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La Rambla: from Spain's tourist haven to street of shame

Photographs of tourists having sex with prostitutes - in full view of passers-by - provoke fresh demands for a crackdown in Barcelona

Barcelona, Spain
Spain's most famous street is often transformed for the worse in the hours after dusk
Maria Callas, Plácido Domingo and José Carreras are among the stars who have performed at the Liceu Opera House in Barcelona’s La Rambla.
Only a few yards away, however, Florita was offering a different kind of entertainment. “You speak English? 40 for sex. We go round back, yes?” she said through a gap-toothed smile. Sex for sale in La Rambla is not new. However, photographs of tourists having sex with prostitutes in view of passers-by, which were published in the Spanish newspaper El País this week, provoked fresh demands for action by the authorities.
Writers, residents, business leaders and diplomats fear that a rising number of desperate illegal immigrants working in the sex trade are dragging down the reputation of one of the most famous boulevards in Europe. The outcry comes amid increasing concern that Spain’s best-known thoroughfare has become a playground for drug dealers, petty thieves, shabby street performers and tacky souvenir stalls.
Joan de Sagarra, the Spanish writer, said: “When I was young the Rambla was a place of flowers and birds. The Rambla of today is not my Rambla. It is time I was able to go back and walk along it peacefully.”
Young prostitutes, mostly illegal African immigrants, grab at tourists if they say no. Others steal from unwitting clients during sex in the dimly lit alleyways leading off La Rambla. Pimps lurk near by, some offering drugs.
La Boqueria, the famous food market in Barcelona, is by day a multicoloured feast for the eyes — and the stomach. By night it is the favourite haunt for prostitutes without homes to take drunken punters to. They have sex in the street, sometimes in view of tourists.
“There are more prostitutes than ever. They don’t wait for their clients, they go looking for them and hassle them. The police are never around,” Xefo Guasch, a restaurateur, said.
La Rambla has always enjoyed a risqué reputation but some see no solution to rid the street of prostitutes.
“Until they regulate prostitution there is not much we can do to change things,” said Eva Fernández, of the Barcelona Association of Neighbours.
Eulogised by writers including George Orwell, La Rambla is the first place that many British tourists head for when they visit Barcelona, according to tourism authorities. Many regret their visit after losing bags to pickpockets.
A foreign diplomat said: “La Rambla is Barcelona’s shop window on the world so they should take care of it. It should be beautiful.”
Authorities have limited the number of souvenir stalls but despite fines being issued for lewd behaviour in public, prostitution is difficult to solve. A council spokesman said: “Prostitution is not illegal in Spain so we cannot stop it until the law is changed.”

Photographs of tourists having sex with prostitutes - in full view of passers-by - provoke fresh demands for a crackdown in Barcelona

Barcelona, Spain
Spain's most famous street is often transformed for the worse in the hours after dusk
Maria Callas, Plácido Domingo and José Carreras are among the stars who have performed at the Liceu Opera House in Barcelona’s La Rambla.
Only a few yards away, however, Florita was offering a different kind of entertainment. “You speak English? 40 for sex. We go round back, yes?” she said through a gap-toothed smile. Sex for sale in La Rambla is not new. However, photographs of tourists having sex with prostitutes in view of passers-by, which were published in the Spanish newspaper El País this week, provoked fresh demands for action by the authorities.
Writers, residents, business leaders and diplomats fear that a rising number of desperate illegal immigrants working in the sex trade are dragging down the reputation of one of the most famous boulevards in Europe. The outcry comes amid increasing concern that Spain’s best-known thoroughfare has become a playground for drug dealers, petty thieves, shabby street performers and tacky souvenir stalls.
Joan de Sagarra, the Spanish writer, said: “When I was young the Rambla was a place of flowers and birds. The Rambla of today is not my Rambla. It is time I was able to go back and walk along it peacefully.”
Young prostitutes, mostly illegal African immigrants, grab at tourists if they say no. Others steal from unwitting clients during sex in the dimly lit alleyways leading off La Rambla. Pimps lurk near by, some offering drugs.
La Boqueria, the famous food market in Barcelona, is by day a multicoloured feast for the eyes — and the stomach. By night it is the favourite haunt for prostitutes without homes to take drunken punters to. They have sex in the street, sometimes in view of tourists.
“There are more prostitutes than ever. They don’t wait for their clients, they go looking for them and hassle them. The police are never around,” Xefo Guasch, a restaurateur, said.
La Rambla has always enjoyed a risqué reputation but some see no solution to rid the street of prostitutes.
“Until they regulate prostitution there is not much we can do to change things,” said Eva Fernández, of the Barcelona Association of Neighbours.
Eulogised by writers including George Orwell, La Rambla is the first place that many British tourists head for when they visit Barcelona, according to tourism authorities. Many regret their visit after losing bags to pickpockets.
A foreign diplomat said: “La Rambla is Barcelona’s shop window on the world so they should take care of it. It should be beautiful.”
Authorities have limited the number of souvenir stalls but despite fines being issued for lewd behaviour in public, prostitution is difficult to solve. A council spokesman said: “Prostitution is not illegal in Spain so we cannot stop it until the law is changed.”