As you may have read previously, I recently went to Valencia for the “Las Fallas” festival. This festival was one of the most unique and unimaginable festival I have yet to see, and I didn’t even see the “las fallas” part. Las Fallas literally means “the fires”. The main aim of this festival is the construction and annihilation of the “ninots”. The ninots are larger than life animated figures made of plaster, wood structures and other unknown elements. These animated figures illustrate humorous scenes and current events, while also making fun of corrupt politicians and celebrities, for example Uncle Sam. Each neighborhood creates their own ninot which are all pulled into a competition that is judged a few days before the festival is over. The ninot winner of this competition is placed into the museum of ninots, while the rest are filled with fireworks and gunpowder and set on fire on March 19th. This day is known as La Cremá, which is where las fallas (the fires) comes into play. The whole town looks like it is set on fire and the ninots are burned to the ground.
Unfortunately I was there a weekend too early for the fires but I did get to see the construction of some of the figurines. They are multiple stories high and look almost like Disney Characters. In fact the winner (as shown below), reminds me of the captain or general guy from Pocahontas.
WINNER! You can also see how big it is compared to the people standing at the bottom.
When I first arrived, I did not realize the size of these figures and merely thought all the things wrapped in plastic where parts to a carnival ride … Low and behold I was mistaken and they were actually different parts of the ninots.
First encounters
It was very interesting to see these humongous figures and if I were to go again, I would definitely be there during La Cremá as well as walk around to see as many ninots as possible AND see them all fully constructed. I did have the chance to see one that had fallen over, but by Sunday they had it glued back together as best they could … aside from the minor (I mean major) scratch marks and paint chips.
Fallen
Reconstructed
The festival also has other aspects such as desfiles (parades), bullfights, paella contests (seeing as Valencia is where paella originated from) and the daily mascletá. The mascletá is another competition of string-lined firecrackers that go off every day at 2pm in Plaza Ayuntamiento. In this competition, it is once again different neighborhoods competing on which neighborhood can make the MOST noise. Each day there is a new neighborhood that puts on a display of firecrackers. Not only did these firecrackers make enough noise for me to plug my ears, but they also shook the ground as well as my entire body as they resounded in the town. And this isn’t a merely 1 minute display but a good 10 minutes at least. We went to this on our second day in Valencia and I didn’t need to go again as my ears rang the rest of the trip and they could be heard from practically anywhere in the city.
The crowd awaiting the noise!
We also saw a parade our second night that was about two hours long and my back was very sore from standing for so long. But the parade was very interesting and I did not quite grasp some of the elements in it. There were over 30+ horses in it either dancing or pulling a carriage. Sadly there was one horse that was literally steaming and soaking wet and I felt so terrible for it! There were also different groups that were holding a Mexico Flag and a Nigeria Flag … I’m not sure what their purpose was but they were in the parade.
Aside from Las Fallas, my friend and I either wanted to see a bullfight or an acrobatic event. I am still not sure on my feelings about bull fightings and so I chose the acrobatic event because there was no killing involved. During this there were 20 performers and five bulls, equaling four people per bull. Instead of fighting and killing the bulls, these people do jumps, tricks and flips around the bull and/or over the bull. Personally I think this is more daring and dangerous seeing as they do NOT have weapons nor can they detect the bulls next move to predict the trick they are going to perform. Unfortunately three people were injured during this event, two more critically than the last one. This was also the first time a woman has performed in this event as well. And at the end of the day these bulls were spared … well at least for now. THIS IS NOT A VIDEO OF A BULL FIGHT BUT A FLIP
We also walked around the gardens to see the Art and Science museum that had an awesome structure on the outside. I think it looks like a fish!
All in all, I think that Valencia was a BEAUTIFUL city! It is the 3rd biggest in Spain (I believe) and there are so many little side streets that it doesn’t feel like a city at all. Perhaps it was because a lot of the roads were blocked off due to the ninots but I really enjoyed my time there. Here are a few pictures of other ninots.
However I definitely enjoyed this past weekend here in Vera after 3 weekends of traveling on busses and trains! I also got to finally go back to the market, my favorite place! I realized I have never shown any pictures of the market and vegetables so here are just a few. Enjoy!
My normal vender
My fruit vender
Cloths
Fresh beans and nuts
Hasta luego! Besos!
Julie
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