Why is the village this blue color?

In the spring of 2011, Júzcar was selected by Sony Pictures España to be the venue of an international promotional event for the then upcoming summer film release of "The Smurfs 3D" which included painting the village Smurf blue. All the residents of the village had to (and did) agree to have the white facades of their houses painted Smurf blue. The paint job started on 22 May 2011 and took about three weeks to complete using over nine thousand liters of Smurf blue paint.

On 16 June 2011, Sony held an international press event to promote their soon to released block-buster film with children from the Upper Genal Valley participating as well as many members of the press and villages residents from the surrounding areas. During the event, the president of Sony España presented the village of Júzcar with a memorial plaque which was mounted in the village plaza stating "Júzcar,  The First Smurf Village of the World"("Júzcar, el Primer Pueblo Pitufo del Mundo").  After the event, Júzcar's residents had all agreed that the village would remain blue through the end of the summer but unbeknownst to them, the theme of a blue village was so unusual that the people started coming and that traffic has, as of April 2012, not yet stopped.

In December 2011, a referendum was held by the Júzcar village-hall to determine when the village would revert to white; the outcome of the vote was to remain Smurf blue for the foreseeable future.  Sony, meanwhile, has announced a second Smurf film to be released in August 2013, “The Smurfs 2” (Smurfs are called "Pitufos" in Spain).

 

Prior to being painted blue, Júzcar was a traditional white village for hundreds of years and no doubt will revert to being a white village again at some point in the future (no date set for that).  As a typical Andalusian white village, Júzcar had the traditional offerings of any white village, Easter procession during Holy Week (“Semana Santa’), annual Andalusian Romería in June, annual festival for their patron saint in August (the Virgin of Moclón”) as well as being quite a well placed central location for visiting many interesting sites in Andalusia, both cultural and natural.

Here in Júzcar, one can still see eagles soaring on the hunt, vultures swirling in packs high in the sky, hopping cotton tailed bunny rabbits alongside the roads and hundreds of spring time wild flowers bursting with color; one can enjoy peaceful nights with a star filled sky, walks through the countryside on any one of the trails connecting the area's several villages or across the top of the mountain through the Riscos. The area is also quite suitable for photography, painting, mountain cycling caving and wild mushroom hunting.



While it is true that life in the village of Júzcar has changed since the blue theme arrived and the village, for the most part, is no longer sleepy, Júzcar and its environs are still a destination well worth exploring from a nature lover's perspective.  And for those coming for the Smurfs, at the moment the best time is at the weekends when the Smurf Market in the village plaza is open with various stalls as well as the village Smurf Store.  There is also a tourist office in the village plaza with local activity information as well as an information kiosk across from the hotel which is open during weekends and bank holidays.

Hotel Bandolero remains the same lovely and charming hotel it has always been. Eight spacious double rooms, six with wood-burning stoves and terraces with fantastic views of the surrounding glorious nature. The restaurant continues to provide quality food delivered by our in-house Cordon Bleu trained chef.


Happy New Year

I don't get around to writing in this blog much these days.  So belated happy new year from the Hotel Bandolero blog in early February.

Since my last entry in November 2011, the village hall organised a day in December for all concerned parties to vote on the state of the village's color.  Let me tell you how that went.

First of all, the mayor, Sr. David Fernandez, had informed us back in the summer that there would be a referendum to be held on the same day that the national general election was scheduled as he thought it best that the vote should adhere to the norms of a general election to make the outcome "legal".  That date was set for 20 November 2011, a Sunday.  My reaction to his proposal was "Well, that won't work for me because I can't vote in Spain."  I told him so and he said Ivan would have to vote for the both of us, something I thought was a bit unfair as we are co-owners of our properties here in Juzcar and now my opinion would not count as I could not vote.  Oh well, what was there to do except accept it and wait to see the results.

The mayor organised a village meeting to inform residents how the referendum would be held.  He encountered unexpected anger amongst the meeting attendees.  You see, when the proposal first came to us in April 2011 to paint the village blue, someone from the village hall walked around the village and obtained the building owner's signature agreeing to paint their building facades from white to blue and back to white again in due course (no dates indicated).  A simple process that appeared to function and keep all happy and satisfied as all owners had a say in the matter.  All appeared to be done legally.  Now, the village hall had come up with a silly idea that the vote should follow the voting guidelines to make it "legal" and in so doing, there would be local people who previously said yes and now could say nothing as they are not registered to vote in Juzcar.  This begs the question was the first time around illegal in one manner or another?  No response to that was forthcoming.

So, like me, others in the village were able to say "yes" before but now could not say what would happen to their property in Juzcar as they are registered to vote in another village, something the mayor had not thought of.  Also, in this way, there are people who are registered to vote in Juzcar who do not own property, so now there would also be persons from outside the village who would be telling the Juzcar residents who could not vote, whether or not their houses stayed blue or returned to white, another reason to be unhappy with the voting procedures.

In the end, 20 November came and went and there was no referendum announced or held.  Eventually, the village hall announced in early December, that the referendum would be held on 18 December; those registered to vote in the village would have one vote each.  Property owners who were not registered to vote would receive one vote per building owned in the village.  This meant that Ivan would get one vote as he is registered and I would get two votes as we own two buildings in the village, go figure.

The results of the vote were 141 in favour of staying blue, 33 in favour of returning to white and 10 blank (or null) votes.  The vote counting and results announcement were broadcast on Andalusia TV as well on the national channel TVE1 later that evening.  So, we are a blue village for the coming year and longer.  I think that the village should stay blue until at least September 2014 as Sony Pictures announced on 9 August 2011 that a sequel film would go into production in 2012 for release in summer 2013.  This will hopefully have a continued positive impact on the village.  We have even heard that Sony will actually film in the village this time as Juzcar was not in the first film as so many people think.  If that happens, the village of Juzcar may have to remain blue perpetually which is not such a bad thing.

Interesting fact, the film "The Smurfs 3D" grossed US$564 million on the box office receipts alone; I'm sure it made more income from merchandising and other things so of course Sony is making a sequel and perhaps more than one.  On that note, I say to Sony Pictures and Sony España in particular: where are the trees you promised the residents of Juzcar if they painted their village blue?  We were all promised back in the beginning a tree in the name of each resident of Juzcar.  So I want to know, where is my tree?  And why do I have to request it?  Why couldn't they just follow through on their promise to plant a tree per resident?  With that level of income from the film which cost them US$ 110 million (a fairly large budget as well) to produce, I think they could have spared a few hundred euros to purchase and plant those tree in the area around the village!!  What the Smurf happened to my Smurfing tree!!!?   I still want my Smurfing tree planted!!