The Final Day
Needless to say it was still raining. This had affected the trip as at no stage could we comfortably stroll around the city, enjoy the Retiro Park or outdoor cafe and restaurant life. Nonetheless we could enjoy the indoor activities of the art museums and in Alan and Ivan’s case football at the Bernabeu. It was also harder to form an impression of the Madrilenos. I found them more sombre then the Italians. Yet Italy did not suffer historically as much as Spain. There are so many ironies when you study Spain’s history. Under enlightened Moorish rule for 700 years until Ferdinand and Isabella it was the Moroccan legionnaires of Franco that caused an enormous amount of cruelty like the castration of Republican prisoners: Ferdinand and Isabella, who united Spain under its own rule, were the force behind another cruel institution the Inquisition and the expulsion of the Jews; Franco ruled Spain for some 37 years but there is no statue, no street or square named after him, he has been airbrushed from history as a dictator who was a supporter of the axis and Soviet bloc-opposer during the Cold War. The Spanish War was not so long ago. Great grandfathers would have fought in it and passed tales of barbarity by both Nationalist and Republican to their children. At the start the brutality was more or less equally perpetrated. It is thought that the Republicans killed over 4,100 priests and 1,000 nuns. After a year it was Franco’s brutality that was winning the day. For example when his army matched on Malaga, 200,000 of the city citizens cleared off to Almeria strafed by airplanes supplied by Hitler and Mussolini. Madrid too suffered a bombardment that took many lives. This must even to this day have affected the city even though there is virtually no contemporary evidence of this.
We all found Madrid elegant with wide throughfares often with a central pedestrian passage of trees. There are many tourist information booths, signs in English and easy to navigate on foot. We saw few beggars, felt much safer than say Rome, there was construction everywhere but employment especially amongst young people has reached 50%. Politically to avoid yet another election the right wing party have been allowed to form a minority government.
In the morning we visited the best known of Madrid ‘s literary cafes called tertula, the Cafe Gijon. You could feel it’s history and I’m proud to say the National Rust is required reading for the descendants of Cervantes. We had hot chocolate, savoured the paintings and ancien decor and its ambience.
We then checked out. We were pleased with the Hotel Urso though Daffers made the point that hotels fashioned by interior designers lack the practicality of enough room lighting and the danger of too many steps. The service was friendly and we liked the touch of a 6pm maid visit with fresh water, and the printed note on the weather and tourist suggestions for the following day.
Anna took us to her golf club at Moraleja which was on the way to the airport. It was a huge high-end complex of homes with 4 golf courses and an American style country club. The food was not too impressive and perhaps conscious that our stay was coming to an end, heads went down. Dear Ivan raised our spirits with a story. Looking at a painting of Jack Nicklaus, who designed the course, he told us of an inter- denomantional golf tourney organised by Pope John Paul 11. The Pontiff attempted to enlist Jack Nicklaus to his Catholic team but the 18-time major winner explained he was not of that faith but nonetheless the Pontiff persuaded him. Jack Nicklaus came off tthe 18th green after his match with a long face.
” What happened Jack?” asked the Pope.
” Your holiness, I got beat 3 and 2 by Rabbi Seve Ballesteros. ‘
On that note we set off to Barrejas airport but in the words of General MacArthur we will be back.
