La fábrica de hielo (The ice factory)
MCER B2288 palabras
Until the middle of the twentieth century, ice was an industry. Before every household had a refrigerator, somebody had to make the ice, cut it into blocks, and get it to the fishmonger before it turned into water. The factory in my town employed sixty people and worked all night, because the lorries left at five in the morning.
What killed it was not a better competitor. It was the fact that the customers stopped existing. Between 1960 and 1975, refrigerators went from a luxury to a normal object, and the demand for block ice fell by more than ninety per cent in fifteen years. By 1978 the factory had eleven employees and one client left: the fish market.
Most of the workers had spent their lives in a trade that no longer had a purpose, and there was no obvious place for them to go. The interesting part is what they did next. Instead of closing, four of them bought the machinery from the owner and rebuilt the business around what was left: crushed ice for restaurants, dry ice for a laboratory, and, later, ice sculptures for weddings and hotels.
The sculptures were the part everybody laughed at. Today they are what pays the wages, and the same machine that once produced two-hundred-kilo blocks for the fishermen is used to make a swan for a hotel in Alicante.
My grandfather worked there until 1994. He never called himself an artist and he never learned to like the swans, but he did once tell me something worth keeping: a trade dies when the need dies, not when the workers get old. Learning to see what the need has turned into, he said, is the only skill that survives.
Palabras que quizá no conozcas
- fishmongerpescadería, pescadero
- demanddemanda
- tradeoficio
- crushed icehielo picado
- wagessueldos
- to rebuild a businessreconstruir un negocio
Preguntas
Se contestan con el texto delante. No es memoria: es entender.
According to the text, why did the ice business collapse?
Its customers disappeared as fridges became normal — What killed it was not a better competitor. It was the fact that the customers stopped existing.
By 1978 the factory had only ___ employees left.
eleven — By 1978 the factory had eleven employees and one client left. Los sesenta eran los de la época en que trabajaba toda la noche.
What did four of the workers do?
They bought the machinery and changed what the business sold — Four of them bought the machinery from the owner and rebuilt the business around what was left.
The ice sculptures were taken seriously from the start.
False — The sculptures were the part everybody laughed at. Today they are what pays the wages.
What does the grandfather mean by «a trade dies when the need dies»?
The work disappears when what people needed changes, not when workers age — Lo dice él mismo: not when the workers get old. Y no promete que todo oficio vuelva: dice que hay que ver en qué se ha convertido la necesidad.
Why does the writer mention the same machine making blocks and then a swan?
To show that what changed was the purpose, not the equipment — The same machine that once produced two-hundred-kilo blocks for the fishermen is used to make a swan: la máquina es la misma y lo que cambió fue para qué sirve.