Menéndez and her small team toiled each year to share the cultural exchange between the Bay Area and Andalucia, the southern Spanish soil into which Spanish, Moorish and gypsy cultures are baked. Each year they were met with enthusiastic audiences and artists, and she says that artistically, the festival has been a huge success.

Cervantes is a Spanish icon: his name adorns Spain's official cultural institution, and is synonymous with the country's soft power. Yet, until now, the site of his grave has been assumed, though not known.

Bloom Consulting is a Madrid based strategy consulting company that specialises in country branding and business strategy. His work focuses mainly on nation building projects and the developing of brand strategies in the private sector, as well as corporate strategy and HR consulting. 

Experts from Korea and Spain exchanged ideas to facilitate bilateral relations in the areas of regional branding, culture and smart cities at the Marriot Hotel in Seoul, Wednesday.

The seminar, to be held on Monday, is organised by the Spanish Permanent Mission to the United Nations together with Casa África, Spain’s main public diplomacy institution dedicated to the African continent, and Real Instituto Elcano, one of the most prestigious think-tanks. It will be attended ambassadors accredited to the UN and business executives from the United States and Spain.

Current news coverage duly notes Juan Carlos’ pivotal role in encouraging and preserving Spanish democracy in the years following the death of the geriatric dictator Francisco Franco in 1975. But the King is perceived in some quarters within and without Spain as tainted goods: a high-living hunter of Botswanan elephants in the midst of a national economic downturn, a less than uxorious royal spouse, saddled with a Marie Antoinette-esque daughter and larcenous son-in-law.