  
THREE GENERATIONS
-IBIZA Island -
Never
before in the history of the island of
Ibiza
has been such a big change in so little time.
It has been for the last sixty years and we have people adapted to the
times in which we live, as always.
I put myself as an example, but we could put many other families of the
island.
My grandfather, same as most of the people at those times, worked in
agriculture.
He did not own land, so he worked
mayoral farm and what was produced he shared with the owner.
He took also one of the few ways that then existed on the island to get
a wage, working in the salt.
At the end of the summer and when land did not give so much work,
leaving his wife and children, that is my grandmother, my father and my
uncles, the care of the land and animals, sheep, goats, cows, horse,
rabbits, chickens, turkeys, etc.. and left to collect the
salt and
salt loading on the
ships that came to get it.
A hard work where there are, the days from sunrise to sunset, carrying
large bags on his head, suffering from high temperatures and the effects
of salt on the skin.
Few were the days that he could afford it, but when he had time enough,
he liked to go fishing.
At that time, people went on foot
or by carriage drawn by a horse.
With time and effort, he had managed to buy a
bicycle and he rode to
the coast on it to fish.
While he spent a pleasant moment fishing, it also brought some variety
to feed the family.
My father lived through the era in which young people left the land to
begin work in tourism.
Once married, he became independent from his family and began working in
another mayoral farm.
It was there I was born.
At the end of the
fifties, the airport
opened to commercial traffic
and tourism began
arriving in significant numbers.
My father found work at
night
concierge at the hotel Montesol,
which was the first hotel in town, called before the Ibiza Gran hotel,
opened in 1933.
The night work allowed him to study languages by himself.
He learned some English and French and soon became a
receptionist,
reception manager and later
director of the hotel.
Until then he went to work by bicycle,
but then his salary allowed him to buy his first
car, a
Renault “Gordini”.
A few years later, he bought a small
hostel.
That was where I was raised.
I inherited from my father love for foreign languages and from a very
young age I liked to talk to
tourists and tell them things from my island.
At that time I could not know that this would become my profession. by IBIZA
GUIDE: Jose Costa Torres Member
of the A.P.I.T.I.F
- Association of
OFFICIAL TOURIST GUIDES for Ibiza and Formentera
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