JimenaPulse
About Jimena de la Frontera, the province of Cadiz and Spain as a whole, focused on this small village in the mountainsArchive for SERIES
WE ARE INSIGNIFICANT (4)
Size matters, we’re told. So in this weird philosophical series, which Prospero hopes is being followed attentively by at least a couple of his readers every Monday, he is trying to relate the way we think of ourselves, sizewise, to our real size. They say that the best business deal is to buy a man for what he is really worth, and sell him for what he thinks he’s worth – don’t know if this applies to women, though. It wouldn’t apply to planets and the cosmos, however. (It might, just, apply to Jimena.)
Last week (click here to see it – or follow the saga by clicking on ‘Series’ below) our enormous planet was still there. Today we have shrunk to nothing. Come back for more shrinking next Monday at 9 a.m.
HEALTH CARE IN JIMENA (4)
THE DEVELOPMENT OF HEALTH CARE IN JIMENA (1952 – 2007)
by CURRINI
People helped each other, too, by passing on things they had learned from their family. Most of this knowledge had no scientific basis: for instance, you might get told to pass a large iron key across your mouth, in the morning for three days, to cure a cold sore. Or to grab a handful of cobwebs and put it in a poultice on a wound. Or to rub your eye with a fly to heal a sty.
There were two doctors in Jimena around 1954: Don José Montero and Don Juan Marina. The former lived and had his surgery across the street from el Pósito (‘depósito‘, i.e. storage rooms, where the Casa de la Cultura at the top of the village is today and that earlier became the village’s first discothèque). He also owned the summer cinema next to his house, where a market was later installed. Don José was asthmatic but he could be seen every day slowly walking up the streets carrying his little black bag, to visit his patients.The other doctor was Don Juan Marina Bocanegra, whose surgery and home was where the new Hotel is now. He was much younger than Don José and further advanced in his medicinal knowledge. He loved shooting and owned the town’s electricity (I remember having electric lights only at nights and never in the daytime). It was Don Juan who started ‘the Insurance’ but the service was so bad that one had in the end to succumb to cash payment. Among other things, the prescriptions never seemed to be covered by it.
There was also the local official partera (midwife), named Rosario, with her green eyes, her hair in a bun and a large black dog that was always looking out of the postigo (shutter or little window in a door). However, most of the women called in the neighbours who had always assisted at births even if they didn’t have a certificate to prove it.
Then there were the practicantes (‘nurses’). Don José Malagón and Don Miguel Cuenca would always be seen with their little shiny boxes that contained the dreaded syringes steeped in alcohol. They went from house to house all too often. The doctors and the practicantes all reeked of medicine and you could smell them coming a mile away.
Follow the story here next Tuesday, November 6th.
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HEALTH CARE IN JIMENA (3)
THE DEVELOPMENTOF HEALTH CARE IN JIMENA (1952 – 2007)
by CURRINI
All of us kids went through the usual illnesses: you know, paperas (mumps), sarampión (measles), escarlatina (scarlet fever), varicela (chicken pox), rubéola (German measles), anginas (tonsillitis), sarna (scabies), uñeros (whitlow) and such. And we had innumerable accidents, of course. All of these were cured at home because, among other things, there was no money at home and a visit to the doctor, who had to be paid, was only made out of absolute necessity. Very few people had el Seguro (‘the Insurance’) in those days, but I’ll talk about that later.
There was also an intermediate stage between medicine from the talega and proper medicine. This was the world of the curanderos and curanderas (healers). I don’t know anything about these things but as a child I had something on my nose they called dicipela (?), which would not disappear no matter how much cream you put on it, and it was getting worse. In the end my sister took me to an elderly lady who said some prayers over my head. But the good lady had to say these prayers for seven days, during which I must not get wet. As I said, I know nothing about it, but the thing gradually went away. There were people who specialized in curing the culebrinas (shingles) with prayers, although they also put on poultices with oil and gunpowder. In this area we can also include other specialists such as el hombre de los parches (‘the man with the patches’). I can see him now, well dressed in his jacket and hat. He was from Olvera and came to Jimena every week to his ‘surgery’. There were also el tío de los huesos (‘the bone guy’) in Montejaque, who mended broken bones, and the man in Arriate who cured mal de ojos (the evil eye).
Follow the story here on Tuesday, October 30th
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WE ARE INSIGNIFICANT (3)
Still feeling the need to explain himself, Prospero assures his readers that he has not gone peculiar. If you’ve followed this series up to now you will know that this is merely an attempt to get a grip on our daily routine; maybe even get us to ask ourselves a few of those questions we don’t like to look at much, such as, Is what I’m about to say that important? Or, What am I doing here? Of course, he understands that these things pale into insignificance when the plumber/builder/electrician/fill-in-the-space hasn’t turned up as promised – again.
Last Monday (click here to see it – or click on ‘series’ below for the whole saga so far) we had shrunk to minuscule proportions compared to some of the larger planets in our galaxy. Look at the picture: we’re getting smaller, aren’t we? And anyway, we’re here for the sun, aren’t we?
Alright, now you can call that wretched plumber…
HEALTH CARE IN JIMENA (2)
THE DEVELOPMENT OF HEALTH CARE IN JIMENA
by CURRINI
Our parents had a lot of these remedies, which, if they really did cure you they made you suffer even more. Opening my mouth my mother would say, “Your tongue’s white” and off she’d go to fetch the classical laxative that came in a variety of tastes, including ‘chocolate’, or Agua de Carabaña, which tasted awful, or little papers known as Panacea. If you had a temperature they’d put cold cloths on your forehead or slices of potato; if you trembled with cold from the fever you’d get a hot brick wrapped in a cloth at your feet. For spots and insect bites there was usually a pot with a bálsamo (balsam) plant (I think my Aunt Encarna still has one) and this was rubbed endlessly on the proper place; the spots or bites were probably cured out of boredom.
My Grandmother Isabel used to cure her sore throats and coughs with the slime of large snails, which she put in a glass, adding two spoonfuls of sugar. When our parents thought our thin legs and knobbly knees looked worse than usual, out came the aceite de hígado de bacalao (cod’s liver oil).
I once had a grano de sangre (‘blood boil’) on my behind: I was in bed face down for eight days while my mother put everything on it the neighbours told her to: hot towels, slices of onion, great chunks of bread rubbed with saffron and san pedro (?) leaves. It was interminable but the idea was for the boil to ‘mature’. On the eighth day my Uncle José ‘Hormigo’ came in from the campo and announced that the boil had indeed matured. “Shall I squeeze it?” he asked. The heavens had opened for my mother, who went about preparing cloths and hot water. My uncle began the torture of squeezing out all the evil the wretched thing contained until the blood came out its natural red. A little trapito (rag) was carefully held by some sticky tape and in no time I was outside in the street. My own heaven.◊
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Follow the story here next Tuesday, October 23rd.
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