How often do you have a chance to go to a bullfight? I guess if you are a bull fighter, you get that chance all the time, but I mean, without going to Spain or Mexico? If you are me, you almost never get the chance.

I was told that about a hundred miles out in the dessert, there was a bull ring, where Portugese people all congregate for a bullfight. Not the old fashioned kind of bullfight, where they kill the bull at the end, but it isn't exactly bloodless either, as I found there. They stab the bull with decorated sticks with about a four inch spike in the end. The stick stabs in the bull and stands straight up as the bull runs around, like a pin cushion. Mostly the bull just looks enraged and confused and keeps running into the plywood shields. It is sort of like watching someone torment a strong, retarded angry beast, and the crowd cheers every time a spike is sunk into the back of the bull. There is also a sad little brass band with a tuba and trumpet, and a very small parade of little girls who wear tiarras and march across the ring before the fight.

There are matadors, and torreadors, and picadors, all in their lycra and spangled outfits, and they have different roles, running around with capes. The bull sometimes hurts people, or hurts the horse that one of the matadors rides.

There was a food concession stand, selling all Porugese food, with names in Portgese, written on a piece of paper. Although I don't speak it, I could see it was pretty much fly covered sausage, fly covered pork, fly covered fish, and fly covered potato salad. There was an incredible density of flies, especially on the nachos. Although there was a grease cloud, the whole place smelled powerfully of cow shit. There were also mosquitos in force, and most of the audience had a can of Off with them.

Although the main action was in the ring, there was quite a bit of action in the parking lot, with all the ranch hands drinking beer and the jailbait girls in their tube tops.

But it was all kind of beautiful and sad, since I couldn't help but think about how the fighters themselves had to be so good at what they do to not get killed, and there is pretty much no place left for what they do. Toward the end of the night, all the Picadors line up and the bull charges them, and they don't get out of the way, they just all tackle the bull. But the guys in front get lifted by the horns, and afterwards, one guy had to be carried off the ring.