Originally published in Spanish: “Jurar en Arameo”. Aurora Nacarino-Brabo. The Objective.
2 Nov 2017
Accustomed to lie, with certain critical and commercial success, the Catalan government thought that he could dub to several languages the sitcom which is the Catalan process and export it to Europe. It would be like a sort of spin-off of the original production, narrating the adventures of a polyglot Puigdemont in exile. The 130th president of the Catalan government and 1st of the Catalan Republic. He appeared by surprise in the heart of the Union, but only after announcing his destination to the insiders through an acrostic in his official statement: “Belgium”, it read, if you took the first letter of each line. However, this point turned out to be a fake —a gorgeous one, though—, only accessible to someone that change cars under a bridge to lose the cops, and to Don Fernando de Rojas.
As a matter of fact, Mr Puigdemont had went to Brussels to look for a Celestina that could find a fix for his thing. His thing can amount to 30 years in prison. The former Catalan president pronounced a long speech where he employed the Catalan, Spanish, French and English, in a confirmation of what Ortega de Salvador de Madariaga said about intelligence and languages. Thankfully, he no longer insisted in the referendum rattle and tried instead a new gag: that independence was an electoral compromise and that he can not be imprisoned for fulfilling it. He planted the bomb, ok, but at least he had called in threat from a phone booth.
Puigdemont was scared shitless. I know because he had the same glassy look in his eyes like my little brother when he lost in a Play Station’s game and was about to cry. Game Over. Faced with the vertigo of laws coming closer with leaden gravity, the former Catalan president blabbered to Europe about repression and horrors, enough for a good Halloween night. He tried the trick, but there would be no treat. So, knowing that they would not give it to him, he proclaimed that he was not there to ask for asylum, in a masterful exercise of the drunkard’s classic strategy: you are not kicking me out, I am the one leaving! However, the former «molt honorable» (or maybe he still is, how could we know, we are perplexed, Ada) has not reappeared in Barcelona so far, even though some European media gladly gave him farewell, “bye, loser”.
With the internationalization of the Catalan conflict we have stepped from the Catalan process in just one country into the permanent process, with remarkable effectiveness: within a few hours of his arrival to Brussels, Puigdemont had already triggered a government crisis in Belgium. Meanwhile, Junqueras has been subpoenaed by the Spanish National Court, quite a laugh. He has been reportedly spotted at an alpine sports shop. He was looking for a piolet or something. By the way, the election campaign has started and Santi Vila asked for a constitutional baptism. For us to forgive his little sins and all that.
Apart from that, the things are calm. At first, those who got some thwack on the October 1st made a face when they saw how Puigdemont, like the Catalan companies before him, flee through the Diagonal avenue, but then they came to understand. Catalonia has found in his wandering president a multilingual ambassador for their so-very-respectable cause. It is more than fine, but it is hard to impress to many of us: in these recent times, we have learnt to curse.
