Spanish Shilling

The British involvement with Spain has certainly taken a dive since the Brexit debacle.

We could blame the Schengen rules, or the misleading propaganda leading up to the referendum, or maybe the British sense of entitlement – whichever it is, the result for many of us comes down to inconvenience, bother and frustration.

Tourists will sooner or later have to get a permit to visit Europe. They will of course still be coming for their hols, and it’s only seven euros (good for three years) each. We read that the scheduled 2024 introduction of ETIAS, a special travel authorization covering most of Europe, will now begin sometime in 2025, so next season’s summer stay is saved…

However, another formality called the EES Entry/exit scheme has now been agreed to start from October 6th next year, with the extra obligation to provide fingerprints and facial biometrics at the border (plus the implied aggravation). Big Brother will be watching.

Visitors who hope for longer stays, but don’t have either special visas or their residence papers, must face the 90/180 rule.

Those bothered by this will likely be the people who own a house here – which, in essence – they can’t fully use. Most of these unfortunates had bought their properties when they were still able to stay here as long as they wanted: that’s to say, pre-Brexit.

The 90/180 rule is frustrating for non-Schengen Area (particularly British) home-owners in Spain. The rule states that (non-EU) foreigners from outside the partnership may only remain anywhere in the borderless zone for ninety days in any 180 days stretch. In short, only European citizens from the 26 Schengen nations (22 within the EU plus Norway, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Iceland) can enter Spain or another member state freely.

It’s not just the Brits, Americans and any other foreigner who suffer with the Schengen rules: Spain loses out as well – on house-sales, business and job creation. Most legal foreigners, at least, spend here with money brought from outside: they buy – or have bought – houses, cars and goods. Those who work here, either in an air-conditioned office or behind a bar (or indeed those poor souls who are in the plastic farms of the South) are bringing wealth to at least someone, along with their taxes and social security paid.

Understandably, there is an active resistance to the 90/180 day problem. A Facebook page called 180 Days in Spain is worth a look. With enough lobbying, maybe things will change.  Indeed, late news from France appears to show that the rule is already being eased there - so keep up the pressure! Maybe we shall hear something positive at the FITUR international travel fair to be held in late January in Madrid.

Those of us who are second-class residents can stay as long as we like; but we are, of course, only resident in the one country – in our case, Spain. Move somewhere else for an extended visit (even if there’s no border control) and we face the same 90/180 issue. Thus – I might fancy moving from Spain to Portugal to live – but what if they catch me? Could I become persona non grata? Indeed I could.

The only thing that hasn’t changed is taking out Spanish nationality. It’s still as long and as tiresome a process as ever it was.

Christmas in Spain. At least down where I live, it doesn’t quite ring true like the old traditions in England. There’s no holly or mistletoe (acebo and muérdago) to leave on the shelf or kiss the maid under. Come to think of it, there’s no maid either. The tree looks a bit out of place as well, and some of us settle for the dried flower from a century plant, una pita, bedecked with a ribbon or two.

I just have the one Christmas card this year to put on the – well, the chimney-piece if there was one. It’s from my old nanny from when I was a child in Norfolk (it’s almost sixty years since I’ve last seen her). It has a snow-scene and a short poem in a rather wonky metre. It was posted in late October and I gather that it must have travelled about fifty kilometres a day to reach me in Almería a mere seven weeks later. Well done our friends at Correos, and don’t forget the seasonal tip for Mr Postie!

Instead of Christmas cards, we seem to give each other those dreadful poinsettias instead.

The thing is, the old traditions don’t really have the same thrust over here. I suppose one can buy Christmas Pud at the English shop in our local market town, and douse it with brandy, but I’ll pass on that, thanks. The turkey is fine, although my Spanish family prefers endless plates of jamón serrano and gambas for the New Year thrash.

I think they may have a point.

We have plenty of cakes here though. The Roscón de Reyes is as delicious as the polverones are terrible. These floury morsels are quite impossible to swallow, even with a seasonable glass of anís.

I wonder - do the banks still offer this interesting combination to its customers (usually consumed before one see one's balance)?

I’m pretty sure that the petrol stations have sadly given up on this delightful institution… After all, there’s nothing quite like like driving drunk with the manager’s compliments.

Carol singing in England for me as a child was a quick couple of verses of ‘The First Noel’ followed by mince pies and some warming toddy. Then off to the mansion at the other end of the lane for a repeat. Here we are regaled ceaselessly throughout the entire season by villancicos: horrible songs pumped out all day long through the Nation’s municipal and supermarket loudspeakers as performed by cute little choristers and their noisome piping voices. Today I heard the revolutionary ‘While Shepherds Wash Their Socks by Night’ on the radio, sung in passable English. 

The Spanish are fond of Christmas lights. Our village has – so I read somewhere – 200,000 euros worth of Christmas light-bulbs and sundry decoration nailed to the trees, lamp-posts, roofs and traffic signs, to continue – I’m told – all through to the end of January.

They are so bright that somebody from the Space Station apparently asked the town hall to ‘tone it down a bit’.

Dressing up as Santa Claus is just silly. He wears a heavy red outfit with cap and mittens, while our local temperature is in the high twenties thanks to Global Scorching.

I think just a red tee-shirt would be quite enough to go with the ho ho ho.

The bus-driver this morning was wearing a Santa’s hat. The American version of Christmas in Spain is every year more evident. They’ve even introduced here the frightening elf on the shelf – el elfo travieso – to watch over the small ones.

There’s no Christmas stocking here as yet, and indeed the whole presents-under-the-tree thing is another foreign import which, no doubt, is working its way into Spanish custom (the toy-shop people will be seeing to this). I suppose that, reeling as we are from not winning the Christmas lottery, something in gaudy paper to unwrap on Noche Buena – Christmas Eve – might have been a good idea. A kind of consolation gift.

The small presents given out by the Spanish for January 6th, the Feast of Epiphany – usually falling on the day before school begins – don’t quite hit the spot.

I was once one of the Three Kings – the blond one of course. All went well as we arrived in the town square in a suitably decorated dumper truck but when the first, rather fat child sat on my knee to receive a dinky-toy, he spotted that under the heavy makeup lurked a guiri. He let out a quite improper shriek, even though I explained that all three of the Reyes Magos were indeed foreigners. You know. From afar.

The best thing about our Christmas season, and you will notice it in the photos we send on the Internet to our families and friends in far-off England (Christmas cards won’t get there until Easter), is the fact that we are all wearing tee-shirts under a warm blue sky.

Now, could there be a better gift than that?

 What a phenomenon Podemos has been! From nowhere to greatness and apparently back to nowhere in just ten years!

Founded by Pablo Iglesias – the university professor with the pony-tail and a Masters in both Arts and Humanities – together with some like-minded companions back in January 2014, the party won an astounding 71 seats in the 2015 general election. Later joining with Izquierda Unida and other far-left groups, Podemos soon became the particular target of far-right politicians, together with part of the Judiciary, the Church, the Establishment, and the majority of the Media. Whenever a reasonably plausible story could be fabricated against the party, it would receive major attention from all sides: both the concepts of fake-news (‘bulo’) and judicial manipulation (‘lawfare’) became mainstream instruments of attack thanks to the group.

Many of the early members of Podemos were to fall out with Iglesias – some starting their own parties and movements (it’s perhaps a common problem with the far-left) – and Iglesias’ popularity began to wane after he and his wife bought an expensive house in Galapagar – a smart area of Madrid. The perception being that long-haired lefties should live in a draughty garret somewhere in a working-class neighbourhood.

Pablo Iglesias with his wife Irene Montero

Following the April 2019 elections, Podemos (67 deputies) failed to join the PSOE in a government, which meant fresh elections for November of that year, where a weakened Iglesias (now with 42 deputies) finally agreed to support Pedro Sánchez.

Iglesias himself left his post as vice-president in the Spanish government in March 2021 to run for the Madrid regional elections (May 2021) where Podemos fared badly. He left the party to work as a broadcaster, leaving things to his wife Irene Montero and the current party leader Ione Belarra. In the July 2023 elections, the party ran within the Sumar movement, polling just five deputies, and in early December they subsequently quit their affiliation with the left-wing alliance and moved – possibly as renegades (‘transfugas’) – to the non-aligned Grupo Mixto instead.

The third strike against the party came from the flawed ‘only yes means yes’ law of Irene Montero – Minister of Equality in the last government. Neither the PSOE nor Sumar wanted her to return as minister, and their offer to give a ministerial position to another Podemos member was rebuffed (the member in question, feeling humiliated by his own partners, promptly quit the group, as have several other leading Podemos members in the past week).

Podemos today, ten years after it bounded onto the political scene, appears to be close to the end of its time in the frontline of Spanish politics. An editorial in the left-wing elDiario.es says gloomily: ‘Live fast, die young, and leave a beautiful corpse’. As for Pedro Sánchez, he now has another minority group to appease during this political cycle. 

My own experience of galloping through the Madrid airport with my wheelie-suitcase last week, with eighty minutes to disembark at the international end of the huge installation, go through immigration (as a non-EU foreigner), take the underground train-link, the security inspection and then the race through the garish duty-free corridor and onward for the local flight at the other - furthest - end just in time to join the back of the queue as they boarded the Almería flight, makes me anything other than a fan of that dreadful airport. 

It seems that I’m not the only one: From El Español here: ‘How the Aeropuerto Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas is no longer the best airport in Europe in just one year: it has dropped 30 places’. 

I remember the first time I landed in Barajas, back in the sixties. I had arrived on a flight from London on a BEA Comet. The airport was - of course - much smaller then, and certainly friendlier. They had a free cinema to while away the time before one's next flight. I shouldn't be surprised to learn that more than a few travelers, enveloped in the comforting arms of Disney, consequently missed their connection to Rio.

Those who didn't fancy the cinema could sit on a sofa rather than a functional metal bench, sturdily designed with arm rests to stop one from stretching out for a time-consuming zizz. Not many of us carry a book any more, and one can only stare at a mobile phone for a limited period. No wonder we untidily lie on the floor with our suitcase for a head-rest. 

They even had large paintings on the walls in those times to lull away our anxiety.

The bar was cheaper too - with prices only twice what they should have been. And you paid the waiter, not a machine. 

Security didn't exist, beyond the odd bored-looking cop. Now, and this happens in all airports, we must waddle through a metal detector while holding up our trousers: our diminutive suitcase pitifully opened by some creature with rubber gloves asking what's in this lead-lined box? It's me teef mister. 

As for flying with a proper suitcase which can hold more than a single change of clothes, well they charge extra these days don't they? 

But times change, and airports grow as they must cater to evermore clients. The Barajas airport now handles some 50,600,000 passengers every year besides me, and probably couldn't care less how happy or otherwise their customers may feel.  

So, here I am. The plane has stopped and the seat-belt light is off. Everyone has stood up, stretching after the cramped nine-hour flight and now they are now taking their cases down from the overhead lockers and standing around in that narrow walk-way looking impatient. 

Naturally, I'm at the way-back of the airplane - and there's just one hour and twenty minutes to go before my connecting flight.