Colombian Life: San Pedro's Festival in Neiva-Huila.

WELCOME TO THE SAN PEDRO´S FESTIVAL.!!

In Colombia from June 14 to July 01 we celebrate a lot of folkloric festivals, the most important is the Folkloric festival and Bambuco National Reign or better known like "San Pedro's Festival". Let me Show you what is all about. Please remember, english is not my native language, so I can make many errors, but the purpose of this blog is practice my writing and show you about colombia. Thanks.

Origin of the Festival.

Sanjuanero Dance.

Since colonial times, the Festival of San Pedro, is the proudest cultural tradition of Huila. Born from rural customs, this celebration remains as a memory of old traditions, where locals and visitors participate in parades, cavalcades, reigns, competitions, festivals and various cultural and artistic events, making the holidays in a Colombian cultural heritage . Our Promotion sentences are: "En Junio, todos los caminos conducen al Huila. Pegate la rodadita". In June, all roads lead to Neiva. "Pegate la rodadita" is a coloquial sentence and doesn't have a literal meaning in english, but mean "Come and enjoy"

During that days in Neiva, all the people think only in two things, receive their relatives and friends who come to visit to the city and enjoy the festival.

The San Pedro´s Festival has its main purpose on choose the National Queen of Bambuco. This contest is different because despite the beauty is important, the most important thing is the dancing of Sanjuanero Huilense.

I know, many Colombian words, let me explain to you some of that words to help you to understand what is this all about.

First: San Pedro. Yes, you are right San Pedro is "San Peter" one of the 12 apostles of Jesus Christ. And we celebrate this traditional festival in his honor.

Second: Bambuco: Is a Traditional Music and dance in Colombia and have many variations, the most important is the "Sanjuanero" is like you have Rock music and variations of rock like blues rock, jazz rock and heavy metal. This comparison is like compare the water with oil but I hope you understand me.

So, we have a National dancing contest and who wins, it will be the woman who dance perfectly the sanjuanero dance. In this case, the dancing performance is most important than beauty.(Of course the women who compete are beautiful too.)

QUEENS

They are the beauty and joy of the festival of San Pedro. In the region, from an early age, girls are part of the folk groups and dance groups in the neighborhoods or schools. So the almost of girls in Neiva known how to dance the Sanjuanero. Is different for men. I think only the 20% of Neivanos known how to dance Sanjuanero. Only profesional dancers do it, I think is because the man has to dance perfectly, so perfectly that the people will not notice, becuase all the contest is about the Queens.

Beautiful Queens with their beautiful dresses.
Now I´m going to show you only a few pictures of the beautiful Women who compete to be the National Queen of Bambuco.

Even the Army compete for the crown. this is the candidate of this year.

She is a friend, really beautiful.

With so many beautiful women, we don't know where to look!!!!

This is a picture in the Tatacoa Desert. I will put an input about Tatacoa Desert later.

Maybe, at this moment men are thinking, "Colombian women are beautiful" answer: oohh yesss. Women will be thinking, "Talks about those dresses!!". Dont worry I will talk about it. But First, more about our beautiful Queens. Enjoy it!!.

She is the National Queen of 2012. she represented the Capital of Colombia Bogotá on the contest. Beautiful and an excellent dancer. Yesss we also have a swimsuit test!!!.

She was my favorite, the Queen of Huila. Let me Remind you. City: Neiva, Department: Huila. Country: Colombia.

So we have a Contest for Miss Neiva, Contest for Miss Huila, and Contest for National Queen. EXCELLENT.

Without words.

More.

CHILDREN´S CONTEST.

Like I said before, almost all the girl start to practice dancing very early, for that reason we have a special Children dancing contest, but believe me, those girls take very serious this contest.

One Sentence in Huila is "In Huila the Foreigners don't exist". This is because Huila try to be a home for everyone.

One sample of this, is this pretty girl who born in Ecuador, Colombian mother, Asian father and won the National children contest.

Sanjuanero´s Costumes.

The costumes of men and women used now in San Pedro, were inspired by the dresses of the ancestors, but improved substantially due to suggestion from the same dancers to facilitate the movements of the dance.

In the women's traditional dress, the blouse is white and zipper behind. The skirt is made with satins of uploaded colors, has painted floral decorations in oil or silk flowers that harmonizes with the blouse.

This is the dress who women used in San Pedro, you can choose the color and there are two kinds, 1. like this one with the flowers put them over the dress or with the flowers painted.

The kids really enjoy using the San Pedro´s clothes. In this pictures you can watch the two kind of dresses, the third one have the flowers painted.

More dresses, different colors and styles.

The Sanjuanero Dance.

The Dance is a mix among differents cultural interpretations of Colombia. The dance is about the man trying to seduce a woman. It starts with flirting, passing to the amorousness and ends with the symbol of marriage. It's a mixed choreography, which combines indigenous steps (gentle movements on the ground) with Spanish influence (strong steps, where rise the bodies).

The red piece of cloth, is called "rabo e' gallo", the e' is a contraction of "de" and the "d" it doesn't pronounce. If we translated literally "rabo e´ gallo" in english it will be rooster tail.

The Dance is all about flirting and how the man will try so hard to get his lady, but she will make him work a lot before say yes.

Like I said before, all the eyes will be over the girls, for that reason there are a few professionals dancers who are in charge to make them look good.

Something really beautiful to see is the dancing of the kids. They practice so hard to make it perfect and receive the cheers from the audience.

In this link you can hear the music and watch the steeps of Sanjuanero.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7Gvf8ZrHkI

Now this is a presentation of the Queen who receive the love of the audience from her excellent presentation.

http://www.sampedriando.com/videos-festival/reinado-2012/youtubegallery?galleryid=4&videoid=wwkaEq4vUZc#youtubegallery

FOOD

ASADO HUILENSE

It is part of the culture of the region, we are traditionally merry revelers, joined to the family environment and the land, so, the preparation has all these components. This dish becomes an ancient rite. Its ingredients include scallions, garlic, guayaba ground, ground cloves, coriander seeds, striped nutmeg, ground cumin, fresh thyme, fresh bay leaves, fresh oregano, salt, sour orange juice , sugar, water, lately the marinated meat with beer. Served accompanied by insulso and arepas and you can drink masato, chicha, or beer.

To cook and excellent Asado it have to be baked in the "Horno de barro" clay oven. It that way the flavor is unique.

Achiras biscuits.

This are the traditional Achira´s biscuits, they are so famous that even the airlines companies are using them to give them to the passengers.

LECHONA

This is a traditional dish in colombian and so unique that everyones love it.

This is a plate of lechona.

PARADES

For each queen there is a "Carroza" (where is the queen and her aide) and accompanying by a cultural and dancing group called "comparsa" during the parade. The "carrozas are made by artisans and selected artists who make a theme each year to pay tribute to the culture, flora, fauna, architecture of the region, characters and significant stories of Huila.

Also we have "cabalgatas" that is what hundred and hundred of horsemen (included beautiful women) riding their horses for the streets of Neiva.

Kids also enjoy the parades.

And if you have good luck maybe you could dance with the "chicas aguila". Aguila is the name of a famous beer in colombia and the beer company select the most beautiful women to participate in the differents parties made it in colombia.
Yes, you can watch the whole day this picture, is ok. jeje

Chica aguila, yessss!!!

San Pedro.

This year we made the Most bigger group of Sanjuanero´s dancers and we got into the the Guinness record. (of course we are the only ones who danced sanjuanero, but was more like a promotion strategy for San Pedro´s Festival.