 |
|
|
 Travel & Outdoors | April 2007 
Bull Fighting - No Child’s Play This!
 Graham Keeley - The Independent
| | Spanish rejoneador or mounted bullfigther Diego Ventura shows off the two bull's ears he won during Feria de Abril bullfighting festival at Maestranza bullring in Seville April 15, 2007. (Reuters/Javier Barbancho) |
Barcelona - A teenage torero lies soaked in blood in his sequined suit, the latest victim of a controversial craze for child bullfighters sweeping Latin America.
Jairo Miguel, (14), was gored in the thorax and had his lung punctured by a 900-pound bull in Mexico City during a corrida.
“I’m dying, I’m dying,” he said as he was carried from the ring. A bull, named Hidrocalido, lifted the slightly-built Miguel into the air, carried him several yards on one of its horns during the fight on Sunday. Surgeons said the bull’s horn came within an inch of Miguel’s heart.
One of the youngest matadors in the world when he started fighting in Mexico two years ago, Miguel sought to evade the ban on child matadors in his native Spain, where 16 is the minimum age to face a bull in the ring. Matadors must be 18 before they can kill the animal.
In the increasingly competitive world of los toros, (bulls) many young Spanish prodigies get round the rules by appearing in bullfights in Latin America, where the fashion for child toreros has become increasingly popular.
Some child bullfighters are as young as 10 or 12, but the youngest on record was Rafita Mirabal, who was only eight.
He faced calves hundreds of pounds of heavier than him in bullfights near Mexico City in 2005. He still listened to stories on his mother’s knee yet did not appear daunted when he had to face potentially lethal calves in the ring.
But the fad for child toreros has been attacked by anti-bullfighting groups, doctors and child protection groups as irresponsible.
Ms Maria Lopes, of the International Movement Against Bullfights, said both parents and governments which allow children to bullfight should be held responsible.
“Children, many from poor families, are seduced into the world of bullfighting by promises of fame, glory and above all money,” she said.
“What happened to Jairo Miguel is lamentable but it is the result of laws which allow children to take part in bull fights.”
Dr Luis Romero, the surgeon who operated on Miguel at the Aguacalientes Gudalupe Clinic, said: “He was lucky, if you can call somebody who has been gored by a bull lucky.” He added if the four-inch cut had been one inch closer to his heart “this surely would have been a catastrophe where it would have been very difficult to control” the bleeding. |
| |
|
Vallarta Weddings
Tell a Friend
Site Map
Print this Page
Email Us