...or an abhorrent sport that should be relegated to a thing of the past?
Tony and I have just returned from 3 days in the phenomenally beautiful city of Madrid, both the capital of Spain and the largest city in Spain with a population of approximately 3.4 million (not including the surrounding ‘metropolitan’ area). Within 5 minutes of arriving, we’d literally seen more people than we’d seen all summer and certainly more than live in Cayman or in our local village here in France! Photos below of some of the interesting characters we stumbled upon within seconds of exiting the metro (we were pretty pleased with ourselves for figuring out the metro from the airport into the centre saving ourselves a EUR35 cab fare to the hotel!).
We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and were fascinated by the beautiful architecture, the incredible array of wonderful foods (not surprisingly paella featured on every menu) and the delicious spanish wines. We even tried tripe for the first (and possibly last) time - it was actually very ‘tastefully’ done (photo below) and surprisingly tasty however, just knowing what it is relegates it to the list of foods that are not necessary to hunt out for further tastings! Still, pleased with ourselves for giving it a go and glad we picked a nice restaurant to do it in so that we could accompany it with a 2003 reserva from the Ribero del Duero region!
Given that we were in Madrid, just minutes away from ‘Las Ventas’ bullring considered to be the home of bullfighting in Spain (with a seating capacity of 25,000), we made the rather sensitive and perhaps politically incorrect decision to attend a fight. The fighting season is from March to December and Las Ventas has fights every Sunday from May through October and so for EUR10 each we signed ourselves up for the Sunday night fight - slated to be a 6 bull fight (just meaning 6 individual fights each lasting approximately 1/2 hour).
We didn’t actually last the distance and left at the end of the 4th fight figuring we’d seen enough. For those readers incredibly anti, I’m ashamed to admit I was rather fascinated by it all - the ballet like moves of the matadors in their pink tights (yes - every single one in different coloured sequins but all in pink tights), the incredible speed with which they whisk off the bull at the end of the fight and the next bull appears and the pomp and ceremony involved throughout.
That said, as with our experience of tripe, it’s not something we’d hunt out or be keen to see again. However, it is very much a part of the Spanish culture and I’m not sure it’s my place to interfere with that culture just because it doesn’t conform to my culture or my sense of what is right or wrong which is of course largely dictated by my upbringing heavily influenced by my local culture as to what is acceptable.
Having researched a little about the bulls themselves, I would suggest that in most cases, bullfighting bulls, barring the last 20 minutes of their life, have a far superior quality of life than any cow or bull currently living in a CAFO (see previous blog found at http://pretendfarmer.blogspot.com/2011/06/if-cows-werent-meant-for-eatingwhy-are.html).
These bulls are primarily bred free range and are selected based on a particular combination of aggression, energy, strength, stamina and intelligence - according to wikipedia, a bull intelligent enough to distinguish man from cape would be too dangerous - so the super intelligent ones are presumably reserved for steak!
Fighting bulls generally reach maturity slower than meat breeds as they are not selected to be heavy although mature bulls weigh anywhere from 500-700kg (1100-1600lb).
Also per wikipedia, the wide-ranging ranches these fighting cattle are born on are also often havens for Spanish wildlife as the farming techniques used are extensive. The fighting bull is raised by its mother until one year old, after which it is separated from the mother. At two years old they are then sent for testing at which time it is decided whether they will be suitable for breeding, the bullfight, or being slaughtered for meat.
At three years old, the bulls are no longer considered calves and are ready for further training. Under Spanish law the bull must be at least four years old and reach the weight of 460kg to fight in a first rank bullring. They must also have fully functional vision, horns that have not been tampered with and be in generally good condition.
Very occasionally, a bull will be ‘pardoned’, meaning his life is spared in the bullring due to ‘outstanding’ behaviour in the ring leading to the audience petitioning the president of the ring with white hankerchiefs. The bullfighter joins the petition as it is a great honour to have a bull one has fought, pardoned. The bull will then be returned to the ranch where he will live out his days in the fields and in most cases will become a ‘seed bull’. In these circumstances a bull’s lifespan can be 20-25 years.
Given the above, I would also suggest that the ducks ‘we’ force feed here in France perhaps have it worse than those bulls, given the ducks are force fed for the last 2 weeks of their lives whereas the bull only has a ‘difficult’ last 20 minutes. I realise this is another aspect of life that many find abhorrent but again I would suggest that this is a cultural thing and we’re all entitled to our opinions (as one of my favourite people once said after being accused of being ‘opinionated’ - ‘If you don’t have an opinion on anything, you really haven’t lived!’), but I’m not sure those opinions regardless of how firmly held, entitle us to try to change the way other cultures do things even when those things are in such stark contrast to what we might consider an ‘acceptable cultural tradition’.
So I suppose that’s my justification for having witnessed the perhaps abhorrent bullfight. I have neither regrets for having seen it nor the desire to repeat the experience. It was colourful, sad, shocking, interesting, lively and distasteful all packaged in bright sparkly sequins worn by men in pink tights! OLE!
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