The bowler is a hat traditionally associated with the city of London. But, Barcelona has managed to snatch that honor thanks to the already famous “Que us bombin!” that Xavier Trias snapped at his political rivals in his speech just a week ago today when he learned that he would not be mayor again thanks to an in extremis agreement between the PSC, the Comuns and the PP. Since that day, the name to designate anyone who lives (and votes) in the Catalan capital ceased to be “Barcelona” to become a “bowler”.
The bowler hat is an extremely paradoxical piece. On the one hand, it was created to protect the heads of the rangers, but, instead, it became an elegant mark of distinction and was adopted by the businessmen of the City as well. In addition, it is one of the distinctive symbols of one of the most famous tragicomic figures in the world, Charlot.
And Barcelona, ??which has long ceased to be the writer Eduardo Mendoza’s “city of prodigies”, has become a great paradox, which is the sum of all the small paradoxes that its inhabitants experience daily and of all the great paradoxes promoted by their leaders. This is how she plans to host the Winter Olympic Games in the midst of climate change or how a former activist for decent housing ends up creating superblocks as mayor where apartment prices skyrocket.
Barcelona is not a city for tourists, for the rich or for speculators, as it is criticized, but is simply the capital of bowler hats.
We could go on and on, because there are a long list of examples of Barcelonans who have wanted to say “Que us bombin” at some point or who have felt as if their city told them: “Que et bombin!”… For this reason, there are no more Barcelonans, only bowlers.
This is also the reason why the socialist Jaume Collboni, whether his term lasts four years or four months, will never be able to avoid being remembered as “the mayor of Que us bombin!”. It is said that whoever has power writes history, but nowadays with new technologies, social networks, the internet… it is no longer so clear.
So, at least, Trias will be able to have the consolation of having surprised locals and strangers with an explosive speech that, in itself, is the synthesis of this great paradox that Barcelona has become, summed up in three simple words pronounced in Catalan. : Que-us-bombin, repeated by a politician whose profile made it unsuspected that he could say them in an act as solemn as the proclamation of the new mayor. Here is another example of the city of paradoxes.
But, as in everything, there are always precedents. The Barcelona of Collboni, that of the “bowlers”, is the modern version of the “piquiponados” of the time of Mayor Pich i Pon, who has gone down in history for his gazapos and his eccentricities. And he is still remembered. The Fundéu, a foundation that collaborates in the proper use of Spanish, organized a lapse world cup three years ago, which won, with 57% of the votes, this sentence by Pich i Pon: “On the Rambla de Catalunya they have opened a restaurant with genital light” (instead of “zenithal”).
The current tragicomic Barcelona of the bowlers is very similar and increasingly to that of the piquiponadas. And it’s not worth trying to translate “Que us bombin!” into Spanish, as all the Spanish media have rushed to do in recent days, because you have to live in this city to really know what it means. And to those who don’t like it: “Que el bowler hat!”.
