Death in the Salamantino Afternoon

rarr!





Hey Folks...

My travels are accumulating so fast that I´m having a hard time keeping up with the blogging. I´ve been to Sierra de Francia and Portugal since I last blogged, but in order to play some catch-up, this entry will be about the bullfight, or corrida de toros, that I saw last week. If you are at all squeamish about things like blood, torture, cruelty to animals, sexism, or brutal re-enactments of ancient rituals of man´s domination over the world of brute instinct, then please do not read on. Some of the pictures will be slightly graphic, though I will try to focus on the humane side of things.

I just finished reading John Dos Passos´Spanish travel novel, Rosinante to the Road Again, which is as much a charming account of a 20-21´year old´s thoughts about being away from home as it is a literary who´s-who of early 20th century Spain. Dos Passos reinvents himself as Telemachus, son of Penelope, travelling with his wild party animal friend Lyaeus, from the small pueblos of western Castilla to Toledo, in the south.

All of it was great, but the part I found most interesting was the theme that he introduces in the first essay, ¨A Gesture and a Quest¨, the idea that Spanish culture is best embodied by an almost undescribable gesture, both vague and immediately recognizable, that is a flagrant defiance of death. Spaniards, he says, are constantly acutely aware (not quite obsessed, but almost) of their oncoming deaths, and so they live their lives in such a way as to say ¨piss off¨ to the destiny to which they know they are bound.

He quotes the Castillian poet Jorge Manrique...

Nuestras vidas son los ríos Our lives are the rivers
Que van a dar en la mar, That will end in the sea
Que es el morir. . . . Which is death...

There are hundreds of places where you can see the gesture... I´ve seen it in the extremely bloody crucifixes in the cathedrals (the Christ figure on the one in Salamanca has real human hair, provided each year by a local wig shop), in the way the Spaniards laze around all day, as if waiting for something big to happen, in the way they cram as much life and partying as possible into each night of fiesta...

"It's the gesture that's so overpowering; don't you feel it in your arms? Something sudden and tremendously muscular."

"When Belmonte turned his back suddenly on the bull and walked away dragging the red cloak on the ground behind him I felt it," said Lyaeus.

"That gesture, a yellow flame against maroon and purple cadences . . . an instant swagger of defiance in the midst of a litany to death the all-powerful. That is Spain. . . . Castile at any rate."

"Is 'swagger' the right word?"

"Find a better."

"For the gesture a medieval knight made when he threw his mailed glove at his enemy's feet or a rose in his lady's window, that a mule-driver makes when he tosses off a glass of aguardiente, that Pastora Imperio makes dancing. . . . Word! Rubbish!" And Lyaeus burst out laughing.

And so I´ve arrived at my point.... The corridas are the perfect example of this unnamable gesture, en vivo. When the torero flicks his muleta (his cape) or steps deftly out of the way of the charging, tremendous bull, there´s something about it that is, if not macabre, at least wholly and entirely Spanish.



That is a picture of Fernando Ordoñez, one of the most famous toreros in Spain. But he is mainly famous because he recently separated from his wife, who is daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Alba. He has cut more than 300 ears in his career (cutting the ear of the toro and giving it to the matador means that he did a good job) and fought over 700 bulls, but to my eye he had no art. He could not stir the toro to any kind of energy or anger, and each of his paseos, the turns of the bull that he executed, were flat and lifeless...



The real star of the show was the 22-year old Serafin Marín, a Sevillano who has only cut 3 ears in his career. He had been out of the ring since May after being gored, and when I saw him it was his first corrida back since then.



His paseos were smooth, elegant, and daring...



guiding the bull into the sand...

and cutting his two ears of the day...



The corrida begins with a big procession into the Plaza de Toros, with each of the three main toreros and their 2 assistants. The picadors, which are prominent in this next photo, ride blindfolded horses...



They carry long spears and their horses are padded heavily on one side to block against the toro´s horns...



When the toreros induce the toro to charge the picador´s horse, it´s the picador´s job to stab the toro in its shoulders, to weaken the shoulder muscles so that when the final dance of death comes, it will charge the matador with its head lowered.



The picador wears a heavily padded boot so that the horns don´t tear up his leg...



After the picadors weaken the bull, the bandililleros come out with two hand-held spikes decorated with crepe-paper. They coax the bull into charging them, then run at the bull at a slight angle, jump over the bull´s head, and plant the spikes in its back. It´s the most bad-ass part of the whole bullfight, and probably the most dangerous...



The final stage of the bullfight takes about 15 minutes, in which the torero does a bunch of sinuous, hypnotizing paseos, leading the toro into the center of the ring (ideally) or to the side, so that he can kill it with his sword. Here is Marin killing:



I insisted to a few of my friends that we should buy wineskins to drink while watching the corrida, but no one listened to me. I did, however, get a shot of this awesome old dude drinking from his like a pro, as well as smoking a cigarette with the same hand...



That guy was pretty lairy. He kept on yelling at the band, which you can see behind this awesome viejo with zero teeth in the next photo. He wanted them to play a paso doble called ¨La Bota¨, which they did, several times, at his gruff requests...



The whole scene was pretty old-school. For my own part, I bought another €2 straw hat for the occasion...



And at the end, after Serafin Marín killed his second bull, the entire Plaza came to its feet and waved white panuelos (handkerchiefs), the ultimate sign of tribute to an artful torero.



And finally, out back after all the swagger and glamour of the toreros, which their shiny traje de luces suits and flamboyant poses, we have the uglier side of things...



....death in the afternoon.

Imagenes de Salamanca

Hey all,

Here's a quick post about my town, Salamanca, and some of the things I've been doing.

For the past few weeks the air's been a bit electric because Las Ferias, the city-wide fairs, were coming, and everywhere parades were being prepared, stages set up, etc... Here's a nice shot of the Plaza Mayor where they were setting up the stage and it was all windy and full of anticipation...



In every plaza in the city, and on a lot of street corners too, they're setting up casetas, these boxcar-looking bars where they sell a cania of cerveza (a little glass of beer) and some tapas for like 1.50 euros. Here's a guy painting his caseta:
















And here's some more casetas:




















And here's me and my roommate Evan (Far left) and my buddy Dave enjoying a cania at a caseta...



Later last week we went to go see a concert given by La Tuna, which, contrary to what you might think is neither a jam band nor a sea-shanty group. It's like this: think of the coolest a-capella group you could ever imagine joining, but only in the sense that it's a club that sings. What I mean is, they play instruments, not just singing, but they're a student group. Each facultad, or department, such as Law, History, Economics, Medicine, etc, has a grupo de La Tuna, and they wear period costumes from the 13th century, with each color of their vests corrseponding to their facultad (yellow for law, red for history, etc). The girl on stage is Maria Angela, one of the IES staffers, and they are serenading her.



The Tuna started sometime around the 13th century, when students started playing together in the plazas and streets of Salamanca for extra cash. It became formalized a few centuries later, and they would hire themselves out for private concerts too and play serenades for the girls who the guys in the group were chasing.



Their capes have ribbons and patches from all the places they've visited, as well as garters and silks from the women they are courting. They sang a bunch of great Spanish songs, including "Las Canarias" and others, and even some popular ones (for us Americans) like "Guantanamera" and "Cielito Lindo".




In the middle of the concert, the guys raised glasses of beers and sang this call-and-response brindis (toast), which I immediately made them teach me after the show:

Del cielo ha caido un grán garafón From the sky has fallen a huge carafe
Para los borrachos de esta reunion For all the drunks of this gathering
Bebiendo, bebiendo, nos Drinkin’, drinkin’, we’re getting cooked
vamos cociendo
Ya vé, ya vé, ya beber vino! Come on, come on drink wine!

Bebamos hasta que no nos conocimos,
O del culo now cayamos!

We drink until we don’t know each other,
Or until we fall on our asses!

Needless to say, it's now the IES kids' drinking anthem.

And finally, an artsy shot of me with cafe con leche and a cigarette in the Bar Sierra de Bejar which is the bar-cafe where my friends and I meet before we go out.



And a shot of me and boys and girls playing dominoes in the Calle de Toro:




And a shot of the Plaza de Toros, which is where I'm going tonight to see a bullfight. This graffiti says "Matadors are murderers". I beg to differ, but we'll see how I feel about it later...



More to come soon on the bullfights and on my recent trip to La Sierra de Francia, where I saw a sky-high convent and did some sweet ambling about on cliff-mounted rocks (scary pictures coming, mom!).

Also, in response to the one outstanding question, they do not have McPaella, but they do have McGazpacho and McFishsticks, which are called McMarins. Also, you can buy a glass of beer at McDonalds.

Love,
Robbie

Segovia

Hey yinz

Yesterday IES took us on a trip to Segovia, a city that used to be the provincial capital of Castille, and is about 2 hours east-southeast of us. It looks like this:





Here are what the streets look like, very old and narrow...



The city is not incredibly interesting except for two things, the Roman Aqueduct, which is a piece of amazing craftsmanship (no mortar used!) and one of the best examples of the Roman architectural style. Here it is, with a smooth-lookin Evan and two of the IES gals:



The other is the Alcázar, a palace that used to house the kings and queens of Castille. There was a lot of sweet period furniture and portraits of the kings and queens inside. You can see it, looming large, in the big photo of Segovia up top, but here´s what it looks like from the top of the tower...



Inside we saw this picture of St. James, cutting off the heads of arabs. His Spanish name is Santiago Matamoros, which translates literally as ¨St. James, Director of the Dept. of Homeland Security¨. It was appropriately gruesome and Spanish...



Later, I bought a 2€ straw hat, exclusively for the purpose of drinking claras, which are these pick-me-up style drinks that are half beer half gaseosa. Gaseosa is not as disgusting as it sounds... it´s actually just sweetish tonic water. But claras are a pretty lairy drink. A lot of old men drink them in the morning at the bar cafes. Here´s me and my buddy Brian enjoying one (note the straw hat)...





Thats all for now, more later...

Love,
Robbie

Hola!

Thought I´d take an opportunity to post some pictures of Salamanca. Here´s my roommate Evan in front of the Juntamiento (government) building that faces southward on the north side of the Plaza Mayor. This is the center of the old city, and everybody meets under the clock tower in this building to go our to the bars together. There are also concerts and speeches in the plaza. It´s lit up like this every night...















Here is me with some IES kids. The plaza in Salamanca is said to be (and according to my comparisons, IS) the prettiest in all of Spain. The one in Madrid doesn´t even compare...
















The plaza is lined with cafe´s, where I sit during the early evening and affect my wine-soaked literary personality... but on quiet nights we just sit around and talk.






















And here´s my artsy shot...

Notting Hill Carnival

Today I went to the Notting Hill Carnival, on recommendation from Time Out London, which is almost as cool as my former employer, Time Out New York (london has more typos).

Carnival is apparently the Biggest Street Festival In Europe, and there were tons of people fo' sho', but it was also extremely large area-wise. I got so tired that I had to come back to center city and watch a movie. I chose "The Rising: The Story of Mangal Pandey" which I thought would be interesting, because I did some research about the Sepoy Rebellion this summer, and I have an affinity for the Bruce Springsteen album of the same name. However, it turns out I was duped, and it was a Bollywood movie. God, was it awful. I should have read Time Out before I saw that one.

Anyhow, here are some things I saw at the Carnival:

For starters, Notting Hill is a pretty posh neighbourhood, and, like in the movie, a lot of the houses look like this:



But on the Carnival days, a lot of thoughfoul people boarded up their houses against the rabble. Turns out it was a good idea...



The parade was amazing. All these groups of dancers, called Mas Clubs, a la Carnival in Brazil or Mardi Gras in New Orleans, followed big floats in outrageous costumes, dancing. (Odd because it's nowhere near the time of year for Carnival, but whatever...)



Notting Hill Carnival is a Caribbean street festival, mostly. I'm not really sure how it happened, but I believe the neighbourhooud used to be a Jamaican neighborhood, but got gentrified. I can hardly imagine that though, because some of the houses are really ostentatious. Anyhoo, there were a bunch of rastas smoking spliffs that looked like this (although the king of all rastas refused to let me take his picture unless i bought weed from him - needless to say, i did, and he stole my camera)...



And a lot of dorky white guys who looked like this (note the "Jah Army" t-shirt) and dancing like fools...



And then I bought some jerk chicken:



Then I ET it!



And the big thing about Notting Hill Carnival is the "Sound Systems". All these DJs spinning roots reggae, soca, hip-hop, salsa, soul, and old-skool tap set up SPEAKERBOXXES (yes, like your favorite outkast record) and try to blow eachother into high heaven with levels of bass that would make my mom have a hernia just to imagine them.

Here are some pictures of speakerboxxes to show you how big they are (remember, each sound system has 4 or 5 of these lined up)...









and this one near the bbq where i bought the jerk chicken...



and finally, an image that I feel sums up Notting Hill Carnival quite honourably (note: not in the least bit staged)...



Also, my buddy Justin had a great idea... He suggested, by his actions, that you good people can post any queries you might have on the blog in the form of comments. For all you old folks reading this, that means just click the "comments" link at the bottom of a given post. The first question Justin asked (though hopefully not the last) is "Do they have McPaella in Spain?". Great question, Justin. I'm not in Spain yet, but once I get there I'll make sure to find out.

Also, you can find a short video of what the inside of the Shakespeare's Globe Theatre looks like here. You need Windows Media Player though, I think.

Cheers!
-robbie.