BOABDIL’S CURSE
Why it’s so hard for us to get to Granada
Boabdil was the last sultan of the last Moorish sultanate in Spain. In 1492, after a siege lasting several years, Boabdil surrendered Granada, ending more than 700 years of Moorish rule. As he left Granada, he looked back from the mountains at a city that he had lost without a fight and sighed in despair. This was the famous Last Sigh of the Moor. Rather than console him, his mother chastised him by saying “You do well to weep as a woman for that which you could not defend as a man.” This might be called The Ultimate Mockery of the Moorish Mom.
How bad can it get? You lose Al-Andalus and suffer a tongue lashing from your mother. All on the same day. If there were ever a time to rage and curse, this would be it.
While history holds no record of a Last Curse of the Moor, there had to be one. What curse might Boabdil have flung upon the victors? Several possibilities come to mind.
“Let history know the children of your children’s children as bull killers and stomp dancers.”
“May your land be conquered once again by non-catholics in search of cheap wine and seaside villas.”
“May the road to Granada be as difficult as the road away has been for me.”
While all three curses have been fulfilled, only the last applies to us. Yes, friends, Boabdil’s curse has been the source of our troubles. Consider the following. When we moved to Spain in October of 2003, our37-hour trip included a 11-hour flight from San Francisco to Frankfurt, Germany, a seven-hour wait at the airport waiting for an open flight, a two-hour flight to Madrid, a one-hour, traffic-clogged taxi ride to the bus station (there were no night trains), a 2 1/2-hour wait for the next bus (we’d missed the nine o’clock bus due to traffic), and a 5-hour bus ride to Granada, where we were met by Flannery.
Our return trip of July 2004, though not so arduous, still held its difficulties. This time the journey began in Knaresborough, in Yorkshire, where we had been visiting Rusty, our dear Mill Valley friend and neighbor. We were driven to the York train station by Rosemary, a long-time friend of Rusty’s and now a friend of ours. This 40-minute ride was followed by a two-hour train trip to London, a one-hour ride to Heathrow on the Underground, a two-hour wait, then a two-hour flight to Malaga, Spain, on the coast.
The flight landed 20 minutes late. We waited almost 20 minutes between retrieving our first bag and our last, then rushed out to the taxi stand. The last bus to Granada left at 9 p.m. The bad news was that it was 8:35; the good news was that a taxi was waiting; the bad news was that traffic slowed well before Malaga.
“Taxi to Granada?” he asked. How much? He handed us the rate sheet. €142, about $170. No thanks. Plus we only had the €130 we left Spain with. We’ll take our chance with the nine o’clock bus, we told him. Then traffic stopped.
“Nueve?” the driver said, rocking his hand back and forth. Getting there by nine didn’t look good. And there were no guarantees that if we made it, there would be available seats on the bus.
“Granada,” he said again. He held up his hand and wrote €118 on it. I’d already figured that if we missed the bus, it would cost more than €100 for a hotel, dinner, a taxi to the bus station, the bus tickets, plus this taxi.
Kay and I looked at each other. We were tired and wanted to go home. We did not want to schlep our five bags around anymore. We wanted to sleep in our own beds.
“On to Granada!” we shouted. And off we went.
We made the two-hour bus trip in one hour flat. Traffic was light, the driver skilled and the ride was muy rapido. He dropped us off at 10 o’clock. I gave him €125 for the speedy trip (I don’t even want to know the conversion), keeping €5 for a sandwich and a beer.
The bad news? The apartment was hot. The good? The air conditioner works quite well. We slept like babes.
