Making Hemingway´s Spain My Spain

There is a saying here in Spain that goes ¨Leer es Vivir dos veces" This translates in English to "To read is to live two times." I read Hemingway, but now I´m living Hemingway too. I went to my first bullfight yesterday with a group of about seven girls. They all cried when the first bull died, but I loved watching the fight. Four of the girls left after the first three bulls, but I stayed. I understood when the bull was putting up a good fight, when it had good breeding, and when it was just a stupid animal. I understood when the matador in turn understood the bull and what he would do next, and I understood when everytging the matador did was just for show. I could pick the brave from the cowards and I observed how as the final sword was driven into the spine of the bull the picadors came up waving their capes on either side of the bull until it kneeled down at the feet of the matador in defeat. The bull´s last sight was usually the matador standing triumphant over it. I was able to understand the fight because it was as if Hemingway had explained it to me. Thus, after the second bull went down I understood that this was an excellent fight and I rose to my feet with the other spainards and waved my fan in a sign to present the matador with the bull´s ear as the other girls looked on dumbfounded. I liked the bull fight. Not many people do. But I take it as a representation of man´s ablity to overcome fear, to take on something so much bigger than itself and do so with a sort of majestic grace.

Something went terribly wrong with the last bull. It was bigger than the rest, and smarter too. It understood more than the other bulls had. So, when the gates opened to let the horses through, the bull made a run for it. He rammed the gate open and gored the man behind the gate. The man was taken and passed up through the crowd like a bloody rag doll and disappeared from view. A few moments passed where we were all on our feet. The silence was broken by hushed whispers and then a riderless horse came flying into the stadium pushed through the gate by the angry bull. The picadors went to work and the matador came out for the final fight. The bull gave up early in the fight, but had won his first battle. The man is still alive. The paper today said he´s in the general hospital in critical condition. I wish I could tell you more, but reading the newspaper in spanish is still not one of my strong points.