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Saturday 22 November 2008

Low life

In the thick of it

Next morning I was back in Pamplona by 7.30 to take my place in the packed street to wait for the daily running of the bulls through the streets.

You could hardly move for people. The street was narrow — the width of a car — and there appeared to be few, if any, hiding places. I had no idea of what to expect. While we waited, I became acquainted with my immediate neighbours, all Spaniards. One told me he’d prepared for this morning’s bull run by taking an LSD tablet. Another hoisted up his T-shirt to show me a scar running from throat to navel where, ten years before, he’d been unzipped by a horn tip not five yards from where we were standing. Someone else added to my growing stock of knowledge by saying that this morning’s bulls were the unpredictable and gigantic Miuras, notorious for killing more famous matadors than any other breed. 

Then everyone sang a lugubrious hymn and when that finished a rocket exploded in the sky, and those crowding the balconies overlooking the street began cheering wildly. The rocket, my sewn-up friend informed me, signalled the release of the bulls from the corral.

The revellers were now bouncing on their toes, trying to see over the heads and down the hill to the corral. I bounced a little also. There was nothing to see except bouncing heads. But I discerned a sort of mass panic rolling our way, accompanied by screams and a sound like rolling thunder. The next moment I looked around and my acquaintances had gone. For the first time I could see the cobbled road we’d been standing on. In the same instant a sprinting mob shot past me, arms flying, knees up to their chins, and behind these I glimpsed enormous bobbing horns. Without waiting to see what these were attached to, I turned and fled also.

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