Dearest Ethel,
This may come as a surprise, but Maude and I have decided to return to England and we shall have to rely on you, as our favourite sister, to put us up in your house until we can find out feet again.
I remember telling you twenty-nine years ago that we were moving to Spain to start a new life and that you would soon be ready to move over and join us. In fact, if it hadn’t have been for the various things which got in the way, I’m sure that you would have been one of the 200,000 Brits that annually leaves the country for better things – or at least did so until the bother with the Brexit.
Which, come to think of it, you supported.
Things started to go wrong here some time ago, when the local town hall decided on tourism as their mainstay. That way, they reasoned, we get their money quickly enough, and in return they get a sunburn and a hangover.
Maybe a social disease which their famous health service will no doubt quickly resolve.
Tourists though, once the flight, agency fees and airport breakfast have all been paid for, don’t leave a great deal of money for the villagers to spend on sprucing up their wardrobes and transport.
The average tourist, having perhaps been sick in the hotel gardens, or creamed a streetlight on the far side of the road while backing out of a parking space with the rental, or purchasing the very last set of water-wings in the whole province, doesn’t leave that much money here, and he only does so for an average of five or six days. Whatever he spends in the hotel (all inclusive?) will end up, once the staff are paid, in Barcelona.
Whereas we foreign residents are here all year long, pumping money into the bars, restaurants, shops, dealerships, furniture stores, dog-charities, pharmacies, tax-experts, lawyers and dentists. Our outgoing begins to add up – as the local bank-manager will tell you. Or he would if he could. Sometimes we rent out the spare-bedroom - pin money of course, and don't tell the Hacienda.
Naturally, we don’t use the local hotels, so we are of no use to them or their apologists.
If we go on holiday, or explore Spain, then we will stay in the Parador and generally splash out in some destination with there are no package-tours, tourists or blue flags. We spend because we love to be here; and we expect, and receive, little in return.
Perhaps a street named after us, or an international gala, or even that the mayor and his henchpersons might come by the local foreign bar for a round of drinks to show that they care. Just the one time would be enough, I think.
We once had a foreign-sounding street. When the mayor of the day decided to open the pueblo to trash tourism, we were greeted with the 'Avenida Horizon' which stretched - briefly under that name - from the bottom up to the top. Mind you, it lasted as long as the tour-company: a couple of years.
After all, there’s a Plaza Margaret Thatcher in Madrid (no kidding!).
The odd thing is that there is no Spanish ministry to encourage foreigners to move here and buy a 200,000€ home. The Ministry of Tourism has international fairs here and there, agencies and offices, staff and a huge budget in 2023 of over ten thousand million euros.
Us lot? Well, we are sometimes allowed to vote.
There are over six million foreigners in Spain, and around a million of them are Northern Europeans. Sometimes, it’s like being on a cruise.
Although to be sure, some of us are in steerage.
I suppose that when a local person sells something, the buyer hauls it off (or drives it away). But, when we are talking about a house, then you’ve suddenly got yourself a new and permanent neighbour who only speaks foreign and keeps dogs. There goes the barrio. Worse still, if your father hadn’t have sold the family land thirty years ago for peanuts, you wouldn’t be driving an old SEAT today.
In short, we have an ‘us and them’ situation, with all the eggs in the ‘them’ basket.
Despite some towns having more Northern Europeans than local Spaniards on the town hall registry – it’s a rare town hall that employs a guiri and a rarer one still that has a foreign councillor.
So the experiment appears to have failed. We have good sun tans, know more about the world than we ever did before, have finally learnt how to cook and can walk through a crowd without saying ‘sorry’; but it is now time to return back to England…
…or maybe move on to somewhere else.
Hmmm…
So Ethel, we won’t be wanting much, but could you get in some decent vegetables.
Besos.