The Bertsotruk initiative, which was launched on 14 November, is no more than an excuse. An excuse to leave the village, an excuse to sing, an excuse to play, an excuse to relate, a pretext for poteo, an excuse for a return to the table… an excuse to know different realities.

We also left our villages on Saturday morning with this excuse to sing at the “tip” of Barakaldo, play with the bertso, meet people who meet every week in the bertso-eskola, take some drinks and taste a very hot dish that would leave us frozen in the early winter cold.

The train departing from the bertso-eskola of Senpere to pick up the members of Erniarraiz and reach the Commissions in the centre of Gipuzkoa, seemed to be unable to go without stopping at Busturialdea. From one end to the other of Euskal Herria, three countries, four bertso-eskolas, four realities, thirty friends and no excuses.

Under the title of a challenge, but between friends and friends the sketches, the zancuds, the ducks, the habaneras of six or seven points that we could not reach eight -- we have never been skilled in the first words. But in addition to the bertsos, they began for a shameful “good day”, continued with the “this is cold” of compromise and exchanged the names to a smile “waiting for the next”, the balls of yarn, the meatballs, the potatoes, the plastic spoons, the pans, the fears, the prejudices (“Barakaldo will bring Euskera, so!”).

Other were the ideas and reflections we had on the return journey from that meeting point to the tip of the house itself. It was seen that they have something to teach in the bertso-eskola of Senpere, and that there are also people who want to be listened to in the valley that has been the cradle of the bertsolaris for years. The Bertsolaris School of Embodiments once again demonstrated that beyond the 4-year-old BEC there is a Barakaldo who wants to live in Basque and Basque and that Bertsolaris is another tool for this. We have to learn from each other in exchange for our own experiences and those of others, turning each encounter into a party.

Therefore, I would say that we cooked something more than the potato dish that burned our tongue in five degrees on the Saturday date, both on the streets of Barakaldo and at the entrance of gaztetxe, and this has only just begun. The Bertsotruk, which will travel all the smaller corners of Euskal Herria, and which will attract bertsolaris, amateurs and anyone close by, is already underway. We are certainly waiting for the next meeting.