NEW YEARS EVE IN CUENCA

Like everywhere else in the world, Cuenca has its own traditional ways to celebrate the new year. Nancy has done an excellent blog on this, which also has a good link that describes the history of the tradition of burning the old year. Check her blog here: http://www.watsontravels.blogspot.com/

All over town seemly impromptu stands have sprung up selling effigies or dummies, some with heads and some without. You can also buy the heads or masks separately. We learned today from a Cuencan that you must have one of these to burn away the old year. This is done close to midnight, at the time when you should also eat 6 grapes and wear yellow underwear for good luck. We are planning to eat black eyed peas tomorrow to bring prosperity in 2009. This is a southern USA tradition that Nancy swears by. In fact, last year on New Years Day she did NOT eat black eyed peas, and look what happened to our economy!

As people have started purchasing these dummies, they display them, in preparation for the big night. Some of the displays are quite amusing.

There will be neighborhood "burnings" all over town tonight. This photo shows a set up in downtown Cuenca where there will be a communal burning.

In addition to the burning of the dummies, fireworks are a BIG thing here. Already we have been hearing large booms, usually in sets of 4. Today when we were walking downtown, there was a gentleman in the middle of the street holding 4 sticks of fireworks that were like bottle rockets, without the bottles. Sure enough, once there was a break in the traffic, he lit them one at a time. These make a boom like an M-80. All over town are stands like these selling such fireworks.
I don't expect to get much sleep tonight, but it should be interesting! Meantime, the parades have not stopped. It is not unusual even now, a week after Christmas, to see traffic stopped for a parade of floats and herds of horses.

And, as promised, I have an update on the bus situation. We are several days now into the new system of having to deposit the bus fare into a lock box which then allows you through the turnstile. There are still bugs to be worked out and it is a source of endless entertainment to watch the bus riders being educated. The biggest issue remains with children and older people who pay the reduced fare of 12 cents. Often the 12 cents just falls out the bottom of the lock box and has to be put in again, which sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. Sometimes when Jim goes to get on, he just shows the conductor the 12 cents and the conductor swipes a magnetic card which triggers the turnstile to open. Some buses are very strict and will no longer make change - thereby turning some people away. Most buses are not this strict. Here is a common way for them to keep the change handy.

This is a typical thing to see on the bus. She's probably going to market to sell her eggs, though it's possible she has just purchased them.

Alas, tomorrow I catch a bus for Guayaquil in preparation for flying home early Friday morning. I will be back in Cuenca in just a few weeks, so will have more to report on then. In the meantime, Jim will have an adventure in the cloud forest near Quito, doing some bird watching. If I have time, I will write another blog about meeting the preeminent panama hat maker in Cuenca. That was our big adventure today.

Hasta Luego y Prospero Ano Nuevo,

Audrey