6:00 PM Manolo and Piki are still missing from the artists. The whole family is here, and some curious people who have “dared” to travel to El Gornal. Of the 98 people who said they would attend on a social network that starts with f, only 6 appear. We must have done something wrong with the communication, or the answer to the question that Mercedes asked us in the interview we did with her is: nothing. The question was: —And why should non-Roma people care about all this?—. She was asking in reference to the place that articulates our inquiry: Lachó Bají. Lachó Bají (Good Luck) was a Puente School for Roma children from some shacks (later barracks) located between two settlements of equally “vernacular” architecture, La Bomba and Can Pi. Some refer to that interstitial place as La Cadena, others as Polígono Pedrosa, and still others transferred the name of the school to the territory. The school was promoted by the Secretariado Gitano and the public administration in the late 60s and early 70s. María Ventura was one of the first two teachers who, together with the neighbors, built the first barrack of the Lachó Bají school, while in the mornings she continued to teach at the Pomezia school in what are now the blocks of La Florida in L’Hospitalet. She and her husband Lawrence, who is from Canada, have allowed us to scan some of the images from their family album. In one of the photos, Larry is lying on the ground embraced by several children, to his right a girl smiles and to his left the one that some have identified as Uncle Raimundo waves his hand, right next to him a child shows the camera his flamenco pose, sideways with his arm raised, the last protagonist of this image laughs and seems to struggle to get out of the photo while the flamenco holds him by the jersey. We have decided to call this project of walk + song + memory with the name of this school. We are not the first, the entity with which we collaborate also takes its name from there; the association Lachó Bají Calí, adds this last word calí, Roma: the Roma good luck.
6:30 PM “El Negro” and Juan finally appear with their guitars, there is nervousness, it is normal. It’s time to start: —This is not a guided tour—, says Paco before giving way to the first song. What we have prepared are some images, on whose reverse there is always a text facing each other. Their origin is diverse: family albums, press, books, own and others’ interviews… The image/text pairs do not have to be related in a “nice” way, let’s say, perhaps the relationship is established with the image(s) or the text(s) of another(s) of the poster(s), together they form a discursive and narrative constellation of the things that we have been finding associated with that place. In the same plane are press clippings and personal photographs, the prefabricated panels of the barracks and the sculptural architecture of Toyo Ito, Celestino Corbacho, mayor of L’Hospitalet from 1994 to 2008 and main promoter of the so-called Economic District that today is imposed on what was once the informal city, and Papa Mundo, one of the old Roma who told stories in the fire of the barracks. The relationships established by Aroa, 14 years old, will not be the same as those established by Nuria, who is a bit older. In any case, what is interesting is that both visions intersect, when passing some of these papers Aroa discovers that she is amused by the accent of Núria, our friend “Asturialiana”(1) (1. Australian of Asturian parents) and that is where a certain type of exchange begins. The start is by bulerías, you have to lower the recorder a little because it saturates, «I am not afraid of your love» says the lyrics of Los Barraconeros.
6:40 PM We arrive at the height of the Masia Can Gotlla. This construction and its palm tree are our place of reference to move between IKEAs and hotels signed by famous architects. For Manolo or Juan it is the only way to locate their old house, the orientation tells them that the second settlement of barracks (the one built by the City Council after the flood of 71 dismantled the first neighborhood of barracks) coincides with the location of the Hotel Congress, of four stars. But before heading there we have to sing a song in this our second stop. There are discrepancies about the exact place, the original idea, more radical without a doubt and defended by Lázaro with vehemence is to enter the plot located in front of the farmhouse, which was once the orchard and is now one of the few spaces not built. The plot, which preserves some trees and where weeds grow wild, is owned by Benetesa SA, an opaque business-real estate group in which Bankia participates with 20% of the shares and the Banco Financiero y de Ahorros (BFA) —of which Bankia is its subsidiary— with 10%; it has been impossible for us to contact the company of which some telephone numbers appear on the internet to which nobody ever answers, ninuni, ninuni, ninuni. The orchard has more connotations for them than the farmhouse itself. But there are many of us and accessing the plot even if only for a few moments is not an easy task. Logistically there are some problems: we only have some pliers, the splice of the gate is flush with the ground and is not too big. In addition, if the police appear, no matter how many explanations we give, we are trespassing on private property and there could be complications. Finally we decided to do it next to the farmhouse, the place also has another layer of meaning not without irony: it is currently the headquarters of the Consortium for the Renovation of the Gran Via; at the door, the logo and the image of the new Gran Via that were designed by Mariscal «to give identity to a comanche territory»(2) according to his statements that we collect in one of the posters that we distribute. Before the song of Los Barraconeros, Lázaro brings two of his children on stage, so they are learning. This stop corresponds to the color green, the photocopy on colored paper is a small luxury that we have allowed ourselves.
7:15 PM. The illuminated facade of the Hotel Congress is present throughout the journey from Can Gotlla. The transit is the richest moment of exchange, some of the Roma who inhabited these places seem really moved by the images, they recognize people, memories and anecdotes appear. Indeed, we confirm during the journey that Lachó bají is not a guided tour, everyone has a memory, a knowledge, an experience of the city to share with others. Someone does not speak and the others listen, but everyone speaks with each other in a multiple and decentralized conversation. The hotel is one of the most significant points of the tour because its location coincides with that of the barracks. Here, too, there are doubts about the exact place to carry out the action of reconstructing the territory with the sung memory: there is a fountain that attracts the attention of the artists, but also another small plot right next to it where, according to Manolo, you can still see some tiles from their old houses on the ground. The height of the reed and the corrugated sheet metal fence make access difficult once again, the plots resist us, however the hotel management agreed that we could occupy its facilities for a moment. Nor will it be the fountain, finally the terrace of the cafeteria is the chosen place. There is a problem with the batteries of the recorder, while Los Barraconeros rehearse and reveal the lyrics that most explicitly have to do with the theme that concerns us today. It seems that they give certain preeminence to the video in front of the action itself. Mercedes comments with the group while we make time “Luis is entering his childhood and wants to take off his shoes and walk barefoot, he has already taken them off. The instinct of his childhood of the barracks has been born, he has taken off a shoe so you can see”. Next to him Luis rubs his bare feet on the floor of the terrace of the Hotel Congress. Mercedes adds: “We all remain from here”, a girl answers him: “From a hotel?”. The batteries have already been changed.
Franco called them shacks
And another jambo barracks
[…]
At night
The old men
Old stories they told
Sitting and in the yaqui
The manolo stayed
Whose is that child
Who has fallen asleep
Go take him to bed
‘yaqui’ is ‘fire’ in caló, and ‘de quién sinela’ means ‘whose is it’.
7:45 PM From the beginning, Los Barraconeros’ estimates of the location of the Lachó Bají school coincide with the entrance door to the pavilions of the Fira 2 of Gran Via, extension of the Fira Montjuïc. Following their indications in the postcard that we have edited we place the name of the school on a construction that looked like it in the aerial view and that effectively corresponds to the door of the Fira. The photo represents a strange moment, early 90s, just the moment of transition, the current streets and plots already appear but there is still no trace of IKEA or the organic forms projected by Toyo Ito. Someone comments with bad blood, that it looks like a chicken durum, the durum won the Emporis Skyscraper Award 2010 for the best skyscraper in the world as commented by Manel Domínguez of the Centre d’Estudis de L’Hospitalet, who shared those data with us while we walked. He also adds that the height of the building was increased by two meters precisely to be considered that, a skyscraper. The sum of the enormous scale of the buildings and the absence of people transiting the streets, make up a strange and, to some extent, inhospitable scenario, you can perceive at skin level the interests that have shaped it. To finish, spontaneously —it was not planned in our initial plan— the members of Lachó Bají Calí, big and small, sing in chorus a song that they composed for the comparsa of the past carnival, it is titled España está pelá and is an adaptation of the I will survive by Gloria Gaynor.
4:40 AM Los Barraconeros have been rehearsing somewhat compulsively due to nerves. The voice of one of the guests of the night crosses from a corner the backstage, “President Arthur no, President Pepe” Arthur is Artur Mas and Pepe, one of the artists of the night. The schedule marked by those responsible for the night is being fulfilled fixed as the clock. The video for the projection that will support Los Barraconeros is the one that has been about to be left out, it arrives just in time, we are parading down.
Mercedes seems to have a little lache, she is not convinced now by the presentation that we had prepared to try to share the work process. She and Paco go out, already on the stage she seems more calm and at the beginning she plays a little to Ortiz Nuevo, but finally it is he who manages to leave her out of the game by asking her if “he can show her what Roma good luck is”. It is the turn of Los Barraconeros, they enter the stage and the first two rows, occupied by the family, are in charge of cheering them and sheltering them.