Apart from the dissertation I also have to write some feature articles for uni, usually on the subject of my own choice. It has been half my choice to write about squatting. So I have done a bit of research and I have learnt a lot of contemporary English History. Well, proper historians would probably contest my methods and argue that wars and battles and Kings’ and Queen’s marriages are more important than a squatting boom in the 70s, but if I want to learn about any kind of History, that is the one kind of History I want to learn about. And squatting has certainly a very long history, and many other things help to understand squatting, and squatting helps to understand many other things.
Then I had my co-op meeting today. All British people – at least they sound British to me. It has been a pleasure to go to the pub, ask a few questions and have the History I have read in a few books and internet pages confirmed by their live voices. And it relates to our own co-op, too, the very one that is providing my current housing now.
Now what is left for me (apart from writing the article) is to understand why in Spain there has not been [so much] squatting, or co-ops, or why there is not [so much] documentation about this. I suspect one of the reasons is because traditionally, young people, especially girls, live in their parents’ home until marriage. In pretty recent years if a girl left home it meant she was a shameless girl and her family’s reputation was destroyed forever, especially if she run away with a man, or with friends. This option was even worse because it was then assumed that she would sleep with all of them. Nowadays, people stay with their parents because economically it is the only option – until they find a partner with which to share the mortgage.
