I am Raquel, 28 years old and mother of a lovely little girl. Her father died due to COVID-19, two weeks before she was born. Together we live in this small apartment, overlooking the Plaza Alfonso XII. Our windows are a first-row seat for the processions on Semana Santa and the Día de la Victoria. We look out on the Santuario de la Victoria. Just like this basilica and this barrio, my little girl is called Victoria, after the city’s Patron Saint, the Virgin of Victory. Her name is also a remembrance of her father, who firmly believed that Si das la gloria a Dios el te dara la Victoria – if you give glory to God, he will give you victory. Victoria truly is a gift. She is the light of my life.

This moment, with the woman telling a story I have known since childhood and the tourists hanging on her every word, truly was a revelation to me. If only I could improve my English, I would be the perfect tourist guide! It would be so great to show people around the city and entertain them with surprising and thrilling stories about the turbulent past of invasions, wars and revolts that have left Malaga with remains of Roman, Arabic and Catholic treasures! What’s even more, it fits in very well with my own interests and allows me to organize my own time. Maybe I could even return to my studies!

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My husband was a teacher. I was still studying for my master’s degree in History. When he died, I needed a job to support us. For a while I worked in La Botica de la Cerveza, a pretty small pub with a trazillion types of beer. I liked the hospitable interaction with the visitors. But the working hours were difficult to combine with a baby girl. When I came home early in the morning, I was dead tired, but then my little Victoria just woke up and a brand-new day started… 

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I  slept  on  it.  And  then  I dared  to  take  the plunge. I used all my spare money for a crash course  in  English  conversation, quit my  job and  started  Castro’s  City  Guide  right  away; knowing that because of the pandemic, most of  the  tourists  would  be  Spanish   anyway. 

Currently  I  have  daily  tours  with  groups  of national     and,     increasingly,     international tourists. I am in charge, arrange my own time. In case of  family  groups  with children, I take Victoria along. 

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One day this older woman guiding a group of international tourists entered the pub. She told them why La Victoria was nicknamed Barrio de Chupitara. It is a great story about the pretentious bourgeois residents in the 19th century who would rather spend their money on elegant clothes to show off than on food. So, they skimped on meat and ate cheap cockles, mussels and other seafood, the empty shells of which they threw on the street. Chupitara is short for chupa y tira; suck it up and throw it away.

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This really is my dream job; telling stories while strolling through the labyrinthine streets of La Victoria and climbing up the Gibralfaro mountain. At the top are the Moorish fortress Alcazaba and the Castillo of Gibralfaro. The latter was built by Caliph Abd-al-Rahman III almost a century before the beginning of our Christian era, on the remains of a former Phoenician lighthouse. That’s how it got its name: gebel-faro means lighthouse mountain. You see, I can’t wait to tell you all the ins and outs of all the beautiful sites. From here, you can see the whole of Malaga, the port and the coastline. You definitely don't want to miss that view!