Wikipedia explanation of: Carnaval de Cadiz (oldest city in Europe...1100 A.D.) -
The city of Cádiz is often considered to have the wittiest people in Spain. The whole city lives the carnival for more than two weeks and the presence of this fiesta is almost constant in the city throughout the year with the rehearsals, representations and contests. The feeling of this carnival is the sharp criticism, the funny play on words and the imagination in the customes, more than the glamorous dressings. It is traditional to paint the face with lipstick as a humble substitute of a mask. It is easy to get involved in the fiesta even not knowing the language and to live the Carnival. On Saturday everyone wears a costume, which many times is related to the most polemical news. However, the Cádiz Carnival is famous mainly for the satirical groups called chirigotas, their music and their lyrics
BACK TO ME SPEAKING. So, we decided to go to Cadiz on Saturday which is the most popular day to go. You go dressed as something else...like Halloween but 10 times crazier. The old part of Cadiz has maybe a population of about 629 thousand (according to Wikipidia). Imagine 300,000 thousand people from all over Spain and Europe coming to this one place dressed and drinking. NUTS!
Anywho, explanation of the night. We arrived at 2:00 p.m. Spent the afternoon in a bar just chatting and hanging out. at about 5:00 we decided to go to the beach to enjoy the sun. At 6:00 p.m we went back to the bar and hung around. A "chirigota" (men singing crazy songs dressed like something) came by the bar and sang in the bar. We ate a little food and then headed off to a more populated Plaza in Cadiz. We found ourselves in Plaza de Espana at about 10:00 and hung out and enjoyed seeing all the crazy costumes. After, we decided to head toward the big cathedral....#1 - bad choice.....#2 - everyone and their brother were headed in the opposite direction....#3 = taryn almost getting killed if not for friends by a huge massive ginormous crowd of people. To sum it up...the night even gets better. We make it to the Plaza de la Catedral at 1:00. Sydney and I decide, we are ready to go home. STOP! Hold that thought....as we come to the realization that trains stopped for the night....NOOOO! Meaning that we had to stay there till 5:00....6:00 in the morning. That was a sad turn of the night as we were cold, hungry, and tired. we made the best of the situation and went back to the bar to sit and wait. We caught the 6:00 train with everyone and the cousin and got back in El Puerto at 7:30.
I've decided, this is one thing that I will only allow once in my lifetime...y ya esta...there it is. DONE!
Here's some photos for you to enjoy and to maybe explain what life is like here in spain. Enjoy.
Leaving on the train which got super full!
OH our old men friends.
A "chirigota" singing in the bar.
La Plaza de la Catedral. This was just the start of everything.
One vital part of my outfit....
And the revealing of my full out costume......an 80's workout star....aka Olivia Newton John....also all my real clothes thrown together. OH, explanation, I decided to do a little workout routine to some nearby music.....no one really caught on. :)
And here shows the amount of trash, glass, urine, and everything under the sun on the ground. Sooooo GROSSS!! This was taken at....oh...5:30 in the morning...no big deal.
3 comments:
Again, thank you for the "no big deal" at the end. You are LIVIN', T!!! Miss you!
I want to play dress up with you.
taryn! that makes me laugh so hard! im so glad you didnt die! and i cant believe you missed that train! HAHA wow!
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