How pure is pure enough? Asking for a carpenter from Nazareth

What I remember most was the sameness - a deep, cosmic uniformity - the kind that creeps up your spine and makes you wonder if the water supply had been laced with sedatives.

It was as though I'd stumbled into a secret convention of the Sons and Daughters of the Middle Class, where the invitation had specified one sartorial commandment: thou shalt look respectable, but not interesting. A city of kings, artists and occasional revolutionaries - and yet, the spirit of Ralph Lauren had staged a quiet coup.

The nearest beach lay some 360 kilometers away in Valencia, but you'd have thought we were one good storm away from a yachting emergency. Boat shoes as far as the eye could see, as if the entire city were prepping for an amphibious assault on the Plaza Mayor.

I had never witnessed so many young people dress with such solemn commitment to a single, tepid aesthetic. It was picture day at school - minus the photographer and the teacher cajoling them into plastic smiles. The women, at least, offered some variety. But the young men had clearly signed a blood oath with a haberdasher's catalogue. Collared shirts in all the most thrilling shades of pale, paired with ironed jeans whose creases were sharp enough to slice ham.

And here was the kicker: they didn't wear the frowns of reluctant grooms or boys forced into ties by nervous mothers. No - this was their native plumage. Pressed, polished, profoundly unremarkable - by choice. Someone, whether mother or maid, saw to the ironing and the boys accepted it as the natural order of things.

It was the 1990s, but parts of Madrid looked embalmed, preserved in a Polaroid family portrait from some sun-drenched, slow-moving decade that refused to die. Everyone posed, everyone matching - and oddly content to be framed just so.

And then something happened. The door was left ajar and the scent of paella, cheap beer and scandalously good healthcare drifted out on the breeze. The secret was out.

Spain wasn't just a great place to holiday; it was a damn good place to live. The quality of life here made Birmingham, Berlin, Boston and Buenos Aires feel like Soviet rehabilitation centres. One by one, the return tickets stayed unused, and the world moved in - some for a season, some for a lifetime, all convinced they'd found the promised land of wine and better weather.

Suddenly, the streets bloomed with new colours - saris brushing past yoga pants and Moroccan kaftans, tattooed arms reaching for tortilla de patatas. Kebab and sushi joints sprang up beside old mesones and tapas bars. Avocados slid into bed with 'jamón' and tomato on toast, and nobody seemed to mind.

And while the vast majority are happy to enjoy 'cocido' for lunch and 'arepas' for dinner, it seems that it's a bridge too far for the far right. Around the country they have proposed a law urging governments to "protect" the traditions of the Spanish people "against the advance of foreign customs".

No more Dire Straits tribute bands, no more Rolling Stones concerts. It's jotas 24/7. That hamburger you were craving? Sorry, save it for your next trip to Kansas City. Goodbye, orange juice. Goodbye, paella - both brought in by infidels.

The only question is: how far back do these atavistic troglodytes want to go? All the way to Jesus?

Oh, wait - he was introduced too.