Chilling in Malaga

Trip Start May 05, 2008
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Trip End May 09, 2009


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Flag of Spain and Canary Islands  , Andalusia,
Thursday, June 19, 2008

Well, last you heard from us, we were preparing to leave Morocco and we headed to the nearest major destination in Spain which we hadn`t visited, Malaga. Initially we had left it off of our itinerary because it has a reputation of being ruined by overcommercialization. Perhaps because it is not high season yet, we did not quite find it to be so bad. It is a city of about half a milllion people, partly colonized by the British, with long stretches of beaches (which are alright, but nothing to really brag home about), and a charming downtown core filled with a vibrant street life buzzing along its many pedestrian avenues.
Initially, coming in from Morocco, we had quite a shock coming in, which must resemble the much greater one a Moroccan immigrant must have coming into Spain. After all, crossing the few dozens of kilometers which constitute the Strait of Gibraltar also means making a giant leap in economic conditions, since Morocco and Spain have possibly the greatest relative income difference for neighboring countries in the world (about $4000/person/year for Morocco and $33000/person/year for Spain after adusting for purchasing power parity) Hollywood sign in Malaga
Hollywood sign in Malaga
 . The wealth difference to the visitor is truly staggering, and is put further into perspective by the fact that Morocco is far from being the poorest country in the world and Spain is far from being the richest. On the surface, it extends from the state of the houses, to the cleanliness of the streets, to the abundance of food in supermarkets, to the people and even to the street cats. In Morocco we had seen feral cats everywhere, most of them almost skeletal and desperate for food; here in Malaga we saw a couple of colonies of feral cats sleeping on some rocks lining the beach, but they actually looked in fairly good shape. Truly the old cliche of the world division in the haves and the have-nots is visible everywhere in these two countries.  
We have spent some time going to the beach, sleeping and relaxing, but we also took advantage of Malaga´s cultural offerings, visiting the Picasso museum, its charming downtown core, and the Baroque cathedral which was left unfinished because the bishop which oversaw its construction determined it was better to use the funds aiding the British in the American War of Independence...
We are now off to the relatively remote region around Almeria, where Spain´s best beaches still lie relatively undeveloped, in great part no doubt due to the arid conditions which made the region the perfect spot for American directors to fill spaghetti westerns there in the 1960s (including such classics as ´´The Good, the Bad and the Ugly´´ and ´´For a Fistful of Dollars´´). So we´re off to the Wild West (or rather Andalusian East) and we´ll talk to you soon.
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