Letter from Spain #20

The rain in Spain washes Rubiales off the front page ... plus TBC notes & research

As if life in Spain is really just one long Pedro Almodóvar movie, this week’s surreal news started with the mother of the disgraced Spanish football federation president, Luis Rubiales (see last week’s ‘Spanish machismo’ letter), locking herself in a church and going on a hunger strike over the ‘inhumane’ treatment of her son.

On Monday, Ángeles Béjar shut herself inside the church of the ‘Divina Pastora’ (‘Divine Shepherdess’) in Rubiales’ hometown of Motril, in the province of Granada. Rubiales apparently grew up in Motril and his father was the town’s former mayor.

Ángeles had said her protest was ‘indefinite’ and would continue until the ‘inhumane, bloodthirsty witch hunt which my son is being subjected to’ came to an end … but she actually lasted just under three days, until Wednesday afternoon.

The parish priest Antonio Rodriguez told reporters on Wednesday: ‘I have to tell you she had a crisis and had to be rushed to hospital. She is no longer here.’

‘Her feet had become swollen and she was very tired. She had also become very anxious,’ he said.

Ángeles was discharged from hospital just hours later.

Since Luis Rubiales became a national embarrassment, the circus of global news surrounding his lewd conduct and later refusal to resign has been ‘damaging the image and reputation of Spain’, according to the Spanish government, at least at a sporting event - and they’ve started a legal case to get rid of him.

‘When the eyes of the world were on our players, his acts caused damage to our sport and our country that is difficult to repair,’ said Miquel Iceta, Spain’s acting minister of culture and sport. So, despite FIFA already provisionally suspending Rubiales from any activity related to football at national or international level for 90 days, the Spanish government is also trying to get him sacked, because the arrogant jackass still has his head in the sand and is refusing to resign.

As the week progressed, I got the impression that the mainstream Spanish media, especially the national broadcaster, RTVE, launched a strategy of damage control, slowly trying to minimise their coverage of the Rubiales saga in order to lessen the global embarrassment.

Midweek, Alberto Núñez Feijóo - the president of the right-wing People’s Party (PP) - tried his best to grab the headlines away from the Rubiales circus, but in the end it was also pretty embarrassing. Poor Alberto, trying desperately to get enough support before his doomed investiture debate and vote takes place on 26-27 September, met with Spain’s acting Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, and as good as begged the socialist to support him in having a two-year stint in government. Legislatures normally last four years in Spain, so it was a bit desperate.

‘Unfortunately, what I have obtained, as far as I understood, is a no,’ Feijóo told reporters after the meeting.

Sánchez didn’t even bother talking to the media. ‘The failed investiture is Feijóo’s attempt to save his skin,’ his PSOE spokeswoman said instead. ‘He’s gone from being disparaging about sanchismo, to begging sanchismo.’

The term ‘sanchismo’ had been used by the PP before and during the election campaign in a derogatory manner to criticise the government policies of Sánchez. (I’ve written previously about the election pacts prior to the possible investiture votes, in Letter from Spain #15, if you’re interested - and I’ll cover it again as we get nearer to 26-27 Sept).

Anyway, the rain in Spain this weekend has finally helped wash Rubiales off the front pages and away from the headlines.

215 litres per square metre of rain fell in the past 24 hours in Alcanar (Tarragona) in southern Catalonia, and - at the time of writing this - up to 120 litres per square metre could fall over the next 12 hours in Madrid.

The mayor of Madrid, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, advised all residents to stay at home on Sunday, and the region’s emergency services also sent texts to residents warning them of flood risks and advising them not to use their vehicles.

‘Due to the extreme risk of storms in Comunidad de Madrid today … do not use your vehicle if not strictly necessary and stay at home to receive further information,’ the alert said. They should have added: ‘And don’t mention Rubiales or his mum again.’

The Barcelona Connection - Research

For those of you following this blog’s research and the locations behind The Barcelona Connection … well, Chapter 18 is set in Nîmes …

The majestic Hôtel Imperator was one of the grande dame retreats of Nîmes; an old haunt of Ernest Hemingway, Ava Gardner and Picasso in its heydey. By the time Vizcaya and Clémenceau arrived, the bullfighter’s assistants were gathered in the bar area. While they were being interviewed, their rooms were also being searched by forensic officers, swabbing for DNA.

As Vizcaya made his way through the foyer towards the bar, he took in the glass cabinets with bullfight artefacts. The bar had framed photos of Hemingway at various bullfights, and there was even a bullfighter’s costume with the fading, yet clearly bloodstained leggings on display in a glass case. Vizcaya had always assumed bullfighting was just a Spanish tradition, yet it was also alive and kicking here in Nîmes.

I spent a long weekend in beautiful Nîmes in March 2013, with Juliane, and we stayed at the Imperator. I spent several hours visiting the amphitheatre and the streets and bistros surrounding it, plotting everything. The description of the hotel bar area is as it was at the time. I think it has since been refurbished, but I wanted to keep it exactly as I saw it.

I’d wanted to include better photos here (I have many), but I’ve had a problem with a back-up disk today. The quality of those I’m posting here is not the best, but it’s all I have for now. In another bar during our visit, I even saw a poster of The Hallucinogenic Toreador on the wall, which was surreal - and it convinced me further that I was on the right track …

As the locations in Chapters 19 & 20 are already covered in previous chapters below, next week we’ll look at Chapter 21 and the research I carried out at the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (MNAC) …

Previous links to my research notes are here:

• Chapter 16 in Letter from Spain #19 (Marta Soler visiting the offices of La Vanguardia)

• Chapter 15 in Letter from Spain #18 (Sants, Les Corts and the Plaça de la Concòrdia)

• Chapter 14 in Letter from Spain #17 (introducing Inspector Vizcaya and Marta Soler).

• Chapter 13 in Letter from Spain #16 (the painting - the possible study of The Hallucinogenic Toreador by Salvador Dalí).

• Chapters 10 and 12 in Letter from Spain #15 (Isabel Bosch and Lieutenant Trias).

• Chapters 8 and 11 in Letter from Spain #14 (Benjamin at Girona Airport and finding the Marqueses’ home in La Bisbal).

• Chapter 7 in Letter from Spain#12 (Séverin and Jürgen).

• Chapter 5 in Letter from Spain#11 (Elena in Girona).

• Chapters 3-4 in Letter from Spain#9 (Marcos Constantinos in Hampstead, plus Benjamin at the UEA & Stansted).

• Chapter 2 in Letter from Spain#8 (the home of the Marqueses de Guíxols, not far from La Bisbal d’Empordà).

• Chapter 1 in Letter from Spain#7 (Benjamin waking up at the service station).

The Barcelona Connection - Reviews, News & Events

This month, on Thursday 28 September, I’m doing an event at The Secret Kingdoms bookstore in Madrid, chatting about The Barcelona Connection and A Load of Bull with Ann Louise Bateson, radio producer, former BBC contributor and presenter of the English language programme, ‘Madrid Live’.

Drinks and snacks will also be served, and although the event is free, places will be limited - so if you’re interested in coming along, then it would be wise to reserve your place by clicking on this Eventbrite link. It will be a fun evening and I hope to see you there!

Another date for the diary, this time in Barcelona. On Saturday 28 October at 2.30pm, I will be participating in a roundtable discussion hosted by Barcelona City Council for their annual International Community Day, with the topic being ‘Discovering & Enjoying Barcelona through Literature’. The event will take place at the Museu Marítim de Barcelona. More details in due course.

As soon as I have news about a possible event at The Salvador Dalí Museum in Florida, I will post details about it here.

Links to reviews & articles

Here’s the link for a review of The Barcelona Connection that came out in La Revista, a publication of the British-Spanish Society.

Here’s a link to a review of the book published by the Spain in English online newspaper.

Here’s the link to an article I was asked to write for The Art Newspaper about my research on Salvador Dalí.

You can also click here for the latest reviews on Amazon, as well as on Goodreads and at Barnes & Noble.

The book is available on Amazon or you can also click here to choose where else to order your copy from. It can also be ordered from any bookshop simply by giving the ISBN number: 978-1-7393326-1-7.

For professional enquiries and foreign rights for The Barcelona Connection, please contact my agent Justyna Rzewuska at the Hanska Literary & Film Agency.