In Cuenca some people celebrate Halloween, but most everyone celebrates Día de los Difuntos. (Check out my favorite Ecuadorian Blogger’s recipes for Día De Los Difuntos.) Since the holiday falls the day before Ecuadorian Independence day, the celebrations sort of blended together. I waited until afternoon to head out to do my shopping. I figured that I would have a better chance to seem something interesting then, rather than in the morning.
The first thing I noticed, was that there were a lot more people on the street than I was used to. I headed from my condo down to the river. It wasn’t long before I started seeing interesting things. When I got to the Juana de Oro escalinata next to the pink Hotel Crespo, I found the first bunch of cosplayers.
I wasn’t expecting cosplay
James P. Sullivan and Mike Wazowski put in an appearance.
Just past the Juana de Oro escalinata, the vendor’s tents could be seen. On this section of the river walk, I am used to seeing five or six people at any one time.
One of many street artist
An electronic band joins one human musician.
The striking thing about the video below, is just how quiet everything is, even during a celebration. These tents lined both sides of the river and by the next day were all around town.
The famed “Panama” hats, which have always been made in Ecuador
La Escalinata, looked very different from normal
Boy, I wish I hadn’t eaten before going out. This was just one of the many vendors selling special foods for the holiday.
It was dark by the time I finished my shopping. I came home via the Plaza El Otorongo. A musician had set up a tent on the Colonel Talbot steps.
In the video below I do a 360 degree turn of the steps. You can see that more white tents are being set up in the Plaza.
After taking my groceries home, I headed out again going down to Calderón Park to see what was going on with the celebrations. I walked out of my way to go back through the plaza to get a video of the tents. I had to split the video up into four sections to be able to load it up to WordPress. The fourth one is the best, if you don’t want to watch them all.
When I was about to cross the street to the park, a man next me smiled and said, “Cukay, Cukay!” I was a little confused thinking that maybe it was a colloquialism I just didn’t know. He grinned bigger and said, “Cukay, Cukay!” again pointing to one of the cosplayers.
“Cukay, Cukay!”
The park and surrounding streets were very crowded, though not as crowded as I would find them the next night, which was Independence day.
There were living statues all around the park. Firefighters seem to be a favorite theme.
I am not sure how this one kept suspended like that.
Group cosplay, they were with the musician below. Note the children’s reaction to the characters
I think he is supposed to be an Ecuadorian street musician.
At the end of the night, a bedraggled fairy heading home.
After I got home I heard music again, so I ran down stairs to find the street lined with “Boom Box” cars. They had decals on the windows showing that groups of cars belonged to some sort of social club. It is a little hard to see in the video below, but all the cars on the side of the street I was one were playing music. The lady I get my meat on a stick from can be seen in the frame at one point.
I walked a little further down the street , where the cars were on both sides of the streets, to take another video. The dog at the end doesn’t seem like he likes it much.
I could hear the music on the street as I was cooking my dinner. By the time it was bedtime, the festivities were over.
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