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Celebrating New Year in Spain |
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| Canarian
Christmas Recipes The Christmas Season Nochebuena/ Christmas Eve Navidad/Christmas Day Day of the Innocent Saints Año Nuevo/New Year´s Eve |
On New Year's Eve, Nochevieja (which translates better to Old
Year's Night), or San Silvestre in Spain, celebrations revolve around the eating of the grapes. The idea is to eat 12 grapes at
midnight, one grape on each stroke of the clock, for luck - all suitably and necessarily (it is difficult to do) washed down with
Cava: Spanish bubbly - a tradition that is believed to come from ancient wine-growers.
It is a night for going out and for fireworks. Almost all families see in the New Year in Spain via the twelve chimes at midnight from the Puerta del Sol in Madrid: an hour later in the Canaries with those of the Cabildo (Island Corporation) in Santa Cruz in Tenerife or their counterpart in Las Palmas in Gran Canaria. After the chimes, there may be a Mass celebrated at 4 am, but it is probably most usual these days to join in a Verbena: all-night street-party with dancing to a Salsa band and the custom at New Year is to wear your very best, new clothes. Los Reyes Magos: Epiphany, January 6 Father Christmas; Santa Claus, better known here as Papa Noel, is starting to gain some popularity in Spain, appearing in the shops alongside Los Reyes (The Three Kings) and he does now bring a few presents on Christmas Eve. The justification for this is that it gives the kids time to enjoy their new toys whilst they still have school holidays to amuse themselves in. Otherwise, the tradition is that the presents arrive with Los Reyes - The Three Kings - on their camels on January 6. It also means three times the seasonal work for two white guys and one black. Who, just for the record are: Melchor: And old man with a white beard. He brings gold,representing Jesus' royal status Gaspar: A swarthy youngster. He brings frankincense to signify the child's divine nature. Baltazar: The black dude. He brings myrrh which refers to Christ's suffering and future death. On the night of January 5th, there is a mass wrapping and then subsequent unwrapping of presents, scant seconds after midnight. Kids are supposed to put water and straw for the camels outside the door of their house before they go to bed and to leave a shoe in a prominent place in a main room of the house, next to which the Kings will leave their gifts - if they have been good. If not, they may get coal instead! In many towns there will be parades through the streets, with the Three Wise Guys arriving on their camels, often by sea on one of the ferries and they will throw sweets into the crowd for children of all ages to catch. With Los Reyes on January 6th, it seems that Spanish Christmas holidays seem to go on for ever, but this is the day when everyone will be at home with the family even if he/she worked on Christmas Day, which is fairly likely with the mostly tourist economy and the northern Europeans to entertain. Traditional to eat on January 6, is Roscón de Reyes, a "crown" or ring-shaped bread, decorated with "jewels" of glacé fruits and which contains a surprise gift somewhere inside. The year's second largest Lottery, El Niño, is drawn on this day. The custom on the 6th is that you get taken round to see what everyone got, which is great because you can get to play with everyone's toys! Now I must go and get some straw for the camels.. ### About the author: Pamela Heywood has been resident in Tenerife since 1992. Formerly an accountant in the UK, she has since written for local magazines and newspapers and now runs several web sites, publishing a number of ezines. This article first appeared in Tenerife Topics, a monthly newsletter that looks mostly at the other face of Tenerife from that the tourist usually discovers. http://tenerife-topics.8m.com |
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