Journal from Spain #2 - Land of Fatty Temptation

Oink! With cured legs of ham hanging from every storefront, it's easier to find bacon than water in Spain. Jamon here, jamon there: its the chewy tendon that holds this country together.

It's ridiculous (and, well, impossibly delicious-looking*.)

Absolutely overwhelming:

1. The creative doorknobs of a sidewalk cafe just a little stroll past my flat.

2. Museo de Jamon - literally, "The Pork Museum."  It's a chain restaurant lined with row after row of hanging ham, in every slow-cured variety.  This one is about a hundred meters past my school, but there are at least two more similar establishments on that one city-block.

3. I'm not making this up. The words of Florencio Sanchidrian, named "the best slicer in the world" at the World Championships in Paris:

"Before I slice, the ham speaks to me and tells me how it wants me to treat it. It comes alive. It's a moment full of magic and mystique, and it varies on each occasion. Its fatty streaks show me the way."

Mr. Sanchidrian refuses to perform in front of audiences of more than thirty people.

"It's because I slice out of motivation and inspiration, and I express harmony, creativity, beauty, poetry, happiness and - dare I say it - culture."

Along a single cut of ham, he recognizes five independent flavors that, together, are actually One.

"There's a succession of hints of almond, of oak grove, of pasture, of nature, of countryside - in short, of freedom."

Magic. Culture. Freedom. Jamon.



--
Rambam, Shemonah Perekim 6 - "[regarding prohibitions that have no apparent rational basis] a person must let his soul remain attracted to them, and recognize that he abstains from them only because of the Torah."