Backstory: Sleepless in Spain: The siesta recedes

Luís Alonso of Bilbao, Spain, used to go home for lunch each day at 1 p.m. He'd slip into his favorite pinstriped pajama bottoms and sleep on the couch for an hour. Then he'd get up, comb his hair, and head back to work - revived.

But three years ago, Mr. Alonso took a job with a software firm in an industrial park. Suddenly, his lunch hour became just that - an hour break at a nearby restaurant. Now Alonso, like many other Spaniards, is more likely to spend his lunch in a pinstriped suit than pajamas.

"The siesta, it's a glorious thing," he says wistfully of the old days.

Spain is rapidly restructuring its workday and, along with it, one of the most well-known customs in the world - the siesta.

The midday ritual that has played out for centuries on shaded terraces, under silk sheets, or on couches is giving way to more modern work habits and - qué lástima! - sleepless afternoons.

In an age of global competition and European integration, Spain is under increasing pressure internally and from neighboring countries to do away with its famously long lunch breaks, which can last two to three hours. Many Spanish companies have already responded by shortening employee lunch sessions to one or two hours. Call it a clash between profits and the pillow.

This month the siesta received another setback when central government workers adopted a new schedule: an hour lunch and 6 p.m. punch-out time. Supporters hope their schedule becomes a model for businesses both large and small countrywide, from the industrial north to the sun-drenched south.

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Those who favor such overhauls say Spain is out of line with the rest of Europe. Increasingly long commutes, coupled with the presence of multinational firms that operate on "normal" schedules, have made the traditional siesta an anachronism. Though many firms still allow long midday breaks, it's getting harder for Spaniards to go home for lunch.

The result, according to Ignacio Buqueras, president of the Independent Foundation, a group lobbying to change the workday, is that most Spaniards start work between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m., but don't eat dinner until 10 p.m. He blames the drawn-out schedule for poor work habits, accidents on the job, and difficult child-care arrangements. A Madrid think tank, Business Circle, reports that Spaniards work more per year than many Europeans, but their productivity is below average.

Reformers would like to see the country adopt a Greenwich Meal Time: A lunch break that begins at 12:30 and lasts no more than an hour. "The current situation is a mission impossible," says Mr. Buqueras.

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Old habits die hard, though. From the height of their empire in the 1500s through a civil war 400 years later, Spaniards have adhered to the ritual that Nobel laureate Camilo José Cela calls yoga, Iberian-style. The word "siesta" derives from the Latin "sexta" for "sixth." It was at the sixth hour when the sun was at its hottest and workers needed a break. Eventually the custom spread from field to city, becoming the centerpiece of "family time" and an ingrained respite.

The siesta has long been the muse of poets, the repartee of humorists, and a source of national pride. As the saying goes, a lunch without a siesta is like a bell without its clapper.

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