Mr Pyrotechnician... Pedro Luis Sirvent

Mayo de 2023. The Assembly Hall of the Casa de la Festa 'Manuel Ricarte'. The book 'Mr Pyrotechnician... Pedro Luis Sirvent', written by Luis Miguel Sánchez Moreno. Many of the pyrotechnician's numerous friends attend. They wonder:

"What surprise will Pedro Luis? have in store for us? "Knowing how he is, he surely has something prepared," they answer each other.

On the table of the stage in the assembly hall, a firecracker. Belén Mora Rosado, Bellea del Foc, approaches the stage with a lighter. It seems she is going to light the firecracker...

"She won't dare," many of the guests at the event continue to answer each other.

Suddenly, the voice of the Bellea del Foc is heard: "Mr Pyrotechnician, let's begin... the book presentation."

And it is there, from that moment, when Pedro Luis 'lights up' the continuous mascletà of his life, summarised in that book. From his initial intention to be a jeweller, his studies at the Nautical-Fishing School of Alicante, explosives technician in the Navy, in the seed of the children's bonfire of Sèneca-Autobusos, Fine Arts student, representative of pyrotechnics or bonfire artist, among many other occupations, until he bought in 1987 the 200,000 square meters of the 'secarral' of Fontcalent, sadly in the news these days. And establishing himself among the 'greats' of pyrotechnics in the Valencian Community.

Anecdotes abound in that presentation. "Do you remember when?" one of the spectators asks him - let's say it could have been Violeta Trives-. Pedro Luis responds and Mario Font adds. Rocío Beltri Santacruz chimes in and, among them all, laughter ensues. What was the presentation of a book has turned into a gathering of friends, in which the president of the Federació de Fogueres Toñi Martín-Zarco Marín also joins in, recounting her experiences with whom she defines as "an anecdote, a big smile, a friendly face to find among the crowd." She concludes her speech emphatically, "he is gunpowder made person."

Pedro Espadero, who since 1997 has counted on Pedro Luis for the cremàs of his official bonfires, intervenes to unravel some of the confessable secrets of that task. The pyrotechnician friend spices them with his particular irony. 'Ignited' that mascletà of affections, the experiences expressed by Roberto Climent, José Leandro Gisbert, Manuel Jiménez, José Manuel Lledó, María José Molina Birlanga or Mar Rodrigo Redondo, the Bellea del Foc who in 2000 awarded him the Extraordinary Emblem of the Hogueras, in an event held at the Parque de Canalejas.

I don't know if in these, bleak and full of memories, days you can find that 'Mr Pyrotechnician... Pedro Luis Sirvent'. If so, and before reading it, take a close look at the cover photo, original by Ana Cortés Vélez, which could be seen in the windows of the Casa de la Festa in 2021, encompassed in the 'Referentes' collection. It perfectly describes what he was like - it hurts, and a lot, to use this verb tense - who once said:

- Biography? I don't have one

- My life is made up of a series of small mascletàs that shape my passion for the Hogueras and Alicante.