It hardly seems real that it was only 2 months ago and fiesta hadn’t even started yet, and we all had the whole thing ahead of us to look forward to…and it hardly seems fair that it’s all over now, and we all have ahead of us 10 months of waiting.

But there is usually a little luz at the end of the callejon, and one can always look back and remember with a smile some of the events of those mad times in a crazy town called Pamplona . To paraphrase a saying, “If Pamplona didn’t exist, they’d have to invent it.” But it does exist, and they didn’t have to invent anything, but just let a town and its inhabitants develop a religious festival into something extraordinary.

And if someone tried to create anything similar now, why, we all know that “health and safety”, (yup, it does exist in Spain , but I think it goes under the name of “animals and alcohol”), would be down on the organisers like a ton of bull. Shit.

But going back to 2 months ago, every one of us who has been before knew that we were returning to the high life again. Not just the highs of the encierro, but of everything else that happens during the 204 hours of the Fiesta of San Fermin. Because everything just seems magnified there…the highs are higher, the laughs are greater, the girls are prettier, the hangovers more spectacular, I get uglier…even the lows are better! And if you’d never been before but are now hooked and can’t wait for next July to come around…believe me, the next 10 months will be the longest months of waiting you’ll ever have.

So now that the Kids of Kuku have un-strapped me from my strait jacket and asked me to write for them again, I’m going to have a little meander down the high road that is memory lane, fiesta-style.

To start with, a bit of fun. Doing the rounds the last few months on a couple of fiesta websites there has been a bit of chatter about the fella above. I first came across him in 1986 as my friends and I were sitting in the gutter in the plaza, and we pretty much instantly called him the King of the Gypsies. I’ve since found out that other groups had other names for him, such as the Garlic King or the Onion Man, (and right now, just as we go to “press”, I’ve seen a couple of pictures drawn of him in 1988, with the title “El Conde de la Basura” – the Count of Rubbish, or perhaps, the Earl of the Rubbish Bin!), but whatever nickname he was given, his party trick was as smooth as it was simple: he’d just show up wearing whatever he happened to find lying around at any given moment, and sit down beside a group of foreigners.

Sometimes he would add to his attire at the same time as someone else was discarding theirs, so bit by bit he would be wearing more and more. One day during one of our rare forays over to the terrace at Bar Txoko, (well, although we were skint it was post encierro time and a cognac and vanilla or three were certainly deserved), he sat down at our table, leant over to me and whispered in my ear, “excuse me please, a patxaran for me.” To my great delight, he spoke a bit of English!

I found out his name was Francisco, and you’d see him throughout the day and into the night, dressed up looking like he’d just arrived from another planet sometimes, sitting with whatever group were buying him drinks at the time, getting gently sozzled. We used to joke that he was probably a bank manager, who for two weeks a year did exactly what he wanted. Or maybe he was San Fermin in disguise, just coming around to see everyone. I don’t remember seeing him in the 1990’s though…does anyone know anything?

As mentioned a couple of months ago, the present bullring was 70 years old this year. Feliz cumpleaños, plaza de toros. Anyone who read the piece for May, “Stair Ways Day”, may remember the two photos of runs from 90 odd years ago, one where the run veered right as you exited Estafeta, heading toward the old ring, and the other veering left and into what became Telefonos and the run downhill and through the tunnel into the new ring.

In the picture above you can see the old ring at the top of the picture with the new one just below it, and to get your bearings as I know it’s not too clear, the Plaza de Castillo is to the right of the old ring, with a water fountain surrounded by trees in the centre, and so to the bottom of the square that long street is of course the Estafeta.

Well, the year the present ring opened also saw the first recorded human mountain in the new plaza, and it happened right at the entrance where the tunnel meets the sand. It also happened, of all days, on the day of its inauguration, July 7th. And amazingly there is a photograph of it, and though it is by no means the clearest photo ever taken, you can still see pretty well what’s going on.

They were, literally, different times in those days, as at 6 a.m the rocket sounded and the bulls from the Herederos de Vicente Martinez ranch hit the streets and the first of that years encierros was underway. All went well it seems and some of the earlier runners had entered the ring without any trouble, but it only takes one to fall to bring down the rest…and that is what happened, until in no time there was a mountain of people blocking the tunnel and the herd were quickly upon them, but with no way through.

But they got through, alright, (with the encouragement of the herders!), but not before they had left over a hundred, yes a hundred, runners injured, to a greater or lesser degree. Amazingly, no one died that day, but it was a heck of a way to christen the new bull ring, and one that wasn’t forgotten for a long time.

High Life meets Night Life

In the mornings, after the bull run, we’d be waiting for the little bulls to come out and play, and there would sometimes be a balloon or two floating above the ring. Not a child’s balloon, but a hot air balloon, and I’d wonder what it must be like, floating around up there serenely, while down here on the sand all was madness. I’ve never been on a balloon ride before, but it must be a great way to travel and see things, especially from such a different perspective. Like being in a plane, but closer, and quieter. It would be great to float around the city during fiesta in the daytime and see all those familiar places from a few hundred feet up, but what I’d really like to do is the same trip, but at night.

My Dad told me how as a child in London (and we’re going back to the mid-twenties and early thirties here), he used to dream that he could fly…yup, just jump out of the window, arms out-stretched…and fly over London at night. That’s how I’d like to do it over Pamplona , arms apart, and just glide and swoosh and smile my way over the city as it partied beneath me. Now that would be the high life!

Now if some of those magnificent street sellers have some jet packs for sale next year, I might just by a couple, (if batteries are included). Even if it does say that they’re made in Senegal …

The Heavenly Peña

For anyone who has read some of these articles before (and thanks so much to those of you during San Fermin who took the time to say how much you liked what I’ve been writing – it was really appreciated), I love delving back into the past, (after all, with no past we wouldn’t have our present), as I often find a particular poignancy about certain old stories, especially if they are accompanied by an old black and white picture or two, or those evocative sepia stained ones…don’t you feel sometimes you’d like to be able to just step into them, and say, “hello…”

Well, if you’re wondering what this has to do with the high life, I don’t think you can get much higher than a heavenly peña…

In 1998 the Club Taurino de Pamplona, in a magazine issued to celebrate their 50th anniversary, had an article about a long since disappeared peña, La Veleta, “The Weathervane.” There are a couple of other meanings for that word, but I’m pretty sure that “weathervane” is a correct translation. Now, this lot were quite something, as they have a couple of “firsts” to their name, a couple of “somethings” that all peñas would eventually have that would change the whole “look” of fiesta forever.

One day I’d like to find out more about some of what I call the “pre-peñas”, too, those that existed before the arrival of those that we have now and know and love, but this lot were certainly amongst the first of the “modern type” peñas. As the article said, “they were the prototype of the modern peña, with their band and their fine style, and they were the admiration of everyone.”

For a club that only had a very short lifespan, their influence was huge in one regard thanks to one original member, and it’s down to him that fiesta in Pamplona, and many other places, has one particular flavour, that “look.”
I didn’t know too much more about them except that after the Civil War they ceased to be – see what I mean about some things being poignant? – but then as luck would have it, in the July 1st Diario de Navarra fiesta supplement this year, there was an article on them.

But it’s back to the past again for the moment. The club was formed in 1929 by a group of friends, and in those days the peñas dressed up in normal, dark clothes, all be it perhaps with a blue or black “blusa”, the jacket. Then in 1931 Juan Marquina Gonzalez (above), one of the originals of La Veleta decided the peña should adopt a uniform of red and white, arguing that when the clothes got dirty, all you had to do was dump them in bleach and they would be clean again. Well, his argument won the day and a legend was born. They were the first peña to do this.

So they’d hit the streets dressed uniformly in a style that is now denominated “Pamplonica” and is famous all over the planet: the white trousers and shirt with the red sash and pañuelo, something that up until then only the gaitero and txistulari piper groups would wear.

Another is that their club song, or as they would call it, the peña hymn, was the first to be written by Manuel Turillas, more commonly known now as Maestro Murillas. Whenever you hear one of those peña anthems it was probably written by that amazing man. Not a bad record for a club that only survived for seven years…the red and whites, the band, the hymn…

How many of us get a tingle when we pack our whites into our bags before San Fermin, carefully rolling the sash up and folding the pañuelo…it’s not really until your fiesta clothes are safely packed that you think, “Yes!, it’s coming…”

And as for the feeling of excitement when first putting them on again on the morning of July 6th…well, a thousand thank you’s, Fantasmas de La Veleta.

The year after, in 1932, two other peñas copied them, dressing in whites, all be it with a different coloured pañuelo and sash. Pamplona ‘s oldest surviving peña, La Unica (1903), used green as their colour, while La Jarana used blue. (Although La Jarana were founded in 1940, there are documents attesting that there was a banner in 1931 saying “La Jarana salutes Turon”). Out of interest, a “suit” of whites in the 1930’s cost 16 pesetas, and a pair of those canvas alpargatas (espadrilles) cost 2 pesetas.

As I mentioned, the last year La Veleta danced in the streets of their home town was 1936. Then came the dark shadows of civil war, and some of them died at the front, some were shot later…and some made it home, but by the time the clouds had moved away, it was too late and the peña fell apart. But, as the Club Taurino magazine said, “they left an indelible memory in the hearts of many Pamploneses.” And I hope they’re all up there together once more, somewhere in that great fiesta beyond the clouds, living the high life again and singing the Veleta hymn, the first to be written for a peña by the great Turrillas. Viva La Veleta!

Finally, some people find they need to leave the city during fiesta, just for some rest, or some sanity, while others begin their fiesta with some pre-party preparations or end it with some post-party rest and recuperation. And I suppose if you want find the high life, what better way than to take the high road. I’ll leave this month’s article with something from A.E Hotchner’s book, “Papa Hemingway.” Take yourselves back to Navarra in the fifties…

“Just to the northeast of Pamplona are the Irati river and its forests, which were such an integral part of The Sun Also Rises. Ernest was afraid that they had been completely ruined, but his fears proved unfounded. For four afternoons we picnicked at various places along the river, going higher and higher up the mountain, leaving at noon, getting back just in time for the bullfight. We travelled in three cars, each car responsible for part of the picnic.

The wine was kept cold in the clear Irati water, and each day we swam up the river, which flowed through a gorge between the high-rising walls of the beech-covered mountain. It was miraculous to leave the wild tumult of the feria and a half hour later to be in the midst of this primitive, quiet beauty.

One day after lunch Ernest and I sat on the pebbly bank, contemplating the view, which consisted of circling hawks, rising mountains, and the seven women of our cuadrilla who were napping at various levels on warm rock ledges above the opposite bank. “Nymphs on shelves in nature’s store,” Ernest said. “What a hell of a happy time.” He watched a hawk plummet earthward and disappear, then re-emerge beating sky-ward with a small prey struggling between his talons. “You know, Hotch,” he said, his eyes on the hawk, “it’s better than The Sun Also Rises.”

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And so, finally, it’s video time. This one has been doing the rounds lately so many of you may have seen it, this version is actually two videos cobbled together, but for those who haven’t, just watch how stupid some people can be. I don’t mean by participating in bull runs and such like, but the way in which some of them behave while in the street, or where they stand. It’s from the Azores . Check the woman out at 2m 50 secs…not the worst by any means…but just how dumb can you get?! Be warned, it’s brutal in parts. Hasta la proxima!

Hemos vivido esta mañana el primero de los actos de Sanfermin 2013 en el Hotel Puerta del Camino de Pamplona. El escritor británico Tim Pinks ha presentado en sociedad a su primera criatura literaria titulada “Bullseye”. Este libro-cuento relata en inglés y castellano el recorrido entre la dehesa y la Plaza de toros de Pamplona desde el punto de vista de un toro de Miura… de ahí el título, Bullseye (El ojo del toro).

Y es que un toro de Miura le habló a Pinks en sueños tras una brutal resaca en Sanfermin de 1997. Pinks, corredor de encierros durante más de 20 años, estaba viviendo oníricamente una carrera perfecta junto a los toros y, al llegar al callejón, un burel le pidió clemencia y le instó a que le ayudara a escapar. Pinks recuerda cómo le dijo al toro que no podía luchar contra su destino. Desde entonces ideas y anotaciones han ido tomando cuerpo hasta que hace dos años se convirtieron en un proyecto real de autoedición que ahora ve la luz y con el que Pinks cumple su compromiso con aquel animal.

El libro se vende a diez euros en La Casa del Libro y en la librería Abárzuza de Pamplona. Próximamente se incrementarán los puntos de venta.

As the last step of the Escalera is taken this June 6th before we’re submerged in the tsunami that is San Fermin, and that tidal wave of craziness and happiness and hangovers that is Pamplona in fiesta sweeps over us, this months bag of bull droppings has as it’s main part the chat I had with Julen Madina, and whether you know who he is or not, I hope you find it interesting. I certainly did. And of course there is other stuff too, starting with…this.

PRIMEVAL

That smell of bull…not the way they smell when you’re near them when you’re watching them in the corrals, or if you’re lucky or good enough to smell them as you run near them, or when they sweep by you in that fluid and majestical way they have sometimes, but I mean the smell they have when you are with them, right by their side or just in front of them as their horns rise and dip in that hypnotic fashion.

That smell…the one that envelopes you when you’re in the middle of the herd and your heart is pumping and you’re so close that they are touching you, and despite the noise of the hooves and the bells on the steers and the screams of the crowd…everything has gone quiet and time, in that strange way it has when something magical is happening to you in the run…time seems to be, if not actually stopped, then operating in it’s own little vacuum, speeding up and slowing down as your own particular run in your own personal world unfolds…

That smell you feel cloaking around you as you become a part of them and their own rhythm and you realise you are running like they are…you’ve joined the herd…but the tunnel into the ring is looming and you know that not only is there is no escape, but it dawns on you that there is no room for you and the bulls…and you know that it is you who is about to go flying as you hit the edge of the tunnel wall and you go down and under the hooves and yes, again, the bulls seem to make time hic-up in that magical, mystical way they have and you have become a part of them as you are rolled and then turned over right under them, every which way like one of those crazy fun fair rides, until you come out from underneath them and somehow you’re on your feet again and running out of the tunnel and into the sunlight and you hear the roar of the crowd and time has gone back to normal once more…but that smell, that primeval smell, is still with you and will be for hours…

That smell…how do you describe it? These animals were painted on the walls of the Caves of Altamira, not a hundred and fifty miles from Pamplona, so there is not just something ancient about them, or wild and savage…but primitive. Yes, primeval. Those bulls take us back to a time when we were hunters, living in caves…and these beasts were such a powerful part of people’s lives in those days that men were driven not just to put their images down in the place where they lived, but I’m sure to honour them too.

Well, one man who knows more than most about running with those extraordinary creatures (and the strange earthly odours that emanate from them) is Julen Madina, as he has probably run longer with the bulls, been closer to them and certainly run as well if not better than anyone out there, whether they are still running, slowing down, or actually…stopped, and I mean “stopped” as in retired, than perhaps anyone involved in bull running. A couple of months ago I said I’d write about a chat I had with Señor Madina on the phone, and now, with just a month to go before fiesta, I think it’s time to post it. At the time I joked about how great I was at multi-tasking, managing to talk to him in Spanish on the phone, while simultaneously translating it into English and writing it down on paper, and drinking a beer and smoking a cigarette.

Um…so good was I at this multitasking lark that when I re-read what I’d written, well, I couldn’t. My shorthand was so short it was unintelligible, my long hand was a scrawl that Guy Fawkes would have been proud of after they put him on the rack and stretched him, and the rest was a jumble of letters that a dyslexic could have understood…but I couldn’t. But Mr. Madina kindly agreed to write down his answers to my questions if I sent them, which I did, and so he did, and here we are.

I hope I’ve caught the flavour and passion of his answers and managed to capture some of his love and enthusiasm for all things related to bull running, not just in Pamplona but elsewhere too. Oh, and that ancient, earthly smell of the bulls? Well, I’ve often heard people talk about it and I’ve smelt it myself, but how do you actually describe it? I’ll try to at the end of this, but first, over to Julen Madina.

The Bull Runner’s Runner – A chat with Julen Madina

There was no particular order to the questions I asked him, so this is how it went from the first question to the last. There was, however, one question I had to ask, and it’s become what I call a “Bay of Biscay” question…that is, I was glad that the Bay of Biscay lay between us when I asked it. Not to mention the English Channel, a whole load of hills and mountains and a thousand miles, too…Anyway, that question comes up fairly soonish, so until then… The first thing I asked came up after something Rex Freriks had said a couple of months ago, about how he’d be in his position on Estafeta and as the bells chimed and the rocket went, he’d look across the way a bit and see Larry Mazlack, and they’d both give each other the thumbs up, and that got me wondering if Madina had a particular pre-run ritual. Many do, of course…my pre-run ritual was staying out all night and then heading to the run at about 7.30, if I’d managed to stay awake, for the world’s quickest sobering up medicine…the fear and adrenaline of waiting for the encierro. But here’s how Madina did it:

“Si, si, I always did the same. I got up at six thirty and I’d feel quite stiff, so I’d stretch and warm up a little, and have a light protein drink and pray to my saints. I’d pray to San Fermin, who I had on the table, and pop into the bathroom. Very important that! Around about 7.15 I’d leave for Pamplona and get there about 7.35 or 7.40, and get into my warm up zone. I’d warm up really well, so I’d be ready to run and be not just mentally prepared but physically too, and at about 5 to 8 I’d go downstairs and out into the Estafeta and get to my place, and…”

I’m tingling already. It’s a long time since I ran, 13 years now, but I have never forgotten that pre-run feeling, and the electrically charged buzz that seemed to come through the very cobbles (in those days) of the street and gently course upwards through my feet and legs until my whole body was warmed up despite the chill of the morning…oh god, how I miss it.

As some of you may know, Madina retired in 2010, but I wanted to ask him if there wasn’t a small part of him that was happy that he didn’t have to run any more…

“No, the complete opposite. Something inside of me has gone out, resulting in it being very difficult for me to be in Pamplona but not run in the Encierro. There is always a part of me that will want to run. Let’s see if this year I can find one way or another to be bound, or involved in the run so I’m able to be in Pamplona”.

I’m pretty sure by this he means hoping to be involved somehow in commentating on the run for the radio or television, and I wish him the best of luck in that.

In 2004 Madina suffered a terrible goring in the tunnel into the bullring, the video of which you can see in April’s posting, “Retarded Runners”, (and I’m still not sure about that title), but I wanted to ask him about afterwards…did he recover perfectly from his injuries to be able to run as before?

“Well, I can say yes, I recovered fine. It took a lot out of me to recuperate, because it’s one thing to recover from the wounds, to improve your mobility, all this is good to have a “normal” life, but to remain competitive, well, that’s another thing. I needed my legs to respond properly to be able to run, and that was hard. Mentally, I was fine, but physically it had affected me, and although I was okay, I was slower”.

Okay, now it was time for the Bay of Biscay question, and I can tell you I was glad there was a big stretch of water separating us. A very big stretch…Now I already knew the answer to this, but I had to ask it, as it’s been doing the rounds ever since I first went, and was probably around before that too. But even as an inexperienced runner I knew it was rubbish, but some people just can’t lay off telling lies or repeating rubbish, as they were born to bullshit, so here’s his answer to my Bay of Biscay question. Oh, and it doesn’t really need any translation, I think any of you would get the drift of his answer, and the force of it, but I’ll do it in English anyway. With a bit of his Spanish left in… I’ve mixed and joined his spoken and written answers here.

Tim: Julen, I have to ask this, even though I know the answer: Is it true that when you ran, you used other running friends as “blockers”, so you could have a good run?

Julen: These stories are just such immense, enormous stupidity. Really, tremendous rubbish. (Chorrada, gilipollez, anormalidad, ignorancia, estupidez…en fin)…these comments show an extreme ignorance of what represents an encierro, of how it is, of what happens during it”.

Phew, thank you Bay of Biscay…he didn’t shout down the line or get angry, but the real force of his feelings about these ridiculous lies certainly made themselves felt. We went on to have a little chat about it, the gist being that no matter how good you are, you just cannot organise a group of people to run in a certain way so that you have a clear path to run in. To speak very generally, for those who don’t know, I’m going to state the obvious… the run is fairly unpredictable, some runners are pretty unpredicatable too, and the bulls, well the bulls don’t behave in any way that anyone can really control, once things start to get messy. To put it mildly!

I still hear stories today about “the blockers”, but with some people, you just can’t fight their bullshit. They were born to bullshit, they’re members of the Bullshit Peña , and they are not going to change, sadly. Shame.

As someone who ran from 1984 to 1999, when I first did it I didn’t really have a clue. I’d never seen the route, walked the run, talked to anyone about it or anything. I didn’t know it was closed at certain points to funnel everybody in near the beginning, I didn’t know the authorities slowly opened up the route so the crowds could move forwards and gave a little more room for everyone…I really didn’t know much at all. So that first run of 1984 found me half way down Santo Domingo with the friend I’d travelled down with, thinking to myself, well, this is rather narrow and crowded…I could tell which way the bulls were going to come, obviously, but as I rather nervously had a cigarette and realised that the place was getting ever more crowded, (and I was sure the street was getting narrower, too), I also noticed that there wasn’t really any way of escape, unless you were Spiderman, just high walls on both sides and a downhill run towards the bulls one way, or an uphill run and hopefully freedom the other way. By the time the first of the bells started to mark 8 o’clock, I could swear the street had narrowed to about a yard wide.

Well, the 8 o’clock chimes sounded, there was a whoosh! as the rocket went up and then a loud bang!! and…my first run. Oh…my…gawd…And I have never, ever, forgotten it. Holy mother of all the saints…

Over the years I ran most parts of the run but soon settled to a place that I just felt comfortable with, and I wondered if Madina had always run the top end of Estafeta. Just like the bulls during the bullfight when they find a spot they feel comfortable in to fight, called the “querencia”, many runners end up finding their own encierro querencia on the route, and stick to it.

“My first two runs (he first went in 1971) were from the Town Hall square, to Mercaderes, until the beginning of the Estafeta. On my 3rd run I positioned myself about 40 meters up from the Estafeta curve, as the herd were pretty defined in position having taken the curve, and from there I would try to make the bull ring, (they were different times then!), and you could make it, but over the years I moved up Estafeta, to the last section practically opposite Bar Fitero, and from there I’d run into the ring”.

On another thread, I’d always wanted to run in some of the other towns I heard about in my first couple of years there, but never did, but for those of you who want to, or have, here are some of the other places he has run and what he thinks about them.

Tim: What other runs did you do? (And I love his description of the Falces run).

Madina: “I’ve run for many years in Tafalla, they were great encierros amongst friends. San Sebastian de Los Reyes, a fast and dangerous run and very powerful. Falces (for those who don’t know it’s on a hillside), is like a mad dash downhill escaping from a herd of mad cows. Cuellar, a playful encierro and very beautiful. Tudela I actually think is one of the great ones. Ampuero is curiously lovely, and is run at a decent time of the day. And Deba, the only bull run in Guipuzkoa”.

He went on to add: “I don’t understand those who say they love to run but then only ever run in Pamplona, because if they love the bulls there are many good encierros around”.

Tim: Do you think you’ll ever run again? What do you do now to take its place?

Madina: “Some decisions have to be taken at certain times, and I think I made mine (retiring from running) at the most apt time. If I did run again it would be in Tudela. I’ve been trying a few other things to keep the adrenalin going, adventure sports and such like”. For those who don’t know, Julen gave up running due to the birth of his daughter. It has obviously been an incredibly hard decision for him for sure, but made for absolutely the right reason.

Now here’s a question for everyone who has done a fair number of runs: what was your best run, or your favourite one? For me that’s easy, as there weren’t too many good ones, but for someone like Madina, who ran for 40 years, and is widely acknowledged as one of the great runners of all time, well…would he have an answer to that one?

Oh yes…

“It was July 8th, 1981, with Aguirres bulls, running 200 meters with the 6 bulls, and also at the final section I was with Joe Distler, Atanasio, my brother Pepelu, Miguel Eguiluz and others I don’t remember, all good runners, and all, and this is important, dressed in whites…it was quite evidently a different era. Along with being great runners, there was much more respect in those days, something that now has disappeared”.

I love hearing peoples old stories about fiesta, whether about the running or the partying, and obviously someone who has such a history as Madina does has a few tales to tell. Here are just a couple more.

“I began running in 1971, and I never missed a year. In 1978 I was doing military service in Madrid, (it was obligatory in Spain until the late 1990’s), and as July arrived I asked permission if I could go and run with the bulls. Naturally my captain told me no, but as I was giving personal sport and fitness training lessons to the bigwigs, I told them that if they didn’t give me permission to go then morally I felt I couldn’t continue to train them. And so the Commandant forced the captain to allow me to go and hence I made it to Pamplona.

But I only arrived at midday on the 8th, so I didn’t run that day, but I did go to the bullfight and so experienced the arrival of the police into the ring, (it was the year of the riots mentioned in last months piece that caused the suspension of the entire fiesta), and lived the general chaos that enveloped the place, the rubber bullets, the tear gas, and the confrontations with the police. I was drunk and went to punch a policeman, but my brother Xabier grabbed me and got me out of there…

There was rioting in the streets, and the death of German. (German Rodriguez, the young man shot by the authorities, again mentioned last month and a whole story on its own). It was a dark episode, everything was still too close to Franco’s military dictatorship, and though he had died on 20-11-75 the system still wasn’t ready for certain things”.

Well, that’s about it. A couple of things that shone through our chat were his love and passion for the run, of course, but also his absolute respect for the run and its traditions. And as for certain runners, when I asked him if he had anything else to say, well, he was worried about giving names in case he forgot anyone, but he had already mentioned some during our chat and so, at the risk of leaving anyone out, he wrote this:

“I can only give thanks for all those moments that I have lived and for the great friends that I have, and there are too many people to be able to mention everybody…but some, yes I can name them. Firstly I always remember someone I consider a visionary, literally a maestro, who took on and became thanks to his charisma, a part of a group of youngsters running the encierros of La Ribera around Lerin, and it’s he who most influenced my style of running and of understanding the encierro…Tito Murillo. Another great is Atanasio…and there are few who are in love with the encierro and respect it and run like Joe Distler. Another top man is Miguel Eguiluz, and of course my colleague, Jokin (Zuasti)”.

And then, like the man he is, he ended with, “I don’t want to name people, for fear of forgetting someone”. That’s my favourite kind of runner…thinking about others. It shows such respect. This after all is the man who, having run into the ring with the bulls, would then run back out again to pick up any stragglers…and goodness knows how many people he saved in his time by attracting the bull from runners who were in serious trouble. He has described one of his friends, who is also one of Los Diviños, (and that lot are a whole story in themselves too), as a “maestro”. Well, I think that I can truthfully say then, with the safety of the Bay of Biscay dividing us, that Julen Madina was a maestro too. A Bull Runner’s Runner.

That seems as good a place as any to leave it, for now. So muchas gracias Maestro, for your time and patience in chatting to me and then following it up thanks to my multi-tasking incompetence, with the written word. Eskerrik asko.

Oh and that smell? That essence of primeval times past? A bottle of Patxaran to my favourite description, if any of you can…all I can think of is that the bulls, certainly when you’re under them, smell of hot, dried, earthy curried dung.

MEDIEVAL – The Gateways of Old Iruña.

I was going to write this little bit for the July piece, as that’s when most of us will be heading off to Spain and it just seemed like the right time…but it’s June already and I’m too excited so I’m going to include it in this months bull runnings. I use the term gateway above, but I just mean any of the old ways into Pamplona , be it under one of the arches or over one of the bridges, or along a dusty track…Although I think the word “portal” does make it sound like the entrance into another world…which it is.

Ever since I first went to Pamplona there comes a point near the very end of the journey that I think…yes!…I’m here, this is it, finally… Pamplona ! And that bit is when whatever car I’m driving passes under the Portal Nuevo. For it’s then that I know that I have arrived, and left the motorway and the outer suburbs behind and entered my beloved Iruña.

Once I’ve driven up the hill that Pamplona was built on, (remember, the city is about 1450 feet above sea level), and passed under the Portal Nuevo, I’ll see on my right the Taconera Park and then the Hotel Tres Reyes, and on my left the old village or burgo (independent borough) of San Cernin and the church where the statue of San Fermin is kept, La Iglesia de San Lorenzo.

And I know I have arrived. Passing under that archway always gives me a buzz, whatever time of year it is I’m visiting, but especially so when it’s fiesta time. The original city is off to my left inside what is now known as the Casco Viejo, the old town, which was originally just a tiny village (we are going back a thousand years here), called Irunea, or Navarreria, which is the street where the La Mejillonera, the Mussel Bar is, and leads up to the Cathedral.

Then another village was started around 1090 – 1100, the aforementioned Burgo de San Cernin, and finally the around the same time but separated by a moat, the Poblacion de San Nicolas. It’s fascinating stuff, as all 3 districts fought each other until merging to become Pamplona , but that is also a story for another day.

I wanted to mention the gateway because there are four of these constructions that mean a lot to me in Pamplona , as they all signify something special for me. Another one is the Puente de San Pedro, and this one is a cute little stone bridge dating from almost certainly Roman times, and I first saw it in 1984 with the crowd I’d been hanging out with in the gutter. We’d heard that there was a public open air swimming pool, with showers and a bar…and we found it, and there it was…a fiesta oasis for those of us living in the streets. Seeing that little bridge meant a shower and food and rest, sorely needed after a night out on the grass in the square where we lived or the cobbles of the Estafeta and the beer shops.

Even when we found accommodation of sorts, (a floor in an accounting school on the Estafeta), we still headed towards that bridge and went to the pool…seeing that bridge became like a crossing to a parallel world…but a sane one. Years later we had a flat in one of the suburbs, Rochapea, and that pretty little crossing meant one of two things, depending on which way we were going: bed…or party!

Just up from it, as we walked into town, was the real portal into another world, a crazy, insane, parallel world of fiesta, and that was the Portal de Francia, or Zumalacarregui.

Again though, depending on which way you were going, it had two different meanings. As it was the gateway right at the edge of the old town, it meant either sleep and siesta…or fiesta and insanity. Oh happy daze…

Finally there is El Puente de La Magdalena, and I love this one because from it you can see one of my favourite spots in all the world, and from that favourite spot I can see the bridge, and wonder what it must have been like centuries ago approaching the town over these bridges or entering through those gateways.

Ah well, not long to go at all now before the madness begins again and we can enter through whatever portal the parallel world that is Pamplona in fiesta. I’ll leave you with something that one Bernie Neumatico found a while ago, and though it’s not Pamplona …it may just put a smile on your face and get you in the mood.

Ya falta mucho menos. Viva San Fermin!

May the 5th be with you.

For the very merry month of May, there is a very mixed bovine bag of bull runnings, but why don’t we start with an old nursery rhyme, as it seems a nice gentle way to begin things…

In the merry month of May,
When green leaves begin to spring,
Little lambs do skip like fairies,
Birds do couple, build and sing.

Ahhh…so, what do we have then for this month’s meanderings. Well, I thought I’d try and update the little ditty above and make it a little more relevant to fiesta and taurine matters, and there’s a great clip from Andalusian TV filmed on the Miura Ranch, showing how the bulls are rounded up. Then there’s the story of the day a super hero visited Pamplona, a couple of photos of the post encierro herd taking a stroll back to the corrals, a “spot the difference” type thing to celebrate the 90th birthday of something, and a small but I think rather touching addition to last months words from his friends regarding the passing of Joe Moskulak.

Finally, a clip of the big summer music hit in Spain (and hence fiesta) from 1976. Why? Because I found out about it, and as music can take us back so wonderfully to a particular place and point in time, I hope that for those lucky enough to be there that year it will bring back some magic memories…and maybe some happy hangovers from hell too! Whether you like it or not, I bet you’ll have the “tune” in your head all day long. Sorry about that…

So, back to that sweet old nursery rhyme that celebrates the arrival of May, and in my part of the world at least, the start of summer. Hopefully. But May also heralds Star Wars Day, and “May the Fourth be with You”. But I’m not talking about nursery rhymes here or Luke Bullrunner, but the “Escalera” of course, and the fifth day in May which is, for all us Sanfermineros, our day.

Of course I hope that if you make it for San Fermin the force will be with you, (goodness knows we need it!), but I also hope that as we approach ever more quickly the start of fiesta, that May the Fifth will indeed with you too. Because there’s really not very long to go now…

Maybe an updated, Pamplona and fiesta related version of the little poem above should read:
Ah, in the merry month of May,
When fiesta’s about to spring,
Big bulls do roam the prairies,
And it’s close to San Fermin.

Okay, okay, no more poems, I promise.

It is around about now that the bulls have been chosen for the bullfight in what ever part of the country they’ll be going to, and hence in Pamplona’s case for the bull run too of course. Which bulls are going where is a closely guarded secret, but I was sent a couple of years ago by my friends at Kukuxumusu the great clip above of just how they round-up the bulls when their destiny is almost upon them, and you can see that clip above. And yes, they’re being rounded up to go to Pamplona.

It’s from Andalucian TV I think, and apart from being fascinating, it also shows one bull, Peleon, that just refuses to be rounded up, until Antonio Miura himself decides enough is enough, and he saddles up to do the job himself. It’s a dangerous job, (you know what happens in the bullring when the bull attacks the picador on his horse…if anything untoward happens the picador is immediately surrounded by the cuadrilla, the team), well, here you can see Antonio Miura practically on his own, and sometimes his horse is just inches from the bull. It’s superb horsemanship, no doubt from a man who, as they say, could probably ride before he could walk.

The Day Superman Buzzed The Bullring

As I’ve mentioned before and as many of you know, anything can happen during San Fermin…actually, for those of us who return to Pamplona anytime outside those magical dates of the 5th to the 15th of July, we know it’s not just during fiesta that anything can happen. Why, I once saw Elvis Presley get out of a taxi, honest to god…anyway, one year during the bull fight, of all things, Superman swooped over the crowd and eventually landed in the ring.

Now you may think that I’m, well, how can I put it, bullknitting here, about Superman and San Fermin, but I promise you I’m not. There is photographic proof! It was back in 1979, on Sunday July the 8th, on one of those hot fiesta days that when you’re inside the bullring the heat is becomes like a furnace.

There’s a bit in one of Johnny Cash’s live prison albums, either the Folsom Prison one or the San Quentin one, where he asks a guard to get him something from “that bag that’s got all the songs I stole in it”, well, as ever with any of these pieces from the archives, I’ve nicked them from either a book or the papers, in this case Diario de Navarra’s Supplement Special from 2009.

Now, the 8th of July was a special date and 1979 a special year, as just one year before another kind of heat had permeated the bull ring and the surroundings, causing the suspension of the entire fiesta after a riot started due to the politics in the region, and the shooting dead by the authorities of a young man, German Rodriguez. This is not the time or the place to go into that, but it has to be mentioned as General Franco had only died in late 1975, and democracy in the country had only just recently been formalised when elections were held on June 15th, 1977.

So imagine the scene: it’s exactly one year after the riots of ’78 that caused the entire fiesta to be suspended, and just over two years since the first free elections had been held since the 1930’s. No one is quite sure how fiesta will take off, what might happen, and how not just the authorities but the public will react. Democracy is in its infancy, politics are on a knife edge, terrorism is rife, and there are doubts and worries floating over the whole town that year.

Whatever atmosphere was permeating not just fiesta, but the city that year, Superman’s arrival certainly added something special to the goings on.

Okay, okay, I bet you’re thinking, “Hey, that can’t be Superman, he doesn’t smoke”, (but he does, you know, as I saw him several times smoking outside Bar Txoko in the mid-eighties). He must have been down on his luck as he was doing some busking street theatre act…but he was smoking.

And no, his off duty name wasn’t Clark Kent, that would be a silly name for a Navarran to have. His name is Fernando Lizaur Gomez, and he initiated one of the greatest acts of spontaneity ever seen in fiesta. Earlier that year he was so impressed after seeing the first Superman film with Christopher Reeve, that as fiesta approached he phoned four Californian friends that he knew from previous years and asked them if they could bring a Superman costume with them when they flew over for San Fermin. No sooner asked than done, and he met his friends when they arrived at Barajas airport in Madrid, and after arriving at their hotel in the centre of town the windows of a 3rd floor room were thrown open and there appeared, to general amusement of the passers by below, Superman. With a moustache.

Once back in Pamplona the plan was hatched, and that hot Sunday afternoon saw Fernando with his peña, Anaitasuna, and the band, going around the streets on the way to the bullfight, with said joker in full costume, and the balconies filling up as word went around that Superman was in town. He managed to get into the bullring due to knowing a couple of the doormen, and once he was amongst his friends he remained hidden during the whole of the starting proceedings and the period of the first bull.

Then it was the turn of the second bull. He was from the ranch of Guardiola Fantoni and was called Ollero and weighed 505kg. The torero was from Jerez, Fransisco Nuñez, known as “Curillo”. During this fight Fernando made his way cautiously down from his place where he had been hiding to the edge of one of the tiers and, with cigar in mouth and pose perfect, suddenly stood up on one of the ledges and made his entrance.

Well, there was widespread laughter and cheering all round. Everybody stopped looking at the bullfight and turned their attention to this character. Then suddenly, and without warning, Superman launched himself off the edge…where he was caught by his friends below, who began to “glide” him around the area. Superman was flying! There was uproar in the ring, of course, in the nicest possible way. Superman then noticed a lady dressed up in a wedding dress, who beckoned him over to her (this is all true, I promise) and, ever the gentleman, he “flew” towards her and landed next to her on the little balustrade.

The crowd all chanted a phrase that is shouted at all Spanish weddings that basically means: kiss – “que se besen, que se besen”. “Kiss, kiss, kiss,” sang the crowd…and so they did. There was a huge ovation and roars all round. But then he noticed that the bullfighter Currillo was having problems killing the bull. A new flight took him nearer towards the ring, at which the crowd all shouted: “Let Superman kill it! Let Superman kill it!”

For those of us who know the special kind of madness that takes over the locals of that town when those “Pamplona moments” happen, well, we can only imagine the mix of hilarity and good natured pandemonium that was going on inside the ring. And, no doubt contrarily, how nervous the Policia Nacional and the Guardia Civil were getting.

Well, the idea of this particular Superman killing the bull himself obviously complicated the script, and Fernando needed to buy some time, and quickly. So in all seriousness, he posed a question to different parts of the ring: “Hey, you lot, do you want me to kill the bull?” “Yesss” came back the reply. “And you lot, do you want me to kill it?” “Siii” was the answer. “And all of you over there, do you also want me…” Well, finally, Curillo did his job, the bull was killed…and Superman was saved!

By this time, Fernando was parched, and somewhere in the ring he bumped into a local councillor, who hugged him, which made the crowd shout and clap once more. He then made his exit where he met another local dignitary who offered him a drink and his thirst was quenched.

When the bullfight was finally over he joined the peña down on the sand, and eventually made it back with the band to their club house. And so ended what Diario de Navarra in their pre-fiesta supplement of 2009 called, “one of the most spectacular, enjoyable, spontaneous, funny and crowd-pleasing acts in the history of our fiestas”.

Back at home, his mother had been listening to the bullfight commentary of Pepe Trujillo live on Radio Popular, and had heard about the arrival of Superman in the bullring. She of course had no idea it was her son until he went home to say hello…still dressed up as Superman. We can only imagine the look on her face as he popped his head round the doorway and said “hello, mum”, and her reaction, he says, was of course one of priceless incredulity, saying “It was you? My son?!…”

Back on the streets, he lived up to his character by helping anyone in trouble. This, amazingly, included copying a scene from the film where Superman saved a busload of passengers from falling into a ravine. With the full complicity of the driver and its passengers, “Superman” saved the day by stopping one of the local buses in it’s tracks and “lifting” it up.

What had started out as just a prank in the ring had become a truly memorable and yes, moveable farce, a joke that developed it’s own momentum and not only flew around the ring but also spilled out onto the streets and lasted for hours…a happy and joyous event in stark contrast to the tragic occurrence of just one year before, and one that has gone down in fiesta history. Hollywood would have been proud.

The night carried on in one long party, as you’d expect.

The stories in the press the next day and beyond were impressive. Papers from all over Spain carried the story, including from El Pais, and the journalist Joaquin Vidal: “The best cape work (alluding to what the bullfighters do), was done by Superman on the 8th of July, the day of the anniversary of the grave events of the previous year, that broke the tension within the ring. Ole! to the joker who was that bizarre, flying and moustachioed Superman”.

In Days Gone By.

Things have to change with the times, I suppose, but it is rather a shame sometimes. This year is the 40th anniversary of the last year that the herd, after the bull run was over, was transferred on hoof as it were, back to the corral. After all they needed to be returned from where they’d started from, they couldn’t hang around the bullring all day.

So as the photo from 1965 above shows, after the mornings fun was over the herd were taken by the shepherds from the Plaza de Toros all the way back to the Corrales de Gas in Rochapea, through the people and the traffic going about their daily business. However, as traffic increased year on year something had to be done, and so it was that 1972 became the last year that the shepherds guided the herd back along the crowded streets. A shame, but understandable. Since then they have been taken by truck.

I just wanted to add one more thing I received about Joe Moskaluk, who passed away in March and was mentioned in last month’s piece. It’s another quote from someone who knew him, and apart from being a lovely thing to say, it’s also a nice excuse to use another photo of him, because the man just exudes charisma, does he not? It’s from James Curly Baillor, and this is what he wrote:

One more for Joe Moskulak

Happy Birthday, Plaza de Toros.

The present Plaza de Toros in Pamplona is 90 years old this year, so for those who don’t know, can you spot “the difference” between the picture above, and the one below? Obviously they are different photos, but can you see the major difference in the direction of the run?

If you look carefully at the photo above, you can just see a first floor “covered balcony” overhanging the street, with a large, wide arched doorway at street level to the bottom left, with the runners running past it, and the bulls behind them having emerged from the Estafeta.

Now, that photo above is a great shot isn’t it? The runners are heading towards the ring, and in the background you can see the fair, where one day would be the Telefonos building. But look closely at the top right of the photo, and you can see, yup, that overhanging covered balcony, with the large, wide, arched doorway below and to the left…and it’s only when you look at the two pictures together that you can see the final part of the run is going in two completely different directions.

In 1922 they inaugurated the new bullring, which was built a couple of hundred yards to the east of the old one, and ever since that year, runners, as they have exited Estafeta, have turned left to the “new” ring, and not right as they used to do, in days gone by…More on that another day, as I bet you’d like to hear about how they used to run through the square, too, once upon a time…

The San Fermin song from 1976.

For me and my crowd, (and know doubt this went for many other groups of foreigners too), apart from just looking forward to returning for fiesta, there were other little things we looked forward to. For example, what would the fiesta poster be like? There was no way of knowing, as there is now, you had to wait till you got there…or at least got close! Now of course everything, but everything is out there for all to see, and it does take some of the mystery away, but yet adds to the fun in a different way as we all get to comment on it.
Anyway, I digress…another thing we looked forward to was to see what would be the big music hit of the summer, and hence fiesta. Having read in one of my old papers that the summer smash in Spain for 1976 was, well, this song by this man, I’ll leave it with you. Whether you like it or not, I hope it makes you smile. Fernando Estoso and “La Ramona”.

Take it away, Ramona! Ya falta menos! Viva San Fermin!

So, it’s April, and the escalera to fiesta is collapsing faster and faster and there are only three months to go. I always get the big rush starting in April, as it means that the end of the long wait is nearly over. These scribblings for April are longer than usual, it’s just the way it panned out, but thanks to everyone who helped. Hope you like this month’s mixed bag of bull.

Hang on a minute, that isn’t right (or is it)…ah…I mean I hope you like this month’s mixed bag of bull runnings.

RETARDED RUNNERS. Sorry, RETIRED RUNNERS
(And a “Bullclips” update, and an R.I.P.) by Tim Pinks

Although, let’s face it, perhaps I was right the first time…maybe you have to have a bit of the nutcase in you to run with the bulls. Or some of us do. Or did… Anyway, having said that, the extraordinary photo on the left is of one of the great runners, and I can bandy around words like “great” and “nut” quite safely from my jail cell up here in my stone suite in the Tower of London, and he all nice and distant thousands of miles away in Texas.

It is a wonderful photo though, isn’t it? It shows a man not just running in front of the horns, or even on them, but in between them…and that is some trick. The man in the photo is Rex Freriks, and he really was some runner. I have been thinking for a while now of writing about a couple of the runners who so impressed me when I first went, but who have since for whatever reason retired. And by pure coincidence Rex got in touch just a few weeks ago. Regarding the above photo, I did ask him if he managed to stay on his feet or did he go somersaulting “a over t” and…well, here’s what he wrote:

“Glad you enjoyed the picture. He did send me flying. As you can see we are going up the left side of Estafeta and I was launched toward the side and not directly in front. I don’t know if you have ever noticed but there is a lot of old piping that runs down the outside of the front of the buildings on that street. I was able to grab one of those on my way down and landed on my feet. I remember the eyes of the group I landed among were as big as plates. I bet mine probably were as well.”

He then ends the letter with the words “una ciudad sin igual”. A town without equal. Ain’t that the truth.

The run from the day of the photo above. Bulls from El Pilar. July 14th 1997. Amazingly, you can see nothing of the incident described above. Less cameras in those days…

There are many reasons why some people have to stop running. Old age, sickness and of course death, sadly. Some may stop running after their first injury, some because their wives forbade them and some perhaps because they found they just couldn’t run properly anymore. And yet others still hit the streets despite knowing they can’t really run as well as they used to, and heck, some can’t even walk too good either. But they just can’t give it up, so there they are, smiling, buzzing, adding to that fantastic otherworld atmosphere and chatting to not just old friends, but no doubt new ones too. I think they have earned the right to be there for forever and a day, however they run now. I wonder if they are perhaps hoping that this is the day a miracle might happen and they’ll take off like in the old days, and be flying again.

Others I’ve heard gave up due to bum clenching, bone shaking, skin tingling fear. I’m not going to mention any names or give any clues here, but god it’s difficult to hold a pre-run drink when you feel like that. Or so I’ve heard…Anyway, all sorts of reasons and all perfect and bona fide ones to call it a day.

This was Rex’s reason. Where you or I might cycle, drive or get public transport to work, Rex took the parachute, and it was after one such outing at a place known as The Farm, where things went a little wrong, not helped subsequently by various medical muck ups that forced his hand and meant he could no longer run. I hear now one of his hips sets off car alarms for miles around and makes dogs bark.

For Rex though, the encierro was the thing, and he says it would be just too painful to come back and not be able to run. There are many others like him. But he has written to me with real emotion and feeling about what it was like for him back in the day, and the friendships he made. I’ll come back to him a little later, but there is just one more thing I’d like to say. I’ve always thought (apart from being one of the best), that he was the most modest, unassuming runner out there, and whenever anyone gathered post run at whatever bar they might go to, joder, there was some bull spoken. But not by Rex. As he said:

“Never thought about how good a run, never bought pictures. Just enjoyed it along with everything else and everyone else.”, and that’s amazing. The photo of him above is the only one he has, and that was sent to him by someone else straight to his computer. Modest to the extreme…Though if he had forked out on buying up all the photos he was in, he’d probably be pretty poor in the extreme by now, too.

Now, Julen Madina. I have to mention him, as he also was an all time great. The trouble is, I can’t really add very much to something I have already mentioned before on this site, an article and interview with Madina by the runner Bill Hillman. It really is something else, an excellent piece, and I make no apologies for mentioning it once more. I re-read it again recently, and from the simple but precise questions Bill asks (I don’t know him too well, but he does not grab me as a man who stuffs around), to the haunting honesty of Madina’s answers, well, it left me shaking…he could have died, for goodness sake.

But Madina’s words are chilling, so once again, you can find Bill’s posting here: thebutchersblog.wordpress.com. But as I say…it’s pretty well as definitive an article about running, the adrenaline, getting hurt…and having to give it up that you could ever read. Julen recovered from his horrific injuries and returned to run for the next several years. He only decided to retire due to becoming a father. He gave up for the very best of reasons…his daughter. Top man.

When I spoke to him on the phone just before completing this month’s wafflings, he was, as I expected, full of the enthusiasm and willingness to talk about something that was still so obviously close to his heart. I told him I wasn’t a professional writer or even an amateur one, just a guy who wrote some stuff for Kukuxumusu and who loved Pamplona, and was writing something about runners who ran no more, for whatever reason. He said it was a pleasure to talk, and away we went. I asked a question, he fired off in typical Spanish machine gun style the answers, while I tried to listen, write and translate at the same time as drinking a beer and smoking a cigarette. Men and multi-tasking? Of course we can.

But you’re going to have to wait for the Madina piece, I’m afraid, as there is too much good stuff in it and this posting is long enough already. But I hope when I do write it, I’ll do full justice to his words. Till then, Bill’s article is well worth another read.

Another character who seemed to be known by all and sundry was Hal “87” Jennings, and he will always be remembered for his fantastic running…amongst other things, apparently! For those of us who were new in the mid-eighties, we knew people by sight before we ever actually spoke to them, and Hal was distinctive in that he ran with the number “87” on his top. I always left these people alone and thought I’d just bide my time and earn their respect and get to know them by running as well as they did, but I never quite made the grade as a runner, (although I did have some fantastic moments), and…well, it never happened. God, how I miss it though.

When, thanks to Rex, I got in touch with Hal about this article, he didn’t send any photos at first, or write about the run, (he’s not a “this is me, me, and me” type of runner), but rather he told me more about Rex and how he was looked after. Which may or may not explain a lot, (I did mention something about “amongst other things”, above), but this is what he wrote:

“Yeah, Rex is one of the most decent human beings I have ever known. Besides being built like superman, he always had my back. I was taking so many sleeping pills to bring me down from the constant high of the Fiesta, that they started making me highly aggressive. After I punched several guys (I was a former boxer missing several teeth: clearly not a good one), Rex would always make sure not too many jumped on me. Curley kept saying to me “Don’t look at me. I don’t want to fight you”. I didn’t realize what I was doing. That said, as you can imagine, there are so many stories. Unfortunately, many lost because of my concussions”.

Hal Jennings hasn’t written anything to me about running, and I love that because of this: when I asked both Rex and Hal about their memories of running, the first thing they did was to write about the other one. But Jennings later sent me an extraordinary set of 32 photos that his girlfriend put together, and trust me when I tell you that the pictures do the talking. Which is apt really, as Rex said that Hal was one who “definitely never talked about how his run went afterwards”. So I have to use Rex’s words, as later he wrote, “One of the things Hal loved to do was position himself so as to run in front of the bulls when they ran through the tunnel. That was always too much for me, so many times I would end up behind the bulls so as to watch him take them through there. I tell you it was magic to watch and I can’t imagine the rush he must have gotten”. Always a sign of the modest runner…talking about someone else’s run.

By the way, those are my italics there, as when I made it through the tunnel or wherever, it was all I could do to concentrate on staying upright and surviving, without admiring how other runners were doing. And Rex was still running of course, he hadn’t stopped to check out the view! Also, I like his turn of phrase there, as remember earlier Hal saying that Rex was built like “superman”? Well, I don’t think you’d be able to fit a thousand pound bull and him through that tunnel…not side by side, anyway.

I know there are all sorts of ways to run and not run, but I truly believe that some people just have a natural rhythm and grace of running, however light footed or powerfully built they are, and I’m sure sometimes a bull thinks: “this guy, I’m going to run with this guy”…it doesn’t mean it made it any easier for the runner, but boy does it make it beautiful for those watching. Rex, Hal and others, I’m positive that, despite what you may have thought about “that bull, he’s mine”…there were times I think when they chose you.

There is more from Hal’s first email, but I’ll come back to it later or at another time…I’m trying to get in touch with a couple of other people that I wanted to write about and he mentions them, as does Rex…but I can’t find them. By the way Hal, (and after your comments above about Rex), while writing about his first (and subsequent) years in Pamplona, and how you helped him, Rex says, “I can never thank him enough and even today if he were to call and say he needed help I would be on the first plane to California”.

Now, sorry about the little love-in there, but I just wanted to make a point in case there is anybody out there reading this who has never been to San Fermin, but is thinking of going. As so many of us already know who have had the luck to discover and fall in love with Pamplona…that’s the way some of us feel about some of our fiesta friends. Good times always happen, and bad things come to pass too, and Pamplona during fiesta can be an extraordinarily intense experience, but as long as you keep talking and sort it out, you’ll have friends for eternity that you’ll do anything for.

It has been great writing this and reliving some of the old days, and my heartfelt thanks to all those who got in touch and told me about their experiences and memories, and as a by product also brought back for me some always remembered, and deeply treasured, bull running days. And some I’d forgotten about too…did I really do that?

So to Rex and Hal and Julen, and to John Riley, who I finally found and had a cracking hours plus chat with on the phone that really brought those streets to life, and who I’m going to write about in the future, along with his brother James, (and hopefully Curly too, once he’s finished trimming his moustache), I’ve thoroughly enjoyed your responses to my request for some old, precious, and not to say priceless memories of your days in during fiesta. Your words and thoughts and the sheer joy and emotions you convey really shine through about your time in a town called Pamplona. I hope to come back to these fantastic ex-runners and others in a couple of months for the last piece I hope to do pre-fiesta.

Well, from the song with the words “una fiesta sin igual”, to Rex’s “una ciudad sin igual”, for the last time, gentlemen, un grandisimo gracias to all those runners who let me write about them a little, and perhaps ruin their running reputations a little, too. For they are surely, in their own way…”gente sin igual”. And people mad as hell, in the nicest possible way too, if you look at the picture below, taken by Gary Shrewsbury.

Now I hope this doesn’t lead to an outbreak of people playing their game this year, (oh alright, I do), but the picture above shows some of the No Bullshit Monkey Peña (no relation to Graeme Galloways excellent little funzine, “No Bullshit”, the NBMP were there long before the fanzine), playing “1000 to 1” with the little bulls after the bull run. The game? While playing with the vaquillas in the ring after the run, you put your foot on the page of newspaper…and you don’t move. The chances of being hit? Well, 1000 to 1, apparently…And I’ve played it. Ow. Ow ow ow…

 Gracias, señores y señoras. ¡Ya falta menos! ¡Viva San Fermin!

An update about March’s article, “Bullclippings”, and an R.I.P.

There is a famous photo shown in last month’s article from 1960 of the human traffic jam in Estafeta. I mention a man just behind the bulls, looking like he’s out for a Sunday stroll, cigarette in mouth, elegant in a suit and open-necked shirt, looking for all the world as if he’s thinking…”Oh, what’s going on here?”.

I wondered about who he was, whilst hoping in my heart it was the legendary Matt Carney. Happily, his daughter Deirdre Carney wrote and said, “Well, he’s wearing a suit, as did my dad, he looks nonchalant, which he would have been and clearly blond…I don’t know for sure but it does kind of scream Matt Carney”.

In a later message: “Hey so my mom said it really looks like him and his style of walking. She doesn’t know for sure either but both of us felt it was him immediately. I don’t know if that helps. But who else would walk up to a pile-up smoking a ciggie?”

Who else indeed…I’ll leave the last words to Dave Pierce: “It was Matt. Not only was I in that pile-up but started it to my shame”. Few words, but perfectly said.

I think we’ve gone definitive on that then. But about the pile up Dave…more please!

Rest In Peace, Joe Moskaluk. Run In Paradise, Big Joe.

Sometimes someone passes away that you hear so much about you wish you’d known them. I didn’t know Joe Moskaluk, but he died very recently, towards the end of March as I was writing this, and the messages that I have seen doing the rounds have been truly touching. Here are just a few of the thoughts (as they wrote them) of some of those who knew him. And loved him.

Amongst what Bunny Centurion wrote, I’ve chosen this: “Our Pamplona family has lost another member, always too soon. Rest in peace Papa Joe you will be in our hearts every morning this July and always”.

“Very, very sad. Joe was a man’s man, a good man, a gentleman.” Jeffrey Hare.

“A saint indeed, standing alone and one of a kind, shedding light with his humour when things seemed so dark. What I would give for one more breakfast at Tres Reyes and a couple of cigars thereafter. You I will remember always”. Leon Friedrichsen.

“God Bless you and watch over you Joe”. Junerose Conlin.

“I don’t want to imagine a world without Big Joe”. Carl Butrum.

“A wonderful man Joe. He will be missed”. Bob Smokey Clark.

“Our lives all were so much better for knowing Joe, he was one of a kind, cigar smoking will never be the same”. Steven Kendler.

“We have lost a guy who probably loved us more than we will ever know…” Rick Musica, who wrote so much more, but I love that particular quote.

“For those of you who knew him, he was a special man. He was a great lover of life, and he lived it well and heartily.
You could see it in the twinkle of his eyes, and in his smile and his laughter.
You could see it in his love for Belle.
You could see it in his love for his family.
You could see it in his love for Spain.
You could see it in his love for the bulls.
You could see it in his sense of humour.
I loved Joe for many reasons, and I will miss him very, very much.
Abrazos”.

That last one was from Yoav Spicehandler, and that says it all, about a man I didn’t even know, but wish I had.

Chinese waiter training.

And now, something I hope will put a little smile on the faces of those up in the Great Fiesta in the Sky, and those still here on beautiful Planet Earth. I’ve often wondered how the Chinese waiters cope and survive during San Fermin, having to handle some of us lot, and after much research, I have found a video of the passing out parade for those selected for Pamplona during fiesta, after no doubt a gruelling, Ghurka style training course:

This has been a long one, hasn’t it? But look on the bright side…ya falta a little bit less now…

First things first…boy, how I hope the bunch at Kukuxumusu spell that title correctly, because any misspelling and it’ll perhaps describe just a little too closely my scribblings that are about to follow. Because, after last months dive into the past about the events of July 8th 1939, and as we approach the third of the third, I thought I’d dip into days gone by again for a few of the defining moments and images of fiestas gone by. I am, of course, spoilt for choice, so I’ll just choose a couple that I like, and perhaps return in the future for another delve into times past.

In today’s world of instant around-the-world in seconds communications and visuals, it’s easy to forget that things weren’t always like that. When I first went to Pamplona in 1984, I’d never even seen a photo of the fiesta, the city or the bull run, whereas nowadays everything is “out there”, and perhaps the sense of discovery and adventure is a little bit lost. I’d read James Mitchener and his book “The Drifters”, four years previously, and it was because I just did not believe what he was telling me about Pamplona that I decided to go. This was more than fiction, I thought…this was rubbish. Nowhere could be that mad, that medieval, that crazy, not in this day and age. And it wasn’t…it was worse! And it was brilliant.

Of course it was Hemingway who made a small town in northern Spain internationally famous way back in the 1920’s, but what is widely acknowledged to be the first photo from the fiesta to travel round the world didn’t happen until a decade or so later, in 1936.

As many of you who know the town will see, it shows the bulls (from the ranch of Antonio Perez de San Fernando), at the top of Santo Domingo and turning into the Plaza Constitorial, and the town hall. The run that day was apparently fast and violent, and the picture from the photographer Ruperez shows in clear and classic detail the two lead bulls causing customary encierro damage.

Two things stand out from that run from so long ago, as well…there were only four bulls running that day, another four from that ranch having run on July 10th. Why? Well that’s a tale for another day. The other curious and rather poignant point from the run is that when you look at the figures in the photo, amongst them some known runners from Pamplona, apparently, such as Martin Jose Muguiro, Jose Antonio Murillo, Pachon Gonzalez and Jose Remon, none of them would have known, as the shadow of the darkness that was the civil war was about to fall, that it would be another three years before they, and some bulls, would be able to run once again over the cobbled streets of their home town.

Oh, and the photo above? Well, it became the first photo from the fiestas to go worldwide because, several months later, the magazine Life chose it as their picture of the year. Not bad for a photographer from Pamplona, with a shop in that very plaza.

Photos of the human mountains formed by fallen runners are always fascinating, but this one is a beauty, as for once it doesn’t happen around the entrance to the ring, but halfway up Estafeta, near where it widens a bit. Photos can play tricks sometimes, but amongst the panic and pandemonium, can you see the man just behind the bulls, in dark trousers and jacket, casually smoking a cigarette? Talk about smoking being bad for your health…

It appears that as the bulls turned from Mercaderes into the long and narrow straight that leads up to Telefonos and the Plaza de Toros, the police who open that last barrier in Estafeta had delayed longer than ever, hence making rather nervous some of the people who were only in the street so they could get into the ring without paying, and well, one thing lead to another, people fell in their rush to get away, and disaster loomed. Amazingly though, as so often miraculously happens when carnage threatens in Pamplona, death was averted, though the emergency services tended to dozens of people. And the smoker? Well, I would love to know who he was, and perhaps…still is.

Every year for many of us foreigners, we don’t just wait for fiesta, or for what bull ranches have been chosen so those who run know what bulls they’ll be running with, but we want to see what the poster of that particular year’s fiesta is going to be. You can see nearly all the posters from the last hundred years and more on the town hall’s website and of course this one. The reason I’ve chosen the four examples shown above is because they are all by one man, a real man of the city.

His name was Pedro Martin Balda, and I’m sure he must be the only man ever to have had four of his efforts chosen for fiesta. Quite a feat, but he also did so much more. Those banners that we see the peñas dancing with and waving about, with those crypto political or comical messages, well, from 1943 and for over forty years, he painted many of them. I can’t pin down just how many, but it seems to be between 147 and 200 different examples. Again, a heck of a feat.

This true Pamplonican, born in the very heart of the city in the old town, finally packed up his paints and his ideas in December 2009 and took them to another place. Or, as Mikel Urmaneta wrote beautifully just over a month later, “Pedro Martin Balda did not wish to know anything of 2010 and he passed away to paint in another world”. He was 89 years old.

The competition has already started for this years fiesta poster, and as always, I can’t wait to see what we get.

Finally, from bulls to another animal. Last months posting finished with a dog named Ortega, this month it’s with an unknown cat, and is again from 1936. It was quite a year for strange happenings during the runnings, it seems….

Well, there have been a few dogs that have appeared in encierros over the years, but it’s believed that this is the only one with a cat. The photographer is again Jose Galle, who took the photos used in last months postings. He didn’t actually notice anything untoward , until he had the photos developed. Well, as that cat had one less life left, and as we approach the third of the third, we also have one less month to wait. One day, I’ll tell you about the lion in the streets of Pamplona. I kid you not!

An update about “Bullclippings”, and an R.I.P.

There is a famous photo shown in last month’s article from 1960 of the human traffic jam in Estafeta. I mention a man just behind the bulls, looking like he’s out for a Sunday stroll, cigarette in mouth, elegant in a suit and open-necked shirt, looking for all the world as if he’s thinking…”Oh, what’s going on here?”.

I wondered about who he was, whilst hoping in my heart it was the legendary Matt Carney. Happily, his daughter Deirdre Carney wrote and said, “Well, he’s wearing a suit, as did my dad, he looks nonchalant, which he would have been and clearly blond…I don’t know for sure but it does kind of scream Matt Carney”.

In a later message: “Hey so my mom said it really looks like him and his style of walking. She doesn’t know for sure either but both of us felt it was him immediately. I don’t know if that helps. But who else would walk up to a pile-up smoking a ciggie?”

Who else indeed…I’ll leave the last words to Dave Pierce: “It was Matt. Not only was I in that pile-up but started it to my shame”. Few words, but perfectly said.

I think we’ve gone definitive on that then. But about the pile up Dave…more please!

Rest In Peace, Joe Moskaluk. Run In Paradise, Big Joe.

Sometimes someone passes away that you hear so much about you wish you’d known them. I didn’t know Joe Moskaluk, but he died very recently, towards the end of March as I was writing this, and the messages that I have seen doing the rounds have been truly touching. Here are just a few of the thoughts (as they wrote them) of some of those who knew him. And loved him.

Amongst what Bunny Centurion wrote, I’ve chosen this: “Our Pamplona family has lost another member, always too soon. Rest in peace Papa Joe you will be in our hearts every morning this July and always”.

“Very, very sad. Joe was a man’s man, a good man, a gentleman.” Jeffrey Hare.

“A saint indeed, standing alone and one of a kind, shedding light with his humour when things seemed so dark. What I would give for one more breakfast at Tres Reyes and a couple of cigars thereafter. You I will remember always”. Leon Friedrichsen.

“God Bless you and watch over you Joe”. Junerose Conlin.

“I don’t want to imagine a world without Big Joe”. Carl Butrum.

“A wonderful man Joe. He will be missed”. Bob Smokey Clark.

“Our lives all were so much better for knowing Joe, he was one of a kind, cigar smoking will never be the same”. Steven Kendler.

“We have lost a guy who probably loved us more than we will ever know…” Rick Musica, who wrote so much more, but I love that particular quote.

“For those of you who knew him, he was a special man. He was a great lover of life, and he lived it well and heartily.
You could see it in the twinkle of his eyes, and in his smile and his laughter.
You could see it in his love for Belle.
You could see it in his love for his family.
You could see it in his love for Spain.
You could see it in his love for the bulls.
You could see it in his sense of humour.
I loved Joe for many reasons, and I will miss him very, very much.
Abrazos”.

That last one was from Yoav Spicehandler, and that says it all, about a man I didn’t even know, but wish I had.

Chinese waiter training.

And now, something I hope will put a little smile on the faces of those up in the Great Fiesta in the Sky, and those still here on beautiful Planet Earth. I’ve often wondered how the Chinese waiters cope and survive during San Fermin, having to handle some of us lot, and after much research, I have found a video of the passing out parade for those selected for Pamplona during fiesta, after no doubt a gruelling, Ghurka style training course:

This has been a long one, hasn’t it? But look on the bright side…ya falta a little bit less now…

Cover Photo. © Mikel Lasa. Santo Domingo. 2002.

When the Larrequi-Herrera family left their flat in Pamplona to go and watch the bullrun, on the morning of the 8th of July, 1939, they could never in their wildest dreams (or perhaps more correctly, nightmares), have thought that the family were about to become a part of fiesta history.

The bulls, those incredible beasts whose very presence in the town seem to pulse through the veins of everyone, were being prepared to be let loose in the street just about 800 yards away, and one of them, Liebrero, was also about to make his mark in the history books of this amazing town. He and his bovine brothers were from the Sanchez Cobaleda ranch.
Actually, none of the family should have been there that morning for the encierro. They had really been enjoying the fiesta, along with so many others, as 1939 was the first fiesta since 1936, as it had been cancelled for two years due to the civil war. All of them had enjoyed the previous day, especially the two oldest children, ( the oldest being 20, and both of whom had fought in the civil war and returned scarred, not surprisingly, from the conflict), and both had run in the encierro of the 7th of July. But that night, when they had all returned and gone to bed, their father changed the alarm clocks and set them to 8 o’clock, so they could all have a decent sleep, but more importantly so that his two older sons would wake up late and so not be able to run the following morning.
But his little trick didn’t work, as the following morning the sunshine woke up the youngest ones, who woke up the rest, so their mother, Clara, felt she had no option but to accompany them to see the run. The family lived at the time above what to many of us will always be the old bus station, which was then still pretty new, so they didn’t have far to go, although in reality they were at the edge of town. The two oldest boys promised their father that they wouldn’t run, and the mother and her six children headed towards the Plaza de Toros. They were running late but would make it with a few minutes to spare. The children were the two youngest daughters, Aurelia, aged just 10, and her sister Maria Jesus, aged 13, followed by Ignacio aged 11, Luis, 16, and finally Pedro, the oldest at 20. Yup, one is missing there, the second oldest son, and search as I have, I cannot find his name in any of the articles I have read. Perhaps he never actually went with the rest of them after all.
But when they got to the bullring it was already full, and here is where fate stepped in, because instead of returning home, they still wanted to see something, and as there were only a few minutes to go, they quickly found a spot at the barriers in Telefonos. As one of the brothers, Ignacio said, “We were just youngsters and it was easy to slip into the first row”.

As the bulls came into view leaving the Estafeta and entering Telefonos, they headed downhill towards the callejon, the tunnel into the ring. A man dressed up as a soldier, or perhaps he really was a soldier, attracted the attention of the bull “Liebrero”, which charged the barrier. Bulls had done this on the run many times before, of course, except this time…the barrier broke. In those days, there was only row one of fencing, not the two they have now. As a consequence of this event, the planks were reinforced with iron, and from 1942 they installed the double row of barriers we see nowadays. I haven’t been able to find out the name of the man who caused all this, or indeed if he was a real soldier.

Well, you can imagine the panic. As it became obvious the bull was going to be able to break through the wooden planks, the crowd stampeded and scattered.

With people running in every direction, it looked like the youngest of the children, Aurelia, was about to get gored, because as you can see from the picture above, she was literally in front of the horns. However, the bull didn’t get the girl, for whatever reason, (some said her mother distracted the bull having seen her daughter was in trouble, but as she is already on her knees and falling to the ground in the photo above, I’m not too sure). But maybe as she turned and fell she saw and cried out…who knows. Also in the photo above you can see the 11 year old Ignacio, at the very top right wearing a white shirt and darker shorts.
What we do know is that Aurelia escaped unharmed, as the bull went straight for her mother, and gored her twice, in a part of the body too delicate to mention here.

While people obviously tried to get as far away as possible, or indeed, as you can see from the photo, as far up the wall as possible, it seems the bull was distracted by 16 year old Luis. Who hit it. Whatever happened, it worked and the bull then turned and went after others, including Maria Jesus, Aurelia’s 13 year old sister. She’s the one in the photo wearing a black dress with white collar, carrying a handbag in her right hand. She also managed to escape injury, as did everyone else who was involved that day.

With the help of other people, Luis and the little Ignacio carried their mother into the infirmary inside the bullring, then run by a Doctor Jauristi, who took the first steps to stabilize their mother, before her transfer to hospital, where she spent the next 34 days. But she survived, and was back the next year watching the bulls, as she continued to do every year until one day she thought she saw one of her sons being gored. Fortunately it wasn’t him, but she never returned to watch the encierros after that. She still remains, however, the most seriously a woman has been injured due to an encierro.

The extraordinary photos above were taken by Jose Galle Gallego, who had a photo shop in Mercaderes street. A curiosity (and a sign of how times have changed), is that there was one other photo taken by him, that no one ever saw, as he destroyed the negative, because, say the now grown up children “he was a gentleman”. That photo showed their mother up in the air when the bull tossed her, and her dress wasn’t covering her knees. So to protect her modesty, he made sure no one would ever see it. As I said, how times have changed…

And finally, what of Liebrero? Well, you can see him in the picture above outside the bullring, and if my eyesight isn’t too bad I believe there appears to be a uniformed figure with a rifle standing in front of the main entrance, and he is a man called Cipriano Huarte. He was a Navarran, born in Olite. I can’t find a copy of this particular photo with his name attached to it, but I would like to think, indeed I am sure, that it is him.

After causing the carnage he had caused, Liebrero, this very mobile beast, had wandered around the outside of the bullring, until he stopped at the main entrance, next to the ticket booths. A member of the Guardia Civil had also made his way there to confront the animal, and that man was Cipriano Huarte. As he was only a couple of meters from the bull, one can only imagine what was going through his mind.

Oh so gently, and very carefully,and in silence, he prepared his rifle…and dropped the loading breech onto the ground. You couldn’t script it. I would like to think he uttered the word “joder!” under his breath.

Not panicking, and with great slowness, so as not to provoke the animal, he bent down, while never taking his eyes off the bull, and retrieved the thing, and prepared the gun once more. Then he calmly raised it to firing level…and with one shot Liebrero was dead. Señor Huarte himself eventually retired with the rank of colonel.

For those of us who have had the pleasure, honour, (and in my case, the bum numbing fear) of running with these beautiful and noble animals, we know just how amazing they are. Unfortunately though, we also know that on any given day with an encierro there will also be death, because as the afternoon ends and the evening begins, those six brave and innocent bulls will die in the ring.

Occasionally, and tragically, a human will die too, and it has happened 15 times since 1924, and before that…who knows. And once, in 1939, the encierro nearly took the life of a child or two. And their mother. Proving, as so many of us know, that anything, just anything, can happen in a bullrun.

Why, even a dog (You can read about the perro Ortega in this link) once risked all in the ring.

¡Ya falta menos! ¡Viva San Fermin!

Cover Photo: Jim Hollander.

Well, if I’ve survived the party and the resulting hangover, it’s now 2012 and I’m in Holland with some of our peña, (the peña that doesn’t exist)… perhaps just call it The Lost Peña, though we do have another name… Anyway, a new year can mean a new beginning,but it also means, for those of us who love Pamplona and its fiesta, that it’s the real start to the countdown that leads to July and the Fiesta of San Fermin.

Now, as always, the townsfolk of that wonderful town are well ahead of us, as they already have a song to mark the start of the new year and the inexorable march towards July and armageddon. Sorry, fiesta. It’s called the Escalera, and I’m sure most of you know it, but for those who have never heard it.

Uno de enero,
Dos de febrero,
Tres de marzo,
Cuatro de abril,
Cinco de mayo,
Seis de junio,
Siete de julio San Fermin.
A Pamplona hemos de ir,
Con una media, con una media,
A Pamplona hemos de ir,
Con una media y un calcetin.

The meaning of the first part is fairly obvious, but the second part maybe not so. All it means is “To Pamplona we have to go, with a stocking, with a stocking. To Pamplona we have to go, with a stocking and a sock”. No, I have no idea what the sock and stocking bit is about, or if it has some other hidden meaning, (actually, with some of our lot, it does!). Well, have you ever had to use those plastic portaloos in an emergency? Anyway, I have asked and been told there is no other secret significance, though my guess is the writer had been on the patxaran over the new year…

It’s a simple song with simple words, written by an extraordinary man. His name was Ignacio Baleztena Azcarate, and he was born in 1887 and died on the second of April, 1972. He was many things in his lifetime. A lawyer, writer, politician and Carlist. But he was also a Navarran, and immersed into the language and folklore not just of the region, but of the Basque Country. He wrote many things throughout his lifetime, writing for not just the present day Diario de Navarra but for other newspapers and publications now long defunct.

But he also wrote poetry, and stories…and songs and music. Along with the “Riau-Riau”, probably his other most widely known and sung song, the Escalera continues to be popular today, nearly a hundred years after it was written. On his excellent website, http://premindeiruna.blogspot.com, his son Javier has a mountain of information about his father, from which I have gathered most of the material for this piece. I don’t think I’ve made any mistakes, but my apologies if my translation is a bit wonky at any point.

He took popular melodies from the mountains, many written by one Silvano Cervantes, and adapted them to fit his words, and a century later we are still singing and dancing along to them. This is also the case for the Riau-Riau, which almost certainly first happened in 1911 after a more or less spontaneous act by Ignacio and his friends. Twenty years later, he was to form the peña Muthiko Alaiak, still in existence and the second oldest in Pamplona after the peña La Unica. For the centenary during last years San Fermin, the peña commemorated the 100th anniversary of the Riau – Riau on their banner.

One more thing before moving on and finishing. In 1912 during fiesta, it appeared that two Englishmen had taken part in the encierro. Yup, it’s that man again, and a friend of his. For one of the bullruns they decided to dress up as colonial Englishmen. Baleztena dressed up in morning coat and breeches, large sideburns, wearing a hat and enormous glasses, and carrying a large camera and tripod, made out of cardboard but very authentic looking, while his friend Emilio Malumbres dressed as an Andulucian, (maybe that’s what they thought some Englishmen looked like, I’m not too sure!), carrying a suitcase.

It appears that even in those days that kind of thing was frowned upon in the bull run, and they had to hide from the chief of police, de Reta, in the Hotel Maissonave, back in the day when it was situated on the run. They did the “valientes” run, and took off with the early runners and made it inside the ring, to general amusement all round, whereupon his friend put down his suitcase and Baleztena set up his “camera”, in the middle of the ring to even greater laughter. They must have looked quite a sight, especially as Baleztena was tall and slim, while his friend was short and chubby.

There, with typical British “phlegm”, as he later described it, Baleztena proceeded to “film” the bullrunners while his great friend stood around “directing”, to even greater hilarity. At the last possible moment they abandoned their props and ran to the side and vaulted over the barrier.Their escapade was talked about for years in Pamplona, not suprisingly. Fifty years later, an article appeared in Diario de Navarra remembering the day.

Which I suppose brings me nicely to the bull run, and closing time. Ah yes, the bull run. Whether you do the run or not, even here his influence still lingers. If you have ever danced to the “Dianas” with the town hall band, either after a hard nights partying or for a morning warm and wake up, you’ll have danced to a few of his tunes. An hour or so later, it’s bull run time, and if you have done it once or a hundred times, there is nothing more I can say. But if you haven’t, and are thinking about going this year and running for the first time, I can’t do much better than direct you to the runner Bill Hillman and his excellent article and interview with the great Julen Madina, at: http://www.thebutchersblog.wordpress.com/julen-madina-complete-interview

And you’ll find the video, too. Ouch. Madina has retired now, for the very best of reasons, but of all the things he says in the article, one still sticks with me. It’s that whenever he hears of or sees the run, it makes him cry, no doubt because of the sheer emotion of having to give it up. And this from one of the greatest and toughest runners of all time.

Imagen de portada de Jordi Cohen.

As many of you know, whether it was your first year in Pamplona for fiesta, or perhaps your fiftieth, it doesn’t matter how much, or little, you know about what goes on there, but that extraordinary town has a way of constantly giving out surprises, and often when you least expect them. I must have had a million magic moments since my first year, (every time I laugh is one of them), and I’d like to share just a couple.

I’m not talking about the bullrun now, as that is a whole different ball game, or should I say bull game, when it comes to surprises, but rather what goes on in fiesta apart from the bull run. And as it’s December, and approaching what for many can be a magical time, Christmas and New Year, I thought I’d use this last months Kukuxumusu page, before the first Escalera starts, to mention one or two of them.

Okay, the bull run. I know I said I wasn’t going to talk about it, but I don’t mean that bull run, the encierro, I mean the other one, the one that doesn’t happen any more. The encierro txiki. The what? Well, the first year I was there, 1984, there were enough shocks in the normal bull run to last a lifetime, especially as in those days there wasn’t the easy access there is now to all the info you’d ever need to find out about it (and ruin the experience a bit, no doubt), so for foreigners like me who didn’t speak the lingo at the time, we knew there was a fiesta, and some bull runs.

Sometime during the week, coming out of the ring not just after the encierro, but after the cow and knackered bull run-a-round, las vaquillas (and nobody had told me about that, either!), instead of heading straight back to the square and the bit of grass by the gutter that I and my new found friends had began to call the “house” – because that’s where we lived – I walked instead back into Estafeta to get something to drink. The shops and bars were all open again, the barriers still up though, mostly…sort of…but there were people in the road and fiesta, street style, was back in full swing. But there was something strange in the air it seemed…

Suddenly, a rocket went off, and a truck that was parked halfway down Estafeta opened up its doors, and down some planks came running…what the fudging heck…more bulls! Holy Cow! I jogged to the side with my litre of beer and joined everyone else to watch, incredulous, as six much smaller bulls ran past, with young teenagers laughing by their side, and even younger children running with their hand being held by a father or older brother, concentrating hard…What! They even have bull runs for children…I couldn’t believe it at first, but it must have been around then that I realised, subconsciously, that this crazy town would never stop surprising me no matter how often I came.

Another year, togged up in red and whites by now of course, and a little more knowlegable, I went to have a look at the encierillo, the night run. It was 1991 and I was trying to impress a girl about how much I knew about fiesta. So, yes, I knew about the night run, but the surprise was I didn’t know how touching it would be. We found a spot halfway between the bridge and the corral, it was about 11 o’clock, and part of the wonder of the whole thing was the silence, after the craziness of the town. In the gloom, and the quiet, you could hear the hooves of the bulls and the herd as they ran up the hill, but that was the only noise, as everyone, but everyone, held their breath – though I swear I could hear the animals breathing – as they passed by and carried on up to the corral. It was a beautiful sight but hauntingly sad, knowing that for the bulls at least, it was their last night on earth.

One more, perhaps. This one happened thanks to my friend Manu from Kukuxumusu, who told me about something that was going to happen one morning at the Church of San Lorenzo, which is where the statue of San Fermin is kept. This was last year, 2010, and two things were to happen that day, one we knew about, and one we didn’t. There was to be a runners mass, but this was to be a special one to remember and commemorate the death of Daniel Jimeno Romero, a young runner who had died during the encierro exactly one year before. His family, all Sanfermineros, (fans of the fiesta), were to be there too, but in the end they found it too emotionally hard and stayed away.

However, the mass went ahead, and as I had never been inside the church that is, let’s face it, pretty central to the whole party (no San Fermin…no fiesta!), I found it a touching experience. I’m not particularily religious, but I find churches soothing and comforting, and being inside what I now think of as San Fermins’ house, with loads of runners, young and old, dressed in their whites, with San Fermin sitting at the altar, resplendent in his golden red, while the priest, Santos Villanueva Eskujuri said mass, was incredibly moving. Another special Pamplona moment, completely unexpected.

But as always with that amazing, beautiful town, that wasn’t all. After the priest had finished, while telling everyone he knew where he could find them (at any of the nearby bars!), the doors to the church opened and sunlight flooded in. Outside, suprisingly, were all the giants and cabezudos, and the kilikis and zaldiko-maldikos. Now that little lot are a story on their own, but as it was the 150th anniversary of the Giants, los gigantes, this enlightened priest had decided to celebrate that fact.

I was still inside the church at the time, and it was filling up with even more people than were at the mass. Suddenly I saw through the open doorway one of the giants begin to fall, but it was as if in slow motion…down he went, gently sliding sideways…except he wasn’t falling, he was being tilted onto his side so he could be carefully carried in, through the portal, and into the church. And in this way all the giants were brought inside the church, followed by the full entourage of cabezudos, kilikis and zaldikos-maldikos.

Well, stuff was said, something was sung, and then the txistularis (the pipers) began to play, and, lined up all the way to the altar, the giants came alive, and began to dance, right in front of San Fermin, in his own house.
I don’t think many people knew this was going to happen, and the looks on some peoples faces, including mine no doubt, were priceless. I swear even San Fermin himself had a smile…

Yet again, Pamplona had worked its magic. And it always has and it always does, and it always will. Not long to go now until the first escalera. ¡Ya falta menos! ¡Viva San Fermin!