Costa News Spain Breaking News | English News in Spain.
As anger grows over the rising cost of living and rent, anti-tourism activists in Spain are increasingly targeting expats.
Michael Barrymore (72), who revealed this week that he had given up his plans to relocate permanently to Barcelona, after spending several months there house-hunting, is among the latest targets.
Popular Instagram page ‘Guiris Go Home’ shared a TikTok video of Barrymore’s and emblazoned it with the message: “Expats go home.”
The former TV star is seen jokingly walking past Sagrada Familia and ignoring it. She also has the caption, “Ignoring Sagrada Familia Because I’m Now a Local (I’ve Been Here Two Weeks).”
It comes as violent graffiti emerged in Valencia, which simply read ‘die guiri… thank you’, next to a cartoon of a stereotypical British or American tourist.
On April 5, Spanish cities will erupt with protests against the growing housing crisis under the battle cry ‘let’s end the housing racket.’
Barrymore was once a household word in Britain but was shunned by the showbiz industry after Stuart Lubbock’s body was discovered in the swimming-pool of his Essex house in 2001.
Last November, he announced on TikTok that he had moved to Cataluña and was house hunting in the region, before being spotted with a mystery man in El Paipol, around a 30-minute drive inland from Barcelona.
However he decided to drive back to London with his pet whippet Lara at Christmas, telling his 3.5million followers that he was ‘homesick’.
He said: “You know what Lara, I’m a f***ing mess, so homesick, I’ve never experienced it before.
“I don’t feel confident, and I am always looking for negatives because of my feelings. What can I do if I don’t like self-pitying? Self-pity. I’ve been doing it for f***ing ages. “I feel tired, unprepared and like we can’t make it.”
He said: “I spent the past three days driving through France’s middle and now we’re okay.”
“But I was not in a good mood at all the last weekend and the week before. My mental health took a beating and I was really debilitated, which I did not expect.
I felt bad for giving up my plans to move to Barcelona. I felt I had let many people down.
He said: “I decided that I would rather house-hunt on my iPad, from the comfort of the couch. I can view houses virtually.” I will decide whether I want to live in London for six months and in Barcelona for six months. It might be more convenient, but we don’t know. What I will not do is rush back into it without having a solid plan.”
New protests are planned in Spain
Locals who are frustrated by the rising prices of housing, exacerbated in part by Airbnbs and tourist flats will be taking to the streets to demand stricter control over holiday accommodation on April 5.
“Everything in recent decades has been done to turn the centre of Malaga into a tourist attraction park that only benefits a few, while expelling its neighbours,” said Kike España, spokesperson for the Malaga protest.
Many popular destinations, such as Valencia, have seen anti-tourism graffiti in the run up to the protests.
Last week, a poster reading ‘die guiri! A poster saying ‘thanks!’ was found near the city cathedral.
The original picture by @nikitadekota features a woman wearing a backpack with sunglasses, fanning herself while sweat drips down her face. Underneath, the caption reads ‘what’s up guiri?’.
However, someone scrawled the threatening message over the poster, urging tourists to ‘die’.
Clearly a hot topic in the city, another anonymous scribbler then crossed out the message and branded it ‘bad’.
