Spain for Pleasure

Corvera is a sleepy (and I use this term with complete accuracy) byway in the dusty south eastern tip of Spain which appears to have been largely ignored by just about everybody. There are cars parked on the streets but seemingly no people to drive them, but if they choose to, at least Corvera has a petrol station and a road which will lead them to the bustling university city of Murcia, which is about 10 miles north. Corvera’s only cab driver, Juan, has one arm (I suppose you could call him a ‘Juan-armed-driver’). Demand for his services are slight (probably wise), and we’re told Juan only recently entered the taxi trade to supplement his haulage business, which perhaps prove Spain’s slightly cavalier approach to road safety.

We’re here during the May bank holiday for Mercia’s SOS 4.8 festival, a non-stop two day event which set us back the measly price of €35. A relatively young cultural event combining visual and performance art with live music, SOS 4.8 mixes an odd collection of British artists (Hot Chip, Mystery Jets, Madness) with the sort of Spanish pop which wouldn’t look out of place on ‘The Fast Show’. Listening to this stuff makes you realise just how important the UK music industry really is, and there is great pride to be had in watching a 30,000 strong crowd of Spanish locals singing along, in interpretive English, to the songs of Franz Ferdinand. As a tourist, and as one of the very few English at the festival, one can take solace in the fact that drunk teenagers are pretty much the same all over the continent, no matter what language barrier, with fashions and behaviours reminiscent of just about any other UK festival that I have had the mortally hung over pleasure to have endured.

The festival’s main beer sponsor, Estrella Levante, aren’t particularly prolific outside of Spanish speaking regions, and can’t therefore afford the global marketing costs of something like Heineken’s Benicàssim festival, which attracts British drugheads in their droves. Mind you, SOS 4.8 isn’t by a beach (although it is located on a car park, like the festival in Benicàssim) and can’t quite boast the same expanse of artists, but it does share that unique Spanish sensibility of forcing its visitors to dance until they’re unconscious, or at least until they can’t quite take anymore. Last night, for instance, Fatboy Slim took to the stage at 4.30am. Let me repeat that. 4.30am. This fact alone puts your average English festival to an embarrassing shame.

Given the educated nature of the predominantly student crowd, a basic grasp of English is clearly a prerequisite, and I wish I could say that this is reciprocated. My limited grasp of Spanish mostly includes repeatedly denouncing myself as ‘Anglaise’ and being able to ask for coffee with milk. Yet the attitude towards the English appears to be quite envious. ‘Anglaise?’ a barmen exclaims, ‘Ci, muy buena!’ My politeness extends to the local townsfolk, one of which clocks me near a petrol station and asks me something I don’t understand. When I point out that I’m English, she asks again. “Blow job?” she says. And being as awkwardly English as you could possibly imagine (particularly when being confronted by a prostitute), I thank her for the offer but politely decline.

Back in Covera, we’re told that the region will soon have sufficient financial support from the PGA who plan to build a top international golf course in the region, something which entrepreneurial ex-pats have taken to heart by quickly assembling a new apartment complex, which is where we are having the pleasure of staying. It has been built like a mass-security compound in a deserted, sandy outback and is therefore, I can only imagine, not dissimilar to Guantanamo Bay, only with better parking. This was built back when moving to Spain for most Brits was almost part of your retirement package, the results of which have seen versions of Little Britain dotted up and down the south coast, where Guinness is served on tap and bars have songs like ‘Sweet Caroline’ on their karaoke roster. But since recession-hit Brits have stopped buying up land for their bespoke villas and swimming pools, unemployment has rocketed here. During our stay at the resort, we only see approximately ten other human beings, including staff.

It's bloody luxury, though, although clearly not quite to the high standards of my mother. “Where’s the bidet?” she asks in all sincerity. Sometimes you don’t realise just how horribly middle class you are.

Gordon Brown’s ‘bigotgate’ gaffe reminded me of that scene in The Naked Gun, which in itself is a joke that is almost as old as the hills. At a press conference featuring top international delegates, lieutenant Frank Drebin takes a prolonged moment of anguished relief in the gents toilets only to discover upon his return that all of his extended lavatory behaviour has been beamed out live across a stunned conference thanks to his tie mic. Surely Brown’s mishap displays the sheer amount of exhaustive cross-country badgering that all party leaders are currently going through: after all, I certainly know that if I were in the same position, I wouldn’t just accidentally forget that I was wired up to a Sky News microphone and that every word that I was saying was being recorded by journalists who have been spending every waking hour trying to screw me. So, really, he should have known better.

Still, a priceless moment nonetheless, and one that further confounds those bullying allegation that many found so unpalatable. He looked so infuriated with himself when he was exposed on the Jeremy Vine show (pictured above) that you wondered whether he might just completely flip out, rip off his shirt and start tearing up the studio. But calling the incident a game changer is short sighted: let’s recall Neil Kinnock’s arse-over-tit routine on Brighton beach during the 1992 Labour campaign, which didn’t singularly lose him the election, but did contribute to a mounting catalogue of errors, which made him look more like a clown at a kid’s birthday party than a viable PM contender. Brown committed the ministerial equivalent of sending a text message to the person that you were meant to be discussing with somebody else. It’s not an excuse, of course, but we’ve all done it.


I failed my driving test on Wednesday. No great shame in that, but it would help if driving instructors told you just when the testing officially starts and ends. As a preamble, I merely happened to comment how hot it was inside the car, to which the official questioned how to turn on the air conditioning. Not knowing the answer to this, or whether we were still engaged in some form of gibbering nervous small talk, I continued to drive and completely avoided answering his question. I had been advised that conversing during the test can help with cooling any built up anxiety, but in hindsight, it’s probably best to just shut up and drive.