Buenas Noches, España

“It's better to be dead with no blood than alive with it festering.”

- Federico Garcia Lorca

I am writing this journal entry from the outdoor veranda of a hotel in Girona. It’s my last day in Spain and the sun is setting behind the blue hills. Tomorrow, I will catch a train to Toulouse and the Spanish leg of my journey will be over.

The above quote by Garcia Lorca resonates with the experience I have had of Spain. It comes from his play Blood Wedding, about two lovers who run away together even though both are married to other people. The quote is spoken by a woodcutter who observes the drama from a distance. He is sympathetic for

the lovers because they follow their passion rather than suppressing it, even though it leads to their banishment from society and death.

The bold expression of passion in the face of great risk (of societal judgment or death), is present in two essential facets of Spanish culture - flamenco and bullfighting.

In Seville, I went with a new friend to a flamenco show. She had never seen flamenco before, and I won her curiosity with descriptions of the energy and passion expressed in the dance.

It was a good show and the dancers were talented, but something was missing. We were in a theatre with a bunch of tourists who had paid to see a good show - so the dances were rehearsed. No one in the audience knew how to join in. No one was clapping along, moving, or expressing approval. It was as if someone had taken a flamenco performance and sucked all the blood out of it.

My friend and I still enjoyed the show, but I encouraged her to try and see flamenco in a tavern or on the street. The energy in flamenco comes from spontaneity. It makes the passion more genuine, because it isn’t all performance, it comes from something real that is already present inside the dancer or the singer.

Improvisation in performance is always a risk, because the performer faces public humiliation if they fail to resonate with the audience. In flamenco, the most important thing is that the passion is genuine. It doesn’t matter whether the musicians are completely in sync, it doesn’t matter if the singer’s voice breaks. Above all, the performance must be able to inspire passion in the audience, and the rawness of the performance helps with this.

After seeing flamenco for the first time, my friend said that it made her think of bullfighting. It was the same observation I made the first time I saw flamenco. In both, the performers carry themselves with tall, firm torsos. Their bodies remain still and controlled, while they make quick, elegant movements with their arms and wrists. In bullfighting the reason for this is because if the matador doesn’t stand firm, he becomes a moving target for the bull.

Risk and passion are valued equally in bullfighting and in flamenco.

When I was in the bullring, there were sighs of disappointment from the audience whenever the matador pulled a theatrical trick that didn’t involve any real danger. The most enthusiastic shouts of approval came when the matador put himself at the most risk. Everyone loved it when Mr. Sombrero dismounted and shouted in the bull’s face because it was an expression of passion in the face of potential death.

The high-regard for passionate expression and risk is my favorite aspect of Spanish culture. It is present in flamenco and bullfighting, and in the Romantic writing of Garcia Lorca. It serves as a reminder that you only live once, and it would be a shame to waste it by suppressing the passion inside you, or by not living it to the fullest.

And on that philosophical note…on to the next leg of my journey.