According to the opposition, Spain under Zapatero will fall apart. I wonder whether it will ever go that far. What surprises me as a foreigner in Spain is the national pride broadcasted in the Spanish media.
This is most graphic in Sports. Not so much during the Eurocup but in general, sports is shown on television (mainly) when Spain is involved. We get to see tennis matches (when Nadal or Ferrer are playing), method one (Alonso), the Nba of the Us (when the Lakers are involved, or more in exact when Gasol is playing), etc, etc, etc. The presented sports news has all the time a Spanish component.
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This is in line with the viewers point; for example in football, in Spain population watch the Eurocup in normal when Spain is playing and much less when other national teams are broadcasted.
A newspaper like El Pais has reformed its structure recently and much of the change was to alter this image of a national newspaper, dedicated to record Spanish news with some global extras here and there. Now the global news is much more prominent.
But not all newspapers have followed this initiative. In many cases, when reading foreign stories, I wonder why the story was prime and very often the trigger was a Spanish involvement. Like for example in Mozambique:
- A Spanish nun is examining the trade of organs in Mozambique (Elmundo). Or, more recently a story in the newspaper Abc reports about malaria in Mozambique. In the end, having read the story it is not so much about the malaria qoute in Africa or more exact in Mozambique, but about a Spanish analyst who is close to having found a vaccine against this disease. verily Spain has contributed much in the battle against malaria (one reads), but for the accidental foreign resident there are too many of such biased stories.
And then the quiz, is "what is Spain" and how about the quest for independence of its communities? Because in many of those stories the Spanish involvement is reduced to a exact region. In the case of malaria in Mozambique the involvement came from man of Barcelona, Catalunya...
In other cases the involvement is from man from Mallorca, from Asturias, Andalucia or the Basque Country. And so far, that is all Spain (at least, perceived by the exterior world).
H.J.B.
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