What do protests against President Bauzá and a visit by Pollensa's mayor to the nature park of La Gola in Puerto Pollensa have to do with each other? Very little on the face of it, but both can be considered as good PR.
Why are the protests good PR? The answer is simple. Get crowds of the youth stroppy mob indulging in some chanting and lobbing the odd missile and the propaganda value is incalculable. It all works in the president's favour. Kick up enough fuss about violent demonstrators and everyone will start tutting and having sympathy for a president battling against problems of economic crisis. The demonstrators would be far better served going along and standing in silence or with their backs to Bauzá when he arrives. This would send out a very different message, and the interpretation of the demonstration would be very different.
Bauzá has been putting in appearances all over the place, conducting a Cook's tour of the provinces. One day Pollensa and Santa Margalida, the next day Artà and Cala Ratjada. The tour is all in aid of getting around the local Partido Popular branches, but it has another, more cynical side to it. The president and his advisors could have expected a spot of bother and demonstrators duly obliged on the first stop of the tour in Inca. They couldn't have hoped for better. One demo spawns another. Copycatism. When politicians then condemn violence (and there has been little or no real violence) and start chucking around insults of their own at opposition parties which don't appear to be as inclined to do some condemning of their own, don't be fooled into believing that they aren't anything but delighted.
The additional PR benefit to Bauzá is that once the demos had started in Inca and then Manacor, he can then say that he will not be cowed or deterred by the "violence" and will continue on his tour. Were he not to, then democracy would be undermined and besides he is the democratically elected president; all this sort of guff. People are astonishingly naïve if they fail to see the propaganda purposes of Bauzá's tour, while the demonstrators have been astonishingly naïve, not to say stupid, in falling into the trap.
Then there was the visit of mayor Cifre to La Gola. He was accompanied by the government's environment minister, Biel Company. No demos, but instead a photo opportunity for the two men who essentially run the nature park. One fancies they were there more out of sufferance rather than really wanting to be there. As someone had decided that Thursday was European Day of Nature Parks, something would have to have been done to acknowledge the fact. Why not go to La Gola as a way of marking the day? At a stroke, not only could the day be given an official stamp of celebration, so also could it be shown that the town hall and the ministry were there at La Gola, taking seriously their responsibilities for its operation and its visitors' centre, a centre which is hardly ever open and will still be open for only parts of the year; it's going to shut again for two months at the end of June.
So, it was all good PR again, designed to quell the criticisms of town hall and ministry alike regarding their management of La Gola. Once more, if anyone truly believes the visit represents a more proactive attitude on behalf of these institutions towards La Gola, then they are being naïve. The visit was about putting in and keeping up appearances by making an appearance that wouldn't normally have been made, had it not been for the fortuitous coincidence of nature parks day.
Back to the Bauzá protests. These have also been somewhat embarrassing for all concerned. The number of school kids shown in a video issued by "Ultima Hora" attending the demo in Santa Margalida suggested that this was far from a protest of real militants and was not something of any "violence". But there is a more serious side to this, which is that the mere presence of those school kids does perhaps represent an example of a growing radicalisation of Mallorca's youth who are embracing more the Catalanist message. This radicalisation is one I have suggested has been occurring before through seemingly innocent events such as the "Acampallengua", the annual camp for promoting Catalan culture and the Catalan language among Mallorca's youth. The next one is to be held over the first weekend of June in Manacor, one of the main centres of opposition to Bauzá. It may not be as innocent as previous ones.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Showing posts with label Acampallengua. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Acampallengua. Show all posts
Saturday, May 26, 2012
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
By The Old Canal
Further to yesterday's piece regarding the "Acampallengua", there was a bit of controversy surrounding the Sa Pobla event. The vice-president of the Obra Cultural Balear, the organisation that promotes the Catalan language and culture, was detained for a couple of hours by the Guardia on the Sunday morning whilst the night party was in full swing. Quite why is unclear, though the Guardia suggest that there may have been some sort of "disobedience". The president of the organisation dubbed it an "absurd provocation". (Quotes in translation from the report in "The Diario".)
The canals and bridges of Puerto Alcúdia have sometimes been subjected to criticism by tourists. The bridges themselves are in need of upgrading, something everyone pretty much accepts, and now the Costas authority, which is responsible for the canals, the lakes and the bridges, has presented a plan costing close on 5 million euros to upgrade the walkways and the canals. The original project that formed the lakes and canals from Albufera was intended to create a "little Venice", and the further development will require some expropriation, for example, from Bellevue. The creation of new walkways and possibly also bridges for the Lago Esperanza (the big lake) was talked about well over a year ago when a plan was also put forward for the lake to become a canoeing centre. While an upgrade in appearance and in facilities is to be welcomed, the thing that may remain a point of concern is the cleanliness of the canals. The odd plastic bottle here or there is almost to be expected, but when whole rubbish bins get deposited it means that someone needs to be doing the rounds rather more regularly than they seem to. One hopes that they also have a plan to keep them up to standard and also to keep the fountains going, all year if necessary, in order to create better water circulation. The other aspect of both the lakes and the canals that really should be addressed, but probably won't be, is the mosquito population. And with regard to mosquitoes, they seem to be bigger and more abundant than ever this spring.
Coming back to all-inclusives and tour operators etc., I'm grateful to Anne Marie for pointing out the some time erroneous information that tour-operator reps give out. She cites the example of one rep who explained to a coach load that the "old town of Alcúdia and its walls had been built by the Romans in the 11th century". Apart from the fact that the Roman Empire had collapsed several centuries previously, by the 11th century Alcúdia was under Islamic control, and it was from Arabic that the town's name was derived.
Not all reps are useless. There are some experienced reps who are extremely knowledegable and would never have made such a mistake, but unfortunately too many are ill-informed or maybe just take no notice of what information they are provided with. Whatever. Many tourists may not be interested in local culture and history, but the tour operators and their personnel still have a duty, or should have, to present the area correctly.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Trevor Horn and Paul Morley. Today's title - this comes from a song strongly associated with Ireland but was in fact written about Salford.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The canals and bridges of Puerto Alcúdia have sometimes been subjected to criticism by tourists. The bridges themselves are in need of upgrading, something everyone pretty much accepts, and now the Costas authority, which is responsible for the canals, the lakes and the bridges, has presented a plan costing close on 5 million euros to upgrade the walkways and the canals. The original project that formed the lakes and canals from Albufera was intended to create a "little Venice", and the further development will require some expropriation, for example, from Bellevue. The creation of new walkways and possibly also bridges for the Lago Esperanza (the big lake) was talked about well over a year ago when a plan was also put forward for the lake to become a canoeing centre. While an upgrade in appearance and in facilities is to be welcomed, the thing that may remain a point of concern is the cleanliness of the canals. The odd plastic bottle here or there is almost to be expected, but when whole rubbish bins get deposited it means that someone needs to be doing the rounds rather more regularly than they seem to. One hopes that they also have a plan to keep them up to standard and also to keep the fountains going, all year if necessary, in order to create better water circulation. The other aspect of both the lakes and the canals that really should be addressed, but probably won't be, is the mosquito population. And with regard to mosquitoes, they seem to be bigger and more abundant than ever this spring.
Coming back to all-inclusives and tour operators etc., I'm grateful to Anne Marie for pointing out the some time erroneous information that tour-operator reps give out. She cites the example of one rep who explained to a coach load that the "old town of Alcúdia and its walls had been built by the Romans in the 11th century". Apart from the fact that the Roman Empire had collapsed several centuries previously, by the 11th century Alcúdia was under Islamic control, and it was from Arabic that the town's name was derived.
Not all reps are useless. There are some experienced reps who are extremely knowledegable and would never have made such a mistake, but unfortunately too many are ill-informed or maybe just take no notice of what information they are provided with. Whatever. Many tourists may not be interested in local culture and history, but the tour operators and their personnel still have a duty, or should have, to present the area correctly.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Trevor Horn and Paul Morley. Today's title - this comes from a song strongly associated with Ireland but was in fact written about Salford.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Monday, May 25, 2009
Art Of Noise
5am. There's a bass sound coming from somewhere. Is it from a car in the street? No, sounds too far away. Onto the upper terrace, and it is a little clearer; not loud but discernible. It's coming from across Albufera. Sa Pobla. It's travelling some eight kilometres or so; it's coming from the party for the "Acampallengua". 5am. Hopefully, no-one in Sa Pobla was desperate for a good night's sleep; they wouldn't have had one.
And what is this "Acampallengua"? Literally it means camp language. It's pretty accurate. This is an annual occasion that moves around the island. It is a celebration of Catalan, and particularly popular with the youth; hence the party and the sports that had been arranged during the day. The camping part is that they pitch up and pitch tents and then head off to the sports, the night party, the fire run, the arts workshops, the giants and the pipers and the worthy speeches by politicos and the head of Obra Cultural Balear, the Catalan promotional organisation - "we will not make a step backwards in the struggle for our language", says he (as quoted in translation from "The Diario").
On the face of it, this event seems fair enough, a bit of camping out, a bit of football and a bit of techno. Yet I can't help feeling there is something slightly sinister about the politicisation of the event and therefore of the language. Statements such as that by the head of the Obra makes this pretty clear, and in his audience are teenagers who are being made more aware of their language (which is fair enough) but also potentially being radicalised (which may not be fair enough). Whatever. It's not my argument.
More noise. The tourism season cranking up and the sounds of entertainment are wafting across the resorts; no, wafting is way too weak, make that reverberating. By no means for the first time, there are a number of mutterings about the loudness of the Bellevue show garden sound system. I'm told that it is louder than last year. Every word can be heard clearly as far away as Magic and probably further. "Do you like The Beatles? Scream and shout ... " And so they do, and then once the show has finished at the midnight deadline they continue for some more minutes, demanding more and shouting some more.
This was a theme last year, as it will probably be a theme next year and the year after. Whether the sound system is excessive is not for me to say, but there is an ongoing difficulty in reconciling the noise of holiday and the sleeping and peace requirements of residents and probably also some holidaymakers. Were this a "problem" only occasionally, it might not all be so annoying to some, but it is every night. Not sure how you resolve it, especially when the wind is in the right (or perhaps that's the wrong) direction.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - it was about a nuclear attack on Britain and the nuclear winter that ensued, and it was horrifying. Today's title - who were the driving forces behind this outfit?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
And what is this "Acampallengua"? Literally it means camp language. It's pretty accurate. This is an annual occasion that moves around the island. It is a celebration of Catalan, and particularly popular with the youth; hence the party and the sports that had been arranged during the day. The camping part is that they pitch up and pitch tents and then head off to the sports, the night party, the fire run, the arts workshops, the giants and the pipers and the worthy speeches by politicos and the head of Obra Cultural Balear, the Catalan promotional organisation - "we will not make a step backwards in the struggle for our language", says he (as quoted in translation from "The Diario").
On the face of it, this event seems fair enough, a bit of camping out, a bit of football and a bit of techno. Yet I can't help feeling there is something slightly sinister about the politicisation of the event and therefore of the language. Statements such as that by the head of the Obra makes this pretty clear, and in his audience are teenagers who are being made more aware of their language (which is fair enough) but also potentially being radicalised (which may not be fair enough). Whatever. It's not my argument.
More noise. The tourism season cranking up and the sounds of entertainment are wafting across the resorts; no, wafting is way too weak, make that reverberating. By no means for the first time, there are a number of mutterings about the loudness of the Bellevue show garden sound system. I'm told that it is louder than last year. Every word can be heard clearly as far away as Magic and probably further. "Do you like The Beatles? Scream and shout ... " And so they do, and then once the show has finished at the midnight deadline they continue for some more minutes, demanding more and shouting some more.
This was a theme last year, as it will probably be a theme next year and the year after. Whether the sound system is excessive is not for me to say, but there is an ongoing difficulty in reconciling the noise of holiday and the sleeping and peace requirements of residents and probably also some holidaymakers. Were this a "problem" only occasionally, it might not all be so annoying to some, but it is every night. Not sure how you resolve it, especially when the wind is in the right (or perhaps that's the wrong) direction.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - it was about a nuclear attack on Britain and the nuclear winter that ensued, and it was horrifying. Today's title - who were the driving forces behind this outfit?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
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