On The Road Again

Arguably, there are no two groups less well liked - among the Brits anyway - than cyclists and the Germans. Which is doubly unfortunate given the fact that most cyclists are Germans. All along the main road they pedal, barking out orders and holding conversations at enormous volume. But this is unfair. Many of my best friends ride bikes, and some of them are even German. However, despite British success on the Olympic cycle track, the British have never really had an affinity with the bike in quite the same way as the Germans have and do. And it shows; shows in terms of the relative numbers of cyclists on Mallorca's spring roads. Locally, these roads are dominated by two-wheeled tourists from Thüringen, invited here by cycling tourism providers such as Max Hürzeler. Springtime for Hürzeler and Germany (and Switzerland).

I was enjoying my morning coffee, flicking through the several pages of the Mallorca Top Gear Rally in "The Bulletin". I beg your pardon, that should be the Mallorca Classic Car Rally: I'd forgotten that there are drivers other than Clarkson, May and Hammond taking part; silly me. I was enjoying that coffee and overhearing a conversation about cyclists and the havoc they create. That's havoc on the roads. Cycling tourists tend not to cause mayhem in bars and late at night, which is part of the problem; cyclists don't go out and spend panniers full of euros on many a pint of foaming ale and vast plates of high cholesterol and chips. They reserve their vandalism, their shocking and anti-social behaviour for the open and not always open road - the latter usually the case in March and April when the stop-go road-work boys are out for a day or several with their signs. These cyclists are tormentors - tarmac tourist terrorists - and economy-class, to boot, which some would like to do.

But this is not me speaking. This is not me saying that these terrorists take the piss. This is not me saying that the road between Puerto Alcúdia and Can Picafort is littered with the dashed hopes of trying to overtake a cyclist and the twisted frames of bikes smashed into by the irrationally irate. No, no, this is not me. Since they lowered the speed limit and built all those obstacles along that road, driving has been turned back several decades. One can take to the wheel and pootle along at a pleasant 30 an hour. Here comes a cyclist. Please, kind sir or madam, do have right of way, do please occupy both lanes of this fine stretch of road, do please cut across my fellow driver and force him to brake suddenly, so that I may shunt him up the arse, so to speak.

I repeat, though, none of this is me speaking. It is someone else. They are someones else. They are the demons of two or four wheels. Every spring. Completely without reason. They shout and they curse. They scream and they bawl.

What the hell does it matter? Relax, and enjoy the ride.


And Jee-ez, Ireland. Triple Crown, Championship and Slam. Was that exciting. Hugo McNeill, professional Irishman, says that sport can sometimes "take you to a different place". Must have meant Gavin's bar. Except of course, Wales didn't win.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Tears For Fears. Today's title - high tinned temperature.

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The Big Chair

As threatened, a photo of the deckchair. It does have the look of much of the current vogue in restaurant and terrace furniture, the dark brown lacquered mock wicker style but squared and without the high backs. There again, restaurants tend not to have many deckchairs. The steel works of the sculpture do, though, make a decent enough stab at re-creating this contemporary furniture design, which does make me wonder if it hasn't actually been commissioned by a furniture manufacturer. Perhaps a sponsorship sign will be hung from it. After taking the photo, I was hailed from his shop by Nacho - the tabacs opposite the Burger King at Las Gav. He and his mother just referred to the deckchair as a "silla", i.e. chair, and I thought, ah, now they might know something about the birds nest roundabout (the photo of 11 March, Fat Albert Rotunda). And do you know what? They did. So, would you like to know what that sculpture really is? I can reveal that it is ... eels. Yep, a load of eels. Those twisted strips of metals are those things that repulse so many, my friends, and that is official. No tornadoes, no candy floss, no birds nests. But eels. Eels such as you get in Albufera and such as might be in fisherman's basket. As he pulls it up, all those eels writhing and wriggling. Now I know, now it starts to make sense. Eels. In Sa Pobla, the eel goes into the local speciality, the "espingada", which is a treat (allegedly) at Sant Antoni, but it (the eel) is very much representative of Albufera, and so there you have it. I say that it is representative, but for whom? Locals may know, but does anyone else? I very much doubt it. But for those of you who thought the sculpture was just a mess of bits of metal picked up in a scrap yard and thrown together, how could you have? Philistines.


I failed to mention yesterday that a further way in which Pollensa town hall is seeking to eliminate tourism is with the change to the building rules. I have referred before to the temporary lifting of restrictions, allowing work this year to continue until mid June and during October. What I hadn't appreciated was that, apparently, the Casinet works will be going on right through the summer. That'll be nice, won't it.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - "Sitting In The Park", Georgie Fame (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3nNB8D_A1k). Today's title - there was an album called "songs from the big chair", and it was by ... ? Only just had them.

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Sitting Here On The Bench

Well, it all seemed to be kicking off in Puerto Pollensa's market square yesterday morning. I say kicking off; that is a bit of an exaggeration. But were it Easter already, there would be some unhappy Easter bunnies among the restaurant and bar owners. It's all to do with how much, or how many. Metres. Metres of terrace. It is not a new story in that restrictions have been anticipated for some while, but a by-law was passed last month which stipulated that terraces could be no deeper than 3.4 metres. Why 3.4 and not 3.5 I don't know, but that - apparently - is how far the tables and chairs of the establishments in the square can stretch. 3.5 metres are not very much, and - from a tourism and business point of view - it sucks; sorry, they suck. The owners can appeal, and have. Just as well; the last day of appeal is 24 March. As far as I am aware, this is just something that applies to the square, though it seems that - buried in the town hall - is a document which shows how far terraces can go, even for places that don't currently have them. Whatever. Anyway, the mayor was there in person, flanked by the local plod, while the traders put forward their case. I can't believe that this will not be challenged and overturned. An argument is that, because the tables stretch right across the pavement, they prevent people from sitting on the benches. Maybe so. In which case, why do they allow the market to take place? It may only be one morning, but the same problem applies. Why not move the benches? If I had to guess, there would be more people, far more people wanting to sit at a table in the square to have a meal on a warm summer's eve than there would be those who want to sit on a bench.

You do wonder at times if town halls would rather just kill off the tourism industry. If they got rid of it, then they would get rid of a number of headaches. Of course, one other development in Puerto Pollensa which, so the spurious argument went, would be a benefit to tourism, was that of the pedestrianisation. It seems like a long time since that was mentioned here, but what I am hearing is that, as far as traffic restrictions are concerned, vehicles will be able to use the whole of the coast road into Puerto Pollensa coming from Alcúdia. What's the point of that? If today is anything to go on, there are vehicles currently coming from the other direction as well. But were the road to be made one-way, it would not be a pedestrianisation, so why bother? This was never about benefits to tourism; it was all about an obscure piece of road legislation dating back to 1967, which appears to have brought ruination to some businesses since the so-called and botched trial was started last autumn. It was always a pointless exercise, and now it seems even more so.


Take it easy - sitting on roundabouts
More on the latest tourist excursion - the island tour of roundabout furniture and art. Further nominations for the birds nest affair in front of the Parc Natural (11 March: Fat Albert Rotunda) include a tornado (if you can actually sculpt a tornado), while the roundabout at what were the traffic lights and junction in Las Gaviotas now boasts something which is quite clearly a deckchair. Actually, it's pretty good in a sort-of contemporary, robust, IKEA or perhaps Paco Muebles deckchair style, as opposed to a Bognor-beach-circa-1965 way. I shall take a photo and you will be able to see for yourselves. I wonder how much it costs to sit on? Perhaps it is an ironic statement regarding the beach wars in Playa de Muro these past few years; those to do with sun beds and so on. Hopefully though, no-one will see fit to slash the sculpture in the dead of night.


The best election
Yes, that is election. Thank God. They could have got the word wrong I guess, rather than just the wrong word. And they are? GC Hotels. I was checking through the Google map that I have done and it seems the link to what were the Almarsa hotels (Estrella de Mar, Coral de Mar etc.) is out of date: it diverts to GC Hotels. The thing is that when you go to that site, you are greeted with a legend which states "The best election". Now, the word "elección" can mean election or selection (choice). Clearly, they have picked the wrong possibility for translation. They shouldn't have. Please, no more of the oh well it's quite funny when foreigners make poor translations excuses. It is not funny. It is downright unprofessional. The hotels of Mallorca are meant to offer quality. And quality should exist in all aspects of their business, including translations. Poor.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Daniel Bedingfield (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxI2DEE_Nco). Today's title - line from a fabulous song from the '60s. Circa 1965 in fact: the British hit was by a well-known George.

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I Can't Read You

"Political turmoil." Thus read the front-page headline of "The Bulletin". What could it have been? Things political seemed to have been relatively quiet in the UK. It turned out to be a local political story - on the front page. And what was/is this turmoil? It involves a minister being implicated in a scandal. That's all you need to know, because this is what mostly all political turmoil stories here have to do with. The story, as such, has been written many times before; the only things that change are the names. The fact also is that you may not be at all interested, and if not, read on ...

The particular minister is the one for tourism. The last time the Balearic Government was rocked by "turmoil", the minister involved was the one for ... tourism. Not the same person, just the same job. The current tourism minister is Miquel Nadal, a name some of you may have taken note of, as it has appeared on the blog before now. I say some of you. It so happened that I was in a bar yesterday morning as the "political turmoil" headline was being read out. It was of course a British bar; you would not get a copy of "The Bulletin" hanging around a Spanish bar. Of the assembled four people (all of whom live here), I asked do you know who the tourism minister is? As in, what's his name? Blanks. Not totally surprising I suppose. But then I tried - who's the president of the Balearic Government? Blanks. Antich, says I. Isn't he a Yugoslavian footballer? Very good. Actually no, because he's now just Serbian, but he was at one time the whole Yugoslavian nine yards. Finally I went for the president (some say prime minister) of Spain. Erm. Well, no. As a specialist subject on "Mastermind", I suggest avoiding Spanish or Mallorcan politics.

This was all quite instructive; at least I thought so. Not only do people - British people - not know who local politicians are, they really don't care. Ok, some do know and do care, but they are, I would submit, in a minority. That same minority would also know about British politicians. The majority might take more of an interest in what's happening with UK politics, but they are more interested still in Jade Goody and the footy.

What was most instructive was what it revealed about the media here, or what the media here can ever mean. Newspapers, British newspapers, appeal to particular demographics. Readers of "The Times" know a lot about British politics; they may not know much about Jade Goody. The reverse applies to readers of "The Sun". So, how do you reconcile these competing demographics and these competing interests through the local media, which amounts to "The Bulletin", freebies and various niche magazines? The answer is that you probably cannot. The market is too small anyway.

And if the political turmoil continues, if it claims another sacked minister, who will care? Not the Brits, that's for sure. For sure, a sample of four people hardly constitutes a quorum, let alone a market research sample. Nevertheless, the story may be written, but it won't be read.


Cloughie and the Damned
Can we just talk a bit about reading of another sort? The Brian Clough novel and film - "The Damned United" - create a bit of an issue here because Clough had a holiday home on the island and there are scenes of Mallorca in the film. I have not read the book. I have not seen the flim. I have heard the arguments though, in particular on Five Live where Pat Murphy played his I-was-a-mate-of-Cloughie's hand (and was not best pleased by the film). But there is this suggestion that David Peace, born in 1967, could not have written a book about events that happened when he was seven. Well, obviously he could have done because he has, and I'm going to defend Peace totally. So what that he would have no personal experience of that time?

There will be much written about this film, not least here because of the Mallorca connection, but maybe it should be taken into account that it was firstly a novel and secondly a film. And novels and films have been known to occasionally play a tad loose with history.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Tears For Fears (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMBbJ_l0Tb4). Today's title - nearly took instead something by his sister about written or, more accurately, unwritten. Who he?

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Head Over Heels

It's some 18 months now since I complained about an encounter with a hole in the street - one near to Alcúdia Pins that, with the lack of street lighting, claimed my ankle and probably had already claimed ankles of others and went on to have other victims, too. I should have taken the matter up with Muro town hall. If it weren't such a bloody schlep to Muro town from Playa de Muro, I probably would have done. At least I didn't exactly fall in it. Some holes are made for falling into. As Gavin has discovered. Gavin, as in Gavin At The Port Gavin. There's a hole, a manhole, in the area of Hidropark, that deserves a blue plaque or something equivalent. It would say: "This is the hole that Gavin fell into". Perhaps it should be "The man who fell into the earth", which would be a bit of a Bowie reference and far too obscure for anyone who normally inhabits the vicinity of Hidropark - so forget that. Coming back to Gavin and his predicament partially underground, he was, fortunately, able to climb out again. Equally fortunately, the manhole cover didn't collide with his anatomy in a way that might have been particularly unpleasant or might have limited the line of ancestry. But I've seen the marks on the legs, and those are enough. He should take it up with Alcúdia town hall, as I should have taken it up with Muro. There may not be as many holes in Alcudia as there are in Pollensa, but they are still numerous. And numerous enough to do a fair deal of damage. In these litigious times when someone cries foul and compensation for the slightest mishap, the town halls might be wise to check their insurance and public liability policies. Get a stroppy tourist, and things could get nasty.

And talking of stroppy. I will not name names, as I did not name names when I could have done, but let me tell you about something surprising that happened yesterday. It was surprising because someone apologised. Saying sorry is hard enough for many people, but the local population struggles more than most.

There are very, very few people with whom I have had a personal problem here. And when I have, it has been because of some totally irrational outburst of rudeness - on behalf of the other party. In fact, I can count the number of occasions and therefore people - three. The last time occurred about this time twelve months ago. A restaurant owner in Puerto Alcúdia lost it. Just lost it. Much as he deserved a smack in the mouth, I walked away. As far as I was concerned, that was the last time we would ever communicate. And then yesterday, I happened to pass by his restaurant. Not only did he break off from talking to the person he was with, he came up to me, shook my hand and said how sorry he was - for an incident that had happened a year ago. He put it down to his being "nervioso", which you can translate in different ways - stressed, anxious, worried.

The point about this is that I could, given what I do with this blog and other things, have told the world about that irrational rudeness. It is where the internet becomes highly tempting and also highly irresponsible. But I chose not to. It did cross my mind, but I soon dismissed any notion of using cyberspace to slag off a restaurant owner and, by implication, his restaurant and, by extension, to hint that people should give his restaurant a miss. I dismissed this notion because ... because why should I? Because it's where the internet is at its worst. I could have, but I didn't. And a year later, the restaurant owner who must have been thinking about this all that time, came up to me and apologised. I had been right; he had been wrong and completely out of order. Sometimes, just keeping quiet is the best course of action.


On thealcudiaguide.com, there is now a Google map of Alcúdia and Playa de Muro. Currently, it shows all the hotels and apartments. More things will be added no doubt. They are a fine thing - Google maps. But they're not without faults. The map of Alcúdia and Playa de Muro has certain roads which don't exist and names that don't exist, or are certainly never used. The Carretera de Marjals. Where's that, do you think? It is in fact the main road that comes out of Muro town going towards Can Picafort. I have never known it to be used to refer to part of the Carretera Artà in Playa de Muro.

Like almost all other maps, the Google map has three roads where three roads no longer exist. Rather, they exist but only as stubs at either end. Most of their lengths have long gone, and the reason why Calles Tord, Merlera and Verderol in Puerto Alcúdia are only bits of road is that there is a ruddy great complex on top of them - a complex called Sea Club. Yet, most maps show these as complete roads, including the Google map. And how often are these maps updated? With all the roundabout construction going on, they need to be done every year.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - James Blunt, and what's more the youtube has Spanish sub-titles (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztc4V3ttlso). Today's title - Gavin fell in feet first, but this is a cracking song and band: who?

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You're Beautiful

Simon Jenkins, chairman of the National Trust as well as a former editor of "The Times", wrote about beauty in this week's Sunday version of the paper - http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5907426.ece. Beauty as in scenic beauty, that is. Not a Renault style of beauty but that of the natural world. Beauty is something to be avoided; at least, the use of the word is avoided. That's his argument. You wouldn't know it: the adjective from the noun is not avoided hereabouts. It is positively over-used; in brochures especially. While Jenkins claims, rightly to a great extent, that the word beauty "borders on the politically incorrect", there is not the same sense of embarrassment among those who stuff local promotional material with the exaggeration of beauty and beautiful as there may indeed be among those responsible for the "catalogues of beauty" that Jenkins has "combed". Here a landscape, there a restaurant terrace: all is beauty and beautiful.

Though the word may have been proscribed in the UK, it is in the top ten of the thesaurus for the Mallorcan propagandist. So much is beautiful, that it can't all be. There again - in the eye of the beholder and all that. According to polls, states Simon Jenkins, 45% say that "natural surroundings" constitute beauty; 33% views. But there are natural surroundings and there are natural surroundings; there are views and there are views. The nature park of Albufera is natural - the map in "The Bulletin" even said so the other day ("the natural park"). Beautiful? I wouldn't have said so, and I live opposite. The point with Albufera is that it is flat and that there are whole loads of rushes; you can't actually see a great deal in order to determine whether it's beautiful or not. And if you look in the wrong direction, there's a dirty great power station coming into view. Some find beauty in industrial scenes, but industry is not what most would have in mind for Mallorca. The view across the bay of Alcúdia. Beautiful? In the distance, there's the other power station - the old one - that suggests otherwise, and then there is the occasional hulk anchored near to the port.

There's drama and then there is beauty, and I wonder if we don't confuse the two. Up in the mountains of the Tramuntana would be drama, but are the "natural surroundings" and the "views" beautiful? Ruggedness does not beget beauty. Or does it? Do beauty and beautiful always have to be refined, honed, shaped, richly-coloured? Can they be angular, chipped, grey? Jenkins observes that the National Trust opts for "chocolate box" shots for its photographs, and the reason it does is that they are "beautiful". The chocolate box top is saturated in the four-colour system, displays hues of vibrancy and regularity of scene: somewhere like Stourhead in autumn would qualify for the National Trust definition.

In official circles, beauty may be frowned upon, but it is still something that is easy to slip in. "Beautiful" is a default setting for those who peddle brochure talk. I'm wondering if it is possible, just conceivable that a brochure or a website could be written or constructed without beautiful or beauty, or also without pretty, awesome, lovely, wonderful, awe-inspiring, dramatic, perfect, splendid, extraordinary, exquisite ... .


Will the R-word cause the bottom to fall out of the Elvis market? It was once calculated that, at the then rate of growth, by 2019 one third of the world's population would be Elvis impersonators. What this, whatever it was, didn't establish was where most of them would be. I can. Most of them are in Mallorca. Just as well that the Elvii aren't in Las Vegas because it is there that the Elvis market is going arse-up.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - JoJo (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FY8hl6b54A). Today's title - oh dear, how could I have done this?

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Too Little Too Late

This past week has found ministers and other worthies in Berlin for the annual ITB holiday fair. These events are good for ratcheting up the air miles of the tourism minister; they are also important for filling copious amounts of space in newspapers. Each day of the fair is reported on. The views of the secretary of state for tourism and the minister for tourism (and there are two different posts), the president of the Balearics, the head of the hotel association, spokespeople from the tour operators: all of them are quoted. Photos are taken, usually of smiling, contented politicians. According to one smiling politico, the situation this year is expected to be the same as last year. In which case, one wonders why there are reductions in tour operators' offers and in hotel prices, with 11 for 14 deals and so on being available (that is pay for 11 days, stay for 14).

The Balearic Government has decided to spend some more money on promotion. It does seem a bit late to be doing this now, but there again campaigns that were in the pipeline had been scheduled for March: the Rafael Nadal promotion in the UK and one for Manchester were due now rather than earlier. It may seem late to be diverting more funds to advertising the islands and perhaps not enough, but maybe not. There is a fair amount of evidence to suggest that holidaymakers are holding off in the hope of good deals. And they may also be right to do so. Prices at 1993 levels, offers at 12 or 13 euros a day for half board in a three-star establishment. These are the sorts of things one is hearing. Despite this, the secretary of state for tourism can say that things will be like last year, for it was he who came out with it.

Still, at least the tourism minister has been satisfied with the winter season. So good for him, though I wonder how this squares with the views of a restaurant owner in Puerto Alcúdia who reckoned that the February gone had been the worst he could recall. Expressions of satisfaction with what winter tourism there has been makes one wonder if the priority, in terms of promotion, has not shifted too far in the direction of a minority and hoped-for off-season tourism rather than the the bread and butter of the summer sun and beach.


One of the great myths about life here, by comparison with the UK, is that youths and young people are all wonderfully well behaved and don't drink alcohol to excess. Rather they sit around in cafés drinking coffee, discussing philosophy and art. It is complete garbage of course. Recently, there was the vandalism at the Sant Marti grotto in Alcúdia, then we hear that trees in Santa Margalida have been uprooted. And now people in the town of Muro are getting hacked off with the noise and mess from the regular "botellón" (street drinking party), something that Alcúdia tackled by passing a by-law to ban any drinking of alcohol in the street. All this anxiety about binge drinking in the UK, references to European café society and how civilised things are here by comparison especially in respect of attitudes to drinking ... And whoever comes out with this guff simply has no idea. It may not be as bad as the UK, but let's not keep trotting out this naïve view of supposedly idyllic Mediterranean living.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Carpenters (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6inwzOooXRU). Today's title - something of a prodigy; she still hasn't reached 20.

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Close To You

Catching up on the train saga, my indignation with the "fool's economy" having got in the way of my following it up yesterday ... . The Alcúdia politicos, of differing colours and ideologies, have grouped together to push - again - for an alternative route to that preferred by the Balearic Government's department of mobility and, it should be said, the environmental group GOB. Mayor Ferrer is arguing for the siting of the station to be in Puerto Alcúdia and not in the town of Alcúdia. Those who are in favour of the so-called "southern option", included among whose number are many Alcúdia politicians and the mayor of Muro, had originally proposed that the station be sited by the Es Foguero ruin, but now there seems to be as much of a lobby for it to go by one of the main roundabouts - the Horse or Magic. I apologise for repetition. We have been here several times before, but there are always people coming to this anew, so I have to give a bit of background.

One of the reasons why the government wants the northern option, which would see the station in the town behind the auditorium, is - so it is argued - that this would be closer to a greater centre of population. The opposing view, that being pressed by the mayor, is that a station by, say, the Magic roundabout would in fact be better - to the tune of some 25,000 people or so more people better. This is the number of tourists who, it is said, would benefit from a station a couple of kilometres away from where the government wants it go. It sounds a sensible argument, but is it? Does it really make any difference to tourists where the damn station is? If it's in Alcúdia, wherever in Alcúdia, it would be good enough. And how many would actually use the train, or indeed could use the train? This is not a rail system capable of transporting huge numbers of people, while the most obvious connection for tourists - to the airport - does not exist and is not planned. Other than the fact that the train would be useful, the tourism argument is, frankly, spurious, except also for the fact that financing is linked to tourism. But I make the point again; it hardly matters, to tourists, whether the station is in the old town, by the Magic roundabout or by Es Foguero.

What one has here is a clear case of local versus central conflict. Alcúdia council has been pissed off by the whole train issue because the government did not consult enough, or so it is said. One does also detect the influence of GOB in all this, and it wouldn't be the first time. There does appear to be a degree of closeness between GOB and the mobility department; I have referred to it before in connection with the road plans in Palma and the conversion of the Son Bosc finca in Muro. Such conflict 'twas ever thus. But the more this all drags on, the more the chances of someone having second thoughts and scrapping the whole project - and the way it's going, you wouldn't bet against this. Oh, and we now find that the sensible part of the whole thing - running the track alongside the main road from Sa Pobla isn't sensible; indeed it is unsafe, or so says some authority in Madrid. That'll be unsafe as in rail lines parallel to roads in England, Germany and Holland. It's never going to be built is it.

Incidentally, on a map in "The Bulletin" which shows the proposed routes, there is reference to "The Albufera Natural Park in Alcúdia". What is wrong with this? Apart from "nature park" being preferable, in which municipality is Albufera? The answer is that it is not in Alcúdia. It is in Muro. Poor old Muro. As ever, it is confused with Alcúdia. Maybe they should just merge it with Alcúdia and have done with it.

And while on Albufera, a follow-up on Albufereta, the "little" Albufera that lies by the coast road between Alcúdia and Puerto Pollensa. I mentioned the other day that there is alleged to be a bit of an E. coli problem there. Driving past a couple of days ago, I noticed that someone had helpfully covered a sign with a sheet of paper with "contaminada" written on it. Well, it was there; probably isn't now. (Actually, it is; I checked this morning.)


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Stone Roses (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4bHMVAKDao). Today's title - Homer and Madge's song.

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Fools Gold

Where is the "cr-eee-sis" greater or greatest, or at its most cr-eee-sis-itic? I'm thinking of starting a local league table, though the higher the score, the greater the cr-eee-sis and likewise the number of points: The Mile 4 Can Picafort 4, as opposed to Pollensa Old Town 1 Cala San Vicente 6. Or something like that. But maybe I've got it all wrong. The Chinese in the old town of Pollensa was full of talk of cr-eee-sis. "Mucha cr-eee-sis, mucha cr-eee-sis." A sort of China cr-eee-sis, ho ho. And whatever happened to them?

In these days of shortage, the cr-eee-sis takes different forms, one of them being that businesses look to cut back, and we all know those areas that they cut - training, advertising, research. The counter argument is that in bad times you do the opposite. There is a free newspaper here, some of you will know it. This week's issue features a piece, an "advertising feature" (advertorial, as it is sometimes known) which stresses the fact that the advertiser - writing the piece - is spending a bundle even in these difficult days. It goes on to say that reducing advertising spend in the circumstances in which many of us find ourselves today is a "fool's economy". In which case, there are a lot of fools around, I suspect. But fool would not be a word I would use.

This is unfair; this article in this paper. The advertiser has indeed taken a lot of space. Good for him, or them. It will probably be very successful. Indeed it should be. A flood of advertising is basically how you do it. You may as well not bother advertising, as just do it once. It doesn't really get you anywhere. Splash it around, do it as much as possible. There are businesses that have become successful solely on the basis of advertising. I can tell you about an estate agency that did just that. From nothing to market leader, thanks to advertising; well, in the good times anyway. Look, it works. The guy who has written this article is right, but to imply that people who don't are fools? I don't think so. People aren't fools. They know that they have to promote: it is a basic of any business. The issue is not that they don't know; it's whether they can.

This is why it's unfair. Here is a free newspaper, which of course relies on advertising, using a major advertiser to hector other potential, existing or lapsed advertisers. It's kind of hard sell via editorial.

I know a number of the businesses that act as distribution points for this paper. I'll tell you about one. Or I could tell you, but I won't, because I resolved that I wasn't going to do the economy-misery stuff here, and because I don't want to talk about the cost of the rent of the house, the cost of the rent of the bar, the cost of the staff (now let go because of the cost), the cost of the child, the cost of the electricity ... . I agree with the author in the free newspaper. He is right. But fools? No, my friend, not fools. Never, ever, fools. And please don't insult them as such.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Perry Como (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5zarGeHKNU). Today's title - how come is it that this is the first time they have been mentioned here - Manchester-ists.


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Memories We've Been Sharing

What's in a name, as in a bar or restaurant name, or even a sandwich bar name? I bring this up as in front of me I have a card for Sandwich and Moments. This is a sandwich place by the yacht club roundabout in Puerto Pollensa, and "sandwich place" may actually be instructive. What is a moment in the context of a sandwich? The card does say that if you call them, they will prepare your moment. Which is extremely good of them, but what on earth does it mean? Does one really have a sandwich moment, a somewhat orgasmic occurrence or something, the consequence of roast loin in a baguette, or how does it work? "Oooh, ooh, I'm having a sandwich moment." I've got to say that I'm struggling with this one. Anyway, whatever it means, I'm sure that it's very good, and so are the sandwiches which, incidentally, seem all to be named after names, as in male or female names. But I am rather uncertain about "roast beef and cheese to the thin grasses (herbs)", which goes under the title of "dudu". Anyway, bon appetit or bon profit, as they say here, and enjoy your moment.

This is all a roundabout way of getting to names, and how effective they can be, or not. Sandwich place is, I feel, instructive, because my guess is that few people say "oh, let's go to Sandwich and Moments" but do in fact say "oh, let's go to the sandwich place", which may be why sandwich places have, in the past, been called The Sandwich Place. It's not, incidentally, as though the name is particularly meaningful for Spaniards either. There are, it seems to me, types of establishment that, regardless of what name is used, are known by a generic, and to the sandwich place, one can add Indian and Chinese restaurants and even the likes of tex-mex. Who actually calls Dakota, Dakota? It's always the tex-mex in rather sneering tones. To back up what I'm saying about Chinese places, there has been an exchange on the puertopollensa.com forum about the Chinese next to Sandwich and Moments - maybe it's something about that particular roundabout. In that exchange, the actual name has not been used, unless I've overlooked it. It is in fact Luna de Miel, but the name itself is largely beside the point. Further evidence of this lack of name recognition comes in the form, for example, of mentions of Taste of India off The Mile; it is only ever referred to, on the internet anyway, as the Indian, as it was when it was previously Agra.

How important are names, the names of restaurants or bars, or indeed sandwich places? (See, I can't stop using sandwich "place".) I can feel a series coming on. Are local or international names preferable? Are name changes always desirable, as in when a new owner takes over? Is enough attention paid to any implications for different nationalities in terms of names used? So, watch this space. I'm sure you can't wait.


A name that has a good deal of currency, certainly in the boating world, is Fairline. Given something of an interest in the boat fair that takes place in Puerto Alcúdia at the start of April, I had a chat with the Fairline folk yesterday, and found out that there will be a Fairline as it were fair of its own the weekend following that of the boat fair, i.e. 10-12 April. So, there you are. Dates for your diary. Boat (and cuttlefish) fair, 4-5 April; Fairline, a week later - in the Alcudiamar marina.


And ever more about the train
There we were thinking that the route of the train from Sa Pobla and the location of the station in Alcúdia was getting towards some settlement, when along comes a pact of Alcúdia local politicos - the mayor and the main opposition - to present a case against the siting in the town itself, with a preference by the Linkin' Donuts Roundabout, otherwise known as the Magic Roundabout. Apparently the location in the town would ago against some plan or other, while a station in the port would be far better for tourists. The argument goes that the main reason for financial support for the train extension is that it would be as a further aid to tourism. Anyway, more on this tomorrow I think, as there are all sorts of figures which may or may not be of interest.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Who else would give you a steam engine live? The Thompson Twins (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0y_91nGEDYw). Today's title - a line from a 1957 song about "moments". If it doesn't get better than Lily Allen now, it didn't get better than (whom) back then. Not that I personally remember, I would just add.


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This Is Where We All Fall Out

So the fallout from the fall - that of the workers at the Can Ramis redevelopment in Alcúdia. Must have been an added bonus for those attending the market - all that excitement, though admittedly not what might have been anticipated, least of all by those who have been injured. Anyway, the theories as to why the second storey of the structure collapsed include insufficient or weak support and excessive vibrations. The constructors say that the support was ok, but it would seem that concrete was being applied to the second level while the lower one was only of wooden beams. Of those working on the building, including the injured, the view is that there appeared not to be any problems. Whatever the situation, the mayor of Alcúdia, Miquel Ferrer, put his finger on it: "es evidente que alguna cosa no ha ido bien". It's this sort of insight that gets you into positions of authority in local politics. I suspect most of you can work this out for yourselves, but just in case you can't - "it's clear that something has not gone right" (or "was not right").

Of course something has not been right with the Can Ramis redevelopment for quite some while, like since it first started. Jinxed is perhaps a diplomatic way of putting it (and the word was used in a report in "The Diario"). That'll be jinxed as in bankruptcy, budgetary miscalculation and certification irregularities. This time last year, the building site had no structure on it and was not being worked on, and yet the surrounding area, the square, had been newly laid, taking up the budgeted amount with it; the town hall had, therefore, to find another million or so euros to hand to another firm to complete the whole project after the original one had gone bust - having spent the original budget. The whole thing was set in motion back in August 2006 and the time for the project to be completed was set at eleven months and three weeks, which sounds suspiciously close to being one year. But it wasn't completed either within eleven months and three weeks or one year.

There was some talk, quite recently, that the whole thing would be finished by July or August this year, so three years after the award of the project was made. Anyone who has seen the work in progress as it is, or was until it collapsed, would have doubted that this would be the case. Presumably it is even less likely now, and so we will have to wait a while longer to enjoy another tourist office, another café and somewhere to sit when waiting for a bus. However, there was some work going on yesterday, underneath the hole that has appeared in the second level. The sadness is that this whole project, the knocking down of the old Can Ramis houses and the creation of something new, was meant to be a prestigious development for Alcúdia but it has been a mess from more or less the word go.


FAT ALBERT ROTUNDA - THE ROUNDABOUT ART STUFF
The thing was that I was driving towards the roundabout coming from Can Picafort at about half four in the afternoon. What's that floodlight, I thought. As I got closer, I realised that the bright light was no floodlight, just the sun reflecting off of the Robert Smith, some say birds nest, some say God knows what. Maybe that's the idea. That the sun reflects. Artistically, the changing angle of the sun through the day and through the seasons, as bounced off the streamers of the what the hell is it would be a kind of performance of nature in art. The only problem is ... that reflection ... at certain angles ... as in right in your eyes, when you're driving. Twisted streamers of metal - the sun jumps off of them, vibrant, white, dazzling - deadly.

May I just thank John for drawing my attention to César Manrique and Lanzarote roundabout art. For those who don't know, just Google him and see for yourselves and the degree to which he, through his art and his thinking, influenced the tourism landscape (both physical and mental) of Lanzarote. Quite striking, it must be said. More so than Mallorca's, which is striking only in the sense of the reflection of the sun blinding you and your going up the arse of the driver ahead - not literally of course, but metaphorically and metallically.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Herbie Hancock. Today's title - this was not a previous title but I have youtubed it before. No apologies for repetition; this is so damned good, and they were so damned good live. Clue as before: Hergé. Oh and of course Matthew Parris caused a bit of a kerfuffle when he suggested that Tintin was gay.

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Fat Albert Rotunda

When the historians of bloggery come to assess the role of this blog in that bloggery world, they will point to certain themes that have been as faithful companions since the early days, crawling from the cradle of blogger.com to be unleashed onto a wholly unexpecting public. One such is and has been the roundabout. The roundabout as in - can you or I make any sense as to how one is meant to negotiate it by means of a four-wheeled vehicle? - or as in - can you or I make any sense of the stuff that grows from the centre of the roundabout? The roundabout furniture. The adornments of roundabouts. Ars rotonda. Rotonda profunda. The meaning of roundabouts. I have an idea for No Frills, and I shall be mentioning it to Seamus when I next leave him stranded at a meeting in the town hall - conducted in Catalan - and that is a tour of the island's roundabouts with accompanying DVD for the aficionado of the roundabout art, Die Kunst des Kreisverkehrs, to take home to his relevant country and amaze and indeed bore friends and family. I actually don't think it's as stupid an idea as it sounds. Mallorca seems to have given the world roundabout aesthetics, or maybe everywhere else offers similar artistic treasures, it's just that I don't get out much. The twisted metals and carved blocks of stone of traffic circulation management are facets of that Mallorcan culture of which we hear so much; they are a heritage to European art, Victoria & Albert museum pieces for a future Tate Modern roundabout design museum. Isn't the old power station in Alcúdia meant to be modelled on the Tate Modern and to be art as well as science? Roundabouts, and their creations, should form the centrepiece.

I once had an email from someone who was doing a school project who desperately needed to know who was responsible for the most hideous of local roundabout art - the Horse (some say chicken or prawn) - and for what Foxes' Jamie dubs "Linkin' Donuts", i.e. the Magic of the Magic roundabout - boing! I did actually know the answer, though I seem now to have mislaid the information, for which I apologise as you are probably all keen to know as well. The point was that the artistic merits of the local roundabout had found expression away from this island. To foreign lands has travelled news of the strange craft of the Mallorcan roundabout. And to all the most famous - the Horse, the rings, the cock of Pollensa, the Canadair of Puerto Pollensa, the basket of Inca - we must now add the "what the hell's that meant to be" in front of the Parc Natural hotel (depicted above). I call it - "Rotonda Flagellens" or "Glorieta Gloriole", the gloriole coming from the suggestion perhaps of the metal straps as kinds of halos. Or are they streamers? If the Magic sculpture is donuts, perhaps this one's a candy floss. Maybe it is an example of a local hairdresser's skill - birds-nested hair - a Robert Smith of the Albufera roundabout. That could be it - the Cure to the answer as to what it is - a birds nest. Don't be fooled, by the way, by the pole in the photo - that's a lamp-post and not part of the roundabout. In other words, it's a lousy photo. It could also be that the artwork is not finished, though I have a suspicion it is, in which case - what is it? Answers, as ever, to the address below. I quite like the Robert Smith Roundabout. It has a ring to it. But then most roundabouts are like rings, or have rings on them, like the linkin' donuts. I still feel though that, as roundabouts are built primarily as places for the traffic plod to hang about on, there should be a sculpture of a cop, arm raised with a "papeles" balloon coming from his mouth. Like a sort of Angel of the North. It would be the highlight of the Roundabout Tour, the day of doing the rounds of roundabouts, a circular excursion of art on the round traffic islands of the island. Well, I'd pay for it even if you wouldn't.

Note: the Spanish for roundabout can be "rotonda" or "glorieta".


THE CAN RAMIS ACCIDENT
The collapse of the second level of the building work at the Can Ramis redevelopment has left five workers injured, one seriously. The redevelopment, which will create a bus station, café and tourist office, has been plagued by delay and has now been hit by another problem. And this comes three months after the accident in Cala Ratjada when four workers were killed as the result of a hotel collapsing. More on this to come no doubt.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Lily Allen (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-wGMlSuX_c). Today's title - should have looked for a connection with The Cure, given Robert Smith, but this was an album by which great jazz pianist?

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Taken Over By The Fear

Right, continuing from yesterday. Why was this study of anything more than passing interest, if indeed that? The answer lies with the holiday-let regulations and the get-tough attitude of the Balearic Government and part of the reason why they have got tough. This goes back over the years but especially to around about this time a year back when there was the announcement about trawling the internet and examining websites to find illicit holiday lets. Although there are perfectly good reasons for the government doing so in respect of matters such as safety, quality and payment of tax, there is the added dimension that it (the government) is being badgered by the hoteliers to, if not stamp out, then do what it can do to reduce the volume of so-called residential tourism. The hoteliers, and indeed the government, have made play of the future of Mallorcan tourism being based on quality hotel stock; holiday lets do not come into this, or at least they are ignored when it comes to the grand plan for Mallorca and the promotion thereof - whatever that grand plan is.

The hoteliers' argument has long been that private rental accommodation is not subject to the same scrutiny as the hotels are, and one can have some sympathy with them. Consequently, when a survey comes along, such as the one I referred to yesterday, which estimates that only 16% of tourists go to holiday lets, then the hoteliers are going to challenge that figure, and challenge it with one that they have produced before, namely that half of the number of tourists who arrive in Mallorca end up in some form of residential tourism accommodation as opposed to a hotel. There is, as you can see, a fairly wide discrepancy between the two figures, with the government adopting something of a compromise position at 30%.

Instinctively, one feels that the hotels are overstating the case. Yet, it does rather depend. Take somewhere like Can Picafort, with every available inch of land seemingly occupied by a hotel, and you would say that the hoteliers are talking rubbish. But then compare this with Pollensa, and that 50% figure is probably about right; in fact I am pretty sure I recall seeing some statistics which did make the hotel-private let split at this sort of level. The report on this survey from "The Diario" made no mention of the fact that Pollensa would appear to be the place most people would choose for non-hotel accommodation. That came from "The Bulletin" and from the same survey of passengers at the airport.

The survey does not of course serve the hoteliers' case well. If the percentage is indeed only 16%, then this would undermine to some extent the whole argument against the private-rental sector, so that is why the survey was interesting. Of course, one can never be sure with these things. The sample was 1300, which may be considered robust, but otherwise I don't know the methodology and cannot comment further as to whether it proves anything. The academic in charge of the survey makes the point that those who opt for the holiday-home-type vacation tend to stay longer and to spend more. This is not a new finding, but it reinforces the fact that Mallorca does have to find a way of balancing the different types of accommodation. Too often one feels that the private-let sector is being hounded, but without it the island would miss out significantly. Not everyone wants to stay in hotels, however good they might be. It is nonsense for assertions to be made that the future of the island's tourism is down just to the hotels, because it most certainly should not be.


Are the hotels just very afraid? Right now, you would think they and everyone should be, or would be. Not so. All this talk of "crisis", or "cr-eee-sis" to give it the Spanish pronunciation (sort of), is partly just that - talk. Things are not easy. Of course they're not. But I am heartened by the degree of optimism that I encounter. There was even some yesterday from an estate agent. And I won't say which one. Erik. In the old town of Alcúdia, there was plenty to make you feel upbeat; not least a look inside the latest interior hotel - Can Pere. How pretty is that? Remarkable what can be done with an old town house (and not a manor house as they have it, but let's not quibble). Take a look here - http://www.hotelcanpere.com/.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Beach Boys (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cTIYsvJOQk). Today's title - no, not everyone has been. As for this song? Does it get much better than this? Not really.

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Don't Go Near The Water

Bacteria reside everywhere. To find them in a water-based environment would hardly be surprising - indeed it would be rather worrying if there were none - but it depends what they are, and there has been an alarm following the apparent discovery of the Escherichia coil (E. coli) bacterium in water at Albufereta, the little Albufera outside Alcúdia on the way to Puerto Pollensa. Now let me make it quite clear. I am no expert. But E. coli, so I always understood, was a bacterium of the gut, be it human or animal. It would not be something that would survive outside of a body for any great length of time - at least that is what I thought was the case. If I am wrong, do please tell me because I don't claim knowledge; in fact I don't claim any, not of course that it's stopped me in the past. Oh, and I say there has been an alarm; there hasn't been, as I don't know that anybody much knows about it.

But, if E. coli has indeed been found, how has it got there? There are different types of E. coli. It is possible, for example, that it comes from rabbits or seagulls - it would seem that beaches on Lake Michigan were closed a couple of years ago and that gull shit was a possible cause of the E. coli that was found which caused the closure. The bacterium in Albufereta is said to be in the aquifers, according to the report in "The Diario", and there is a call for the environment ministry, which denies that there is contamination, to conduct a study of all the wells in Pollensa in order to establish where the bacterium has actually come from. Furthermore, there is a call for an investigation into the state of the water in Albufereta, which - it is further claimed - has high levels of salinity.

Anyway, I'm sure that the chaps have all got it under control and that there is nothing at all to be worried about. And one would have hoped that this was the case for all those who went to Pollensa for the hunters' fair over the weekend. Apparently, and finally, this did seem to get some publicity. None that personally I was aware of, but I am told there was. After I had made reference to the fair more than a week ago (1 March), I did actually get concerned that perhaps I had got the year wrong, and that it was happening next year. My concern was caused by the almost total absence of any information. But never too late, there was finally some, and so the one hundred thousand plus euros that was spent by the Council of Mallorca on the fair would not have gone amiss after all. And I'm sure that we are all reassured by that.

For those who wish to make Pollensa the destination of choice when it comes to holiday lets, the fact that any E. coli is of small concern and under the watchful gaze and control of the environment ministry will be welcome news. There was a study of people coming into the airport, which asked about where they were staying. This found that close to 16% were headed for places of so-called residential tourism (apartments, villas in other words). This is not a very high percentage. The study, under the auspices of an academic at the university, has revealed a figure about half that which the Balearic Government believes, and a third of that which the head of the Mallorca hotel federation believes to be the case. How very interesting, you might think. And I shall go into more detail as to why it is all very interesting tomorrow.


Things that are starting again
As every year, as things start to spring back into action, so I duly make mention, if that is people tell me. So, what have we got? Foxes Arms is back in operation as from today, the cheery home of a Division One title romp and where, some day before the end of the season I imagine, the drinks will be on the house when Leicester indeed secure that title. And this Friday sees the resumption of trips out with No Frills Excursions, Valldemossa being the first of the season and the island trip scheduled for Sunday.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Temptations, "Papa Was A Rolling Stone" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61U90Pqo-rU); the group didn't much care for the sentiments of this song or others that Norman Whitfield created. They still sang it though. Today's title - well, not one of the better ones from which Californian group known for the water.

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Wherever He Laid His Hat Was His Home

Shopping Trolley gets around. One moment he's in the Magic area, pushing himself past Kroxan, and then he's down by Eroski, lurking under the branches of pines by the Platja d'Or. Not far, in this latter instance, from where Doggo is getting out the ghetto-blaster in the warm early March sun; he'll be bending balloons before we know it. Shopping Trolley must have a good fifteen bags; I underestimated the amount when I mentioned him before. Fifteen, could be more. One of them has a TV in. He was seen watching it once; it had been plugged in to an outside socket. Perhaps he looks for one such when he comes to pitch his tent at night: after all, a chap needs a reliable electricity supply to watch the telly before turning in for the night. The trolley itself has to be pretty sturdy. All those bags. It must take some pushing as well. I once saw him in the old town, just by the church. If he'd ventured up there along the cemetery road that would have been a push and a half - all those bags, some with household electrical goods in them: if only there was a house to hold them.

I used to think that Doggo, the Local Colour, wasn't a Man of Ideas, but I've had to revise that. Last couple of times in Eroski I've seen him handing over coins in return for cans of beer. He is incomprehensible, which is part of the definition of a Man of Ideas. At least the dog seems to know what's going on. I certainly don't. Every time he speaks to me, I haven't a clue. Shopping Trolley though. No, I don't think he has Ideas. I've not seen him with a drink. If he were going to have one, then you'd reckon he'd crack open a can when he was watching the telly, but seemingly not.

A while back there was someone begging by Eroski, someone who had moved in on Doggo's manor. I only saw him once. Maybe there's some honour in this alternative world. Shopping Trolley once took a seat by the sports shop, the one with the Mallorca triathlon beach towel, but that's kind of on the periphery of Doggo's patch. He would have to wait for an invitation to come into Doggo's territory probably, and if he got one it might be by mobile phone. Or maybe Doggo just talks into a phone with no credit. That would seem about right. Not that I wish to do him down. It could be that the phone works, but speaking to an empty mobile with no-one on the other end would be the epitome of Man of Idea-dom. Perhaps Shopping Trolley hasn't got a mobile; put it this way I've not seen him with one. There again, I've not actually seen the TV; I was told about that.

Eroski seems to have got a manager. Well, there's a bloke working there where there used to not be one. A few years back, there used to be another bloke who was obviously in charge, or maybe thought he was. He used to shout after tourist kids who were running in the aisles, and he'd follow men of bellydom to make sure they didn't nick anything. Then he disappeared. No more Mr. Manager; that was in the days when it was still Syp. And for all this time, it has been almost completely female-run. No-one seemingly in charge, a sort of co-operative non-hierarchy that somehow worked; well, usually. But now there's this chap. You might think he would get tough, but appears not to. Doggo was there next to me in the queue yesterday morning, rambling on about something to me, or was it to the checkout girl, or maybe it was to the ceiling. Doggo's dog was sniffing around the checkouts and the café as well. I thought this manager chap would be bound to kick him out; the dog anyway. Said nothing. At least the girls at the checkout don't pick the dog up and give him a cuddle now though.

Maybe I have this all wrong. A few minutes later, Doggo was talking to a chap making a delivery. Maybe he's the manager. No, can't be. And as I drove away, there was Shopping Trolley, sitting. Sitting like he sits all the time, except when he's pushing the trolley. And when he sits, he just stares. Every day, just sitting, the bags of different colours and different sizes mounted on his trolley, tied to each other and to the trolley sides. Just sitting and pushing.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Arcade Fire, "In The Backseat" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpikhegY-Vs). Today's title - one of the great Motown songs, not that the group responsible were that keen on it.

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I've Been Learning To Drive

I should of course have mentioned, as a follow-up to 10 February, Mirror Man, that Sara passed her driving theory test. This is not bad going as you have to stump up for two tests as standard, on the basis that they expect you to fail first time what is considered to be the most difficult theory tests in Europe. Which does all rather make you wonder what happens between the theory and being let loose on the road. It does rather depend as to what theory; it could, after all, be theory as to how to be a complete and utter tosser when it comes to actually taking a vehicle on the road. If that is the case, then there are many who have indeed been able to translate theory into practice.

Anyway, now that she no longer needs the books, I have taken temporary possession in order to delve into the strange world of Spanish driving. The "learning to drive" book (and there is indeed an English version) suggests, with its front cover, a liberating experience of youth and activity. Five early-twenty-somethings in front of what may be a Golf, are all smiling, having been able to fathom out the contents of what is, in truth, a book of almost total incomprehensibility, and have taken to the road in order to drive to wherever it is one has to drive in order to play football and go skateboarding. And the reason I say that is that, of the five, one has a football and one has a skateboard, and so one has to draw the conclusion that driving is a means to an end, the end being football or skateboarding (and not of course going clubbing, getting rat arsed, off your face and crashing into high-kerbed islands in the centre of the main road that runs alongside the beach in Puerto Alcúdia).

It would be impossible to do full justice to the 200-odd pages of "learning to drive, playing football and going skateboarding", so let me choose but one example of the mysteries of Spanish driving for the time being. Now, you must realise that the book uses the verb "accord" liberally and not wholly accurately and therefore descends into tortuous prose as in - "drivers should drive with extreme caution when approaching the vicinity of crossings, always being prepared to stop to accord precedents to pedestrians". Yep, of course.

It goes on: "Motorists should not gesture to pedestrians to cross the road and should only use recognised signs to convey to pedestrians that they are according them right of way, such as brake lights to indicate the fact that they are slowing down and stopping". So, what this means is that you shouldn't, under any circumstance, it would seem, wave your hand, for example, in a manner that indicates that the pedestrian might cross the road. And the reason why not is that the pedestrian must walk to the back of your car to see if your brake lights are on, and then, and only then, will the pedestrian realise that he or she has been accorded precedent to cross the road. Or something like that. And it just goes to show how important it is that your brake lights are functioning properly, because if no drivers' lights were working properly, no pedestrians would ever cross roads. So keep those brake lights working!


The Inca plan
In the scheme of tourism things in the northern reaches of Mallorca, you would have to say that Inca fails to register other than as a place you pass en route to Alcúdia or Pollensa or as the town with that big market and those leather shops you get hauled off to on a Thursday. Well, the town hall wants to change all that, having put together a "strategic plan" for tourism development of a commercial and gastronomic nature. Oh dear. The words strategic and plan together bring me out in a cold sweat, induced by management bollocks-speak. And I can speak about management bollocks-speak with great authority, trust me on this. I have been working, for a while, on my own theory of what provisionally I call "the theory of the edifice of complete and utter shit", of which management speak is one major constituent. The past year of economic destruction has tended to help me in constructing this theory. Keep watching.

Anyway, I don't wish to debunk Inca's brave attempt at becoming a tourist destination. I'm sure that there are many cultural routes - which is one of their things - as well as fine cooking and shopping that will have tourists flocking to the town. Actually, I'm not sure about that, but good luck to them anyway and to the idea of a museum of hunting. Astonishingly, the town hall is saying that it wishes to open a tourist office: astonishing that there isn't one already, especially given those tourists who are dragged around the town on a Thursday as part of Inca excursionism. And can I just ask? I have seen this word - excursionism - used on more than one occasion recently. As far as I'm concerned, it doesn't exist. Can someone please confirm or deny this as I am unable to sleep.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - D-D-D-David Bowie, and from some US TV thing - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chUolMjZyHc. Today's title - how could I have overlooked "quizzing" this lot for so long? Canadians: think amusements and heat.

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Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

Every winter brings changes. What was previously that is now this or is in the process of becoming this. Some of that which is now this is fairly grand, such as the conversion of the old Alcúdia cinema into what is the Roman-themed Satyricon. There is also some of that which is to be that once again, apparently - the minigolf opposite Bellevue for instance. But nowhere seems to offer greater evidence of the transformation from that to this than Puerto Pollensa. Indeed the square - some know it as market, some as church - is in a state of empire-building. The yellow peril advances ever more in the form of the Dragon Oriente people and then there is of course the Bonyisation of Puerto Pollensa. For some, the devil that has taken the soul of the resort is a two-horned satyr, one being Grupo Boulevard and the Dakotas, the other being José, olé, and Bony. For some; not me.

There is a corner of a foreign market square that will forever be Bony - or "not forever" to use the rather enigmatic slogan that I tried to persuade José not to use. And that corner of a foreign market square is growing from both sides. Abutting what will be the yellow peril in the square will be son of Bony, Bony Mark II or, to give it the actual name, Más Bony y-to, which is a play on the Spanish "más bonito" (meaning prettier) in which the "más" will in fact be represented by a plus sign. "Don't cry." And "don't panic". That seems to be the latest José-ism. Corporal Jones to the rescue, or rather Bony with prices being cut to 2007 levels, more or less, so I understand. Of course, every time I pass Bony I am reminded of myself. It's that poster, the one with trousers rolled up and the clothes-pegs. Who do you have to blame for that? Yep, I'm afraid it was me; not the trousers and the legs, but the photo and what passed for design.

Elsewhere, the change has yet to be effected but seemingly everyone knows about it - it being The Nag's Head. However, I'm not going to go into it - the story - as it hasn't happened. Suffice to say that it was being spoken of in JK's where I had gone for the express purpose of taking the piss out of Kevin for being quoted three times in quick succession in "The Bulletin" apropos different things, including being the inspiration for the Pollensa tourism cash boom that isn't (as referred to on 26 February). Kevin is now a sort-of rent-a-quote for pretty much anything I think. What's your view of quantitative easing? "20%," said Kevin Park, owner of JK's Bar in Puerto Pollensa. Actually, between you and me, it's more than 20%. Because that's what Kevin told me. However, I am not in the rent-a-quote quoting business - yet. Anyway, what do you think about the Costa Brava Pyrenees Tourism Authority using a photo of a beach in Australia to publicise the 100th anniversary of the Spanish coastline? "Twenty per cent," said Mr. Park of Puerto Pollensa's JK's Bar. Yep, I reckon so, too. Odd thing though that the Spanish coastline is only a hundred years old. I would have said it was a bit older. But according to "The Times", that's all it is. Or maybe it's according to that tourism authority. Just so you know what I'm talking about, I quote (from "The Times") - "The photograph of a man and a boy standing on a white beach, staring out into a clear blue sea was used by Costa Brava tourism officials to mark the 100th anniversary of the Spanish coastline at the recent Forum Gastronimic (sic), a food fair in the nearby city of Girona." So you see, it definitely does refer to a hundred years - and that's all - of coastline. More embarrassing though is the fact that the beautiful coastline of the Costa Brava was not the Costa Brava but a beach in Perth, Australia. And to add to the embarrassment, the publicity company responsible (or should that be irresponsible, to use an old Peter Cook gag?) was the same publicity company that secured a photo of a beach in the Bahamas for another Costa Brava ad. Oops.

Kevin was first contacted by "The Bulletin" about the couple who got stuck in their boat in the Atlantic and who are now on dry land. Stuart, who is known to Kevin, was interviewed on Five Live's "Drive" programme yesterday. Though this whole thing has been blown up into a major story by, among others, "The Bulletin", he is - and I quote again - "amazed at how much hype" there has been, while he reckons it was "a storm in a teacup" and that he and his partner Andrea had "a lot of laughs" for the 40 days that they were floating around. If you missed the connection, Stuart and Andrea used to work at The Nag's Head, and that is why it became a story here and why Kevin found fame. I didn't catch all the interview, but I don't think Puerto Pollensa featured exactly; it will - and does - elsewhere.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Len Barry (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=An1-ntyBcz8). Today's title - no clues given or needed.

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1-2-3

The Mallorca triathlon. And no, don't get excited, I'm not telling you about an actual Mallorca triathlon. One, two, three. There are triathlons, iron man's (or men I guess) and other acts of insanity. Not so long ago I got an enquiry from someone who organises the Scottish junior triathlon team. They were going to be staying in Puerto Pollensa and wanted a swimming-pool. Go to Alcúdia. For God's sake don't try Puerto Pollensa's; they'll probably have drained it by the end of next week.

Anyway, I saw this towel yesterday - Mallorca triathlon it said. This was a towel as in beach towel. You wonder why anyone would think to buy a beach towel with the grey skies and the gathering wind of what is meant to become severe gusts. Maybe some do. The towel itself was a grey and black mix. Hardly the colours of the beach you would have thought. There again, tasteful in its contrast perhaps. Some grey tones; rather sophisticated amidst the garishness of yellows, blues and reds. But not really that tasteful when you studied what was written on it. The towel was the first one on the rack, hanging outside the sports shop by Eroski. That was how I came to notice it. Mallorca triathlon it said. And that is? One, two, three. Drinking, Eating and ... Fucking. Replete with little pictures; well, like cartoons. How are your sensibilities? Mine? I really don't give a damn. You can swear as you want. Be as gross as you want. Anything can go, but there is rudeness and then there is funny rudeness, and this towel does not come anywhere near drying off some funny rudeness; it is stupid, blatant and without any semblance of humour. So why does someone bother to produce it? I have no idea.

Much as there may be something of a counter PR effort to suggest that that Virgin hospital programme was anything other than the usual let's see how stupid some people who go to Mallorca are, you cannot escape the fact that many people who go to Mallorca are stupid. Stupid enough to want to buy a stupid beach towel with a stupid thing on it about triathlon and the gerund form of the f-word.


It's a month or so before the annual boat and sepia fairs in Puerto Alcúdia; the dates are in fact 4 and 5 April. Not everyone knows that. Like restaurants that might stand to benefit from being open and participating. I said to one such restaurant owner, who enjoyed a packed terrace on the Sunday of the event last year, that I presumed he was looking forward to benefiting this year. Not as such. Wasn't planning on opening until 6 April. When were the fairs again, he asked. 4th and 5th. I suspect he might rethink.

Last year some 10,000 people came to Alcúdia for these fairs. The boat fair is the only one on the island other than Palma's. It's a month away, and yet who is aware of it? Not every restaurant owner, that's for sure.


Coming back to Muro's mayor and his wish to see the train ending up close to the Muro boundary. One of his reasons - well the reason as far as I can make out - is that having the station by Es Foguero will benefit "murers" (those from Muro). Let's just think about this though. Firstly, people from Muro would actually have to want to use the train in the first place, and people from Muro, like people from the whole of Mallorca, have their lives dominated by cars - several of them in some cases. Secondly, it is not unusual to have to travel to a train station. And the people of Muro would actually have a fairly long journey. Some ten kilometres or so, if they live in the town of Muro, and the majority of residents of Muro do live in the town of Muro. What, for the people of the town, would be closer? A station by Es Foguero or the current end-of-the-line station in Sa Pobla? I think you may find that it is in fact Sa Pobla. Which would leave those who live in Playa de Muro, the majority of whom, whether it was sited by Es Foguero or by, for example, the Horse Roundabout in Puerto Alcúdia, would need to make some sort of journey (probably by car) to get to it. Were there a bus that went past Es Foguero, then this might make a difference. But there isn't. The Muro argument is a non-argument. The train will not be stopping at Es Foguero.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - U2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWPosB-nTns). Today's title - sort of white soul from the mid '60s.

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Drowning Man

These are watery times, and so it must be the rain that has broken what seems to have been many weeks of dry weather but was probably nothing of the sort, just perhaps a fortnight at best, or perhaps it's the finally reopened Puerto Pollensa pool and the open doors policy at the weekend which meant you could go for free, but you wondered should it not have been an open waters policy instead or is it the case that their waters had broken or something like that or nothing, or was it all down to FUSOSA and their regular cuts to supply, and do you want to know something, the bloke actually rang back to ask if the supply had been restored, which was good of him, in fact it is unheard of, except you have now heard it, or then could it be the new desalination plant for drinking water that will serve Alcúdia and Pollensa from the coming summer and mean that supplies in certain parts, Cala San Vicente for instance, will have better quality than the cloudy, puffy stuff they've had to contend with till now, and I remember those little fluffy clouds, and also mean fewer nitrates and that "inhabitants wlll be able to drink tap water", in the words of Alcúdia's mayor Miquel Ferrer, albeit that he didn't speak them in English of course, and should also mean that those responsible for getting Alcúdia and Pollensa's water sorted out have a word with the people at the plant in Can Picafort that supplies that town and Playa de Muro where there are too many nitrates, or there again perhaps it's the news that all the marinas on the island are expected to be full to overflowing this summer, if - that is - boats and yachts can ever be said to overflow, which you would rather hope that they wouldn't I guess but would more likely be said to be buoyant in the water and in their number and in therefore the market for nautical tourism and raise again the question as to whether there should be more moorings and how much they should cost and what the effects might be on the environment, marine in particular, and also on the whole social dynamic of tourism in that an affluent, water-based elite assumes supremacy over the all-inclusive economy-class who might stretch as far as a pedalo but no more, and brings into sharp relief this notion of water-sports centres, the Estaciones Náuticas, that will be Alcúdia and could be Pollensa and whether they create second-class zones around, for example, The Mile, while the port and the marina is reserved for what some love to call "quality tourism" and yet is an affront to many, or perhaps it's all just a case of drowning under the weight of too many words in too long a sentence that has all to do with water because these, as I say, are watery times, and so it must be the rain, and those little fluffy clouds, or is it that everything comes in, flows in, lungs imploding, just like one long, unbroken, never-ending sentence, like a drowning man gulping for air, gulping for help in these watery times, which is how it feels, perhaps for you as well, and so it must be the rain that has broken what seems to have been many weeks of dry weather ...


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Duran Duran. From the same album, "Ordinary World" was better, so here it is, in fact it was bloody great (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaTL6VAr2RY). Today's title - it's them yet again, but this comes from a long time ago when it was decreed that all Irish bands had to feature a violin.


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Too Much Information

It's an old saw of course, but you should never believe what you read in newspapers. As a maxim, it's rubbish, but you do wonder sometimes. There are a couple of stories doing the rounds at present, both with differing information. Take the Puerto Pollensa swimming-pool. One source has the cost at 600,000 euros, another says 1.4 million. Then there is the story about Muro's mayor and the train. From one paper we learnt, as I said yesterday, that most of the rest of the council did not support his wish to terminate the train by Es Foguero, and then another says that the "government team" (most of the council therefore) is against the decision to not consider this as a location, thus contradicting the story from yesterday.

We live, I'm afraid, in misinformational times, and I'm not sure if I have not misinformed you by using "misinformational" as I'm not sure if this really is a word or has been conjured up by one of the prime sources of misinformation - the internet - as an adjectival development from the established noun of misinformation. But the word, the adjective, makes perfect sense and seems to be perfectly used, at least I think so. The irony of the information age and the ease of information is that there is an awful lot of it that is complete and utter garbage. The additional irony is that with the increase in the availability of informational sources we still end up with misinformation, as we always did. At least in the old days there were really only the newspapers you couldn't trust; now you can't trust any media. Do you trust what I write? Well of course you should, but it's not beyond possibility that what I write is actually total bollocks. And then, like with newspapers and other sources, I will get quoted somewhere and so the whole thing goes on, for ever, ad infinitum; an endless chain of pass-the-informational/misinformational parcel in the cyberspace party where the music never stops. Where will this entry end up, do you wonder? Years from now. Somewhere in whatever post-internet misinformational society we live in.

Actually, I do try to get or at least hope that I get things right. If I were paid for this, I would do thorough research, like a journalist is meant to. But I'm not paid, and so I do only so much research, if any. Even if I were paid and were I to attempt to be assiduous with my research, where would I go to find my information? Often it would be the internet, the never-ending chain or indeed roundabout of information and misinformation.

Anyway, this is by way of introduction to a conversation I had with Ben and Sara yesterday afternoon. We got to talking about history; history of Alcúdia. There were a whole bunch of old photos to look at, and the discussion led to the idea of doing, writing a history, not perhaps a whole history but a history of tourism - in Alcúdia. And as we spoke, the different strands cropped up. What was all this about the Swedes and the Belgians being the first to colonise Alcúdia? Which were the first hotels? When did it really all start? When ... when ... what ... what ... . If places can be said to have amounts of history, then Puerto Pollensa may have more than Puerto Alcúdia, though even then one asks how accurate it is, or if it's this damn misinformation. The internet says the Miramar hotel dates to 1912. Maybe it does; or maybe it doesn't. What's the oldest hotel in Puerto Alcúdia? How many would say a building that is no longer a hotel but in fact private apartments? Yep, the Primavera Garden. Or perhaps it's not yep.

The problem is that there are many anecdotes and half or partially remembered facts, but information, accurate information relies on accurate sources. The memory plays tricks. Ask someone about his or her experiences some twenty, thirty years ago, and how sure can you be that they are accurate? It's hard, but in fact it is not always misinformation. Anecdote is an accepted part of historical or indeed journalistic research, but there is still a need for verification. Primary sources. Do you know what those are? Often they are very, very dull, written in strange tongues and found lurking between thick, dusty covers. It's a long process to check them. Trust me. I've done it. Or they can also of course be newspapers - one with 600,000, the other with 1.4 million. The easy thing is to take the anecdote and leave it at that. But that's when you can just end up with misinformation, or is it? For now though the anecdote, the story will have to do, and it will do. The history starts here ... . Anyone want to join in?


Another FUSOSA moment. If you don't know, FUSOSA is the water company that supplies (sic) Playa de Muro and part of Puerto Alcúdia. Unreliable might be its promotional message. "We won't get you washed." Like this morning. A dry shower. A phone call. Something's broken. Yea, reckon we knew that. It'll be back on quickly. Maybe it will.

There is a problem with the supply probably once a month. Do you know by the way how much it costs to get connected? 630 euros. 630 in order that you can't get a shower in the morning. Please don't tell me that "this is Spain", as also with the electricity company GESA and its bizarre billing procedures. This is crap, and I'm sick of it.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Paul McCartney (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVK_mJrLbmY). Today's title - one of their less well-known; from the same album came something "ordinary".

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Pipes Of Peace

As tweeted on Twitter, and I'm coming to realise that if it serves any purpose then the Twitter thing is as a breaking-news or advance-notice facility, Muro's mayor is still blowing a whistle in favour of the Sa Pobla train extension; he being all aboard for a trip to end at the Es Foguero ruin. There is only one reason why: it would almost be in Muro, and he wouldn't have to drive as far to catch the 9.30 to Palma. Despite admitting that it doesn't really have a lot directly to do with him (actually, it doesn't have anything to do with him), he has raised a motion for the train to run by the side of Albufera and finish up by the ruin and therefore close to the Muro hospital; so says "The Bulletin". Not even Alcúdia's mayor supports this idea any longer. At one point he was in favour, but the governmental technical bods have closed the line on this one. This route was one considered under the so-called southern option. No-one now, apart from the mayor of Muro, is even talking about this. So the question has to be: why has he brought it up? The train extension would not pass through Muro, which means it really is not a matter on which Muro's opinion counts; all the environmentalists are against this option and pretty much all the rest of Muro council is in fact against it, so why go on about it? As is pointed out, this same mayor is the one who is in favour of the golf course on the Son Bosc finca. Maybe he just likes to antagonise the enviro lobby. Nothing wrong with that, but he's wrong on both counts, and not for environmental reasons. There is no need for the golf course, and the northern route for the train alongside the main road from Sa Pobla has been staring everyone in the face as the obvious choice ever since President Antich announced his age of the train. No, I really don't understand what the mayor is hoping to achieve, other than to perhaps make people realise that he's still there.


How To Ruin An Otherwise Perfectly Pleasant Sunday Afternoon
March entering as a lamb, how agreeable to take to the terrace and to the late-winter sun, the Sunday papers to hand. Only for it all to be shattered. What is that frightful noise? Oh no, don't let it be. Anything but that. I'm afraid it was though. Two down, the neighbours two down. They'd bought a CD. Giving it a bit of an airing. Outside. Quite loud. You could, unfortunately, imagine yourself at one of the local markets. It was a CD of the Ecuadorean, some say Peruvian, pipe players. Crimes against musicality. That's not what the CD is called; they are the offences, m'lud. Sting's "Fields of Barley", U2's "With Or Without You", Buggles, "Video Killed The Radio Star". How deeply, deeply unpleasant, especially bloody Buggles in a South-American Indian stylie. I really should have done what I said I was going to do with that pipe to that pipe-player at Puerto Pollensa market those years ago. Now, I might have to do it to my neighbour.


Maybe there is a way of getting hold of all the CDs and letting a JCB loose on them. That's what they do with pirated CDs and DVDs and the like. Well, that's what the photo in "The Diario" suggests happens. But what of the chaps that sell them? The street vendors, the looky-looky aka lucky-lucky men. I can tell you. They get let off. The paper reports the case of a gentleman of "sub-Saharan origin", in other words a luckster, who was nabbed in Arenal with 100 CDs and some DVDs and video games. The prosecution had wanted him to be banged up for a year and to be fined. The magistrate disagreed. It was a civil matter and not a criminal one, she said, and the scale - i.e. the number of discs etc involved - did not merit the sanction being called for in respect of the violation of copyright. The magistrate accepted that rights had to be protected, but the real villains were those who produced the pirated stuff on a grand scale. In this, she is absolutely right. Annoying though the lucksters can be (and not everyone finds them so), they are at the bottom of the pirating food chain and just trying to earn a centimo or two. You may recall that there is now a by-law in Alcúdia which makes it an offence to buy from illegal street sellers. So now the possibility would exist to fine a purchaser and not the seller. Meantime, can someone fine the people who make these bloody pipe-player CDs?


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Village People (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CS9OO0S5w2k). Hard hat was one of the group (the construction worker), and I suppose Red Indians and indeed cowboys were hunters. Today's title - no, not really.

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It's Fun To Stay At

Put your hard hats on, chaps. And not just those of you who will be working on building sites into June and throughout October. Oh no, protect yourselves from the falling masonry of indignation in Puerto Pollensa; from the bricks and mortar of outrage; from the scaffolding of it's not what it used to be. Ah, the sweet sound of a Kango drill drifting across the prom-prom-prom-tiddley-om-pom-pom; the hammering of summer lawns; the summer breeze of brick dust and cement. Well, there you go, and just think yourself lucky that building work will stop in the middle of June and not resume until the first of October.

These are exciting times if you happen to be in Puerto Pollensa. Celebration of abnormal seasonal construction coincides with the re-opening of the great construction success that is/was the public swimming-pool. There was duly a "fiesta" to mark the occasion yesterday and which continues today. I wonder if there will be another one when it gets closed down - again. Rather curiously, given that we are at the start of March, there has been a poster doing the rounds which shows children happily engaged in water activities in what, unless I am very much mistaken, appears to be summertime - and in the open. Maybe they've decided to do away with the roof altogether.

And next weekend there will be something else to celebrate, though this will involve going to the old town. The hunters' fair descends on Pollensa for its ninth annual occurrence. Huntin', shootin' and fishin'. I can well imagine that there are, among the ranks of the Pollensa be-expated, those with an inclination to donning Barbours and flat caps, to looking like Prince Edward and to blowing small animals to smithereens. One trusts that they might not do so on the streets of Pollensa; indeed one might hope that they would give the whole gig a wide berth as the hunting class of Mallorca is not a class thing - it is very much more egalitarian.

The hunters' fair takes place in different towns each year. Last year's event was in Campos and it was in Alcúdia in, I think, 2005. According to reports, some 60,000 people turned up in Campos last year, so it is a little odd that they are forecasting only a third of that number to put in an appearance in Pollensa. Still, 20,000 is a fair number, and there will be restaurants offering hunting-based cuisine in the feeding of the 20,000 which will presumably do very well thank you. Not sure what this hunting-based food is as pretty much anything involving dead animals could, I suppose, be described as having been hunted. Perhaps you get to pick the shot out or something, so that you know it has been authentically blasted. Restaurants and other businesses that might gain from the weekend's festivities can thank the Council of Mallorca. A hundred and twenty grand is what it pays for this shindig.


Following on from the news that tourism in January was up by nearly 6% comes the perhaps even more surprising revelation that tourism spend for that month was up by almost 25 per cent. Unclear though it is as to how these figures are derived, a leap of this magnitude goes against all other current economic indicators. Polish and Hungarian pensioners can't be responsible, one would have to assume. It is largely all down to German tourists, despite Germany having to contend with similar economic woes to everyone else. Maybe there is something in that cash boom after all, even if it is island-wide as opposed to just Pollensa. Or maybe it is just one of those rather inexplicable blips. But if it were to be a blip that were to continue, I don't know that there would be many complaining. That said, this February, according to one restaurant owner in Puerto Alcúdia, was the worst he had known. However, one owner does not represent a whole resort.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Musical Youth (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFtLONl4cNc). Today's title - well various I imagine if there is still building work going on, and what other relevance does this have today (in the first line for example)?

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