End of the Year Traditions Part I

Cuenca is a city that takes its cultural richness quite dearly. Important dates are marked with festivals, parties, and processions. Throughout the month of December on the weekends one can frequently bump into some sort of procession exacerbating the already bad downtown traffic. From my apartment I can always hear them in the distance and I usually try to guess where they are headed before I go out an investigate. The largest of these in the month of December is known as the Pase de Los Ninos. This year it was estimated at something absurd like 20 kilometers long of marchers, cars decked out in displays, and people atop horses. This is the big day when you get to dress up your little kid in a variety of possibilities and show off their cuteness throughout the streets of Cuenca. The procession begins around 11am the eve of Christmas and lasts till around 5pm. Yes, you heard me correctly, this whole event lasts around 6 hours. As the procession gets into the heart of the city it slows down so you can imagine 20 kilometers worth of displays can really take a better part of the day to go by. The event is quite famous and unique to Cuenca, and for the majority of the first half at least they televise it on the national stations. Think of the rose parade but with a bit more cultural uumph.



This was easily my favorite. Thank god the catholic tradition doesn't get all up in arms about iconoclasm otherwise this would be one hell of a heretical parade. Photographers swarmed her for obvious reasons, and her presence was stunning. The well behaved nature of these kids is a running theme is seems. There was little shade which explains all the umbrellas. Volunteers took water to the people driving inside the cars and trucks. Speaking of which, none of the vehicles you see here save for the larger trucks are allowed to be on. They coast down the slight grade as long as they can in neutral. I imagine they are allowed to switch on when the grade disappears, but to my knowledge the route is planned in such a way that this is very infrequent. Traffic was also entirely blocked from the city center making the general atmosphere that of a big party. If you aren't watching the parade, you are shopping here and there enjoying the lack of traffic.



This is a good example of what the average person does for this procession. Everybody with a very young child loves to compare them to the Christ child. Here we have a manger allegory with my friend who was unable to resist the urge to tickle the belly of this kid. I must admit he was cute as a button but I am impervious to belly poking. Keep in mind the really young kids are only displayed off in that parks rather than exposed to the long haul of the procession. If you are wondering about the pig, many of the displays have all sorts of food offerings. Pigs and guinea pigs are pretty common meats as well as chickens both live and cooked.



Here you can see a typical secular display. This is in many ways also a slightly nationalistic parade. Many of the different traditional groups of Ecuador are represented in their varied clothing styles.



Of course kids really dress up as whatever. You even see a few spidermans here and there.



These displays can get quite elaborate and then need a flatbed to transport them.




This guy was one of my favorite. Many people on this parade took their facial expressions quite seriously. You don't really see it well here but he looked like he was on the verge of crying from being in the presence of the divine child. They don't really need that backdrop considering the Cuencan sky is quite heavenly as is.



This dude is another excellent example. Moments before this picture he had his arm out commanding the stopped procession to continue forward. He didn't want to hear any excuses no sir.




Appreciate that directly in the sun it is really hot in Cuenca. As I mentioned before, all of these kids maintained their cool (keke) regardless of how many pounds of clothing they wore. I've never seen so many well behaved children in one area.

Lets finish with some sheep as well as a couple of poorly shot videos of dances and the music that is playing during this procession.







These dudes are jamming but I didn't really have the time to record much of it.