Why Barcelona means freedom for tourists

In the last few months I’ve been hit with the most curious sensation:  I’ve started to miss being a tourist in Barcelona.

Don’t get me wrong – I’ve only lived in the Ciudad Condal for two years, so I’m hardly a dyed in the wool, sardana dancing Catalan. Nevertheless, Barcelona is where I live, work and pay taxes and it is where my daughter was born. And all this implies certain obligations.

It was not always thus: I first visited Barcelona in the summer of 1995 as a fresh-faced (ish) youth of 17 years old and was immediately hit by the city’s air of freedom. This freedom resounded in any number of inconsequential things: you could buy beer from the bakers and drink in the street; night clubs stayed open until when they fancied; and people on the beach undressed with no regard for the fact that they were at the heart of a major European capital.

Of course, knowing a city better does reveal many of its lesser-known charms, places and experiences you are unlikely to ever experience as a tourist. Nevertheless, I have found myself lately envying the endless tourists sunning themselves on the beach or queuing for the Picasso museum. In them, I see the same feeling of freedom I experienced some 20 years ago.

Why does Barcelona, home to staggering youth unemployment and a shocking number of bank repossessions, represent such freedom? It’s hard to say. On the one hand, for visitors from Britain the laws on things like selling alcohol and opening hours are far more relaxed. You will get told off by the police and possibly fined for cycling on the streets in London. In Barcelona, no one really seems to care.

Then there’s the place itself: cities on the sea and great ports always seem to possess a great freedom, as if the sea and the transitory population it brings cannot stand to be cooped up and enslaved. Barcelona, with both beach and port, gets a double helping.

It is in the politics too: Barcelona’s fierce left-wing history and spirit of independence – much like a sunny Manchester - can be felt in the city’s streets. It seems right, somehow, that Barcelona should be one of the last bastions of the anarchist movement in Western Europe.

Then there’s the football. Like it or not, Barcelona FC is key to how millions of foreign visitors view the city (not for nothing is the Barca Museum the most visited museum in the city). For anyone raised on the English Premier League, Barcelona play with a freedom of expression and love of the beautiful game that is entirely absent when Stoke face off against Fulham.

Many residents of Barcelona hate tourists. It’s easy to see why: they get in way when you’re in a hurry, take ages to order in bars and generally seem to be having a better time that you. What’s more, it is easy to sympathise with the residents of, say, La Barceloneta who feel they are being priced out of the area by the demands of tourism.

Despite this, I think tourists should firmly be embraced. There are the economic arguments, of course, with tourism bringing millions of euros into the city every year. More importantly, though, tourists serve to remind Barcelona of what it is: they come for the freedom of the city, to escape from the drab day-to-day of London or Paris and they come to relax in body and mind.

Tourists hold a mirror up to the city – a cracked and often distorted one but a mirror nonetheless. And in Barcelona it shows freedom.

Spain’s troubled waters

 

 

Today, 22nd March, marks UN World Water Day 2013, its theme - ‘cooperation around water’.  However, as the Spanish Government repeals coastal protection rules and potentially revives controversial hydrological plans, water is not so much forging cooperation but a divisive element threatening to resurrect old divides.

 

For the Los Reyes public holiday in January this year I visited Osuna in Andalucía.  Whilst chatting to the hotel receptionist Maria, she said, for the first time ever during the fiesta, she’d been swimming outdoors as temperatures soared well over 20°C; and over the last decade she’d noticed winters becoming much hotter and drier.  It turns out she was right.

Last year Spain suffered its driest winter in 70 years; by summer 2012 the country was desiccant, its trees tinder; the consequence - a catalogue of forest infernos that rampaged through regions from Catalonia to Andalucía.  I myself witnessed first hand the eerie smog and grey ash rain from blazes in the Guadarrama Mountains.  Malaga suffered what officials described as ‘the worst fires in living memory’ with over 12,000 hectares obliterated.

Barely a month later in September 2012, Andalucía suffered its worst flood in a decade.  Torrential rains and violent storms led to flash deluges of biblical proportions killing ten people.  Yet, EU Joint Research Centre (JRC) research showed that with less than 200mm of fresh water available annually and consumption at least three times this, Spain is facing a serious problem.  The European Environment Agency (EEA) has warned that Spain is highly vulnerable to climate change.  It’s already lost 90% of its glaciers - the remaining expected to disappear within decades, leading to further water shortages as rivers depending on ice-melt shrivel up.  The Centre for Climate Adaption says the average temperature in Spain is predicted to rise 4°C by 2080 and extreme summers are likely to increase fourfold.  Precipitation is projected to decrease 5% in most of Spain - and by a staggering 10% in the southwest by 2040.  This combination will result in creeping desertification and water scarcity. 

Water and the economy

Spain is starting to count the cost of climate change which has already impacted Spain’s €2 billion wine industry; vineyards are being moved to cooler and moister climes.  Olive Oil Times reports that Spain is going the same way as Greece and Italy which have both seen production of olive oil halve since the early 2000’s.  2012 saw Spain’s harvest drop 40% due to drought.  Manuel Vargas Yáñez, author of the book Cambio Climático en el Mediterráneo Español says: ‘Sea level in the Mediterranean has risen by between 1 and 1.5mm each year since 1943, […] it now seems that the speed at which it is rising is accelerating’.  The sea is consuming Spain’s beaches and this could have serious consequences for the tourism industry.

Exploitation of water sources

As Spain seeks new water sources it’s encountering water exploration side effects.  It’s thought massive extraction of groundwater had helped unleash the deadly earthquake in Lorca in May 2011 that killed nine people, left hundreds injured and homeless and decimated priceless monuments.  Depletion of the water table by illegal wells is shrinking Spain’s irreplaceable wetlands - vital habitats for millions of the region’s indigenous birds as well as countless migrating species.  Birdlife’s Manuel Mendez has said that Spanish wetlands are endangered yet there is no commitment to ensure their conservation.  Another key problem is the salinisation of Spain’s rivers.  Research by the Department of Ecology at the University of Barcelona found that high levels of salinity in Spain’s waterways caused by industrial waste discharges and farming residues has led to excessive salt concentrations with huge ramifications for Spain’s potable drinking water.

Mismanagement and corruption

However, some regions have implemented policies that exacerbate the water problem.  Farmers in arid areas such as Murcia are planting water-thirsty crops like tomatoes and lettuce; and land has been transformed into golf courses and resorts that guzzle billions of gallons of water daily with farmers buying and selling water on a growing black market.  Many believe overexploitation has been spurred on by the bribing of local officials.  Chema Gil, a journalist who exposed such a plot has faced death threats: ‘The model of Murcia is completely unsustainable […] We consume two and a half times more water than the system can recover.  […] All the water we’re using to water lettuce and golf courses will be needed just to drink.’

Reckless development

Despite this, the Government is controversially repealing the Coastal Act to free up 8,000km of coastal land for development with the capacity to build about 40,000 homes.  Detractors say this makes no sense economically speaking given Spain’s property industry is in meltdown with some coastal property values dropping 75%.  From an environmental perspective, there’s simply not enough fresh water to sustain any further construction and this will impact UNESCO protected wetland sites such as Doñana, threatening their status and the tourism associated with it.  Moreover, given sea levels are rising as well as the risk of coastal flooding, this is downright reckless.  Critics are incredulous that the Government is promoting construction just as Spain has gone cap-in-hand to Europe for a bail out of its banking sector which failed due to the construction crash.  As the recent expose by El Pais shows, corruption amongst the political classes is rife in Spain - many commentators believe it’s this that’s at the root of such unworkable policies.

Juan Carlos del Olmo, Secretary General of WWF, said: ‘The decision [to repeal the Act] is setting the situation back 40 years, when Spain endured the worst urban development on the coast […] the reform was made without adequate public participation’.  Meanwhile, the WWF conservation director, Enrique Segovia, insisted that corruption ‘which is out of hand’ defines how it worked Spain and was one of the reasons there was a feeling that you can use natural resources with impunity.

National Water Plan

The demolition of coastal protection is not the only major controversy emerging over water.  On 21^st December 2012, Miguel Arias Cañete was appointed agriculture and environment minister - the same minister, who in 2001, under José María Aznar’s Popular Party (PP), approved a National Water Plan (NWP) to divert water from the Ebro River in the north to zones such as Valencia, Almeria and Murcia in the south.  This was shelved in 2004 under PSOE party leader José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero due to mass opposition in Catalonia; and because the EU refused to finance it given it was contrary to European environmental policy.  In Catalonia storm sirens are sounding.  Catalan News Agency reports suggest Cañete has mentioned carrying out a form of the NWP that many had believed was dead in the water; and though he has not directly referred to the Ebro River diversion, Catalan Minister for Sustainability and Territory, Lluís Recoder, believes that new water plans might be worded in a way that could allow river diversion to leak through the back door.  Indeed, Cañete’s reappointment has been a viewed as a boost for supporters of the water plan.  The national irrigators’ federation FENACORE described Cañete as ‘a guarantee for the sector’.  Antonio Cerdá, Murcian minister for agriculture and water, compared his appointment to ‘winning the lottery’.  

Luis M. Jiménez Herrero, executive director of Spain’s Observatorio de la Sostenibilidad said to me that the danger of the water plan has largely passed ‘because of the country's economic crisis and because it would entail a considerable impact on the territory, with huge environmental costs.  Furthermore, as Spain is a very vulnerable to climate change, developing a project of this calibre might not work at all in some years.’

However, given the repeal of the Coastal Act, a mechanism put in place 25 years ago to protect the coast, it’s not so difficult to believe the Government might not dredge up its water plan and forge ahead despite the huge wave of opposition.  Sadly it seems that calls for cooperation this World Water Day are likely to be drowned out by the decrees of power politics.

 

Photography: Charles Ansdell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chávez’s debut

The Monday night of February 3, 1992, I was coming home after having dinner and drinks with a few colleagues from The Daily Journal, the now-defunct English-language newspaper in Caracas, Venezuela where I worked for six years. It was a typical weekday late evening in the Venezuelan capital with so many noisy mini buses ferrying workers home across the city while  popular merengue tunes blared from their drivers’ radios. We lived just on the edge of downtown, not far from the suburbs, but a reasonably close distance from the center where the newspaper’s offices were located.  The Daily Journal, considered Latin America’s oldest English language daily, was widely respected across Venezuela because of its nonpartisan stance. I had two jobs at the time. In the early mornings, I produced a daily 15-minute English program on Radio Nacional de Venezuela that was broadcast across the globe on shortwave, so weeknights meant getting to bed as early as possible. As I was heading home on the por puesto, as the micro buses are known, I noticed a lot of police and military vehicles headed the opposite way toward the center of town. When I got home I fell asleep but a few hours later a startling rap on the front door suddenly woke me. Golpe de estado, my stunned elderly neighbor announced.

I switched on television to see the images around Miraflores presidential palace surrounded by tanks and young soldiers - many looking scared - brandishing their automatic weapons in menacing gestures. No one knew where President Carlos Andrés Pérez was. For months, there had been rumors about discontent within the military because of the deteriorating economy, bleak social conditions and rampant public corruption. But repeating rumors in Venezuela was, and continues to be, a national pastime. Who was behind the coup was the $64,000 question; not even the television newscasters, who fortunate enough were left unbothered to continue to do their jobs and provide excellent on-the-scene coverage, knew exactly what was happening.

I phoned my co-workers at the radio station and newspaper and we decided to sit tight for the time being. Still, my concern was getting the news out to the world on the shortwave bands and in English. It would take a few more years before the “super information highway,” now known as the internet, would become a household outlet to the world but back then a country’s national radio was the prime source of official news and regularly monitored by the BBC, VOA, RFI and other major broadcasters. Our station wasn’t a powerhouse, but at 50 kilowatts it could still be easily picked up across Europe and North America.

Needless to say, there was no more bed rest for the entire evening or the day that followed. Fighter jets roared over our neighborhood at seemingly random intervals while distant gunfire added to the haunting ambiance that permeated across the city. State-run television station Venezolana de Televisión, channel 8, had been taken over by rebel troops but they didn’t know how to work the controls to get their message on the air. From Zulia state, the identity of one rebel finally emerged. Lt. Col. Francisco Arias Cárdenas of the self-proclaimed Bolivarian 200 Revolutionary Movement had full control of Maracaibo, Venezuela’s second largest city and the country’s petroleum producing hub. It was only a matter of time before Caracas fell. But at 3.30am, a weary and worried President Pérez, standing alongside the Venezuelan flag before a black curtain backdrop, finally came on air on the private Venevisión television network demanding that all the rebels retreat to their barracks while assuring loyalists that the situation under control. It was later learned he barely escaped with his life running through the underground tunnels of Miraflores Palace.

At daybreak, I decided to head off to the station. For a normally bustling Latin American capital, Caracas was dead silent. The streets were empty so it was easy to get to Radio Nacional’s studios without any problem. The rebels never took over the radio station, which was heavily guarded. My French- and Haitian Creole-speaking colleagues and I went straight to work to prepare our  respective broadcasts. By 7am we were on the air and managed to get out nine transmissions at each half hour in four languages. Shortly before noon, when I knew it was near time to get back out on the streets and head on over to The Daily Journal’s offices, all television stations went to a live nationwide broadcast in which it was announced that the leader of the coup had finally been captured and would address the nation. Heavily escorted, the young and serious-looking soldier wearing a red beret, the stamp of a Venezuelan paratrooper, was paraded in front of clicking cameras inside a paneled conference room. He was identified as Lt. Col. Hugo Chávez Frías. In his brief remarks, he thanked those who supported him and asked his rebel soldiers to lay down their weapons, but punctuated his call with the following message: “the cause is lost for now.” Along with the image of a bold, assured man who seemed unconcerned that he would probably spend the rest of his life in prison, that phrase resonated with Venezuelans for the years to come. By the time it was over, at around 5pm on February 4, 133 officers and 956 soldiers had been arrested for taking part in the coup.

He hadn’t been defeated. After another coup attempt that following November led by his supporters and a disgraced exit by Pérez, who was ousted from the presidency for misusing a secret national security fund, Chávez, pardoned by President Rafael Caldera, found that his time finally came when Venezuelans swept him into office in 1998. Fifteen years later, el comandante, who died at age 58, has left behind an uncertain future and a country as bitterly divided as it was in 1992.

The Other Six Nations: Los Leones start their 2015 qualifying campaign under the radar

As the guiris (myself included) filled out the Irish bars this weekend to sup cider and Guinness whilst watching the opening matches of the Six Nations played in front of packed 60,000 plus stadiums, one of Spain’s lesser known national sides embarked upon their own rugby adventure.

A world away from Twickenham, Murrayfield, and Le Stade de France lies the European Nations Cup Division 1A (or, if you like, Six Nations Division 2), which also doubles up as the qualifying rounds for the Rugby World Cup 2015, to be held in England. Matches are, somewhat peculiarly, played in tandem with the ‘box office’ Six Nations games, thus reducing the chances of national broadcasters like Canal+ or Teledeporte buying the viewing rights – something which the IRB will surely have to address if they are serious about developing more interest in the game in so called ‘minor’ nations. The qualifying period agonisingly lasts well over a year (due to the fact the Six Nations is only once a year), and standings are only confirmed after each team has played each other both at home and away at the end of a two-year cycle. Complicated.

The top two placed sides will automatically gain a place in La Copa Mundial, and the third placed team goes into a repechage playoff for one last chance at making it. Even more complicated.

New Leones coach Bryce Bevin – a Kiwi – took charge in July, and has quickly assembled a new core of Spanish-born players, complimented with a small group of distinctly non-Spanish sounding names who have qualified for selection via residency, playing in the División de Honor (the La Liga of rugby), who he believes are capable of helping Spain reach what would be only their second ever Rugby World Cup; the first and last being in 1999. Bevin will surely be looking to the example of Italy, who through a fine balance of home-grown talent, imports and clever use of their large diaspora (mainly found in Argentina) have gone from Six Nations whipping boys to taking full points from World Cup finalists France in two of their last three meetings in the tournament. 

Smells Like Team Spirit: Spain's players unite during the national anthm, with a rather empty grandstand in the background (Photo via FER website)

The main criticism that haunted Bevin’s predecessor, Frenchman Regis Sonnes, was that he recruited too many of his fellow countrymen who spoke little of the language, were based outside of Spain and lacked the desired commitment to la selección, with club duties often coming first. That’s not to take anything away from Sonnes and the work he did. He and his légion étrangère have taken Spain, and Spanish rugby to a new level. The national side sit at a record-high ranking of 18^th in the world, ahead of Nations Cup rivals Romania and Russia (19^th and 20^th respectively), just behind Japan and USA, all four of whom qualified for the 2011 Rugby World Cup. This achievement is all the more admirable, given there are only around 30,000 registered players of the sport (very few of whom are professional) in a country that boasts either the World and/or European Champions in the more lucrative games of football, basketball and handball, and has seven of the top 50 tennis players in the world. Even a newly expanded División de Honor only has 12 teams, with the vast majority of players having to do a regular nine-to-five job before training in the evenings. The worsening financial crisis does not help matters in the world of Spanish Rugby either; league champions VRAC Quesos Entrepinares unable to take their place in the Amlin Challenge Cup due to the fact they simply could not afford to embark on a European campaign. The nearest team who had the financial clout to take on such a challenge in their absence was fifth placed Basque outfit Bizkaia Gernika, a side fortunate enough to benefit from regional government funding.

Spain’s national Sevens side now forms part of the IRB’s 15 ‘core’ nations, and as such will participate at all nine of the official HSBC Sevens World Series tournaments this 2012-13 season; which started off with the impressive 19-14 defeat of England in the final of Australia’s Gold Coast ‘Bowl’ – a knockout competition for the teams who finished in the bottom two of their initial pool groups. This newfound success in the shorter, smaller form of the game actually creates a rather large problem for Bevin. Spain’s pool of elite players is small, and in selecting a strong squad for the Sevens Series’, they actually harm their chances of qualifying for 2015, with Sevens tournaments being held in New Zealand, and then USA at the same time as the opening two European Nations Cup fixtures. They don’t have the luxury of elite rugby nations such as England, Australia and New Zealand, who have entirely different rosters for the 15-a-side and 7-a-side games.

And so, as first orders were being taken at 11am CET and the words to songs like Swing Low, Sweet Chariot were being rehearsed religiously, Spain lined up against Russia at a freezing, and by all accounts very empty Stadium in Sochi. The Bears, as the Russian’s are aptly nicknamed (due to the fact their players all seem to be the size of one) defeated Spain twice in the 2010-12 edition of this tournament, however could only finish fourth overall, whereas Spain came second; the same finish this time round would see the team reach England 2015 – no pressure! Taking lessons from their more illustrious companions, The Lions kicked themselves into a 7-9 lead early in the second half, a penalty from La Vila’s Javier Carrión, and two drop goals from former Aviva Premiership player César Sempere putting the away side within touching distance of a win. However two late Russian penalties turned the game, and Spain were unable to recover sufficiently in the remaining minutes to recoup the deficit, and the match ended in a 13-9 defeat. A small consolation is that they at least come away with a bonus point owing to the fact they lost by fewer than seven points, yet Bevin will perhaps be left wondering what might have been should the players involved with the Sevens have been available.

Action from Spain vs. Russia (Photo via FER website)

Any pondering and regrouping will have to be done quickly, as the second round of fixtures is rapidly approaching. Brussels is the venue on February 9^th, as Belgium (who were also defeated in their opening fixture; 13-17 by favourites, and highest-ranked side in the group Georgia) provide the opposition. Although early in the calendar, the fixture is a must win game for El XV del Leon given the opposition, and their lack of experience at this level of rugby. Two weeks later Romania travel to Gijón, followed by a trip to Georgia and a final game against the old enemy Portugal in Santiago de Compostela, by which time it could be all over, or just beginning for one of Spain’s smaller, less successful selecciones.

All games will be shown via a live stream on ferugby.es

 

The Great Escape: young Spaniards see the UK as a land of opportunity as 'la crisis' takes its toll

“Well, I did my first degree in Audiovisual Communication, so I guess I kind of coached myself not to have a strong accent,” Rocío explains when asked as to why she only speak with the softest of Andalusian twangs, “then afterwards I did a post-graduate teaching certificate, and then my Masters in European Studies.” It takes a moment to register; yet the sad truth is that hers is an all too common story.

“I was unemployed in Spain for two years, which is just too long,” says the 28-year-old originally from Seville, “I wasn’t just looking for jobs in my city, I was applying for jobs all over Spain, Madrid, Valencia, Barcelona, but I was barely even offered an interview. I went eight months without even receiving one phone call in relation to all my applications, and after that I decided that I had to leave.” The pain is etched all over her face. 

As the job queues increase in Spain, so do the numbers of those leaving the country (Photo: EFE via El País)

Indeed, the number of people leaving Spain is increasing dramatically. The Insituto Nacional de Estadística recently released figures showing that over 40,000 left the country in the first six months of 2012; a 44-percent increase on that time in 2011. Many of them are seeking pastures new in the United Kingdom, where the Spanish population has increased by a third in the last five years, and the volume of National Insurance Number applications received by the Department for Work and Pensions by Spaniards over the last 12 months was second only to those made by Pakistani’s as the highest number of foreign national requests.

“It was a difficult decision to leave, of course it was,” she adds. “I have my friends, my family, and my boyfriend. He’s lucky. He works in an industry that hasn’t really been affected by the crisis, and hasn’t come to England with me. But sometimes you to make decisions and sacrifices for yourself, for your career, for your life. Two years of being unemployed is just demoralizing, I really wondered at times ‘Rocío, what are you doing with your life?’ So, I came here to improve my English, and I’m looking for a job as a waitress, barmaid, housekeeping…anything really, and then in the future we’ll see if I’m able to go back to Spain or if I will stay here and get my English to a level where I can work in marketing or communications … Who knows what the future will bring.”

This uncertainty is a reality now facing many, as those young and old are finding it ever-harder to find a job in a country where 52.3% of 16-24 year-olds are unemployed, and overall unemployment has risen to over one-in-four people.

Her friend Ferran joins us. He is 22 and graduated with a degree in Human Resources Management last June. “There’s just no opportunities for young people,” he says explaining the decision to swap his native Barcelona for Leeds in September. “I mean, you can work as a becario (intern) but you get paid next to nothing, and in a big city it doesn’t even cover the rent. I’m earning more as a barman here than I would be back home interning in a big company. Here I can improve my English, earn some money and then start looking for a more permanent job. I want to stay here for a long time.” I try to put myself in his shoes. We’re the same age, have similar interests, and although I have lived abroad for a period before, it was always going to be a temporary measure as part of my degree before I returned to the security of Blighty.

They both scoff when I suggest that Britain too has high levels of unemployment, “For you maybe seven or eight percent [unemployment level] is high, we have twenty five percent, and it’s worse for younger people like me,” Ferran retorts. By this time I have realized it is impossible to even contemplate being in the same, or a similar situation to what is being called la generación perdida (or, lost generation) by some people in Spain. These are highly educated, skilled people moving out of necessity.

Portobello in London is an area that has traditionally had a small, sociable Spanish community. There are a couple of Spanish delicatessens, selling chorizo, vino and more. There is the Spanish School Instituto Vicente Cañada Blanch, from which a stone’s throw away is La Bodega tapas bar. Proprietor Antonio Carrera has been in England for 45 years and used to struggle to find Spanish-speaking staff; not anymore. “I probably get around 25-30 CV’s a week minimum, and at least half of them are normally from Spaniards,” he tells me, with a tone of sorrow that reflects the gravity of the situation his homeland now finds itself in. “I only have room for about 10 staff, and yet I keep getting these applications from people with degrees, and masters in difficult subjects looking for what they can get – waiter, chef, washing dishes, even cleaning the restaurant. They are just forced to do anything to be able to go on with their lives, and it really is sad.”

Antonio Carrera's 'La Bodega' Tapas Bar in London (Photo Ewan-M via flickr)

Back in Leeds the sentiment is shared, “It’s tough for Spain because there is a whole generation of people without work, and they are leaving,” Ferran explains. “I came here with my best friend, and we both have friends who have gone to Germany, France, and other cities in the UK like London and Dublin. We’re trying to be as English as we can; we pay our taxes, and do our shopping in the supermarket, even if the food is not the best,” he laughs. “And don’t even get me started on the weather,” as we jovially look out of the window into the thick, grey clouds, something which in retrospect is a seemingly pertinent metaphor for the economic situation these two young professionals have left behind in Spain.

 Suddenly the laughter stops. “But you can’t blame us, right?” Ferran says solemnly, “there’s just no future for us in Spain at all.”