Like pied pipers, the four cavaleiros on horseback and the matadors on foot, all dressed in glittering jackets, tight pants and pink leggings, led a procession along Avenida Infante D'Henrique on Saturday afternoon, calling on the populace of Macau to attend the touradas, the Portuguese bull-fighting competition which had just arrived in town. They guided the people to the shadow of the famous Lisboa casino, where a bamboo stadium had been erected and the ground covered with sand for the performance of the fighters and 24 bulls flown in to the Portuguese colony on the south China coast. But animal rights activists were at the stadium to meet them and to ask the Macao people and tourists to boycott what they called a barbaric sport. "At a time when Macau is reeling from front page headlines of gangster violence, the government is importing yet more bloodshed and cruelty to the enclave," said a spokesman for the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Several protesters were young Chinese members of Earthcare in Hong Kong.
Agnes Liu Oi Na said indignantly: "We are teaching our children to mistreat animals as good entertainment." Dr Gail Cochrane from Scotland representing the International Fund for Animal Welfare said that barbs plunged into the bulls "wiggled and caused damage under the skin and acute pain".
The activists were ignored by about 2,000 tourists and local people, including the Macau Minister for Culture, whose guests in the enclosure for dignitaries included finance ministers from former Portuguese colonies who had come from the World Bank conference in Hong Kong.
There were nevertheless many empty benches as the fights began and a Chinese brass band struck up a catchy toreador-type tune, which they played over and over again throughout the afternoon.
The first bull, its horns sheathed and the number 135 stamped on its side, was fought by a cavaleiro. The rider galloped round the arena while the bull ran with great speed at the horse's legs. Then he faced the bull and charged towards it, skilfully jamming a bandarilha, a gaily-coloured, razor-sharp harpoon, into the beast's shoulders. A broad river of blood glistened as it ran down the bull's side. Its mouth opened and a long grey tongue lolled out. The animal shook its head violently to try to dislodge the weapons. The crowd cheered. When the cavaleiro had impaled the bull with four more razor-sharp barbs and simulated a kill - unlike the Spaniards the Portuguese do not slaughter the bulls in public - the director ordered the fight to end with a bugle-call. A group of forcados, or bull catchers, entered the arena as the horse rider backed off. The bull charged the first one who, with incredible courage, seized it by the horns and wrestled it to the ground as the others piled on top. The defeated animal was then roped and hauled out of the stadium. As a tribute to his masterly horsemanship, the mounted fighter was given permission by the director to trot slowly round the ring, and flowers in silver foil wrapping showered down from the stands.
The bull fighters didn't have it all their own way. A white horse was gored and left the arena with blood on his flanks. A 19-year-old espada, a matador fighting on foot in classic style with cloak and sword, was thrown to the boards by an agile bull maddened by three bandarilhas hanging from his back. It was a dangerous moment as its curving horns were unsheathed, but the espada escaped by crawling backwards, face up, at incredible speed.
In the stands, a middle-aged Portuguese official, an aficionado of bullfighting, was not too pleased with what he saw. "The bull should not be attacked unless it charges first," said Antonio Raymond, shaking his head after a horseman had taken the initiative early. "In Portugal, the people wouldn't like that. Also in Portugal, the bull would be surrounded by cows to pacify it after the fight, not pulled out with a rope."
Bullfights are a traditional way of selecting the best animals, he said. The horsemen represent the landowners, the forcados the labour force and the espadas the men in charge of the workers. The most elegant cavaleiro on display was in fact a well-known Portuguese landowner, Luis Miguel da Veiga. The injured bulls were taken to an abattoir after the fight, killed by injection, and cut up for select Macao restaurants. Four more touradas are scheduled before the troupe returns home. It is their second visit for what is planned as an annual event. Macao officials say they want to promote Portuguese culture in the territory, which reverts to China in 1999. Its population of 500,000 is now overwhelmingly Chinese. Protest co-ordinator, Steven Lewis, said however: "Bull-fighting in Macau holds as much cultural relevance as bringing fox-hunting to Hong Kong."
Even in Portugal, bull-fighting is a dying tradition, the activists claim. In Macau, it has produced a first - Chinese protests against European cruelty to animals (it's usually the other way round). In Hong Kong, posters calling for a boycott proclaim "Victim Stabbed Seven Times Before Crowd of Onlookers". The empty seats, the disgruntled Portuguese official and the animal rights protesters all pointed to one inescapable conclusion: that Portuguese bullfighting, like local wine, does not in fact travel very well, even to a Portuguese colony, which itself, these days, is an anachronism.