Today in Pamplona, Spain, a bull gored to death one of the people participating in the annual Fesitval of San Fermin's "Running of the Bulls." The young Spainerd's death was the 15th since 1910.
Hemingway (who may or may not have been a KGB agent) wrote about it in "The Sun Also Rises." He helped turn what had been a local festival of bullfighting into a one of the biggest parties on the planet. More than 1,000,000 people crowd into a city of 200,000 for the fiesta. It's sheer madness.
As a Hemingway wonk, I've always been intrigued by the encierro (the run) and the corrida de toros (the actual bullfights). Most people don't realize the entire purpose of the run is to move the bulls from corrals to the bullfighting arena for that evening's bullfights.
Anyway, I've come to realize I'll probably never run in Pamplona. But I now know somebody who has attended the festival! Karen's dad is there right now. No word on whether he ran the encierro or attended the bullfights. I hope Karen gets a full report about what it's like over there for me.
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Yes he was there and he sent me a link to San Fermin's newspaper website so I could read about the guy who died. Going to the "Encierro" has always been one of my dad's dream trips. That's were he celebrated his 71st birthday this year!! I'm happy for him, although you know how i feel about the whole thing ;-)
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