Two b esotted cartographers, thoroughbred journ alists, Agustín Lomeña and Juan Gaitán , h ave embarked on the sacred task of honouring the homeland of their childhood. It is said th at the essence of a city lies in change. Borges once said that he was born in a city "that used to be called Buenos Aires", but any fellow citizen of my age can also say that they were born into the world in a place "th at used to b e called Malaga". It is our city that h as ch a nged the most in recent times, but not on ly th at, it is the city that will cha nge the most in years to come. Indeed, there are some things that are just about to happen and th at will make us all very h appy when they do. I ca n only hope th at it will not be too late for me to see the h allowed places of my distant childhood rescued a nd rejuvenated: the Baños del Carmen Spa, where children were made to wear cork lifebelts; the docks, with their still waters, iridescent with the remain s of shimmering diesel, the colour of a pigeon's breast; the Miramar Hotel, to b e given the historical justice it deserves when it is moved to the Law Courts.

Etymologically speaking, the verb "to recall", comes from returning to the heart, a nd I recall, not without some heartache, that there was a time when there was a tendency to confuse the nauseating with the tradition al. "Traditional" post cards were published in which a woman appeared carrying a pitcher on her head up a steep a nd rocky incline. "A Traditional Scene", read the shiny traveller's memento. We also turned the statue of the Cenachero, a monument to slavery in the workplace, into the city 's emblem: a fisherman stripped to his waist h awking his merch andise for a pitta nce in the shadows of our alleyways. Perhaps it would h ave b een better to have turned our lighthouse, La Farola, into a n insignia: the only pillar of light on our coastline referred to in the feminine.

Fortu n ately, all this began to ch ange tha nks to a timely reminder from the conductor's ha nd. The miracle actually happened down by the seaside a nd there were ma ny loafs a nd much fish . My friend's prophecy, Pepe Salas Guirior, who h ad said that Malaga was destined to b ecome the "deckch air of Europe", came true. It was tourism that taught us th at Swedish girls h ad a soft centre, a nd we b ega n to b e the centre of the world; the promised la nd for pensioners and u n shackled youngsters. The tra n sformation had its boiler-room -Torremolinos a nd Marb ella- a nd sudden ly we saw Japa nese eating pipirran a and roasted green pepper salad with ch anquetes, like the fin al brushstrokes th at fill in the space b etwe en the waves crashing on the b each and the horizon .

Agustín and Jua n, historians of a past th at they themselves were part of whilst it was still passing, record and explain th at glorious tra n sformation . This book not only tells us about events, but also about the places, the people, the cha nges and the tradition s. Our accredited hospitality did the rest, a nd if one stops to read the list of "houseguests", one discovers that it reads very much like a Hollywood telephone directory. Having realised th at there is nowhere in the world quite like this, h alf the world h as visited a nd continues to visit this corner of the pla net. A poet once said th at " Geography is a love affair". The authors of this book might say the same.

* The book "Reencontra ndo la Costa del Sol", by Jua n Gaitán a nd Agustín Lomeña, has been published by Lunwerg.