The pro-Independence Convergència i Unió (CiU) party fared badly at the Catalan election yesterday. Losing twelve seats it failed to win an absolute majority in the Catalan parliament. Spain’s Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy, eager to keep the whole of Spain intact, toasted this ole result with the claim that “this was a slap in the face for Catalan independence”.
Rajoy’s dancing in the end zone might be short lived. Almost two thirds of the seats went to parties that back a referendum on independence. The CiU could join forces with minority parties to form a coalition that keeps the momentum for change on the agenda.
The lines and the places on the map are forever shifting. At the end of the Cold War the Soviet Union broke into fifteen parts and Yugoslavia into six (After some bruising Balkan wars). For those of us that like to know our capital cities this was more homework. If Catalonia does form a new country at least its capital will be easy to remember. This is the city with the garbage football team. The B word is also off-limits for me.
England’s brilliant cricket victory in Mumbai (Why oh why was Monty not MOTM?) was a reminder that cities change their name. Mumbai will always be Bombay to me and don’t get me started on Kolkata. Even India’s close neighbour Burma is at the madam on the country front with its Asian Jim Royle-esque put down: Myanmar. Furthermore, Rangoon (Yangon, anyone?) has been replaced by Naypyidaw.
The United States of Europe seems dead in the water which is a pity as the massive umbrella organisation would have one capital. Perhaps Athens, perhaps not. With other European countries having separatist tendencies there might be more tumultuous map changing and new capital learning times ahead.
Northern Italy have Independence parties, Belgium might split into two and Bavarians will be Bavarians. The domino toppling could begin if Catalonia breaks away. After Catalonia what price the Basques? Thank God we don’t have anything like this in our back yard.
Boadicea's Chariot 
Howzit TR
There are places within 20/30 miles of where I live have had their names changed. In fact ‘places’ don’t change their names but ideologists do. There are regions and towns within the said 20/30 miles that I have no idea where they are when referred to in the press or on the news. Personally I couldn’t care less, when goods or functions are advertised in areas that I have no idea where they are I simply give them a miss.
KP was quite rightly MOM, I could have taken 10 wickets on that pitch, but 180 runs? I just might have come unstuck just after my ton and then where would we be?
Two mighty games of cricket today, well done England but what about our boys gutsing it out for a draw?
I know nothing about Catalunya but I’m all for splitting New Zealand up into 2 countries 😉
Paradoxically Rajoy’s home region, Galicia, is more sympathetic and well-disposed to its Lusitanian neighbour than it is to the Castilian hegemon that presently dominates it. What never ceases to amuse me about the changes in Indian city names is that very few Indians I’ve ever met have used them. If they do, they use it only if they think I do not know the proper names. The Burma/Myanmar issue is also more culturally loaded, the latter being a rather more chauvinistic version of the first.
Soutie: well put. Eventually it’s no longer worth the trouble to keep up with the changes in names.
Ideologies come, ideologies go, and very rarely do they do anything but confound and underwhelm.
I’m not so sure, JW. The one thing the Eurocrats oppose is a democratic vote on absolutely anything which threatens their (not our) beloved EU project. What I really want to know is why, with all the Eurozone basket cases´and France having recently lost its AAA status, the Euro is STILL at 1.2350 to the Pound and not at 1.75 or worse.
OZ
OZ: it’s for the same reason I have to pay roughly 1.27 Obama drachmas per EU-ro. Western currencies in general have become so debauched that it’s merely a matter of which one is least ugly at the moment. Germany is also in a bad way so it might not be that much longer until everything falls down. After all, even in a dictatorship some degree of consent is required for a government to function.
Christopher, I have been honking for some time that the Euro is not responding to normal market indicators. It is an economic basket case by all normal parameters, yet still retains an apparent strength. I spent thirty years working in international markets and have never seen anything like it apart from Nick Leeson and that Nigerian bloke at UBS recently. What I have learned is that, no matter how big, you can’t beat the market and when the Euro finally crashes it’s going to be bloody.
OZ
OZ: I agree with you fully. If the Scandinavian Monetary Union could not hold together — all three members coming from similar cultures and countries with broadly similar development — what hope is there for something as large as the present eurozone?
My suspicion is that the mendacity south of Canada has been busy pulling strings, quietly buying bonds with printed money, and otherwise doing everything possible to prop it up to avoid having to expose the depth of its own involvement and lack of viability. Considering that a partial audit showed vast sums of off-book lending to the EU, there might be something to this.
I gather from the Canadian news that the Catalan area is about all that is keeping Spain afloat at the moment. One of the biggest bitches being that they contribute billions in taxes and get nothing back at all in their area.
Sounds like the average UK working citizen!
As a geographer it grieves me mightily to have to admit that I gave up years ago trying to keep up with changes of names of countries and cities. But as they are all disgusting rat holes I would never visit in a million years so I don’t care! Actually every decade or so I buy a new current atlas that has all the new nomenclature but rarely look at it. My favourite atlas is that of my uncle showing all the steam ship routes and the settlement of WWI and reallocation of territories. c.1920. That and a Times atlas c. 1995. A range of atlii (?) are far more informative than the shabby stuff that is published on the internet for free. Try getting good contour maps without a subscription. I’ve never found any.
It strikes me on a casual basis that an awful lot of countries, regions etc wish to disassociate themselves from their neighbours and yet all the governments concerned seem to be hanging onto to integrated places like grim death. No government anywhere wants the return of the nation state, I wonder why? None of them are willing to risk plebiscites, what is in it for them?
Hi there, finger-spinning Soutie
Didn’t see much of the two Tests at the weekend. Congratulations on your successful salvage mission.
Taking ten wickets in a match is pretty rare so just by using the lies, lies and damned statistics formula I would have given the award to Monty. And what have New Zealand done to upset you? Did they thrash you at rugby?
Christopher, only recently I read in a book by Clive James about Indians still using Bombay, Madras etc. when talking. Thanks for corroborating his statement.
OZ, last time I checked the Scottish ten pound note was equal to the value of its English counterpart. Let’s hope this doesn’t change in the foreseeable future.
I don’t travel much myself, CO, but I do like looking at maps and trying as best I can to keep up with the numerous changes. Few things from school stuck in my mind as much as being told that Quagadougou was the capital of Upper Volta. The teacher pronounced it “Wag-A-doo-goo”. I’m not sure if he was right or not about this but it’s the way I say it.
Upper Volta is, of course, now called Burkina Faso. When younger I always wondered why there was no Lower Volta on the map.
You are right royalist but the failure to have an upper and lower is not confined to the infernal continent. Wales is also guilty!
Xxxx Uchaf and Xxxx Isaf, I know several of one or the other and a complete lack of the matched pair!
England too is guilty, take the Thames valley, Lower Assenden and Middle Assenden, but no upper- the next village up is called Stonor!
The Poppletons in Yorkshire too. Quite bizarre when you think about it. So I guess we had better let the Africans off THAT hook!!! Probably probably named by some pissed up paeon from the Foreign Office about a zillion years ago.
Morning Mrs O. Upper Volta (the upper reaches of the Volta river no less), was fortunately not “One of ours” some paeon from the Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, probably did the deed.
I know, I can’t find those / \ bloody things on the keyboard either.
I always preferred Over, Middle and Nether (as in the Wallops) but Greater and Lesser also work well.. My favorite will always be Great Snoring, a nice little village close to Norwich
Ah ha but I HAVE found the exclamation mark, look, see!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just love Great Snoring, absolutely brilliant, must be the soul home of the current incumbent!
“England too is guilty, take the Thames valley, Lower Assenden and Middle Assenden, but no upper- the next village up is called Stonor!”
… and then one continues up to Pisshill, sorry Pishill.
I’ve been staying near Puttocks End. Nuff said.