Donostia Bat Bakarra Munduan

January 19th at midnight commenced the largest annual fiesta of Donostia/San Sebastián: La Tamborrada. When I say it's big, I'm not exaggerating. I was lucky to be here for it, especially when I already had some local friends. Looking forward to seeing it all again someday.

To begin, my roommate Ane had 11 of her friends over for dinner and invited me. Authentic eh! They were all very pleasant, and made food in the kitchen so that the tables were full of plates of pintxos: jamón, salmon, tortilla de patata, y más. There was also a delicious seafood soup mmm.

After dinner I met up with my friend Stephanie to check out the opening ceremonies. They had warned us that la Plaza de Constitución would be packed, and I guess they were correct, although from where we were it didn't seem to bad. Thousands of people were in the plaza to watch them raise the flag of Donostia at midnight to begin la Tamborrada. We stood in the second row at the right side of the stage. Up close and personal! At first relatives of Basque prisoners came out with long posters of their loved ones so we couldn't see. The crowd was less sympathetic than I expected, but after all they were there to see the show. When they moved en fin, we saw that the stage was one half drummers dressed as soldiers, and one half dressed as chefs. It's because of historical things, but I couldn't really explain. At midnight they drummed the Hymn of San Sebastián, with all of the crowd singing along enthusiastically. Such camaraderie! Even though we didn't know the words, we tapped along on my wooden drum. (And I sported a chef hat until it started raining)

The gathering in the plaza was only the beginning of the fiesta, as I said. Afterwards, we sort of followed the parade of drummers out into the streets of Parte Vieja. It felt like we were in the parade because people were watching from the sides as we followed the march and drummed along to the tunes. Then we headed to a few bars, and I met up with some other friends. I have never seen the streets so full. Digo, normally there are people on the streets in Parte Vieja at any hour of the weekend night, but not half as many. It was crazy!

When I was on my way home, I saw my intercambio Miriam from last semester, with some of her Spanish friends. They were standing beside a group of chefs getting ready to march. They told me to stay and drum with them so I did and we paraded around a bit. I think I went to bed around 9am, gracias San Sebastián!

I guess I should mention that La Tamborrada is 24 hours of this drumming. Groups of sociedades parade around different parts of Donostia between midnight Thursday and midnight Friday. Therefore, Friday is a holiday, so people in the streets would chant "Mañana en Bilbao, día laboral" meaning "jaja in Bilbao they have to work tomorrow xP"

The closing ceremony was Friday night at midnight. All good things must come to an end. :( This time I went with my friend from last semester Meghan, but I got there late so we were waaaay in the back. The good thing about such a crowd is that when it rains, you are covered by somebody  else's umbrella mwahaha. Jo, it's really sunny I ought to go outside soon. After they lowered the flag and sang the songs, we went home. As I was walking home, I was behind two women who were humming the tune of a Donosti song. I quitely tapped my drum at the appropriate part. They turned around and we shared a smile. Aupi!


Usually the children have a parade on Friday, but due to rain they rescheduled it for today (menos mal because I was sleeping anyways). The route was directly outside of my apartment, and I watched it for maybe 40 minutes and didn't even see all of the kiddies. They were cute  though in their soldier outfits.