I doubt there's many North Europeans residents here
who haven't looked at the indulgence shown to Spanish kids and
wondered what sort of adults they'd grow up to be. In his book,
Ghosts of Spain, Giles Tremlett writes about the glorious Spanish
Family and its adored and spoilt star-turn - the child. . . . If life has been getting
better continuously and rapidly over the past three decades, one type
of Spaniard has done even better than the rest. That Spaniard is the
child. The imperious little princes and princesses of the, now
typical, one or two-child family are a wonder to behold. The centre
of attention of parents, grandparents, neighbours, aunts and uncles
and an endless list of admirers, their life is as golden as it can
get. There are, of course, many exceptions but it seems that
childhood is often an obligation-free experience. I cite all this as a lead in to a news item of
this week that violence by teenagers against parents has risen
alarmingly in Spain. They kids lack boundaries, apparently, and
"girls are just as abusive and aggressive as boys". Who'd
have thought it? I thank my lucky stars I've only got the tots that
run into me on their plastic motorbikes while their mothers look on
and smile.
The spanish dimension. Bankia is a bank formed
from several weak savings banks. It hasn't been a huge success,
partly - it seems - because its management has had some difficulty
distinguishing clients' money, the bank's money and their own
pockets. An astonishing 30 of them are now having to answer questions
in relation to charges of fraud, embezzlement and the falsification
of accounts.
Here in Galicia we can't compete; Banco Pastor can
only only offer its former chairman, who's been charged with forgery
and fraud. It seems the company accounts for 2008, 2009 and
2010 were 'forged' to show the bank was solvent when it was
actually in the process of declaring itself bankrupt. What next?
Oh, yes: The Spanish Ambassador to the Democratic
Republic of the Congo has been fired after he was caught selling
Spanish visas for €2,900 each. The clever bugger realised he was
being investigated and immediately put in a report about someone on
his staff selling the visas. Not clever enough, though.
Ex-President Zapatero has put forward an
interesting argument for why senior Spanish politicians shouldn't be
expected to speak English. This, he said, would deprive poor kids of
the chance to reach office. I'm still trying to work out if this is
brilliant or inane. But am tending in the latter direction
In his recently State of the Nation address, the
current President Rajoy offered the pre-election promise that income
tax would be reduced for those earning less that €12,000 a year.
Either no one had done the homework or he thought voters would be too
dumb to figure it out for themselves but it seems the average
individual will save a mere €49 a year. Or €1 euro a week. Way to
go, Mariano!
Finally . . . To say the least, "brothels are
a common sight in Spanish cities. And prostitutes, often
scantily-clad at most, line many roadsides throughout the country."
Every now and again there's an 'exposé' in one of the serious papers
or a documentary on the TV and then the subject goes away for 2 or 3
years. Now, though, outrage has been caused by a plan to provided a
'career development course' for aspiring prostitutes. This, some
fear, will make Spain the "whorehouse of Europe". Sorry to
say, folks, it's a bit late for that.
Note: British TV: For those affected by the
recent move of FTA programs to a new satellite: If you now find your
BBC programs broken up by rain, try the Northern Ireland channels
(957 and 969) as these seem to provide the best signal. God knows
why.
No comments:
Post a Comment