Donkeys in the Old Days

In the old days donkeys and most other animals were beasts of burden, they all had a job and if they couldn’t do it they were discarded. Donkeys never were given names or brushed or given treats by hand. There was no reason because they were there to work and not for fun or pleasure. Most of the townspeople had land high in the mountains where they would grow food for themselves and the animals and get spring-water to bring home and to deliver to the other townsfolk. It is also where they took the sheep and goats in the summer to find grass and be a bit cooler. The donkey always wore hand-woven grass baskets, two on each side, and the man would ride on the back even if the donkey was loaded to the top, while the women would hold on to the tail and be dragged up the hill. If the donkey were to get sick, home remedies were used as they were on the people that were sick. When an animal got colic, soda water with bicarbonate of soda was poured down its throat, if they had foot problems nitric acid was poured on their feet and covered with rags and an old tin-can nailed to keep it covered or it was burned. If they had lung problems, Zotal or creosote was burned in a closed stable for the donkey or person for that matter to breathe to get better. It does turn your tongue black and make you feel rather ill, but it works and the effects go away with time. For the donkey that wouldn’t move or get up, that happened a lot, a fire was set under it and in short time the donkey was on its feet and ready to go. Because of the distance between towns and the shortage of people I am afraid to say that some of the animals were sexually abused on a regular basis, which is also why there was so much incest among the families. Due no doubt to the incest, many villages have a special disability or tick, or perhaps crossed eyes, or six fingers and toes (as one entire family clan does in our own village); mild deformities or a resemblance between parents, children and cousins, so you can’t tell them apart. Soon after strangers and foreigners started to arrive all of these things slowly stopped and the treatment of animals changed for the better although they still think it is funny to give a donkey a name or feed it a carrot from your hand.
Everyone lives in apartments now and shops in a supermarket so the donkey is slowly dying out. It’s just not much use any more, they shrug. All sorts of programs exist now to try and restore the Spanish donkey. They are wonderful easy-going animals and adorable as babies. With the changes in Spain, the foreigners bought the farmland high in the mountains to make their retirement homes and the locals have no desire to return to the days of hard labor. Everything was on steep hillsides so dry-rock walls were carefully built to make terraces for growing food and building houses. The houses were also built out of dry-rock wall and some of them are still standing while the new homes are falling to pieces due to poor construction and the use of sea-sand to make cement. The dry-rock style only used mud and century plant flower poles to hold the roof. The rocks fit together so well they look like they have been carved to fit but they put them together like a puzzle and collected rocks from all around with their donkeys. There was no wood in this area. My first house and the house where I now live were built of mud and rock and still stand, having had minor adjustments and a lick of paint. There were no roads to the hillside properties - only donkey paths, as were the other abandoned farms in those days, so every rock and window frame was carried on the back of a donkey to build the houses on the beautiful hillsides that the locals abandoned and the foreigners bought for the spectacular views and large pieces of terraced land, plus spring water. Now everything is paved and we have vets and doctors, the beach is full of tiny holiday apartments, bars and discos. The peaceful life has gone in exchange for tourism. In reality, the all-year residents bring in much more money to the community than do the tourists, and they create local jobs as opposed to the tourist who only buys a drink or two before returning to their cheap hotels.