Corona-Lockdown Spanish Edition - D60 - Adiós Hogueras

Well that's it... no Hogueras this year! 😢

After postponing the June holiday to September, today the mayor announced that the 2020 edition was canceled. So no giant sculptures will be burnt to a crisp with firecrackers until June 2021. *sob*

I've been expecting this announcement ever since the city of Munich announced the cancelation of Oktoberfest a few weeks ago. I figured if an event that big (with the economic impact it entails), and that was set for a month after the Hogueras new dates, was canceled, then our holiday was heading for the chopping block.

I was even more convinced on Saturday when I went to the hair dresser's. The woman who cut my hair is a member of one of the big Hogueras commissions, and she told me that most of the 100+ commissions in Alicante wanted to cancel the holiday, both for health (massive gatherings of people) and economic reasons (they did a poll this weekend and 92% voted in favor of canceling). Apparently the festivities are financed mostly through the dues the members of the different Hogueras commissions pay, the tables in the party space they rent to non-members for the week of the fiesta, and donations/advertising in the magazine by local businesses in their neighborhood. Well this year not many people are going to have extra cash to pay to actively participate in the holiday, the number of tables would have to be reduced to keep distances, and very few businesses would be in a financial situation to allow them to contribute significantly. To all that you add the risk of going ahead and moving into the heavy-duty stages of the fiestas launch, the building of the monuments themselves starting... only for them to be canceled shortly before due to a second wave of the outbreak hitting in the summer instead of next fall. 🤷

So yeah... no fiestas in Alicante this year. Next up? I'm waiting to hear if they cancel the Fallas which Valencia had to stop a week before the big event and postpone to July...

Addendum 14/05: July's postponed Fallas have finally also been cancelled. Ditto Alcoy's Moros y Cristianos that had been postponed for October. That's it for all the major holidays in the Valencia Community (and the smaller ones). No marching bands, no celebrations, no smell or sound of gunpowder, no fireworks, until 2021... Is going to be a very hard blow on the Fallas/Hogueras industry, all the artisans who make those giant sculptures each year. 😢

#stayhome, #quedateencasa, #restecheztoi