Who cares about Barcelona?

Talking about your city is dangerous because you can get trapped in the useless nostalgia of a time that will never return. A nostalgia as human as it is unjust, because memory is selective. Without going any further, Barcelona is greener, the metro and buses are infinitely better, and the streets of my childhood, in Gràcia, are more enjoyable today than they were years ago. Or those of the Eixample, much less polluted but sometimes dirtier because we live in perpetual consumption and, therefore, in the overproduction of garbage.

And, at the same time, in these streets I feel that English is spoken and offered.brunchBecause the community we used to identify with has disappeared. The new community replacing it isn't made up of second- or third-generation neighbors, who can't afford the rents or mortgages required, neither for the shops themselves nor for the apartments themselves.

The disappearance of local commerce is both a cause and a consequence of uprooting, and now franchises or businesses designed for tourism abound, which can pay the astronomical rents, and where the service is so lax that it seems they work for Amazon. Municipal markets, which once teemed as the epicenter of everyday life, are closing due to higher-quality products and afternoon hours. Corner supermarkets, open all night, advertised with dazzling lights and swoopy signs unbecoming of the city that once boasted of its design, seem like the symbol of municipal resignation. Many of these problems extend to larger cities, but the misfortunes of many are no consolation. Barcelona has expelled thousands of Barcelona residents, and this is its greatest failure. And now, who cares what happens to Barcelona, ​​if it's not for purely extractive purposes?