The Carnival is Over and The Sardine has Been Buried
I love being in Las Palmas for Carnival. The city takes on a wonderful atmosphere, where, it seems, every man, woman and child wears fancy dress and abandons themselves to the magic of carnival. The ubiquitous cheap household emporia to be found all over Las Palmas and managed by Asian/Chinese families, are stocked to the gunnels prior to the start of carnival with a wondrous array of costumes, wigs, beards, hats, toy guns, bows and arrows, tiaras and all sorts of accessorising crap. Customers are in there choosing whatever suits them least, the largest and hairiest of men revelling in being Alice in Wonderland, Snow White, Elsa and Anna from Frozen, air stewardesses and other indeterminate female characters. As long as a short skirt, wig and lipstick (inexpertly applied) is involved, they seemed thrilled with themselves. I didn’t take photos, they seemed more suited to the dark web than a family carnival.
Some years we aren’t there for carnival or we just get the first few days. It depends when Easter falls. It’s Mardi Gras with feeling, and although my understanding of Mardi Gras is that it is held in the period before Lent, when the faithful make merry and use up all their sugar, fat and other extravagances before Ash Wednesday when 40 days of abstinance start. Well let me tell you, the people of Las Palmas totally ignored that principle and we didn’t burn or bury the sardine until the Sunday after Ash Wednesday (of more later). In fact the partying got more frenetic towards the weekend, so there’s a whole city not going to heaven any time soon.
Carnival starts the way it means to go on. A huge arena is built by the city of Las Palmas, as are floats by organisations and districts. There are drag galas, Miss Carnival, dog contests and dancing contests all televised locally. The all nighters are crowd pullers. We see them weaving their way back down the prom at 5:30am, living their best lives, but, for us, the best bits are undoubtably the parades. All the stops are pulled out; costumes are fabulous, noise from the drums is deafening and all the city turns out to watch. The dancers pose and break ranks to greet family and friends. They pick up babies, presumably their own or a relatives, and a wonderful time is had by all. They march past the building at the back of our rented apartment, up the road to the Parque de Santa Catalina and onwards to I know not where, with the crowd following excitedly.
One day we came back from the bus station to find the elaborate floats being stored at the back of the science museum in a large warehouse, except that although the base of the floats was uniform and well able to be pushed inbetween two pillars, there were some very elaborate, feathery structures that had clearly exceeded their remit and left the float pusher-inners in ‘sharp intake of breath and shaking of heads’ mode. We left them shouting and gesticulating, knowing this was not a problem to be solved in under two hours at the very least and we needed to eat.
The parades were spectacular, especially the last one on the Sunday, when over 100 floats took part, most of them huge double decker lorries heaving with pirates, Cinderellas and Mad Hatters. The last night of Carnival is even more bizarre than the preceding days, as we were to find out later.
However, remember those big flashy floats that couldn’t get into storage? Well they couldn’t get down the road either. The parade was hindered by officials trying to get the huge set pieces past road signs, with mighty cheers from the waiting crowds when they were set free.
Behind every float walked about 100 supporters, dressed in assorted costumes, some pushing buggies with cans of beers underneath the seat, or dragging hot, fed-up children, some of whom threw tantrums. We loved the sight of a mini Smurf lying on its back, screaming.
The glamorous floats soon petered out and what followed was one hundred lorries, all packed as tight as they could be, with very loud music playing and the hundred plus on board jumping up and down to the beat, while the lorry bounced down the road. Health and safety? Never heard of it, Mate!
At 9pm on Sunday, a ceremony started close to Las Canteras beach. We had seen groups of people of all ages dressed in black with painted faces, usually a death mask, making their way up the prom to a stage at the top. It transpired that they were ‘professional mourners’ for the ceremony of Burying the Sardine. OK, I didn’t know either, but here’s the link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Burial_of_the_Sardine#:~:text=The%20Burial%20of%20the%20Sardine%20(Spanish%3A%20El%20entierro%20de%20la,Madrid%20ending%20on%20Ash%20Wednesday.
And here’s a brief explanation for those haven’t got the time/ can’t be arsed, to look it up.
The burial of the sardine is an expression of sadness that the carnival is coming to an end. The skeleton of a paper sardine is burnt and a funeral procession is celebrated. The habitants are sad that the festival of happiness and cheerfulness has come to an end. It’s an old ceremony, that at one time would have had a coffin with a sardine in, which would have been buried.
‘The closing celebration is a series of acts revolving around the ‘Burial of the Sardine’, with a final parade tinged with the black worn by outrageous widows and scandalous mourning-women (mostly men in drag). These women, the authorities and the world of the Carnival mourn the death of the fish, and walk with it as far as Las Canteras Beach, where it is burned on a pyre; the moment has come to start the wait for a new edition of the festivities.’ Carnival Website https://lpacarnaval.com/en/events/the-burial-of-the-sardine
So, there it is, the mourners gurned and howled, the sardine was burnt in the sea off the slipway and the crowd waited expectantly for the promised drone display. Eventually the crowds dispersed, disappointed. We don’t know why it didn’t manifest itself, but the answer seems to lie somewhere between technical failure and sabotage. At that same ceremony the organisers announced the theme for next year. Wait - there’s a theme - who knew?
Maybe next year we’ll have our own costumes; I’ve always fancied being Boudica. The stated theme next year is The Olympics but I bet that won’t trouble the thousands of people who come in Roman togas, naval uniforms, Viking headdresses, and Le Flic uniforms, together with their Marvel character kids. As a sad footnote, all the unsold costumes are in the front of the shops the next day at 50% off. Even sadder is that Easter is later next year, so Lent will be later and that means Carnival won’t start until some time in March and we leave at the end of February. I might still wear a costume to be with them in spirit.
Thanks for reading or listening, hope you’ve enjoyed it. I don’t appear to have sound on the videos and I don’t know why, the originals did have sound but for some reason when I copied it over, it disappeared. My apologies, you’ll just have to sing along …
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I haven’t finished any books this month. Caught up in carnival and leaving Las Palmas it was easier to listen than to read
I’ve listened to audio books
Night Music Jojo Moyes. I enjoy Jojo Moyes novels when I want something light that I can pick up and put down, but is never predictable, and this is an imaginative and believable love story. I had sympathy with most of the characters.
For Thy Great Pain Have Mercy on my Little Pain Victoria MacKenzie. Two medieval women tell vividly of their life’s devotion to God, both going about it in very different ways, one walled up as an anchoress and the other abandoning family ties to tell of her ‘shewings’. This is a debut novel and well deserved prize winner.
Radio
The Limelight series of serials and fiction is well worth downloading from BBC Sounds. I can recommend Sabine, five part murder mystery by Mark Healy.
I’ve watched
Theatre - The Hills of California by Jez Butterworth at the Harold Pinter Theatre in London, directed by Sam Mendes. The premise of this play is simple enough - a mother’s fierce theatrical ambitions for her daughters is thwarted and years later she lies dying. Will the daughter who escaped to the USA come back to see her mother? The way in which Butterworth handles the material is magical and Mendes direction skilfully complements the writing. We see the sisters coming together as adults, and we see them as their younger selves being rehearsed as the Andrew’s Sisters at a time when rock‘n roll is coming in. The musical harmonies from the very talented cast were spectacular, the set design was brilliant and the play was produced images I will never forget. Well deserved standing ovation at the end.
Cinema - Wicked Little Lies with two of my favourite actors - Olivia Coleman and Jesse Buckley. Based on a true story, great fun and super period piece.
I can’t remember watching any TV in the last month - see ‘reading’ above!