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True Tale From Rural Spain

By Frank McKell

We are in the last days of summer in southern Spain and I am happy that there are clouds so we have some respite from the heat here in La Sierra Travesía; probably most people in Europe would prefer the heat, particularly those in Britain who can never be sure of a summer of sunshine.

Early one morning after preparing some photographs I had taken of two groups of friends, people in the pueblo (village) of Joyantható during their fiesta and others of a European woman and her Spanish husband who live in Húmdiga, I walked along the main street in the shade of some huge trees. It was already very warm and clearly, we were going to have ‘mucho calor’ later that day.

As I reached the underground garage where my wee hire-car had passed the night, I noticed that ‘Pinta de León’ – ‘Look of Lion’, was shadowing me. Pinta is a very small dog with scruffy ginger hair, a misplaced jaw with twisted teeth and hind legs that appear crossed over – the result of his being hit more than once by cars, according to his owner who lives across the way. My new friend is a cantankerous ten years old, he doesn’t see or hear very well and has taken to lying outside the place where I am staying and barks at everything that moves. As Pinta, who does things his way, refuses to travel in the car he was soon running – sort of lolloping, along behind while barking out his protest for a short distance; he is not much of a runner and seen from behind he seems to be doing the Tango as he bobs along like a rocking-horse. Pinta is lovely! For treats, I give him dry grains of ‘All Bran’ and salted peanuts – not at the same time, and he loves them.

I drove the seven miles up the hot and very dusty road to Joyantható – dustier than usual as there was work in progress to widen the road and huge machines were biting chunks of soft mountain earth to drop into hungry lorries that then tipped the contents across the way – each operation obscuring the road with clouds of dust.

When I arrived at Barrio Alto in Joyantható my friends Pablo Bienhecho and Pedro Letrero, the renowned poet of La Travesía, were sitting on low high backed chairs in the street outside the home of Pablo. After handshakes and greetings, Pedro showed me a poem that he was writing at that very moment and added the final line as I watched. I do admire his capacity for writing poetry at any moment and anywhere just as I enjoy his verses – they seem to capture the essence of the way of life in La Travesía. Pablo’s wife Angelita was attending a funeral in the pueblo but Carmen, the wife of his son, came out of her house in front to see the fotos and took charge of them. Pablo, who had been in hospital for an operation, looked to be in good health but said he wasn’t feeling very well, as he was bothered with his stomach. We sat chatting in the shade for a while but as the air became ever warmer I realised I should move on. Our goodbyes completed and with calls of ‘come back soon’ hanging in the sultry air I set off downhill. Of course my car was stopped once more at the road works and there I parked in the shade of an overhanging olive tree – the same tree under which the road controller was resting!, Asking how long the pause would be I got the reply,

“Oh about five little minutes”.

As the lorry was parked up awaiting the machine to finish biting chunks of soil in preparation for loading I suggested he might let me pass.

“ Oh no, five minutes doesn’t make any difference here or there,”

replied the controller.

I said there were many instances where it could make all the difference; for example if someone were five minutes late the bank might be closed, the mail collected, their girl friend might get upset, or whatever.

“ Oh, but in urgent cases you could always pass right ahead”

said the controller,
demonstrating in this simple and effective manner the way of life in La Travesía.

In due time after five machine shovels, not the two he had stated, were dumped in the lorry I was given the all clear and with an exchange of ‘Adios’, continued my journey to the house of friends at Cortijo Almendro.

The track uphill from Húmdiga pueblo to the Cortijo stretches for more than a very stony, rough and rugged mile, flanked on either side by dry, rock-strewn soil that struggles to support olive and almond trees. Driving in bottom gear over the last 200 metres I arrived hot and sweating with my shirt sticking against my back - the temperature was 36º in the shade.
Leaving my car on a circular section of flat ground that lies just below Cortijo Almendro I walked the last 70 metres uphill. My first barking greeting came from an outlying sentry lying low in the long grass to my right; I could hear the warning but not see from where it was coming until suddenly a tiny brown dog rose from its cover on my right and came towards me wagging his bushy tail, which was about the length of his body. Still barking he moved in behind to check me over and stayed there as he escorted me in. Next out was another small brown dog that was surely from the same litter, or a parent, and he took up station on my left; both dogs continued barking as I pressed on. Nearing the open door of the cortijo I could see a grey horse and a black burra (female donkey, burro is male) tethered, while inside sitting on the sofa by the door was the gitano, (gypsy) ‘Bartolo el Bobo’. Bartolo, who is about 50, is the eldest son in a family that produced 13 children, five of whom have died. The father was only 51 years old when he died, as was his own father before him; both deaths apparently brought on by their heavy drinking habits. I had met Bartolo and already knew that his nickname was ‘El Bobo’, supposedly because he was born in February, which is known as the stupid month because of its changeable weather. In fact Bartolo is not over bright and is considered to be a bit simple by the local people; however they also say he is a good person and a hard worker who is forever labouring at all sorts of tasks to get money for the maintenance of his wife and children.

As I made to enter the cortijo two or three larger dogs rose to make their inspection, and then I was in! After mutual greetings inside the cortijo, Bartolo went off to the almond trees below leading his horse with the burra following behind. My friends Arturo and Adela had given him permission to collect all of the existing nuts for his own benefit. Settling down on a large sofa I was warmly greeted with cries of

‘you are welcome, where have you been, what have you been up to, we’ve missed you, have some food, there is a large pot of bean stew ready’.

So of course, I said I would be pleased to eat with them and at once Arturo placed a large plate of thick green bean & chicken stew on the low table by the sofa. Oddly enough, nobody else sat to eat as Arturo busied himself in the kitchen while Adela seemed to be hungry only for gossip. However, I was joined by the inevitable squadron of hovering flies, some of which dived on my food as well as hovering over it so I had to keep a sharp eye on what was on my spoon before putting it in my mouth. Nevertheless, that is how things are in Cortijo Almendro and the food was crammed with healthy vegetables and excellent, as was the company.

While I concentrated watchfully on my eating Arturo was relating that he had given Bartolo permission to collect all the almonds remaining on his property; most of the crop in La Travesía had been lost when a sudden sharp frost froze the buds earlier in the year. It may take Bartolo a month to collect the 2,000 kilos or so that are hanging from many trees spread over a large area, though he could earn one euro per kilo. Continuing his tale, Arturo said,

“Bartolo is a super person and would give you anything. It is a fact that he is a bit simple and people often take unfair advantage of his innocence, and I'll give you an example:

At this moment he has five children and his wife in the house to feed and look after; the oldest child is a girl of 10 years of age (she also does not appear bright) and she is the only one of whom he is the father. The other four children his wife had with three different fathers, two of them with a well-known gypsy character who lives in the pueblo.”

(Known as ‘El Grasiento’, this unwholesome character is a beer-swilling, beer-bellied, longhaired, yellow-toothed, scruffy, unclean, vociferous, argumentative layabout who delights in shaking his bulk around to music during the street fiestas, usually with a litre bottle of beer swaying somewhere between his grubby hands and sloppy lips – yet he seems to have appeal for some people. Arturo said that El Grasiento has children with a fair number of local women, which gives substance to an old Spanish saying – ‘For every pot there is a Lid’).

Bartolo knows he is not the father of these four children and although he appears to stumble through life apparently unconcerned, there are unhappy dark lagoons within).

Continuing to talk about Bartolo, Arturo recalled an occasion when he called for him at his very humble and, from the outside, very scruffy home at eight o’clock in the morning – they were to go off working together that day. Inside the home, Arturo could see into a second room and there, at that early hour, ‘El Grasiento’ was performing his particular gymnastics with Bartolo’s wife who was sprawled across the tabletop! This woman is a very large person and so it follows that at least the table is substantial even if nothing else is in that dreadful dwelling. Bartolo was by the door and quickly moved outside with Arturo following. Once in the street Arturo told his friend Bartolo what he had seen and received the reply, “I don’t want to see that, I don’t want to know anything about it”. Enjoying my bean stew while duelling with the diving flies, I listened as Arturo continued with his story.

“ On one occasion Bartolo was in such a torment with his circumstances that he ate rat poison and some other toxic substance, for which he had to be treated in hospital. Then another time he left his wife for a year and stayed with his mother in a different pueblo; she was arranging for all the children to be adopted legally by Bartolo and to live at her home but before this could be finalised Bartolo went back to his wife”. A case of ‘Pots for Lids’, perhaps.

(During the school year, the five children from Bartolo’s house, along with others in the district with special needs, are cared for in a splendid boarding school run by nuns in Húmdiga; there they sleep and have all of their meals free of charge. However, during holiday periods the parents of such children are obliged to have them stay in their own homes.)

My stew eaten and flies avoided I thanked my hosts and left with a bag containing green peppers, aubergine, cucumbers and a lemon!

Just below the cortijo, Bartolo was working with a cane beating the branches of an almond tree and collecting one by one the few nuts that reached the ground. Stopping to chat he commented that there was very little fruit to collect and it would be a slow task. We got talking about his horse which, according to Arturo is the most sweet tempered animal and would be the ideal companion to take me up into the hills of La Travesía – something that is on my ‘want to do list’. Without asking for the horse, Bartolo said, “You can take it whenever you like”.

A gesture as spontaneous, honest and generous as is that fine person, ‘Bartolo el Bobo’.

Author’s Note: Names of places and people are camouflaged to protect private lives but this story is based on true happenings.

Written by Frank McKell © 28 October 2004

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