THE MUSICAL ONION MAN

‘Twitters from the Atlantic’ – by Barrie Mahoney

Barrie Mahoney was a head teacher and school inspector in the UK, as well as a reporter in Spain, before moving to the Canary Islands to launch and edit a new English language newspaper. He enjoys life in the sun as a columnist and author, and continues to write a series of popular novels, books for expats, as well as designing mobile apps and websites to promote the Canary Islands.

The Musical Onion Man

The sound of a flute playing a short piercing melody interrupted my writing this morning. I looked out of the window and spotted a tall, young man standing in his jeep playing a flute. In the back of the battered old vehicle were boxes of dried, plump onions. After a second or two of playing his cheerful tune, he would drive the vehicle a little further down the road, where he would stop, pick up his flute and repeat the melody. Sadly, he had chosen the wrong time of day, as most of our neighbours were out at work, but one elderly woman did buy a string of onions from him. I could hear laughter from the old woman in response to his cheeky banter, as his vehicle turned and swept out of sight.

This brief incident reminded me of a story that my mother told me long ago about Spanish onion sellers who used to travel from village to village in the UK selling strings of onions from their bicycles. The same onion sellers used to appear at about the same time each year, and village folk would look forward to their visits and often buy strings of onions from them. Spanish onions have, of course, a well-deserved reputation for being particularly delicious, as, it would seem, did many of the onion sellers.

I remember a story about one of my mother’s teenage girl friends who, over a period of two or three years, received regular visits from a Spanish onion seller. By all accounts, he was a particularly handsome and rugged young man, who always had a friendly banter with all he met, whether or not they bought onions from him. He became particularly friendly with one pretty young woman, and it was quickly noticed by many in the village that her family was receiving rather more visits and a greater share of onions than most. It didn’t take the village gossips long to work out that the young woman was receiving a great deal more than onions from this attractive young man.

Matters in the village became rather unpleasant and the young woman quickly became ostracised by those who thought that she was “behaving no better than she should”. However, the story ended happily because, one day, the onion seller appeared for the final time and whisked the young woman off to Spain on his bicycle where they lived happily ever after, or so the story sounded to my young ears.

As a child, I used to wonder how exactly a grown man and woman, complete with luggage and a generous supply of onions could actually cycle from rural England to sunny Spain, but I guess where romance is concerned, anything is possible. My mother never heard from her friend again, but she did once receive word from another friend that the young woman eventually married the onion seller and made her home in Spain, where the happy couple bred a new generation of onion sellers.

As I listened to our musical onion seller disappearing down the road in his battered vehicle, I wondered, fleetingly, if this young man could somehow be a descendent of my mother’s onion seller? I guess, where romance is concerned, anything is possible.

If you enjoyed this article, take a look at Barrie’s websites: www.barriemahoney.com and www.thecanaryislander.com or read his latest book, ‘Escape to the Sun’ (ISBN: 9780957544444). Available as paperback, Kindle and iBooks. iPhone/iPad and Android Apps: ExpatInfo, CanaryIsle and CanaryGay now available.

© Barrie Mahoney

Filed under: http://www.theleader.info/article/41687/

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