One day, my friend’s friend Rafa Lopez came to “Las Bellotas” because he was looking for a male to inseminate his Spanish Mastiff
dog. He was really surprised to see so many donkeys, so I explained to him the idea of our project. Then, he told me
about the donkey with a really strong character he used to have one day and which he bought for the rehabilitation of
his autistic daughter. Unfortunately, he had to get rid of that donkey… So I invited him and his children to come back in some
other occasion. For that day I prepared some brushes for Rafa’s children so they could get closer and brush one of our donkeys
called Alfarero.
In the beginning the beautiful six-years-old girl, Elena, didn’t really pay attention to Alfarero. But then, slowly, she started
getting closer and closer to the donkey, brushing and petting him. After getting her father’s permission, we put Elena on
Alfarero’s back. Suddenly, the girl repeated the donkey’s name she had heard before! Rafa and I got so amazed, because as he
explained to me afterwards, this was one of the first times Elena pronounced a four-syllabe word in such a short period of time.
In that moment I gave Alfarero as a gift to Elena who interacted so well with him.
They took him to a ranch where Eleonora keeps on improving her development and every day gets closer to her donkey
and people.
Then, one day, Rafa Lopez called me to say Alfarero was ill, so I told him to call a vet. Unfortunately, this serious
illness and his age took Alfarero…
In order to fill the emptiness after Alfarero’s death, in “Las Bellotas” we prepared another donkey-Nevero, younger than
Alfarero, but as noble as him.
We do belive that Alfarero is somewhere far away from here, but still helping children through the “donkeytherapy”.
Rafael Fuentes, July of 2013
