The Walk

My grandmother always says that I’m very lucky because of all the rights I have now. The story would have been different if I had been born in her decade. Isabel and Angel, my grandparents grew up in a little town in the north west of Spain. Between the years 1936 and 1956 Spain was sunk in a difficult situation. The Spanish Civil War broke out. At the same time Spain was also immersed in The Moors War in Africa. Furthermore, General Franco at that time was a very powerful person in the army who later became the dictator of Spain. My great grandfather and his son, Angel, lived this terrible period where they had to fight every day to survive in a devastated Spain.

During the Spanish Civil War there were bombings every week. My great-grandfather was one of the volunteers to advise all the people of the town to run to a shelter. He was able to know when the bombings were going to happen through how the birds acted flying away. Most of the houses had underground wine cellars, and these cellars acted like bunkers. Thanks to them my great-grandparents were able to survive. Another thing that my great-grandfather had to do was take the ration cards of his family and get the food for the day. The portions were very small, so they were always hungry. My grandmother always tells me how she had to eat potato peel. Another sad moment that my great-grandfather had to experience was seeing their friends leave. Every other day, empty trucks arrived at the town, and the soldiers forced men to ride the trucks. They told them that nothing was going to happen, but they never returned. My great grandfather used to call it “The walk”.

However, my great-grandfather was lucky. He didn’t fight in Spain, but he was sent to Africa were the Moors War was happening. The trip to Africa was four days long. He took several trucks and a boat. My great-grandfather was short and thin, so by the time he arrived to Africa he was even thinner and weaker. He arrived with another hundred men. The soldiers divided them into five groups. My great-grandfather was scared, because all the men in his group were like him, short and thin, so the possibility of surviving was slim. General Franco, by that time, told his group that they were in charge of making cigarettes for the whole Spanish armament. My great grandfather was relieved to hear that he wasn’t going to risk his life. He was too short to use big guns so he spent two years of his life making cigarettes. The war was not over, but General Franco and his war squad returned to Spain, and among them, was my great-grandfather happy to see his family after many years.

Meanwhile, life in Spain was going to worse because Franco’s dictatorship began. The Spanish Civil War ended, and General Franco was more powerful than ever. There were a lot of rules to follow if people didn’t want to die. Angel, my grandfather at that time, was twenty, and he was a shepherd. Every time he saw soldiers on the roads he had to put his arms up, and shout “Go Spain!” so they didn’t kill him. There weren’t political parties, and talking about politics was prohibited as well as meetings of more than ten people. Moreover, he had to do turns at the church door to spy people. There wasn’t freedom of speech. Also, all the people had a curfew so after eight o clock my grandfather had to communicate with his friends by underground passageways. People could only speak Spanish, but my grandfather’s neighbors used to speak Catalan at home. My grandfather’s brother-in-law was killed because he said something that he was not supposed to say, and there were more people like him who disobeyed one of those rules.

My grandfather died, but my grandmother is still alive, and she remembers those days as dark gray. She was able to raise six children trying to give them everything that was possible at that time. She taught them to value what she did not have, and she is doing the same with me. Every time my grandmother sees that me, my cousins, aunts or uncles are not being fair, she tells us some story that she or her ancestors had to experience through. Sometimes my grandmother and I think differently because I didn’t see all those barbarities that occurred during the war. Consequently, she is relieved that our family is living in a period of relative calm with rights and freedom.