Marinaleda: Una Utopia Hacia La Paz.

sloppy. hungry. second breakfast.

Another early morning departure led us to a farming cooperative La Humosa in the curiously remarkable town of Marinaleda. We were greeted with a feast of packaged Spanish cured meats, flour dusted loaves of freshly baked bread, La Humosa's own bright yelllow olive oil for dipping, and bottles of a super sweet orange drink and evocative chocolate milk that we chugged like we were seven years old again. The 3,000 acres estate is land which the government seized from the Duke of Infatatdo in 1991 and is devoted to growing olives, artichokes, fava beans, and peppers. 350 hectres are devoted to the olive trees for olive oil production. They have three types of olives: arbincina, picual and hijo blanco. We had a tour of the olive oil production facility and then were chauffeured in vans to the fields. The seemingly endless flat field of pepper plants was like a giant Tutti Piccante! Green and red piquillo peppers grew surreptitiously underneath the dark green leaves, protecting them from the thirsty heat of the sun and our greedy fingers. We ate the peppers in the field - only slightly concerned about their use of integrated pest management, which means that they are not 100% organic but use pesticides only when needed.

The artichokes plants were overflowing with spiky leaves but no sight of the vegetable yet as the artichoke is only harvested from November to May.

We then went to see the jarring facility as all of the vegetables grown here are preserved in jars. With so many fresh vegetables we all wondered why they would "waste" them in jars, whereas to them, they were preserving them. I think it must have something to do culturally and historically where they feel that they need to save the food in case of hard times. It is curious though, that this social-deomcratic (re: Communist?) town is so against Capitalism, yet are producing these jarred products to be sold in large supermarkets, which directly feed into the Capitalist system. At the time of our visit, they were jarring red piquillo peppers. The peppers would come in the truck loads, go into this large tube where they would be quickly fire roasted and then into a vat to be cooled. The first group of women along the conveyer belt, of which was so high they stood on wooden crates, would remove the seeds and skins and then the peppers would be washed again. The next group of women would individually layer and place the piquillo peppers into the jars. The jars are sealed and pasteurized with only water, garlic, and citric acid added. The women were of various ages; the younger ones would giggle and stare at us - even give the middle finger as we all stared back with our cameras in front of our faces. The floor was covered in seeping pepper juice and dotted with little white seeds. The only men, besides manager-like positions, were two men who were gluing the labels onto the jars.

red peppers go from truck to fire roasted to conveyer belt.

woman manually peeling each pepper

the only men doing manual work. painting the labels.

putting the peppers into jars. 

jarred peppers. ready for the supermarket.

I was fascinated by the assembly line and wondered what it would be like to work there - stage?! I wanted to investigate and write about it. So many products that are easily accessible to just grab off the  store's shelf and ready to eat without cooking require this intimate manual labour to appease our culinary hunger and satisfaction - each pepper is individually added to each jar - but we as consumers just take such convenience for granted. A new lesson on where our food comes from. A new appreciation. 

oozy sluicy pepper sewage

Furthermore, to elaborate on the fact that this is a socialist town, we had a lecture by the man who is charge of housing and development and I thought to myself, why are we hearing about this? we are gastronomy students. but none of us expected to be so intrigued by what we were to hear about this small community. Each employee earns 47 euro a day - 5 euro higher than that national minimum - and each employee regardless of position earns the same salary. The workers in the field work for 6.5 hours a day and the workers in the processing plant work for 8 hours a day. Profits are not divided amongst workers as bonuses at the end of the year, but are reinvested into the infrastructure and the creation of new jobs. Everyone is required to build their own house - the state provides the loan and materials, the town provides the land, and the owner builds it (or can hire someone but young people are trained. also, houses are built in groups so that everyone agrees on a design and each help to build the houses as if it was their own and only after they are finished are they allocated.)

language books.

The houses are also not allowed to be sold, but are passed on within families. Therefore, there are no mortgages, they only pay 15 euro a month, and no value can be added or deteriorated from the house. For only 3 euro, the town pool is available to the residents for the 3 hottest months during the summer. The town determines the books to be taught in school as we sat in a room with elementary language-learning books lay on the floor amongst us. I callowly wondered what these students needed to learn if they were to grow up to work in the jarring plant. In a town that was founded on fighting for the rights of the rural poor and to guarantee employment and housing, I think I might have been missing the point. 

the mayor with his typical,
symbolic Palestinian-style scarf.

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We had lunch at a local restaurant, La Bodega, with the mayor of the town, Juan Manuel Sanchez Gordillo who has been the mayor for the last 30 years. We asked him questions about the fight and struggle they participated in to gain labour rights, land, employment, industry, basic welfare, housing, and agricultural reforms. We asked him about his thoughts on the future and who he looks to for inspiration - Jesus a Communist, he said, was number one. All at once and ever-changing, it sounded creepy, realistic, idealistic, unsustainable in the real world but perfect for their community.


"Así que nos pusimos a conquistar toda y cada una de aquellas cosas que a simple vista nos faltaban" - http://www.marinaleda.com/