A woman is seen in a storage area for essential items during mud removal and cleaning operations on a street in Paiporta, south of Valencia, eastern Spain, on November 6, 2024, following deadly floods. — AFP
Young volunteers have led a humanitarian effort for victims of Spain's deadliest floods in decades, challenging stereotypes of a self-absorbed and weak 'snowflake generation' focused only on themselves. 'Hundreds, maybe thousands have arrived, and they have acted magnificently,' said Noelia Saez, a 48-year-old from the devastated town of Catarroja. The altruism also delighted 62-year-old Teresa Gisbert, a resident of the ruined town of Sedavi, where dozens of young volunteers rushed to help as mud covered the streets and her home. 'They bring us food, they have helped us... they are angels,' she told AFP. Their towns are in the eastern Valencia region, where almost all the destruction and over 200 deaths have occurred since the floods hit a week ago. With authorities absent in some of the worst-hit areas for days, an army of ordinary citizens walked to provide food, water, and cleaning equipment to clear the mud. Youths were at the forefront of this wave of solidarity and were seen working again in Catarroja on Wednesday, loading trucks with fresh supplies, according to an AFP journalist. This was a stark contrast to stereotypes portraying the generation born in this millennium as self-centered 'snowflakes' addicted to endless scrolling on social media. 'The elderly always say that people from other generations are worse,' said Angela Noblejas, a 19-year-old industrial engineering student. 'But now that they've given us a chance, maybe they wouldn't have in better times, we young people have responded pretty well.' Noblejas and her millennial friends spent Tuesday wading through mud and debris in the town of Algemesi to aid the cleanup. Her grandfather had recounted a 1957 flood that devastated the Valencia region and killed dozens. Now, Noblejas believes she is creating stories for her children and grandchildren. 'I think going, getting covered in mud, helping, will have been much better than telling them, 'No, I stayed at home without doing anything',' she said. Her friend Gisela Huguet also dismissed the accusation that today's young are always on their mobile phones, seeking the next 'like'. 'We're concerned about society,' the 19-year-old IT and mathematics student told AFP, saying the victims were 'people from our town, people like us, university buddies'. For Jose Antonio Lopez-Guitian, a 61-year-old humorist from the city of Valencia who has joined the volunteer mobilization, modern youths are 'soft' because they live in 'times that are perhaps not so hard'. 'They are people of their time, and with their mobiles there's no reason why they should be like those who came before,' he said. 'Young people don't have the chance to do something meaningful,' he said, but Spain's greatest crisis in living memory has given them 'a real goal, which above all is to help'.
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