November 4 – St. Charles Day in Andorra

nPostednon November 4, 2015

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Todaynis the Feast Day of the Catholic Saint Charles Borromeu.

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nNow,nI couldn’t seem to figure out why this saint is celebratednwith a bank holiday in Andorra, since he lived in Milan (in what isnnow Italy), and he is considered the patron saint of a city innBrazil, a city in Italy, and a city in California, U.S.A.

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nNonspecial connection, that I could find, with Andorra! And it’s not asnif Andorra is a newcomer to the list of nations (like Italy, whichnbecame a unified country in 1861) – Andorra has been Andorra since the year 1278!

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nI also couldn’t see any details on how Andorrans celebrate the day (other than closing the banks). Still, since the time I briefly visited Andorra last summer, I been wanting a chance tontalk about this nation.

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The darker yellow dot on the border between
SPAIN (light yellow) and FRANCE (green),
marked “AND.,” is Andorra.

nFirst,nAndorra is really tiny. We often speak of nations or countries asn“states,” and Andorra is referred to as a microstate. It is 179^thnin the world, as far as size goes – far smaller than the smallestnU.S. state, Rhode Island, and smaller even than Los Angeles, New YorknCity, or Chicago!

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nIt’sna bit less than 181 square miles in area. That translates to almostn468 square kilometers.

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nAnothernthing about Andorra is that it is quite high in altitude, and reallynmountainous. It is perched in the Pyrenees mountains, in betweennSpain and France. The capital of Andorra, which is Andorra la Vellan(which means “Andorra the Old”), is the highest capital city innthe world.

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This photo of the Tour de France
shows you how twisty-turny the road from
France to Andorra is…

nWhennmy husband and I drove through Andorra, on our way to Spain fromnFrance, we took a steep and winding road up, up, up into thenmountains. Visibility was pretty terrible – we seemed to be drivingnthrough clouds! – but that didn’t scare me, because so many peoplenwere traveling up that road ahead of us, we were goingnreeeeeaaaaaaalllllllllllllllllyy slowly!

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Sometimes Andorra gets a LOT of snow!

nThenlast point I want to make about Andorra is that its economy isndominated by tourism (including skiing) and being a tax haven. Thenlatter was really obvious as we reached the border of France andncrossed into Andorra. Suddenly ALL of the cars on the road stopped atngas stations and shops strung out along the road, right by thenborder. It turns out that people often come from France to Andorra tonbuy things at a much cheaper price, tax and duty free! n

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nAndorranis special in several ways:

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nAndorran has the longest life expectancy of any nation: an average of 81n years.

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nItn is the only nation in the world whose official language is Catalan.n Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Portuguese are also commonlyn spoken.

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nItn is also the only nation in the world whose head of state is an president democratically elected by another nation!

Thatn last one is weird, so let me explain: Andorra is an “co-principality,” which means that the “heads of state” aren two princes. One “prince” is the democratically electedn president of France, and the other “prince” is the Spanish Romann Catholic Bishop of Urgell. Of course, these positions are justn formal figureheads without the power to rule Andorra.

Andorran is actually governed by a democratically elected parliament and an Head of Government, chosen from the ruling party of parliament.

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