by Domnall Óg
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Well, it’s not a love thing with me. I can tell you. For many years I lived in the charming seaside town of San Sebastian and summer for me was about invasion, bad manners, and revolting children.
The invasion begins after the Easter holidays, when swarms of back-packers infest the main train station. I like to sit down and read my newspaper as I wait for a train. But in summer all the seats are occupied, not by people but by backpacks. “Where?� I hear you enquire, “are the backpackers?� I will tell you where the backpackers are. The backpackers are sitting on the floor smoking marijuana or murdering a song on the guitar.
The world is turned upside down. Around the entrance to the train station are the vulturesque landladies of the accommodation racket. These are four or five women who own Bed and Breakfast establishments not good enough to get on the Tourist Board-recommended list. They approach innocent travellers on the platform. “Are you looking for a room?� they demand. Travellers who do not have the castellano to cope with the situation are then kidnapped, charged rent, and never seen again.
A reason for celebration, admittedly, if the victim is a backpacker.
On the beach, all is permitted. Bodies that should really never see the light of day can be revealed with varying degrees of nakedness, while young people can wear rubber clothes and go surfing.
I may not condone but I do not condemn.
However, the beach is the beach and the real world is the real world. If I decide to enjoy a cold beer in a bar on the Zurriola Promenade, I do not wish to do so surrounded by pink Rubenesque tourists in ill-fitting bikinis. If they want a drink, they should dress themselves before leaving the beach. Out-of-context beachwear is like out-of-season fruit: poor taste.
Children should be seen and not heard. End of argument. They have sand, they have sunshine, and they are provided with sufficient entertainment. They do not need to run around in the streets like giddy goats. If they wish to run and shout, take them to the countryside.
Last summer I saw a North American gentleman having trouble communicating with the lady at the newsstand in the Boulevard. “Perhaps I can help?â€? I asked. “It’s incredible!â€? he blustered, “she doesn’t speak English!â€? I translated his comment to the lady at the newsstand. We had a good laugh and I walked away. Some people simply don’t deserve help. Summer does not have to be a time when we lose our good manners and taste. After all, we have Christmas for that.
San Sebastian is no more Benidorm than Bambi is Beelzebub. Seats for people, floor for backpacks, beachwear on the beach, streetwear on the streets, children and animals quiet and under control.
Simple rules for the general good.
Once there were travellers. Now there are tourists. A traveller follows the local customs. A tourist looks for McDonald’s. That’s why we sell them such ghastly souvenirs. The heart has gone out of summer. People just want sea, sun, and sand. So I shall avoid backpackers, the bikini brigade, and all the other flotsam of the season. I will dream of the golds and oranges of autumn and the enchantment of the San Sebastian Film Festival.
__
Summertime sung by Ella Fitzgerald
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Posted on http://www.weeklyletter.com at 2007-08-02 10:00:00 +0200
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Everytime I think to myself ” Those damned horrible backpackers” I try to remember that I used to be one.
I agree they can be annoying,but I also remember being on the Paris metro on route to Perpignan in the rush hour with my great big rucksack and rolled up tent. I didn’t feel very popular. I can tell you that! ( Especially as I hadn’t had a shower for 2 days!)
As for bodily freedom: one thing I also notice if I go back to Margate on the South-East coast of England where my sister lives is that going topless for a man in bars and restaurants is perfectly acceptable whereas in Spain it isn’t.
With reference to “children”. I’ve just come back from holiday in Santa Susana on the Costa Brava and my daughter didn’t give me a moment’s peace!
It was ok for her mother,because she just laid on the beach and sunbathed, but every five minutes I heard “Dad come and play sand castles with me.” Or ” Let’s play with the ball etc” (I love children really?)
I remember you once said they should make a new entry in the dictionary:
child-horrible grubby thing that makes a noise. (I must say I see what you mean). Especially if it’s somone else’s!
My nephew once said it seems customary to buy children an ice cream take them on the beach and then hit them and shout at them. (He was about ten at the time!)
I think I can see what he meant!
Actually I do like children. I just don’t like parents who let them scream and shout. Kids need limits and parents who don’t provide them are remiss. Once kids learn that there is a time and a place for everything, they are much more fun to be with….even on the beach!
I suppose there must be decent backpackers. I just haven’t met any yet. I remember a Russian couple in a bar some years back whose feet smelled like a putrid carcass in a barrel of Camembert . We had to ask them to put their shoes back on.
I live in Madrid now and so we don’t have the beach problems. The place is so big and diverse that I don’t notice the tourists. Now my problem is the heat!!
Speaking of feet, summertime is the time when feet are in because feet are out. All kinds of feet. Rubenesque feet, feet that should not see the light of day. Shy feet, sly feet. Confident feet, insolent feet. Fat feet, flat feet. Baby-face feet, varicose feet. Feet for flip-flops, feet for footsies. Do you like feet?
Voltaire once said “I should like to lie at your feet and die in your arms.� He must have been a contortionist.
I have to admit that I have no feelings one way or the other about feet as long they are kept at arm’s length. I can take them or leave them, frankly.
Do you really think the only place occupied by backpackers is San Sebastian ?
I can assure you that there are a lot of places where the backpackers are running free. And not only near the beach.
Nowadays, I live in Girona, a very beautiful city, one hundred km from Barcelona and forty km from the beach. When the weather it isn’t sunny the swarms of backpackers come from the coast to the city in order to visit it. These are the days you can’t take a walk, because if the bad manners are disagreeable on the beach, in the city they are intolerable.
I wonder if these people have the same behaviour in their own cities?
You are right Toni.
Backpackers, like omelettes , are everywhere! Responsible citizens should meet them at the city limits or train platforms and turn these khaki quasimodos away until they get proper jobs and settle down. Then they can come and stay in our hotels and guest houses and have regular showers.
If we wanted our towns and villages to look like a latter day Woodstock we’d have said so!
The invasion begins. My house becomes a hostel but we are not on any tourist board-recommended list because this is exclusive. It’s a welcome invasion because the invaders are kin or friends. These days we have a whole family from Holland. The kids are my age and they are very well-behaved.The dad’s name is Koldo, Basque for Luis, because he was born in Donosti and lived here until he was three or so. Every three years or so, they come here as if to come home. And we always return their visit the next year or the year after. We go to Rotterdam. Then it’s our turn to invade. It’s like going Dutch.
Oscar,
I remember when I was your age we would have the invasions from Ireland. You see I lived in England but all my relations lived in Ireland. There were so many of them! I have (had) seven uncles and aunts and I have thirty-one cousins- You can imagine what that was like!
I remember the happiness and the laughs and the songs. Last year I invited my cousins to come and visit me in Madrid. Twenty-two of them accepted and I had the pleasure to recreate with my own family what my parents used to do. One day you will do the same!
There is a story that I would like to share with you. It’s about a tourist who was visiting the United States. He was passing through Jefferson City and he remembered that he had heard there was a very wise man, a Rabbi, who lived there. The tourist decided to call on the Rabbi and say hello.
The Rabbi was delighted to meet the tourist and invited him into his living room. There was one wooden table and two chairs. Very little else.
“But Rabbi, ” said the tourist, “where is your furniture? Where are your things?”
“Where are yours?” came the reply
“Mine? I’m just visiting, I’m passing through”
“Me too!” said the Rabbi simply.
Yesterday, on the barge from Fraser Island back to the mainland, some German backpackers happened to sit next to me. Then, the one sitting closest to me noticed that he had a splinter in his foot (obviously, because he had been walking around barefoot the whole time). His friend happened to have a safety pin, so the guy started to use it to try to pluck out the splinter. All this happening just some decimetres away from my right knee. Gross!
Thank you for supporting evidence Paola,
You see! The word “backpacker” crosses frontiers as easily as virulent bird-flu.
This German variety could easily have waited until he was suitable alone before he tried to remove the splinter. “Inappropriate Chiropody” is another crime to lay at the door of the feckless backpacker!
Ay! Another opportunity to complain about those horrible tourists, those horrid folks who generate a measly $300.1 billion! Why are people so averse to tourists? Aren’t we ALL tourists?
I like the beach and I like tourists; I like summer and everything that comes with it. Frankly, San Sebastián in the winter is dull! While there are always hoi polloi tourists who don’t know how to act even in their own country, for the most part, I like the variety and the movement that tourists bring with them, whether it be with their backpacks or not. I am not the backpacking type but the thought did cross my mind when I was a college student.
However, regarding the shirtless walking down the street, the scary vultures at the train station, and children’s less-than-acceptable behavior, I must say that I agree with Donal!
What especially bothers me, I think, are the people who think that their country, city, or town is so special that they shouldn’t have to share it with anyone. Think twice before scoffing at tourists. Spanish international tourism is rising; I hope the scoffers get a taste of their own medicine.
I don’t need scoff medicine. I’m not scoffing at all travellers. I’m only deriding some tourists; the noisy, tasteless bothersome ones with repugnant offspring. I’m making a stand for decorum
I’d hate you to think I was intolerant or something!
Tourism creates lots of money, it’s true. So do drugs and TV programmes like Big Brother. Perhaps tourism is a good example of the saying Love of money is the root of all evil
Sharing with others is good. But to do so, you must value what you share. I will share my dinner table with any cultured person. But I will expect them to use cutlery and make no noise when they drink their soup.
—“OLYMPIAN, adj. Relating to a mountain in Thessaly, once inhabited by gods, now a repository of yellowing newspapers, beer bottles and mutilated sardine cans, attesting the presence of the tourist and his appetite.
Ambrose Bierce quotes (American Writer, Journalist and Editor, 1842-1914)
Book: Devil’s Dictionary
Hi everyone.
I feel strongly disagree with this article,my idea of summer is just exactly about wthat the article mention, so that I feel myself on that beach.
I reckon summer has to be different just beacuse the weather, sense of humour, atmosphere, etc are too different, and because is the season where the most of people are out of duties.
My idea of fun is to do something different from time to time, and to have a beer wearing summer clothes out the pub is brilliant and confy t the same time.
The idea of meeting new blood is even more interesting especially for single people who are looking to have something.
I go even further with my idea of summer:
It is especially important for our country just beacuse is the main income and make people to find a job and to increase our standart of living.We should encourage all the foreigns to visit our country, it is to much to learn from them, just the lenguage, culture, customs,trens, etc.
Regards