The Pope, the Bunny and the FIFA-Cup

 

I’m told the FIFA-Games begin this Thursday. Gracious me, what a time we live in: Pope, Bunny and now footie. All very exciting, I’m sure. Since the Spanish are playing, then they are of course my team (Go Spain!), but then I’m told that little Cabo Verde is doing well (they play Spain on June 15th) and that they will need our support.

Indeed, may the odds be ever in your favour.

I’ve never cared much for soccer (as you will probably have guessed by now). The sports master put me on the left wing at my first school, since I was tall and fast, but as I learned out much later, when trying to ski in a straight line, my left leg is a fraction smaller than my right, which meant I kept missing when shooting at the goal (that, and crashing into a tree). At my second (and last) school, they made us play rugger, and my inclination was to keep as far away from the ball as possible.

Since then, my only sport has been walking around in giant circles.

I’ve only ever watched one soccer game as an adult, when I was dragged to an Almería – Granada game after attending a political rally in the city bullring (you see how useful these things can be?). I genuinely thought they were teasing me, all the way to my seat high above the pitch, and this in the days before Facebook. God, it was boring.

Me centre with my dad (left) and Charlie Braun

I did join a game on one interesting occasion just after I had finally left school. I was seventeen and the foreigners (we were neither called either ‘expats’ or ‘immigrants’ – or guiris – in those days) decided to play against the cream of our village in a ‘friendly’, the losers to stump up for a jolly barbeque following the adventure.

Their side took it a bit more seriously than ours, with a final score of 11-1 (I think the Mojaquero team scored an own goal just to cheer us up). I remember that, as the final whistle went, five of our stalwarts were seen to be standing off the pitch and surrounding my mum who had at that moment arrived with a freezer-box full of beer.

But enough of this, the gentle reader wants to hear about the World Cup (Yay!).

It’s being played in various stadia scattered across Mexico, the USA and Canada.  It’s apparently very expensive to go there, to stay there (while not being arrested or deported by Trump’s goons), and to travel from one game to the next, if the inclination to do so should tempt you.

For me, having just watched a full week of the Pope’s visit to Spain on the telly, plus listening to Bad Bunny on the radio (he’s still performing in Madrid), it’s now six weeks of endless footie (104 games says the webpage). No news, just penalty shoot-outs.

Luckily, I’ve just loaded up with some thrillers at our English library.

This may all be good for Pedro Sánchez, as the attention of the electorate is swung to other distractions, and it may even be good for Donald Trump (the American 250th celebrations will be held on July 4th, half-way through the games).

So, if you like soccer, have a great time, don’t drink to many beers or eat too much popcorn, and may your team make it to the finals.

If you don’t, I could lend you a book about fishing once I’m through with it.

Delfos Bar, Grill, Apartments and Concerts.

One day, my late wife brought home a foal she had acquired from a gypsy. Barbara loved horses and always rode bareback, When she was a child in California, she would ride to school on her horse and, as they said in those times: a hundred dollar horse and a five hundred dollar saddle. 

Well, the horse was the important thing. 

The stable, for want of a better word, was an old building near our house in Mojácar, across the street from the camposanto. A couple of years later, a Madrid doper and his British girlfriend moved in, put up a plank of wood across some bricks, and opened a bar: La Venta del Olivo. It wasn't a great success perhaps, but on the plus side, management didn't object if the customer rolled himself a joint. 

Carlos (known to all as Karlangas) tended to stock whatever he could find, which was often a fraction skimpy. You mean, he told me once, you've never tried Kahlua, reaching for the one lonely bottle in evidence upon the shelf behind him. 

Life went on, and the place was taken over by a famous artist from Águilas via Mallorca: Manuel Coronado. He put a young Mariano - him with the long hair (he now runs a successful flamenco tablao in Mojácar pueblo) - behind the bar, covered the walls of his now greatly extended building with his paintings and set out to enjoy life in Mojácar as we all strive to do. Manuel ('Manolo') was indeed famous, and he created the Premio Delfos, with candidates who would come down for a few days and stay in the Parador hotel. These included José María Álvarez de Manzano, the mayor of Madrid for over a decade; Manolo Pimentel, a cabinet minister under Aznar, and one or two others...  

The town hall, an early enthusiast of the if-it-ain't-one-of-ours doctrine currently known as La Prioridad Nacional, would have nothing to do either with Manolo Coronado (they still don't have one of his paintings in the municipal collection) or indeed with his Premio Delfos.  Manolo eventually threw in the towel when a couple of local people from Turre borrowed a horse of his for the fiestas, and managed through inattention to strangle its foal. 

Mariano was left running the Delfos. Besides several brave attempts to open a restaurant, hold exhibitions and run the bar, the fact is that it is a little off the beaten path and never attracted the custom it deserved. 

Now it's run by a new group, including the indefatigable Angeli van Os. I had got to know Angeli while we were both living in Paris in around 1984, and she must have remembered me talking about Mojácar, as a few years later, to my surprise, I bumped into her here. Angeli was a successful model before she retired and settled locally. She is one of those lucky people who remembers everybody's name, which makes her ideal for the front-person of the Delfos. The bar and restaurant is now very much a place to visit, while enjoying the advantage of being off the tourist radar. There are concerts and other events going on regularly. It's a fun place with plenty of outside tables, empty views and amusing regulars. I have to say - I've still yet to see anyone from the town hall there.

The Delfos is located on the left, down from the cemetery on the Mojácar road to Turre. 

Vivere Bibere Est - To Live is to Drink

I’m back from a fortnight’s holiday – to a village in the sun-lit green fields of southern Germany. Beautiful walks (they have walking- and cycling-paths that go through the fields and forests rather than as here: a painted-red strip alongside the roads), there’s a local children’s zoo with ducks and lambs and budgerigars, and lots of storks nesting high above a jolly chiringuito where the adults stay for lunch and a drink; and there’s a nearby glider club with a whisper of sound as the aircraft land on the meadow after a few turns in the sky above.

All very nice. We stayed in mostly and watched television.

Now returned on Election Day to my village on the Almería coast, my grown-up children wanted to ‘take me out for a tapa’. This means, translated into English, to go and have a drink or two.

So we did, and duly refreshed, I thought I’d write about Mojácar’s bars, which come, as only fair, in many different shapes and sizes. 

Illustration by Peter Honey

I remember the first time I got drunk. I was fifteen and had gone with my parents to some party in the village given by an odd Spanish-American couple who were, I have to say, a little creepy. They served champán (as it was called in those days). I was given a glass of this sickly stuff as my dad explored the house looking for something better to drink. He soon struck gold when he found a bottle of Johnny Walker stashed in the washing machine.

I thought it tasted even worse than the bubbly.

Later on, I was sick down my father’s shirt and we all went home.

Mojácar back in the early days (in my case, the late sixties) only had a couple of local bars in the village, plus a tiny night-club in the arch run by madrileños and a discothèque owned by Philippe, a Frenchman from Casablanca (25 pesetas a gin and tonic). There were also a small number of bar/restaurants on the beach – plus a Government-owned Parador Hotel and towards the fishing village next door, a French-Algerian run restaurant with a cook from Maxim’s in Paris. If you made it as far as Garrucha, a fisherman’s bar opened at one in the morning – idea for that final carajillo and a sing-song.

The French place, El Rancho del Mar, had excellent food and a roof terrace one could sit on. My dad fell off it once and, as he picked bits of cactus spines out of his back, falsely accused the owner of pushing him.

We lived in the village in the upper of two apartments, bought (according to the escritura I still have) for 90,000 pesetas, which is 540 euros. Now, I agree that people used to pay partly in ‘black’ with the bank-manager seated in the corner at the notary and holding a suspicious-looking package, but Mojácar was in those days quite ridiculously cheap.

Probably a point of contention these days: ‘My dad sold your dad a plot of land for pocket change…’. Well amigo, that’s for sure. 

We rented the downstairs to the son of the Rancho for 1,000 pesetas and just across the way, my dad bought an old house, fixed it up with a plank of wood and a fridge, and opened his own bar. This was called La Sartén and served the community for the next half century (under various hands – my dad was strictly ‘customer class’). Sad to say, it’s now gone.

There were a number of foreign bars in the village in those times when few people lived on the playa, a couple of kilometres below. Americans Arthur and Geri had The Saloon (my dad – again – once kicked Dennis Hopper up the backside there). Sammy and Charlie Braun ran the Zorbas – both of them out to seduce tourists, according to their gender and inclination. Bob from London had La Escalera, where one could sit outside on the public stairwell and be noisy.

There was a Dutch bar, An Anglo-French eatery, an Indonesian restaurant, Mamabel’s Spanish restaurant, and an English breakfast place run by a retired nurse who would give you your injection in the lavatory… all gone now.

Now it’s rather a village of souvenirs, guided tours and improbable fictions.

On the beach for a couple of decades, the chiringuitos were mainly foreign: three American ones, an English one (with the train robber Gordon Goody), a Hungarian one, an Italian one and so on. Now, they are all reconditioned blockhouses run professionally by Spaniards.

Spain has a lot of bars. The Spanish don’t tend to visit them with the intention of getting drunk (Well Done, those tapas!) but to socialise and even arrange business deals over a cold caña. In Almería, there’s a bar for every 126 inhabitants. The winner though, is León with an incredible 79 neighbours for each and every caff and Granada coming next with 87.

There is, after all, nothing much on the television.  

Our strip of coast has grown with over twenty beach-bars, several hotels, many restaurants and so on (Google says there are 150 establishments now, making Mojácar, visitors aside, about one drinking place for every forty residents. If you had stayed home to watch Eurovision the other night, the town would have gone bust!).

We are lost for choice – although most of us have a very small number of preferred venues.

My parents and their friends drank too much, too fast and too well and they are all in the cemetery now. Indeed, if you visit late at night, you might be able to hear the furtive sound of a champagne bottle being opened and the bubble of muted laughter.

Me, I stick to beer.   

The Power of Prayer

Back in 1982 while travelling in Guatemala, I met a Mayan fellow who told me that one should beware of the Catholics, and stick with the Evangelicals, the Protestant movement which includes the Baptists and Methodists and various other assemblies. I’m a non-religious sort, but always happy to learn something new. It seemed that the president there, following a (no-doubt regular) coup d’état, was an Evangelical. Wiki describes the faith as ‘the act of sharing the Christian gospel, the message and teachings of Jesus Christ. It is typically done with the intention of converting others to Christianity. Evangelism can take several forms, such as personal conversations, preaching, media, and is especially associated with missionary work…’ 

Evangelism and politics intersect frequently, particularly in the US, where evangelicalism has become a significant, predominantly conservative voting bloc. You may have seen the photo of the clutch of preachers surrounding President Trump in the Oval Office in what is, for European viewers, a rather embarrassing scene.

Google AI tells me that (American) Evangelicalism has become strongly linked to conservative politics and the Republican Party, especially since the 1970s and 1980s, driven by issues like abortion, school prayer, and the rise of the Moral Majority.

Anyway, that’s there. And here in Spain?

‘Evangelical Christianity is experiencing a period of significant growth in Spain, often described as a "quiet revival" despite the country's largely secular or Roman Catholic cultural landscape. The focus of active outreach in Spain is primarily on church planting, social action, and converting a population where only about 1.6% are estimated to be evangelical Christians’. It’s growing fast here, with around one and a half million followers attending some 5,000 places of worship. The main support comes from Latin American immigrants, allied with the Gypsy community through the Iglesia Filadelfia.

Early this month, a large crowd of 35,000 celebrants joined in the Estadio Metropolitano in Madrid to listen to preachers including the newly converted (and disgraced) ex-soccer star Dani Alves. The organizers claimed that the objective of the event was to consolidate Madrid as the "European capital of gospel and a meeting point for thousands of attendees from Europe, the Americas, and Africa."

From El País in English, we read of another upcoming event: ‘The evangelical boom in Madrid: Packed stadiums, public transit advertising, and political connections’. It says: ‘For days now, advertisements for the Festival of Hope featuring American preacher Franklin Graham have been appearing on Madrid’s Municipal Transportation Company (EMT) buses. The posters, which cover the sides of the vehicles, include a direct invitation: “Share the love of Jesus Christ with people from all over Madrid.” The event, expected to draw a large crowd, will be held on May 30 and 31 at the Vistalegre Palace concert venue and, according to the website, will bring together evangelical churches from all over Spain around the son of the legendary televangelist Billy Graham…’

Later in the article, we read: ‘In Spain, political connections are also becoming visible. In 2023, the Partido Popular intensified its contacts with evangelical leaders in pursuit of the Latin American vote. One of the most visible figures is the Colombian pastor Yadira Maestre…’ She says, as a preacher participating in a political rally back in 2023: “Lord, bless our mayor, bless our president (she means Ayuso), and bless Sr. Feijóo!”

Religious power can mean political power, especially if carefully handled.

On the metro, a captive audience suffers as two predicadores begin their spiel, and there’s no way off until the next station. Elsewhere, a YouTube presentation says that ‘this movement (also known as la Iglesia Pentecostal) employs "shows", the speaking in tongues and alleged miracles to attract young people and immigrants in low-income neighbourhoods. Unlike Catholicism, they seek to directly influence politics to impose their moral code, following successful models established in the United States and Brazil’.

But, as the different churches fight for our souls (and sometimes our vote), we must prepare for the impending visit of Pope Leo XIV in June. This is a Pope who defends progressive views: a popular leader heavily criticised by everyone on the right from Trump to Abascal.  

The battle lines, Brothers and Sisters, are being drawn on the fields of Jericho.