As the Junta spends millions on attracting Korean and Luxembourgoise tourism (they could fit them all in Gordon's Bar), the slavishly pro Govt El País today reveals figures from Unicaja that foresee tourism for the region will fall by 12% from last year (so far this year, Almería is almost 16% off) and unemployment should reach 30% by the end of 2009.
In Spain, tourist figures, solutions and expertise are always in the 'capable and experienced' hands of hoteliers.
When was the last time you stayed in the Pueblo Indalo?

In the Coast's favourite local newspaper there's a page three uncredited piece this week entitled 'Tribute to a legend'. It's to do with the passing of Michael Jackson.
Shoulda called it 'Filler' (duh dum)!

Later: There’s this handy thing on the weenie-webpage which compares web-traffic with competitors. It’s called Compete.com which is free to join. In fact, I already have here. I’ve contrasted five portals, the Euro Weekly, The Roundtown News, the Sur in English, Typically Spanish and my own humble site (the smallest). Did you look?
Hey, what about those guys from Typically Spanish, eh? Streets ahead of the pack!
Turns out, if your go to ‘visits’ (click down on where it says ‘unique visitors’ on the left), The Euro Weekly was not doing much until March of this year when it went from the ‘bottom’ to the ‘top’ with a jump from 1,707 visits to 63,244. My warmest congratulations. It also seems that they coincidentally have hooked up with www.conduit.com which ‘delivers unprecedented face time through this new communication channel resulting in higher traffic, stickiness and revenues’. In short, it increases site traffic. Another site, mi-alojamiento.com apparently has almost 60% of its entire traffic driven to our friends. Good for them, but it rather begs a question or two…

Oh, and scroll down to the bottom of the page to see who checks The Entertainer Online site most of all...?
Coooeee!
Fascinating stuff...

Who says justice doesn't work in Spain? A mere nine years ago, an elderly Almería couple in their eighties asked a realtor to sell their 7,000 m2 piece of land in La Cañada, which he did, keeping the 170,000 euros from the sale in his pocket. Astonishingly, they denounced him.
And now, look what has happened! Just nine years later, the realtor has been given two years in jail for fraude, and has to pay the... er... heirs a whopping 151,061 euros. Worse still, the realtor can't work in real estate for two years following the sentencing.
I know, lucky the victims weren't, ahem, from foreign parts!

'WATCH ITV later this year to find out what happened when the debonair sophisticated star of Britain’s Got Talent met the formidable passionate and determined girl from Rochdale with her successful husband at their home in Southern Spain'. With Pix!

Colin Davies at Thoughts from Galicia collects strange Spanglish words, but I doubt that there are any stranger than Telecinco's Guaipaut show. Say it again: Wipeout.

Off the Wall

The big story this week, of course, is the premature demise of pop legend Michael Jackson. Jackson who was 50 was due to start a 50 date tour starting on July 13th. It is said the first 10 concerts alone would have netted the singer some £50 million.

As in death, so in life, however, and while Michael Jackson could possibly have been the most adored man on the planet there can be little doubt that he was also one of the loneliest. And, it is this controversial persona, I believe, which so fascinated those who loved and those who loathed him alike.

There was never anything straightforward about Michael and you can still speak with people today who are convinced that the child abuse allegations, which dogged his later career, are nothing but fabricated lies to get at his money. Simultaneously, there are those in the other camp who, despite Jackson's acquittal at trial, believe he was always guilty.

While few people disliked the music, or would have argued that he couldn't dance, Jackson was undoubtedly a great show man, an all round entertainer. And, yet he was also known to be a tremendously generous man supporting a reported 39 charities. When his hair caught fire while filming a Pepsi-Cola ad he was rushed to the Brotman Medical Centre, Culver City, California where he was treated for second degree burns to his scalp. After settling his lawsuit against Pepsi-Cola for $1.5 million Jackson gave the money to the hospital that had treated him.

For me, speaking personally, there seemed something almost inevitable about Michael Jackson's death and already there are commentators comparing his demise to that of Elvis Presley. Various reports have put the cause of death as being pharmaceutical based, of being related to his overuse of painkillers, which he was reportedly addicted to, and narcotics.

But nothing is simple with Michael Jackson. Apparently, suicide has been ruled out and it is thought that the man died from heart failure. There is now talk of the funeral being a private affair while simultaneously the organisation of concerts across the globe, so even in death Michael Jackson courts controversy.

Like the MP’s expenses, this story of a man who curiously was always dogged with serious allegations about his personal life, will no doubt run and run. What I can never get my head around is the hysteria which will, no doubt, follow in the wake. I never knew Michael Jackson, but I am sad that he has died and I can feel empathy, of course, for his family. I liked some of his music, but beyond that I never knew the chap and refuse to get involved in the ludicrous circus which will inevitably follow.


[ Read the rest ... ]

You can ask for a vino tinto in ten bars, and get ten different wines - some bad, some OK and if you ask for one at Felipe San Bernabé's, it'll be very good indeed. With beer, you can stick to the same brand in those ten bars - more or less.
How is it then, that at the supermarket, there are some real cheap and very wretched brands on the shelves? Usually with German-sounding names. Scrotlebürg and Von Pis. I just found a litre bottle in the fridge of some fake-teutonic cerveza made, I discover, in Valencia, and took an incautious gulp. Urrgh: nasty!
But, here's the deal. All beer is made out of the same - very cheap - ingredients, right? Malt barley and hops. The only thing that is going to vary much is the water. So what kind of crap water are they using in the brewery over there in Valencia? For an extra 0.001cents per litre, they could no doubt produce something a lot better, digo yo.

I don't have Sky so missed the recent 'Paradise Lost' programs on ITV. The two-part series related various stories about Britons in ill-advised situations in Spain, following 'the dream'. Bits on Malaga and a couple who buy a bar in Benidorm, apparently without a clue. Most of the comments on the forums here reckon that the programs were inaccurate or didn't look into either 'blame' or offer solutions. Oh dear, just another Brit program slagging off Spain...
However, the AULAN (property abuse association) secretary received a letter from a British viewer which says: 'Just to let you know that the two television programs about planning problems in Spain have had a huge impact here in England. Everybody is talking about them and are scandalised that this could happen in an EEC country. All the golfers, people at the gym, hairdressers, all the builders at the house etc etc etc. We didn't have the chance to see the programs... but we didn't need to... we have heard all the details. Best of luck with the campaign'.
For more critical discussion on the program, see Eye on Spain.

Some fellow got into a gerfuffle in a bar in Competa, Malaga the other evening and, tragically, was killed. Pushed off the terrace in the struggle, apparently. The victim was a Briton and his killers were, according to my editor, Spanish. I've been sent out into the street to ask Spaniards if they are hostile towards the British.
My first stop is in Oliva, in Valencia. Laura, 40, says 'It's only hooligans we don't like...'. I write it down. This is gold. I get into the car to find another Spaniard. Three hours later, I'm in Huercal Overa (Almería) talking to Raquel was says '... Without them, we would have no customers here on the Costa del Sol...' (Raquel is clearly confused about where she lives).
I jump on a plane for another insight into the locals. There's one in Mallorca called Pep. He says: 'Rubbish - there's no anti-British feeling ... I have plenty of British friends'.
And lastly, to round out my report for my editor (together with a rather large expense account) I find Paco in Fuengirola. Well, whaddyaknow, he likes us too!

My daughter has been here since she was one. She's now thirty. Spain is all she knows. Unfortunately, she has an American passport and her residencia is currently out of date. Being a foreigner, it's hard to get work (she is a tri-lingual simultaneous translator) and, with the ever sterner and more rigid rules from the Ministry of the Interior regarding renewing residence cards and working in a proper job here, she has finally thrown in the towel and is now leaving Spain.
I rather envy her.