For Spain’s people, it’s a sad state of affairs

The Unhappy Planet is how the Spanish newspaper El Mundo headlines a report on the state of the world we live in. The story deals with the New Economics Foundation’s Happy Planet Index, which measures the social well-being of countries.

This year, although Spain remains among the top countries in terms of the perception its citizens have of their quality of life, it has dropped a couple of steps and seems to be moving away from the circle of happiness, like a star adrift.

What is the reason for this growing melancholy in a country that until recently retained the splendor it acquired upon its transition to democracy in the late 1970s?

To a great degree, the cause of this collective ailment is the economic crisis that lately has crept like poison ivy into the Spanish social fabric. With an unemployment index just below 25 percent and one out of every two young people out of work, the national self-esteem not only does not raise its head but plunges it ever deeper into the pit of despair.

Many find it difficult to rise up with zest every day, pummeled as they are by economic news that resembles the obituary of an entire nation. Germany heads the circus of a Eurozone that has lost its step. There are no longer any rescues, or risk premiums, or an International Monetary Fund that might bring back confidence to societies shocked by the loss of savings and safety nets.

That is why Spain has turned into itself more than ever, becoming a spaceship Enterprise traveling alone and stunned in the orbit of its own planet. At times, there are demonstrations on the streets, but what’s most prevalent is the growing frustration of young people who fear being remembered in the future as the new Lost Generation, even though they never lost themselves in the adventures of a bohemian Paris between the wars. They simply watch their lives passing them by, with no way out because, at least for now, there is no way out.

In the country of Melancholia, a young man emerges from a temporary-job placement office on Madrid’s Atocha Street. I can hear what he tells a friend: “The only thing I want is to find a job. Any job.”

But opportunities are scarce and youngsters with a college degree are packing their bags to flee abroad — Latin America, northern Europe, maybe Canada. Anywhere, before they’re too old to burn their youthful gunpowder.

Some years ago, Joaquín Sabina wrote one of his best songs, Melancholia Street, where he said he felt “like someone in a ship gone mad that comes out of the night and goes nowhere.”

It sometimes happens that countries, like life itself, become a street with no exit. From the window, one sees a cloud of Melancholia.

Gina Montaner nació en la Habana en 1960. Se instaló en Madrid con su familia en 1970, donde ha transcurrido gran parte de su vida. Desde hace veinte años publica una columna semanal sindicada en una serie de periódicos en los Estados Unidos y Latinoamérica. Desde entonces ha alternado el periodismo escrito con el de televisión como productora de informativos, una labor que desarrolló en CNN+ (Madrid). Actualmente reside en los Estados Unidos y está a cargo de proyectos especiales para informativos de la Cadena Telemundo (Canal 51).

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