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If you’ve ever scrolled through TikTok and thought, wow, foreigners have a very specific idea of Spain, meet Kelly. She’s a British traveller from Essex who’s just discovered the Spanish siesta and, let’s put it like this, she’s not impressed. In a now-viral clip filmed in Marbella’s Puerto Banus, Kelly looks genuinely baffled as she walks down a sleepy street in the early afternoon. “Spanish people literally sleep during the day,” she says to the camera, her face somewhere between confusion and existential crisis. “They stop working at 2 PM, go home, sleep for a few hours, and then go back to work. And I just don’t get it.” “Why sleep in the daylight?” debate The video triggered exactly the kind of online chaos you’d expect. Because if there’s one thing Spaniards won’t let slide, it’s being told how to live by a tourist holding an iced latte. “Why would you sleep during the day when you could be living your life and chasing your dream?” Kelly asked herself. She goes on to explain that when she worked long hours, she used her free time to build her own business. So naturally, she can’t understand why Spanish people wouldn’t do the same. “Why are they just going home and sleeping and not chasing their dreams?” she repeats, shaking her head. How did the people react? To be fair, her logic might make sense in Essex. But in Andalusia, under a sun that could melt your will to live by 2 PM, that nap is basically self-preservation. And locals were quick to remind her in the comments that what she’s witnessing isn’t a national mass napathon, but just that split workday still common in many Spanish cities, where lunch breaks stretch long enough for a proper meal and some downtime before the second shift. As one commenter named Blanca wrote: “In your free time, you can do whatever you want: sleep, shop, read a book, or run.” Working to live, not living to work Others were less diplomatic. “Literally nobody in Spain sleeps for two hours in the middle of the day,” one user shot back, a comment that racked up hundreds of likes. Another wrote, “I’m so tired of foreigners thinking they know more about us than we do.” Another Spaniard, María, summed it up perfectly: “The siesta is a luxury, not a lifestyle.” Still, the viral video sparked an oddly revealing cultural moment. For Brits like Kelly, productivity is practically a moral code. For many Spaniards, rest is just as valuable as work. It’s not laziness, as some foreigners may think, it’s a rhythm. A clash of clocks Kelly’s “I could never” mindset isn’t unique, it’s part of a broader Western European work ethic that often prizes grind over pause. Meanwhile, Spain has quietly perfected the art of living: working to live, not living to work. Spain isn’t wasting time, in fact, it’s protecting it. And maybe that’s what really bothers some people. The idea that slowing down might actually make life richer. So next time you see a quiet street in the Spanish afternoon, don’t mistake it for laziness. It’s just the calm between two halves of a life well-lived.
