The afternoon siesta is commonplace in Spain, particularly in its villages and smaller towns. According to our fluent English speaking host at the Hostel Ciudad, the afternoon heat is so unbearable that people in the town only work between 7am and 3pm, before hibernating indoors until around 8.
While most support the traditional view that the siesta was first introduced in Spain to protect its field workers from the heat, others claim that it stemmed from the severe poverty caused by the Spanish Civil War. People forced to work in more than one job had to eat their traditional family lunch late due to their unusual working hours. Others argue that it’s simply because the Spanish people like to enjoy a long lunch, which often includes the entire family. Whatever the cause, it certainly allows its people to enjoy more of their evenings, sometimes well into the early hours of the next day.
With the town’s communal character on full show, on what was otherwise an ordinary Thursday evening, its footpaths were busy with families and couples out walking. Not a car to be seen, people were riding their pushbikes along the street, while others sipped beer on the back of Andalusian ponies.
No matter where we travelled in Spain, the evenings were the same. The streets began to fill around nightfall and often remained that way until the early hours of the new morning. It bears the hallmark of a pleasurable existence but a hectic one as well, certainly if it was to be without the presence of the siesta earlier in the day. Today, there is a growing belief among many Spanish that the afternoon ‘snooze’ doesn’t help the country’s economy or its youth unemployment.
In what has been considered a positive measure to help improve the country’s flagging economy and high unemployment rate, new laws were introduced in 2012 to increase the number of hours in retail stores from 72 to 90 hours per week. Old laws catering to religious observance in a traditionally Catholic country have also been relaxed, allowing shops to open on more Sundays and public holidays than were originally permitted. And in what is seen as an even more significant step to encourage new trends, the country’s capital has deregulated retail hours altogether, permitting shops, regardless of size, to stay open for as long as they wish.
Nevertheless, lying deep in recession, where 25% of its people are on the paro (dole), and the number of youth unemployed significantly higher, it seems that it will still take eons for a country whose traditional past has been a slow evolution, to change its sleep patterns. And in spite of the consequences, in some respects, who can blame them.