Save Me…… from going up to 11 all the time

There is a famous scene in the film This Is Spinal Tap where dimwitted rock guitarist Nigel Tufnel shows documentary maker Marty DiBergi his amplifier. He excitedly points out that all the volume control knobs don’t, in fact, go up to ten. They go up to 11. He adds: “It’s one louder, isn’t it?”, missing the obvious flaw in his argument.

The impact of that line has been so great that it has entered the English language as an idiom. “Up to 11” suggests taking things to their extreme.

And so it is the case at least with volume and personal space when it comes to Spain. Everything here is a little louder, a little closer, a little more in-your-face.

Go out in the street and the cars are louder, sit in a café and people next to you will be speaking louder so that you, in turn, have to speak louder yourself to be heard. Go on the metro or a train and someone there will be speaking loudly on a phone or to their companion even though they’re sitting right next to them. Turn on the TV and the adverts are always louder than the programmes (until a few years ago, also true in the UK, before the TV regulators banned the practice).

I’m not saying the UK isn’t ever loud and that personal space isn’t stomped all over. It is at times. Especially teenagers and young males full of alcohol. But I’m talking about general, everyday, routine activities. Compare the two and you’ll find nine times out of ten that Spain is just louder.

Maybe that’s why a lot of people go to church here, just so they can have a bit of peace and quiet for a while.

This got me thinking. Why is Spain generally louder?

Is it because they´re a bit closer to the equator and so a bit closer to the sun and therefore as it´s hotter everybody is a bit more tense, on edge and therefore louder out of frustration? No. Get the aforementioned 20-something British males fuelled up on alcohol on a Friday night and there´s plenty of tension, frustration and loudness.

Maybe it´s because Spain´s land mass is generally higher than Britain´s. In that respect, there´s less air and so people have to talk louder just to be heard? No. That´s just nonsense. And besides, I´ve been to the mountains in Scotland many times and I haven´t noticed people shouting about the weather or if you´d like another sugar in your tea.

So I thought about it a bit more to try and find an answer.

Last week on a train from Seville to Jerez there was a man in the carriage talking on his mobile phone the whole hour-long journey. The whole journey. To one person. He was sitting further down the carriage from us, but after about 20 minutes a woman sitting opposite him leaned over and asked him if he knew that everyone could hear his conversation in minute detail and would he mind just turning it down a bit because she was trying to read her book.

He put his hand over his mobile and for a second looked at her, inhaled deeply, smiled, then turned back to his telephone friend and explained as loud as before: “Where were we?”. The woman just rolled her eyes and went back to her book. I would have punched him.

Last night we went out for a walk and passing by a café full of busy outside tables, we saw an elderly man burst into song. Not good singing either. Bad singing. Very bad. I don’t think he was drunk either. But nobody said anything. Nobody said “Shut up”. They all just started talking louder themselves.

On the TV, there are a myriad of debate shows, discussing everything from the economy to the latest colour of handbags. But tune in to any of them and you won’t have to wait long for at least two people to start talking over each other, louder and louder. And it’s not as if the presenter steps in and says something like “Er, one at a time please so we can hear the different points being made.” They let it continue for ages. It’s just a wall of sound.

Which leads me on to the closely connected issue of personal space. In the UK, a person’s personal space is a big thing. Invade it and you’re liable for a confrontation, or at the very least an irritated scowl and a “Do you mind?”.

But here, everyone gets right up close to everyone else all the time. Up close and loud. You could go into an empty pub, as we did yesterday, and sit at the table right in the corner away from everything, and someone will still comes in five minutes later and sit down at the table right next to you and start talking really loudly. I contained my irritability by furiously sipping at my Vino Tinto and rolling my eyes.

Yes, I rolled my eyes. I didn’t cough, frown, and say “Do you mind?”. I didn’t even make a sarcastic comment, which if you ask anyone who knows me, is like getting a dog not to piss on a lamp post. It’s just not natural for me. But I did it.

What have I become, for God’s sake?

So does this phenomenon irritate me or have I got used to it now. I’m not acutely aware of being louder myself or more in people´s faces, but then I’m in a loud country so maybe it’s difficult to tell. However, when I’ve been back in the UK from time to time recently I’ve not had anyone ask me why I’m shouting all the time.

And I think therein lies the answer. It´s geography. Obviously.

Spain is a big place, quite a bit bigger than the UK. But it has a population of only 46 million, a massive 20 million less than the UK. You would have thought in such circumstances, we’d be climbing over each other in the UK and that personal space and peace and quiet would be an impossibility.

But it’s quite the opposite. I think it’s because of the fact that everyone is so jammed in there that space and peace and quiet have become so precious.

In Spain, we´re all rolling round like peas in an aircraft hangar. Masses of space, little to fill it, lots of people desperate for human interaction. So everyone shouts and gets in your face all the time.

See? Everything is so simple when you can sit down with a bit of peace and quiet and no distractions, and just think about it.