The Annual They Should Be So Lucky

The Calvia police conducted an operation against “vendedores ambulantes” a couple of nights ago. These vendedores are, of course, better known as “looky-looky” or “lucky-lucky” men. According to a report in “Ultima Hora”, the number of luckies heading for Magaluf of an evening has recently increased, as has the number of complaints. Cue plod.

The luckies are a part of the local scene, in whatever resort. Mostly they are harmless, but like anyone who does some street “selling” – and these can include legitimate PRs where they are permitted outside their own establishments and the scratch-card wretches – they can be a damn nuisance. Apart from the fact that they are selling shit (and sometimes they are selling a type of shit that comes in small wrapped packages), the biggest beef with them concerns the fact that they take away business from shops or others and pay not a cent of tax or social security. None are legal.

That the police in the different resorts often turn a blind eye to them has to do with the sheer numbers, lack of police resources and the fact that even if they get hauled in there isn’t much that can be done with them. The police in Magaluf let all of its 41 catch of luckies go, save for one who’d got stroppy. As was once pointed out by an Alcúdia policeman, take one lucky in and another will replace him. There is a production line that never seems to run out of resources.

By coincidence, “The Diario” had a report on different types of vendedores in Playa de Palma on Sunday. To the luckies can be added the beach vendors selling if not necessarily shit, then highly overpriced fruit or drinks. As one shopowner pointed out, they go to a shop, buy some cans and then go and flog them at four or five times the proper price. Another example of the tourist being ripped-off. Doubly if the shop was already charging over the odds.

The simple solution would lie with tourists not encouraging any of the street sellers by not buying their wares or not being hauled off for a hard-sell pitch for holidays they don’t want or need. The latter can be more difficult to shake off as there are more silver tongues, ones that speak the language well. The luckies can be fobbed off, and many do fob them off. But many do not. Kids are especially susceptible, and so therefore are their parents, because the kids often find the luckies funny and enjoy the game of bartering.

But should we really be so sanctimonious? Who has never bought some shit from a lucky or another seller? Who has never bought a dodgy CD or DVD? There are some, including bar-owners, who are good customers for the luckies and for those who don’t bother with luckies and sell direct their packaged, pirated DVDs by the hold-all load.

The luckies and their nuisance and illegal value are an annual theme. Every year’s the same. Despite the efforts of the police, and the Magaluf operation will probably prove to be isolated, and despite local laws that make it illegal to not only sell but also buy hooky gear (as is the case in Alcúdia), the luckies are not going away. Like the poor, they will always be with us. And there will be some who, strange to report, will be quite happy that they are.

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

Money For Nothing?

Anyone going to the old town of Muro these past few months will have been aware that they have been busy digging the centre up and re-doing it. Finally, it has all come to an end. And the result is a general beautification of this ancient pueblo. Not that they did all they had intended, which may come as a relief to all those who had to contend with the inconvenience of the work that they did do. Money. Ran out, basically. Nevertheless, the improvements have cost close on 2 million euros, the town hall coughing up a third and the government (the tourism ministry to be specific) the rest. So it was, therefore, that the government, in the form of tourism minister Nadal, pitched up to celebrate the conclusion of the project.

Muro. Now here is a town that lies some ten kilometres from its playa, as in Playa de Muro. It is to the latter that tourists flock in summer; it is to the latter that elements in the town hall would rather they also flocked at all times of the year in order to play golf on the as-yet undeveloped course; it is the former – the town of Muro – that, were you a tourist minded to go and visit the old town that gives the playa its name, does not have a direct bus service from this same playa; it is the former that the tourism bods singularly fail to make any great play of, save some brochures at the Playa de Muro tourism office; it is to the former that no-one probably would be inclined to go, save to admire its vast church or to trek around a museum.

When, therefore, Sr. Nadal says that this upgrading of the old town centre is all a facet of the de-seasonalisation of tourism and of the tourism offer by the interior towns (in this case Muro), what tourism is he actually referring to? Are there great hordes of tourists flooding into the town? No, I don’t think so either. Even when there is something going on in Muro, as there will be with the fiesta later this month, will there be a big tourism promotion? I somewhat doubt it.

The point is that it is the playa of Muro that generates the town’s tourism, not the town. There is absolutely nothing wrong of course in upgrading the centre, but what about upgrading the playa? Those awful eyesores that are the empty units along the main road could, should, be given some serious attention. Some money might well have been diverted towards creating something that Playa de Muro badly lacks – a focal point. But no, the old town has got nigh on two millions worth of folding notes, and for what?

Turn the music off
There has been a bit of an old rumpus cracking off in Magaluf. This relates to the application of a new law emanating from the environment ministry which states that nights start not at 24:00 but at 23:00. What this means is that bars have to stop music on their terraces at 11 o’clock at night. Moreover, the bars have had to reduce the decibel levels by a further ten points. Bar owners have protested. And how? By closing, which does seem a bit like cutting your nose off to spite your face, but they have a legitimate gripe. Bear in mind, this is a law from the government, it isn’t just a local thing, though the decibel levels have been cut following a “denuncia”. Magaluf is not the only place affected.

The bar owners, and this means bar owners everywhere, have been getting it in the neck for years. Twelve o’clock curfew, now an hour earlier; sound limiters and now lower decibel levels. You can add in the colossally petty way in which the size of terraces are policed and numerous other things. And now of course there is the sheer difficulty caused by recession. Yes, noise is an issue. But these are holiday resorts. This latest attack on bar owners is ridiculous.