El Entierro de la Sardina,Murcia, the night when it rained footballs and glitter.....

Murcia, the end of the Spring Fiestas

The burial of the sardine in Murcia.

A night of fire, of madness, of hands stretched aloft in an act of supplication, a night of masked figures fighting back a screaming mob with flaming torches, of dragons, monsters, smoke and sparks.

El Entierro de la Sardina.

The last night of the spring fiestas.

An act of cleansing.

The night when misrule rules and the final moment of burning the effigy of the sardine wipes the slate clean of all misdemeanours and the spring begins, reinvigorated and rejuvenated with a fresh air of renewal, the rituals rooted in the traditions of pagan celebrations of spring, modernised in a uniquely murcian way.

Murcian traditions involve giving, and visitors to the city during Seman Santa have often commented on the volume of food and sweets shared with onlookers during the religious Easter celebrations, but this giving is taken to the extreme during this last wild  spirited burst of celebrations ending the spring fiestas, the event culminating in this Saturday night parade, in which hundreds of thousands of toys are thrown in mindboggling quantities to the watching crowds, leaving the streets knee deep in empty packaging and burnt out firecrackers.

The peñas escort their soaring glittering floats, adorned with icecream scallops and lollipop pink figures, grotesque, shining in the reflection of the torched bearers which guard them, dispensing manna on the waiting crowds below as glitter and confetti rain down on the onlookers, frizbees, footballs, soft toy sardines with engorged botox lips, and plastic toys which are worth just cents and will last even less seconds when played with, fly though the air into the eager hands of waiting children.

And their fathers.

Grown adults squirmed and squealed with their offspring to catch yet another football to fill their  bulging plastic sacks, the mind boggling as to what one family could do with 6 footballs, whilst the more timid stood there with none.

It´s a scrum.

The streets were packed, parking an impossibility unless attendees were willing to walk halfway across Murcia capital to reach the parades, police tow trucks working at a frenzied pace to keep the crossings and roadsides clear from illegally parked traffic.

This year they were on a mission, and whilst slapdash parking is tolerated as given during these fiestas normally, there would have been many last night who returned to their habitual fiesta parking places on verges to find their cars gone, a sticker on the floor announcing a heady fine which increased the price of a few plastic footballs to the price of hand stitched leather, cars alongside the gardens of Malecon awaiting their owners in the municipal carpound instead.

It´s quite normal to see these cars quite happily occupying the slipway off the ringroad and up on the central reservation, but this year there was no mercy or fiesta spirit in evidence, and the habits of many years will have to change it appears, for the fiestas of the future.

Although the sacks were as full as ever, there was a hint of austerity in the pre-float parade, a few less statuesque giants warming up the crowd into a frenzy of excitement, and there was certainly a noticeable lack of volume to some of the paradees this year, although, it has to be said, ingenuity won the day, and many of the costumes had definitely opted for "less is best."

It appears that austerity cuts had even reached the float of the regional "Murcia No-Typical" offering in the parade, as there had obviously been insufficient money to even buy the girls adorning the float more than a very small thong, and the rest of their bodies had simply been painted a variety of colours and a very small amount of tinfoil stuck on to hide what little could be left intact of their modesty, certainly a most un-typical offering for a family event, although the male onlookers thought it was a cracking idea.

Many of the other participants were dressed as cartoon characters or film heroes, Darth Vader and SuperMario still attracting a timeless degree of adoration, Mickey Mouse going down a storm, and a rock monster proving a particular hit for those wanting a cartoon cuddle during the parade.

The mandatory monsters breathed their fire and smoke and some of the carnival peñas which wowed us all during this years parades strutted their stuff yet again, with the gorgeous red birds and yellow cats from Águilas attracting rapturous applause from the crowds and the barely clad chicas from Cartagena battling it out with the No-Typical team for " who can wear the least possible during a fiesta parade " award.

For us, however, one of the highlights was catching up with la Sal de Torrevieja group, as we'd been contacted by Lauren, an English reader, to say she would be taking part in the parade, feathered up to the hilt.

And we found her, resplendent in pink, silver and white, gorgeously strutting her stuff along with the spanish members of the group, an inspiration for anyone wondering if it´s ever possible to really get stuck in and become part of these fiestas.

We also had a shock as a band stopped to wait for the girls in front to finish their routine, drawling American accents wafting past on the wind. It turned out to be the Quaker City String band from Philadelphia, who travel all over the world attending events such as this, famed for their extravagantly coloured outfits and routines, perfectly at home in the madness of a murcian sardine festival.

They were a great hit with the crowds, as were the band from Rome who came along behind them, the participation of International acts part of what enabled this event to remain an event of International tourism interest, and they´d had an amazing week, they told us.

However, these were just a warm-up for the stars of the show, the sardineros and the enormous lipstick floats full of toys which crawled through the streets, showering onlookers with toys and glitter, torchbearers pushing back the crowd to stop them boarding the great floats, or being crushed beneath them, a time of madness, a time of frenzy, a time, it has to be said, of greed.

But that´s humans, and the shrieks of pleasure as footballs found new owners and plastic sacks filled with plastic bits and bobs, families after the frenzy had passed clutching sackloads of pleasure, everyone left in good humour for what seemed an interminable wait for the last ritual, the burning of the sardine and the splendid firework display to follow.

So that´s it, no more fiestas until tomorrow and the Running of the Wine Horses, then Los Cruces de Mayo, and then a drought: 2 whole days with no fiestas until Los Mayos next weekend!

Who says Murcians have too many fiestas?