Here is a link to a story that warmed my heart.
http://www.castromonte.net/clarolin...El__camarero_nonagenario_de_los_Torozos..html
If you have been in the Bar Caribe and met the owner, you will probably enjoy the story. I have translated it (forgive any errors) just because I think it is such a great read. Yet another reason to walk untraveled caminos, you can meet people like this.
Buen camino, Laurie
Here goes:
At a very early age, Braulio Martín had already decided that he would open a bar in his hometown, Castromonte, in the heart of the Montes Torozos of Vallodalid. When he reached the age of 40, he realized his dream by opening the Bar Caribe. This was almost 54 years ago.
The nonagenarian had worked in RENFE. He had been in the Spanish Civil War, in the “Baby Bottle Battalion” in the Battle of the Ebro, when he was only 16 years old.
“We saw a lot of misery, a lot of death. We were very young, just children, and our mission, the mission of the Baby Bottle Battalion – they called us that because we were children – was to pull the cadavers out of the Ebro. We would bring them to shore and others were in charge of burying them. Some of it had such a nauseating smell that our bosses ordered us to smoke so that the smell of the cigarette smoke would cover the smell of death.” At his 95 years, his mind is sharp, fill of names, of stories, of people and of dates which he processes absolutely correctly.
Baulio Martín went to work at RENFE, so he would have a fixed salary, but he gave it up at age 40 and rented a house in front of the church in Castromonte, a house he would later buy, and where he set up the bar that has possibly sold more seafood than any other bar in the province of Vallodolid, including the capital city.
For more than half a century, Braulio and his wife Victoria Gómez, “only” 87 years old, and so timid that she doesn’t even like to be photographed, have been in charge of this business. A huge number of well known individuals of all ages, professions, passions and conditions, principally from the world of bullfighting, sports, journalists, intellectuals and painters, have been in the bar and have either enjoyed the famous seafood or had big meals or family celebrations. The walls are lined with pictures that immortalize these events.
These days, Braulio opens his Bar Caribe, every day, around noon, but he only does it because it’s fun. “It helps keep me alive and it helps keep me active, and I can chat with my life-long friends. They may have a glass of wine, but I rarely charge them anything because I enjoy being with them," says this bartender, who is probably the oldest one in Spain.
The quantity of kilos of seafood that Braulio Martin has brought to Castromonte from the Mercado del Val in Valladolid is impossible to count. “At first I brought it up on the “Train Burra” (something like milk run in English, I think, meaning slow and with many stops) to Medina de Rioseco and then from there to Castromonte on a bicycle.” The bar only opened on weekends.
He would leave his job at RENFE, pick up the seafood, and take it to the pueblo. "When I began to bring the seafood here, some people called me crazy, because in the town no one had ever seen a crab or a winkle (?) not to mention shrimp or lobster, which were thought of as food for stuck up dandys. I made a lot of trips on the bike, then I bought a Guzzi motorcycle and later a Seat 600, which has transported more kilos of seafood than many boats. Thousands of servings of these things went on the grill in the Bar Caribe. But no longer. I'm not up to that kind of work anymore, but on the occasional Sunday, at the hour of vermouth, we put out some shrimp, but not much, more than anything to maintain the tradition." And he gives a big smile, this delightful person who has, in his professional life, dealt with Captains General, even ministers, presidents of football clubs or hunters of the likes of Miguel Delibes, who used to be a regular customer, as his children are now. Delibes even dedicated some lines to him in his book The Last Preserve.
The bar is decorated with a lot of pictures, some in black and white, like the 1926 class picture from his school. Of all of them only he and one other survive. And there is another photograph, placed prominently, of his teacher, who was killed during the Civil War.
"... How good he was... And how many good people like him were taken from us", Braulio says, while a tear runs down his cheek.
Bulls are his passion, but painting and reading are his two great hobbies. Braulio has a series of pictures in his bar and in his home, which he did himself. They call out to you, because they are painted on the wall itself, not on screens or cloths, on the wall.
"They are painted with paint in a tube, the kind that they sell in the drug store, but no one would think so. Felix Cuadrado Lomas, one of my patrons, told me I could dedicate myself to painting and leave the bar. The paintings are there, and on the walls of my house I have a series of little vignettes that I painted in the 1930s. Whoever wants one of my pictures will have to take it with the house attached," Braulio smiles. He shows us the tools he uses to do pyrography (an art done by burning designs into wood). He has completed pictures of all of the animal life of the Montes de Torozos, which are intimately connected to his history, and which he can do at almost the age of 100 with no visual assistance. A genius and a great person.
http://www.castromonte.net/clarolin...El__camarero_nonagenario_de_los_Torozos..html
If you have been in the Bar Caribe and met the owner, you will probably enjoy the story. I have translated it (forgive any errors) just because I think it is such a great read. Yet another reason to walk untraveled caminos, you can meet people like this.
Buen camino, Laurie
Here goes:
At a very early age, Braulio Martín had already decided that he would open a bar in his hometown, Castromonte, in the heart of the Montes Torozos of Vallodalid. When he reached the age of 40, he realized his dream by opening the Bar Caribe. This was almost 54 years ago.
The nonagenarian had worked in RENFE. He had been in the Spanish Civil War, in the “Baby Bottle Battalion” in the Battle of the Ebro, when he was only 16 years old.
“We saw a lot of misery, a lot of death. We were very young, just children, and our mission, the mission of the Baby Bottle Battalion – they called us that because we were children – was to pull the cadavers out of the Ebro. We would bring them to shore and others were in charge of burying them. Some of it had such a nauseating smell that our bosses ordered us to smoke so that the smell of the cigarette smoke would cover the smell of death.” At his 95 years, his mind is sharp, fill of names, of stories, of people and of dates which he processes absolutely correctly.
Baulio Martín went to work at RENFE, so he would have a fixed salary, but he gave it up at age 40 and rented a house in front of the church in Castromonte, a house he would later buy, and where he set up the bar that has possibly sold more seafood than any other bar in the province of Vallodolid, including the capital city.
For more than half a century, Braulio and his wife Victoria Gómez, “only” 87 years old, and so timid that she doesn’t even like to be photographed, have been in charge of this business. A huge number of well known individuals of all ages, professions, passions and conditions, principally from the world of bullfighting, sports, journalists, intellectuals and painters, have been in the bar and have either enjoyed the famous seafood or had big meals or family celebrations. The walls are lined with pictures that immortalize these events.
These days, Braulio opens his Bar Caribe, every day, around noon, but he only does it because it’s fun. “It helps keep me alive and it helps keep me active, and I can chat with my life-long friends. They may have a glass of wine, but I rarely charge them anything because I enjoy being with them," says this bartender, who is probably the oldest one in Spain.
The quantity of kilos of seafood that Braulio Martin has brought to Castromonte from the Mercado del Val in Valladolid is impossible to count. “At first I brought it up on the “Train Burra” (something like milk run in English, I think, meaning slow and with many stops) to Medina de Rioseco and then from there to Castromonte on a bicycle.” The bar only opened on weekends.
He would leave his job at RENFE, pick up the seafood, and take it to the pueblo. "When I began to bring the seafood here, some people called me crazy, because in the town no one had ever seen a crab or a winkle (?) not to mention shrimp or lobster, which were thought of as food for stuck up dandys. I made a lot of trips on the bike, then I bought a Guzzi motorcycle and later a Seat 600, which has transported more kilos of seafood than many boats. Thousands of servings of these things went on the grill in the Bar Caribe. But no longer. I'm not up to that kind of work anymore, but on the occasional Sunday, at the hour of vermouth, we put out some shrimp, but not much, more than anything to maintain the tradition." And he gives a big smile, this delightful person who has, in his professional life, dealt with Captains General, even ministers, presidents of football clubs or hunters of the likes of Miguel Delibes, who used to be a regular customer, as his children are now. Delibes even dedicated some lines to him in his book The Last Preserve.
The bar is decorated with a lot of pictures, some in black and white, like the 1926 class picture from his school. Of all of them only he and one other survive. And there is another photograph, placed prominently, of his teacher, who was killed during the Civil War.
"... How good he was... And how many good people like him were taken from us", Braulio says, while a tear runs down his cheek.
Bulls are his passion, but painting and reading are his two great hobbies. Braulio has a series of pictures in his bar and in his home, which he did himself. They call out to you, because they are painted on the wall itself, not on screens or cloths, on the wall.
"They are painted with paint in a tube, the kind that they sell in the drug store, but no one would think so. Felix Cuadrado Lomas, one of my patrons, told me I could dedicate myself to painting and leave the bar. The paintings are there, and on the walls of my house I have a series of little vignettes that I painted in the 1930s. Whoever wants one of my pictures will have to take it with the house attached," Braulio smiles. He shows us the tools he uses to do pyrography (an art done by burning designs into wood). He has completed pictures of all of the animal life of the Montes de Torozos, which are intimately connected to his history, and which he can do at almost the age of 100 with no visual assistance. A genius and a great person.