I don't recall which friend it was, but it was said many a long year ago: one of those expressions that has remained with me ever since. "You can grow old waiting ... (insert as applicable)."
I firstly need to offer a qualification. Generally speaking, I am not impatient, but the potential for growing old is great. I thus attribute a good deal of the ageing process to the causes of likely impatience. These are, in no particular order, the bank, the supermarket, the chemist, the newsagent. There are others: the pedestrian crossing, for instance.
One refers to the phenomena that are each of these especially in the summer, though each has its moments at other times of the year as well. The bank can be dispensed with in comparatively short order. There is one key thing to be aware of: under no circumstances whatsoever attempt to get served in a bank on a Monday. If you have tried this forlorn task, you will be familiar with the multitudes who descend on every available bank branch in order to deposit the weekend's takings - mostly all of it in small coins and brought to the bank in a supermarket plastic bag.
Which brings one conveniently to supermarkets and indeed to plastic bags. While other supermarkets are naturally available, Eroski will be delighted to learn that, despite what's coming, they have managed to secure my loyalty for longer than I care to think about. Grown old? You bet.
Perhaps the first thing to take into account is that if you live in a multi-Eroski environment, which is the case in Alcudia, you need to figure out which one is the least bad, as in least likely to leave you queuing at a checkout for sufficient length of time to require the undertaker being called. It isn't, to be fair, entirely their fault. There are only so many notices that can be put up, reminding customers to weigh their fruit and veg and stick the sticky thing on. However, even if customers achieve this, there is always the sticky thing which has been stuck on in sufficiently awkward fashion to make the bar code unscannable.
We then have the service "encounter" moments, none of which is individually that long but which when combined can make the entire encounter last a short lifetime. For example, "do you want a plastic bag?" This presumably comes from the English manual issued to all staff: the only English it contains. Unfortunately, not all non-Spaniards (and even some Spaniards who are asked the very question) understand English. The bafflement conspires to prolong the "encounter", as do, for instance, the dozens of slips of paper disgorged by the till offering the lucky customer ten per cent off his or her next purchase of toilet duck.
Now we move on to the chemist. Oh dear, where to start? Maybe with the resident and so user of the island's health service whose card reveals that he or she is entitled to receive mostly all pharmaceuticals in stock. Hundreds of them are piled high on the counter, awaiting the removal-by-scalpel procedure of the bit of cardboard packaging. Or maybe with the different nationalities and their individual chemist-going foibles. A Mallorcan pharmacist acquaintance once offered his own national characteristic classification. The most difficult, surprisingly enough, aren't the Germans. Yes, they can be difficult and made more so by the mixed blessing of a pharmacist being able to speak German.
A point to remember with the Germans is that they have such an impressive health system that many of them choose to use it even if they have no particular complaint. It's something of ritual, like having coffee and cake at four in the afternoon, and if they don't go to one of the numerous types of clinic available in even the smallest of towns at least once a week, there must be something wrong with them. Allied to an in any event attention to the minutest of detail, this all leads to an intimate knowledge of every conceivable pharmaceutical, its components and side-effects and so therefore an in-depth and longwinded discussion. For brevity's sake, it is best if the chemist feigns ignorance of the German language.
In fact, the lengthiest encounters, according to my source, are with the locals. There is always the far from small talk of how well is your aunt's third cousin and numerous other relatives, but this is nothing compared with the need to explain at least three times to the more elderly of Mallorcans what it is they are actually being given, of which there is of course the equivalent of a truckload.
Finally, we come to the newsagent. Not because of the newspaper but because of the tobacco. Any doubt about tourist spending is quickly (slowly) dispelled in the newsagent. Grown old? I have passed away and been re-born.
Showing posts with label Banks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Banks. Show all posts
Friday, July 22, 2016
Thursday, October 16, 2014
The Black Card Of Caja Madrid
A credit card operates according to a simple rule. Use the card for credit and then pay the credit back. There is another rule. Use the card for credit and don't pay the credit back. Not because you can't afford to pay it back but because the card isn't credit at all, it is a payment card. Draw a certain amount each month, pay for the groceries, clothes, meals or whatever you like and treat this as "representation expenses". Such a card might be fair enough or legitimate enough so long as there is a tax declaration to include these expenses, but legitimacy is not a word that can be applied to a bank at the centre of the scandal of these expenses; a bank which no longer exists as such and which has become a by-word for all that was wrong with the pre-crash Spanish banking system and with political and business influence. Caja Madrid.
Today, the Supreme Court in Madrid is due to hear a declaration from Rodrigo Rato, a banker and politician at the heart of the Caja Madrid expenses scandal. Rato was a vice-president of Spain (or deputy prime minister if you prefer) in José María Aznar's Partido Popular government from 1996 to 2004. He was also the minister for the economy and for finance. In 2004 he became the director-general of the IMF, succeeding Dominique Strauss-Kahn. In early 2010 he was made president of Caja Madrid and then president of Bankia, the bank formed by mergers (of which Caja Madrid was one component). Rato once had ambition to be leader of the PP and so head of Spain's government. As things turned out, Mariano Rajoy succeeded Aznar, but Rajoy was magnanimous and helped smooth the way for Rato to become the president of Caja Madrid.
Though the court is interested to hear from Rato, the scandal of the "opaque" or "black" credit cards goes back several years. It covers a period from at least 2003 to 2012. Primarily the cards were given out to executives or board members of the bank who were nearly all members of the PP, though not exclusively. This was a bank which acquired a certain notoriety when it became clear during all the fallout from Spain's banking crisis that there were certain board members who had no right to be anywhere near a bank's board, let alone draw some remuneration. They were board members who knew nothing about banking and were representative of the cronyism that had been practised for years.
The total amount of money that went out through these cards is reckoned to be in the region of 15.5 million euros, and it is money that is alleged to constitute a misuse of funds. But the amount may be greater as Caja Madrid appeared to have been giving out the cards for longer than the 2003-2012 period which is commonly being cited. The practice was drawn attention to in the media in 1999, though in fact it would seem that the scheme started earlier than this. When there was press exposure in 1999, the practice was scaled back, but it clearly grew again and nothing was done about it. Indeed, it has become increasingly clear that the Tax Agency was fully aware of what was going on and its role is now under scrutiny.
The amounts on an individual basis may not typically have been huge but they were substantial enough, very much more substantial than might have been deemed to be legitimate representation expenses (as has been noted by a report from Spain's bank bailout fund). The monthly limit on the card was actually increased from 900 euros to 2,000 euros at precisely the time the banking crisis took hold and when Caja Madrid was on the point of collapse.
But there have to have been higher limits. The revelations have been coming thick and fast over the past few days. One is that ten directors of the bank spent between them nearly 350,000 euros basically on overnight stays in hotels and meals. The itemising of expenditure and by whom shows, for example, a bill of 1,800 euros at the famed El Bulli restaurant in 2006. There are other restaurant bills, like the one for 2,801 euros at Madrid's Principe de Viana in 2010. And then there were the peaks in expenditure, such as at Christmas time, and so the shopping sprees at El Corte Inglés. The former secretary of state for tourism, José Manuel Fernández Norniella, would appear to have given El Corte Inglés over 94,000 euros worth of sales.
The list goes on and on, a virtual who's who of political and business life and a who's what of Spanish luxury. The PP says it will expel anyone who is found to have been abusing privileges. The courts might consider some other retributions.
Today, the Supreme Court in Madrid is due to hear a declaration from Rodrigo Rato, a banker and politician at the heart of the Caja Madrid expenses scandal. Rato was a vice-president of Spain (or deputy prime minister if you prefer) in José María Aznar's Partido Popular government from 1996 to 2004. He was also the minister for the economy and for finance. In 2004 he became the director-general of the IMF, succeeding Dominique Strauss-Kahn. In early 2010 he was made president of Caja Madrid and then president of Bankia, the bank formed by mergers (of which Caja Madrid was one component). Rato once had ambition to be leader of the PP and so head of Spain's government. As things turned out, Mariano Rajoy succeeded Aznar, but Rajoy was magnanimous and helped smooth the way for Rato to become the president of Caja Madrid.
Though the court is interested to hear from Rato, the scandal of the "opaque" or "black" credit cards goes back several years. It covers a period from at least 2003 to 2012. Primarily the cards were given out to executives or board members of the bank who were nearly all members of the PP, though not exclusively. This was a bank which acquired a certain notoriety when it became clear during all the fallout from Spain's banking crisis that there were certain board members who had no right to be anywhere near a bank's board, let alone draw some remuneration. They were board members who knew nothing about banking and were representative of the cronyism that had been practised for years.
The total amount of money that went out through these cards is reckoned to be in the region of 15.5 million euros, and it is money that is alleged to constitute a misuse of funds. But the amount may be greater as Caja Madrid appeared to have been giving out the cards for longer than the 2003-2012 period which is commonly being cited. The practice was drawn attention to in the media in 1999, though in fact it would seem that the scheme started earlier than this. When there was press exposure in 1999, the practice was scaled back, but it clearly grew again and nothing was done about it. Indeed, it has become increasingly clear that the Tax Agency was fully aware of what was going on and its role is now under scrutiny.
The amounts on an individual basis may not typically have been huge but they were substantial enough, very much more substantial than might have been deemed to be legitimate representation expenses (as has been noted by a report from Spain's bank bailout fund). The monthly limit on the card was actually increased from 900 euros to 2,000 euros at precisely the time the banking crisis took hold and when Caja Madrid was on the point of collapse.
But there have to have been higher limits. The revelations have been coming thick and fast over the past few days. One is that ten directors of the bank spent between them nearly 350,000 euros basically on overnight stays in hotels and meals. The itemising of expenditure and by whom shows, for example, a bill of 1,800 euros at the famed El Bulli restaurant in 2006. There are other restaurant bills, like the one for 2,801 euros at Madrid's Principe de Viana in 2010. And then there were the peaks in expenditure, such as at Christmas time, and so the shopping sprees at El Corte Inglés. The former secretary of state for tourism, José Manuel Fernández Norniella, would appear to have given El Corte Inglés over 94,000 euros worth of sales.
The list goes on and on, a virtual who's who of political and business life and a who's what of Spanish luxury. The PP says it will expel anyone who is found to have been abusing privileges. The courts might consider some other retributions.
Sunday, January 26, 2014
Art For Banks' Sake: IVA and works of art
The Spanish Government is to reduce the rate of IVA (VAT) on transactions involving works of art from 21% to the 10% rate which commonly applies to certain tourism businesses. It is doing so, according to deputy prime minister Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría, in order to promote Spanish culture. She has said that a similar reduction is being considered for other cultural and artistic endeavour, such as for the film industry.
The government has been put under pressure to cut the tax rate and to bring it in line with rates of value add tax that are applied to works of art in other European countries. In December last year the Spanish Consortium of Art Galleries wrote to the finance minister Cristóbal Montoro and let him know what they thought of the government's attitude towards art; a lack of empathy and sensitivity, said the galleries' people.
The Spanish art world is in crisis - though there again, what area of activity isn't - and the market for Spanish art has contracted by a third in the past five years. This is one statistic that highlights problems in the art world, though it isn't as catastrophic as another one, revealed by the magazine "Artprice", which suggests that sales of works of art in Spain plummeted by almost two-thirds in 2013 alone.
This depression in the art market clearly has a negative impact on artists as well as on galleries, and where the former are concerned, young artists are being affected the most. The consequence of this is that, as with younger people in all manner of sectors, they may look and are looking to work in other countries, thus fuelling a cultural drain from Spain as much as a brain or brawn drain.
But behind the gloomy situation depicted by the galleries there lies much which, regardless of increases in prices because of tax, is stacked against a thriving art market in Spain. Some galleries may be collectors in their own right, but who actually stands to benefit most from a measure designed to breathe life into sales of works of art?
Spain has few serious private collectors of art and the number has been dwindling, the reason being that they are broke. This was an observation made almost three years ago, and the situation will not have altered since then. Indeed, it will have got worse. With the art world already well mired in crisis in 2011, the government, helpfully, went and upped the IVA rate, thus making the situation that much worse. But Spain does have some serious collectors. It's who they are which can be seen as part of the problem affecting the art world. They are banks and the State. It is they who would, because they are the most important collectors, stand to benefit the most from a cut in IVA.
If the government doesn't now extend the tax reduction to other areas of the arts and culture, ones with which it and its friends in the banking sector are not so intimately engaged, then it runs the risk of exposing itself to a charge of self-interest. As it is, selecting works of art as the first (and possibly only) beneficiary of a tax cut has to be looked upon with some cynicism. But more than a potential accusation of looking after their own, the dominance of the banks and the State in art collection has been singled out as a reason why Spanish art has been in the doldrums in any event. Artists are dissuaded from displaying originality and critical thinking, meaning that more innovative artists have indeed opted to work abroad where they might find more receptive and open-minded audiences.
The governmental-banking nexus, the one that did so much to bring about general economic crisis, did at least attempt to boost the art world through developing new infrastructure in the form of arts centres. But as with other projects that involved regional administrations and banks in cahoots, some of these have floundered while others, not untypically, were too grand for their boots. Everyone seemed to want another Guggenheim but ended up with a gooey mess that couldn't be afforded. They were projects undertaken with little planning either for what they would be or why they were even being created.
Yet, governments and banks can't really be held responsible for what Adrian Searle, the art critic of "The Guardian", said about Spanish art three years. "Why is painting so lousy here?" It was a staggering comment that reflected awfully on the nation that produced Miró, Dali and Picasso and many others going further back in time, such as the greatest of them all, Francisco de Goya. Searle attributed this to inadequate art schools, the absence of an arts "movement" and to artist emigration.
The cut in IVA, while welcome, doesn't address a more deep-rooted problem for Spanish art, one that merely adjusting tax will not solve.
The government has been put under pressure to cut the tax rate and to bring it in line with rates of value add tax that are applied to works of art in other European countries. In December last year the Spanish Consortium of Art Galleries wrote to the finance minister Cristóbal Montoro and let him know what they thought of the government's attitude towards art; a lack of empathy and sensitivity, said the galleries' people.
The Spanish art world is in crisis - though there again, what area of activity isn't - and the market for Spanish art has contracted by a third in the past five years. This is one statistic that highlights problems in the art world, though it isn't as catastrophic as another one, revealed by the magazine "Artprice", which suggests that sales of works of art in Spain plummeted by almost two-thirds in 2013 alone.
This depression in the art market clearly has a negative impact on artists as well as on galleries, and where the former are concerned, young artists are being affected the most. The consequence of this is that, as with younger people in all manner of sectors, they may look and are looking to work in other countries, thus fuelling a cultural drain from Spain as much as a brain or brawn drain.
But behind the gloomy situation depicted by the galleries there lies much which, regardless of increases in prices because of tax, is stacked against a thriving art market in Spain. Some galleries may be collectors in their own right, but who actually stands to benefit most from a measure designed to breathe life into sales of works of art?
Spain has few serious private collectors of art and the number has been dwindling, the reason being that they are broke. This was an observation made almost three years ago, and the situation will not have altered since then. Indeed, it will have got worse. With the art world already well mired in crisis in 2011, the government, helpfully, went and upped the IVA rate, thus making the situation that much worse. But Spain does have some serious collectors. It's who they are which can be seen as part of the problem affecting the art world. They are banks and the State. It is they who would, because they are the most important collectors, stand to benefit the most from a cut in IVA.
If the government doesn't now extend the tax reduction to other areas of the arts and culture, ones with which it and its friends in the banking sector are not so intimately engaged, then it runs the risk of exposing itself to a charge of self-interest. As it is, selecting works of art as the first (and possibly only) beneficiary of a tax cut has to be looked upon with some cynicism. But more than a potential accusation of looking after their own, the dominance of the banks and the State in art collection has been singled out as a reason why Spanish art has been in the doldrums in any event. Artists are dissuaded from displaying originality and critical thinking, meaning that more innovative artists have indeed opted to work abroad where they might find more receptive and open-minded audiences.
The governmental-banking nexus, the one that did so much to bring about general economic crisis, did at least attempt to boost the art world through developing new infrastructure in the form of arts centres. But as with other projects that involved regional administrations and banks in cahoots, some of these have floundered while others, not untypically, were too grand for their boots. Everyone seemed to want another Guggenheim but ended up with a gooey mess that couldn't be afforded. They were projects undertaken with little planning either for what they would be or why they were even being created.
Yet, governments and banks can't really be held responsible for what Adrian Searle, the art critic of "The Guardian", said about Spanish art three years. "Why is painting so lousy here?" It was a staggering comment that reflected awfully on the nation that produced Miró, Dali and Picasso and many others going further back in time, such as the greatest of them all, Francisco de Goya. Searle attributed this to inadequate art schools, the absence of an arts "movement" and to artist emigration.
The cut in IVA, while welcome, doesn't address a more deep-rooted problem for Spanish art, one that merely adjusting tax will not solve.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Personal Service - Tourism, information and banks
Our friend Pedro Iriondo, the head of the Mallorca tourist board (Fomento del Turismo) and a chap who looks variously like Nixon (the film version) or "Knuckles" Norman, an East End associate of the Krays, is back in the press pages singing a familiar song. In an interview with "The Diario", he says basically the same as he has said elsewhere, including snatches in "The Bulletin". While lengthy enough, the interview really doesn't add to the sum of our existing knowledge. What is slightly new is that he has a chance to speak about the effects of corruption at the tourism ministry. It doesn't give a very good image to tour operators - I think we could have guessed that, and indeed I have said this very thing - but it also has meant that money intended for tourism promotion (in short enough supply) has of course been allegedly filtered off in different directions. The only other thing, amidst the normal stuff about all-inclusives (bad but what can you do), seasonality (there has been lots of promotion - but how effective?) and what the coming season holds (hard to say), that was new - to me at any rate - was the idea that images of people wearing masks in Playa de Palma last summer was somehow a set up by other tourist destinations. This was all to do with swine flu, and Iriondo reckons that this, and the mask-wearing, had a negative impact on tourism numbers, more so than ETA and its bombs. Apart from stupid sensationalism by the German paper "Bild", I don't know that it did. As for suggesting that perhaps the Turks and Croats and Bulgarians had ganged together to get some bad publicity, well this does seem somewhat far-fetched.
Back in Bulletin-land, I am somewhat baffled by the paper's email what's on thing. Its website gives a daily running total of the numbers who have sent in their email address together with dates of when they plan to visit Mallorca, and for which they then get an email giving them a list of things that are going on. The daily total announcement, all a tad self-congratulatory one can't help feeling, is a bit like the Blue Peter Christmas appeal. "We've now raised 296 Fairy Liquid bottles that will be turned into a Jeep to help the starving of (add as applicable)." The reason for bafflement is why they're doing it. Seems like work for someone, when putting the information onto the website would, one might have thought, be less hassle and might also have the benefit of generating additional site traffic. There again, maybe this is all part of a more personal touch that the internet has dispensed with. Like banks. Touching on the news about the Halifax branch in Puerto Pollensa closing, what it, and indeed other Mallorcan banks, have going for them is that the customer isn't simply left to the de-personalised cyberworld of internet banking as the means of communication. Personal contact. With the bank manager. How very quaint. However, I do wonder if there isn't a drawback with this. Is the relationship with the bank manager or with the bank? When the manager leaves, might the customer also leave if there is a strong recommendation for another bank, or rather another manager? In fact this isn't a "might", it's a yes. I've done it myself.
Still, at least a relationship with a bank can endure for some years. Unlike that between tour operators and Mallorcan tourism ministers. Unless the former intend to get themselves banged up in the next cell.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Back in Bulletin-land, I am somewhat baffled by the paper's email what's on thing. Its website gives a daily running total of the numbers who have sent in their email address together with dates of when they plan to visit Mallorca, and for which they then get an email giving them a list of things that are going on. The daily total announcement, all a tad self-congratulatory one can't help feeling, is a bit like the Blue Peter Christmas appeal. "We've now raised 296 Fairy Liquid bottles that will be turned into a Jeep to help the starving of (add as applicable)." The reason for bafflement is why they're doing it. Seems like work for someone, when putting the information onto the website would, one might have thought, be less hassle and might also have the benefit of generating additional site traffic. There again, maybe this is all part of a more personal touch that the internet has dispensed with. Like banks. Touching on the news about the Halifax branch in Puerto Pollensa closing, what it, and indeed other Mallorcan banks, have going for them is that the customer isn't simply left to the de-personalised cyberworld of internet banking as the means of communication. Personal contact. With the bank manager. How very quaint. However, I do wonder if there isn't a drawback with this. Is the relationship with the bank manager or with the bank? When the manager leaves, might the customer also leave if there is a strong recommendation for another bank, or rather another manager? In fact this isn't a "might", it's a yes. I've done it myself.
Still, at least a relationship with a bank can endure for some years. Unlike that between tour operators and Mallorcan tourism ministers. Unless the former intend to get themselves banged up in the next cell.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Mallorca's Two Jags - Muro and the golf course
So much for confident statements. On 29 January I said that work on the golf course on the Son Bosc finca in Muro would start in two weeks. It hasn't. Maybe it will do so next week. Despite the payment of the tax to the town hall, which was seemingly the final obstacle overcome, there are now further twists. Oddly enough, neither of them seem to have to do with the environmental pressure group GOB. One twist comes from the socialist opposition at the town hall. It says that the developers have not, as they should have, submitted to the town hall the modified plan for the course, one that takes account of changes to the development in order to preserve aspects of the flora and fauna, notably the rare orchid that grows there. This runs counter to the assertion by the mayor that everything was in order to allow the works to proceed.
The second twist has to do with changes at regional government level. Although it was being said that the work would start within those two weeks (meaning that it should have started already), there is now a suggestion that a decision to proceed next week is somehow being rushed. This has to do with a possible change of heart at regional government level. And why might this be? Never more than a short pitch and then a putt away from controversy, step forward the Unió Mallorquina. Or rather, step backward. The decision by President Antich to make the UM, as it were, miss the cut and smack it out of the coalition with a driver had ramifications at the environment ministry, the authority that had to give its final blessing to the project and which did so despite the allegation that it ignored a negative report by its own officials. The ministry was, until the UM's dismissal, under the control of the UM and specifically Enviro Man, Miquel Grimalt. He was one of the ministers who lost his job as a consequence of the fracture within the coalition. The UM out of the way, Antich decided to merge the environment ministry with that for transport and planning, a ministry run by the PSM Mallorcan socialists (a member of the so-called Bloc) in the form of our old chum Biel Vicens, he who made the supposedly unsanctioned reclaim walk at the Ternelles finca in Pollensa and who was at loggerheads with Alcúdia's former mayor over the siting of the railway.
In combining the ministries, Vicens has assumed a position and a series of responsibilities not far removed from those that John Prescott once had as part of his "super-ministry". "Two Jags" Vicens we should maybe start calling him. Like Prezza once seemed all-powerful within New Labour, so Vicens has assumed significant power. He has said that he will look at ways of avoiding the golf course work going ahead and he is also on record as having voiced his objections to the course in the past; hence the apparent panic to get the bulldozers in smartish before he can stop them.
What this highlights is one of the faultlines of the coalition. The change in political colour at environment could mean the reversal of a previous decision, but this would not solely be because of competing environmental ideologies. It would also be a reflection of the battle between the PSM and the UM for the nationalist political soul of Mallorca, albeit one from opposite political positions on the left-right divide. Where the PSM sees something stamped with the UM name, it opposes - as with the Alcúdia train - and vice versa. Moreover, there is a possibility that work could indeed start at Son Bosc, only for Two Jags to wade in with an order telling them to down 'dozers.
Just when you thought they'd finally come to an agreement, something crops up. Son Bosc and its golf course is the story of Mallorcan politics. This way, that way, and maybe something will happen. Or maybe it won't.
A Little Extra Help - Or Not: The Halifax to close
Mallorcan banks vary in their service. Generally though they are good, and the personal contact to be had is something that has seemingly been forgotten in the UK. But some banks get a reputation for superior service, and one such is the Halifax in Puerto Pollensa. The branch will close on 17 March.
This was something I was aware of. What I hadn't been aware of, and I thank Kath for highlighting it, was the depth of feeling regarding the closure. Anger is just one response. Sorrow also as the staff offered "the most personal service in the north of the island". Add to this the fact that the nearest branch will, from middle March, be in Santa Ponsa. Having transferred to the Halifax only a month ago, one can appreciate that a customer - Kath - might be a little annoyed. Annoyed and also sad because of the loss of the "fantastic" help and "service second to none in the area". A little extra help. Clearly there was. Rather more than just a little extra. Think again, Halifax.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The second twist has to do with changes at regional government level. Although it was being said that the work would start within those two weeks (meaning that it should have started already), there is now a suggestion that a decision to proceed next week is somehow being rushed. This has to do with a possible change of heart at regional government level. And why might this be? Never more than a short pitch and then a putt away from controversy, step forward the Unió Mallorquina. Or rather, step backward. The decision by President Antich to make the UM, as it were, miss the cut and smack it out of the coalition with a driver had ramifications at the environment ministry, the authority that had to give its final blessing to the project and which did so despite the allegation that it ignored a negative report by its own officials. The ministry was, until the UM's dismissal, under the control of the UM and specifically Enviro Man, Miquel Grimalt. He was one of the ministers who lost his job as a consequence of the fracture within the coalition. The UM out of the way, Antich decided to merge the environment ministry with that for transport and planning, a ministry run by the PSM Mallorcan socialists (a member of the so-called Bloc) in the form of our old chum Biel Vicens, he who made the supposedly unsanctioned reclaim walk at the Ternelles finca in Pollensa and who was at loggerheads with Alcúdia's former mayor over the siting of the railway.
In combining the ministries, Vicens has assumed a position and a series of responsibilities not far removed from those that John Prescott once had as part of his "super-ministry". "Two Jags" Vicens we should maybe start calling him. Like Prezza once seemed all-powerful within New Labour, so Vicens has assumed significant power. He has said that he will look at ways of avoiding the golf course work going ahead and he is also on record as having voiced his objections to the course in the past; hence the apparent panic to get the bulldozers in smartish before he can stop them.
What this highlights is one of the faultlines of the coalition. The change in political colour at environment could mean the reversal of a previous decision, but this would not solely be because of competing environmental ideologies. It would also be a reflection of the battle between the PSM and the UM for the nationalist political soul of Mallorca, albeit one from opposite political positions on the left-right divide. Where the PSM sees something stamped with the UM name, it opposes - as with the Alcúdia train - and vice versa. Moreover, there is a possibility that work could indeed start at Son Bosc, only for Two Jags to wade in with an order telling them to down 'dozers.
Just when you thought they'd finally come to an agreement, something crops up. Son Bosc and its golf course is the story of Mallorcan politics. This way, that way, and maybe something will happen. Or maybe it won't.
A Little Extra Help - Or Not: The Halifax to close
Mallorcan banks vary in their service. Generally though they are good, and the personal contact to be had is something that has seemingly been forgotten in the UK. But some banks get a reputation for superior service, and one such is the Halifax in Puerto Pollensa. The branch will close on 17 March.
This was something I was aware of. What I hadn't been aware of, and I thank Kath for highlighting it, was the depth of feeling regarding the closure. Anger is just one response. Sorrow also as the staff offered "the most personal service in the north of the island". Add to this the fact that the nearest branch will, from middle March, be in Santa Ponsa. Having transferred to the Halifax only a month ago, one can appreciate that a customer - Kath - might be a little annoyed. Annoyed and also sad because of the loss of the "fantastic" help and "service second to none in the area". A little extra help. Clearly there was. Rather more than just a little extra. Think again, Halifax.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Sunday, October 05, 2008
Relax? Won't Do It
Credit needed. Fat chance, you might think. The organisation for small to medium-sized businesses is asking for a relaxation of the rules to allow banks to extend credit to small businesses which are, or will be, struggling. I doubt that there will be any relaxation.
One of the reasons why Spain is in a relatively good position to withstand the worst of the financial and banking crisis is the regulation of banks. While some of the smaller savings banks may be vulnerable, the larger ones should be safe enough. At the heart of this is an old stipulation put into place by the Bank of Spain which forced banks to build up reserves to combat precisely the kind of crisis that has engulfed institutions elsewhere. The banks had to create reserves to meet bad loans. Santander, the saviour of Bradford & Bingley, benefited from such sound management as well as an acquisition policy that has made it one of Europe's leading banks. Moreover, the national bank's rules prevented much of the bundling of mortgage risk into financial products, the type of which led to the toxic debt of the sub-prime crisis in the USA.
Nevertheless, there has been an almighty amount of lending, and therefore debt, in the form of mortgages, and now there is the problem of people who have taken on large mortgages for overpriced properties being unable to meet higher mortgage repayments but unable to lower prices of these properties. The banks are trying to be accommodating, but there is also so little mortgage lending occurring at present that those facing negative equity are unlikely to attract buyers even if those buyers were persuaded to pay the prices being sought to cover the high mortgages. In this climate, therefore, it is difficult to see how the banks can be persuaded to take a more relaxed attitude towards their business lending. This could have quite significant repercussions. Businesses, such as bars or restaurants, that are available for purchase might normally be snapped up, but unless a buyer has the cash or certainly the bulk of it, a loan is far less likely to be offered as part of the purchase package. One can anticipate, perhaps, that more businesses may stay closed with no purchaser and the owner unable to trade. Another aspect of the credit crunch is likely to be felt as the new season next year approaches. It is not uncommon, certainly at the start of the season, for businesses to get credit from suppliers. Yet these suppliers may well be seeking credit from their suppliers, and so the cycle goes. If the banks won't assist and if suppliers are reluctant to either, then one does wonder how easy some businesses are going to find even getting going next year.
EVER MORE PEDESTRIANISATION AND ROAD SIGNS
And once more into the breach, dear friends, the breech position of the Puerto Pollensa pedestrianisation, now with added Bot dimension. Where would we be without it? The press had it that the trial closure of the front line was to be between the Calle Elcano and the Avenida Paris. It isn't. Apologies, because I said before that it was, because that was how it was being reported. Yesterday morning, I happened to spy a notice in the El Pozo bar in the port. It said that the closure was to be between Elcano and Calle Bot. For those who do not know, Calle Bot is the road that goes past the Pollensa Park hotel; it is further down the road than Avenida Paris going towards Alcúdia. So I went and checked, and the diversion sign does indeed send traffic along Calle Bot. Thanks for the misinformation.
As far as the Gotmar residents challenge is concerned, this doesn't change things that much, albeit that the Calle Bot and then the Calle Cadernera meet up with the roundabout on the new road for Gotmar. More of an issue perhaps, were this to become a permanentish state, is that the Calle Bot is not a road designed to take great volumes of traffic. It may no longer be the pitted and potted horror it once was, but it is narrow, and when there are delivery trucks parked up by the bars, Bot is also a pain in the arse. However, I sense in all this a cunning plan by Mayor Cerdà. He and his town hall chums will already know that Bot is a botch of impracticality. So at some point they will sit in session and say that it's not quite working, this Bot-ty passage. And some bright spark, who has been rehearsing the lines handed to him, will receive the end of the metaphorical mayoral pointed stick, spring to attention and declare that there is a road that is suitable for traffic, the Avenida Llenaire. And they will all nod their heads and say, "why didn't we think of that?". Though of course they did and had, as this was the plan all along - to pedestrianise the whole of the road from Llenaire. And so it will happen because the alternative has been designed to fail. Cue ever more angst in the ranks of the Gotmar radicals.
Now that the pedestrianisation trial has been started, there is still the question of the road signs. As one comes to the junction of Juan XXIII, the road down to the roundabout by the entrance to the nautical club, and the Calle Vicente Buades, the road signs show right for Palma and Pollensa and left for Alcúdia. Ever since the new road opened, this has been a nonsense; it is now even more of a nonsense, as you can of course no longer get to Alcúdia if you happen to go left, which of course many a tourist in a hire car will attempt. Go left, go right, who knows?
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Paul Young (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8l8D0aFVjvg). Today's title - no prizes except for knowing which DJ saw to its banning by Radio One.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
One of the reasons why Spain is in a relatively good position to withstand the worst of the financial and banking crisis is the regulation of banks. While some of the smaller savings banks may be vulnerable, the larger ones should be safe enough. At the heart of this is an old stipulation put into place by the Bank of Spain which forced banks to build up reserves to combat precisely the kind of crisis that has engulfed institutions elsewhere. The banks had to create reserves to meet bad loans. Santander, the saviour of Bradford & Bingley, benefited from such sound management as well as an acquisition policy that has made it one of Europe's leading banks. Moreover, the national bank's rules prevented much of the bundling of mortgage risk into financial products, the type of which led to the toxic debt of the sub-prime crisis in the USA.
Nevertheless, there has been an almighty amount of lending, and therefore debt, in the form of mortgages, and now there is the problem of people who have taken on large mortgages for overpriced properties being unable to meet higher mortgage repayments but unable to lower prices of these properties. The banks are trying to be accommodating, but there is also so little mortgage lending occurring at present that those facing negative equity are unlikely to attract buyers even if those buyers were persuaded to pay the prices being sought to cover the high mortgages. In this climate, therefore, it is difficult to see how the banks can be persuaded to take a more relaxed attitude towards their business lending. This could have quite significant repercussions. Businesses, such as bars or restaurants, that are available for purchase might normally be snapped up, but unless a buyer has the cash or certainly the bulk of it, a loan is far less likely to be offered as part of the purchase package. One can anticipate, perhaps, that more businesses may stay closed with no purchaser and the owner unable to trade. Another aspect of the credit crunch is likely to be felt as the new season next year approaches. It is not uncommon, certainly at the start of the season, for businesses to get credit from suppliers. Yet these suppliers may well be seeking credit from their suppliers, and so the cycle goes. If the banks won't assist and if suppliers are reluctant to either, then one does wonder how easy some businesses are going to find even getting going next year.
EVER MORE PEDESTRIANISATION AND ROAD SIGNS
And once more into the breach, dear friends, the breech position of the Puerto Pollensa pedestrianisation, now with added Bot dimension. Where would we be without it? The press had it that the trial closure of the front line was to be between the Calle Elcano and the Avenida Paris. It isn't. Apologies, because I said before that it was, because that was how it was being reported. Yesterday morning, I happened to spy a notice in the El Pozo bar in the port. It said that the closure was to be between Elcano and Calle Bot. For those who do not know, Calle Bot is the road that goes past the Pollensa Park hotel; it is further down the road than Avenida Paris going towards Alcúdia. So I went and checked, and the diversion sign does indeed send traffic along Calle Bot. Thanks for the misinformation.
As far as the Gotmar residents challenge is concerned, this doesn't change things that much, albeit that the Calle Bot and then the Calle Cadernera meet up with the roundabout on the new road for Gotmar. More of an issue perhaps, were this to become a permanentish state, is that the Calle Bot is not a road designed to take great volumes of traffic. It may no longer be the pitted and potted horror it once was, but it is narrow, and when there are delivery trucks parked up by the bars, Bot is also a pain in the arse. However, I sense in all this a cunning plan by Mayor Cerdà. He and his town hall chums will already know that Bot is a botch of impracticality. So at some point they will sit in session and say that it's not quite working, this Bot-ty passage. And some bright spark, who has been rehearsing the lines handed to him, will receive the end of the metaphorical mayoral pointed stick, spring to attention and declare that there is a road that is suitable for traffic, the Avenida Llenaire. And they will all nod their heads and say, "why didn't we think of that?". Though of course they did and had, as this was the plan all along - to pedestrianise the whole of the road from Llenaire. And so it will happen because the alternative has been designed to fail. Cue ever more angst in the ranks of the Gotmar radicals.
Now that the pedestrianisation trial has been started, there is still the question of the road signs. As one comes to the junction of Juan XXIII, the road down to the roundabout by the entrance to the nautical club, and the Calle Vicente Buades, the road signs show right for Palma and Pollensa and left for Alcúdia. Ever since the new road opened, this has been a nonsense; it is now even more of a nonsense, as you can of course no longer get to Alcúdia if you happen to go left, which of course many a tourist in a hire car will attempt. Go left, go right, who knows?
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Paul Young (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8l8D0aFVjvg). Today's title - no prizes except for knowing which DJ saw to its banning by Radio One.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
The Road To Ruin
Proof, if it were needed, and really it wasn't, that the season has misfired comes in the form of a report from the organisation for small to medium-sized businesses. Revenue down by as much as 25% for bars and restaurants, even during the height of summer. Of course, one never really knows with these stats and percentages; there was another report recently which indicated that tourist spend had been up. Common sense suggests that the fall is more representative, though it doesn't tell the full story as there are places I know for a fact that have enjoyed increases this season. Nevertheless, the figures don't surprise, and it is not only the bar and restaurant trade that has endured a hard year; the sea-based businesses have also seen a slump. I know of one that reports about a 30% decrease. Messing about on the sea is an optional extra at the best of times; at the worst of times it ceases to be an option.
Elsewhere, reps are being allowed to go home early as there simply aren't the people, and from next year there is to be a trimming of rep staff for the season as a whole; at least, that's the word coming out of First Choice mouths. This is not necessarily a reaction to economic circumstances, though they may hasten a strategy for more remote forms of guest assistance, one which I heard that TUI had in mind. Phone services, be they helplines or via mobile phones, are likely to be the de-personalised reps of the future.
Reps may get a bad press, but they are far from all bad. One of their problems is a lack of information, something I referred to recently in respect of the rep giving the wrong advice for a bus to Palma. But how much information can they truly be expected to assimilate if they don't know a resort? There may be the resort "bibles" for them to digest and learn on arrival, but - as with anything - if you don't use what you learn, you forget it. Reps that come back for the following year may find themselves allocated to a different resort. Where's the sense in that? They have to do the learning all over again for somewhere else. However, in future it is likely that there will be fewer of them. Bad press or not, I would reckon most tourists prefer the personal touch, even if it is misinformed. Rather than turning to the telecoms services, chances are the guests will rely more on hotel receptions, which may not be what hotel receptions want to hear. And somehow I can't see some old dears needing a chemist texting a request for information.
BANKING CRISIS
The banking crisis continues its claim on victims and now it has branched out from its epicentre of Anglo-Saxon capitalism; a Belgian bank does not fall into this category. The Spanish bank, Santander, is a white knight for a British bank, which all sounds as though the Spanish system is bearing up where others aren't. Up to a point, this is the case. Spanish banks, for example, didn't have great exposure to Lehman's, but loss of confidence knows few boundaries, be it among consumers or financial markets. The real danger for Spain lies with its debt; the country ranks alongside the UK in this regard, and much of this debt is the result of reckless mortgage lending. There is also a concern regarding Spain's reserves, which the Bank of Spain sold off to finance the country's current account deficit, meaning that that if there were to be a banking crisis, the national bank might be stretched as the lender of last resort, notwithstanding Spain's place within the European monetary system. Recently, the head of the Sa Nostra bank on the island offered reassurances that the financial sector was strong, but there have been plenty of mumblings to the contrary. Spanish banks may not have had the buffeting of those in the UK or the US, but don't be sure that they won't. This sucker may not be going down, or anything like it, but this sucker could yet get sucked. The perversity of the House of Representatives' vote is only likely to add to the potential for collapse in countries and banks as yet unaffected, though surely to God they will reverse this vote.
PUERTO POLLENSA PEDESTRIANISATION
Well, it's started - as of yesterday. After all the uncertainty as to what would be pedestrianised and when, the first phase of the trial sees a closure between the calles Elcano and Temple Fielding; the part from Temple Fielding to the Avenida Paris appears to still be open in the Alcúdia direction. Buses can still use the road, but taxi drivers cannot and there is also some question as to use by the Guardia Civil whose local HQ, it should not be forgotten, is right by the Avenida Paris. Makes one wonder - did they talk to the Guardia and the police about all this?
THE UM MINISTERIAL ISSUE
The head of the Unió Mallorquina, Miquel Nadal, has come to the aid of the party. He will replace Francesc Buils as tourism minister. So I am sure we are all relieved at this news.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Re-Flex. Today's title - this was an album by one of the greats of British folk music.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Index for September 2008
Alcúdia Fair 2008 - 20 September 2008, 22 September 2008
Animal welfare - 10 September 2008, 28 September 2008
Architecture - 13 September 2008
Balearic Government - 18 September 2008, 29 September 2008
Banks - 30 September 2008
Bars - 17 September 2008
Binissalem - 20 September 2008, 22 September 2008
Blogs - 11 September 2008
Catalan - 12 September 2008
Climate change - 20 September 2008
Debt - 9 September 2008
Driving licences - 22 September 2008, 23 September 2008
Economic crisis - 18 September 2008, 28 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Expatriates - 23 September 2008
Fairs - 15 September 2008, 20 September 2008, 28 September 2008
Feria del Mar 2008 - 15 September 2008
Fines - 26 September 2008
Flags - 1 September 2008
Flies - 5 September 2008
Football - 3 September 2008, 6 September 2008, 10 September 2008
Franco - 1 September 2008, 7 September 2008
Hills - 21 September 2008
Hotels - 3 September 2008, 16 September 2008, 22 September 2008, 28 September 2008
Iberian ham - 22 September 2008
Immigration - 8 September 2008
Integration - 23 September 2008
Languages - 12 September 2008, 14 September 2008
Mallorcans - 27 September 2008
Media - 23 September 2008
Mountains - 21 September 2008
Open-water swimming - 2 September 2008
Pedestrianisation - 11 September 2008, 14 September 2008, 24 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Pickpocketing - 2 September 2008
Political parties - 29 September 2008
Pollensa town hall - 6 September 2008
Processionary caterpillars - 5 September 2008
Property market - 3 September 2008
Railways - 13 September 2008
Ramón Llull - 12 September 2008
Real Mallorca - 3 September 2008, 6 September 2008, 10 September 2008
Reps - 17 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Road signs - 11 September 2008
Roads - 11 September 2008, 14 September 2008, 18 September 2008, 19 September 2008, 24 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Schools - 14 September 2008
Scratch cards - 8 September 2008
Seasonal workers - 17 September 2008
Show cooking - 15 September 2008
Small town mentality - 27 September 2008
Social tourism - 5 September 2008
Son Real - 6 September 2008
Storms - 12 September 2008, 14 September 2008
Street drinking - 26 September 2008
Street names - 7 September 2008
Street selling - 25 September 2008, 26 September 2008
Sunwing Resort - 16 September 2008
Tour operators - 12 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Tourist behaviour - 16 September 2008
Tourist days - 11 September 2008, 15 September 2008
Tourist spend - 30 September 2008
Town halls - 6 September 2008, 19 September 2008
Trains - 13 September 2008
Unemployment - 3 September 2008
Unió Mallorquina - 29 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Vermar 2008 - 20 September 2008
Violence - 15 September 2008
Walls - 4 September 2008
WiFi - 1 September 2008
Wine - 20 September 2008
Winter tourism - 5 September 2008, 25 September 2008
XL Leisure Group - 12 September 2008
Young adults - 9 September 2008
Elsewhere, reps are being allowed to go home early as there simply aren't the people, and from next year there is to be a trimming of rep staff for the season as a whole; at least, that's the word coming out of First Choice mouths. This is not necessarily a reaction to economic circumstances, though they may hasten a strategy for more remote forms of guest assistance, one which I heard that TUI had in mind. Phone services, be they helplines or via mobile phones, are likely to be the de-personalised reps of the future.
Reps may get a bad press, but they are far from all bad. One of their problems is a lack of information, something I referred to recently in respect of the rep giving the wrong advice for a bus to Palma. But how much information can they truly be expected to assimilate if they don't know a resort? There may be the resort "bibles" for them to digest and learn on arrival, but - as with anything - if you don't use what you learn, you forget it. Reps that come back for the following year may find themselves allocated to a different resort. Where's the sense in that? They have to do the learning all over again for somewhere else. However, in future it is likely that there will be fewer of them. Bad press or not, I would reckon most tourists prefer the personal touch, even if it is misinformed. Rather than turning to the telecoms services, chances are the guests will rely more on hotel receptions, which may not be what hotel receptions want to hear. And somehow I can't see some old dears needing a chemist texting a request for information.
BANKING CRISIS
The banking crisis continues its claim on victims and now it has branched out from its epicentre of Anglo-Saxon capitalism; a Belgian bank does not fall into this category. The Spanish bank, Santander, is a white knight for a British bank, which all sounds as though the Spanish system is bearing up where others aren't. Up to a point, this is the case. Spanish banks, for example, didn't have great exposure to Lehman's, but loss of confidence knows few boundaries, be it among consumers or financial markets. The real danger for Spain lies with its debt; the country ranks alongside the UK in this regard, and much of this debt is the result of reckless mortgage lending. There is also a concern regarding Spain's reserves, which the Bank of Spain sold off to finance the country's current account deficit, meaning that that if there were to be a banking crisis, the national bank might be stretched as the lender of last resort, notwithstanding Spain's place within the European monetary system. Recently, the head of the Sa Nostra bank on the island offered reassurances that the financial sector was strong, but there have been plenty of mumblings to the contrary. Spanish banks may not have had the buffeting of those in the UK or the US, but don't be sure that they won't. This sucker may not be going down, or anything like it, but this sucker could yet get sucked. The perversity of the House of Representatives' vote is only likely to add to the potential for collapse in countries and banks as yet unaffected, though surely to God they will reverse this vote.
PUERTO POLLENSA PEDESTRIANISATION
Well, it's started - as of yesterday. After all the uncertainty as to what would be pedestrianised and when, the first phase of the trial sees a closure between the calles Elcano and Temple Fielding; the part from Temple Fielding to the Avenida Paris appears to still be open in the Alcúdia direction. Buses can still use the road, but taxi drivers cannot and there is also some question as to use by the Guardia Civil whose local HQ, it should not be forgotten, is right by the Avenida Paris. Makes one wonder - did they talk to the Guardia and the police about all this?
THE UM MINISTERIAL ISSUE
The head of the Unió Mallorquina, Miquel Nadal, has come to the aid of the party. He will replace Francesc Buils as tourism minister. So I am sure we are all relieved at this news.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Re-Flex. Today's title - this was an album by one of the greats of British folk music.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Index for September 2008
Alcúdia Fair 2008 - 20 September 2008, 22 September 2008
Animal welfare - 10 September 2008, 28 September 2008
Architecture - 13 September 2008
Balearic Government - 18 September 2008, 29 September 2008
Banks - 30 September 2008
Bars - 17 September 2008
Binissalem - 20 September 2008, 22 September 2008
Blogs - 11 September 2008
Catalan - 12 September 2008
Climate change - 20 September 2008
Debt - 9 September 2008
Driving licences - 22 September 2008, 23 September 2008
Economic crisis - 18 September 2008, 28 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Expatriates - 23 September 2008
Fairs - 15 September 2008, 20 September 2008, 28 September 2008
Feria del Mar 2008 - 15 September 2008
Fines - 26 September 2008
Flags - 1 September 2008
Flies - 5 September 2008
Football - 3 September 2008, 6 September 2008, 10 September 2008
Franco - 1 September 2008, 7 September 2008
Hills - 21 September 2008
Hotels - 3 September 2008, 16 September 2008, 22 September 2008, 28 September 2008
Iberian ham - 22 September 2008
Immigration - 8 September 2008
Integration - 23 September 2008
Languages - 12 September 2008, 14 September 2008
Mallorcans - 27 September 2008
Media - 23 September 2008
Mountains - 21 September 2008
Open-water swimming - 2 September 2008
Pedestrianisation - 11 September 2008, 14 September 2008, 24 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Pickpocketing - 2 September 2008
Political parties - 29 September 2008
Pollensa town hall - 6 September 2008
Processionary caterpillars - 5 September 2008
Property market - 3 September 2008
Railways - 13 September 2008
Ramón Llull - 12 September 2008
Real Mallorca - 3 September 2008, 6 September 2008, 10 September 2008
Reps - 17 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Road signs - 11 September 2008
Roads - 11 September 2008, 14 September 2008, 18 September 2008, 19 September 2008, 24 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Schools - 14 September 2008
Scratch cards - 8 September 2008
Seasonal workers - 17 September 2008
Show cooking - 15 September 2008
Small town mentality - 27 September 2008
Social tourism - 5 September 2008
Son Real - 6 September 2008
Storms - 12 September 2008, 14 September 2008
Street drinking - 26 September 2008
Street names - 7 September 2008
Street selling - 25 September 2008, 26 September 2008
Sunwing Resort - 16 September 2008
Tour operators - 12 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Tourist behaviour - 16 September 2008
Tourist days - 11 September 2008, 15 September 2008
Tourist spend - 30 September 2008
Town halls - 6 September 2008, 19 September 2008
Trains - 13 September 2008
Unemployment - 3 September 2008
Unió Mallorquina - 29 September 2008, 30 September 2008
Vermar 2008 - 20 September 2008
Violence - 15 September 2008
Walls - 4 September 2008
WiFi - 1 September 2008
Wine - 20 September 2008
Winter tourism - 5 September 2008, 25 September 2008
XL Leisure Group - 12 September 2008
Young adults - 9 September 2008
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Party, Party!
A report today reckons that standards of service at UK banks are lower than other European countries, including Spain. Hmm. Maybe, maybe not.
I have had cause to question the service at Credito Balear in Puerto Alcúdia, mainly because of the lack of people to give you service. But I now also have an account with Solbank, also in Puerto Alcúdia. Can’t be faulted. I should do a Bank of the Week thing, but I think that’s going a bit far.
Yes folks, we’re coming up to that time again. FIESTA time. Yippee! Great traditional events and piss-ups. First up of the fiesta season locally is Saint Peter, or San Pedro, or Sant Pere, depending on what language you prefer. More of a gig in Puerto Alcúdia than Puerto Pollensa, the fiesta is actually a nine-day series of events. The first day (22 June) features, for instance, folk dance and music down on the Paseo Marítimo. The real big day is the 29th, which finishes off with a grand fireworks display. Ominously, prior to all the pyrotechnics, there is entertainment courtesy of one Natalia. Who she? Apparently she is a one-time contestant on “Operación Triunfo”. Now if you thought the likes of “X Factor” were a big deal, they pale into a Simon Cowell scowl compared with Triunfo. Doesn’t make it any better though. Normally, all the girls are wannabe Jennifer Lopezes, the boys wannabe Enrique Iglesiases. Sounds cool eh? So Natalia, whoever she is, will be larging it for the masses. Bet you can’t wait. I can.
Anyway, enough of this cynicism. Go and enjoy the events; they’ll be loads of fun. The programme is listed on the WHAT’S ON BLOG which is linked here.
Quiz time: Yea, well, I knew it was tough. No-one has tendered any suggestion in favour of Carla Lane. Rather suspected this would be the case. Anyway, back to Pop Quiz. Enrique Iglesias is the son of Julio. But for which football team did Julio play?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
N.B. According to Wikipedia, Natalia is/has been quite big in the UK and is/was a sort of Spanish Britney Spears. So, presumably she’s in rehab and has shaved her hair. There again, you can’t believe everything you read on Wikipedia. By the way, I have got a great Wikipedia thing up my sleeve. Not saying, but it is Mallorca-related. Maybe I should start this as a quiz.
I have had cause to question the service at Credito Balear in Puerto Alcúdia, mainly because of the lack of people to give you service. But I now also have an account with Solbank, also in Puerto Alcúdia. Can’t be faulted. I should do a Bank of the Week thing, but I think that’s going a bit far.
Yes folks, we’re coming up to that time again. FIESTA time. Yippee! Great traditional events and piss-ups. First up of the fiesta season locally is Saint Peter, or San Pedro, or Sant Pere, depending on what language you prefer. More of a gig in Puerto Alcúdia than Puerto Pollensa, the fiesta is actually a nine-day series of events. The first day (22 June) features, for instance, folk dance and music down on the Paseo Marítimo. The real big day is the 29th, which finishes off with a grand fireworks display. Ominously, prior to all the pyrotechnics, there is entertainment courtesy of one Natalia. Who she? Apparently she is a one-time contestant on “Operación Triunfo”. Now if you thought the likes of “X Factor” were a big deal, they pale into a Simon Cowell scowl compared with Triunfo. Doesn’t make it any better though. Normally, all the girls are wannabe Jennifer Lopezes, the boys wannabe Enrique Iglesiases. Sounds cool eh? So Natalia, whoever she is, will be larging it for the masses. Bet you can’t wait. I can.
Anyway, enough of this cynicism. Go and enjoy the events; they’ll be loads of fun. The programme is listed on the WHAT’S ON BLOG which is linked here.
Quiz time: Yea, well, I knew it was tough. No-one has tendered any suggestion in favour of Carla Lane. Rather suspected this would be the case. Anyway, back to Pop Quiz. Enrique Iglesias is the son of Julio. But for which football team did Julio play?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
N.B. According to Wikipedia, Natalia is/has been quite big in the UK and is/was a sort of Spanish Britney Spears. So, presumably she’s in rehab and has shaved her hair. There again, you can’t believe everything you read on Wikipedia. By the way, I have got a great Wikipedia thing up my sleeve. Not saying, but it is Mallorca-related. Maybe I should start this as a quiz.
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