La Fiesta De Casabindo

Mar 16th, 2007 | By admin | Category: Travel Journal

I took these photos in August 2004 in Casbindo, a small village in Jujuy Province in the north-west of Argentina. It was a very interesting experience and makes a fascinating story. Details below:

On the 15th of August every year in the remote Andean north-west of Argentina the tiny village of Casabindo holds it’s unique fiesta, celebrating the ascension of the Virgin Mary. One of many colourful local festivals held in the region during the Pachamamma (earth mother) celebrations of August the local people, whose ancestors lived in the mountains before the arrival of the Spanish, combine elements of Christianity with pre-Colombian rituals in a colourful fiesta that lasts the whole weekend.

It’s difficult just to get to Casabindo, at over 3300m above sea level the winter temperatures can drop to -30 degrees celsius overnight. I got a lift in a van from a tour company based in Humahuaca, the nearest town on the tourist trail. We arrived Sunday morning to a small village of mud-brown adobe huts and a large crowd that included market vendors, photographers and even a tv camera crew.

The evening before the villagers had lit huge bonfires and semilantes, men dressed in rhea feathers, had danced around. Today, they were preparing for an afternoon of bullfighting, which takes place in the specially built Plaza de Toros in front of a simple, white painted church, the largest building in the village. In the 16th century the church was known as the Cathedral of the Puna, the local name for this high mountain landscape.

We sat shoulder to shoulder on the low stone walls surrounding the plaza. A long procession of semilantes, a white robed priest, and villagers carrying elaborate idols and blowing erkes (long metal pipes with a mournful and eerie sound) left the church, circuited the village and re-entered the church.

Then the bullfighting began - unlike in Spain the object is not to kill the bull but for the torero (bullfighter) to snatch a red headband with coins sewn on (the vincha) from between the horns of the bull. The vincha is an offering to the Virgin and the torero proves his bravery by outwitting the bull to take the vincha.

Ambulances waited nearby for the injured, and there were a few, one bull in particular had a nasty temperament, charging the crowd several times before leaping the surrounding stone wall, taking several spectators with him.The fiesta of Casabindo is just one of many colourful local festivals set in remote and beautiful Andean locations.