Sentiments contraposats

Proximitat, llunyania, generositat, austeritat, són paraules que sovint, darrerament, les intuïm en el ambient com si d’un pèndul es tractés la nostra vida. Ens atansem uns als altres amb una solidaritat extrema, ajudant-nos amb un objectiu comú, quan veiem que l’egoisme d’altres irromp com un volcà per sobre nostre, i de la mentida en fan un hàbit per tapar la realitat esfereïdora. Sentim a dir barbaritats i ens enfonsen la confiança en aquells als que vam empènyer a tirar endavant un ideal de país millor, més just, més pròsper i més social. Ens havien dit que venien vaques magres i vam creure que duraria poc. Un Estat que s’ha endeutat sense fre i ha conduit als seus ciutadans també a fer-ho, mentre permetia la cobdícia dels seus dirigents, potser és un Estat que ja li convé veure’ns a tots atrapats en la misèria. El que compta és el que passa i el que importa són les conseqüències. Corrupció i malversació de fons han estat pecats que, com d’un confessionari es tractés, s’han perdonat molts polítics amb simples penitències, mantenint la intenció de vot d’uns ciutadans que sense exigir que retornin el robat es creuen que els mals venen d’un poble que ha passat a l’acció. S’han aplicat mesures d’austeritat sense reformes. I sense reformes no canvia res. Som espectadors i actors d’una obra que ens ha decebut a tots, i ha generat una etapa de gran insatisfacció. De què s’estranyen doncs, que ho expressem al carrer? Quina manca de generositat!

article publicat al setmanari el 3 de vuit 

Octubre

Octubre pinta fulles amb colors de tardor. Vuitè mes del calendari romà, és el desè del gregorià. Comença sent balança, creativitat, harmonia, diplomàcia, amor al debat, resolució pacífica de conflictes, i acaba com a escorpí, actiu, contundent, valent i irresistible. Clou la verema i molts pobles la celebren amb una segona Festa. Onomàstica de ma filla just quan el seu avi anys complia, i tres dies després, la meva mare ja en fa 10 que no hi és. 525 anys ençà, diuen, Colom va desembarcar a Guanahaní, al Carib. Retarda una hora els rellotges. Dia u el més matiner. Tota la nit, joves sentinelles, i des de les cinc, els votants protegeixen urnes i paperetes. Dies d’indignació per la repressió a milers de ciutadans catalans. No delinqüents, no lladres, homes de negre, soldats d’un exèrcit més que servidors de l’ordre públic. Dies i vespres angoixants amb notícies a totes hores. Es declara i no es declara la independència i l’espera desespera. Els dos Jordis empresonats ens deixen orfes de celebracions. Temperatures properes a l’estiu fan d’aquest octubre el més calent que es viu. El 27, coincidint amb el meu primer dia a la universitat, el recordaré pel naixement d’una república que la incubadora no pot abandonar. El govern que ha fet seu l’art de parlar en clau, s’ha de defensar des de Brussel·les de l’embat de l’Estat central. Quan el octubre va a la fi, tots els ocells de l’hivern ja són aquí. 

article publicat en el Setmanari de el 3 de vuit 

OPEN LETTER TO JOAN MANUEL SERRAT (catalan singer-songwriter of the 60's) Celestí Ventura 10/17/2017

Dear Joan Manuel,

I have decided to address these words to you after watching, on the past October 10^th, the interview you gave on a state television channel, at the entrance to the Palau de la Generalitat Valenciana, just before you received that government’s high distinction. As its usual these last few weeks, everyone is asking for your opinion about the current situation in today’s Catalonia. Homages shouldn’t surprise you: they have focused on one of the most beloved artists – We all agree on this point: the Castilian speaking Spaniards and Catalans-, you have given us, in both languages, some songs that due to their proximity and tenderness, have ended up being in collective memory of several generations. In that interview you said, after expressing doubts about the independence of Catalonia, a phrase that made me to reflect: "One does not go to sleep Spanish and wake up Catalan." True, I thought: feelings do not change overnight.

But excuse my lack of manners; I should first tell you about myself, to introduce myself. I was born in the neighborhood of Gracia just at the beginning the fifties, at the end of a long postwar period that you know quite well. My schooling, like that of many boys of that period, went to a public school, where we could only learn in Spanish language and in the morning, we sang "Snow-covered mountains" in the courtyard, with the right arm straight up before entering the classroom. With the distance of the years, now, it may seem embarrassing, but then we were not fully conscious. With our innocence, and the vanquished silence of our parents, it became a daily routine. That’s the way we were educated! afterwards, at the high school, already a teenager, I was able to enjoy for the first time a Catalan radio station, where in the Radioscope program, Salvador Escamilla introduced young singer song-writers that performed in our language. It was then that I found you, that I discovered your songs, songs that without noticing I made mine. They followed me wherever I went, I did not need to know about music or play any instrument because singing A guitar (your first record) I could imagine its cords. In my moments of sadness or melancholy I found solace: "Now I know about a mate that never cheats, that when joy fills me it will sing with me, with me; I’ve got a faithful friend, poor guitar: it sings when I sing and always cries with me ». Like the little brother who follows the steps of the older one, I was learned the lyrics of your songs. And I sang them. They announced my arrival to mother when I went home. I did not have to use the key to open the door. I kept on growing and by college time, also in Spanish language, the same as you began to use. By then the smoke-filled air by the Ducados and the "Mediterranean" verses were the companions of long nights of study. And the military service, at Talarn, in the Pallars Jussà, and the captain remembering us, every two by three, that he was It is forbidden to speak in Catalan, not even among us. And singing, in our free time, between songs of the Beatles, to disguise: "Now that I am twenty years old, now that I still have the strength, that I do not have the dead soul, and I am feel my blood boil. Now that I can sing if another sings, today I still have a voice and I can still believe in gods ... ». It was everything I had at hand to express my rebellion. The songs of protest, from Raimon or  Llach, were too remote for me. They did not reach my heart like yours did. After a short while, the dictator died; nothing is eternal, and the streets filled up all of a sudden with voices claiming: "Freedom, amnesty and statute of autonomy". Everyone said that it was the opportunity to build a democratic state, they called it “Transition”. And we got to learn that our small Country had Institutions that had been stolen from us: «Citizens of Catalonia, Here I am!». They political parties returned, many of us only knew about them by the tales told to us by our parents and grandparents. And we learned what it was like to vote and people from all over became part of the city councils, the Parliament and the Generalitat- our self-government, we called it. And, with the new Statute, we began a few years full of collective enthusiasm.

Our children went to Catalan schools, and with them the written language was rescued, and our television, and more radio stations and the Catalan press arrived. A great joy to rebuild the feeling of being a Country. Some said we were going a bit too slow, others too quickly. And we became part to Europe! As if all those gray years had pushed us away from the continent. It must be a democratic Country, they said, for be able to join. At last we came to paradise. And the State was developed economically and socially. They were years of work and of progress. I stopped singing, as if doing so meant to take life seriously. Without almost realizing it, Barcelona enjoyed the largest and most famous festival - unimaginable, even then- the Olympic Games! And with Maragall and Pujol, two different ways of understanding society and the country, the new Catalonia was built, and autonomy reached its highest point. Too high for the Spanish right. It was in Maragall, as well as the president of the Generalitat, who dared to ask for a new Statute of autonomy, to appease the anxieties for more self-government. They did not care that the immense majority of the Catalan Parliament approved it, nor that the Spanish Parliament, after deluding it - with sarcasm -, would agree, nor that the people of Catalonia vote it in a referendum. It was all worthwhile: the Partido Popular - as always -, rejected it, picking up signatures throughout the state. For them everything was valid, with the aim of curbing the illusions of the Catalans. The lies not only served to bring a law suit to the Spanish Constitutional Court (TC), but to face the rest of the State as well. An expired, politicized and discredited TC did the work. And the disappointment began. And we were faced with reality: the Socialists who had promised to support the new statute turned their back and abandoned us. The so-called barons, who led the most influential communities in the autonomous Spain, aligned with the right: Catalonia is no more than a Spanish region, they maintained, and therefore cannot have any privilege over other autonomies. If they want it, so do we. That's how they saw it. That seems to be the way all of Spain sees it.

It did not take long for the arrival of an announced economic crisis. We never learn. A bubble of the capitalist system, which only trusts economic growth as the only solution to promote progress. An indebtedness like had never been known to obtain it. And the end of trust: the richest countries demand austerity for the poorest, and that these must return everything they owe. Spain discovered a sad reality: it was not as rich as it boasted. And layoffs arrived and inequality grew. Also between the autonomies; the richest regions must foot the bill. It does not matter if they themselves do not make ends meet to arrive at the end of the month, they must reduce their budget! And the weight of the crisis falls on the services, on the citizens. The State, the elites and the banks are still exempt: not only they do not suffer any cuts, they must be helped.

Joan Manuel, I do not want to bore you, it is not easy in four lines to explain everything that happened because today a good part of Catalans do not feel Spanish. It has not been a feeling that has changed overnight. It can’t be a tantrum what has caused so many Catalans, Catalan or Castilian speaking, who believe that the treatment they receive from Spain is not fair. Catalans only had to travel by car through the peninsula to see that they are the only ones who pay tolls within their Country, or that thousands of kilometers of high speed trains (AVE) connect, almost empty, the provincial capitals with Madrid, while our aged Suburban trains, break down on a daily basis. Or that the Government of the State continues to ignore the Mediterranean shore and continues to promote the Mediterranean corridor to Europe through the center, crossing all the mountain ranges of the peninsula, as if they had not learned anything from the Aníbal. The State transfers less and less resources to Catalonia, and Catalans increasingly pay more taxes in relation to other autonomous regions, and have more precarious services. Curiously, we have never heard that the Constitutional Court, or the Government of the State - worried about the equality of the Spaniards - have done nothing to correct it. Joan Manuel, many Catalans feel like orphans.

I am horrified to think that the Spanish right, and a good part of the left, believes that this feeling - according to them, anti-Spanish - is due to our model of public school and want to “Spanishize” it. Nothing in World would be worst for my grandchildren than to return to "One, great and free". Maybe you do not see it that way and you think we are making too much ado about nothing. But many of us can not feel Spanish if we are denied the right to be Catalan. Is this called nationalist sentiment? Is not it the same that they have? If we can understand it, why is it so difficult for them?

For years, a sense of grievance and a vindication have been taking root, and while in much of southern Europe, people went out to claim the return of their social rights, we have focused on the right to decide. After so many years of denying us the realization to increase our self-government, we have asked, by active and passive, to hold a referendum so we can decide our own future. It has been denied to us, under the pretext that we are not entitled to decide our own future, that our destiny is linked to that of all other Spaniards, we like it or not, and that they are the only ones who can decide. We have used the word democracy to define one thing and the opposite at the same time. We use the words until they lose all their meaning, until they no longer serve us. Let us concentrate on the exercise of democracy (vote) with the exercise of authority, we believe that if we have the majority we can impose ourselves, we have changed the authoritarianism of the dictatorial regimes to the imposition of the majorities. We do not realize that without respect for the rights of minorities there is no democracy, there is no social justice, we will not have a future. I said that we have tried, in all possible ways, to agree to run a referendum. Many Catalans have come out every September 11th, in the most imaginative, civilized and festive ways possible, to the streets, to claim this right. Those have been unique and civic manifestations in the World. On November 9^th, 2014 a participatory process was organized, a popular consultation without legal ramifications. The answer was – in view of the participation: more than two million Catalans - that the Spanish Government demanded the disqualification of the president of the Generalitat and three of its directors, for disobedience and embezzlement. It took Spanish Courts a very short time to comply. On September 27, 2015 Parliamentary elections were held with Together for Yes and the CUP presenting their candidates, with the promise of holding a referendum on self-determination in their election program. They won in Electoral seats but missed not by much the majority of votes. Even so, they committed to hold the referendum with the consent or not of the State. It seems like a foreign notion that a political class would fulfill its promises. All the machinery of the State, all its powers, the legal ones and the illicit ones (the sewers) worked hard to make its celebration impossible. The prosecutor's office and the judges did not stop even pressing the people involved. Fear as a weapon against hope. Volunteers, people on the street, committed themselves. The Civil Guard and the National Police confined to the ports of Barcelona and Tarragona - they did not trust the Mossos d'Esquadra. Orders to search for ballot boxes, searches at private homes, printing shops turned upside down looking for ballots, threats and more threats to school principals. Resignations and substitutions. The computer servers of Generalitat websites closed, yet new ones appeared. Our president assures us that there will be a referendum, and the State denies it. And the people, who attentively, wait.

The Catalan National Assembly and the Òmnium Cultural ask the volunteers to protect the polling stations since Friday night. Parents, teachers and neighbors take turns not to abandon them: the Spanish National Police is ready to shut them down. Life goes on, activities do not stop, and sleep can wait. The country wakes up early on Sunday, very early. The early risers find people crowding the school’s doors. They are the ones that spent the night there. The sky is gray and it threatens rain, and this threat will be confirmed, umbrellas open up but people stay, queues grow up, at nine o’clock computer systems have crashed, people get impatient, and with WhatsApp appear the first images and with them the fear vanishes, and begins the resistance.

I was saying, Joan Manuel, this does not happen overnight. And I'm at a loss for words - my knowledge of Catalan is inadequate. I hoped that on that day at the gates of the Palau de la Generalitat Valenciana you would have explained - as you only know how to do - what they could not see, and that you could not shut up: that obscure men, with their faces covered, with military training, they charged against the people, against ordinary people. They did not care if they were grandparents or young people, their night-sticks did not distinguish gender or age, and they aimed for their heads, to hurt. You saw how they took girls by the face and hair and they took them away, one by one, and then they threw them down the stairs, to kill them by kicking them in the back with their boots. And rubber bullets right and left. We did not see their faces, we did not know what were they feeling, but by their acts they seemed possessed by indifference, rancor, and hatred. They had been sent by southern Spaniards chanting: "go get them". And they did. Soon they would receive plaudits and recognitions, as the weaponized arm of their army. That was their victory.

You could have said, too, that you did not see the face of fear in people who passively, with resignation, waited for their turn, their martyrdom. And to firefighters who to protect their neighbors took the front lines. Even, (why not say so?) some Mosso d’Esquadra uneasily squirming, with tears, as his commander consoled him.

And bloodied grandmothers who had lost their smile, but kept their serenity, their dignity. The dignity of a whole town that day was free. That day they voted. It did not matter what anyone voted. Everyone had their opinion. They just wanted to count.

Sometimes, Joan Manuel, it is easier for us to think abstractly and to defend the human rights of other peoples, the more distant they are, the better if it is in Chile or Argentina, and we are not able to see the abuses and injustices in our house. Or could be as well that we are afraid of taking sides – you see? fear, always fear – we wouldn’t it happen to us what happened to Gerard Piqué, and then they would not welcome us as we all like. It was not my intention to bother you. We all own our words and our silences. Today I just can’t shut up. And I would have liked it so much that you, Joan Manuel, wouldn’t either that day. With your words we would have felt more comforted, less alone.

Forgive my daring, and I'm sorry if my words were angry. I would not like to finish this letter without expressing my most sincere appreciation for all your songs. Will stay with me, forever:

"You must say goodbye to the door that closes and we did not want to close. You need to fill your chest and sing a song if the cold outside makes you tremble. You do not have to listen to this dog now barks tight to a dry stick, and to forget at once your image and this small place. But I do not want your eyes to cry: tell me goodbye. The road goes uphill and leave walking”.

Letter translated into Spanish of the original written by Celestí Ventura to Joan Manuel Serrat. With his permission published to share to anyone who wants to read it