You have recently been to Etxalar, where you have your first contact in Euskal Herria, in the early 60s of the last century.

Even before I came to the Basque Country, I started reading Caro Baroja, in Chicago, when I was studying anthropology. I had read two or three books. The people of Spain, The Basques and some others. Not much more, but I'm sure it does. The anthropologist Julián Pitt-Rivers was going to be a thesis director, but he had not yet arrived in Chicago. Meanwhile, as I said, reading Caro Baroja, taking into account my intention to do my fieldwork in the Basque Country.

Why Euskal Herria?

The truth is, I don't know. I have read the peoples of Spain and I know that it touched me inside. But it could also have come to Galicia, I do not think so. They were friends Julian Pitt-Rivers and Caro Baroja, Pitt-Rivers himself had carried out a pioneering research on an Andalusian town, he was as expert as he had studied, but in that book of Caro the Basques drew my attention, and I read him Los Vascos. And then, The Peoples of the North. Therefore, I entered the Basque Country through the window of July [Caro Baroja], and if I came in, I would have to say that I have walked from one side to the other of the house.

When I studied in Madrid in 1959, I had no news of Euskal Herria.

None of that. In Reno, for example, when I was in high school, in the only private Catholic school in Nevada, I met two or three Euskaldunes, but I considered them Italians. I could not give another form to his last names… I mean, but I could have heard something, since by then the first American festival had already been held in Reno. Of course, I was not there, because I was studying in Madrid. On the other hand, Sweet Promised Land by Robert Laxalt had already been published, and I might have heard it, too, but you are sure that I had not read it. I don't know. Maybe I'm inventing everything, because when it's been over 50 years, we all have the shy tendency to do that, the urge to invent history. Maybe I'm reinterpreting this from what I've lived. Who knows?

In 1963, he first arrived in the Basque Country in an anthropologist's field work. Which country was it?

As I had read Caro Baroja, I was not surprised. The books of Caro Baroja also had illustrations, there appeared the houses of the Five Villas and the reality was not very different. On the other hand, if I had a lot of work, I was twenty years old, a woman and a one-year-old child. I mean, I couldn't have a solid image of Euskal Herria, I didn't know what I wanted to do, I wanted a small town, immerse myself in their day-to-day lives. Moreover, it had no object of investigation. Saying that I was lost is not too much in this case.

What's your first memory?

I went to Etxalar's inn, with the words I did with Salbadora, her boss. It was he who brought me into contact with the Sarobe. They had a daughter in Paris who worked and owned the Agerea house, already renovated, to rent it to a tourist. He pioneered it, since in 1963 in Etxalar no one smelled of tourism. Now it's 40 rural houses. The fact is that we were housed in Agerra. The neighbors welcomed me with a lot of respect, but of course, Etxalar was a town of smuggling, and it was impossible for people to open all the doors and windows of the house in front of us. While we were at it, I decided that we had to live in a family's home, so that we could do my research as best as possible. In the village there was a very Vascophilous old man, Papillo de Danbori, uncle of Adela and Anjel Sarobe. Papillo gave me the first lessons in Basque. We didn't have grammar or anything like that, except his wisdom and my notebook. It was nothing more than taking notes, some referring to the conjugation of the verbs. Little by little, Papillo and I became friends and friends, and I also met my nephew, Jesus of Danbio. Over time, we strengthened ties with Danbori and those of Sarobe. With them, for example, on the street where we were together every afternoon, he had almost been taken as our one-year-old son, Johnny, and talked to him in Euskera. This is how we get stuck. And then, when I decided to live within a family, Jesus opened the doors of his Buxungoborda, because I wanted to live in the dwelling.

You wanted to act according to social anthropology.

Yes, yes. I had to dissolve myself within the community to which my research was directed. The outbreak was in the village, and it is, it had the rural world in the first person, but on the margins of that everyday reality. I made a journey through the archives of the people, but when I began to ask home, I preferred to live in the dwelling, in the heart of a family, living a real situation, and practicing the Basque as much as possible. A few months after arriving at Etxalar, we were welcomed in Buxungoborda, very happy. I'm glad, my son, not so happy with my wife, Patricia, who was bored with life in the field, had to be in the field from morning to night. After all, I had my job, I was coming down from the town of Buxungoborda to the city, to the archive office, and I was also walking from home to home and from hometown to hometown collecting data. It was hard for Patricia, the child had to grow up in Etxalar. Little Johnny should have been raised in an apartment in Chicago, where my wife lived, not in Buxungobordan, lost in the mountain... We did the year in Etxalar, and in the next two or three years I went back to Euskal Herria, to Etxalar and to Aulesti, to complete the research.

What if you had entered the Basque Country, for example, not by Etxalar, but by Tafalla de la Ribera?

It could not be said. An investigation might have been carried out, but that was not the case. It is pure speculation. If the Pitt-Rivers himself had not been able to come to the Basque Country, and had ordered me to go to Albacete (Spain), I do not know what it would have been. I would have done my job and it's over. When I was a student, I had no attachment to the Basque Country, the Chicago teachers who wanted me to study Maia. They didn't do too much, but if they had been committed, I would have been able to do my thesis in Chiapas, Mexico.

To what extent did Etxalar mark you?

More than terrible. As many as births in Reno. I was born in Reno, but the anthropologist inside of me was born in Etxalar and in Aulesti and, as far as that is concerned, I am entirely from here. I've already done studies in Italy, Australia, here and there, I've worked on other lines of research, but there is no country in the world that has marked me as much as Etxalar and Aulesti. It doesn't exist. And it wasn't more than two years.

What do you say about the time?

When I started working in Etxalar's field, I didn't know, I wasn't able to understand it, but I realized as work progressed, I knew I was researching a world that was going off. It was obvious. It was a very interesting historical moment. That was more Spain than Euskal Herria. The Basques did not care about themselves, but decided on the future of the people here, there was no autonomy, no unified Basque, nor efforts for the Basque culture. In part, everything was condemned, but, on the other hand, the leaders of the people declared themselves in favor of local culture, even though they wanted Euskal Herria within Spain. ETA had already started, but there were not many, not even a threat to the Spanish State. On the other hand, no one knew how far it would go in the future.

In the investigation he went to Aulesti.

It was very different. His parish priest, Don Emilio (Kortabitarte), almost forced us to take those from the house Goitiandia. Don Emilio took the decision, not those of Goitiandio. It is true that his boss, Francisco, was a pastor in the west of the EE.UU, had two children in Boise (Idaho), and that environment inevitably made things easier. I just told him that Etxalar was a contraband people, who lived quietly. In Aulesti, on the other hand, the pastor was the one who struck the fender of Goitiandi, knocked down the door, and with this permission and without mystery we entered the village. What is more, Don Emilio pushed the people to help me, and he certainly also strived to show me the path of nationalism. There was nothing like that in Etxalar. Etxalar's nationalism was in the neighborhood. However, he was known to be a red people of the Five Villas, because he was the only one who voted in favour of the Republic in the elections held before the war in Spain.

In that then Basque country, how does the current one see?

I have no answer. I am going to do it in parts… Politically, the Basques have achieved more than anything. They've been on. Language work is unique in the world, despite all discussions, fights and fights. The standardization of the Basque Country, the work that has been done in teaching, in the media… is impressive. At the time I was in Etxalar, the current situation could not be foreseen. By far. The Basques are the owners of the cultural initiative, they have the initiative of economy and ecology as well. I would have thought about it right away! Today, the Basques are at the head of their country, as well as masters of their landscape. Who would believe that when I lived in Etxalar? Then the corners here were completely destroyed, the dirty air, the bankrupt river… That situation was not only due to Franco, but it was ahead. This disaster was not caused by the Falangists, but was inherited. I see the Basque Country today and I see it as an example.

After the stays at Etxalar and Aulesti, at the University of Reno-Nevada, you were ordered to launch the Basque Studies Program. What then were the Basque studies, what are they now?

Basque studies at that time? At that time there were no Basque studies. As I have said many times, people knew nothing about the Basque. “What is it? French? Spanish? What is Euskera? Do you speak Spanish? They say that the Basque is a country of European mystery.” In this case, mystery is synonymous with ignorance. Disinformation reigned. Since then, we have created a very serious centre and have published several English publications on the Basque Country. We have also done many studies… Few of those who today work in English will ask you what Euskera is. There will still be some on the slopes, but the Basques are no longer unknown in the United States.

You have much to do with it.

The situation forced me. I have worked at the University, not at the level of Basque clubs, but I assure you that the leaders of the Basque clubs know, thanks to the Basque Studies Programme of Reno, what its origin is, what is Euskal Herria, what it is to be Basque. In this respect, we have contributed to the creation of a Basque culture, not directly, but indirectly. If it wasn't Reno, I'd like to know what would have been from here to the United States. United States and, in general, the present of the Basque emigrated to the diaspora. I had no vision of the future. If someone had that vision, it was Jon Bilbao. He wanted to foster Basque culture. I research it. We completed the team.