MARGARITA ORFILA
Margarita Orfila, president of the Ateneu de Maó , shares her impressions today after visiting the Salinas de la Concepción and reveals the importance of the careful restoration that has been carried out, as well as the significance for her of being able to salt food with Menorca Salt.
It probably brings to mind my first memory of being a student very close by, in the early Christian basilica next door. And how we would sometimes go to see these salt flats.
It reminds me of how something that was deteriorating has been recovered. To see it as it is now, so natural, and to see the architectural work that has been done here, where the recovery isn't just about reclaiming spaces and a way of doing things, a way of working. I find it wonderful, spectacular, and to recover an activity that has always been associated with humankind.
Before refrigerators existed, salt was the foundation of life. It was the basis of preservation, and it was made just as it is here today. I studied it when I was young for my doctoral thesis, which focused on the salt flats in Mallorca, and the way salt was obtained—the explanation Guillermo gave us today—and seeing that nothing has changed, because there's no need to change anything, because the foundation is already there.
I think it's splendid, very beautiful, and congratulations, especially to the promoters who made it happen. How wonderful it will be in the future to be able to salt our food with the salt from here, Menorca salt, with that marvelous Fleur de Sel. These are harvested daily when the weather permits. Which, in Menorca, with the sun and wind, means quite a few days.
Very nice, and above all, congratulations on that recovery.
Margarita Orfila
President of the Ateneu of Maó
