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30.5.13

FELIZ DIA DE CANARIAS!

THESE TWO LITTLE GENTLEMEN WERE ON THEIR WAY HOME AFTER A MORNING CELEBRATING DIA DE CANARIAS AT SCHOOL

Their costumes are a modest version of the full oufit, which for men includes a colourful sash and heavy woolen leggings - like leg-warmers knitted by a fisherman's wife  in Guernsey.











We only went to Las Galletas because the cat had eaten all her food, but after a quick coffee I followed to sound of music to the sports hall opposite the school and watched every pupil participating in an annual demonstrartion of national pride.
 Costumes were everywhere - the shops are full of them too - and the stands were full to bursting, Even the old men we usually see sitting by the car park were there, joining in the fun, Today is the actual holiday - so no doubt tonight there will be parties and fireworks and fighting and drunkenness, but yesterday was just music and dancing and lovely.

And on our way back to the car we saw this - an infant school's very creditable attempt at making a Corpus Cristi Carpet, for this is actually the feast ho Corpus Cristi and all over the island temporary carpets will me made out of flowers and coloured volcanic rock  I had to take my photograph upsidedown through the fence, but it looks really weird if I turn it right way up!

5 comments:

  1. Church holiday which meant they all went off to church. Not sure you would get away with taking photos like that in the UK. People are a bit touchy about it.

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  2. Some of those outfits can be quite elaborate - reminds me of costumes in shop window displays we saw when we visited Ubeda just before Semana Santa earlier this year.

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  3. A lovely blog about traditions in Tenerife and the introductions of children to them.

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  4. Wow - did the children make it?

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  5. Liz - I expect the teachers helped. Traditionally the Feast of Corpus Cristi - this weekend - is when carpets of flowers or coloured sand or salt are made in the streets of La Orotava. They stay there until Sunday morning when a religious procession walks over them to the church for Mass.

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