Fiesta Del Poncho

The Fiesta Del Poncho has been one of Argentina's grandest cultural festivals since its inception in 1967. Taking place in the capital city of the Northern province of Catamarca, "El Poncho," as it is generally referred to, is a 10 day extravaganza of song, dance, food, and art and takes its name from the hand-woven garments which are plentiful, and famously well-made, in the province.

I had the good fortune to be invited by my friend Pastor to participate in Poncho 2009. Artisans come from near and far to advertise and sell their handiwork, but also to just be part of the experience. Many of them know each other from other stops on the national crafts fair "circuit," so the atmosphere is one of a big reunion. Some stay in the back of vans, some in tents, some at hostels, some with family nearby. In between attending to customers, they just sit around and smoke, drink, eat, and shoot the shit. Some have big operations while others are rastafarians rolling out a mat of bracelets on the sidewalk. Most of the more established artisans seem to care little about how much they sell, being happy enough to have gotten away from home.

Due to a late night arrival and runaway confusion regarding his name, Pastor and I stayed for free in a room in the city cathedral complex. In this most unlikely of places I found my first high-powered super-hot shower in over four months. Despite the fact that I was no longer cold, I took full advantage.

We started "work" each day around 1pm and went until 11 or 12 pm depending on the day. The work consisted of hanging around the stand chatting and sellin' them chimes--our stand was a big hit. The weekends were busy and the chimes chimed continuously. We drank milkshakes and we drank beer and we drank wine in the middle of the day. We ate empanadas and hot dogs and sweets and stews and steaks.

A pudgy man with a limp and a nasally voice wandered around the hall selling coca leaves and muna muna, a plant rumored to augment male virility--"Muna muna, coca!....Muna muna, coca!" was his constant refrain. A white-haired Chilean selling Andean flutes played the same song once every five minutes for ten days and I started to hum it in my sleep.

I explained to no less than 500 people, confused by my accent and appearance, that "Yes you are right, I am not from Argentina, I am American but, for the time being, I live in Argentina....and I met this guy down South and I am learning about what he does and helping him in the workshop." They told me how great that is and that they have a cousin in Michigan. Many of them personally welcomed me to Argentina. Old men clasped my shoulders and called me "son" and old women kissed my cheek with smudgy lipstick. One group of teenage girls conducted an informal but thorough interview and later offered me some orange juice.

Every evening we went home wiped out. We ate dinner almost every night at the same place on the plaza because it was good, it was easy, it was cheap, and they knew us. We went to bed late and woke up late and had coffee in the morning and went back to sell them chimes.

my friend sebastiana is michelle obama's brazilian cousin

kids out front getting busy
pastor fixing some breakfast in the room
glass mandalas and windchimes
the puesto

setting it up on the first day
in the truck on the way to the first day of the Poncho