to be encountered in the Balearics - which is more aggressive than the current lot and can even bring with it the transmission of diseases such as dengue, which isn't a particularly reassuring prospect. Perhaps some scientists could turn their attention to the matter and get themselves a Principe de Asturias award in the process.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Pete Seeger, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AN3rN59GlWw. Today's title - the band with the lead singer who looked like Alexei Lalas, circa the World Cup 1994 (or maybe it was the other way round).
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
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