Gibraltar

There are certain places that are lucky: luck permeates the air and somehow finds resonance in everyday affairs. Other places seem to have a perpetual air of gloom or foreboding, and no amount of frivolity or camaraderie will ever change that. In the former category is present-day Gibraltar. When I first visited Gibraltar some 30 years ago, it was a drab, rather rundown and ugly place, despite being situated in a location which enjoys sun virtually year round. "Only the English could pull this off", I thought at the time. There is a saying that one should never return to places visited in ones youth, since the risk is not so much that the place will have changed and thus disappoint, but rather one's way of perceiving the world will have surely changed. Gibraltar may be the exception which confrms that rule. The intervening years have seen a vast change, with new developments, fresh face-lifts to old buildings, and the needs of the tourist taken seriously. The best elements of English and Spanish culture are perfectly melded into a unique hybrid. The two days I have spent here, wandering around every corner, have really made me appreciate why real estate prices here are so high.

These are some of the things which make Gibraltar an attractive place to live:

• perfect weather, they enjoy 320 days of sun a year on average,
  
• everyone is fluently bilingual in Spanish and English, and in some of the conversations I had with locals, I noticed the complete ease and transparency with which they switched from one language to the other, often in mid-sentence, without a trace of an accent in either language, so long as you don't count English or Andalusian as an accent,
  
• the food is a wacky combination of Spanish and English, but using fresh ingredients from Spain.
  
• No taxes. Gibraltar is a tax haven for certain companies or residents not actually making any money in Gibraltar. Essentially this is very much the same arrangement that the Channel Islands enjoy,
  
• People drive on the right hand side of the road, but there are double decker buses.
  
• For 29 pounds, you can fly to London, and there are four flights a day from Gibraltar airport. Alternatively it's possible to drive to Algeciras and take a cheap Vueling flight to anywhere in Spain for around $50.
  
• In talking with someone who works in tourism, his experience was that most Brits that visit either have family here, or spend less than 3-4 hours here as tourists. They see the sights and leave back to the tourist hell-holes of Torremolinos, and other British vacation nightmares, consequently outside of Spring break and Summer, there's not that many tourists, thus avoiding the "Little Britain" syndrome.
  
• There are nice sandy beaches,
  
• Apes!
  
• Tropical birds,
  
• Fresh fruit,
  
• Everything is within walking distance, and pedestrian friendly. This is true of most places in Europe obviously, but it is worth noting that the entire main shopping area of Gibraltar is pedestrian only.
  

Currently I'm staying at a very nice four star hotel in La Linea, Spain, which is some 500 meters from the border. My experience with hotel 3 decades ago still weighed heavily in that decision, as did the idea of the English cuisine of that period. Since then, Britain has joined Europe (at last!) and the English especially, no doubt through the wonders of the Chunnel and their visits to France, have learned that it isn't necessary to boil away all the flavour of food. Nevertheless, I digress. This morning I had breakfast at a place called "Churros Only", a typical name in these parts that would cause apoplectic fits if the Royal Academy of Spanish Language ever read it. For all my readers who are unaware what a churro is, it's a type of deep fried pastry, cooked very quickly, then dusted with sugar, and served immediately with an accompanying cup of deep, dark, rich chocolate: the best thing the Spanish ever stole from the native Americans.

Waving my Canadian passport at the border without slowing my walking speed is also a welcome relief from the Broadway musical production which border security has devolved into. The guards look rather bored and distracted; I'm not sure what they're looking for, but apparently it doesn't normally look like a pedestrian. The walk into Gibraltar is long in as much as you have to cross a working airfield. Naturally, during the eight times a day when planes are landing or taking off, access is temporarily halted.

Another 500 meters after the airfield, the town proper starts. Past the original defensive wall, through the tunnel, and suddenly there is the town, complete with fast food, English pubs, and electronics stores.

My first order of business was getting my credential stamped at the Cathedral. This particular cathedral is worth a visit as it was originally built as a Muslim mosque, later transformed into a cathedral and enlarged by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabela when they kicked out the Moors. During The Great Siege of 1782 the church was heavily damaged, but subsequently rebuilt. Also curious is that the original Moorish patio was retained and rebuilt. More information can be found here.

It is in this patio where the offices are located, but there was a sign informing that they were closed. Fortunately, just at that moment, one of those ubiquitous church ladies happpened by, and I explained my predicament. She produced a large brass key from her apron, disappeared through a door, and a few minutes later returned my credential with it's new stamp.

After that I ventured off to the end of the pedestrian heart of the city to find the arial tram up to the top of The Rock. Because of the steep cliffs, most of the population lives in the flat area below, but along the top is a verdant area of low trees and tropical foliage, and it is here that Gibraltar's leading animal attractions live. The Barbary Macaques which inhabit this rock were once found throughout southern Europe, but have since disappeared, though there may be less innocent reasons why our closest relatives in the animal kingdom went extinct in Europe. Of this particular variety, which are endangered, there are about 5000 left mostly in Africa, 200 of which live in Gibraltar. Though this may seem like a good protected refuge for them, they are actually being loved to death. The apes are promoted as living in a "semi-wild" state. Nothing could be further from the truth. While feeding them is strictly forbidden and punishable by a 500 pound fine, the apes have taken this with risible non-chalence, and routinely snatch bags of Cheezies, taco chips, and All-Sorts licorice out of the hands of tourists. In the normal dominance rule of these apes, the males are the arbiters of who eats what, and this is strictly enforced through displays or even biting. Thus when humans feed them, they are inadvertently indicating that they are subservient in their social order, therefore they feel no reluctance whatsoever in climbing up someone's leg and snatching a bag of snack food from them. The unfortunate part of this is that Cheezies and All-Sorts are not normally a part of Barbary Macaque's diet, thus diabetes and obesity are rampant in this population. They are very intelligent animals, and I spent many hours interacting with them. Their facial expressions are far more diverse than dogs, however many of the same techniques apply; avoiding direct eye contact until some sort of trust is built, getting them to come to you, not touching them, etc. So close is the genetic relationship between humans and apes that they can catch colds and other infections which humans carry. I made a point of not actually touching them, but often they instigated contact. Their incredible intelligence is obvious, and this may very well be the only place on earth where such close association with apes is permitted. As with all pictures on this blog, click to enbiggen.

"Have you tried the Atkins Diet?"

" Oh, I agree with you on everything except mathematical propositions which are not real propositions at all. 'Mathematical truth' is essentially non-referential and purely syntactical in nature. Wittgenstein's view was that we invent mathematical calculi and we expand mathematics by calculation and proof, and though we learn from a proof that a theorem can be derived from axioms by means of certain rules in a particular way, it is not the case that this proof-path pre-exists our construction of it."

 

 

The apes live together in family units, though they are quite poly-amourous, but have very strong ties to their children. If an infant is present, it's best to avoid contact, though on several occassions I had them approach me looking for treats, so the claim that they are semi-wild is rather doubtful. I saw one of them go into a shop and try to make off with a bag of cookies. Another one climbed into the window of a tour bus and refused to leave, despite coaxing from the driver with peanuts. They're so spoiled rotten that nothing less than licorice All-Sorts or Cheezies will tempt them.

I have included many more pictures in the photo album here.

The highlight of this visit was St. Michael's cave. There are over 200 natural caves on Gibraltar, not including all the many kilometers of tunnels dug in preparation for war, but St. Michael's is the most impressive. The cave was well known in ancient times, though only first mentioned by Pomponius Mela in 45 AD. Artifacts found in this cave prove that it was known sooner than this by the Phoenicians, Greeks and Romans. Legends have it that the cave is bottomless, and for certain, it has not been fully explored so it is uncertain how deep it really does go. One theory of how the apes crossed over from Africa is that there is an entrance to a tunnel somewhere on that continent which comes out at this cave. In ancient times, it was thought that this was an entrance to Hades. But the history of this cave goes back much further than this. Gibraltar is likely the last place on earth where "the other type of human", Neanderthal, finally lived out their last days. In 1848 Neanderthal skulls were found in this cave, and with the possible exception of some remote caves in the Pyrenees mountains, this may very well have been where they made their last stand against the murderous marauding hordes of Cro-Magnon who became our ancestors. There is tantilizing new DNA evidence that suggests there may have been some cross-species fraternizing, but this research is still in the early stages. So strong is our aversion to this other human that even now calling someone a Neanderthal is considered an insult. This is interesting in as much as Neandertals were more robustly built and had a larger cranial capacity, suggesting higher intelligence. Archaeological evidence indicates that they were capable of speech, but rather than the low growling voices often depicted in films, the latest research indicates that they spoke with a high, thin, nassally voice. Given the known set of circumstances, one would predict that they would have been the species to succeed, if we were to choose one. Yet evidence of this first genocide at the very birth of our species seems to indicate that intelligence is not what predetermines survival, as much as success in battle, and as the Burgess Shale in Alberta proves, just plain luck. The Greeks were far wiser than the Romans, but were no match for them militarily. This same story seems to play out throughout history with the Etruscans, the Minoans, the Moors, and many others. If Stanley Coren is correct and the act of domesticating wolves was the deciding factor, then poor Neanderthals never had a chance. The ability to read a dog's thinking, very easy to do by observing their ears, eyes, and vocalizations, would have represented a huge evolutionary advantage in terms of hunting prey or defending against predators. The "early warning system" represented by a dog's tremendous olifactory and auditory superiority would have made short work of Neanderthal attacks. DNA evidence will eventually prove the truth, but it is likely that they were in many ways the Betamax of humans, superior, but doomed. These photographs, and others in this album, may have been the last things which Neanderthal humans saw before falling into the black chasm of extinction.

During WWII, one of the galleries in the cave was set up as a full military hospital. Fortunately it never had to be used, so it has now been converted into a concert hall, and due to the excellent natural accoustics, many classical concerts are played here. (This would make a really original place for a Winter Harp concert next Christmas.)

More modern excavations date to shortly after the English and Austrians captured Gibraltar from the Spanish in the 18th century. Earlier, Spain had actually fought the Moors for it, and it changed hands back and forth a few times, finally coming under Spanish control with the expulsion of the Moors. The last attempt made by Spain and France to recapture Gibraltar occured in 1782, what is now referred to here as "The Great Seige", and the tunnels which were used to defend the rock are now a museum with diorama and original cannons still on display.

A Moorish castle can be seen in any picture of Gibraltar taken from the continent, and this changed hands several times. The damage done by Alfonso XI's massive seige engines dates from 1333 and is readily apparent in the patched up holes. This is the largest tower of its type in all of Al Andaluse.

The Spanish and French did not exactly give this territory up without a fight, and on several occasions England was prepared to simply hand it over, the most recent being a vague promise by Winston Churchill during WWII. Such is the nature of diplomacy that this never happened, and to this day Spain harbours some bizarre hope of regaining control of Gibraltar. A quick look at any map will show that the most Southern point of Europe is not here, but further West at Tarifa, in Spain. The furthest Northern point of Africa is very near Ceuta, also Spanish. Consequently in this age of inter-continental missiles, satelites and submarines, the strategic importance of Gibraltar is rather limited. The Gibraltar residents do not want to belong to Spain, though their ridiculously generous tax situation with Great Britain may account for some of their feelings in this respect. There is an air of exclusivity to many establishments, and the familiar British heirarchical cast system does give it a certain snob appeal. Having said that, there seems to be little or no enmity or feeling of unease between the actual residents, and intermarriage is quite common. Many shops have Spanish names and long- time residents truly feel like Gibraltarans, something unique. The population also has many people of East Indian, African and Jewish heritage. Likely the best solution is simply a status quo, and leave a good thing alone. With the EU tightening the rules on tax havens, the only compelling reason for residents to stay in the future may well be family, fresh fruit and sunshine. With more and more people being able to work anywhere in the world over the internet, Gibraltar will no doubt eventually become a sunny enclave of the affluent who are tired of the damp and cold of London winters. Then again, they willl probably join the tens of thousands of Brits in Estopena, Torremolinos, and other British enclaves on the Costa del Sol.

Further pictures can be found here.