La Corrida de Toro

The past two weeks have been an onslaught of Spanish culture starting with a bull fight, “una corrida del toro,” two weekends ago. I already knew the specifics before attending because I learned about it in my Spanish culture class. To be honest, before living here I did not know exactly how the whole thing went down. I knew that a bull was killed and I thought that was it, wrong. Why kill one when there are people to entertain? So if you don't know, here is how it goes. There are three toreros (bull-fighters) whom each kill 2 toros (bulls), yes that makes a total of 6 toros killed in one event. They let the bull out into the arena and the torero and his “gang” mess with it using the capes. Then the “picadores” come out. A man on a horse takes a long poll with a knife/sword on the end and stabs the bull in the back. After he feels he has sufficiently cut the bull, or the bull gets pissed enough and tries to ram the hose, the picadore leaves the arena. Moving on to the second part, the “banderillas.” Now that the bull has been sliced in the back it's time to stab him some more and this task is usually done by the torero's “gang.” Three men come out and each put in two bandereras in the toro's back. There bandereras are meant to stay in the back of the bull for the remainder of the fight moving into the third and final part of the corrida. In the final stage the torero comes out with his knife and red cape and taunts the bull some more until he finally decides that the bull is tired and he stabs it in the back, aiming to go through the heart and kill the bull. Sometimes the final stab is not so smooth and has to be repeated until the torero gets it right. The only torero who got it on the first time (both times) was El Fandi, who is one of the famous bull fighters in Spain. At this point you probably think it's over, well it's not. The crowd cheers and waves their pañuelos (scarves) in order display whether the torero deserves the ears of the bull. One ear is good, two is great, and if the tail is cut off then the fight was the best. Fortunately I did not see any tails cut off, but I did see the son (5 yrs old) of one of the toreros walk around the arena with an ear. This whose process is repeated 6 times. Needless to say it is redundant and I think I have seen my one and only corrida.