Santurtzi Jaietan El Carmen 2012

Being able to be part of the annual festivity your residing place holds is joy. And this is why Santurtzi gathers a plus 1 to my love to it.

Day 1 of the feast includes the Gran Sardinada hosted at the streets of Capitan Mendizabal and Juan XXII. Thousands of sardines sacrificed their yummy lives for the hungry mob, and of course, for the feast. I love this activity. Why? Because it's free food! Free for everyone! Aside from my mom and my siblings, our relatives from Las Arenas joined us too. There were my cousin, Stephen, Ninang Ondet, Tita Jean, Tita Lila, her bestfriend, Tita Nida, Tito Rudy, and my other cousin, Joshua. Also, tita Josie was with us. Ninang even bought "palamig" also known as "gulaman drink", enough for everyone. Panulak baga.

Another thing I like about this place is that they're not afraid to dress up occasionally. For the girls, they dressed up as the fishsellers who wear skirts and have a bilao or planggana filled with fresh fishes they just gathered from the fishermen who went sailing. As much as I wanted to dress up like that, I wasn't able to. hehe. Kids and even their pet dogs were also dressed up to their desired outfit. Some boys even wore skirt too! Some just tied hankies around their neck, and some group of people had their group shirt on.

Jovenes (the young ones) had their own activity, where getting wet is how they celebrate it. While passing by Capitan Mendizabal St., they get to stop to some point, look up and shout for "Agua" to people who were in their homes at the higher ground. Not being KJ, they throw out gallons of water and wet those water thirsty party people. It's so cold already, don't know how do they manage it. In the Philippines, getting wet is called "buling-buling", and believe me, it's something other people avoid.

Anyway, there was this one guy who talked to me and said something I didn't understand, but I assumed that he was asking to take picture of them. He called his friends anyway, and in my surprise, I think he just called me a "Tsina". Haha. It's hilarious.

Before having a damaged pair of foot and energy drained body, we checked out the feast place where there was loud music and lots of people and stores and stuffs. Tita Nida, Tito Rudy and Joshua went home right away because the night was getting deeper (did I said it right?) and Joshua was already having tantrums. There was this Concierto de Txistularis at the big stage set up at the wide rode near the port, but it's not the kind of music my aunties were looking for, so tita Josie invited us to go to the club where his son works as a DJ. Too bad it was still closed, and they were all tired of walking and walking, so they just went home.

On the 16th of July, Procesion Maritima took place at 6pm, where Virgen del Carmen was sailed to the sea with like a hundred or two people from the other boat following it, and then back to the church. I'm pretty sure it's the main event of the week's feast.

There was a carnival between Polydeportivo and Agurtza and my cousins and I tried the rides too. We've always wanted to try the Loop Zone the moment we saw it because I wanted to try taking pictures while up in the air, but for the record, it was the first ride that made me wanna throw up right after riding it. Maybe it just so happened that that day, I was having some stomach troubles. My mom don't even want to let us ride there at first, but when she talked to the girl whom we were with at Frias who just happened to be around the barracas too, and after asking questions about how secured can a person be when up there, and who rode there for like four times already, she finally agreed.

On the next ride, I didn't even care being more thrilled. Just sat there and ate bubblegum (no hard candy available e) from stephen. Only Theron, Eva, Stephen and kuya Gheran rode and had them swirled to the air inside the cage (sorry, don't know how to explain it thoughroughly). I just took picture of them. But they said it was fun.

Then, for my youngest brother's turn, he drove the bump car with Theron. Yay!

Then we had churrows. Yum!

Oh, there were the statue-like people there too. I don't know how do you call them. Maybe statue mime. Haha. They were pretty cool too, especially the one coated in gold paint who pours a water enlessly from a bottle to a mug. Well that's not what amazed us and kept watching, but it was his "walang kangalay ngalay na position". There was one who was phantomiming a baby in a stroller and he sure heck is scary!

There was this activity called Skate Eguna, where it of course attracted skateboarders. Ramps were placed at Parke Gernika in the morning where they can practice doing stunts and tricks, and in the afternoon, the real challenge happened. From the high stairs, I think they were challenged to some perfectly stupendous tricks to take the breath of the judges away where they could win 10000 euros! (Hey I'm not sure with this, but I think I saw four zeroes) I forgot to bring my camera that time, and this is the best shot I could have that time. :P It sure was very interesting. It made me remember my bestfriend. She sure is gonna gasp and be excited too when she ever know it.

I promise there were a lot more activities done there, we were not just the "most active citizen of Santurtzi", but I know they're fun and I am amazed that the event organizers were really trying their best to get every citizen involved. Because there were bounce houses for like a couple or more days for the kids. In the internet, I saw some pictures of the teens playing some parlor games, there were dance grounds for middle aged people and old people, stores for everyone, football tournament, other more ball games, circus, concerts, theater shows, dog shows and a looot more.

Superb Santurtzi for a super awesome celebration!

xoxo: the citizen who started loving you since February, neds ;)