Alisa said she heard a tourist got gored in Villa Real on Saturday night. He was Canadian, like her, and apparently quite drunk, like her. The only difference is that he jumped in the ring with the bull and she sat in the stands and watched. She said he died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. How do you know he died? Pistol Pete asked. That’s what she heard.
It’s hard to say here in Tamarindo. Rumors get started and travel not by reliable news channels but from the brother of the waiter working the lunch shift at the Diria hotel when we’re getting our first beer to the new fat security guard in the parking lot to the tout on the street yelling “My friend, my friend, for you special price!” to the golden dread-locked surfer selling the new AK47 strain of weed to the Nicaraguan hostess off work at Bar One and finally to the tourist, with a new sunburn and fat wallet, who is buying her drinks, thinking he’s going to get in her pants but really she’s dating the DJ at Aqua and just wants some free drinks. Where am I in this information loop? Well Pistol Pete is super cool with all the waiters at the Daria and the bartenders in town so we’re pretty far up on the food chain, though honestly I’d much rather be in closer proximity to the hostess’s pants.
The rumor mill is so notoriously unreliable that even the local newspaper, The Tamarindo, is referred to as the TamaRumor. We asked around a little and Marlon, the bartender at Que Tuanis out on the dirt road on the way to Santa Cruz, said he didn’t die but did get fucked up. Well either he did or he didn’t – that much is sure.
We we’re just at the fiestas in Santa Barbara on Saturday night to see the bullfights. Fabio, the guy you want to know if you need anything semi-legal, met us there and treated us to cold beers out of a plastic bag with ice and a hundred introductions to his mom, cousins, and friends. During the Christmas holidays almost every little town or province has their own Festejos Populares, or Popular Fiesta. In the town park they’ll have vendors in make-shift shacks selling roasted corn on a stick and beef snacks, Imperial and Pilsen beer, rum, inflatable bounce houses for the kids, and a karaoke machine set up at deafening volumes. The epicenter of all the fun is always the bull ring, or “rondel”. Some of the bigger venues, like those in San Jose, have permanent rodeo arenas and bull fights all year long, but in these small quaint pueblos the locals build them anew every Christmas time. I was amazed to see the bull ring was thrown together with spare wooden planks crossed with warped 2x4’s held together only with rusty nails. It looks like the whole creation could tip over or fall apart at any time. The stands go twenty feet high so the residents and families can sit on the bleachers and watch the festivities. We got closer and stood behind the arena wall, crowded with fathers holding their baby daughters up for a peek and countless teenagers climbing and straddling the wooden wall. We had a great view of the ring as the bull came out.
Bullfights in Costa Rica consist of the bull being released out of the gate with a brave cowboy on his back. They ride the bucking beast, which sometimes weigh as much as 600 kilos, as long as they can until thrown to the ground, where others distract the bull so they can scamper away to safety and applause. Then the real fun starts. The whole night the ring is filled with teenage boys and young men, sometimes 20 to 40 of them. Unlike bullfighting in other Latin countries that are little more than ceremonial slaughtering of these huge beasts, the bulls in Costa Rica have a decided advantage and are actually legally protected from being killed. The bull runs free in the rodeo ring and the boys run around tormenting and teasing it, getting as close as possible demonstrating their bravado and athleticism. Enraged, the bull chases them as they dive and dodge for safety.
The scene is equal parts chaos and orchestrated adrenaline. If you were to look down on the ring through a time-lapsed film the periods of inaction and then violent intensity, flocking and fleeing of the participants, would mirror the growth of a cell under a microscope. These young men are so hopped up on adrenaline as they run across the bull’s line of sight, grab its tail, or touch it massive flank. Others see how long they can stand in front of it without moving before bolting. The crowd basically torments the bull until the bull gets pissed off - and then bad things happen; a one-ton charging beast with sharp horns as big as ski racks coming at you. Often times the bull goes after a crowd and loses interest as they disperse, but every once a while the bull will lock in on one young matador like a guided missile and give chase. The young man senses this, whether they are looking over their shoulder or not, and sprints for their life towards the side of the ring, attempting to jump onto the wall and scramble over to safety. It’s not uncommon for a bull to jump right into the wall and even get over it, spilling the bloodshed into the stands. It’s impossible to outrun a bull so many times before they reach the wall the bull catches up, lowering its head and delivering a mighty blow with its massive skull before goring the unlucky boy with its horns and tossing him high into the air. If you know you’re getting caught the only way to be safe is to go down on the ground as quickly as possible in the fetal position, covering your balls and your head, and shrinking the target for the bull. The bull will certainly run over you but hopefully you too close to the ground for them to get a horn into you or toss you in the air.
People get trampled, stabbed, stepped on, gored, kicked, flipped 15 feet in the air, crushed against the wall, shirts tattered, pants ripped off (this happens more than you think, leaving the bullfighter bare assed in front of all), bloodied, skulls cracked, lungs crushed, ribs broken, shoulders dislocated, and legs snapped in two. If you manage to survive you’ve achieved the adulation of the crowd and glory in your town forever. You may even get on television with the carnage of that day’s bullfights replayed on shows like La Torra, or highlights on the nightly news like a sick Kobe Bryant dunk. Or you could end up being dragged out of the ring and thrown in the back of a waiting ambulance for the hour drive to the closet ramshackle medical clinic. At the big venues the Red Cross is actually present in the ring, wearing green vests, to assist those who have fallen and been seriously injured. You can even buy insurance right before you enter the ring. Run fast my friend.
To add to the pageantry the boys in the ring dress in funny wigs, super hero masks, clown outfits, silly costumes and sport large capes they use as mock matadors and to capture the crowd’s attention. I was impressed by the camaraderie of those in the ring, working as a team to rush someone to safety after being injured or distracting the bull at just the right time. The adrenal bond of man versus beast is primal.
Cynthia, who is from San Jose where they have the biggest bullfighting festivals and actually give a sobriety test to those getting in the ring, told me about the biggest, meanest bull in the country, Malacrianza. He’s an imposing jet-black beast as big as a minivan that travels the country messing people up for $60,000 an appearance, killing at least 3 people so far and putting hundreds in the hospital. Guanacaste, the province where we live along the coast, is known for breeding the most vicious bulls, and this one is its proudest son. The name Malacrianza is slang for a spoiled or rebellious kid who throws a tantrum, and saying his name incites whistles and old timers from Limon to Liberia to touch their scars.
They used to enlist midgets running around in clown costumes to add to the overall “je ne sais quoi” of the event. In the middle of the ring was a two foot deep pool of water that the midgets could jump in as a refuge from the bull. The only problem was that a few times the bull charged after them into the water. In one incident, dubbed (by me) as the “Midget Massacre of 2008” or “the Battle of Little Big Horns” the bull ran into the water and pinned these little people under its massive weight, crushing and drowning several of them. Midgets are now excused from the festivities, and have moved on to more stable job opportunities of seasonal work at the mall as Santa's elves or lobbying for another Wizard of Oz remake.
Eventually the bull gets tired or loses its aggression. Cowboys on horseback ride in the ring and lasso its head and lead them out. The crowd never loses its thirst and will stay drunk and frenzied until 4 in the morning. Then there are more festivals next week in Heredia, Nicoya, and Abangares. We didn’t get home until 5am, dusty and dry mouthed.
We met up with Alisa last night at Caracollas near the beach. We ate fish tacos and drank Pilsens to celebrate Juan and Maria’s one month wedding anniversary and talk about where we were going to party for New Years. They heard that a big real estate developer in town was throwing a free party outside Aqua with bonfires on the beach, a DJ, and fireworks. Alisa said she heard that the Canadian guy who got gored by the bull didn’t die but is in really bad shape and had to be emergency airlifted back to Canada. Who knows? He either was or he wasn’t.
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