Is Spain now too sophisticated for the English?

Is Spain now too civilised and sophisticated for the English?

The other day I had a long argument with one of my Spanish students about Spain. I was trying to say that when I, and many of my generation, first came to Spain (I’m not going to say exactly how many years ago – but Franco was still in power) one of the biggest attractions was, apart from the sun, the beaches, the cheap cigarettes and the cheap alcohol, that it was different. It was like “going abroad”. The people couldn’t speak English – the menus were a constant source of amusement and the waiters were all like Manuel from Fawlty Towers. The bars looked (and smelled) different from our pubs; a visit to the toilet outside the hotel was more dangerous than a safari in Kenya. The food (even the “international menu”) was often only for the brave of stomach. A bus ride or a train ride was a life changing experience. Most villages could only boast one telephone, an extremely public payphone. Excursions “inland” with the famous packed lunches from the hotel were never undertaken without the services of a guide, preferably one who actually spoke English.

My student, who is about thirty years old, scoffed at this. She finds it impossible to believe that such a Spain ever existed. Now a visit to Madrid or Barcelona, is precious little different from a visit to London or Paris. The city skylines have as many skyscrapers as anywhere else. McDonalds and Burger King have a catering monopoly on fast food, and you can even find Chinese restaurants in the smallest towns. Mr Roca and the flush toilet have reached the smallest house in the most hidden villages. Mobile phone and internet coverage is almost universal. Power cuts and water cuts are no more frequent than anywhere else. The motorways, in general, are a pleasure to drive on, and there are now hundreds of kilometres of high-speed trains. Coming to Spain is no longer an adventure.

But is that really fair? Despite the Europeanization of Spain and its headlong rush into the twenty-first century has it actually lost its identity? Perhaps the best way to discover the real Spain today is to participate in the fiestas of your local town or village, perhaps the latter more than the former. Everyone has seen the running of the bulls in Pamplona, or the “battle of the tomato” (La Tomatina) in Buñol in Valencia, Semana Santa in Sevilla or maybe a Moors and Christians procession, but these have now grown beyond their original intention and are as much to attract tourists as a fiesta in which the whole community has participated for hundreds of years. Indeed many places that find themselves excluded from the tourist map because they have no “picturesque traditions” are quite capable of inventing a tradition overnight to bring in the punters and swell the coffers of failing bars.

Of much more interest are fiestas that attract no tourists, neither foreign nor Spanish, but at the same time often manage to attract a great number of local people. For example, the fiestas in the “ugliest village in Spain” are just around the corner. The programme has just been pushed through the letter box for the fiestas of Saint Pantaleón. A promise of five days non-stop fun: a lunch by the fountain with eggs and green peppers; a popular dance with bingo in the interval; three masses in the village church; several steers will be released into the bullring for a mock bullfight; and much, much more.

Sophisticated Spain? More next week if I survive…