Benijofar is one of those places - like Algorfa, where we live - that rarely makes the news. In fact, unless you live there, or know somebody who does, you're likely to say, 'Benijofar - where's that?' However, now Benijofar is making international news, due to the arrest of a vet in connection with the death of his wife. The facts are thin on the ground, but basically this is the indisputable truth:
A vet in Benijofar has been arrested following his admission that he had his wife cremated after she died in the surgery. Nothing wrong with that, except she was cremated in a place which is usually used for the cremation of animal remains. That's all that the news reports are consistent on.
In some reports, she died following a DIY liposuction operation that went wrong. In others, the vet found her dead from an overdose of self-administered medication. Whatever the truth, a 46 year old woman is dead, and a family is in mourning. That's terrible, but what is even worse is knowing the people involved in this tragedy.
My friend and I have been talking about this all weekend - even before the news hit the headlines - because we know these people well, and we feel for them. The vet - and his daughter - have been a valuable and valued source of support and information to us over the last few years. They've become our friends.
We don't have a pampered pooch or a cosseted cat, but we do keep tropical fish. While they may not need flea treatments, worming, vaccination or grooming, it's not easy to keep them in the rudest of rude health. Our first foray into fish keeping ended badly. We bought a bunch of flowers at the same time we bought the fish, and the flowers lasted longer.
Unfortunately for the fish - and for us - we didn't go to the experts to start with. We got the fish - and the expensive tank and all the equipment that went with them - from a place that was more interested in profit than the welfare of the livestock they sold. We were very upset when the fish died. We hadn't given them names or anything like that, but you don't like to think that something in your care has died because you weren't up to the job of caring for it.
We decided that before we repopulated the tank, we'd find out more about fish keeping, and a friend recommended the vet in Benijofar to us. She knew even less about fishkeeping than we did, but she had been using the vet's services for some years for the benefit of her two dogs. She described him as a very nice person who really cared about the animals he treated, and also their owners. As a bonus, he was an enthusiastic and expert keeper of tropical fish.
To cut a long story short, as they say, we went along to the surgery in Benijofar and called on their expertise. On that first visit, we spent around an hour just chatting to the vet and his daughter. It wasn't even as if it was a quiet afternoon - people were coming in and out, either for treatment or just to pick up supplies, and everybody was treated like a friend. Even the animals who were coming in for treatment or grooming didn't display the characteristic reluctance on entering the surgery. It was a happy, homely place, where everyone and their dog - or cat, or budgie, or hamster, or whatever - was welcome.
Following their advice, we successfully repopulated our expensive fish tank. Too successfully, some would say. Our Guppies and Sail Fin Mollies have been extremely - productive, is the only word I can use on a family-friendly blog. The vet and his daughter assured us that this was because we were good parents, and our fish were happy. If that was the case, it was down to the advice we received in Benijofar. When the first babies arrived, they talked us through it all and even gave us suitable food for the first few vital days of life.
All this may sound trivial in the light of the breaking news, but I think you have to look behind the headlines. Some of the details in the reports are lurid to say the least, and to people who only know about the vet from what they have read, he may come across as some sort of monster.
To us, he's a decent human being who - along with his son and daughter - is now living through everyone's worst nightmare with the whole world as witness. Eventually, the real truth will emerge; at the moment, the rumour mill around here is in overdrive, and it's virtually impossible to separate fact from fiction.
All I can say is, the whole family need and deserve the support and prayers of everyone out there. And although it's not admissible as evidence or defence in a court of law, nobody I know can bring themselves to condemn this man. There's a lot more to real life than what is reported in the media.
