Galicia
Historic but stateless nation located in northwestern Spain with its own culture, language, and identity
Entre as Pedras
One of the best things about living where we do is the lush flora, with trails and paths everywhere along and protruding from the riverbank. We can explore our surroundings on foot, without the need of a car to reach a trailhead.
A few days we took Alqo to a wide open space. Unofficially designated as the dog park of the town, there weren’t others dogs for him to play with. It had rained the whole day before and we weren’t ready to head up the monte to cloister ourselves up by our heater, so we started down a path following the river. It turned in to a 6 kilometer out-and-back, leaving town behind, crossing the river, and heading deeper into the forest.
These paths bring back so many memories of Sierra Leone. The foot paths from my village in Loko country led to smaller settlements, passing upland farms, palm plantations, sacred bush for gbangbaní ceremonies, and irrigated swamps for rice farms. The human interaction with the physical environment was minimal but symbiotic. You could see palms with a small plastic container hanging from the tree collecting palm wine, or a bundle of sticks with thread and a lock, signifying some type of swear that a moriman had constructed, for a price, to protect the property or harvest of another. While there are no fetishes, we could see the land was cared for in a wild way. There were mossy stones organized as small walls or boundaries, and small plastic water bottles hanging from young castaños (we’re still unclear what function they serve).
We saw a lot of quartz on the walk too. Even up on the monte the cloudy white rock is everywhere.
Despite the cold and rain, I’ve been outside every day. It’s quite a change from living in Cologne, and it’s much appreciated. Nature is close, and I feel it.
View from the Village
Afincados
Por fin.
A few days ago, we left the coast and moved into a small house in a village of around sixty inhabitants. Situated on a carretera secundaria, up a small monte, we’re a few kilometers outside a town of 6,000 people, from which is a 25-minute drive to Ourense.
We’ve met a few neighbors, who’ve already generously given us apples from a small orchard across the street and candied pecans. We have fresh bread delivered every morning and even though we are on a carretera segunda, there aren’t many passing cars throughout the day. We are almost definitely the youngest people in the village.
Yesterday, we took a walk further up the monte with Alqo. The feeling of having lush, beautiful forests to enjoy so close, without needing to drive, is unmatched.
I can get very used to this fresh morning air and quiet rainy evenings, dawn to dusk filled with birdsong and incredible views.
The Republic We Want: Spanish Republicanism and the Crown
Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Source: WikiCommons)
“We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings.” — Ursula K. Le Guin
King Felipe VI of Spain is here in Galicia. I normally don’t keep up with his movements, I only saw he was in the area when Xuventude Comunista, the Galician youth wing of the Communist Party of Spain tweeted some photos of their protest against him speaking at the University of A Coruña. Patricia’s grandmother also told me that he will stop in O Grove for the Atlantic Forum and to make an appearance at the Festa do Marisco. I’ve only read about it around the edges, but it sounds like a Davos forum for Spanish business and political élites.
To have a king in the 21st century. I assume some hardly think about it. But others, regionalists, younger generations, leftists, imbue the situation with deserved thought, criticism, and nuance. These people are repúblicanos, and advocate for a Third Spanish Republic. Not a party (like in the United States), much less a coherent voting block, Spanish republicans see an unfinished project in la transición, the transition from a fascist one-party state to a constitutional monarchy, and must deal with the consequences of political instability in the historically two-party system and growing fascism on the right with Vox.
While there still exists an aristocracy in America, like most countries with similar situations of income inequality, our history of tolerating monarchism ended with the loyalist refugees fleeing to Nova Scotia and New Brunswick after the Revolutionary War.
Spain’s trajectory with monarchism is different, of course. Today, the Crown enjoys support from around half the country, depending on poll numbers. Many older Spaniards I’ve talked with tell me Juan Carlos I did what he could with what he had at the time.
In 2007, only 22% favored a republic and in 2008 just 16% (7% claimed they were Juancarlistas, supporters of the king without a preference on the fate of the monarchy after him) But since the 2008 financial crisis, the string of royal scandals (including the Felipe VI’s brother-in-law, African hunting photos, infidelity, etc.), repúblicanismo is rising in Spain. And many are dreaming of a Third Spanish Republic.
El Confidencial had a recent poll in June of this year regarding preferences for a republic or monarchy. 46.1% of Spaniards now prefer a republic (with 50.8% for a continued monarchy, and 3.1% undecided).
I chose some of El Confidencial’s datapoints, both strongest preference per system including one in the middle, and added them here:
| Republic | Monarchy | |
|---|---|---|
| Age | ||
| 18-24 | 70.4% | 26.1% |
| 25-34 | 54.8% | 44.6% |
| 34-44 | 52.3% | 44.5% |
| 55-64 | 35.7% | 61.4% |
| Voted Party (April) | ||
| Partido Popular | 7.8% | 90.7% |
| PSOE | 51.6% | 44.5% |
| Unidas Podemos | 86.0% | 9.3% |
| Community | ||
| Andalusia | 23.5% | 75.1% |
| Galicia | 51.6% | 45.6% |
| Catalonia | 74.0% | 21.6% |
A majority of those polled who were born after 1975, the year Franco finally died (I’m not sorry, good riddance) prefer a republic, but stronger amongst the youth. It’s not surprising when broken down by party. The troika of right-wing parties, Partido Popular, Ciudadanos, and Vox all favor a monarchy by at least 82%. What’s interesting to me is the historical nationalities of Galicians, Catalans, and Basques being more inclined for a republican system, arguably giving more decentralized power to the autonomous communities, while the rest of Spain, specifically Andalusians interested in retaining the monarchy.
My question really is this; will we see a Third Spanish Republic in the next twenty or thirty years? And when it happens, can it endure? We can dream.