The Life Of Riley

There was both a "storm" and a "sensation" the other day. The words were those of "The Bulletin". They applied to a story that had appeared in "The Daily Mail". Allegedly, it was the work of one Lynnette Evans, depicted as a disgruntled expat tired of life in Puerto Portals. Her partner claims that only one per cent of what she had actually said made it into the Mail article; she didn't, for instance, live in Puerto Portals. The editor of The Bulletin remarks that the Mail article is "totally different" to the original. One wonders, therefore, what the Mail was seeking to achieve, other than run an expat-in-hell feature, and hell was part of the headline.

I have only seen the Mail article and the rebuttals in the Bulletin. Not having seen the original, it's impossible to pass comment. Yet the Mail article, taken at face value, is venomous in its characterisation of a certain expat type. What it does is to portray an expat lifestyle of shallowness, of shopping and lunch, of image and money obsession and of parties on yachts. It is written about Puerto Portals. Some while ago, I suggested that, were there to be a soap about expats here, Alcúdia would be Eastenders or Corrie, while Pollensa would be Dallas or Dynasty. I was wrong. Pollensa would be Howards' Way; Portals would be Dynasty. Pollensa is sort of wannabe wealth unreality; Portals is the real unreality. Harking back also to that thing about Sardinians having had enough of ostentatious wealth, if and when the Mallorcans choose to start slinging wet sand at the yachts, it will be Portals sand that they use.

An island the size of Essex might, you would think, be fairly homogeneous, but it isn't. While there are pretensions in the north, there is little of the celebrity vanity of parts of the south. I presume that "Celebrity" magazine is still kicking around down south; it never ventures north because the celebrities are penned in to their gated southern communities or are moored along with the yachts in marinas of expensive Sunseekers such as Portals. The Riki Lash column in the Bulletin is partly a big-up for his celeb chums and their restaurants in places like Bendinat. The Mail article taps a similar vein of wealth, celebrity and vacuity; it's not an expat lifestyle I recognise in the north, or maybe I just don't move in the right circles. Sure there are the gofe (sic) clubs and the yachts, but, in my experience, expats are, for the most part, regular people, most of them working and with little time for airs and graces, and this applies all over the island. It ain't the life of Riley for everyone.

I once had the misfortune to go to the Santa Ponsa Country Club. Not that there is anything wrong with the place as such; indeed, it is quite pleasant. But, from a table engaged in a business meeting, one was aware, from the sheer loudness, of the God-awful pretentiousness of some fellow countrymen and women; they were doing lunch, as I imagine they do lunch most days. The Mail, or was it Ms Evans, reckons these lunches can go on till six in the evening.

Among the country club set were some "brown wrinklies" whose exposure to ultra-violet had given them faces lined like shutters. They're the ones who've not overdosed on the cosmetics and the surgery. Down in Portals, do not be surprised to see a Joan Collins-alike, botox baked hard by the sun and expressions as immobile as a waxwork, or a going-to-seed Victoria Principal-ity tottering on Jimmy Choos and toppling over with an uplifted bosom.

On first moving to the island, someone said to me that one of the good things about Mallorca was that people were unconcerned about image. He then went on to tell me about the Porsche he used to drive during his time in the City. I started to become aware of the bling that dangled from his wrists and around his neck. I suspected him of talking bollocks, and he was. He may well have hung out at the country club as Santa Ponsa was his manor.

The Mail is not wrong in identifying one stratum of expat humanity, but it is wrong if it seeks to generalise this to the island as a whole. That some expats may choose to live their lives in a certain way, in a certain shallow way, is for them to decide; the expat community, in its diversity, is merely a reflection of any community. The majority of people I know, and also, or so it would seem, Ms Evans, have taken quite a different decision.

Here is the link for the Mail's article - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1066285/As-revealed-75-000-Britons-emigrating-year-expat-warns-escaping-PARADISE-land-HELL.html


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Mike Read, and this was what disgusted him - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPLrXFw76Qg. Today's title - Liverpool chaps

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)