I felt rather depressed when I read this article about Spain
being urged to give up the siesta: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/26/spain-working-hours-ending-siesta
Any holiday-maker, once they’ve got used to everything apart from bars and
restaurants closing from 2-4pm, will tell you it’s rather special. For one, it
kind of forces you to spend two hours in a bar or restaurant. For another, you’ll
see the Spanish on holiday together as extended families, in a way that I don’t
think you see in the UK.
What depresses me is the orthodoxy of the solution. At the
risk of understatement, there’s some economic problems in Spain. Working hours are too long, but there’s really good
evidence for shorter hours being better for health and prosperity: http://www.alternet.org/story/154518/why_we_have_to_go_back_to_a_40-hour_work_week_to_keep_our_sanity
So why do Spain have to conform to everybody else’s idea of what a
working day looks like? They can do as they choose with the timezones (and if
Franco changed them, that seems like a sound rationale for changing them back).
Why not simply start the working day later?
If the siesta can be preserved in some form in the working week,
it will surely thrive outside of work. But if you take it away five days a
week, will you change your body clock for the other two days? The siesta, and
the late-night lifestyle is a key part of the Spanish cultural identity, and
that’s very important to people’s feeling of worth and happiness. I think Spain
would be poorer, in all senses, without it.
And if the knock-on effects mean that the odd footballer can’t
adjust to Spanish life, then sorry Michael, but that’s a price worth paying: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/columnists/michael-owen/10263747/Michael-Owen-Real-Madrid-was-a-horror-story-for-me-off-the-pitch-but-Gareth-Bale-will-flourish-if-he-feels-at-home.html
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