The Mallorcan fiesta is an all-year-round occurrence. Arguably, it is never more spectacular than in January, a month when comparatively few visitors witness the demonic happenings on behalf of the saints Antony and Sebastian, breathe in the smoke of the bonfires and listen to the music - contemporary and ancient - in squares across the island. But it is summer that is most closely associated with fiesta. The word has an almost onomatopoeic quality: its sound is one of summer suffused with vibrant colours, embraced by the heat of the night and the literalism of its meaning - party.
The fiesta is of course more than its contemporary manifestations of DJs, Zumba sessions and children's entertainment gangs. It is tradition, rooted in religious ceremonies and in the idiosyncrasies of island culture. In the recent past - since the late 1970s at least - it has also been the heartbeat of revivalism. The soul of Mallorca was rediscovered. From the ashes of industrial upheaval that caused migration from the fields to the tourist empires of the coasts came the Phoenix of the return of traditional symbols - the instruments (such as the xeremia pipes), the curious and the bizarre (demons, big heads), the folk dances in their various guises. None of this had died out, but much of it had become sidelined in the rush towards a new age of touristic gold in the (some anyway) manufactured resorts.
This process of rediscovery over the past four decades or so has to be considered in the context of current-day developments. They are ones which seek to amend tradition or even eliminate it. And they all come with degrees of argument or controversy attached.
In the town of Alaro, for example, the town hall wants women to be part of the cossier folk dance troupe. Heaven forfend! The townsfolk are said to be divided on the matter, though there appear to be more in favour than against. In an age of equality, the majority view is likely to prevail, and who is to say that it should not. The Alaro case, however, and when set against other arguments, can seem minor, for there are more controversial matters at stake.
Take Soller and its Firó fiesta in May. The showpiece is the Moors and Christians battle, the grandest of all the island battles between invaders and defenders. Bar owners in the Plaça Constitució, the setting for the climax, are unhappy at proposals that they close for a time. Theirs is a commercial controversy, not one to do with tradition. There is another: the simulation of the hanging of peasants by the invading Moors. There have been calls for this to be stopped. They have been made not on the grounds of any political correctness but because of the sensitivities of some: psychological effects or sad reminders of a suicide. The town hall has listened. The hangings will continue.
And then there are fiestas with animals. The controversy is being played out in the Balearic parliament. An amendment to the animal protection act would see the end to any fiesta display that might entail animal suffering. Principally and most obviously this refers to bulls; indeed, bulls are the reason why the amendment is to come before parliament and will surely be approved.
Bullfighting will cease to be. Some will lament its passing. Many more will not. But the ban raises a question about tradition. Is tradition finite? Can it be said to be outdated and to have run its course? There is almost certainly a majority view that it can and should be consigned to the past when it involves bulls. But the people of Fornalutx, with its bull-run the centrepiece of the summer fiesta, are less inclined to this view. While outsiders look on and see barbarism, the villagers see tradition. It will be banned.
But the amendment may affect all manner of other fiesta traditions. Will the live cockerel at the summit of Pollensa's greasy pine of Sant Antoni become history? There are those who have made the case in the past for it being so. They have invoked the ban (now some ten years old) regarding the release of live ducks for the Can Picafort swim of high summer. Yet there is a rule that applies. More than one hundred years of tradition, and the animal tradition is permitted. This is the case in Pollensa but is not in Can Picafort.
There is no rule which says that tradition has to be for all time. No rule which says that tradition cannot be amended. There are traditions worth fighting for and maintaining. There are others which are not.
Showing posts with label Animals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Animals. Show all posts
Monday, April 18, 2016
Tuesday, January 06, 2009
At Your Leisure
Right, getting back to something like normality, not that matters round here can ever be described as being particularly normal. But here we go - the new year effectively starts here.
Know what the word "ocio" means? The answer is leisure, with an emphasis on activity. Muro town hall is putting up for bid some land designated to be used for "leisure" in Playa de Muro. The news reports don't actually spell out where this land is, but apparently it is currently not being used; to the tune of some 7,000 square metres not being used. I'm scratching my head. Where is this? Other than saying that it is located next to an important hotel area, it doesn't specify.
7,000 square metres. Sounds a fair amount of leisure I suppose. I can think of some plots, but none that immediately springs to mind in the main part of Playa de Muro. Down towards and in Alcúdia Pins though ... : I reckon this might be the land in front of the last Iberostar hotels before you hit the forest. That would be about 7,000. Then you think again, well actually it isn't that big a piece of land, despite the town hall reckoning that it will be a large area of leisure. The question of course is what they would do with the land. And here, one loses a bit of heart. The town hall itself doesn't have any firm ideas. The mayor says that it might be a minigolf. A minigolf. If it's not a full-blown golf course, it's a sodding minigolf. And this, we are led to believe, will - in the mayor's words - add dynamism to the tourist offer. Give me strength.
It's not as though minigolfs are not popular. There are many who lament the passing of the tropical variety of minigolf down Bellevue way some three years back. The Golf Fantasia is a good enough attraction in the south. No, there's nothing wrong per se. It's just that it's the same old thing; just like real golf is the same old thing. Bit of spare land, let's hit a small ball with a stick. Oh well, maybe they'll actually do something else. Whoever they are, as the town hall's looking for a minimum of just under a quarter of a million euros - not including the IVA (VAT) and plus the annual concession fee - to take the land off its hands.
There was this thing in yesterday's "Diario" about some old-trout tourist who has donated some 20 grand to an association in Calvià known as SOS Animal which protects and cares for abandoned cats and dogs. It wasn't actually her personal moolah, but that raised through the sale of second-hand goods somewhere in the depths of the shires of England, i.e. Worcestershire. One has, probably quite mistakenly, an image of stout walking shoes, tweeds and giving the master of the local hounds a thorough ear-bashing and a sound thrashing with a walking cane.
I find this charity malarkey all rather difficult, I'll be honest. Difficult because I know I'm likely to offend and to give off an impression that I don't care for animals, which I do. But I really do wonder what many locals make of what they probably see as interfering foreigners involving themselves in animal-welfare matters. It's not as if this is an isolated example. It most certainly is not. At times, one senses that there is a whole army of Brit expats, many of them at a stage of advanced troutdom, wandering the bars of Mallorca with a tin for some animal or other charity. Why? The answer is complex. They haven't got anything better to do. It makes them feel important or acts as a lever for some other purpose. Some have a missionary zeal, believing that the locals are there for the converting - to the word of St. Francis. There are, of course, those who are genuinely altruistic, and the lady in Worcestershire is undoubtedly one of these, though of course she is only a tourist. But there are others ... No, not so sure as to the motives.
But I shouldn't be so uncharitable. Today is the big day in the local Christmas fortnight. Three Kings. The day of giving pressies. Yesterday evening, the Kings - not the same ones in every venue - arrived across the island, in the likes of Puerto Alcúdia, ferried there on a very biblical and nativity-style Submarine Vision boat. And after today, we can really start to get back to normality. The grinding normality of the remainder of winter. Except. There is another fiesta. A week or so's time. Always a fiesta.
QUIZ
Today's title - from a single by one of the great electro-pop acts, known best for "destroy(ing) everything you touch".
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Know what the word "ocio" means? The answer is leisure, with an emphasis on activity. Muro town hall is putting up for bid some land designated to be used for "leisure" in Playa de Muro. The news reports don't actually spell out where this land is, but apparently it is currently not being used; to the tune of some 7,000 square metres not being used. I'm scratching my head. Where is this? Other than saying that it is located next to an important hotel area, it doesn't specify.
7,000 square metres. Sounds a fair amount of leisure I suppose. I can think of some plots, but none that immediately springs to mind in the main part of Playa de Muro. Down towards and in Alcúdia Pins though ... : I reckon this might be the land in front of the last Iberostar hotels before you hit the forest. That would be about 7,000. Then you think again, well actually it isn't that big a piece of land, despite the town hall reckoning that it will be a large area of leisure. The question of course is what they would do with the land. And here, one loses a bit of heart. The town hall itself doesn't have any firm ideas. The mayor says that it might be a minigolf. A minigolf. If it's not a full-blown golf course, it's a sodding minigolf. And this, we are led to believe, will - in the mayor's words - add dynamism to the tourist offer. Give me strength.
It's not as though minigolfs are not popular. There are many who lament the passing of the tropical variety of minigolf down Bellevue way some three years back. The Golf Fantasia is a good enough attraction in the south. No, there's nothing wrong per se. It's just that it's the same old thing; just like real golf is the same old thing. Bit of spare land, let's hit a small ball with a stick. Oh well, maybe they'll actually do something else. Whoever they are, as the town hall's looking for a minimum of just under a quarter of a million euros - not including the IVA (VAT) and plus the annual concession fee - to take the land off its hands.
There was this thing in yesterday's "Diario" about some old-trout tourist who has donated some 20 grand to an association in Calvià known as SOS Animal which protects and cares for abandoned cats and dogs. It wasn't actually her personal moolah, but that raised through the sale of second-hand goods somewhere in the depths of the shires of England, i.e. Worcestershire. One has, probably quite mistakenly, an image of stout walking shoes, tweeds and giving the master of the local hounds a thorough ear-bashing and a sound thrashing with a walking cane.
I find this charity malarkey all rather difficult, I'll be honest. Difficult because I know I'm likely to offend and to give off an impression that I don't care for animals, which I do. But I really do wonder what many locals make of what they probably see as interfering foreigners involving themselves in animal-welfare matters. It's not as if this is an isolated example. It most certainly is not. At times, one senses that there is a whole army of Brit expats, many of them at a stage of advanced troutdom, wandering the bars of Mallorca with a tin for some animal or other charity. Why? The answer is complex. They haven't got anything better to do. It makes them feel important or acts as a lever for some other purpose. Some have a missionary zeal, believing that the locals are there for the converting - to the word of St. Francis. There are, of course, those who are genuinely altruistic, and the lady in Worcestershire is undoubtedly one of these, though of course she is only a tourist. But there are others ... No, not so sure as to the motives.
But I shouldn't be so uncharitable. Today is the big day in the local Christmas fortnight. Three Kings. The day of giving pressies. Yesterday evening, the Kings - not the same ones in every venue - arrived across the island, in the likes of Puerto Alcúdia, ferried there on a very biblical and nativity-style Submarine Vision boat. And after today, we can really start to get back to normality. The grinding normality of the remainder of winter. Except. There is another fiesta. A week or so's time. Always a fiesta.
QUIZ
Today's title - from a single by one of the great electro-pop acts, known best for "destroy(ing) everything you touch".
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Monday, October 22, 2007
Forgotten Town
What goes around, comes around. It was 8 September (“Finding Nothing But Warmth At Fig Tree Bay”) that I mentioned the fact that there has been talk of Puerto Alcúdia becoming a cruise stop. Well maybe a step has been taken in realising this, though one stresses the maybe. After many years of debate, the dosh is finally to be handed out to construct a new passenger terminal at the commercial port. Though the port is already of course used for passengers, it has primarily been a port for goods, but the terminal project - coming in at a tad under 16 million euros - will increase inter-island passenger movement as well as transport to the mainland ports of Barcelona and Valencia. So no talk of cruises as such. Forget that one then.
The port itself is now more accessible by foot since the extension of the promenade. Like Puerto Pollensa, therefore, Puerto Alcúdia has a functional unit at the end of its promenade: in Puerto Pollensa, it is the military area; in Puerto Alcúdia, the port. But here the similarities stop. Does anyone ever eulogise about the walk along the extended promenade in the way that many do about the pinewalk that leads to the Illa d’Or and then onward - as far as is permitted - towards the military base? No. Not that this extension is unattractive, it just doesn’t have anything much going for it. One might have felt that when it was completed, there would be people strolling along, but generally speaking they don’t. Despite the access, there is a sort of mental block that excludes going past Bodega d’es Port: a block that says ”oh, there isn’t much down there”, so people don’t go, which is a shame as there are restaurants along there well worth checking out. This bit of Puerto Alcúdia is the forgotten part, by visitors at any rate. To go to one of the restaurants along the road heading out towards Alcanada and the port is to be rendered somehow insecure; it is the reverse of the herd instinct or the security in numbers, a phenomenon one can witness elsewhere - the packed church square and promenade of Puerto Pollensa, for instance, and the relative quietness of other parts. Human nature - odd thing.
And a note about the charity day held outside the Little Britain supermarket for Victoria’s Animal Refuge (3 October: “Protection”). A success. Over 650 euros were raised. Thanks to Steve at Little Britain for mailing the report of the day, from which I quote Jim Murchie from the refuge: “This is a great help for the many abandoned dogs we have to deal with. We will use the money raised to waterproof our kennels and cages - all the more essential after the recent heavy rains and flash floods". Personal note: sorry, sorry, I just could not make it.
QUIZ
Yesterday - “Stormy Weather”. Today’s title - which group? Clue: they did a cover of The Isleys’ “Harvest For The World”.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The port itself is now more accessible by foot since the extension of the promenade. Like Puerto Pollensa, therefore, Puerto Alcúdia has a functional unit at the end of its promenade: in Puerto Pollensa, it is the military area; in Puerto Alcúdia, the port. But here the similarities stop. Does anyone ever eulogise about the walk along the extended promenade in the way that many do about the pinewalk that leads to the Illa d’Or and then onward - as far as is permitted - towards the military base? No. Not that this extension is unattractive, it just doesn’t have anything much going for it. One might have felt that when it was completed, there would be people strolling along, but generally speaking they don’t. Despite the access, there is a sort of mental block that excludes going past Bodega d’es Port: a block that says ”oh, there isn’t much down there”, so people don’t go, which is a shame as there are restaurants along there well worth checking out. This bit of Puerto Alcúdia is the forgotten part, by visitors at any rate. To go to one of the restaurants along the road heading out towards Alcanada and the port is to be rendered somehow insecure; it is the reverse of the herd instinct or the security in numbers, a phenomenon one can witness elsewhere - the packed church square and promenade of Puerto Pollensa, for instance, and the relative quietness of other parts. Human nature - odd thing.
And a note about the charity day held outside the Little Britain supermarket for Victoria’s Animal Refuge (3 October: “Protection”). A success. Over 650 euros were raised. Thanks to Steve at Little Britain for mailing the report of the day, from which I quote Jim Murchie from the refuge: “This is a great help for the many abandoned dogs we have to deal with. We will use the money raised to waterproof our kennels and cages - all the more essential after the recent heavy rains and flash floods". Personal note: sorry, sorry, I just could not make it.
QUIZ
Yesterday - “Stormy Weather”. Today’s title - which group? Clue: they did a cover of The Isleys’ “Harvest For The World”.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
When The Day Is Done, And The Sun Goes Down
You can get this sensation in October; it’s a sensation of summer just saying - “that’s it; had enough.” Nothing as dramatic as the tornado, just showers and chill when it rains. It’s that feeling of twilight summer again; a constant sense of the sun going down. And if you go to some of the quieter places, it feels distinctly odd. Take Morer Vermell/Barcares. I happened to be there this afternoon. For those who don’t know, this is the area north of the old town. It’s quiet at the busiest of times. Now... .
I find it a strange area of Alcúdia. While there are those who swear by the place, if it were me I think I would be swearing. Oh, maybe that’s a bit strong. It’s pleasant enough, but there isn’t a lot by way of beach and just a couple of bars, like Red Rum. And what there is by way of beach is clogged up with seaweed, at least the bit in front of the one-time Grand National winner.
If you want to go walking, it’s not a bad base, as you can wander along to Manresa, Mal Pas and then onto La Victoria, but if not you just have to be someone who wants quiet and an unremarkable bit of beach. But it’s not somewhere you’d exactly call “quaint”. The two hotels - More and Panoramic - are modern blocks of no great architectural merit, though the More has something of a quaint feel of old English seaside hotel as it always smells of cooking. (I remember hotels in places like Hastings always smelling this way when I was a kid.) More positively though, I know that many families like the place as the kids can go looking for things around the rocks, and there is always the great view across the bay of Pollensa. Horses for courses as always, which is appropriate given the name of one of the bars.
Excitement is mounting as the number of protected-species figures given away with “Ultima Hora” grows. Meantime, something of a development in the world of local fauna - a particular type of bat (“Pipistrellus nathusii”) has been found in the Albufera nature park. Apparently it has never been sighted before on the Balearics. How does it get here? Bats don’t exactly fly great distances. Must have thumbed a ride.
QUIZ
Yesterday - Homer Simpson. Today’s title - it’s a line from? Think bat. Easy.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
I find it a strange area of Alcúdia. While there are those who swear by the place, if it were me I think I would be swearing. Oh, maybe that’s a bit strong. It’s pleasant enough, but there isn’t a lot by way of beach and just a couple of bars, like Red Rum. And what there is by way of beach is clogged up with seaweed, at least the bit in front of the one-time Grand National winner.
If you want to go walking, it’s not a bad base, as you can wander along to Manresa, Mal Pas and then onto La Victoria, but if not you just have to be someone who wants quiet and an unremarkable bit of beach. But it’s not somewhere you’d exactly call “quaint”. The two hotels - More and Panoramic - are modern blocks of no great architectural merit, though the More has something of a quaint feel of old English seaside hotel as it always smells of cooking. (I remember hotels in places like Hastings always smelling this way when I was a kid.) More positively though, I know that many families like the place as the kids can go looking for things around the rocks, and there is always the great view across the bay of Pollensa. Horses for courses as always, which is appropriate given the name of one of the bars.
Excitement is mounting as the number of protected-species figures given away with “Ultima Hora” grows. Meantime, something of a development in the world of local fauna - a particular type of bat (“Pipistrellus nathusii”) has been found in the Albufera nature park. Apparently it has never been sighted before on the Balearics. How does it get here? Bats don’t exactly fly great distances. Must have thumbed a ride.
QUIZ
Yesterday - Homer Simpson. Today’s title - it’s a line from? Think bat. Easy.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
Protection
And in response to a request ...
Here is a list of the scientific names of the protected species on and around the Balearics that I referred to on 1 October:
Amphibian -
Alytes muletensis (frog)
Birds / fowl -
Aegypius monachus (vulture)
Falco eleonorae (falcon)
Fulica cristata (duck)
Larus audouinii (seagull)
Merops apiaster (the long-beaked budgie type bird)
Milvus milvus (falcon family)
Neophron percnopterus (falcon family)
Oxyura leucocephala (duck)
Pandion haliaetus (eagle)
Phalacrocorax aristotelis (pelican family)
Puffinus mauretanicus
Gastropod mollusc -
Charonia lampas
Mammals -
Miniopterus schreibersii (bat)
Monachus monachus (seal)
Tursiops truncatus (dolphin)
Reptiles -
Caretta caretta (turtle)
Podarcis lilfordi (lizard)
As a sort of footnote to what I did on street names (17 September: Where The Streets Have No Shame), I could also have mentioned that streets take the names of birds. By Albufera, there are, for instance, Corb Marí, Falcó, Gavines (to use their local names) - all of them represented in the above list.
Continuing the animal protection theme. It is the case here that, whilst care for and treatment of animals have improved, there is still a lot to be desired. I recall the time a puppy was retrieved from a rubbish container, having been tied up in a plastic bag and dumped. Just an example. Anyway, this is by way of highlighting the charitable work performed by Victoria’s Animal Refuge in Alcúdia. On Saturday, 20 October, there will be a charity day at the Little Britain supermarket in Puerto Alcúdia for Victoria’s, and if one needs proof of the need for this charity’s work (one aim being to fight pet abandonment), there was a short piece in “Ultima Hora” yesterday. It concerned a dog left on the industrial estate in Santa Ponsa; left without food and water and in an “estado deplorable” - I think the translation is straightforward. More info on the charity day on the WHAT’S ON BLOG.
Also on animals. This weekend sees the annual Alcúdia Fair which, because of its wider-interest factor, is one of the area’s best events. Animals are a feature of the event, the animal fair actually being on the Sunday as are demonstrations with police dogs and horses. Info for the fair is also to be found on the WHAT’S ON BLOG.
QUIZ
Yesterday - Bernard Cribbins. A follow-up to this is - what pop group took its name from another of the Cribster’s classics? And today’s title. Tracey Thorn sang the vocal. But the group was?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Here is a list of the scientific names of the protected species on and around the Balearics that I referred to on 1 October:
Amphibian -
Alytes muletensis (frog)
Birds / fowl -
Aegypius monachus (vulture)
Falco eleonorae (falcon)
Fulica cristata (duck)
Larus audouinii (seagull)
Merops apiaster (the long-beaked budgie type bird)
Milvus milvus (falcon family)
Neophron percnopterus (falcon family)
Oxyura leucocephala (duck)
Pandion haliaetus (eagle)
Phalacrocorax aristotelis (pelican family)
Puffinus mauretanicus
Gastropod mollusc -
Charonia lampas
Mammals -
Miniopterus schreibersii (bat)
Monachus monachus (seal)
Tursiops truncatus (dolphin)
Reptiles -
Caretta caretta (turtle)
Podarcis lilfordi (lizard)
As a sort of footnote to what I did on street names (17 September: Where The Streets Have No Shame), I could also have mentioned that streets take the names of birds. By Albufera, there are, for instance, Corb Marí, Falcó, Gavines (to use their local names) - all of them represented in the above list.
Continuing the animal protection theme. It is the case here that, whilst care for and treatment of animals have improved, there is still a lot to be desired. I recall the time a puppy was retrieved from a rubbish container, having been tied up in a plastic bag and dumped. Just an example. Anyway, this is by way of highlighting the charitable work performed by Victoria’s Animal Refuge in Alcúdia. On Saturday, 20 October, there will be a charity day at the Little Britain supermarket in Puerto Alcúdia for Victoria’s, and if one needs proof of the need for this charity’s work (one aim being to fight pet abandonment), there was a short piece in “Ultima Hora” yesterday. It concerned a dog left on the industrial estate in Santa Ponsa; left without food and water and in an “estado deplorable” - I think the translation is straightforward. More info on the charity day on the WHAT’S ON BLOG.
Also on animals. This weekend sees the annual Alcúdia Fair which, because of its wider-interest factor, is one of the area’s best events. Animals are a feature of the event, the animal fair actually being on the Sunday as are demonstrations with police dogs and horses. Info for the fair is also to be found on the WHAT’S ON BLOG.
QUIZ
Yesterday - Bernard Cribbins. A follow-up to this is - what pop group took its name from another of the Cribster’s classics? And today’s title. Tracey Thorn sang the vocal. But the group was?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Saturday, September 15, 2007
“It’s Late September And I Really Should Be ...”
Vuelta al cole. Back to school. Same phrase, same adverts, but here there is a marked difference when it comes to the start of the new school year. Firstly, it is much later than in Britain, but more interestingly it invites pages and pages of copy and photos in the local press - happy, smiling faces, some less than happy smiling faces, queues of traffic. Don’t think for one moment that the school run is confined to Britain. One of the issues the papers concern themselves with is how well, or not, the traffic police are doing in managing the panzer divisions of SUVs descending on the local primary or secondary.
Reporting on the return to school has also emphasised the fact that the start has gone ahead with classes opening “with normality”, as though opening without normality would be what one might expect. But why all this interest? The start of the school year, like fiestas and Christmas, are the same every year. Same time, same sets of photos. But that’s probably the answer. The sheer normality of the “event”, the sheer déjà vu of pictures of kids at school gates or of fiesta demons or dancers is the underlying continuity of community that the Mallorcans revere and celebrate so well: continuity of community and family. Vuelta al cole can teach others a lot of lessons.
And on fiestas, an update on the bizarre happenings in Can Picafort during the Mare de Deu d’Agost fiesta when live birds were released by people in masks (18 August: This Here’s The Rubber Duck) amidst the rubber surrogates that turned the sea into a vast child’s bath-time. Or rather, there is no update except to say that the police have been unable to identify the perpetrators. “Who was that masked man?”
Cruelty to animals is an issue taken increasingly more seriously here, though I am unclear exactly as to the alleged cruelty to the live birds in Can Picafort. What of all those doves that get boxed up and then released at major sporting events? Or perhaps that has been banned as well. There is a more substantial argument about cruelty in the case of bullfighting; indeed it is irrefutable, I should have thought. I know the arguments about culture, and one is wary as a foreigner of being critical, but I’ll just say that the decision by the national Spanish television service to remove bullfighting from its “sports” reporting is perhaps a step in a more humane direction.
And weather. The mid-September storm duly arrived, a couple of days later than normal. Yesterday evening was almost suffocatingly sweaty and not just because of the sweat of anxiety surrounding England’s mauling at the hands of South Africa. During the night, the skies were ablaze with lightning, but the storm, mercifully, dumped most of its load out at sea. It was a monster.
QUIZ
Last time - Frankie Valli. Now Frankie Valli was the lead singer with The Four Seasons, and a Guest Quiz Inquisitor, namely Geoff, wants to know what was unusual about The Four Seasons’ hit, “Silver Star”. Good question this. And today’s title? Complete the line from this famous song. What was it? And who sang it?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Reporting on the return to school has also emphasised the fact that the start has gone ahead with classes opening “with normality”, as though opening without normality would be what one might expect. But why all this interest? The start of the school year, like fiestas and Christmas, are the same every year. Same time, same sets of photos. But that’s probably the answer. The sheer normality of the “event”, the sheer déjà vu of pictures of kids at school gates or of fiesta demons or dancers is the underlying continuity of community that the Mallorcans revere and celebrate so well: continuity of community and family. Vuelta al cole can teach others a lot of lessons.
And on fiestas, an update on the bizarre happenings in Can Picafort during the Mare de Deu d’Agost fiesta when live birds were released by people in masks (18 August: This Here’s The Rubber Duck) amidst the rubber surrogates that turned the sea into a vast child’s bath-time. Or rather, there is no update except to say that the police have been unable to identify the perpetrators. “Who was that masked man?”
Cruelty to animals is an issue taken increasingly more seriously here, though I am unclear exactly as to the alleged cruelty to the live birds in Can Picafort. What of all those doves that get boxed up and then released at major sporting events? Or perhaps that has been banned as well. There is a more substantial argument about cruelty in the case of bullfighting; indeed it is irrefutable, I should have thought. I know the arguments about culture, and one is wary as a foreigner of being critical, but I’ll just say that the decision by the national Spanish television service to remove bullfighting from its “sports” reporting is perhaps a step in a more humane direction.
And weather. The mid-September storm duly arrived, a couple of days later than normal. Yesterday evening was almost suffocatingly sweaty and not just because of the sweat of anxiety surrounding England’s mauling at the hands of South Africa. During the night, the skies were ablaze with lightning, but the storm, mercifully, dumped most of its load out at sea. It was a monster.
QUIZ
Last time - Frankie Valli. Now Frankie Valli was the lead singer with The Four Seasons, and a Guest Quiz Inquisitor, namely Geoff, wants to know what was unusual about The Four Seasons’ hit, “Silver Star”. Good question this. And today’s title? Complete the line from this famous song. What was it? And who sang it?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
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