The pandemic has given a desolated look to the Spanish interiors

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

In normal times, the Santos Bar, across from Cordoba’s famous mosque, remains overcrowded with tourists tucking into its trademark Spanish tortillas. However, with the onset of the pandemic, “everything’s dead”, the owner laments.

In the Andalusian town located in southern Spain, the Mezquita, an eighth-century mosque turned cathedral, is the most visited site of this region.

From the time this UNESCO World Heritage site has reopened at the end of May 2020, only 16,000 people so far have set their foot in this architecture. It’s considered one of the most accomplished works of Moorish architecture. This site normally welcomes that number of visitors in a week.
“It will take months to make that up,” said Jose Juan Jimenez Guet, a church spokesman, even though money set aside in previous years means staff remained busy with projects related to restoration.

Nearby restaurants, hotels and shops of this architecture are not so lucky, as many of them are closed.

Only owner Jesus Maldonado is working at the Santos Bar, currently. Business is “a quarter of normal”, he said. Around 10 employees of this church are on a state-backed furlough scheme.

The tourism drop, an industry that accounts almost 12 percent of the economy of Spain experienced a major blow.

As the beaches of the country are its prime attractions, cities like Cordoba also pull tourists because of their cultural sites.

Places like Grenada, Toledo, and Segovia that experienced the worst of conditions, as per Spain’s national hotel association, with revenue dropping to more than 50 percent in regards to restaurants and bars in their historic city centers.

Hotel occupancy rate in Andalusia is at an average of just 25 percent, a good 10 percentage points lower than in establishments by the side of the coast, said Francisco de la Torre, head of the region’s hotel association.
He expressed his concerns by saying that Andalusian eateries will finally have to get rid of up to a third of their staff.

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