The week
before New Year’s , the local people started
collecting/making/buying their dummies-viejo anos- to be burned at 12 o’clock on New Year’s Eve. I blogged
about this custom last year as the same was done in Cuenca and all over Ecuador.
In Salinas, the dummies looked far less home-made, more like cartoon
characters, soccer players or super heroes.
http://www.cuencahighlife.com/post/2012/12/28/Ecuadorian-tradition-the-New-Years-Eve-burning-of-the-dummy-clears-the-slate-for-2009.aspx
Here are a
few near the Naval Base street corner.
As we walked
along the Malecon, several could be seen decorating balconies
As New Year’s
approached, the beach became more and more busy, much like it had been during
Carnival. As well, almost every condo in our building and surrounding buildings
became occupied by their absentee owners. Most of these buildings are second
homes to well off Ecuadorians mostly from Guayaquil. They usually only come
during the ‘high’ season- New Year’s to Carnival in February. In the two
provinces, ours, Santa Elena, and
Guayas, that the large city of Guayaquil
is in, have summer vacation for their children
in February, much like July and August back home.
We had been
told that a huge long fireworks show would be held all along the beaches on New
Year’s and that last year one million visitors partied in Salinas. We made the
wise decision to stay home and watch the festivities from the privacy of our
balconies. We also decided on a simple meal of home-made pizza and were soon ready
to enjoy the display.
As the
evening progressed, more and more cars came. Parking was soon filled up to three
blocks past the beach. The sidewalk along Chipipe beach was also covered with
lawn chairs rented to all those visitors who wanted to watch right on the
beach,
We did take
a short walk along our street just to get a feel for what was happening.
Everyone was in a great party mood- adults and children all gathered to watch the show.
Here is our
condo dummy waiting his turn to burn
Here is the
New Year’s crowd on the Main Malecon
The
fireworks started about 8-8:30PM and continued all along both beaches, the main
Malecon beach and our beach Chipipe, for hours. Uwe and I alternated between
two of our balconies, one overlooking Chipipe beach and the other overlooking
the main Malecon beach. The display was amazing! Thousands and thousands of
dollars must have been spent. Here the rich people try to outdo each other in
their fireworks to the benefit of all us watchers.
We stayed up
until at least 3AM watching this spectacle, consuming way too much vodka.
At 5AM we
woke up to incredibly loud music coming from one of the houses behind our
building. It continued until at least 9AM and moved us out of our beds far too
early.
Welcome to
the New year 2013!
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