Wednesday, January 15, 2014
Dropping Bombs On Spain: The Palomares incident
Last year when I was researching old copies of the "Majorca Daily Bulletin" in order to write a history of the paper's news over its 50 years, I came across a news item for 18 January, 1966. It was news that I hadn't gone looking for. It was not news that had registered with me. I'll excuse myself on the basis of having been too young at the time to have noticed
Under the heading "US Jets Collide Over Spain", the news item read thus: "Two giant US Air Force jets collided over Spain today and seven crewmen were feared dead. The planes, a B-52 and a KC-135 tanker, had been due to rendezvous so that the bomber could be refuelled in the air - a delicate operation with the planes flying only yards apart. The burned wreckage of both planes was found about 65 miles north-east of the Mediterranean port of Almeria. Three bodies were found. Four men are missing."
The news report goes on to say that "fishermen raced to their boats when they saw parachutes dropping into the sea". It says that the bomber was en route to an "eastern country" (unspecified) and that the tanker had taken off from an air base near Seville. Other than this, there is nothing of real note in the report.
It is what the report didn't say which is important. The B-52 was carrying four hydrogen bombs. One of them ended up at the bottom of the sea. Two of them exploded. The explosion was a conventional one in that it quite obviously didn't amount to what the bombs were capable of; they were carrying 75 times the force that had been dropped on Japan. But the explosion did, nevertheless, scatter radioactive material.
Palomares is a small town of 1700 people in the Almeria province. This is a part of Spain which is heavily dependent upon tourism. Palomares enjoys some of the rewards of this industry but not as many as it might do. Palomares was the town that was most affected by the radioactive plutonium that was scattered. Parts of it remain sealed off to this day because of the contaminated land.
The incident sparked off an emergency operation that was initially dealt with by Spanish services. Unused to the technology and not prepared for taking the necessary precautions, many members of the emergency services, primarily from the Guardia Civil, suffered from exposure to radiation. Over 500 compensation claims were eventually settled by the US Government. The Americans have paid, so it is believed, at least two billion dollars for compensation to individuals, for land that was affected and for the clean-up operation. Yet the matter has still not been definitively resolved.
At the meeting in Washington between Barack Obama and Mariano Rajoy this week, Palomares was not on the agenda. The fact that, certainly for the news media in Almeria, it wasn't on the agenda shows how much the 1966 incident is still very much alive. Though Obama didn't discuss the matter, Hillary Clinton has suggested that she wants it sorted out once and for all, and this means the removal of the remaining contaminated land.
Extraordinary though it is that it has taken nearly 50 years to bring some closure to the incident, it is also extraordinary how it came to be known about. One imagines of course that it would have become known about eventually, but the Spanish and the Americans, for differing reasons, sought to keep the lid on the bombs. The reports of the collision were as in "The Bulletin", though even this went further than had been originally intended by the media manipulators. The admission that a B-52 had been involved had originally been excluded from news feeds.
The Spanish had very good reasons not to let the world know what had happened. Tourism was one and another was public opinion in Spain. Franco and his government may not typically have cared what the public thought, but it didn't want the people knowing that the Americans were flying in Spanish airspace with nuclear weapons and that they were dropping them on Spanish soil, if only by accident and if only because safety devices had prevented a thermo-nuclear explosion.
The two governments might have got away with it had it not been for a chance meeting between a US military policeman and an American journalist with Spanish roots by the name of André del Amo. The full story of André, his brother, how they came to be in Mojácar and how André came to talk to this policeman has been told in "El País". But just to explain the chance meeting, André was asked by the policeman to translate. He wanted to tell local people to leave the area because of "radioactivity". The policeman used the word and then went on to tell André more or less the whole story. The official line had of course been to deny that the B-52 was carrying H-bombs. Del Amo's information ended up with "The New York Times". It published, the attempt to cover up was blown apart, and Franco went ballistic.
So this is some of the story that couldn't be reported in 1966. And something else that couldn't be reported was where the B-52 was going. The "eastern country" was apparently the Soviet Union, or its European borders at any rate. Those were the days.
* Read about André del Amo and the Palomares incident here: http://elpais.com/elpais/2014/01/14/inenglish/1389699914_451699.html
Tuesday, January 14, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 14 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.30am): 11.5C
Forecast high: 15C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Northwest 5 easing by midday to West and Northwest 3 to 4.
A mainly sunny morning, possible shower this evening but otherwise fine. Outlook for Sant Antoni at present - may be a spot of rain on Thursday evening with the wind picking up a bit from the south.
Evening update (21.00): Well, a warm 18.3C high today, so better than had been forecast.
How The Beatles Changed Mallorca
All the while, there was the discourse as to the social impact of this musical revolution. How could young girls (and occasionally young boys) be so infatuated with long-haired layabouts or an American who sounded as though he was a negro? National Service would have to be restored to drum discipline into the youth cadres of teds then later mods and rockers whose heads were turned to violence by this music. It was a discourse that very few people over the age of thirty could take part in with any sense of impartiality or understanding. They were bystanders witnessing a wholesale and fundamental shift in a society in which the teenager and the young person had been expected to copy only the fashions and tastes of their parents and not those of this strange breed of pop star.
It is easy, at the distance of 50 or more years, to forget just how much changed as a consequence of the emergence of pop culture and also how much society was further changed in the few years after it emerged thanks to the pill, the Abortion Act and the partial decriminalisation of homosexuality. It is also easy to style this change as the product of a progressive, liberated society, when in truth it wasn't. As an example, it should be remembered that where pop music was concerned, the bastion of the establishment, the BBC, held out until 1967 before it launched Radio One.
Nevertheless, pop music and culture played a crucial role in transforming Britain from its post-war austere and staid conservatism into the Britain of the Swinging Sixties, and The Beatles, more so perhaps than Elvis (or certainly Cliff), were the popular flag-bearers of this transformation. But their influence went much further than Britain. Their music and the culture that went with it was felt in repressive regimes, and one of these was Spain's and, in particular, parts of Spain that had opened up to tourism. Which meant Mallorca.
Francesc Vicens is a Mallorcan musicologist about whom I have written on a number of occasions. A couple of years ago, Vicens put out a book entitled "Paradise of Love", which considered how pop music and tourism collided in the Mallorca of the 1960s. He has now, along with fellow researcher Tomeu Canyelles, had a book published which is called "Beatles Made in Mallorca". Its theme is similar to the previous one in that it looks at the social impact of pop music on the island, but it homes in on the impact of one group, The Beatles.
In certain ways, 1960s Mallorca wasn't so different to the conservative Britain of the 1950s. It was ruled by a repressive regime of course, but there was no such thing as a youth culture and very little access to contemporary music. Whereas it was American sailors who were often the means of supply of discs to aspirant musicians in Liverpool, so flight crews and tourists were the ones who supplied the discs for local musicians. Once the musical cat was out of the tourist or flight attendant bag, there was little that the regime could do to put it back in again. Though they never played Mallorca, The Beatles did play Madrid and Barcelona in early July, 1965. Their performances were greeted, as Canyelles has pointed out, with disbelief by the regime. They were hugely successful but, and just had been the case in Britain, there was incredulity as to how young people could be so taken with these longhaired individuals and their music and huge concerns as to the effects on morals and society as a whole.
In Mallorca, though The Beatles were copied and imitated, a discernible style emerged: The Beatles with a Mallorcan flavour, local musicians having found themselves liberated. Suddenly, a conservative music characterised by patriotic melodies and French and Italian crooning was replaced by the guitar, the drums, the bass and the pop song. Vicens and Canyelles, in researching their book, have considered the output of the likes of Los Javaloyas, Los Pops and Los 5 del Este, and how these groups got hold of discs brought to the island and how they would have listened, using long-wave transmitters, to radio stations that were banned in Spain (echoes of those early years of access in Britain to music from Luxembourg and then the pirates). They would note down all the notes, either do their own versions or use the songs as the basis for their own originals. And having developed their own "sound", courtesy of records brought by tourists, they ended up selling their own records to these same tourists, who would take them home as souvenirs.
The Mallorcan Beatles may have been a peculiar phenomenon but they were a perfectly understandable phenomenon. It was mass tourism which truly altered Mallorcan society in the 1960s, and this was a tourism buoyed by its own social change, one in which The Beatles had been crucial.
Monday, January 13, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 13 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.45am): 12C
Forecast high: 16C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Northwest 2 to 3 increasing Southwest 3 to 4 during the morning and Northwest 4 to 5 by the evening. Rain from the afternoon.
A pleasant morning but rain due to come in over the afternoon. Temperatures due to drop a bit over the coming days.
Evening update (19.00): 16C the high on a mostly cloudy day with some spots of rain at times.
Not Boldly Going: Local administration reform
A law of some significance came into effect on 30 December. It is the national law "of rationalisation and sustainability of local administration", the one by which the number of paid councillors at town halls will be slashed following the next local elections in 2015 and by which mayors of towns (sic) with fewer than 1,000 inhabitants will cease to be full-time.
There are six municipalities in Mallorca which have under 1,000 people. They are Ariany, Banyalbufar, Deià, Escorca, Estellencs and Fornalutx. It isn't completely bad news for prospective mayors of these municipalities as the law, somewhat vaguely, allows for mayors to "exceptionally" be able to be part-time and to receive a remuneration within maximum limits set out in the national budget. Quite what exceptionally means is unclear, but the principle of taking away a full-time salaried post could well mean that no one will wish to bother standing for the post of mayor.
In practice, but it depends on the municipality, there are already mayors in the many towns of Spain with fewer than 1,000 residents who don't take a salary, so the fear that the Mallorca Six will end up minus a mayor from next year is probably exaggerated. Nevertheless, without a full-time job and the possibility of a full-time salary, one does have to wonder why anyone would bother taking on the aggravation that goes with the role. Other than political ambition, the job would hold little appeal.
Though Mallorca has its six tiny municipalities and several others with fewer than 5,000 people, the fragmentation of local administration is nothing like it is in other parts of Spain. 91% of all Spanish municipalities have fewer than 10,000 people. In Mallorca, the percentage is 70%. And when it comes to towns with a population less than 1,000, Mallorca's percentage is just over 10%, compared with a staggering 60% nationally.
The reform that will see mayors of these small places deprived of the automatic right to full-time salaries is being seen as a means of the government seeking rationalisation without actually legislating. In other words, mergers of municipalities will occur because it is no longer tenable to administer the smallest of towns as separate entities. There is also, it might be noted, the legal provision to enforce merger or to just do away with municipalities if they fail to operate in a financially efficient manner.
If merger is what the government wishes, then would it not have been better for it to have been that much bolder and enforced this anyway, rather than leaving it to stealth or inefficiency? It may have wanted to be bolder, but it would have been a very difficult step to have taken. Tampering with local identity in such a way would be more than just a political risk, it would have been political suicide. Or some would believe that it would have been.
As it is, opponents of the local administration reform couch it in terms of a return to the old days of centralised government and a loss of democracy. This is a criticism which isn't justified. Spain is one of very few countries in Western Europe which hasn't undergone some major reform of its local government structure over the past 30 or so years. Along with France and Italy, there has been a stubborn resistance to introducing a system which might be considered more efficient. But if Greece and Portugal can cut the number of municipalities, then why can't Spain?
It has been shown that the very small municipalities incur, in relative terms, higher costs than larger ones, while various studies, including one by the Council of Europe, suggest that the minimum number of inhabitants per municipality which makes sense is anywhere between 5,000 and 8,000. If the upper limit were to be applied to Mallorca's municipalities, then 35 (out of the 53) would disappear; 25 at the lower limit.
There is always the argument that reducing local administration to the smallest possible unit and size is the ideal state for the practice of democracy and for preventing corruption. Whether this ideal can be supported is open to question. The larger the municipality, so the alternative argument goes, the more efficient and the more professional the administration is. Again, there may well be evidence to the contrary. But if financial efficiency is the sole arbiter of municipal size, then there is little argument. There should be a massive cut in the number of municipalities. Persevering with the very small ones may make sense in terms of preserving local identities, but if professionalism is to be a factor, then how can these municipalities truly be professional, especially if its councillors and mayors aren't being paid? The government really should have been bolder.
There are six municipalities in Mallorca which have under 1,000 people. They are Ariany, Banyalbufar, Deià, Escorca, Estellencs and Fornalutx. It isn't completely bad news for prospective mayors of these municipalities as the law, somewhat vaguely, allows for mayors to "exceptionally" be able to be part-time and to receive a remuneration within maximum limits set out in the national budget. Quite what exceptionally means is unclear, but the principle of taking away a full-time salaried post could well mean that no one will wish to bother standing for the post of mayor.
In practice, but it depends on the municipality, there are already mayors in the many towns of Spain with fewer than 1,000 residents who don't take a salary, so the fear that the Mallorca Six will end up minus a mayor from next year is probably exaggerated. Nevertheless, without a full-time job and the possibility of a full-time salary, one does have to wonder why anyone would bother taking on the aggravation that goes with the role. Other than political ambition, the job would hold little appeal.
Though Mallorca has its six tiny municipalities and several others with fewer than 5,000 people, the fragmentation of local administration is nothing like it is in other parts of Spain. 91% of all Spanish municipalities have fewer than 10,000 people. In Mallorca, the percentage is 70%. And when it comes to towns with a population less than 1,000, Mallorca's percentage is just over 10%, compared with a staggering 60% nationally.
The reform that will see mayors of these small places deprived of the automatic right to full-time salaries is being seen as a means of the government seeking rationalisation without actually legislating. In other words, mergers of municipalities will occur because it is no longer tenable to administer the smallest of towns as separate entities. There is also, it might be noted, the legal provision to enforce merger or to just do away with municipalities if they fail to operate in a financially efficient manner.
If merger is what the government wishes, then would it not have been better for it to have been that much bolder and enforced this anyway, rather than leaving it to stealth or inefficiency? It may have wanted to be bolder, but it would have been a very difficult step to have taken. Tampering with local identity in such a way would be more than just a political risk, it would have been political suicide. Or some would believe that it would have been.
As it is, opponents of the local administration reform couch it in terms of a return to the old days of centralised government and a loss of democracy. This is a criticism which isn't justified. Spain is one of very few countries in Western Europe which hasn't undergone some major reform of its local government structure over the past 30 or so years. Along with France and Italy, there has been a stubborn resistance to introducing a system which might be considered more efficient. But if Greece and Portugal can cut the number of municipalities, then why can't Spain?
It has been shown that the very small municipalities incur, in relative terms, higher costs than larger ones, while various studies, including one by the Council of Europe, suggest that the minimum number of inhabitants per municipality which makes sense is anywhere between 5,000 and 8,000. If the upper limit were to be applied to Mallorca's municipalities, then 35 (out of the 53) would disappear; 25 at the lower limit.
There is always the argument that reducing local administration to the smallest possible unit and size is the ideal state for the practice of democracy and for preventing corruption. Whether this ideal can be supported is open to question. The larger the municipality, so the alternative argument goes, the more efficient and the more professional the administration is. Again, there may well be evidence to the contrary. But if financial efficiency is the sole arbiter of municipal size, then there is little argument. There should be a massive cut in the number of municipalities. Persevering with the very small ones may make sense in terms of preserving local identities, but if professionalism is to be a factor, then how can these municipalities truly be professional, especially if its councillors and mayors aren't being paid? The government really should have been bolder.
Sunday, January 12, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Moreno's goals rescue Mallorca against Cordoba
Real Mallorca 2 : 2 Cordoba
Substitute striker Gerard Moreno saved Mallorca from a home defeat against Cordoba, scoring twice in the second half to secure for Mallorca what in the end was a well-deserved draw after Cordoba had gone two up through Xisco after 14 minutes and Pedro eight minutes into the second half. It was well-deserved because of the comeback, but Mallorca had goalkeeper Miño to thank for keeping them in the game with two first-half saves, Cordoba generally having been on top until Moreno's introduction turned things round. A draw against a side similarly placed in the Liga Adelante to Mallorca (just below the play-off positions) may not have been too bad, but Mallorca need to start winning these matches not drawing them.
Substitute striker Gerard Moreno saved Mallorca from a home defeat against Cordoba, scoring twice in the second half to secure for Mallorca what in the end was a well-deserved draw after Cordoba had gone two up through Xisco after 14 minutes and Pedro eight minutes into the second half. It was well-deserved because of the comeback, but Mallorca had goalkeeper Miño to thank for keeping them in the game with two first-half saves, Cordoba generally having been on top until Moreno's introduction turned things round. A draw against a side similarly placed in the Liga Adelante to Mallorca (just below the play-off positions) may not have been too bad, but Mallorca need to start winning these matches not drawing them.
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 12 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.15am): 12.5C
Forecast high: 16C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Northeast 2 to 3 veering North during the morning.
A grey, calm morning. Rain possible. The outlook for the week is mixed, getting colder from Tuesday.
Evening update (19.00): There was some light rain but the sun came out for a time. The high, a mild 16.7C.
She's Just A Devil Woman: Demons' traditions
There isn't, or doesn't appear to be, much good rhyme or reason as to why certain towns in Mallorca - apart, quite obviously from Sa Pobla - go big on the Sant Antoni fiesta and others don't. One town which does is Son Servera, the municipality to which Cala Millor (part of it) belongs, and so seriously does Son Servera take Sant Antoni that it has an "obreria" devoted to the fiesta; an obreria, in this instance, being an association which is a sort of guardian of tradition. And very traditional it is in Son Servera. Its obreria was founded in 1775, principally to oversee the maintenance of the chapel of Sant Antoni Abad, which had been ceded to Son Servera in 1698 by the parish of Artà. There's your rhyme and reason then.
Other towns have their Sant Antoni obrerias as well - Sa Pobla, for instance - and the different obrerias of the Llevant and Pla (plain) regions of Mallorca have an annual get-together to discuss matters of a Sant Antoni style. They all gathered in Son Servera's Bar Nou last November for their Antoni-in. Sa Pobla's obreria, one of those at the meeting, gives a flavour of what it does on Sa Pobla town hall's website. The most recent development in its own long history was in 2006 when it was agreed by the town's council that the demons' gang (the "colla") would be dependent upon the obreria for present and future "management". In other words, it is the obreria which has the say as to what is traditionally correct when it comes to demon activity during Sant Antoni, because it, the obreria, is the master of the whole Sant Antoni tradition.
A similar arrangement exists in Son Servera. However, not all is well on account of a controversy which is said to have divided the town. It centres on interpretations of tradition, the two sides in this argument being represented by the town's principal demon of many years standing and the obreria, which was given something of an overhaul last year when new blood was brought in to its membership. Guidelines by the new, improved obreria have sought to get back to traditions which the demon, Joan Llull, appears, over the years, to have broken with. There may not be that many local people truly that bothered, but there are sufficient for some to have taken to daubing graffiti, expressing both sides of the argument, and to engaging in rants on social media.
Clearly, when it comes to tradition, someone has to have the final say as to what actually constitutes tradition and what doesn't. Though the rumpus in Son Servera all sounds a bit silly, it probably isn't. If traditions can't be argued over, then what can be? Mallorca lives by its traditions, and in its small towns they are matters of importance, to the point at which people get worked up into a rare old lather, grab a can of spray paint and find the nearest wall.
The world of demons is not always an harmonious one, but as they are demons, who, tradition itself suggests, aren't always trustworthy and are prone to acts that are less than goodly or even Godly, then total harmony would be surprising. There again, we are talking earthly, dressed-up demons here. But, human nature being as it is, even the earthly demon can feel compelled to strike disharmony.
A few years ago, 2010 to be precise, there was a different fallout and one which had a potentially far more wide-reaching impact on the demons' world. A rival demons' organisation had reared its ugly head, following an outbreak of internecine strife at the Balearics Federation of Demons. There had been an emergency general meeting of the federation in May, and by October, the rival organisation was behind a night of fire in Pollensa that featured various demons' gangs. It was all a little like the world of professional darts, which suddenly found it had two controlling bodies and two separate world championships. Quite whatever happened after this I can't honestly say, but if one takes a look at the federation's blog website, its register of demons' gangs numbers only 26. I fancy that there are others.
A federation of demons might in itself seem odd, but there is, in addition to tradition, a fair bit to being a demon. Not everyone can do the stalky-walky thing they do without having been instructed as to the correct way to stalk. Not everyone can whirl a trident with flames spitting out of it. And the flames are a pretty important aspect of being a demon which needs control. Hence, it is a requirement for all demons, including mini-demons (from age eight), to have a certificate for being an expert in pyrotechnics.
Modernity requires, therefore, that tradition is certificated, but whether it is tradition tampered with by bureaucracy or by disagreements, there is one demon tradition which prevails. One day, concedes the Grand Demon of Manacor, his role could be taken by a woman. Whatever next? "She's just a devil woman ..."
Other towns have their Sant Antoni obrerias as well - Sa Pobla, for instance - and the different obrerias of the Llevant and Pla (plain) regions of Mallorca have an annual get-together to discuss matters of a Sant Antoni style. They all gathered in Son Servera's Bar Nou last November for their Antoni-in. Sa Pobla's obreria, one of those at the meeting, gives a flavour of what it does on Sa Pobla town hall's website. The most recent development in its own long history was in 2006 when it was agreed by the town's council that the demons' gang (the "colla") would be dependent upon the obreria for present and future "management". In other words, it is the obreria which has the say as to what is traditionally correct when it comes to demon activity during Sant Antoni, because it, the obreria, is the master of the whole Sant Antoni tradition.
A similar arrangement exists in Son Servera. However, not all is well on account of a controversy which is said to have divided the town. It centres on interpretations of tradition, the two sides in this argument being represented by the town's principal demon of many years standing and the obreria, which was given something of an overhaul last year when new blood was brought in to its membership. Guidelines by the new, improved obreria have sought to get back to traditions which the demon, Joan Llull, appears, over the years, to have broken with. There may not be that many local people truly that bothered, but there are sufficient for some to have taken to daubing graffiti, expressing both sides of the argument, and to engaging in rants on social media.
Clearly, when it comes to tradition, someone has to have the final say as to what actually constitutes tradition and what doesn't. Though the rumpus in Son Servera all sounds a bit silly, it probably isn't. If traditions can't be argued over, then what can be? Mallorca lives by its traditions, and in its small towns they are matters of importance, to the point at which people get worked up into a rare old lather, grab a can of spray paint and find the nearest wall.
The world of demons is not always an harmonious one, but as they are demons, who, tradition itself suggests, aren't always trustworthy and are prone to acts that are less than goodly or even Godly, then total harmony would be surprising. There again, we are talking earthly, dressed-up demons here. But, human nature being as it is, even the earthly demon can feel compelled to strike disharmony.
A few years ago, 2010 to be precise, there was a different fallout and one which had a potentially far more wide-reaching impact on the demons' world. A rival demons' organisation had reared its ugly head, following an outbreak of internecine strife at the Balearics Federation of Demons. There had been an emergency general meeting of the federation in May, and by October, the rival organisation was behind a night of fire in Pollensa that featured various demons' gangs. It was all a little like the world of professional darts, which suddenly found it had two controlling bodies and two separate world championships. Quite whatever happened after this I can't honestly say, but if one takes a look at the federation's blog website, its register of demons' gangs numbers only 26. I fancy that there are others.
A federation of demons might in itself seem odd, but there is, in addition to tradition, a fair bit to being a demon. Not everyone can do the stalky-walky thing they do without having been instructed as to the correct way to stalk. Not everyone can whirl a trident with flames spitting out of it. And the flames are a pretty important aspect of being a demon which needs control. Hence, it is a requirement for all demons, including mini-demons (from age eight), to have a certificate for being an expert in pyrotechnics.
Modernity requires, therefore, that tradition is certificated, but whether it is tradition tampered with by bureaucracy or by disagreements, there is one demon tradition which prevails. One day, concedes the Grand Demon of Manacor, his role could be taken by a woman. Whatever next? "She's just a devil woman ..."
Saturday, January 11, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 11 January 201
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.15am): 11.5C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): East 2 to 3. Good, possible rain.
Light cloud should clear to give some sun. Rain due to come in overnight and linger till Monday.
Evening update (19.00): A high of 17.1C. Not that much sun today and a few spots of rain come the afternoon.
BCM Meets Mallorca Rocks: Magalluf youth tourism
Update of 13 January: Since writing this article, which was based to an extent on press information from Cursach, I have received further information from the Ibiza Rocks (Mallorca Rocks) group which seeks to clarify inaccuracies, which I am more than happy to do. The agreement between Ibiza Rocks and Palladium in respect of Mallorca Rocks expires after this year's season, so a new agreement will be in place as from 2015. This is the one which involves Cursach taking on the management of the four hotels. Mallorca Rocks, the brand, will not be a part of this new arrangement. My understanding is that options are being considered for maintaining the Mallorca Rocks brand in Magalluf at a different location to the current one. So, the implication in this article that there will be a coming-together of Mallorca Rocks and Cursach (BCM) is inaccurate, and I am pleased to set the record straight.
The hotel business is not a straightforward matter when it comes to who does what. We may see the name of a hotel chain shining into a night sky, but behind the neon, the logo and the brand there are invariably other businesses involved, while the appearance of a hotel chain's name isn't always an indication of ownership.
The move towards hotel theming and branding makes the who-does-what equation rather more complicated than it used to be. Brands, if they aren't specifically hotel ones, don't necessarily want to be involved in hotel day-to-day. Indeed, they may not want to be involved at all, other than to be informed as to how much they are getting by way of royalties and commissions. Brands can have "hotel operations", but these are not managerial operations; they are purely strategic and financial.
A brand which does have day-to-day involvement is Mallorca Rocks (or Ibiza Rocks). It has to. Its holiday offer isn't conventional, given that it is predicated on live music and all that goes with it. Be it customer service, marketing or pandering to the needs of a chart-topping pop or rock act, it is essential that the organisation has control and involvement. But Mallorca Rocks doesn't own the Mallorca Rocks hotel. Ultimately, the ownership lies, through the Palladium Hotel Group, with GEM, Grupo Empresas Matutes. Palladium was, until the end of 2012, known as the Fiesta Hotel Group. Name change notwithstanding, its principal owner is Abel Matutes, a one-time minister for foreign affairs with the Spanish Government.
Palladium, an Ibiza-based operation and not a Mallorcan one, had announced towards the end of last year that it intended to rent out Mallorca Rocks. It was said at the time that the company which would be doing the renting, the Dutch investment firm Evertaas, would take on the management. In fact, there will be another company which will be doing the managing. It is Cursach. Yes, that Cursach, which, among other things, owns the BCM club in Magalluf.
A year before Palladium made the announcement about Evertaas' involvement, Cursach had gone public about its interest in having the BCM brand name used for a theme hotel in Magalluf. It said that this wouldn't just be a branding exercise; it would want management involvement. In considering this, I suggested that the move would make a great deal of sense for BCM and for Magalluf and that it was an understandable move in light of the tourism law which permitted secondary activities, such as concerts and clubs open to the general public, in hotel grounds. It appears that I was pretty much spot-on; Cursach is citing the tourism law as a reason for it now realising its interest in hotel management.
There is an irony in all this, though. It is no secret that Cursach opposed the concerts at Mallorca Rocks. But there is a further irony in that it was the support for the concerts offered by the then Calvia mayor Carlos Delgado, something which brought forth all manner of complaints channelled via the tourist businesses association Acotur, which acted as a template for the provisions for hotel secondary activities in the tourism law that Delgado was to draw up once he became tourism minister. Mallorca Rocks, revolutionary in many ways, was, without necessarily knowing that it was, the secondary-activities pilot scheme in Mallorca, the Ibiza Rocks hotel having trialled the secondary-activities scheme some time before.
It is remarkable, given the fuss about Mallorca Rocks, that Cursach should now end up managing it. But in so doing, it will create a mega youth brand that combines Mallorca Rocks and BCM, while at the same time keeping them distinct. It sounds like very good business, and there is more to it. There won't be just one hotel. There will be four. Mallorca Rocks, Tropical, Sahara and Magamar, and they will form one complex with over 1,000 rooms, one for which an upgrade to four-star is envisaged and which will have all manner of attractions for the much-hyped "Millennials" age group.
But where, you might be wondering, does this leave Evertaas? Very much in the thick of things. It is an investment company, one that invests in real estate. It, one has to conclude, is going to be the prime mover behind the financing of the changes that Cursach plans. And it has form in this regard in Magalluf. Though it has been reported that there is a fair amount of British money sloshing around in Magalluf (rightly so, as there is), Evertaas is the front organisation for a good deal of the investment that Meliá Hotels has been pumping into Magalluf.
So, as you can see, things aren't straightforward when it comes to who does what. But then, the hotel business isn't straightforward. Not nowadays anyway. It is the melding of brands, hotel chains, investors, management companies to meet the demands of new market segments and enhancements to the overall holiday experience. And Magalluf demonstrates this as well as anywhere. The Cursach move is intriguing and potentially a very good one.
The hotel business is not a straightforward matter when it comes to who does what. We may see the name of a hotel chain shining into a night sky, but behind the neon, the logo and the brand there are invariably other businesses involved, while the appearance of a hotel chain's name isn't always an indication of ownership.
The move towards hotel theming and branding makes the who-does-what equation rather more complicated than it used to be. Brands, if they aren't specifically hotel ones, don't necessarily want to be involved in hotel day-to-day. Indeed, they may not want to be involved at all, other than to be informed as to how much they are getting by way of royalties and commissions. Brands can have "hotel operations", but these are not managerial operations; they are purely strategic and financial.
A brand which does have day-to-day involvement is Mallorca Rocks (or Ibiza Rocks). It has to. Its holiday offer isn't conventional, given that it is predicated on live music and all that goes with it. Be it customer service, marketing or pandering to the needs of a chart-topping pop or rock act, it is essential that the organisation has control and involvement. But Mallorca Rocks doesn't own the Mallorca Rocks hotel. Ultimately, the ownership lies, through the Palladium Hotel Group, with GEM, Grupo Empresas Matutes. Palladium was, until the end of 2012, known as the Fiesta Hotel Group. Name change notwithstanding, its principal owner is Abel Matutes, a one-time minister for foreign affairs with the Spanish Government.
Palladium, an Ibiza-based operation and not a Mallorcan one, had announced towards the end of last year that it intended to rent out Mallorca Rocks. It was said at the time that the company which would be doing the renting, the Dutch investment firm Evertaas, would take on the management. In fact, there will be another company which will be doing the managing. It is Cursach. Yes, that Cursach, which, among other things, owns the BCM club in Magalluf.
A year before Palladium made the announcement about Evertaas' involvement, Cursach had gone public about its interest in having the BCM brand name used for a theme hotel in Magalluf. It said that this wouldn't just be a branding exercise; it would want management involvement. In considering this, I suggested that the move would make a great deal of sense for BCM and for Magalluf and that it was an understandable move in light of the tourism law which permitted secondary activities, such as concerts and clubs open to the general public, in hotel grounds. It appears that I was pretty much spot-on; Cursach is citing the tourism law as a reason for it now realising its interest in hotel management.
There is an irony in all this, though. It is no secret that Cursach opposed the concerts at Mallorca Rocks. But there is a further irony in that it was the support for the concerts offered by the then Calvia mayor Carlos Delgado, something which brought forth all manner of complaints channelled via the tourist businesses association Acotur, which acted as a template for the provisions for hotel secondary activities in the tourism law that Delgado was to draw up once he became tourism minister. Mallorca Rocks, revolutionary in many ways, was, without necessarily knowing that it was, the secondary-activities pilot scheme in Mallorca, the Ibiza Rocks hotel having trialled the secondary-activities scheme some time before.
It is remarkable, given the fuss about Mallorca Rocks, that Cursach should now end up managing it. But in so doing, it will create a mega youth brand that combines Mallorca Rocks and BCM, while at the same time keeping them distinct. It sounds like very good business, and there is more to it. There won't be just one hotel. There will be four. Mallorca Rocks, Tropical, Sahara and Magamar, and they will form one complex with over 1,000 rooms, one for which an upgrade to four-star is envisaged and which will have all manner of attractions for the much-hyped "Millennials" age group.
But where, you might be wondering, does this leave Evertaas? Very much in the thick of things. It is an investment company, one that invests in real estate. It, one has to conclude, is going to be the prime mover behind the financing of the changes that Cursach plans. And it has form in this regard in Magalluf. Though it has been reported that there is a fair amount of British money sloshing around in Magalluf (rightly so, as there is), Evertaas is the front organisation for a good deal of the investment that Meliá Hotels has been pumping into Magalluf.
So, as you can see, things aren't straightforward when it comes to who does what. But then, the hotel business isn't straightforward. Not nowadays anyway. It is the melding of brands, hotel chains, investors, management companies to meet the demands of new market segments and enhancements to the overall holiday experience. And Magalluf demonstrates this as well as anywhere. The Cursach move is intriguing and potentially a very good one.
Friday, January 10, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 10 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.45am): 12C
Forecast high: 16C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Variable 2 increasing Southeast 2 to 3. Some fog.
Another greyish morning, not mist so much as cloud. Remaining mostly grey today and over the weekend with some risk of rain at times.
Evening update (20.15): Once the greyness lifted, not a bad day at all. A high of 16.4C.
The Man Who Wrote About Sa Pobla
Mallorca's towns have their historians and their chroniclers. If you were to put them together in a room, what tales and stories they could tell. Many of them have been told, but they are all too remote for the non-Catalan speaker. They tell so much, and so much that is overlooked because of linguistic obscurity. Biel Pieras, himself a leading Mallorcan historian and also Inca's chronicler, said at the end of June 2011 that Mallorca had lost its finest official chronicler. He was speaking about Alexandre Ballester.
78 years of age, Ballester was Sa Pobla through and through, despite having been born in Barcelona. He was only very young when his parents settled in Sa Pobla, and he was to become one of Mallorca's foremost literary figures. He wrote almost twenty plays, he wrote poetry, he wrote satirical essays and he wrote a novel, for which he received an award (the first of very many) in 1965. But he was far more than this, because he was also an historian; he was Sa Pobla's chronicler. When not writing for the theatre or for publication, he was writing about the place that, only a few months old, had become his home town, and included in his writings were those about the history of the Sant Antoni fiesta.
In late 2003, Sa Pobla town hall produced a history of the town. Its title is "Sa Pobla: The People, The Environment, The History". It was the work of four teachers from the town. Ballester wrote the foreword and wasn't being unkind when he referred to the history as "basic". It was a "basic book, indispensable for everyone who lives in, works in and loves our town". Ballester was cited extensively in the book, and one begins to get a flavour of just how diverse his own coverage was. From eleven bibliographic references, there are those to the archaeology of Talapi, a finca in the town, to the land at the turn of the twentieth century, to Albufera's "yesterdays" and to the third centenary of the Sant Antoni parish church in 1997 (the 300th anniversary of the church which replaced the original that was built in 1357).
There could have been many more references. Ballester, like any good historian, dealt with the broad picture and the specific, and included among his investigations in the latter category were those into the glosadors, themselves chroniclers of times past when communications and the perpetuation of Catalan (Mallorquín) were largely achieved by these monologuist-chanters, and into arròs brut, that most traditional of Mallorcan dishes but in truth a tradition that was bound up in the development of Albufera at the end of the nineteenth century and the cultivation of rice in the wetlands.
There is far more to Sa Pobla's history than two themes, but they are two themes which dominate its past and also its present. Albufera is one and especially the period of the English engineers - Hope, Waring, the preacher man Mister Green, Bateman and his son Lee, who adopted the Catalan Lluís name and called the Gatamoix colony after himself. The other is Sant Antoni, the tradition of the fiesta and the parish churches built in his honour.
There is a third theme, which is agriculture and specifically the growing of potatoes. Put these three themes together, and you get what you have - a town wedded to the land and the wetland and to centuries-old tradition that was imported by the kings of Mallorca and which was invested in Sa Pobla; Sant Antoni became and remains the centre of this tradition. It is not for nothing that Sa Pobla is referred to as the capital of rural Mallorcan life, a mix of cultivation, the working of the land and superstitions and fiesta. Sa Pobla, perhaps in a self-appointed way, has assumed a role as capital also of a specifically Catalan rural life, and in its simple denomination, it asserts a position in Mallorcan history as a sort of favoured town. Sa Pobla, "the populace". Not a populace but the populace. And Ballester was the man who truly asserted this position. He was the man who wrote about Sa Pobla and, in many respects, was the man who made Sa Pobla.
* Photo from www.escriptors.cat
Thursday, January 09, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 9 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.00am): 9.5C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): South and Southeast 2 to 3. Fog in parts.
A damp, grey, misty morning. Should lift to be be quite sunny, but not as warm as recently. Rain possibly coming in tonight.
Evening update (19.15): The sun didn't make much of an effort - some but not a lot. The fog is likely to be around again tonight and into tomorrow. High of 15.5C.
Hi Ho Selva: Promoting small towns
Being five places in one, Selva's political organisation reflects this. Three of the villages - Caimari, Moscari and Biniamar - have their own delegates at the town hall and, in tourism terms, there is a councillor responsible for fiestas and fairs in the three. You could say, therefore, that things are either somewhat fragmented or perfect in conforming to an ideal, highly local, fiesta democracy. There is, though, one councillor who has the wider tourism remit. Pere Segui Caimari is that councillor and, yes, he is also the chap who looks after Caimari's fiestas as well as sanitation, maintenance, municipal services and, unless I'm totally misunderstanding the Catalan, manure. He's a busy fellow, therefore, and possibly unique. Or maybe there are other councillors knocking around Mallorca who have the dung portfolio.
Selva's tourism plan hasn't yet been decided upon, but the process for arriving at a definitive plan is commendable. The town hall has been asking the people of the town what they think. 90 people turned up to the first meeting to offer their views. What a revolutionary concept. Actually seeking opinions as to tourism. There must be a lesson to be learned here by grander tourism bodies. Or perhaps not. Whatever comes from this consultation, Selva's tourism is not going to be huge. Two hundred hotel places are all that the town can stretch to, spread across a dozen establishments, both agrotourist and petit interior hotels. But in addition to these hotel places, there are some 90 holiday homes which presumably can accommodate rather more tourists than the hotels can. As such, Selva is pretty much a model town for the tourism ministry's bold move into rural tourism and liberalisation of rural properties for tourism purposes.
The town hall believes that future success for tourism lies with the town's location. In this, he is probably not wrong. Selva, five villages in one, can offer three aspects of tourism in one. Mainly agricultural, it is typical of rural Mallorca, while it has mountains close by and the beaches of Pollensa and Alcúdia not a million kilometres away.
As with tourism plans for other small towns on the island, the devil lies not in the detail of cultural routes, walking, Selva's herbs fair and Caimari's olives fair but in how the message is put across - if at all - and also in establishing a back story, one that makes the town stand out. The town hall, fair to it, has put the brief history of Selva that appears on the municipal website into both English and German. But it is brief. It doesn't really tell you anything that might make you think, ah, I must have a holiday in Selva. What might mean more to the prospective visitor are the images of places of local interest. Yet, click on these and up comes a description in, you've guessed it, Catalan, and only in Catalan.
These towns, and the same can be said for much of Mallorca's tourism, needs to reach out far more and do so systematically in different languages (English and German at least). Doubtless there is information for Selva knocking around that makes use of social media - videos, social networks or whatever - but it will be fragmented, a bit like the political organisation for the fiestas and fairs.
Resources are, one accepts, an issue. A town with under 4,000 people and with tourist accommodation for possibly a maximum of 600 is limited both in terms of funds and probably also of ambition. But if there is to be a tourism plan, there needs to be much more than just a document drawn up and handed over to the ministry for filing. While the town hall is right in believing that Selva's location does offer benefits which could lead to success, it needs to demonstrate these, and a co-ordinated and systematic social media programme could do just this.
Selva may not have a particularly compelling back story, but a story can be told nevertheless and in an effective manner with photos, videos, information via social media. It is not a means of promotion that requires breaking the bank. It just needs organising. And people who can communicate in something other than Catalan.
* Photo from the Selva town hall website, http://www.ajselva.net
Wednesday, January 08, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 8 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.00am): 8.5C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): South and Southeast 3.
A colder morning, but one the sun's up, getting warm again. The outlook by the weekend doesn't look all that great, though, with rain coming in.
Evening update (19.30): Again, not a bad day at all, with a high of 20.2C. Getting misty by the evening.
The Forgotten Language: Castilian signs
In the arguments about trilingual teaching, the law of symbols and the removal of the requirement for public-sector employees to speak or be proficient in Catalan, something has tended to be lost. It is the Castilian language. It hasn't of course been lost by its defenders, be they in the regional government, in certain organisations (mainly of the right, such as the Circulo Balear) and in the public at large, but the polemic that has raged as a consequence of the government's anti-Catalan policies has tended to portray the Catalan language as the victim and as the principal matter for debate while ignoring the rightful claims of Castilian.
It is worth remembering that Catalan and Castilian are co-official languages in the Balearics and that the 1986 law of "linguistic standardisation" envisaged the co-existence of the two languages in a balanced fashion. But this didn't happen. Though the government at the time was dominated by the Partido Popular (strictly speaking, the Alianza Popular, which was the forerunner to the PP), Catalan was adopted as the language of government. The government of Gabriel Cañellas also introduced a measure to apply to public signs. They would be in Catalan, but Castilian could be used as well for what were referred to as "sociolinguistic circumstances". Even then, Catalan would take preference. In 1990, the then minister for culture, Maria Antònia Munar (her party, the Unió Mallorquina was in coalition with the PP) took this further. She had been instrumental in drafting the measure for public signs, which had included establishing place names in Catalan/Mallorquín only (e.g. Sa Pobla rather than La Puebla), and under a decree of 1990, she succeeded in all but eliminating Castilian from the Balearic administration.
What followed was that Catalan came to dominate, especially in two key sectors of public administration - health and education. So dominant has Catalan become that there was, in May 2009, a sizable demonstration in Palma against the "Catalan imposition"; some 25,000 people took part. So dominant has Catalan become in education that for the 2011-2012 school year, according to government figures, seven out of ten children in state schools received their education in Catalan only.
It is this dominance that the Bauzá government has sought to address. It may have gone about doing so in a far from satisfactory fashion - as with the cack-handed way it has dealt with trilingual teaching - but there were legitimate reasons for it to have addressed the "imposition". Castilian had become an all but non-language.
But there was a world of difference between the public and private sectors. In 2001, the government of Francesc Antich, ostensibly therefore a PSOE administration but beholden to partners on the left and the Unió Mallorquina, introduced a law by which businesses' signs could be shown in both Catalan and Castilian but which also allowed signs to be in Catalan only. It was deemed illegal if signs were only in Castilian.
To what extent this law was really paid any real attention to is questionable. It was observed, by the "El Mundo" newspaper that by 2008, in Palma at any rate, signs and information provided by private businesses tended to be in Castilian rather than Catalan. It is often said, with justification, that Palma is more Castilian than the rest of Mallorca, but nevertheless, these businesses were, in effect, flouting the law. In that year, therefore, Antich's second government reiterated the law that had been passed in 2001. Fines for non-compliance could be as steep as 60,000 euros.
The Bauzá government has now repealed the 2001 law. Businesses will no longer be required to have signs and information in Catalan "at the very least". While this might raise some hackles, the law was hardly ever enforced. And in another move, the government has opened the way to foreign-run businesses to have information in whatever language they want without, or so it would seem, having to use Castilian or Catalan (not that all have been doing so, by any means). The government doesn't seem to be insisting on place names going back to being in Castilian - a suggestion which had been raised early in the current legislature - presumably having reasoned that it would be more trouble than it would be worth.
Scrapping the law is common sense. While it was a futile law in any event, it was a nonsense of one, too. Private businesses should not be dictated to as what language they use. If one is better than the other for a particular business, then so be it. It was a law which showed how far the "imposition" had gone and how far a zeal for Catalan had indeed become an imposition. The Bauzá government may not have always applied common sense in linguistic matters, but on this one, it most definitely has.
It is worth remembering that Catalan and Castilian are co-official languages in the Balearics and that the 1986 law of "linguistic standardisation" envisaged the co-existence of the two languages in a balanced fashion. But this didn't happen. Though the government at the time was dominated by the Partido Popular (strictly speaking, the Alianza Popular, which was the forerunner to the PP), Catalan was adopted as the language of government. The government of Gabriel Cañellas also introduced a measure to apply to public signs. They would be in Catalan, but Castilian could be used as well for what were referred to as "sociolinguistic circumstances". Even then, Catalan would take preference. In 1990, the then minister for culture, Maria Antònia Munar (her party, the Unió Mallorquina was in coalition with the PP) took this further. She had been instrumental in drafting the measure for public signs, which had included establishing place names in Catalan/Mallorquín only (e.g. Sa Pobla rather than La Puebla), and under a decree of 1990, she succeeded in all but eliminating Castilian from the Balearic administration.
What followed was that Catalan came to dominate, especially in two key sectors of public administration - health and education. So dominant has Catalan become that there was, in May 2009, a sizable demonstration in Palma against the "Catalan imposition"; some 25,000 people took part. So dominant has Catalan become in education that for the 2011-2012 school year, according to government figures, seven out of ten children in state schools received their education in Catalan only.
It is this dominance that the Bauzá government has sought to address. It may have gone about doing so in a far from satisfactory fashion - as with the cack-handed way it has dealt with trilingual teaching - but there were legitimate reasons for it to have addressed the "imposition". Castilian had become an all but non-language.
But there was a world of difference between the public and private sectors. In 2001, the government of Francesc Antich, ostensibly therefore a PSOE administration but beholden to partners on the left and the Unió Mallorquina, introduced a law by which businesses' signs could be shown in both Catalan and Castilian but which also allowed signs to be in Catalan only. It was deemed illegal if signs were only in Castilian.
To what extent this law was really paid any real attention to is questionable. It was observed, by the "El Mundo" newspaper that by 2008, in Palma at any rate, signs and information provided by private businesses tended to be in Castilian rather than Catalan. It is often said, with justification, that Palma is more Castilian than the rest of Mallorca, but nevertheless, these businesses were, in effect, flouting the law. In that year, therefore, Antich's second government reiterated the law that had been passed in 2001. Fines for non-compliance could be as steep as 60,000 euros.
The Bauzá government has now repealed the 2001 law. Businesses will no longer be required to have signs and information in Catalan "at the very least". While this might raise some hackles, the law was hardly ever enforced. And in another move, the government has opened the way to foreign-run businesses to have information in whatever language they want without, or so it would seem, having to use Castilian or Catalan (not that all have been doing so, by any means). The government doesn't seem to be insisting on place names going back to being in Castilian - a suggestion which had been raised early in the current legislature - presumably having reasoned that it would be more trouble than it would be worth.
Scrapping the law is common sense. While it was a futile law in any event, it was a nonsense of one, too. Private businesses should not be dictated to as what language they use. If one is better than the other for a particular business, then so be it. It was a law which showed how far the "imposition" had gone and how far a zeal for Catalan had indeed become an imposition. The Bauzá government may not have always applied common sense in linguistic matters, but on this one, it most definitely has.
Tuesday, January 07, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 7 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.15am): 11.5C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): South and Southwest 3 to 4.
A clear and clam morning. A good deal of sun anticipated. The outlook is for rain to come in by the weekend.
Evening update (19.45): Another very decent day; a high of 20.4C.
The Slow Pace Of Modernisation: Hotels
Getting an exact figure for the number of hotels in the Balearics is a straightforward task. If you are of a mind to go to the tourism ministry's website, you will find spreadsheets for "types of establishment" for each year from 2004 up to 2012. One has to know what the abbreviations mean in order to understand what is what, but the total number of establishments is (was in 2012) 2,591. Of these, 711 are hotels from one-star to five-star-plus and 241 are hotel apartments. In addition, there are 863 apartments, which are different to hotel apartments, and which are rated according to the key system rather than the stars.
When one looks at the star ratings for 2004 and 2012, it is noticeable that there hasn't been an especially significant change where the core 3-star hotel is concerned. There were 371 hotels (excluding hotel apartments) in 2004. In 2012, there were 354, of which two were 3-star superior (a category that didn't exist in 2004). The number of 5-star hotels rose by eleven to 34, while the biggest mover was the 4-star: 204 in 2012 versus 150 in 2004.
The 2012 tourism law placed a great deal of emphasis on modernisation and renewal. Since it was passed, there have been 215 applications for an increase in star (or key) ratings, and over half of these have been applications to upgrade to 4-star, to 4-star superior or to 5-star. 65 3-stars are seeking 4-star status, 41 want 4-star superior status and four are seeking a 5-star rating. These applications represent, therefore, what is perhaps the single most significant rise in hotel standards there has ever been.
Overwhelmingly, the hotels seeking upgrades are located in Palma and Calvia where, respectively, there are applications for 40 and 38 increases. Nowhere else comes close, which probably reflects the fact that Palma and Calvia have considerably more hotels anyway. But to take one municipality - Alcúdia, with at least 70 hotels and apartments, there are only six applications. This seems on the low side. Capdepera has 13, Sant Llorenç has 11 and Pollensa ten.
While this all suggests a commitment, in line with the modernisation drive envisaged under the tourism law, to greater quality and improved standards, there are questions that need asking. One is why it takes such a hell of a long time to approve the applications, and the other is whether the implication of higher prices that come with superior hotels will actually result in greater profitability.
The procedures for gaining approval and for the granting of licences in order to permit renovation are notoriously slow and complex. So far, of the 110 applications for 4-star and 5-star status, a mere 26 have been agreed to (three have been declined). At the current rate of progress, therefore, it will be the end of 2016 before all the applications have been dealt with. The tourism ministry, conscious of the need to get a move on, says that it will do just this, but in the meantime, one does have to wonder if work is being undertaken without the necessary agreements. This was an issue that was highlighted when the upper floors of the Son Moll hotel in Cala Rajada collapsed during renovation work at the end of 2008. The death of four workers was not attributed to the absence of the proper licence, but the Son Moll incident showed that renovation was commonly done without licences being in place because of the time it took for them to be agreed.
If bureaucracy is holding things up, then the tourism ministry (and also town halls, which do have a say in all this) need rockets being put under them. It makes little sense to put in place a strategy of modernisation only for improvements to be delayed because there is either an insufficient number of technicians to sign off on plans or because there is too much red tape. The ministry, indeed the Balearic Government in the form of President Bauzá, had said that processes would be streamlined.
As for greater profitability from 4-star or 5-star establishments, the mere fact that prices are put up simply because of the number of stars on a plaque outside a hotel do not necessarily mean greater profitability. Just as an indication, figures for the Hoteliers Price Index, one compiled by the Spanish National Statistics Office, showed last year that only 5-star hotels had in fact registered an increase in revenues per room. And there is a further issue when it comes to raising prices because of an upgrade in star rating. In competitor destinations, Greece for instance, prices have been going down. Mallorca's hoteliers might hope that they can compete on improved quality and so demand higher prices, but they might find themselves thwarted in this hope by market conditions.
Improving hotel standards is very welcome, but we shouldn't get carried away. 110 establishments equate to only roughly 10% of hotels and hotel apartments, and this improvement is a case of catch-up with elsewhere where 4-star, if not 5-star, is the norm. In the Balearics, the 3-star remains king.
When one looks at the star ratings for 2004 and 2012, it is noticeable that there hasn't been an especially significant change where the core 3-star hotel is concerned. There were 371 hotels (excluding hotel apartments) in 2004. In 2012, there were 354, of which two were 3-star superior (a category that didn't exist in 2004). The number of 5-star hotels rose by eleven to 34, while the biggest mover was the 4-star: 204 in 2012 versus 150 in 2004.
The 2012 tourism law placed a great deal of emphasis on modernisation and renewal. Since it was passed, there have been 215 applications for an increase in star (or key) ratings, and over half of these have been applications to upgrade to 4-star, to 4-star superior or to 5-star. 65 3-stars are seeking 4-star status, 41 want 4-star superior status and four are seeking a 5-star rating. These applications represent, therefore, what is perhaps the single most significant rise in hotel standards there has ever been.
Overwhelmingly, the hotels seeking upgrades are located in Palma and Calvia where, respectively, there are applications for 40 and 38 increases. Nowhere else comes close, which probably reflects the fact that Palma and Calvia have considerably more hotels anyway. But to take one municipality - Alcúdia, with at least 70 hotels and apartments, there are only six applications. This seems on the low side. Capdepera has 13, Sant Llorenç has 11 and Pollensa ten.
While this all suggests a commitment, in line with the modernisation drive envisaged under the tourism law, to greater quality and improved standards, there are questions that need asking. One is why it takes such a hell of a long time to approve the applications, and the other is whether the implication of higher prices that come with superior hotels will actually result in greater profitability.
The procedures for gaining approval and for the granting of licences in order to permit renovation are notoriously slow and complex. So far, of the 110 applications for 4-star and 5-star status, a mere 26 have been agreed to (three have been declined). At the current rate of progress, therefore, it will be the end of 2016 before all the applications have been dealt with. The tourism ministry, conscious of the need to get a move on, says that it will do just this, but in the meantime, one does have to wonder if work is being undertaken without the necessary agreements. This was an issue that was highlighted when the upper floors of the Son Moll hotel in Cala Rajada collapsed during renovation work at the end of 2008. The death of four workers was not attributed to the absence of the proper licence, but the Son Moll incident showed that renovation was commonly done without licences being in place because of the time it took for them to be agreed.
If bureaucracy is holding things up, then the tourism ministry (and also town halls, which do have a say in all this) need rockets being put under them. It makes little sense to put in place a strategy of modernisation only for improvements to be delayed because there is either an insufficient number of technicians to sign off on plans or because there is too much red tape. The ministry, indeed the Balearic Government in the form of President Bauzá, had said that processes would be streamlined.
As for greater profitability from 4-star or 5-star establishments, the mere fact that prices are put up simply because of the number of stars on a plaque outside a hotel do not necessarily mean greater profitability. Just as an indication, figures for the Hoteliers Price Index, one compiled by the Spanish National Statistics Office, showed last year that only 5-star hotels had in fact registered an increase in revenues per room. And there is a further issue when it comes to raising prices because of an upgrade in star rating. In competitor destinations, Greece for instance, prices have been going down. Mallorca's hoteliers might hope that they can compete on improved quality and so demand higher prices, but they might find themselves thwarted in this hope by market conditions.
Improving hotel standards is very welcome, but we shouldn't get carried away. 110 establishments equate to only roughly 10% of hotels and hotel apartments, and this improvement is a case of catch-up with elsewhere where 4-star, if not 5-star, is the norm. In the Balearics, the 3-star remains king.
Monday, January 06, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 6 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.15am): 10C
Forecast high: 18C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): South and Southwest 2 to 4.
Much calmer, the wind having died down, and a fine Epiphany in store, the sunny weather staying for the next couple of days at least.
Evening update (19.15): A high of 20.8C, so a warm day.
The Town With Two Dots: Montuïri
But the history of the town (sic) is not in the least bit odd in Mallorcan terms. As with several others, it was founded and granted "royal" status by King Jaume II in the year 1300 while its toponymy (the study of the origins of its name) is, as with other towns on the island, open to some debate. The Latin "Mons Tueris" is a front-runner, which means it was a mountain of protection or defence, but there are competing theories, while the contraction to what is now Montuïri is put down to the Mozarabic period of Muslim occupation, i.e. "Muntuwîri", and its meaning to village of the mountain (derived from the same period).
It is this linguistic debate which affords a place like Montuïri a certain mystique. It isn't unusual in this regard because other names are open to interpretation, but it is the very fact that total certainty doesn't exist which adds to the mystique and emphasises the multi-cultural influences that stretch back into near and far antiquity. Mallorca's towns are exercises in looking for clues, in seeking explanations. Their fascination goes way beyond their physical attributes .
A curiosity with the name, however, is the "mons" part. Montuïri is on Mallorca's plain. This is flat, agricultural land (hence the plain), but there are nevertheless hills, rather than mountains. The highest elevation in the municipality is 342 metres. It may not be that high, but in warring times up to two millennia ago any hill came in useful: "mons tueris", mountain of defence.
The slightly fewer than 3,000 residents of Montuïri are swelled in summer by an estimated 670. Well away from the coastal bustle and mass invasion of tourists, Montuïri is representative of a very different Mallorca, an "authentic" Mallorca, so it is said. Five small hotels and agrotourism establishments provide just over 130 places. Very different indeed.
Despite its smallness, Montuïri does of course have a town hall. And the local council, as with others on the island, has been charged with putting in place a tourism plan. This has been demanded by the tourism ministry under its diktat in the 2012 tourism law. Its neighbour Algaida, roughly twice the size, approved its plan recently. Unlike Algaida, though, Montuïri does have a councillor who has responsibility for tourism. There may be little obvious tourism, as is the case also in Algaida, but this is not for want of having charged a councillor with overseeing it.
Montuïri has enlisted the help of the Mallorcan hoteliers federation in drawing up its plan for 2014-2015. But quite what help the federation has given is not entirely clear. The plan covers the town's cultural, natural environment, archaeology (in particular the talayotic settlement of Ses Fornés), birdwatching, the rural tourism marked by its agrotourism and sports, including cycling, hiking and Nordic walking. No doubt the federation has proved to be useful, but it is not a plan which sets the pulse racing or which is markedly different from other towns, such as Algaida. It, too, has its natural environment and its cycling, though it does also have the Osborne bull and makes more of its gastronomy than Montuïri appears to be doing (Algaida is reckoned to be the centre of Mallorcan-style cuisine). And the plan doesn't seem to emphasise something for which Montuïri does have a claim to fame; its "cossier" dancers at August fiesta time.
There again, why should it set the pulse racing? This is inland, rural, alternative Mallorca where very little happens and where, because very little happens, has an attraction of tranquility and authenticity. But is it enough? And having drawn up this plan, what will happen with it? How will it be rolled out in promotional terms? Will it be rolled out in the form of promotion?
The ministry has stipulated that each town has to have a tourism plan. Put them together and these plans should amount to one grand plan. But is this what is going to happen? And even if they are put together, what will they amount to? Montuïri is not unique. The same can be said for Algaida. They are towns in Mallorca's interior which suffer from a lack of obvious selling points. They have ruralism, they have nature, they have cycling, but there has to be more.
The point is that there is more. If you look for it. But not everyone does. There exists this mystique, this peculiarity about Mallorcan towns that can fascinate and attract. This is what needs stressing. And with Montuïri, it has an obvious advantage. Why the hell are there two dots in its name?
* Photo from www.mallorcaweb.com
Sunday, January 05, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 5 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.15am): 12C
Forecast high: 15C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): West and Northwest 5 to 6 easing 3 to 4 by the evening. Swells to one metre.
Very windy at times overnight, now calmer and sunny. A fine day expected with the wind down for the arrival of the Kings this evening. Tomorrow, a holiday, also fine and sunny.
Evening update (20.00): A high of 15.8C.
We Three Kings Of Orient Are
When I was small, the Christmas morning sack - and it was a sack - used to contain, buried at the bottom, an orange. It was a tradition, one which, as small children, we went along with. Thank you for the orange, we would parrot, and then ignore it and turn our attention to the altogether more interesting booty that Santa had delivered, having picked up the goodies from the local Woolworths over the preceding few weeks. The orange was symbolic of Christmases past. All we got for Christmas was an orange, if we were lucky, my parents would explain. That was rather sad, we thought, but we also began to question the truth of the explanation in similar ways as we began to question the notion of the "bone in the leg" when a reluctant older relative declined the invitation to kick a football about or the chances of actually discovering Australia if we dug a hole deep enough.
Unlike the impossibility of suddenly finding ourselves confronted by a kangaroo, the orange explanation was of course accurate. Christmases past did mean an orange and/or an apple and/or a tangerine and/or a piece of coal.
Much as we make distinctions between Anglo-Saxon traditions of present-giving at Christmas and the Spanish preference for Three Kings, the actual present, in historical terms, was essentially the same, and the history of present-giving austerity was the same. The present-giving days may have been separated by slightly less than a fortnight, but just as there was a time when Christmas in Britain meant an orange and very little else, so Kings also meant an orange and very little else.
But arguably, the British orange tradition was borrowed from the Spanish. It was basically a tradition of war times when oranges and other fruit were in short supply and were, as such, a luxury. In Mallorca, by contrast, there was no real shortage. Oranges as Christmas presents were very much in vogue regardless of wars. They weren't luxuries so much as a reflection of a simpler era and of an era when the common man could stretch to no more than an orange or a lump of coal.
Go back to the inter-war years of the 1920s and 1930s and Three Kings in a Mallorcan style meant gifts of chocolate sweets (or one sweet), carob, a couple of oranges and the inevitable coal. Alternatives were "carbón dulce", the sugary lump coloured black, and for children who had been particularly good, a couple of ensaimadas. A pair of shoes was a real treat, as was a rag doll or a tin toy car.
In the villages of Mallorca, back in the day, shoes filled with beans were placed in the windows of houses. The beans were intended for the Kings' horses (nowadays the shoes serve a different function; for the Kings to fill them with gifts). But in a similar way to Santa Claus and Rudolph, there were no actual Kings and no actual horses. Despite their having been make-believe and despite the miserly nature of the gifts, the night of 5 January was one of great anticipation, and the following morning there would be talk as to whether the Kings and their horses had been heard.
It was to be quite some years later that the children (and indeed adults) of Mallorca's villages were to actually set sight on Kings and on the pages who provide the warm-up act a couple of days before. It is now taken as the norm and as the tradition of Three Kings that the Kings pass from house to house or dispense gifts from town halls, but their physical presence, in the villages and small towns at any rate, is a relatively recent phenomenon.
And this physical presence occurs in different ways. The arrival of the Kings all depends on where you are. My main experience of the Kings is of their coming into the old pier in Alcúdia on board the glass-bottomed boat, a means of travel which doesn't quite chime with any known tradition. But clearly the Kings have to arrive somehow, and in the coastal towns, the best way, it has been deemed, is by sea. For the old town of Alcúdia, the arrival is different. It is as part of the parade that forms in the port, pauses for a time at the port's church and then makes its way on the short journey into the town.
The parades do of course differ. Only Palma does a parade on anything like a grand scale. There again, Palma's parade was among the first and most famous of the "cabalgatas". The tradition of the parade had started in the town of Alcoy in the Alicante province in 1866, but it wasn't to be until the 1920s that it really started to catch on, and Barcelona and Palma were to the fore. Compared with Palma, parades elsewhere are more low-key but they still have their own special feel of anticipation and excitement. In Alcúdia, this is heightened by following the parade as it heads away from the port and into the old town where the Kings eventually appear on the balcony of the town hall before handing out the goods.
It is a world away from how Three Kings used to be. From the days when there were no Kings as such and when the best a kid could hope for was an orange or an ensaimada. From the days when Kings were much like Christmas in Britain. But now there is one very big difference to a British Christmas: the arrivals of the Kings, the parades, the spectacular and the excitement. A recent tradition perhaps but winter wonderful nevertheless.
And finally, you will know that there is a very small village in Mallorca called Orient. Before all the parades, the arrivals by boat and all the more recent traditions, the children of the neighbouring villages knew where the Kings came from: the hamlet of Orient. But how was it that the children of Orient and the nearby villages never saw the Kings? This was because they took their horses into the mountains, to let them graze and grow strong before they rode once again on the fifth of January. And this, everyone, is a true story of local folklore. Happy Kings!
Unlike the impossibility of suddenly finding ourselves confronted by a kangaroo, the orange explanation was of course accurate. Christmases past did mean an orange and/or an apple and/or a tangerine and/or a piece of coal.
Much as we make distinctions between Anglo-Saxon traditions of present-giving at Christmas and the Spanish preference for Three Kings, the actual present, in historical terms, was essentially the same, and the history of present-giving austerity was the same. The present-giving days may have been separated by slightly less than a fortnight, but just as there was a time when Christmas in Britain meant an orange and very little else, so Kings also meant an orange and very little else.
But arguably, the British orange tradition was borrowed from the Spanish. It was basically a tradition of war times when oranges and other fruit were in short supply and were, as such, a luxury. In Mallorca, by contrast, there was no real shortage. Oranges as Christmas presents were very much in vogue regardless of wars. They weren't luxuries so much as a reflection of a simpler era and of an era when the common man could stretch to no more than an orange or a lump of coal.
Go back to the inter-war years of the 1920s and 1930s and Three Kings in a Mallorcan style meant gifts of chocolate sweets (or one sweet), carob, a couple of oranges and the inevitable coal. Alternatives were "carbón dulce", the sugary lump coloured black, and for children who had been particularly good, a couple of ensaimadas. A pair of shoes was a real treat, as was a rag doll or a tin toy car.
In the villages of Mallorca, back in the day, shoes filled with beans were placed in the windows of houses. The beans were intended for the Kings' horses (nowadays the shoes serve a different function; for the Kings to fill them with gifts). But in a similar way to Santa Claus and Rudolph, there were no actual Kings and no actual horses. Despite their having been make-believe and despite the miserly nature of the gifts, the night of 5 January was one of great anticipation, and the following morning there would be talk as to whether the Kings and their horses had been heard.
It was to be quite some years later that the children (and indeed adults) of Mallorca's villages were to actually set sight on Kings and on the pages who provide the warm-up act a couple of days before. It is now taken as the norm and as the tradition of Three Kings that the Kings pass from house to house or dispense gifts from town halls, but their physical presence, in the villages and small towns at any rate, is a relatively recent phenomenon.
And this physical presence occurs in different ways. The arrival of the Kings all depends on where you are. My main experience of the Kings is of their coming into the old pier in Alcúdia on board the glass-bottomed boat, a means of travel which doesn't quite chime with any known tradition. But clearly the Kings have to arrive somehow, and in the coastal towns, the best way, it has been deemed, is by sea. For the old town of Alcúdia, the arrival is different. It is as part of the parade that forms in the port, pauses for a time at the port's church and then makes its way on the short journey into the town.
The parades do of course differ. Only Palma does a parade on anything like a grand scale. There again, Palma's parade was among the first and most famous of the "cabalgatas". The tradition of the parade had started in the town of Alcoy in the Alicante province in 1866, but it wasn't to be until the 1920s that it really started to catch on, and Barcelona and Palma were to the fore. Compared with Palma, parades elsewhere are more low-key but they still have their own special feel of anticipation and excitement. In Alcúdia, this is heightened by following the parade as it heads away from the port and into the old town where the Kings eventually appear on the balcony of the town hall before handing out the goods.
It is a world away from how Three Kings used to be. From the days when there were no Kings as such and when the best a kid could hope for was an orange or an ensaimada. From the days when Kings were much like Christmas in Britain. But now there is one very big difference to a British Christmas: the arrivals of the Kings, the parades, the spectacular and the excitement. A recent tradition perhaps but winter wonderful nevertheless.
And finally, you will know that there is a very small village in Mallorca called Orient. Before all the parades, the arrivals by boat and all the more recent traditions, the children of the neighbouring villages knew where the Kings came from: the hamlet of Orient. But how was it that the children of Orient and the nearby villages never saw the Kings? This was because they took their horses into the mountains, to let them graze and grow strong before they rode once again on the fifth of January. And this, everyone, is a true story of local folklore. Happy Kings!
Saturday, January 04, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Draw in the Canaries starts Mallorca's 2014
Las Palmas 2 : 2 Real Mallorca
After the week off, back to league action for Mallorca away in the Canaries at a team one above Mallorca in sixth place going in to this weekend's round of matches. A cautious opening, and then Masoud put Las Palmas ahead on 22 minutes, the home side going on to dominate the first half and taking a two-goal lead five minutes after the break through Artiles. Mallorca, though, hit back straight away, and it was Alfaro, continuing his goalscoring run, who brought one back. The game was now very much more open, and it was Mallorca who capitalised, Moreno equalising with twenty minutes left. Not a bad result for Mallorca, but the team is still not managing to impose itself in a division in which it should be doing better.
After the week off, back to league action for Mallorca away in the Canaries at a team one above Mallorca in sixth place going in to this weekend's round of matches. A cautious opening, and then Masoud put Las Palmas ahead on 22 minutes, the home side going on to dominate the first half and taking a two-goal lead five minutes after the break through Artiles. Mallorca, though, hit back straight away, and it was Alfaro, continuing his goalscoring run, who brought one back. The game was now very much more open, and it was Mallorca who capitalised, Moreno equalising with twenty minutes left. Not a bad result for Mallorca, but the team is still not managing to impose itself in a division in which it should be doing better.
MALLORCA TODAY - Open-air concerts area planned for Pollensa
The land where there had been a plan for an auditorium to be built in Pollensa will now be used for staging fairs and open-air concerts. This is Can Conill, which is currently used for parking. It is the land along the Calle Cecilio Metelo opposite what is a small park with a children's play area.
See more: Diario de Mallorca
See more: Diario de Mallorca
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 4 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.15am): 15.5C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Southwest 3 to 4 increasing 4 to 5 during the morning, 5 to 6 during the afternoon and veering West and Northwest 6 to 7 by the evening.
Mild morning, fairly cloudy, though rain likely to stay off until the evening. Wind and rough coastal conditions meaning yellow alerts are in place, the wind also a factor tomorrow but easing somewhat for the Kings' parades in the evening.
Evening update (18.15): The wind has made things colder than temperatures suggested. A high of 20.8C.
Society In Reverse: Spain's abortion reform
Strip away the religion and abortion remains an issue of morality and ethics. No one, or at least I assume no one, can ever suggest that it is an easy issue. It is not an issue which requires either men of religion (and it is of course men) or politicians to present the moral dilemma. But retain the religion and the issue is one of circumscribed moralism, of doctrinaire prescriptiveness that asserts the self-proclaimed moral authority of religion to dictate to secular society how it should think and behave. In addition, this religious assertiveness is embraced by zealous politicians eager to be bedfellows (no condoms allowed) in issuing dogma of scriptural correctness.
The reform of Spanish abortion law is the reaffirmation of the political-religious alliance of years past. It is regressive, a legislative move out of step with a changed society, which had been - the female members of it in particular - granted a greater liberalism in tune with progressive instincts of a modern Spain. But though religious doctrine is the philosophical basis for this reform, political dogma has provided the impetus. This is a reform which highlights the political divide in Spain, undoing as it does the relaxations on abortion introduced by the previous socialist government which operated according to its own dogma, one which was avowedly anti-clerical. It is a reform about the Catholic right-wing imposing its authority, regardless of changes that have occurred in society and regardless of medical opinion.
It was known that the Partido Popular government would enact the reform. It had after all filed actions against the Zapatero government's 2010 law, the one which had finally brought Spain more into line with much of Europe and which was viewed with horror by the Catholic Church, fearful of even more of its power evaporating. By removing the possibility of free choice to abort up to fourteen weeks, it is a reform which is more restrictive than that which had been in place before 2010. The Church may look upon it with delight, while the horror is on the faces of women, many health professionals and many in society who had believed that Spain had indeed thrown off the shackles of Catholic conservatism.
In theory, there could yet be amendments to the abortion bill, but in practice they are unlikely. Justice Minister Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón has ruled them out. However, he may just be moved to think again. Regional PP presidents - in Extremadura and Galicia - are among members of the PP who believe the reform goes too far.
These presidents, as well as city mayors, will be only too well aware of the potential damage that the reform could have. While the government has grappled with attempting to turn the economy around - its foremost concern - it has managed to undermine support for its austerity by engaging in legislation which casts it in a reactionary mould. To limits on protests can now be added abortion. The usual classification of the PP as "centre-right" (a questionable classification at the best of times) has been shown to be erroneous. This is a right-wing government and party, one that is displaying its historical roots. Regional presidents and mayors have every reason to be concerned that electorates will make them suffer.
Governments don't of course concentrate on single issues such as the economy. It is why they are governments. But there are times, and these are such times, when meddling in other issues appears counterproductive. It was Lord Palmerston who declared that "the function of government is to calm rather than to excite agitation." It is a reasonable maxim, but governments pay it little heed. Why enact something which will only serve to agitate an already agitated society?
In much the same way, the Balearic Government has been doing something similar with its law of symbols. It is a very different issue to abortion, granted, but would it not be a sign of wisdom to leave alone a matter which can only foment more agitation? In some respects, the attack on symbols, i.e. the Catalan flag, is far less wise than the national government's abortion reform, as it is a case of tilting at windmills. The Catalanist enemy within, if it exists, sits in a corner of Balearics society being paid little attention to. President Bauzá only succeeds in drawing the enemy into the centre of the room, all the time threatening his position and his attempts to take society with him along the course of righting economic woes.
There is a point at which political dogma and its consequent legislation become expressions of fanaticism. Abortion is most definitely not an easy issue. It is one for which there is arguably no right, only a wrong. So it becomes a question of the scale of the wrong and what drives it. When fanaticism takes the wheel and places society into reverse, only a wrong turn can be made.
The reform of Spanish abortion law is the reaffirmation of the political-religious alliance of years past. It is regressive, a legislative move out of step with a changed society, which had been - the female members of it in particular - granted a greater liberalism in tune with progressive instincts of a modern Spain. But though religious doctrine is the philosophical basis for this reform, political dogma has provided the impetus. This is a reform which highlights the political divide in Spain, undoing as it does the relaxations on abortion introduced by the previous socialist government which operated according to its own dogma, one which was avowedly anti-clerical. It is a reform about the Catholic right-wing imposing its authority, regardless of changes that have occurred in society and regardless of medical opinion.
It was known that the Partido Popular government would enact the reform. It had after all filed actions against the Zapatero government's 2010 law, the one which had finally brought Spain more into line with much of Europe and which was viewed with horror by the Catholic Church, fearful of even more of its power evaporating. By removing the possibility of free choice to abort up to fourteen weeks, it is a reform which is more restrictive than that which had been in place before 2010. The Church may look upon it with delight, while the horror is on the faces of women, many health professionals and many in society who had believed that Spain had indeed thrown off the shackles of Catholic conservatism.
In theory, there could yet be amendments to the abortion bill, but in practice they are unlikely. Justice Minister Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón has ruled them out. However, he may just be moved to think again. Regional PP presidents - in Extremadura and Galicia - are among members of the PP who believe the reform goes too far.
These presidents, as well as city mayors, will be only too well aware of the potential damage that the reform could have. While the government has grappled with attempting to turn the economy around - its foremost concern - it has managed to undermine support for its austerity by engaging in legislation which casts it in a reactionary mould. To limits on protests can now be added abortion. The usual classification of the PP as "centre-right" (a questionable classification at the best of times) has been shown to be erroneous. This is a right-wing government and party, one that is displaying its historical roots. Regional presidents and mayors have every reason to be concerned that electorates will make them suffer.
Governments don't of course concentrate on single issues such as the economy. It is why they are governments. But there are times, and these are such times, when meddling in other issues appears counterproductive. It was Lord Palmerston who declared that "the function of government is to calm rather than to excite agitation." It is a reasonable maxim, but governments pay it little heed. Why enact something which will only serve to agitate an already agitated society?
In much the same way, the Balearic Government has been doing something similar with its law of symbols. It is a very different issue to abortion, granted, but would it not be a sign of wisdom to leave alone a matter which can only foment more agitation? In some respects, the attack on symbols, i.e. the Catalan flag, is far less wise than the national government's abortion reform, as it is a case of tilting at windmills. The Catalanist enemy within, if it exists, sits in a corner of Balearics society being paid little attention to. President Bauzá only succeeds in drawing the enemy into the centre of the room, all the time threatening his position and his attempts to take society with him along the course of righting economic woes.
There is a point at which political dogma and its consequent legislation become expressions of fanaticism. Abortion is most definitely not an easy issue. It is one for which there is arguably no right, only a wrong. So it becomes a question of the scale of the wrong and what drives it. When fanaticism takes the wheel and places society into reverse, only a wrong turn can be made.
Friday, January 03, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - German man in Puerto Pollensa dies after attack in home
Kurt Schwab, a retired German businessman, aged 78, has died five days after two men attacked him in his home in Puerto Pollensa, handcuffing him and subjecting him to repeated blows. The victim's wife also suffered injuries. Nothing of any value, it would appear, was taken from the house.
See more: Diario de Mallorca
See more: Diario de Mallorca
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 3 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.00am): 13.5C
Forecast high: 20C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Southwest 3 to 4.
With southerlies dominating, very mild, and possibly quite warm today. Going downhill tomorrow though with rain coming in.
Evening update (18.15): Well, that was a warm day. A high of 22C.
1914 And All That: The Pollensa School
The war and the tensions left Mallorca relatively untouched. Its idyllic isolation was a contributory factor which made 1914 a year of importance for a very different reason to war. It was the year that art really made its mark on the island. It was the year when the Pollensa School was founded.
The Argentinian painter Francisco Bernareggi, reflecting on his time in Mallorca, said in 1949: "That landscape in Mallorca is extraordinary. You cannot imagine anything like it. Olive trees shade the beach, such as the one of the Cala de Tuent, and fishermen's boats are moored from their trunks. These are trees from the time of the Apostles. Its landscape is poetic, pictorial and musical."
The Tramuntana mountains and the coves like that of Tuent were what helped to attract painters to Mallorca. Prior to the establishment of the Pollensa School, two painters from Barcelona, Santiago Rusiñol and Joaquim Mir, had come to Mallorca; the first time was in 1893. They stayed in Pollensa and Cala San Vicente as well as in Sa Calobra, Palma and Valldemossa. Rusiñol it was who was instrumental in another painter from Barcelona, Hermenegildo Anglada Camarasa, coming to the island. It was Camarasa and the Argentinian Tito Cittadini who were to create the "school" in 1914.
Though the Pollensa School became the most important artistic movement on the island, a Deyá School had been formed some years earlier. Bernareggi was one of this group. So Mallorca had been gaining a reputation during the early years of the twentieth century, and for painters who were predominantly based in Paris, like Camarasa, Mallorca offered a location well away from the gathering turmoil in Europe. It was tranquil, it was isolated, it was beautiful, it was idyllic. It was a painters' paradise. Removed from the horrors of war, Mallorca was paradise and utopia and the Pollensa School was its pictorial chronicler.
It can't be underestimated how important this artistic movement was not only to the world of art. In the history of the Fomento del Turismo (the Mallorca Tourist Board), which was nine years old at the outbreak of war, art played a very significant role in the development of tourism. The war meant that there was little by way of tourism, but the output of what became known as the Pollensa School and the "American artists" was extremely useful to the tourist board in spreading the name of Mallorca. The school was doubly important in this regard because the war meant that the island was deprived of the person who had been, up to this point, the prime promoter of Mallorca, the honorary president of the tourist board Archduke Luis Salvador, who was recalled to Prague (and indeed died in 1915).
These American artists were central and southern Americans. In addition to Cittadini, there was, for example, the Mexican Roberto Montenegro and yet another Argentinian, Roberto Ramaugé. These two had close links with, respectively, Puerto Pollensa and Formentor. Montenegro stayed at the Hotel Miramar, which had opened in 1912, and mainly paid by donating paintings to the hotel. Ramaugé bought the Punta Avançada on the Formentor promontory, and with it came Sa Fortalesa, which became a base for all manner of artists. As well as Camarasa, Cittadini, Rusiñol and Mir, visitors included the Argentinian poet Adan Diehl, and he was to be behind the Hotel Formentor, which opened its doors in 1929. Another visitor to Sa Fortalesa was the Spanish classical guitarist, Andrés Segovia.
Rather like the Archduke, who had invited various intellectuals, artists, scientists and others to the Miramar in Valldemossa in the nineteenth century, so Ramaugé and his fellow artists created a centre of artistic excellence in Pollensa. The founding of the "school" by Camarasa and Cittadini in 1914 had been the impetus behind this and behind also an artistic and cultural tradition that Pollensa has enjoyed ever since. 1914 was an important year therefore, the year when the Pollensa School started, though the actual title of the Pollensa School was not, or so it would appear, coined until 1916. It was a journalist called Pedro Ferrer, who had a close relationship with Camarasa, Montenegro and others, who seemingly first used it in a book published in Barcelona which was called, oddly enough, "Flirt".
Photo: Mountain by Hermen Anglada Camarasa.
Thursday, January 02, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 2 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.15am): 14C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Southwest 4 increasing 5 at intervals and also easing 3 occasionally.
A much warmer morning. Due to be mostly sunny. Fine tomorrow but rain due to come in on Saturday.
Evening update (19.00): A high of 17.7C on a day that has been a mix of cloud and occasional sun.
What Has Happened To Malén Ortiz?
Though a small place, people can disappear in Mallorca. They may disappear without any crime having taken place, but it is hard to say categorically that no crime has occurred. One thinks of Jacqueline Tennant, the rep who disappeared over six years ago when she was out hiking on a day off from the hotel at which she was based in Can Picafort. Her body has never been found. It may never be found. And one says that there is a body to be found with just ever such a slight doubt. Might she actually be alive? It would seem very unlikely. It is unlikely there was any foul play, though who can say for sure? The most likely explanation for her disappearance is that she met with an accident in the mountains. She may have fallen into the sea. No one knows.
Malén Ortiz wasn't in the mountains. She was near to her school in Calvia. Just after three o'clock on the afternoon of 2 December, she phoned her boyfriend to arrange to go to his house for something to eat. She then left a text message for her father to tell him where she was going. A security camera, viewed some days after she had disappeared, recorded her movement, heading in the direction of Son Ferrer where Dani, her boyfriend, lives. Another camera, close by, did not record her movement.
Initially, Malén's disappearance bore all the hallmarks of a problem at home. She lives with her father Alejandro and younger brother. The parents are separated. Her mother was in Thailand when she went missing. Both parents pleaded for her to come home, the mother saying that Malén could come and live with her if she no longer wanted to live with her father. The assumption that was being made was that Malén was staying with someone. That she was a runaway. That she had gone missing voluntarily.
A month on and this hypothesis is shot to pieces. Police have been searching small manmade lakes in the Son Ferrer area; they have been searching in the sea. They have looked for her in a flat in the Es Pil-lari area of Palma, having apparently found a message on social media that came from the girl. She wasn't there. They have even searched for Malén in the Son Banya district of Palma, the neighbourhood notorious for its drug dealing and drugs gangs. And to make the story stranger, "El Ico", one of the La Paca clan, the chief gang in Son Banya, has offered a reward for information that will lead to her being found. Her father says that he came into contact with El Ico purely because of Malén disappearance; he wanted to help. Investigators were nevertheless surprised by El Ico's intervention.
The search for Malén has drawn criticism. The hypothesis that she had gone missing voluntarily may have been why the search was suspended for a weekend. The indications were, those that were being discussed in the media and social media, that the police expected her to be found. But these indications proved to be false. The search effort has intensified over the past few days. The voluntary disappearance theory looked ever more shaky when the two video recordings were taken into account.
Four days after she went missing, Teresa Palmer, who is the government delegate for the Balearics and so the person ultimately responsible for police and security matters in Mallorca, reiterated the view that Malén had left home and that she had acted "voluntarily". Alejandro Ortiz did not subscribe to this view, even if he and family and friends posted a video on YouTube calling for her to come home.
It wasn't until just about Christmas Day that the official line changed decisively. Malén's disappearance had not been voluntary. Meantime, on 20 December, there was an attempted abduction of an 18-year-old girl in Sa Pobla. It may have had nothing to do with Malén, but it inspired Alejandro Ortiz to issue a third video, one calling on the people of Mallorca to help find her. It was now being openly admitted that Malén had probably been kidnapped.
Small place Mallorca may be, but people can disappear. Malén Ortiz, though, is not a woman in her forties who in all likelihood had a terrible accident. She is a fifteen-year-old schoolgirl who was on her way to have lunch with her boyfriend. A month on, the runaway hypothesis having been dismissed, serious questions have to be asked.
Wednesday, January 01, 2014
MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 1 January 2014
No Frills Excursions
Morning high (8.15am): 8C
Forecast high: 16C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): West 3 to 4 backing Southwest 4 to 5 later.
A cold New Year's Day morning. Clear skies with sun during the day. For the rest of the week, staying fine and getting a bit warmer.
Evening update (19.45): A high of 18.9C, so pretty warm for the first of January.
Mallorca In 2014 ... Just Like 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010 ... ?
Tradition demands that the end of the old year and the start of the new year are celebrated by looks back at the old year and looks forward to the new. I have indulged in both over the past seven years but not fastidiously. If I could be bothered, I did; if I couldn't be bothered, I didn't. But being curious as to what I might or might not have said, I have delved into the archives, starting with awards for 2006.
Notable among these was the Special Bryan Adams Award For Murdering What Was Already Lousy Music. It went to the Ecuadorean pipe players who still insist on putting in appearances on market days. The award went to them because, as I had observed on 27 May, 2006: "The next time I’m trying to avoid a market and I hear the strains of canned Ecuadorean “Everything I Do ...” piping its way across a hot square, I will take one of the offending pipes and oblige by indeed doing it for them and placing it in a part of the anatomy perfectly moulded and sculpted to accept a pipe". There was also the First Choice Contribution To Local Culture Award. It went to a rep at a hotel in Puerto Pollensa, one which is barely a minute's walk from the pinewalk. She had, by this time, been at the hotel for a couple of months. Rep: “What’s this photo of?” Me: "The Calvari steps." Rep: "And this?" Me: "The pinewalk, here in Puerto Pollensa." Rep: "Oh yes, I must go there some time."
It took a couple of years for me to be bothered again, and so at the start of 2009 I offered some predictions for the year ahead. Only one of them sort of proved to be correct, though the effects of crisis on fiestas didn't really hurt hard until the following year. "The economic crisis will hit the annual fiestas hard. Firework displays are cancelled, but everyone is given a sparkler." Other predictions were, sadly, wrong.
"1. The British Government, as part of its anti-obesity drive, realises that a major contribution to the nation's lard mountain is the Alcúdia and Can Picafort all-inclusive. A short waddle from the lift to the pool, and that's the exercise for the day, save for one belly-flop that creates a parting of the pool's waves. Otherwise, the only other movements of the already lard-bucket chav ASBO cases are to raise an arm in order to cram ever more pizza and grease and watered-down lager and, therefore ever more fatness, into their gobs, from which emanates some occasional vomit or an admonishing shout directed at a hideous and equally voluminous offspring as it prepares to shit in the aforementioned pool. Step forward, consequently, HM Government with an order via Brussels to ban all all-inclusives.
"2. Alcúdia's Mile will be decreed a site of international heritage and cultural importance. And because they can't raise the money to effect the re-development, the old power station, rather than a science and technology museum, will become a giant bouncy castle.
"3. Albufera is turned into the world's largest water theme park. And just to make things more interesting, they release a bunch of crocodiles as well."
At the end of 2010, I wrote an article entitled "The Year Of Living Corruptly". I suppose this could have applied to any year over the past God knows how long, but 2010 it was, and the article contained quotes from the spokesperson for the new political party, the UPyD (it was three years old then). "The Balearics have the highest number of people who are corrupt or allegedly corrupt per square metre in Spain." He then reeled off a list of cases, all of them ongoing, and concluded by saying that all the main executive and legislative bodies in the islands are implicated along with various individuals - "businesspeople who are friends of certain politicians, businesspeople who assemble companies in order to receive adjudications decided by their political friends, as well as the wives, husbands, cousins and nephews of politicians".
For 2011, I forecast that it would be the same procedure as every year, borrowing the hilarious (sic) line from the unfunniest comedy ever made, "Dinner For One", the popularity of which among Germans says much about cultural differences when it comes to comedy. What did 2011 hold? Moans about all-inclusives, for example. And talk of protests. Complaints about dog mess in Puerto Pollensa, about the price of car rental, about the price of a cup of coffee. The same procedure as every year.
In 2012, there were no predictions, but right at the start of that year there was an article which might now seem vaguely prophetic. It started thus: "Are you aware that in twenty years time half the world's population will be homosexual?" This was what two leading figures in the Catholic Church were saying, taking aim at both UNESCO and the former Zapatero government and alleged pink liberalism. What seems prophetic now is that, despite Pope Francis having ushered in a humbler and more tolerant Church, the now Spanish Government appears to want to turn the clock back to the days when it was the Vatican's standard-bearer for Catholic fundamentalism. I hesitate to suggest, however, that 2014 will witness a return to the Inquisition, so exclude this possibility from my predictions for this year. Instead, I forecast that this year there will be complaints about a lack of winter tourism, about a lack of flights to and from Palma in winter, about all-inclusives, about holiday rentals. Same procedure as every year, except for President Bauzá being ousted in the Balearics. Well, that at least would be interesting ...
Notable among these was the Special Bryan Adams Award For Murdering What Was Already Lousy Music. It went to the Ecuadorean pipe players who still insist on putting in appearances on market days. The award went to them because, as I had observed on 27 May, 2006: "The next time I’m trying to avoid a market and I hear the strains of canned Ecuadorean “Everything I Do ...” piping its way across a hot square, I will take one of the offending pipes and oblige by indeed doing it for them and placing it in a part of the anatomy perfectly moulded and sculpted to accept a pipe". There was also the First Choice Contribution To Local Culture Award. It went to a rep at a hotel in Puerto Pollensa, one which is barely a minute's walk from the pinewalk. She had, by this time, been at the hotel for a couple of months. Rep: “What’s this photo of?” Me: "The Calvari steps." Rep: "And this?" Me: "The pinewalk, here in Puerto Pollensa." Rep: "Oh yes, I must go there some time."
It took a couple of years for me to be bothered again, and so at the start of 2009 I offered some predictions for the year ahead. Only one of them sort of proved to be correct, though the effects of crisis on fiestas didn't really hurt hard until the following year. "The economic crisis will hit the annual fiestas hard. Firework displays are cancelled, but everyone is given a sparkler." Other predictions were, sadly, wrong.
"1. The British Government, as part of its anti-obesity drive, realises that a major contribution to the nation's lard mountain is the Alcúdia and Can Picafort all-inclusive. A short waddle from the lift to the pool, and that's the exercise for the day, save for one belly-flop that creates a parting of the pool's waves. Otherwise, the only other movements of the already lard-bucket chav ASBO cases are to raise an arm in order to cram ever more pizza and grease and watered-down lager and, therefore ever more fatness, into their gobs, from which emanates some occasional vomit or an admonishing shout directed at a hideous and equally voluminous offspring as it prepares to shit in the aforementioned pool. Step forward, consequently, HM Government with an order via Brussels to ban all all-inclusives.
"2. Alcúdia's Mile will be decreed a site of international heritage and cultural importance. And because they can't raise the money to effect the re-development, the old power station, rather than a science and technology museum, will become a giant bouncy castle.
"3. Albufera is turned into the world's largest water theme park. And just to make things more interesting, they release a bunch of crocodiles as well."
At the end of 2010, I wrote an article entitled "The Year Of Living Corruptly". I suppose this could have applied to any year over the past God knows how long, but 2010 it was, and the article contained quotes from the spokesperson for the new political party, the UPyD (it was three years old then). "The Balearics have the highest number of people who are corrupt or allegedly corrupt per square metre in Spain." He then reeled off a list of cases, all of them ongoing, and concluded by saying that all the main executive and legislative bodies in the islands are implicated along with various individuals - "businesspeople who are friends of certain politicians, businesspeople who assemble companies in order to receive adjudications decided by their political friends, as well as the wives, husbands, cousins and nephews of politicians".
For 2011, I forecast that it would be the same procedure as every year, borrowing the hilarious (sic) line from the unfunniest comedy ever made, "Dinner For One", the popularity of which among Germans says much about cultural differences when it comes to comedy. What did 2011 hold? Moans about all-inclusives, for example. And talk of protests. Complaints about dog mess in Puerto Pollensa, about the price of car rental, about the price of a cup of coffee. The same procedure as every year.
In 2012, there were no predictions, but right at the start of that year there was an article which might now seem vaguely prophetic. It started thus: "Are you aware that in twenty years time half the world's population will be homosexual?" This was what two leading figures in the Catholic Church were saying, taking aim at both UNESCO and the former Zapatero government and alleged pink liberalism. What seems prophetic now is that, despite Pope Francis having ushered in a humbler and more tolerant Church, the now Spanish Government appears to want to turn the clock back to the days when it was the Vatican's standard-bearer for Catholic fundamentalism. I hesitate to suggest, however, that 2014 will witness a return to the Inquisition, so exclude this possibility from my predictions for this year. Instead, I forecast that this year there will be complaints about a lack of winter tourism, about a lack of flights to and from Palma in winter, about all-inclusives, about holiday rentals. Same procedure as every year, except for President Bauzá being ousted in the Balearics. Well, that at least would be interesting ...
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