Spain and Portugal for Visitors

"Podemos" (we can) was the Obama-inspired slogan for Spain during the Euro 2008 tournament, which concluded last night with a Germany-0 Spain-1 victory in the final. And only a slight tense change, from "podemos" to "pudimos" turns it into the triumphal cry, "We could!" It would be hard to overestimate the importance of this win for the national psyche, already uplifted on the sporting plane by the successes of Formula 1 driver Fernando Alonso and Wimbledon favourite Rafael Nadal. Last night, Spain was euphoric, almost ecstatic, and hundreds of thousands of Spaniards took to the streets to celebrate throughout the country.

Posted by : John Ross on Monday, June 30, 2008 - 01:17 PM 112 reads

UK consumer magazine Which? has published its yearly Best Airlines report, the result of a postal survey of Which? members - the magazine says that 30,000 of them responded. Top-rated among the short-haul airlines was Bournemouth-based Palmair, closely followed by Germanwings, while the best long-haulers were oriental - Singapore Airlines, followed by India's Jet Airways. One of the nice things about the Which? report is that it lets us see which are the worst airlines as well, and this year Spain's Iberia is outstandingly badly rated, being third from the bottom on the list of short-haul airlines, and the uncontested worst long-haul airline, with a miserable Customer Satisfaction Score 27%, compared with the 32% of its nearest challenger for duffest llong-distance airline, Air India. Only Thomas Cook Airlines looks anything like as unpopular as Iberia.

Posted by : John Ross on Thursday, June 26, 2008 - 10:36 AM 163 reads

When I say "hero," think "mythological," even "demigod." Seven ears from four bulls in two afternoons, in Madrid, the most difficult bullring in the world. Two stunning afternoons in Madrid's Plaza Monumental de Las Ventas have raised José Tomas to bullfighting's firmament, alongside names like Juan Belmonte, Joselito or Manolete. You normally have to be dead to be included in this bullfighting echelon, and José Tomas nearly did that as well, ending his second afternoon in the infirmary, seriously gored but out of danger. It needs to be described in Spanish, for the English translation, tremendous, does not do justice to the original word - apoteósico. It is thirty-six years since a bullfighter was awarded four ears in one afternoon in Las Ventas, as Tomas achieved the other week, and on his second appearance Tomas impressed with his determination and fearlessness, being repeatedly tossed and gored. His injuries were all that prevented the ecstatic crowd from carrying him out of the ring on their shoulders - again.

Posted by : John Ross on Monday, June 16, 2008 - 09:40 AM 276 reads

Montjuïc Castle - castell in Catalan - has been "returned" to the city of Barcelona. Built in 1640, the castle is unusual in that it has served less often to defend the city than to control it, most recently after the Spanish Civil War, when it was a prison and execution ground - most famously, Lluis Companys, president of the regional government, the Generalitat, was shot in its moat. Its transfer from the Spanish Ministry of Defence to the city is thus heavily charged with symbolism. Although nowadays it holds a relatively inoffensive Military Museum and the Museu Del Comic I La Illustracio, the Comic Book and Illustrations Museum of Barcelona (could anything be less repressive?), the city council intends to replace the Military Museum with a Peace Centre. The municipal website reports that an open day at the castle attracted 40,000 visitors, with the significant slogan, “Barcelona té castell, Barcelona has a castle,” emphasising that the castle has never belonged to the city before, but to its overlords.

Posted by : John Ross on Monday, June 16, 2008 - 08:12 AM 257 reads

Heard the one about the speculators, the ecological organization and the rise in sea level? A firm of Madrid lawyers, J. Abad & F. Pérez, has announced that it intends to bring a suit against Greenpeace for a series of photomontages Greenpeace published last year showing La Manga del Mar Menor, Murcia, as it will be in 2050 with the sea level half a metre higher, i.e., largely under water. Claiming to represent unnamed inmobilarias, real estate companies, and "hundreds of property owners," José Ángel Abad has said (without the slightest indication this might be the joke it would seem at first sight) that they will sue for over 20 million euros, because "Greenpeace manipulated the forecast rise of half a metre in order to create alarm. It has sunk the property market: no-one is buying and everyone has put their houses on sale." The bare-faced cheek of this is staggering. Greenpeace points out incredulously that "they are trying to make Greenpeace pay for the consequences of the urban destruction of La Manga del Mar Menor."

Posted by : John Ross on Tuesday, June 10, 2008 - 12:36 PM 341 reads