Sunday, December 21, 2008
Spain and Lisbon research trip
I'm currently on the last legs of a research and photography trip to Spain and a weekend in Lisbon for good measure. I've stopped in Madrid, Vejer de la Frontera, Granada, Cordoba, Seville and Lisbon. Currently I'm in Barcelona and slowly moving North back towards Copenhagen, as I want to spend Christmas at home.
The general theme everywhere has been the upcoming Christmas, and it's interesting to see how a Christmas Tree is not really a Christmas Tree but rather a multi colored tree shaped icon of one. You take a place, often a fountain, and build a tree shaped skeleton around and over it. Add colored lights in different patterns, add power and voila!
The perception of Santa Claus on the Iberian peninsula seems to be that he climbs up a rope ladder to each apartment with a rucksack holding the gifts on his back - small plastic santas climbing up rope ladders hang all over Spain and Portugal. I've bought one which will hang from the office as soon as I get home. Hopefully it won't cause any traffic accidents because it's so unusual in Denmark.
Driving around in Spain and Portugal has made me realize that there are worse drivers than the Spanish, the Portuguese take the prize for opportunism and self centered driving. I hadn't thought that the Spanish could be challenged, but there you go. Some of both the Spanish and Portuguese take something as basic as being overtaken as a deep personal insult, and they insist on pushing their usually small car to its absolute limits to re-overtake you - and then what? They eventually get overtaken again.
When visiting Lisbon I got to see a frightening picture - not only homeless, but poor people everywhere, so many beggars. I read that there is actually a shanty town outside Lisbon which is like the one you know from outside Rio de Janeiro, with people living in cardboard boxes and the like. With several governments a year since the Salazar regime was overthrown in 1974, things are not going well for Portugal. Their joining the EU has helped the country in general because of the massive EU investments in infrastructure and public administration, but this aid has not had any effect for the common man in the street. Most portuguese are poor, poor, poor and can see no end to it. That's not a pleasant backdrop to a Christmas weekend, but if anybody need the extra money you spend visiting it's the Portuguese.
A somewhat similar picture can be seen in Andalucia in Southern Spain. The German tourists for some reason stayed home in 2008, and then the financial crisis hit and a lot of people who used to be employed in the tourism business are facing very hard times. Especially the area West of Gibraltar, on the Atlantic coast called Costa del Luz, where tourists have to find their way themselves because there are no charter tours going there, things are tough. The absense of tourists has a profound effect on the local economy.
Currently I'm in Barcelona and am enjoying the city. It's a great place to go, but this weekend it's like the city has been under occupation by the Spanish police. There's police everywhere and tonight the streets were full of police cars racing through the streets with howling sirens and a police chopper was hanging above Plaza Catalunya. I asked a friend who replied that it's probably because Valencia - a neighboring town - had lost a football match to Madrid. You're thinking terrorism and ETA and what's the deal? Soccer.
Today's pictures have ben downloaded to the laptop harddisk now and it looks promising. There'll be plenty to work with after this trip for several months, and new pages to be made on existing and new websites. It'll get there.
The general theme everywhere has been the upcoming Christmas, and it's interesting to see how a Christmas Tree is not really a Christmas Tree but rather a multi colored tree shaped icon of one. You take a place, often a fountain, and build a tree shaped skeleton around and over it. Add colored lights in different patterns, add power and voila!
The perception of Santa Claus on the Iberian peninsula seems to be that he climbs up a rope ladder to each apartment with a rucksack holding the gifts on his back - small plastic santas climbing up rope ladders hang all over Spain and Portugal. I've bought one which will hang from the office as soon as I get home. Hopefully it won't cause any traffic accidents because it's so unusual in Denmark.
Driving around in Spain and Portugal has made me realize that there are worse drivers than the Spanish, the Portuguese take the prize for opportunism and self centered driving. I hadn't thought that the Spanish could be challenged, but there you go. Some of both the Spanish and Portuguese take something as basic as being overtaken as a deep personal insult, and they insist on pushing their usually small car to its absolute limits to re-overtake you - and then what? They eventually get overtaken again.
When visiting Lisbon I got to see a frightening picture - not only homeless, but poor people everywhere, so many beggars. I read that there is actually a shanty town outside Lisbon which is like the one you know from outside Rio de Janeiro, with people living in cardboard boxes and the like. With several governments a year since the Salazar regime was overthrown in 1974, things are not going well for Portugal. Their joining the EU has helped the country in general because of the massive EU investments in infrastructure and public administration, but this aid has not had any effect for the common man in the street. Most portuguese are poor, poor, poor and can see no end to it. That's not a pleasant backdrop to a Christmas weekend, but if anybody need the extra money you spend visiting it's the Portuguese.
A somewhat similar picture can be seen in Andalucia in Southern Spain. The German tourists for some reason stayed home in 2008, and then the financial crisis hit and a lot of people who used to be employed in the tourism business are facing very hard times. Especially the area West of Gibraltar, on the Atlantic coast called Costa del Luz, where tourists have to find their way themselves because there are no charter tours going there, things are tough. The absense of tourists has a profound effect on the local economy.
Currently I'm in Barcelona and am enjoying the city. It's a great place to go, but this weekend it's like the city has been under occupation by the Spanish police. There's police everywhere and tonight the streets were full of police cars racing through the streets with howling sirens and a police chopper was hanging above Plaza Catalunya. I asked a friend who replied that it's probably because Valencia - a neighboring town - had lost a football match to Madrid. You're thinking terrorism and ETA and what's the deal? Soccer.
Today's pictures have ben downloaded to the laptop harddisk now and it looks promising. There'll be plenty to work with after this trip for several months, and new pages to be made on existing and new websites. It'll get there.
Labels: barcelona, beggars, christmas, christmas tree, homeless, lisbon, madrid, poor, seville, vejer de la frontera
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