"This year I have been chosen to be the herald of the festivities of my town, and without my mandolin I feel like something is missing, and I don't think I'm ready, but in the end they encouraged me. I would take the instruments, tune them and play some folías, seguidillas and even a sorondongo.
It is a pride for me, and it fills me with joy, and at the same time it makes me nervous, because as those who know me well know, my thing is folklore.
The most important dates of our town are approaching, where we make the houses white, paint the doors, and the seamstresses are "at full throttle" to make our new clothes.
These are dates to invite friends and family and share our parties with them.
In the square there were stalls and it was full of people, I remember those dances, popular games such as gymkhanas, sack races,?
Finally, the great day arrived, August 24, our Patron Saint Bartholomew, where the military band accompanied the Procession and in the afternoon the ball championship was played with the two teams, Mario and Andreino's team and the other team was Manuel Álvarez's team, known as Manuel "El Aniceto" and Maximino De León and at night we went to see the theater performance.
San Bartolomé has been an agricultural and seafaring town.
Both men and women worked the land to earn a living for the family.
The sailors went to the coast and arrived around the first weeks of July for the festivities of their patron saint, the Virgen del Carmen. I remember that the sailors sang verses to the virgin. When we went with the Ajei rondalla to Arrecife in the years 62-63 at the mouth of the dock, next to the Puente de Las Bolas we sang this verse to the virgin.
Blessed Mother of Carmen
Patroness of Sailors
Bright star of the seas
That lights our way
You enjoy so much greatness
Joys I want to sing to you
Or comfort of sorrows
Lucid star of the sea.
I remember that in the years 55, 60 there was a lot of emigration here in San Bartolomé, many people from the town went to Venezuela, Tenerife, La Palma, Gran Canaria to the Tomato Harvest.
My father was also an emigrant, he went to Venezuela.
I remember when the pionadas were made, people had a meeting point (we'll see each other at La pared La reina or on the Camino Las Majoreras).
In those years the mountain of San Bartolomé was being broken and on the slopes of Montaña Mina many bonfires were made as sweet potato roasters.
Here in San Bartolomé there were many resellers where they went to the Recova de Arrecife and others went through the towns.
I went many times with "Seña Rafaela" to Mácher, which is where my grandmother lived, because she had the distribution in that area, La Asomada and Mácher.
In those streets of La Molina de Don Juan Armas and Don José María Gil there was always a lot of movement of people. I remember that there were many people begging.
Some came to grind, others to buy sweet potatoes, others to buy wines since the best wineries on the island were found in San Bartolomé.
I also remember that they came with donkeys loaded with fresh and dried fish, others with salt from puddles, others with salted shearwaters and sometimes during seasons the Moors came with camels to sell them or trade them.
They played ball there in the ruin that was the store and canteen of the Molina de Don Juan Armas. I lived next to the mill. Later we came to live in Las Calderetas where my father had a store and a canteen.
I remember the parrandas that were formed there. I was lucky enough to be in the store and be able to see the parrandas, because the children could not be where the adults were.
From here perhaps from my childhood where I have lived surrounded by players and singers such as Damián (The Shoemaker), Bernardo Barreto known as "El Rubio", Rafael Elvira, Casimiro Tejera and many who were passing by.
As I liked it more and more and wanted to learn, I went to the house of Don José María Gil in a small room (Casa Juan Viña) and he told me that he had many children and that they did not fit there but he told me to come and learn to play. So I asked him the first days to teach me the tuning points and he replied that without knowing the tones he could not do it, but he told me that the guitar was tuned to the fifth fret, and then I took my grandfather's guitar with wooden pegs, tuned it and Don José María could not believe that I had tuned it.
Until one day he told me that a mandolin was needed for the Rondalla Ajei. Then Don José María Gil brought me a bandola and I played it like a mandolin, shortly after Don Esteban Gil told his father that he was ready to be a member of the Antigua A.F. Ajei together with the elders. I was the youngest of the group and I was there until it dissolved.
Although we continued to meet a few friends and went out for Ranchos de Pascua and some birthdays until one day we decided together with Gaudencio De León and Esteban Gil to form Guadarfía, where my brother-in-law Ico Arrocha and a few more joined us, all this in 1978.
Always taking our folklore through the towns of the island and outside of it. Counting on the luck of having great singers, such as Marcial Betancor López, Pedro Martin and many more, always sharing with Ico Arrocha. Until one day they called us from television to compete in the program Destino El Éxito, where the beginnings of the dance corps were, being a semifinalist of the Canary Islands.
Today it fills me with pride to belong to Guadarfía, my home, my people, today we have 32 people between dancers and players, all of them are my family, my town?
We will see each other between folklore, with my companion La mandolina, my memories and our future, as always uncertain.
Thank you to all who have accompanied me on this special night, in which I proclaim the Festivities of my town, San Bartolomé. From today its festivities begin, in the street, in the square, in the church, in the park?.we will see each other in them".
