Dawn

Dawn

Monday, October 27, 2008

In the September issue of Prospect magazine, the actor and writer, Alexander Fiske-Harrison, provides an elegant description of a bullfight down in Sevilla and asks whether aesthetics can justify the suffering of an animal. To know his answer, you'll need to go to the article itself. But here are a couple of extracts to whet your appetite:-

The bullfight is one of the most morally contentious of all legally sanctioned activities in the western world. There is a long history of argument against the bullfight, but the most notable feature of the modern form is that it takes the side of the bull rather than the man.

There is something ironic about British families sitting down to watch wildebeests eviscerated by lions on Big Cat Diary after a nice joint of roast beef while deploring their Spanish cousins when they are sitting down to watch a bullfight. After all, while slaughtering techniques have become more humane, most of the billion or so animals killed annually in Britain are still reared on factory farms.

But it is too easy to mock this hypocrisy. Bullfighting is most interesting because it does live on a borderline between right and wrong.

Galicia

Another conversation with my old friend visiting from the UK, as we are about to depart for a school of a Spanish friend who is, like him, a teacher:-
Col, do you have a tie I can borrow?
Why, Geoff? No one wears a tie here. Miguel certainly won't be wearing one.
Yes, but I want to be properly dressed to visit his school.
No, I don't have a tie and you don't need one to be properly dressed.
But I'm not comfortable. I want to look professional.
Well, in that case, you might want to consider wearing something other than trainers on your feet.
I don't have anything else.
Well, there you go.

Walking through a village in the hills yester-evening, we greeted two octogenarian ladies outside one of the houses. Whereupon, they seized the opportunity to engage us in conversation. Entirely - I might add - in Gallego. At least from their side. Having established that I owned a nearby house, one of the old girls asked if Geoff - who's one year younger than me - was my son. When I protested and said he was a friend of 40 years visiting from the UK, she gave me a Galician village apology - Does he want to buy my house?

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