But I Could Have Told You, Vincent

Location-wise, Euro 2008 may have all the tweeness of a "Heidi" novel, the starchy haughtiness and death-by-cake of a Viennese coffee house or the Edelweiss-ing schlock of a Von Trapp family climbing every mountain to escape into Switzerland, but many a European tribe has wisely chosen to give a wide berth to being woken at five in the morning by an Ermintrude clangling her bell outside an Alpine chalet. They have eschewed the über-cleanliness, the cuckoo clock and the waltz in favour of savouring the moment of defeat or perhaps even victory in the altogether less refined surroundings of a Mallorcan bar.

A glance at the list of participating countries finds that a goodly dozen provide succour to the Mallorcan tourism industry. Only the Croats, the Greeks, the Turks and the Romanians fail to register on the tour operators' coach-transfer itineraries, though the Romanians have pitched up in the guise of hordes of itinerant workers or those banned from computer shops.

But amongst the various nations who will be represented in Mallorca during Euro 2008, special word should be reserved for the Poles who, though relative newcomers to the Premier League of the island's tourism, have begun a process of tourism-land annexation of which their neighbours (those of the G-country) would be proud. And moreover, they are colonising not discarded and unwanted parts in the vicinity of The Mile but the genteel place that time forgot, Cala San Vicente. Yes, the Cala is now officially part of Poland, and I know this thanks to my mole all things Cala St. Vince, Tomas from Marinas. Given that he has a bar opposite, I suppose he does have a bit of an angle on the whole deal, but, in the wake of the Don Pedro having been all-inclusivised for some years now and also stubbornly refusing to be demolished, the Simar, also arming the wrists of its clientele with the stigma of the wristband, has been taken over by Poles. Which is not to say that the Poles should not have taken it over, but is to say or rather ask - are they expected to drive their own buses and kit out their own bathrooms? Tempting though it might be to suggest that hotels provide them with flat-packs and some items of porcelain from the local B&Q equivalent and then set them to work, this would of course mean succumbing to stereotyping - as in all Poles drive buses or are plumbers. And that would never do.

Yet having arrived in Cala St. Vince, our Polish friends will not be frequenting that Mallorcan bar to watch and suffer further defeat at the feet of the Germans. They will not because they are all-inclusive. It matters not from where the tourist comes or not that that tourist has barely a euro, a pound or zloty to rub between them, as all-inclusive places no premium on a well-stocked wallet. And talking of feet, if Cala St. Vince had any, it might well be argued that the mini-resort that it is would be dying on them. Here is a place that should be ringfenced with all-exclusivity and not fencing off part of its hotel stock and clientele into all-inclusivity. One might be able to make an argument that justifies all-inclusives in a place as widespread and large (in relative terms) as Puerto Alcúdia, but in St. Vince it cannot make any sense; indeed I would suggest that it borders on the irresponsible. Which is in no way to deny the Polish their place in the Mallorcan sun; just that it would be nice, were there much sun at the moment, for them to be enjoying it by packing the local bars and eateries while supporting the national team.


QUIZ
Chain - King Crimson (Greg Lake), The Nice (Keith Emerson), therefore Emerson Lake and Palmer. And what other "super group (?)" came out of ELP? Yesterday's title - Half Man Half Biscuit (see this here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=na12OyJEgJ8). Today's title - who?

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A Dukla Prague Away Kit

This would not be this blog were it not to preview the impending European Championships. Football is Mallorcan life, well bar-life anyway, and this blog of course reflects all human life in Mallorca and some which isn't.

But then I ask myself, should I rise above all this BBC-desperation who will you support for God's sake we've stumped up a Ronaldo salary to get the rights so we're going to make damn sure those saps tune in malarkey? Of course I should. The real Euro football angle we should be adopting is that it is better to not take part. Ah yes, remember those good old days before the Second World War when England thumbed a nose, a laced leather ball the weight of several house bricks and a baggy pair of shorts that could accommodate much of The Mile's belly fraternity to the rest of the world in the sure knowledge that England, had they deigned to turn up, would have walked it, or perhaps even run off with it. Or even those good old days like the '74 and '78 World Cups and various Euros as well. Let Johnny-Rep foreigner battle it out on the footy pitch while we're lounging on the beaches of Mallorca. You can have your total football or your catenaccio; we could, were we bothered, take the field having bucketed some sangria and had it all done by half-time.

Maybe I should, but I can't. There is something that stirs deep in my football soul that is forever European. Whereas others waited once every four weeks or so by the letter box for the paper boy to deposit the "Football Monthly"-fattened daily blah, my monthly anticipation was for a slimmer work - "World Soccer". I attribute this contra-convention of pre- and early adolescent non-peer group football reading to one event - Hungary versus Czechoslovakia in the '62 World Cup, a game viewed in the graininess of dodgy black and white transmission, a celebration less of central and eastern European Soviet bloc soccer skill and technique but more of the strange-named. Hungary may be the Nottingham Forest of European football - a 15 or 90 minutes of fame in the footballing floodlights and the long ball of mediocrity ever since - but it was they and their curiously-monikered continental team mates that fanned a fandom of pan-European football. Oh my Ujpest Dosza, my Hadjuk Split, my Dukla Prague of youth.

Sad the young of today deprived of the fleeting moments of European football mystery and appellations by the familiarity brought not only by the foreign presence in the domestic game but also by the fact of the bloke fixing the domestic appliance who would, in an earlier era, have been lumping the ball for Gornik Zabrze.

As for this year's championships, I frankly couldn't care less who wins. As I feed from the generosity of its land, then Spain and a Spanish triumph would be satisfying were it not for the fact that, in winning, Spain would cast off its underachieving achievement, one that it has fought long and hard to preserve - just like England. The best thing about Euro 2008 is that Danny Baker is being restored to 6-0-6. Forget your Mellors, your Littlejohns, your Greens; this is football as it should be with one eye on the oddball or even the odd ball.


QUIZ
Chain - Toyah Willcox was in Quadrophenia and is married to Robert Fripp, he of King Crimson. And what links King Crimson and The Nice? Yesterday's title - no not Niall Quinn, it was Keane, "Maps" (see this here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6JEyWrpmxw). Today's title - which group wanted this for Christmas?

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A Long, Long Way From Where I Am Supposed To Be

I like these little tourist stories folk are sending in. Here's another one from Charles:

'Dog walking late yesterday afternoon, a youngish couple in the ubiquitous hire-car (you know the type, no hub caps, blazing headlights complete with two ill-behaved children in the rear). "Hey mate, you English?" "Yes", I replied. "Where are we?" "Well, you are now heading for Formentor and if you wish to continue, carry on to the Cap and on a clear day you'll see Menorca, fantastic and spectacular views," I replied. "Nah" said one of the brats, "that sounds boring." Bending down a bit more to speak to the driver I noticed one of those Sat-Nav things on the window, a compulsory gizmo that seems to be a must-have for every driving tourist nowadays. "Surely that thing shows your whereabouts?" I asked. "Would do mate but the effing battery is dead."

'Now bear in mind that this oaf has pulled up fifty metres or so on the Formentor road from the roundabout by the Port Football Club and has zilch chance of reversing. I too am risking life and limb with a quivering canine lump by my side, as the traffic squeezes past my protruding arse. "Look, the most sensible thing you can do is drive up to the top, pull of the road, and look at your map," I said. Wait for it...

' "Map, what map? Tossed that into the bin a couple of days ago." Bloody hell, this guy is heading back to Can Pic to a hotel he has forgotten the name of and had no recollection of how he got here or where he was heading! Anyway I gave him directions to Alcudia, but he had never heard of that place either!

And the season has started...'


Apart from the rich vein of humour and discussion that can be extracted from the local hire-car industry (and one day I may well), here is enough stuff with which to conduct an entire seminar - indeed a whole semester's worth of seminars - regarding tourist behaviour. But for now, I shall limit myself to two matters of importance - maps and mates.

Firstly to maps. Not only whole rainforests, my friends, but the entire Finnish pulp industry are co-opted to produce local maps. Walk into a hotel lobby and the machete of a rainforest is required to cut through the growth of maps to be encountered. Tour operators have diversified their business - they are now publishers of maps. Everywhere, maps and more maps. So many maps, and so many thrown into the bin. Someone who once worked for a major UK tour operator told me of the job that it was to collect the discarded maps on the transfer coach from the airport.

And yet a map is almost a pre-requisite for the visitor, you might have thought. But maybe they don't teach maps any longer. Maybe that's the reason. "What's this?" "A map." "Dunno about that." When I was at school there were two things you learned in geography - maps and oxbow lakes, the former singularly useful, the latter singularly useless, unless there happens to be an oxbow lake on a map, which in the case of Mallorca there is alas but not one example.

And secondly, mates, as in the use of "mate". Everyone is a mate, so much so that it comes as a surprise, a shock even, when one is not a mate. This morning I was heading towards the Vanity Golf hotel in Puerto Alcúdia. From the beach came a group - males of bellydom and a Kylie or two with baby-buggies. One of the chaps spoke. "Excuse me, sir." Sir!? Sir, sir!? So universal has mate become, that I had quite forgotten about sir. I was hugely impressed. The only time I have been addressed as sir in Mallorca has been by Spaniards; the British never, until today. I shall reciprocate. From now on, I shall only use sir or "my good man", and all bar owners will be referred to as "landlord". Anyway, the gentleman (see, not bad this formal language) enquired as to the location of the nearest bank. You need a map, my good man, I thought, wishing only to send him off in his search for a local finance house replete with a geographical representation of where such an establishment might be found. But I didn't. For next to us was ... a bank.


QUIZ
Chain - Mark Wingett, who played DC Carver in The Bill, was Jimmy's mate in Quadrophenia. And how do you get from Quadrophenia to King Crimson?Yesterday's title - Peter Gabriel, "Games Without Frontiers". (See this here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bz-qeJOo7cs). Today's title - who? Think Sunderland FC.

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Hans Plays With Lotte, Lotte Plays With Jane

"The Germans". This was the title of one of the so-few "Fawlty Towers" episodes. It was a title that needed no further explanation. Despite Basil's demands that the war was not to be mentioned, he, of course, succumbed to his own mania and climaxed with the famous silly walk and the finger for a moustache. The Germans. The war or some sense of the war still seems to pervade British attitudes towards the Germans; this and a series of steps that undermined the British claim to superiority, punctuated only too rarely by some British "victory", e.g. 1966. The German post-war economic miracle; German manufacturing and cars; German dominance of a Europe, the Brits were too haughty to join until it was too late; German football (despite 1966 and 5-1 in Munich); and, perhaps most importantly, Germans on holiday. Everywhere the Brit goes, he is reminded of German achievement and has only the sad memory of war with which to fight back.

The convenience of cliché holds that the Germans are arrogant; as if the same could not be said for the British. I once lived among Germans. They are not arrogant; selfish perhaps, rather unaware of things outside themselves, but arrogant? I don't think so. The Germans are also often portrayed as being rude. Again this is a fallacious categorisation; it is largely founded on a more direct style of speech that manifests itself in a general mode of behaviour. But it is not rudeness; no more so than the British can be rude, anyway.

Recently, there was a sort of lifestyle report about the Germans. One of its findings was that Germans are very conformist; going to Mallorca on holiday was one aspect thereof. There is a degree of truth in this. Individualism does not sit easily with Germans. I knew one German chap. Long-haired, he was dubbed the "space cowboy". Yet he worked in a very traditional industry, surrounded by very conformist colleagues. He himself liked to declare that his hair and his style of dress demonstrated his individualism. He clearly was "individual" in that he looked very different, but he still felt the need to state that he was being individual.

Many German males, from a young age, adopt a look of conformity; it can be noticed by the desperate desire to sprout facial hair even when this is of a "fluffy" variety (albeit that there is, according to "Blackadder", no word in German for fluffy). Yet Germans are far from being alone in the desire to conform. God knows, look along The Mile and you will find enough Brit conformity to fit Wembley Stadium; and indeed that would be where many of them might otherwise be found: the close crop, the tattoo, the arms in slightly gorilla or George W. Bush pose and varying degrees of bellydom. Nations and tribes are suffused by conformity; it just differs in its style. Yet the German male shares something in common with his British counterpart - size. It's that bellydom. The German word for big is "gross"; pronounced differently but it has travelled into English with ease, even if the English took the word from the French.

The Brits and the Germans share an awful lot; the English are, after all, basically Germans. But for all there is historical closeness, there is also historical difference and enmity. There is a touch of the I'm not racist but attitude towards the Germans. This translates as oh of course the war was a long time ago and I know some Germans are very nice but. And nowhere is this more in evidence than by the pools or in the hotels or bars of Mallorca.

I am amazed at some comments and questions one reads. People do ask - "what about the Germans?"; they do comment about the Germans at their hotel. Why on Earth are we so obsessed by this? And now we have the ultimate absurdity, that of compensation granted to a British holidaymaker because there were too many Germans and there was too much German language whilst he was in Greece.

"The Sun" and the German paper "Bild" have long engaged in jibes across the Channel. "Bild", responding to the compensation victory, has asked whether German holidaymakers can be recompensed if there are too many Englishmen. Apparently not, and it quotes a representative of one travel firm who says that the best solution is to avoid "well-known English holiday citadels". In Mallorca, it may come as no surprise that Magaluf takes pride of place. But where else does? Yep, sedate, nice, charming old Puerto Pollensa; even a place with a reputation for well-behaved English abroad does not escape the great Germano-British divide. I hope that Pollensa town hall isn't planning on a Ç-based marketing blitz to attract Hans and Helga from Hannover. It would be money ill-spent, now that the German press has branded the resort a no-go area for its citizens.

You know, maybe they should just ban all beach towels.

(N.B. "Bild" references are from "The Times".)


QUIZ
Chain - The "Men Behaving Badly" in-joke was when Tony asked Debs if she'd ever seen "Quadrophenia" with Sting playing the bell-boy. Debs said she hadn't. Leslie Ash starred in "Quadrophenia". And what's Quadrophenia's link with "The Bill"? Yesterday's title - John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John, "Summer Nights". Today's title - where's this from?

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Tell Me More

One of those catching-up days, with feedback on a number of things - cleanliness, tourism strategy and the Pollensa Ç carry-on. Oh, and weather, the least said about, quite honestly, the better. Except they say it will be better from tomorrow, and it may well be, but they've been saying that for at least a fortnight.

Firstly, to cleanliness, and Geoff confirms that a clean bill of health for a toilet is a sure guarantor of repeat patronage. His wife has a scoring system for loo cleanliness, with those receiving "nul point" or not many being relegated from the Bar-Restaurant Premier (though they were probably only Conference level to begin with). Like "Strictly Come Dancing" or ice-skating, there should be panels of tourists trekking to and from toilets with their score cards and holding them aloft post-pan pointing. Here therefore is another thing for bars etc to consider when next putting together their publicity: "We have clean toilets"; "The cleanest loos in ..." Another sure winner like the "we have number ones" of the haircut piece of a while back. Beats "specialists in meat" any day.

Secondly, the whole business about tourism diversification. And here's what John has to say:
"I see from a number of your blog entries that the tourist authorities are getting worried about maintaining visitor numbers to Mallorca. Having visited the island many times and lived there for a period, it is abundantly clear where the problem areas are.
"Just as with the acting fraternity, tourist destinations get type-cast and as you rightly point out, 30 years of mass tourism have left Mallorca with the image of sun, sand and surf. Then, of course, the towns like Arenal and Magaluf and the greasy mile in Alcúdia have added big-belly-boozer to the image. Printing posters that say 'golf and fine dining' aren't going to make much of a dent. Mallorca is not exactly on the gastronomic route in Europe. I believe you made a good point to me once, when you said that they should concentrate on making Mallorca a winter destination as well. This would require putting in suitable weather-proof entertainment. Maybe a small Disney Land somewhere.
"The authorities need to work out their demographics and see which groups make up the main tourist numbers and if they are British and German, which I am certain they will be, then for heaven's sake make the place language friendly. I came across with my tennis racquet but despite all efforts never came close to getting a game. The tennis complex on Crta. Arta (Puerto Alcúdia) is a ghost town. The office is always closed and when I asked some youngsters who were playing there for some information, they said they just slipped in and played a game and then left. No one was ever able to give me any information.
"I can just imagine what these so-called think tanks are like. A bunch of insular pro-Catalan/Mallorquín civil servants trying to coin catchy slogans. I can see all the signage changing to Catalan to add to the confusion that already exists, with different town names depending on which map you have. Mallorca will not easily lose its present image, and indeed does it want to, as this brings in a fair amount of revenue. It needs a dual image, and I believe that if it develops the infrastructure and the marketing promotion needed for a winter destination, this will gradually drag over into the summer season. They should hurry as countries like Croatia and Montenegro are starting to stir."

Well, some of this does rather reinforce some of what I'm been saying. I should point out that the current think tank, that one convened by the British Consul, is, save for the presence perhaps of IBATUR, the tourism promotion unit, not comprised of local civil servants, even if the stamp of local thinking is inked into other aspects of tourism promotion, like the Pollensa Ç. Which brings me to the third piece of feedback.

Seamus wonders if any "bright spark" might have thought about the letter P rather than the Ç, which would have been a suitably fine piece of mis-promotion in the sense that the P is universally known as a symbol for Parking, which, as anyone knows, there is an absence of in Pollensa. "P - Come to Pollensa and Park." He also wonders about the cock as in like the one on the roundabout, but now it's mentioned, I thought the cock was the Pollensa symbol. Did it not used to be? Maybe it still is. Perhaps though there was a rare display of cross-cultural and linguistic understanding in that "cock" may not be the most appropriate word for the British. Apart from the obvious, there is also the expression "a load of cock". Another c-letter, not far removed from ç.

At a rather more official level, the singularly un-Catalan-sounding Cathy Sweeney, speaking for a body behind the Catalan language, says that the adoption of the Ç to promote the Balearic language should not interfere with Pollensa's tourism promotion and also that the letter cannot be registered as a "brand name". Precisely.


QUIZ
Chain - Another film by The Who was "Quadrophenia" in which Sting played the Ace Face. Not so much a chain question, but what is the in-joke about Sting in Quadrophenia in the "Men Behaving Badly" special where Gary takes them to Worthing? Yesterday's title - Camera Obscura. (See this at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiLh9rkvjac). Today's title - where's this from?

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Keep It Clean

Cleanliness is next to Godliness. Who coined this expression? John Wesley is probably the best bet even if the original is Hebrew. Doesn't really matter. The religious dimension doesn't feature in the running of a bar; well, not normally. But cleanliness does and should.

I recall that some years ago Honda made a point of cleanliness being at the centre of its overall quality management. The company still does make a point of it. Founder Soichiro Honda is quoted as saying that "superior products don't result from an attitude that allows disarray, untidiness and uncleanliness in the work environment". From this obsession with cleanliness comes an "attitude and environment that is productive and efficient, organised and reliable".

(Quotes from an article by Paul V. Arnold, "Case Study: The Honda Way", www.reliableplant.com)

Japanese manufacturing practices may seem a million miles away from the average local bar, but they do offer lessons nevertheless. In addition to an efficient production environment, Honda seeks to create a place of work that people enjoy and therefore makes them more content and more productive. Cleanliness is one aspect of this. The company also wants to let its customers know and see that it operates such a clean working environment. Staff and customers.

This all started to come to mind when I was speaking today with Kevin and Jane at JK's in Puerto Pollensa. This bar does well. I asked what they attribute the bar's success to. There are a number of factors, but one that came shining through, literally I guess, was cleanliness. To be honest, I had never really given this aspect of a bar much attention. I suppose I would if a place was unclean, but as a sort of selling point for a bar I wouldn't have placed it high on the list. But I'm not necessarily like others. I have heard this cleanliness angle elsewhere in respect of bars; cleanliness and uncleanliness. I have heard of people opting not to return to a bar because of a lack of cleanliness. People do rate it as being important.

I was given an example. Couple come in, order a couple of Pepsi's, sit down for a minute or so and then one goes to the loo, comes back, says something approving about the cleanliness and then they order something to eat. Cleanliness is next to Godliness and next to the goodliness of the bar.

All this emphasis on "clean" shouldn't come as a surprise. Look around reviews and you will often find cleanliness or filth being commented on. I know of a restaurant in Puerto Pollensa where a new owner took over this year and spent a tidy sum on rectifying the unedifying state of the loos.

Coming back to JKs, one of the other points they made was that they have a reputation for reliability in a variety of ways. What was it in one of those quotes about Honda? The last word in the second quote - "reliable". And perhaps that should be the last word about bars and their success.


QUIZ
Chain - The Elton-The Who connection was "Pinball Wizard". Elton was in the film of "Tommy" and how do you get from "Tommy" to Sting? Yesterday's title - The Boxtops. (See this at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-z8RCfnWPOo). Today's title - lovely song by an underrated Glasgow indie band.

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The Letter

One of those fine daft little local rumpuses has cropped up in Pollensa. This one has to do with the c-cedilla (Ç).

Some of you may recall my speaking about Pollensa town hall's adoption of Ç as its tourism symbol. You can see it around and about; it's even used to draw attention to the useless www.pollensa.com, the town hall's website that cannot integrate the Ç into the domain address - so much for joined-up marketing thinking. The Ç will, for many an overseas visitor, be more symbolic of France, but it is also Catalan, and Pollença is the Catalan spelling for something that everyone else spells Pollensa. The Ç branding is an exercise in parochial marketing - it is introspective and singular in its affinity to a Catalan-understanding audience (unless you also count the French). Quite what it is meant to "say" about Pollensa (or indeed Pollença) is anyone's guess, other than declaring "we've got a Ç and you haven't", the only problem being that, unfortunately, the Pollensa Ç is not unique among place names in Mallorca, among tourist place names in Mallorca - Santa Ponsa is also cedilla-ised in Catalan. Maybe Alcúdia should brand itself Ú.

Anyway, the rumpus has to do with the confusion that is likely to be caused, so they reckon, by the fact that the Ç has also been adopted as the symbol to promote the Balearic islands' own language. Pollensa town hall wants such confusion to be avoided, and says that the Ç is a registered logo for Pollensa tourism. That it may be the symbol for this tourism, questionable in its sensibleness though it may also be, is not in dispute, though how a letter can be deemed a proprietary logo I'm not entirely sure. It would be a bit like Manchester saying that the letter "M" belongs to the city and to the city alone, whereas we all know that it belongs to James Bond. The alphabet, unlike brand names or branded abbreviations, is public property.

I'm not sure what the French make of all this, even if they know about it. Ç has international linguistic currency as being French. If anyone should be jealously guarding the letter, then it should be the French and their language police. The linguistic purpose of the cedilla is to denote that the sound is sibilant, i.e. a hiss; the local difficulty in Pollensa has all the air, or rather discordant air, of a hissy-fit.


I'm afraid to have to return to the subject of road accidents and to the notorious stretch of road along the coast between Alcúdia and Puerto Pollensa. The other night there was a head-on collision between a taxi and a car being driven by a member of the Guardia Civil who was killed. Two weeks ago there was another loss of life along the same road.

The latest accident took place near to the Club Pollentia resort. Not knowing the exact circumstances of the accident, it would be wrong to speculate as to the cause, but in the immediate area by the Club Pollentia there is a combination of factors that can be, and unfortunately are, disastrous - the bend in the road just before the hotel complex coming from Alcúdia, the turning into the complex itself, speed and lack of lights. Even in daytime it can be dangerous.

Recently, a list of island blackspots was drawn up. I haven't seen the list, but locally the Alcúdia-Puerto Pollensa would be one, together with the Cala San Vicente turning off the Pollensa-Puerto Pollensa road and the frightening junction between the Puerto Alcúdia bypass that goes behind Bellevue and the road between the horse roundabout and close to the main roundabout as one comes into Alcúdia.

In the case of the Alcúdia-Puerto Pollensa road, I'm not sure what can be done. A roundabout to slow traffic might help, but there probably isn't the room. Perhaps it might just be better if the beach were to be reclaimed after all, and the road closed completely (9 May: "Road To Nowhere").


QUIZ
Chain - Nik Kershaw, "I Won't Let The Sun Go Down On Me"; Elton John, "Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me". And what is the connection between Elton and The Who? Yesterday's title - ELO. Today's title - who originally made this song famous?

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Mister Blue Sky

Well absolutely no surprise. This has been the rainiest May on record. And this Saturday dawned with a return of grey skies and drizzle. The fourth weekend that will have suffered from poor weather. It seems like a long time ago that I said on the first of May that "the weather has put on its finest gown and has danced a tango of vivid blue". The first day of the season was ushered in with glorious weather and the optimism of a new season. Where did it all go? Into the drains and reservoirs and onto the gardens. And the optimism has been washed away with the rain. The season is in danger of going down the pan, and taking businesses with it. When you hear stories such as a bar that takes 15 euros over the course of an evening - in the main tourist area of Puerto Alcúdia - something isn't quite right.

Take away the sun and Mallorca is stripped of its life-blood. The rain of May tells us everything about Mallorca as a holiday destination, which is why all this talk and tank-thinking about tourism diversification is largely peripheral. It is the sun and therefore the sea and the sand that combine to make Mallorca, and no amount of golf and gastronomy will compensate. The poor weather throws into sharp relief the lack of genuine alternatives for the mainstream tourist, the one who wants his sangria warmed by the rays of the sun. What else is there really to do in places like Alcudia, Puerto Pollensa and Can Picafort? Very little in truth.

Of course one can see all this like they do in the UK when there is heavy snow. It happens infrequently enough to make the lack of provisions to deal with it excusable. So it is with poor weather here in summer. This May has been unusual. But if one looks at tourism as a whole, the summer and winter and therefore the other possibilities, the absence of genuine options for the mainstream tourist should, I believe, be at least one of the items on this think-tank agenda. I have said it before on this blog, and one only has to look at parts of mainland Spain and Portugal to understand that the lack of foresight in tourism planning here requires far more dynamic thought processes than are seemingly on display at present.

Mallorca, in a way, is like England of the Industrial Revolution. As it was at the forefront of mass tourism, it - like the new industrialism of England - had little in the way of a blueprint to go by. Just shove up some hotels and the sun will take care of the rest; that is how I imagine it might have been. But if you look at other places, and Portugal is a good example, they played catch-up by appreciating some of the lessons. Accordingly, Portugal has integrated developments which allow for much of the extra tourism that is constantly banged on about in Mallorca. The planned development of La Gran Escala near Zaragoza just emphasises the absence of integrated facilities that would enable not only winter tourism but also alternatives when the sun doesn't take care of the rest.

The rain and misery of May should be held up as a lesson to those who would fill the diversification void with a golf course or two that no one would want; except if it were part of a tourism campus or two or three. Blue-sky thinking is needed and not just an unthinking stare into the blue sky, whenever it finally returns.


QUIZ
Chain - "Wouldn't It Be Nice (Beach Boys) / Good (Nik Kershaw)". And, in similar vein (the odd word or two), how do you get from Nik Kershaw to Elton John? Yesterday's title - Morris Albert. Today's title - who?

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Index for May 2008

All-inclusives - 29 May 2008
Andratx - 26 May 2008
Bars - 8 May 2008, 12 May 2008, 24 May 2008, 27 May 2008
Beaches - 2 May 2008, 9 May 2008
British Consulate - 30 May 2008
Cala San Vicente - 2 May 2008
Can Picafort - 2 May 2008
Canals - 19 May 2008, 21 May 2008
Chinese bazars - 17 May 2008, 20 May 2008
Corruption - 26 May 2008
Design - 3 May 2008
Eco tourism - 18 May 2008
Eurovision Song Contest - 25 May 2008
Events - 16 May 2008
Fiestas - 16 May 2008
Football - 12 May 2008, 22 May 2008
Garden Hotels - 15 May 2008
Hotels - 15 May 2008, 26 May 2008, 27 May 2008, 29 May 2008
Learned journals - 15 May 2008
Local authorities - 16 May 2008
London elections - 6 May 2008
Mayors - 6 May 2008, 26 May 2008
Music systems - 26 May 2008, 27 May 2008
Noise - 26 May 2008, 27 May 2008, 28 May 2008
Portobello Restaurant - 7 May 2008
Potatoes - 23 May 2008
Price - 29 May 2008
Puerto Pollensa - 7 May 2008, 9 May 2008, 10 May 2008
Racism - 14 May 2008, 21 May 2008
Restaurants - 4 May 2008, 7 May 2008
Road accidents - 19 May 2008
Road races - 5 May 2008
Roads - 9 May 2008
Romanians - 14 May 2008, 21 May 2008
Sa Romana Restaurant - 4 May 2008
Season - 1 May 2008
Shops - 17 May 2008, 20 May 2008
Slogans - 13 May 2008, 15 May 2008
Spanish television - 22 May 2008
Sunbeds - 2 May 2008, 7 May 2008
Toilets - 1 May 2008
Tour operators - 30 May 2008
Tourism statistics - 23 May 2008, 24 May 2008
Tourism strategy - 13 May 2008, 20 May 2008, 30 May 2008, 31 May 2008
Vamps Bar - 8 May 2008
Weather - 11 May 2008, 20 May 2008, 23 May 2008, 24 May 2008, 28 May 2008, 31 May 2008
Websites - 3 May 2008, 16 May 2008
Weddings - 8 May 2008

Feelings

As alluded to yesterday, this pow-wow at the British Consulate.

You may recall my reporting on a meeting that took place between the British Consul, Paul Abrey, and the Balearics President, Francesc Antich (9 January, "Our Man in Palma"), at which they discussed the boosting of tourism to Mallorca and the issue of winter tourism. From that meeting has come the "think-tank" that is the Consul, representatives of major tour operators and IBATUR, the promotional part of the tourism ministry; oh, and the bloke from Pirates, too.

I am still none the wiser as to quite what this all has to do with the British Consul. It is unclear as to whether it has fallen to the representative of a foreign government to convene a meeting designed to boost the island's tourism. If so, then quite what does IBATUR do? Moreover, I do wonder if there is not something slightly askew with priorities in terms of the promotion of British commercial interests. If the purpose is to somehow assist local British-run businesses (bars and so on), then maybe I can understand it, but I doubt if that is the case, and if it were the case, then why are those interests not represented?

Seemingly, the main point of discussion is the Holy Grail of tourism diversification, away from the simple message of sun, sea and sand. To this end, IBATUR have got themselves going with that strange "much more than golf/meetings/good food" slogan thing (13 May: "More Than Words"). According to the Consul, the promotion of Mallorca as a multi-activity destination is something that the local government and tour operators will be working on. Is it indeed? This all may be something that can be tagged on to summer tourism, but the winter season still needs a fair chunk of co-operation from another interested party - the airlines. Oh, and also the hotels. And the bars and the restaurants.

I have a horrible feeling in the pit of the stomach when the words think and tank are combined. Not that there is anything wrong with think-tanks so long as they are more than talking shops and, far more importantly, that they do not descend into exercises in "groupthink". And what is groupthink? It is the group dynamic by which the dominant idea becomes accepted by all; unanimity and consensus of view without conflict or the exploration of alternatives is the preferred group modus operandi. The point of a think-tank should be - to coin an awful cliché - to think outside the box. I fear that this think-tank has already fallen into the box marked conventional thinking, been closed up and taped over, typified as it seems to be by the old chestnuts of a bit of sport, a bit of nosh, a bit of a conference and a bit of a weekend break. It can hardly be called a think-tank if all that's coming from it is what has already been thought. One thing I do hope is that whatever thinking may have gone on, it had a whole-island perspective. The name of Palma and only of Palma is writ large over the winter market.

The reporting on the meeting, that at least that comes from "The Bulletin", is not very encouraging. It says nothing that we haven't hard numerous times before. The tank is due to be filled again in September when it will look ahead to how the winter market (this coming winter's market) can be boosted. Eh? Would this not be a bit late? Apart from anything else, the tour operators have already got their winter plans sorted out.

A horrible feeling in the pit of the stomach and a horrible sinking feeling, dropping lower and lower into a tank of thinking. Sinking, thinking, drowning.


QUIZ
Chain - The Isley Brothers to "Behind A Painted Smile" to the album "Smile" by The Beach Boys. And from The Beach Boys ... by one change of word, how do The Beach Boys connect with Nik Kershaw? Yesterday's title - Pink Floyd. Today's title - who did this first?

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Money, Get Away

Is price everything?

It's something that's intriguing me more and more. I read today that only 5% of the population makes buying decisions based on price. I find it hard to believe, though I am well aware of all the marketing theory which suggests that it may well be right. Price-conscious times we may live in, but has price really become the determining factor over all? This may well be the first in a short series on this theme. Once intrigued, I start to dig.

Let's take as a starting-point the all-inclusive hotel. Is the decision to book an AI anything more than just a price decision? I don't pose the question in respect of the more luxurious all-inclusives, and there are even one or two of those knocking around here. I raise it in respect of the mainstream AIs, those that tend to suffer from reputations of less than wonderful service, less than wonderful (if plentiful) drink and less than wonderful (if also - usually - plentiful) food.

Some while ago, I drew attention to prices for self-catering and for all-inclusive in Puerto Alcúdia. The same tour operator, the same two weeks in high season. The price for one adult was something in the region of 250 pounds greater for the all-inclusive. You might say, well that's not buying on price as it's more expensive. Except of course that the consumer makes the calculation. Would I spend 250 pounds or more if I went self-catering? And the chances are he would.

So, having made the calculation and the booking, the holidaymaker lacks any real incentive to spend more. He has made his decision on the size of his pocket, nothing else. And yet, the reality of what he gets for this calculation can undermine this price-only decision. There was the couple from the Hotel Jupiter in Alcúdia the other day. Finally, they had broken away from the confines of the hotel. Finally, they had had enough of the food they were being served. So, they went and found a bar to have a breakfast. This is hardly a unique case.

Then there is the bar in Can Picafort, near to the Clumba Mar. The bar has sports TV, karaoke and other entertainment. Yet the hotel also has its TV set-up, unremarkable so I am told. Rather than go to the bar to watch the match, and watch on good screens with a bar atmosphere, the clientele prefer to stay in the hotel. Why? Simple. Price. The price they've already paid for their beer. And on a wider theme, the bar-owner made a telling comment. People don't leave the hotel as they're afraid they might miss something to which they're entitled. For which they've paid. For which they've paid the price. Then there was that story from The Smugglers in Puerto Alcúdia. About the AI punters from the Piscis who would sit at the bar terrace and have pints passed to them through the railings. Price. They'd already paid, but they still fancied getting away from the hotel even if they not prepared to pay the extra price.

There is a report today about the "think-tank" convened by the British Consulate, about which I will talk tomorrow probably. It, as ever, refers to the drive for greater quality in tourism as one aspect of its "thinking". I dislike this "quality" tag, as I have said before. Moreover, one wonders just who they are kidding. Price, price, price. And quality can apparently go hang.


QUIZ
Chain - "Caravan of Love" was Isley-Jasper-Isley originally, therefore The Isley Brothers and the connection was ... brothers. So, how do you get from The Isley Brothers to The Beach Boys? Yesterday's title - Captain Beefheart. Today's title - who?

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Lost 'n' Found

"Lost May." Where did it go? Did someone take it? Is it likely to be found?

"Mayo perdido" is a headline in today's "Ultima Hora", the newspaper which, for once, spreading as it is the bad news about this month of May, gets close to living up to its anglicised nickname of the ultimate horror. A lost May is not perhaps the ultimate in horrors but it will do for starters, though one trusts that there is nothing to follow - like a lost June as well. Under the paper's banner are photos of an empty shop, an empty beach and an empty terrace, all of them in Arenal. But for Arenal, you can probably read most of the island. The loss of May has been down to one thing - the weather. And there is still no sign of a permanent shift for the better, even if the weather maps show the latest band of cloud clearing by Monday next week, which will indeed take us into June. The Ultima also carries these headers: "Black May for tourism" and "The rain and the cold mean that the month will end up as one of the worst that can be remembered". And this "worst" was not lost on a client to whom I spoke today. My, what a good old laugh we had when I broached the subject of his invoice. Mind you, any old excuse.

Someone once said to me that Mallorcans don't take their cardies off till June. But I think he was exaggerating. Quite a few do, though not necessarily this year. And this quite a few has not been taking to the beaches and resorts during May. Though the poor and wretched old tourist has been rained off, the locals, who supplement the whole tourism industry at weekends, have stayed at home and watched Eurovision. There have been three weekends without sun; and that is not great news, even in May when some cardies remain firmly buttoned. Personally, I don't possess a cardie, but by this time of May I would not normally expect to a) still be deploying a thickish duvet or b) be wearing socks as a matter of course, even if there is - you'll be saddened to learn - a recurrence of the infected toe problem. Duvet and socks - May has been lost, but found in the winter wardrobe.


And more noise, following on from the last two days' entries. John has mailed me to suggest that maybe there is just a touch of double standards when it comes to the insistence on limiters and curfews. He refers of course to the fiestas and specifically to the annual disco-party-thrash that occurs in the centre of Alcúdia town as the culmination to Sant Jaume. The annual thrash that lasts well into the small hours; indeed well beyond sunrise. And Alcúdia is not alone in this regard. Pollensa and Puerto Pollensa both stage similar dos that run up close to breakfast time.

Now one can of course argue that it is but once a year (actually if you take in various other events, it isn't), and that the Spanish are used to doing things that much later than your average Brit, but what is good for the town halls, who run these events, is not good for the humble bar that has been served with all those decrees against noise - by the town halls. As John points out, a bar-owner could apply for a licence for something similar, but the laughter in the chambers of the ayuntamientos would be as sardonic as that of the client faced with an invoice at the end of a soggy May. Forget it, in other words.


QUIZ
Chain - "Brimful of Asha" was remixed to hitdom by Fat Boy Slim aka Norman Cook, so therefore to The Housemartins and thence to "Caravan of Love". And what's the very simple connection between "Caravan of Love" and yesterday's titlists who were The Allman Brothers Band. Today's title - "get herself lost 'n' found"; one of the greats. Who?

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Midnight Rider

I should I feel just clarify something from yesterday. Whilst there was apparently an issue with the Lagomonte system, which did lead to its being closed down for a couple of days, there is none with Bellevue's. What I had heard was that the sound from the Show Garden was being taken right up to the last minute, i.e. midnight, to which I am afraid my response is well what actually is the problem with this?

My point is that noise is an inevitability in a holiday resort. That is why the proximity of houses, apartments and the rest is an issue that requires some compromise. The midnight cut-off might actually be the thin end of the wedge. Once a time limit is placed on the music, then there is the temptation to change it, i.e. to make the cut-off earlier. That, I believe, would be a mistake.

You cannot satisfy everyone. There are of course those who have to get up early in the morning; there are also holidaymakers who prefer to retire early. But there are plenty who do not. Music into the night is one of the "romantic" associations of holiday. Years ago on some Greek island, there was an open-air disco nestling next to a rock face. It was well away from anything else. It was perfect, though even there I expect someone complained.

Puerto Alcúdia, at least that part of the town around The Mile, is essentially a purpose-built resort. But it is also a residential area. The two do not necessarily make for happy bedfellows, especially if one is kept from one's bed by the music from a bar or hotel. In a way this is though a fault of planning; the twain should ne'er have met. However, one comes back to that factory-town analogy. At least part of the point of the residential area is to house those who work in or run the bars and the hotels and all the rest.

In my experience, there is a high degree of assiduousness when it comes to complying with the demands of both limiters and the midnight cut-off. That a fault may occur in a system is one thing, but I am not personally aware of deliberate contraventions. Why would there be? The Noise Patrol is equally assiduous. I do hear that the odd bar here or there is apparently excessively loud. In which case that bar runs a risk. They don't get asked very kindly if they would mind turning the volume down a tad; the Noise Patrol doesn't operate like that.

You can't live without noise. Well not here you can't. I have spoken before about the occasional roar from the power station at night, and yet that is some two kilometres away. What can you do about it? Request that they slap the local equivalent of an ASBO on the site director? Then there are the "motos". Apparently the racket from these was meant to have been dealt with. I don't think so. Then there is the human noise. There is one hotel in The Mile area where guests frequently ask to be moved because of the noise of people leaving an adjacent bar at four or five in the morning. Human noise - shouting, screaming, wailing - is far more disruptive than any music system that is stilled on the stroke of midnight

The music systems of bars and hotels are something of an Aunt Sally. They are an easy target because they are so obvious and do not move. But they have compromised. They have had limiters imposed, and at curfew time the terraces are cleared, the doors are closed and the outdoor systems are turned off. Leave them alone.


QUIZ
Chain - George Michael to "A Different Corner" to Cornershop and therefore to "Brimful of Asha". And how do you get from that song to "Caravan of Love"? Yesterday's title - The Carpenters. Today's title - who?

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Close To You

Unless you happen to be one of those eco-egotists who enjoys the silence of the ice caps, there is no such thing as holiday without noise. And even a holiday on an ice cap is not totally silent; there is the sound of the melting ice sheets below you, but that's a whole different story. There is of course degree of noise and there is also compromise. Noise, holidays and compromise. I'm not sure you can put these three words into one coherent verb-based sentence, which is why I haven't.

When they developed holiday resorts, there was a need for proximity. The hotel factories and their human raw material wanted the bars and restaurants that the factories begat to be close by, and the bars and restaurants were only too happy to oblige. But the proximity created its own problems, not least of which was noise.

At one point, noise was mainly a thing of the spoken human voice or shouted human voice. But gradually noise became also a thing of the microphone, the music machines, the stage, the karaoke and ever more shouted human voices. It was not simply the proximity of the clusters of bars; the hotel factories became net contributors to the noise as well. Noise begat noise. Then finally, someone said that something had to be done, so they started to clear the terraces before midnight, they installed limiters on the sound systems, they made them close doors on the strike of 12. They changed the holiday forever, because noise had always been the unbrochure emblem of the holiday; noise is after midnight and laughter and shouting and music and romantic-into-the-wee-small-hours of balmy nights. They looked for compromise, and still they look for compromise.

They look but often they do not find. The midnight curfew is not enough - for some. And it isn't necessarily just a case of the wind being in the wrong direction. The noise. The sound of the entertainers, the encouragement of the audience and the cabaret song. All that noise and all that sound. There is certainly no compromise when the Noise Patrol come and close you down. Apparently this has happened to one of the hotel factories, the Lagomonte. And then there's the sound from the Bellevue Show Garden, also apparently.

When they developed holiday resorts, they should have neglected proximity. They should have avoided the temptation to make them like factory towns with the houses built within walking distance of the furnace, mill or colliery. The factory begat the houses, and the noise was that of the factory itself, which everyone came not to notice. Not so the noise of the hotel factories and their bars and restaurants.


Sort of breaking news ... Remember all that corruption stuff in Andratx. It was on this blog for ages well over a year ago. Well, the ex-mayor, Eugenio Hidalgo, has gone down for four years.


QUIZ
Chain - Forgot yesterday. Anyway, how do you get from George Michael to "Brimful of Asha"? Yesterday's title - "Chaka Khan, Chaka Khan". Today's title - who?

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Chiki Can't, Chiki Can't

And as threatened, the blog's annual visit to the mobile-phone fest that is Eurovision. One has but to assume that Gazprom had texted the whole of the former eastern bloc to let them know that if their boy didn't win, they'd cut off the supplies. Or maybe it was just fear of renewed Russian expansion. Either way, I'm still trying to figure out where the intro to the song was lifted from and also wondering what clout Heinz had in the whole affair. Unnoticed by many perhaps was the fact that one of the song's composers was someone called Jim Beanz.

Apparently Sir Wogan is thinking of giving up in protest at the whole farce, but had he not noticed before that there was something slightly biased about the voting? Not to defend the last place scooped by the UK; it might have made it on to a Real Thing album circa mid-70s as a last-minute filler. Not that old-fashioned is a crime in Eurovision circles.

But at least Spanish TV has got into the mood a bit more. Gone is the seriousness that it once attached to the event, as was evident from the Spanish "song" performed by a Viz-Elvis who had modelled himself on Tucker from "Citizen Smith"; see, told you there was nothing wrong with old-fashioned. And the Spanish commentator amused himself hugely by guessing, usually correctly, where the votes were going. Mind you, he was not alone. The contest needs a return to a bit of good old bribery and corruption of a Franco-esque nature to right the injustices of the voting system. There again, the UK can't complain too much. In an act of cross-Irish Sea fraternity, Dublin top-three-ed our boy, though there was clearly some display of sympathy emanating from the Emerald Isle as the other two were the Polish woman who could have teethed for Eurovision (and indeed did) and only beat our chap on some form of goal difference principle and the Latvian pirates who would be made to walk the plank were they ever to have the brass-neck to pitch up at Magaluf's Pirates Adventure.

I am grateful to today's "Sunday Times" for presenting some of the lyrics (sic) of the drivel with which Tucker, sorry Chiki Chiki, regaled Europe with the story of the girl who dances with her knickers in her hand:

"El Chiki Chiki is a reaggeton
Dance in Argentina, Serbia and Oregon
Give el Chiki Chiki to that little sister
With el Chiki Chiki
She's gonna like it mister"

Fabulous.

Still, the Greek girl was acceptably girl-next-door even if she was doing a sort of Kylie in the early days of Stock Aitken and Waterman. The only song that had any real merit was Sebastian Tellier for France. Way too clever for Eurovision, and it duly flopped. There again, France doesn't have a bunch of former satellites to boost its score; even Andorra sided with Chiki rather than stump up for Seba. France doesn't even have the Italians to maybe help a bit. They've taken their ball home and, which about sums the whole thing up, have let San Marino onto the Eurovision field of play. You know, it's all those years of making up the numbers in football qualifying events - Moldova, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Estonia, etc. They're just getting their own back, even if San Marino have yet to learn the full lesson, which is don't give the UK six points.


QUIZ
Chain - Peter Wyngarde was in "The Innocents". Em, do I really need to explain the association with George Michael? Yesterday's title - Pet Shop Boys with Dusty. Today's title - a variation on?

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What Have I Done To Deserve This?

Who was it that let me be a weather forecaster? Who was it let me say something like, oh well, there may be a bit of a shower but then it'll be nice and sunny? Who was it? Hmm, yes, well me. Take no notice. Want to know something certain about the weather. Rain. Today. Rain. Crap. You might believe that poor weather would not unduly concern me, given that there is always next week, or the week after, or the month after. Well it does. Apart from the fact that I genuinely do feel sorry for the visitors, there is what I do. Today. Rain. Crap. Only some spits and spots to begin with, then more, and more. Going around Puerto Pollensa with "El Puente", making drops all over the town. Getting wet. Trying to shield the books. And succeeding at my expense. Wet. And venturing onto the front, the chill off the sea hits at the sweat of having marched about the place for an hour or so already. The combination of a cold. I know. It's happened before. Wet. Sweaty. Windy. Chilly. Fever. What I go through in the name of clients. Get up. No breakfast. Get out. Get wet. Eventually I gave up. And stopped off for something to eat - finally. And saw Emma from Sea Club. How do you keep a hotel full of over 1000 people happy with this weather? Well, they're managing, she says. This is when the hotel staff, the receptionist, the entertainers really earn their crust. When they can also be reduced to tears. The story goes of the receptionist at the Jupiter (or was it Marte or Saturno, doesn't matter, you know where I mean) who was so bombarded by the misery of the guests and the accusations that it was all somehow her fault that she just broke down. I can understand frustration, but - odd though it may seem - there is not a lot that hotels, receptionists, entertainers, bar owners, restaurant waiters, excursions operators, tourist office personnel can do about the weather.

And so where were we? Yesterday. Remember those good figures for visitors in the first four months but the decline that had occurred during April? Well today comes what might have been expected. Holiday sales to the Balearics have gone into "recession" in the UK, according to the head of the Mallorca hotel federation (as reported in the "Diario"). To compound the external problems and that of the euro-pound imbalance, there is also the issue of local inflation. As a consequence, prices have risen, as some anecdotal reports have suggested, not that these price rises are necessarily going to translate into profit growth; the contrary in fact.

But you know, even with all this bad news knocking around, you talk to a bar-owner who really works his place and you hear that things are better than last year. Which bar? Try guessing. Puerto Pollensa. And moreover, though this bar does very well thank you from sports television, there is not a concern about the absence of British Isles teams from the upcoming Euro championships. He knows you can't rely on this. I know it, too. Run a good house. Be reliable. Provide a good atmosphere. And despite the apparent problems, turnover can still be increased.


QUIZ
Chain - Roger McGuinn to The Byrds and "Turn, Turn, Turn" to "Turn Of The Screw" by Henry James which was filmed as "The Innocents". And how do you get from that film to George Michael? Yesterday's title - Bob Dylan. Today's title - who?

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A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall

Oh well, so all is ok. The weather may have been somewhat iffy this month but at least the four months of the year were good - statistically speaking. Ho hum, here we go again. The silly statistics season. Not that it is a season, it is all-year, a hardy annual. But during those first four months, the total number of visitors to he Balearics was up by 1.5 %. Champagne-corking time indeed. Ah, but wait. Put the champagne back on ice and settle for a Vimto. In April, there was a decrease of 2.4 %. You see, statistics can tell you all sorts of stories. April is close to May. Generally speaking, it is the month before May. Maybe that decrease is more telling than the cheery numbers taken across the whole of the first third of the year. Anyway, despite the economic gloom back in the UK, it is the UK market that is keeping the Balearics buoyant. There was a 3.7% increase in the number of Brits from January to April.

The problem is, however much the figures are spun, and there is a love affair with statistical evidence as to the splendid number of visitors, there are also the numbers and the anecdotal evidence regarding the visitors' spend. This is more important than the totals coming into the islands. Those totals are used as means of self-congratulation, but they disguise the real tourist economy.

I am unaware of any figures yet for spend this year, but I was chatting today to someone who, anecdotally admittedly, probably has a decent handle on how things are this season. He is one of the few PRs knocking around Alcúdia. He's been doing it for years. His first words to me today were: "hard work, mate, bloody hard work". "How come?" "No money, mate. No one's spending. The pound and euro."

This comes as absolutely no surprise. Combine the weak pound with the economic problems back in the UK and you have the conditions for weak spend as well.


And then there is the hard work that is being caused by the weather. Go to forums at the moment and there is considerable anxiety among those coming over the next week or so and even into the middle of June. Ever since it became possible to see weather forecasts so easily, the visitor has become a nervous wreck, checking those forecasts by the day and fretting over what to pack, what to do if it rains, and even whether to cancel. Now I don't wish to diminish the importance of the weather. Of course people want sun, but, in a way, all that information, all that ease of information, has just led to worry; worry that didn't exist in the good old days when you got on a plane and listened intently to the pilot telling you it was 75 degrees or whatever. My take on all the current forecasts is that, though cloud and rain is being shown for a few days yet, there may be occasional showers, but that generally it will be fine, sunny and warm. Yesterday was like that. Rain in the morning. Good by midday and then for the rest of the day.

There is another take on the rain that we've been having. It's good for gardens and farmers. The editor of "The Bulletin" made a point of this, saying that he finally said to a taxi-driver who was commenting on the benefits of the rain for farmers, that he was sick of hearing this and that we need good weather for the far more important economic sector that is tourism. He's right, but the taxi-driver wasn't necessarily right. That rain has been a disaster for some involved in the market gardening sector - the potato-growers in particular. There is a real concern in the centre of the potato - Sa Pobla - as to how well exports will be this year because of the rain. The fact is that the rain is generally not important. Go through the centres of farming and market gardening and there are always sprinklers; water, artifically applied, is what much of the agricultural community uses. Rain, at least rain at this time of the year, is of questionable value. So, could someone just stop it. Stop it raining that is.


QUIZ
Chain - "Papa Was A Rolling Stone" to The Mamas and The Papas, to "Creeque Alley" and so McGuinn and McGuire. So how do you get from Roger McGuinn to the great British film "The Innocents"? Yesterday's title - Mary Hopkin. Today's title - who?

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Those Were The Days

And so, one of those not really anything to with local matters blog entries, save for the nuisance factor that is Spanish television. The European Champions League final (and expect another detour from the norm in a few days time when the blog pays its annual tribute to Eurovision).

To the football. So Man United won. The best moment of the game was Drogba's sending-off, a delicious slice of Schadenfreude heaped on a fine player but one who, if one accepts the rantings of the anti-Chelsea brigade on the likes of 6-0-6 and most of the media, is a pariah to whom a plague should be wished on both his houses, or however many he owns. Except ... What did he actually do? Gave Vidic a bit of a slap. So what?

I blame the Americans. Though I have been challenged in this assertion, to me it was the 1994 World Cup that changed football for the worse. In seeking to make the game more "attractive" to an audience ill-versed in the game, FIFA introduced all manner of rules contradictory to the spite and malevolence that used to once grace the sport. Moreover, the 1994 tournament spawned the embarrassment of the Bebeto baby-rocking celebration that has continued to blight all manner of sports since.

Go back, let's say, to 1978. Argentina. Still then a country of fruitbat military rulers and with a team from both the gods and from hell. Need to qualify against neighbours Peru? Stick an Argentinian in the Peru goal and then score six. They don't make games like that anymore, and more's the pity. Somewhere lurking on the Internet must be Argentina v. Hungary from that World Cup. Dastardly and dirty the Argentinians might have been, but before the game the Hungarians must have feasted long on tapes of the water polo clash against the Soviets some 22 years before.

Go back a bit further. The late '60s and Celtic v. whoever it was from Argentina. How many were sent off? Seven? And this was in the days when a player had to almost commit murder to be ejected. Well if not murder then something akin to GBH, as in when John Hughes kicked the goalie in the stomach. Couldn't do that now. And any old little cuff will suffice. Off you go.

When the football nannies stopped the sport being a more entertaining form of Rollerball, not only did they take away its very soul they also paved the way for the cheating that now exists. Enter Didier Drogba. This is not to say that there wasn't cheating and diving before: there was. But once it was no longer acceptable to hammer into a forward at breakneck speed from behind, so the cheating took over. Back then if a player was tackled, he usually was genuinely hurt. Players didn't give mere slaps, they issued the full bare-knuckle fist. The argument is that, having more or less banned physical contact from a physical contact sport, the more adept footballers can show off their skills. Who are they kidding? Go back again to that Argentinian side - Kempes, Luque, Ardiles, Villa. That some Hungarian might have tried to maim them didn't stop them playing. But fundamentally, the game was more exciting, it was also far less just; if you saw England being kicked all over the park (as in 1970 v. Romania) and the ref doing nothing, a great swell of Kafka-esque impotence rose from the stomach. It was theatre, war, drama, however you want to describe it. Not now. And the very rarity and therefore high drama of a sending-off has been so undermined by its regularity that it no longer holds any force. It took till 1968 for the first England national player to be dismissed (Alan Mullery), which given that two years earlier no one had got round to telling Nobby Stiles about Anglo-French detente is all the more surprising. Stiles could not only kick for England, he kicked for the world.

And then there is Spanish television. It may have escaped your attention that Spanish TV is currently in the naughty chair with the European overlords regarding the excessive amount of advertising per hour that can be broadcast. And rightly so. They don't miss a chance. They don't miss a chance, moreover, to waste the advertiser's penny or centimo. Whose bright idea was it to divide the screen up with adverts in one part and scenes of Man United post-victory in another? Was anyone taking any notice of the ads? Of course they weren't. It was both annoying and misguided. Now, they really do deserve a Drogba slap.


QUIZ
Chain - Heaven 17 did "Temptation", The Temptations did "Papa Was A Rolling Stone"? Told you it was easy. And from that record, how do you get to McGuinn and McGuire? Yesterday's title - The Dave Clark Five. Today's title - who?

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Bits And Pieces

So, even more by way of updates. This time the canal incident and the Beep Romanian row.

Someone came through anon with a comment appended to the piece on 19 May, saying that he or she had seen the car at 6.30 in the morning sticking out of the canal and, moreover, had seen the way the police handled the episode, by essentially letting all and sundry have a good look at what was going on with the forensics. I don't know what that really tells us, but I would guess that elsewhere, let's say the UK, it might have been dealt with a tad more discreetly. Apart from the voyeuristic, the general Joe or Jose Public has no need to be presented with death and an incident of this nature in such a way.

This is the comment in full: "I saw the car sticking out of the canal at 6.30am. I couldn't believe the time it took to get that poor girl out of the canal and how laid back the police were in letting passers-by look in and witness them taking her out and doing forensic tests on her in full view of the public.. It was both shocking and very sad."

And so to the Beep story (14 May). It did occur to me that there might be something more behind that sign than a mere dislike of Romanians. But there was nothing that I read in the press other than the facts of the sign and the resultant hoo-hah. So I'm very grateful to Nicole for pointing out that the shop had had 3000 euros worth of laptop lifted by a couple of Romanians, and that they were caught on camera but had not been tracked down - yet.

Well, I can understand the store owner being somewhat annoyed. When I had the break-in and the expensive camera was lifted, I wasn't exactly overjoyed. But had the police ever discovered who did it and had that person been of eastern European origin (for sake of argument), it would not have made me harbour the view that all people from that area were burglars. The point about the sign was that, by implication, Romanians were being branded thieves or potential thieves. You cannot do that. And if you were allowed to do so, therein would lie the roots of civil disorder to say nothing of sanctioned racism.

But I am doubly grateful to Nicole as it highlights the risk that we all, myself included, take received information either of a biased or a partial nature (and by partial here I mean in the sense of being incomplete) and form a judgement that may not be accurate. We interpret that information to suit our world view, even if some of us strive for a balance rather than seeing merely black or white. But I admit that I read the story and formed a distinct impression. In fact initially I laughed as it was so preposterous, but then I could conceive of only one word - racism. I still hold with that, but to begin with I had acted without the knowledge of some background. Had the fact of the theft been reported at the time, it would not have changed that impression; indeed it may well have hardened it. At least, however, I would have been acting on complete(-ish) or verging towards complete rather than partial information. For what it's worth though, sympathetic as I am to the store-owner in terms of the theft and of his frustration, I cannot excuse him his action.

There is a whole wider issue here, and it is the fact that rarely do any of us know the full story, and yet we make conclusions, utter opinions, become dogmatic with the benefit of only bits or pieces of information or, worse, information that is flawed, prejudiced, one-sided, wrong and sometimes malicious. The sources of this partial information are clear - gossip, embellished gossip, newspapers, television, the Internet. We take this partial, biased or manipulated information because we want to, because it suits our world view, our prejudices. The McCanns were/are a classic example.

And yet, were we to stop and wish to check every bit of information, we would get nowhere. There is an inevitability about human discourse, that it is incomplete. Of course it is. But this is not to say that there shouldn't be some responsibility, and no more so than on the Internet. I can feel a very long thesis coming on, so I shall close, but you've been warned: I might just publish it here.


QUIZ
Chain - Led Zeppelin to "Stairway to Heaven" to Heaven 17 who basically were the British Electric Foundation. Simple. And so how do you get from Heaven 17 to "Papa Was A Rolling Stone"? Dead easy. Today's title - who?

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Night Boat To Cairo

If it's the 20th May, must be update day. Follow-ups to the Chinese bazar and tourism density stories.

On the first one, it's been bugging me since I wrote that piece. Then I realised what it was I'd failed to mention the other day - the existence of other "bazar"-type shops; other shops not run by Chinese, but run by Spaniards, Mallorcans even.

In Alcúdia, there are three shops of this nature - De Tot Un Poc by the market square, one up near the tourist office and a third by the old hospital. Maybe there are more. In Puerto Alcúdia, there used to be one quite big cheapo place in what was taken over by a combination of the Petits i Mamas shop and Genius toy store, the latter now Engel & Völkers. It was pretty good; my household still has some decent towels to testify to that. Puerto Pollensa has at least one, as does Pollensa town, both of these, like one of the shops in Alcúdia, made a thing of selling stuff for one euro.

The point is that the cheap and cheerful Chinese bazar is not significantly different to any of these Spanish-run shops. Except in one respect - Chinese. I'm not sure if one can draw any conclusions, but let's just say that the low-cost shop phenomenon was not unknown before the arrival of the Chinese bazar and is also not unknown as a line of business for the local Mallorcans. I leave it to you to draw a conclusion.


And so to the tourism density issue. Having declared Can Picafort the tourist-sardine centre and having asked for any suggestions of somewhere that could rival Can Pic's claim to this award, I duly got one. Seamus volunteers Peguera. Something about more hotels than you'd find Frauleins in Lederhosen in Munich. Which does raise a whole different issue, but let's not dwell on that. But I take the point. In fact Peguera is a sort of German colony. There is, I understand, even a German school there. There again, Can Pic was essentially a German colony as well; before the Brits started to occupy to some extent. Mallorca can seem like another of the Bundesländer, and Peguera is like a Hauptstadt, one of hotel-squeezed sunbedsraum.


And weather. No surprise to learn that May thus far has exceeded records in terms of rain. Yesterday was yet another utterly miserable contribution to what has been a diabolical month overall. To give a measure of how much rain there has been, in Palma there has been 138 litres per square metre till now; the norm is 31. In all this I guess people will be searching for evidence of this that and the other, but I suggest it is no more than a righting of nature as the winter had been generally very dry. However, that is a rather facile explanation, so I myself went searching for explanations and was amazed at the sheer deluge of websites and blogs and so on devoted to weather. I had thought that perhaps the explanation would lie in the influence of La Niña, but I'm none the wiser despite having trawled through all this meteorological worthiness. Let's just say it's been very wet.


QUIZ
Chain - So how do you get from Led Zeppelin to the British Electric Foundation? Today's title - couldn't think of anything "bazar", so thought Arabic and here's the youtube of the nutty boys - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSTHMxBttlU

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The Canal Accident Story

The lady of the lake. Or the lady of the nearly lake. In fact the lady of the canal. It did rather depend on which report. There was one that would have made it lady of the lake as it said "lago esperanza". Unmistakably, it was canal, though I should not approach this matter in this way. It's not right. I'll stop it now.

Imagine you live near to a canal, or could be a stream or even a small river. And imagine you get up in the morning and find the rear of a car sticking out of the water. Well, that's pretty much what happened. How it was found. The exact circumstances are not clear, though one can guess. What is known is that the car left the road by the canal, the road being the Avenida Italia by the Jokers pub near the Viva Sunrise hotel - off The Mile in other words in Puerto Alcúdia. The car embedded its front into the canal bed, the doors jammed, the car flooded, the woman driver drowned. Not all the canals are that deep, but you don't need to drive into the Marianas Trench to drown, a foot or so can be sufficient, though the canal in question was some two metres in depth.

This is not the first time a car has gone into a canal in Alcúdia. It happened a few weeks back, not far from the fatal incident of the week just past. Then, the driver got out. Not this time. One cannot jump to the wrong conclusion, but it is kind of possible to appreciate how this can happen. Go a bit too quickly, not be aware of the sharpness of some of the bends and corners by the canals and ... splash, or worse.

The canals of Alcúdia, made to prettify the place, and to link the lakes and the sea are not always as benign a feature as one might hope. Sometimes they clog up, sometimes they whiff, sometimes the fountains don't function and sometimes someone ends up in one, either in a car or without the aid of motor transport. When was it? Three years ago perhaps. A friend of a friend was fished out. Had fallen in and had not got out until the body was retrieved. And the other day, one early morning, someone in a car hit a curb, jumped that curb and died; died in an awful way.


QUIZ
Yesterday's chain - 10cc to Graham Gouldman to "For Your Love" (which he wrote) to The Yardbirds and therefore to Led Zeppelin. Yesterday's title - Chesney Hawkes. And, smallish world time, it seems that Geoff went to school with Chesney's dad who was of course in The Tremeloes. No quiz today - doesn't quite seem appropriate.

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