Moving back to Spain is a bit like returning to the third world. There are parts of Valencia that could pass for the dilapidated streets of Centro Habana. Mind you, one could say the same for the slums of Philadelphia. Still, there is something about Spain that is just insistently third world...Like, for instance, when people start the ignition of their scooter (which is inevitably parked on the sidewalk, probably somewhere between the rubbish bins, the dog shit and the crosswalk, or in what would seem to be an otherwise pedestrian-only area, such as a plaza), just as you walk past, sending a cloud of exhaust into your face, then they fly down the sidewalk cutting-off or dodging whoever may be in their way (what self-respecting developed country sends its people to work on scooters anyway? Italy you may say, but I said self-respecting, not self-enamoured). The haphazard flow of motorists knifing their way across the city, like the antennas planted atop the city´s rooftops, scream third world: Valencia from above looks more like Cairo than Paris.None of this has really started to bother me yet. Nor, perhaps, should it. I make ¨third world¨ sound like an accusation, which it is, and it should be: it means hopes crushed, people beaten back into their holes (by their own police, if need be), development halted, sovereign states overrun by foreign military or capital... I suppose I´ve been throwing ¨third world¨ around a little too loosely then, but my use of the term is not entirely feceitious. Partly, I´m just pissed off because it doesn´t seem Spain can get its act together. But, there is a creeping sense here that we´re losing ground. There is dirt on the streets, bums on the street corners, outside the glitzy cocktail bars and the re-developed port that hosted the America´s Cup, there is poverty. And it has caught my attention. I think it was Carol Goar, the columnist for the Toronto Star, who asked: what good is your $90,000.00 BMW 4X4 if you need a 24 hour private security guard to protect you from the poor bastards waiting to slit your throat?
Forget keeping the third world down and out so we can keep on happily exploiting it, we´ve got to keep it out of our own back yards. And by that I don´t just mean that the third world is literally creeping through our national borders, though the waves of immigration Spain and Europe are experiencing may mean just that to some people, but that the first world seems to be becoming a smaller and smaller place. There are first worlds within first worlds.
And you can see this in Valencia. Even Amanda, having spent the past month in Stockholm, commented on it.
—Don´t you think this looks like the third world? It´s horrible. ¡Dios mío! It´s like 1 Franco 14 Pesetas, when the family returns to Madrid only to find how dirty and backwards everything looks [is]. Admittedly, this was her opinion as expressed on a particularly frustrating day in our search for a new apartment, and just after climbing 5 flights of stairs to look at another god awful flat built for midgets, in a semi-abandoned extremity of the city. But, the fact remains, this place is a bit backward.
Maybe it´s like baseball.Baseball is an attitude. Half the game is scratching yourself in a really macho way, spitting, and fucking being on the ball, man. So is being backward (an attitude, that is). It´s that intangible quality that can perhaps only be conveyed by stereotypes and anecdotes (but is later reflected in the overall productivity and quality of life of a country): the men who, Amanda assures me, run the gamut from construction workers to suits, and make kissing sounds and yell, "GUAPA!!!" (or worse things) at the passing women. The way nobody lets you get off the train when the doors open. The newly renovated buildings whose windows leak when it rains. The dog shit all over the place (what´s up with that? Come on, guys.) It´s the general disfunctionality of stuff here (nothing works). These things are difficult to articulate, to even put your finger on, but I think every ex-pat (from N. America, anyway) must be to differing degrees aware of or bothered by them.You just have to take it with the right attitude.
Just finished reading:
Freakonomics. I´m sure those guys could come up with an interesting explanation for the quantity of dogshit here, something about the incentive structure (moral, social, economic) not being sufficiently strong to encourage people to stoop & scoop. If you ask me, we have to start whipping offenders (the people, not the dogs), or at least forcing them to step in the poo (the punishment should suit the crime, after all). 200€ fines wouldn´t hurt either. Also, we should yell at offenders and wave our arms the same way we do at the corner fruit store when you touch the fruit without your little plastic gloves. Shame on you!
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