Blanca is 22 years old, she is a rural nurse in the health centre of Aínsa and provides home health services to sick patients in the Sobrarbe region, (Northern Spain), she is also the mother of little Ángel, a few months ago she decided to go and live with her son in his grandfather's old house in Sarsa de Surta, a small village in the Huesca Pyrenees with only 4 inhabitants, to fulfil a dream and live in the countryside.
Ángel has started school for the first time this year at the Paúles de Sarsa school, the smallest school in Aragón, where only 5 children between the ages of 4 and 12 from different villages in the area attend. Blanca relies on the help of neighbours and relatives to be able to reconcile her long hours and different shifts as a worker at the health centre in Aínsa with raising her son.
It has been several decades since a child living in Sarsa de Surta has run through its streets, Ángel has helped to keep the small Paúles de Sarsa school open for at least another year. After six months of closure of all schools in the country due to the coronavirus pandemic, schools are reopening their doors to pupils under strict security measures.
Spain becomes the first country in Western Europe to reach half a million confirmed COVID-19 infections.
This is a story of courage and sacrifice, of repopulating empty Spain, of people helping each other to get through difficult times, and of dreams fulfilled.
September 2020.