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12/2/03 Front Page Features Advice From Strangers Ain't That America? Globetrotting With Push Musing With Mitch Moth's Diary Previous Issues Crap Shop Who's at Fault? Contact Us! |
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Aye, mateys! Get you some Daily Probe booty! 
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Globetrotting with Push With your host, Raji "Push" Pushparajah |
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Push Does la Tomatina Alberto, my former friend, invited to visit him and tour some of the quiet Spanish countryside. We spent the night in Valencia before taking the train on a 40 km ride to the sleepy little town of Buñol. In the Plaza Del Pueblo I noticed an odd object. A ham at the top of a lard-encrusted pole. Also, all the store fronts were covered with plastic sheeting. Some sort of mass renovation project I assumed. The smell of spiced foods filled the air. Drunken men and women indicated some sort of festival. Alberto said it was "la Tomatina." The revelers seemed stimulated by the warm Spanish sun and fueled by numerous barrels of sangria. I thought it odd when several large trucks unloaded what must have been several tons of ripe tomatoes on the street. Nearby a cannon fired and then all hell broke loose. Everybody was hurling tomatoes at everybody else. My poor little brown body was pelted from all angles. Welts began to form immediately. It must be illegal for men to wear a T-shirt during this melee for the crowd was chanting "Camiseti!" just before they tore the shirt off my back. This left my delicate hide even more susceptible to the sadistic sting of the produce. Whenever I slipped on the drenched surface or was just trying to hide from the onslaught, a partygoer was only too happy to pull me to my feet so I could to be set upon and attacked by the vicious fruit again. Pulp hung from my ears and seeds wedged their way into my eyes. In the end it wasn't a tomato that was my demise but a knotted up wet T-shirt that struck me square between the eyes. An hour after it started another shot was heard and all activity ceased. Fire trucks came in to hose off the people and the buildings. As I lay marinating in the tomato mixture a kindly couple scooped me out before I floated into the river with the rest of the ankle deep puree. When I awoke I was back in Valencia in a hospital where a beautiful nurse, Inocencia, was trying to separate the tomato flesh from my own. The hospital was very well equipped as was the nurse. What I had been a part of was the world's largest food fight. I have heard the American media refer to weapons of mess destruction and those tomatoes must surly fit that category. At the very least I think the Buñol town elders should petition the Pope to have the tomato declared a forbidden fruit. In the future I will be wary of any occasion that begins with a pork product dangling from the end of a greased stick. Alberto was no where to be found, so my nurse invited me to spend a week recuperating at her apartment where she proved to be nothing like her name. Alberto, I don't know whether to damn you or thank you. |