Cristina Mateo-Yanguas's Notebook:

Bullfighting is still a celebrity sport in Spain

Some argue that bullfighting is on its way out in Spain, especially in Catalonia, where a proposed bullfighting ban may become a reality in the coming months. But a look at the numbers tells a different side of the story.

Bullfighting tickets sold in Spain during 2007 numbered 45 million, according to Luis Corrales, coordinator of the Platform for the Promotion of Bullfighting. That means 8 to 12 million Spaniards — or 25 percent of Spain’s population — go to a bullfight at least once.

Ticket prices vary, depending on the seat location in the bullring and the town. In Seville, whose arena has a capacity for 12,000 people, a seat in the shade during the Feria, Sevilla’s main festival, cost about 86 Euros ($128). In Madrid (with a capacity for 20,000), it's between 60 and 70 Euros for a good seat. In Barcelona (with a capacity of over 19,000), the official ticket price can reach 120 Euros. According to the daily El Periodico, scalped tickets to see matador Jose Tomas at a 2007 bullfight in Barcelona topped out at 600 euros.

Some corridas or bullfights are beneficas; this is, charity-driven, whose takings are, for example, to support cancer research or help associations of children with special needs. It is not unusual to see sisters — that is, Catholic nuns — among the public.

The Spanish royals, prominent businesspeople and famous singers and actors are among the celebrity spectators.

Bullfighters who make it big become celebrities themselves in Spain. Their lives and romances are ever present fodder for gossip magazines. They are also a treasure for advertisers. Fran Rivera presented, with Spanish actor Paz Vega, a new collection of Paul Versan Swiss watches. He was married for a few years to Eugenia Martinez de Irujo, the Duchess of Alba’s daughter. Armani designed a fashionable traje de luces, or bullfighters’ outfit, with Swarovski crystal, for Fran’s brother, matador Cayetano Rivera, who has done the catwalk a few times.

King Juan Carlos presided over a ceremony this week that granted Fran Rivera a Gold Medal of Fine Arts. Other recipients of the award this year, granted by the Ministry of Culture, include painter Isaac Diaz Pardo, jazz musician Pedro Iturralde, singer Miguel Bose, actor Pilar Bardem (Javier Bardem’s mother), film director Isabel Coixet and chef Juan Mari Arzak.

Bullfighting receives public funds, though this is not so in Catalonia.

Some bullrings are artfully decorated beauties of architecture. When bullfighting is out of season, the arenas are used for other events, such as the circus, concerts — Madonna and Elton John, among others, have played in bullfight rings — and sports events such as Red Bull’s Xfighter Competition.

Bombing rattles Spain

Spain woke up Wednesday morning to a mix of fear, relief and indignation. A car bomb parked next to a 14-story building of Guardia Civil offices and homes in the northern town of Burgos exploded at 4 a.m., stripping the facade down to its framework but "miraculously" causing no casualties. Reportedly 65 people suffered injuries, mostly with cuts, none of them serious. One hundred seventeen people — Guardia Civil agents and their families, including 41 children — were inside the building, sleeping. Spanish media reported the vehicle — a van stolen in France and with fake Spanish license plates — was loaded with several hundred kilos of explosives. Authorities believe ETA was responsible.

Minister of Interior Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said, "This is not an attack against the Guardia Civil only, which is detestable, it is an attack planned to hurt their families, which makes it particularly mean ... An attack aimed to kill — there's no doubt about it — that luckily did not cause deaths." Perez Rubalcaba added, in reference to ETA, "Today we know they are murderers, savages and mad, and that does not make them stronger, but it no doubt makes them more dangerous."

Listed by Spain and the European Union as a terrorist organization, ETA, the initials for "Euskadi Ta Askatasuna," which in Basque means Basque Homeland and Freedom, was founded in 1959 to fight for the independence of the Basque region of Spain and France. Since then, it has killed more than 800 people, including children. Its targets have included members of the armed forces, police, politicians, university teachers, judges and journalists. The Guardia Civil is a Spanish security corps dependent on both the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Interior.

Neighbors from nearby buildings were evacuated in the aftermath. Spanish television news showed nervous women and men on the verge of tears, explaining with trembling voices how suddenly a big noise was followed by glass raining upon them.

School's out of the closet

This year’s Gay Pride parade poster shows a triangle similar to the traffic sign warning to watch out for children crossing the road. The slogan is “Escuela sin armarios” or “School without closets.”

Antonio Poveda, president of FELGTB, Spain’s Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Transsexuals and Bisexuals, said the message is that homosexuality should be more visible in schools.

He explained that a study conducted by his organization shows only 7 percent of high school students knows that poet Federico Garcia Lorca was gay. Books and teachers do not tell about historical characters’ homosexuality, he complained.

Jesus Santos, father of a 7-year-old son and president of Galehi, an association of lesbian and gay families with children, argued, “We don’t live in a heterosexist society only, there’s also us. This should be brought up in schools so children see homosexuality as something natural.” Adolescence is a difficult time, and emotional-sexual development is key in a person’s personality, he said. “Many gay and lesbian teenagers experience critical situations in school,” he added.

“Teachers do not talk about sexual orientation. We need schools without closets to continue our progress,” Poveda said.

But Ignacio Arsuaga, president of HazteOir, a citizens’ movement, thinks otherwise. “At first, homosexual marriage is presented as sort of a right, but now what gays want is to impose their own ideology in schools,” he protested.

Benigno Blanco, president of the Spanish Family Forum, contends that the introduction of that “particular vision of the person and sexuality” in schools is “a clear disdain to a free society’s ideological pluralism in a democratic nation.”

Free society. Ideological pluralism. Democratic nation. Phrases that supporters and critics of the initiative could all employ to defend their positions.

Stinging business

Jellyfish can ruin a summer vacation. Their presence on the coasts — which can neither be anticipated nor prevented — means at best not swimming and at worst a painful sting.

But an increase of swarms on Mediterranean shores has yet to reach levels that could supply a practical use for these creatures beyond their translucent poses in underwater photography.

The tons of jellyfish removed from the Spanish Mediterranean coasts every year are left to dry in the sun for 48 hours and then rinsed with fresh water. This puts an end to their toxicity. They are then treated as organic waste.

There are no specific businesses dedicated to jellyfish disposal. “A sector cannot be built on an unpredictable resource,” said Josep Maria Gili, a marine biologist with the Ocean Science Institute, belonging to the CSIC, the Center for Scientific Research.

That explains why other initiatives to exploit jellyfish have gone nowhere.

Bionaturis, a Spanish biotech company, conducted a study, together with Malaga University and Malaga Oceanographic Center, on jellyfish viability for a variety of uses, including as a fertilizer, in cuisine, and cosmetics.

Jellyfish are 95 percent water and the rest is protein, with virtually no lipids, carbohydrates or  cholesterol, according to Bionaturis. So it would make a healthy food — but yummy? Some Chinese think so. Spanish media reported Chinese businessmen visited the Andalusian coast last summer, searching for this ingredient they reportedly often use in salads; although it seems they did not find the species or the amount here to their liking because a deal was never closed. A very small number of Spanish restaurants are introducing jellyfish into their menus, but it is far from being a popular Spanish tapa.

Jellyfish have high collagen content and thus could be used in anti-aging creams. If people can put snail slime on their faces, why not jellyfish jelly? But the Bionaturis study concluded the hordes of jellyfish arriving in the Spanish coasts are too erratic and small in number to make a reliable resource for an industry.

Spaniards scold the country's ruling party in European elections

Spain's leading opposition party, PP (center-right People's Party), received the largest number of votes in the European elections: 42 percent and 23 seats. PSOE, the ruling center-left Spanish Socialist Workers' Party, received 38.66 percent of the votes and 21 seats.

Analysts conclude Spaniards expressed their anger at the PSOE's management of Spain's economic crisis, but the punishment seems to have been less than predicted. The difference between Spain's two largest parties is two seats, while in the previous European elections, held in 2004, this difference was one seat — 25 seats for the PP and 24 for the PSOE.

After results were made public at 10 p.m., Leyre Pajin, the PSOE's spokeswoman, said the economic crisis had been "a relevant factor in voting behavior in all countries in Europe." She expressed "concern for the increase of extreme right forces in the European parliament."

PP voters gathering outside their party's headquarters to celebrate victory chanted, "Zapatero, dimision" or "Zapatero, resign", in reference to Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero.

CEU, Coalition for Europe, a group of conservative nationalist parties, won two seats.

UPyD, which won its first seat in Spain's national elections last year, took its first seat in the European Parliament with this election.

IU (the United Left) took two seats, and Europa de los Pueblos-Vers (a group of left-leaning nationalist and green parties) a single seat.

Participation was higher than expected: 45.9 percent, similar to the 2004 turnout. Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega, Spain's Vice-President, called the level of participation "decent."

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